Two years ago, he had drunk too much.
He'd been thrown out of the house not because of what he did, but because he drank this much purely out of grief. That's how he ended up living in a dump. He had seen the night turn to darkness and the morning rise more times than anyone should ever wish to.
While living in that wasteland, he once saved a bureaucrat and earned a 20,000 Yev reward.
Then money brought more money — like magnets. He bought a lottery ticket and won 40,000 Vey.
Then he gambled again.
This time, with a girl.
Emma Tyle.
After a rough night, Emma's kisses were on his cheeks. Her warm breath lay upon his chest.
He thought they belonged to him — entirely.
Until the night he introduced his best friend to her, just for one evening.
It was the night he hated himself the most — for drinking so much, for leaving them alone.
But none of it was his fault.
Cheating wasn't just something you did with your hands. It was something that happened in the heart — sometimes in a single look.
Sometimes it happened without even happening.
Just like there's no real difference between thinking about putting on your obsidian glasses and actually putting them on.
The crystals in Steve Meyer's obsidian glasses had turned into a disco ball that lit up the dusk of night.
He wished to hell the girl who gave him those beautiful glasses hadn't been her.
He'd stuffed a few obsidian daggers into his handbag and, after a few steps, tied the slippery shoelaces of his boots — also made of obsidian. The ground rumbled beneath him, warming his body. Like some kind of weird, underfloor heating system.
The smooth glass vest he wore couldn't take it anymore — it began to melt, and the air smelled like burnt plastic.
With each step, he could feel the obsidian daggers in his bag clashing against one another.
His head was full of the things he wanted to say to his ex-girlfriend.
If he ever ran into her again, he wanted to do more than just spit in her face.
The shrill sound of the blades clashing cut through his thoughts like a knife.
Veins tingling from the buzzing, Meyer scratched the back of his neck.
The cocktail party at Bruno's had bored him to death — thank God he'd slipped out between the chatter.
The music coming from that filthy-smelling speaker didn't play — it reeked.
A man named Huyger, made entirely of basalt, suddenly stepped in front of him and asked,
"Where'd you get the obsidians?"
Then leaned in and whispered into Meyer's ear:
"They look damn cool."
Goddamn it, as if there was nothing else about Meyer that could be considered cool, people kept saying it — and they loved saying it, too.
Emma included.
Their first meeting.
And the bed that had witnessed it…
Goddamn it all.
"Hmm. Yeah," Meyer muttered. "They hurt like hell."
Which maybe meant: I'm hurting like hell.
"So where you off to now?" Huyger asked, placing his hands on his waist.
His bronze-colored arms bent at a forty-five-degree angle.
Although Meyer mentally calculated it as thirty.
"When the world's burning, I mean…" Huyger chuckled at his own joke and zipped his lips shut. Then he rubbed his greasy belly, shoved his hand inside his clothes, and pulled out a beer.
"Don't tell me you stole that from the cocktail bar," Meyer said, rolling his eyes.
Or rather, he rolled his glasses. That was more accurate.
Even if he wouldn't admit it, his insides were burning.
The voices of the women from the party kept dancing in his ears.
One of them had just touched his ass, saying, "Baby."
"You there?" Huyger asked, opening his mouth wide like a dog showing its teeth.
He waved a huge hand in front of Meyer's glasses.
"Totally frozen on the icy surface of our planet," he replied sarcastically.
Another of Huyger's classic, unfunny, out-of-order jokes.
The heat nearly grabbed Meyer with the arrogant grip of hell itself.
A single drop of sweat fell onto the bridge of his nose beneath the glasses.
"How's your girl?" Meyer asked, stealing Huyger's beer.
He couldn't find another topic to talk about, and none of the everyday, dumb but annoyingly sticky news from Channel Crystal 7 was fresh in his mind.
He took a sip.
The cold beer — the same one he'd just criticized Huyger for stealing — cooled his throat.
"She's been cranky ever since she gave birth," Huyger said. "I thought that only happened during pregnancy."
"It'll pass," said Meyer, waving his hand.
His braces were frozen over. Exactly twenty-four wires.
And Meyer was twenty-four years old.
He had always wanted to have twice as many teeth as his age.
Which meant forty-eight.
But on his next birthday, he'd have fifty. Then fifty-two the year after.
He could reach dangerously high numbers.
If I live to be a hundred, I'll have two hundred teeth. They won't even fit in my mouth.
He kept thinking about it at night.
If God heard his prayer instantly and granted it, Meyer would probably turn into a flesh-eating creature —
and that would be his nightmare.
"Well then. Yeah. It really passes," Meyer said, turning back to Huyger.
But his mind was stuck on the teeth.
The multiplication table…
If I'm forty-five, how many teeth would I have?
Ninety.
He didn't give a damn.
He threw the beer bottle into a trash can made of burning charcoal that glowed with orange flames.
By trash, he meant the depths of the earth.
A waste pit that could vaporize you in an instant.
Like a black box. A bottomless well.
"My wife will never get better.
Actually, when I say since pregnancy, I mean during the pregnancy of our first child.
Our daughter's seventeen now," Huyger said with a sigh.
Meyer raised his eyebrows.
"No way, man! How old are you?"
"If I said eighty-nine, it'd be a lie."
"Forty-five?" Meyer said, winking.
To show off that move properly, he'd need to take off his glasses —
but if he did that, he wouldn't look cool.
It was like the Grandfather Paradox.
"Forty-six," said Huyger, emphasizing both digits.
"Well, cool. Is it a girl or a boy?"
"Girl, obviously. But if you so much as glance sideways, I'll filter your beers through your intestines."
"What the hell, man?"
Meyer suddenly shouted, focusing on a point behind Huyger.
He opened the lock on his bag and reached for one of his blades.
He imagined the sharp edge slicing through the enemy's flesh.
"What is it?" Huyger roared.
A giant spider was walking straight toward them.
"Hmph," Huyger grunted, crossing his arms.
He pulled out a spray from his pocket and, like someone who'd done this many times before, sprayed the multi-legged creature.
"Since these things evolved, they've surpassed my wife!" he shouted grumpily.
"And if your wife evolves, who will she surpass?" Meyer said.
He glanced at the handle and the blade of the dagger.
His chance to take out his anger on a spider had just passed.
"That's a damn good question!" Huyger said.
"Seriously, who would she surpass?
Eh, whatever. I dunno. See you."
Just as Meyer waved and started walking, his damn shoelaces came loose again.
His legs dropped to the ground next to a pile of blue spiders.
The stench of the creature's corpse was unbearable.
Its red eyes made it look like the spawn of the devil.
Lava had scorched his pants.
Good thing he'd only knelt on one knee.
He muttered to himself:
"It used to seem so stupid when people ran from erupting volcanoes...
Wait a sec.
Is a volcano erupting right now?"
A deafening, absurdly terrifying sound rang out.
He reflexively opened his mouth to avoid pressure shock.
He saw Huyger floating in a sea of lava in the distance — and without looking back, he took off running.
"Shit!"
The lava flow roared as it spread in every direction, unleashing gray smoke and blistering heat.
It was anything but gentle.
The smell of melted basalt filled the air.
While being swept along in the current, Meyer saw Huyger with his eyes shut.
"Huyger, are you dead?!" he yelled.
He was running, cupping his hands around his mouth like a megaphone.
He could feel the pain now.
"Say something, damn it! The lava's right behind me!"
Huyger floated in the peach-colored current, his eyes still closed.
Meyer had no choice but to run.
He'd been caught off guard.
If he turned back or stood still, he'd die.
And that would mean giving up on his grand goal.
He'd have to abandon the plan to plunge an obsidian blade into the heart of the so-called friend who stabbed him in the back.
Not by decision—
But by death.
That would mean he'd never get to take revenge on Magmus.
"I will never give up. Even if I die!"
he screamed—
but only inside.
Only inside.