Motif · Book 2, Carl's Doomsday Scenario

The stuffed figures

Miss Quill's collection: some three hundred tagged, stuffed monsters on the shelves of the magistrate's office (more than a thousand in her apartment), the dungeon's Beanie Babies, as Carl sees them; a stuffed armoured rider on a black horse, tagged Kimaris, in a glass case forged on the fifteenth floor, is the most valuable thing Carl owns and he does not know why.

Segment appearances

• Chapter 18 — Miss Quill
• Chapter 21 — Katia
• Chapter 22 — The Mysterious Letter

Progression

Miss Quill's collection: a colourful line of small stuffed animals on the magistrate's desk and three hundred more on the shelves behind it, most with their tags, a few on the top shelf in individual glass cases — 'the dungeon version of Beanie Babies' (ch. 18). Carl hides his dynamite in the hollow shelves that hold them (ch. 21), and they are buried with the office (ch. 22). One survives: a charred, unbroken glass case in the rubble, with a plush armoured man on a black horse inside and a tag that says Kimaris (ch. 23). Sorted by value, Kimaris is the top item in Carl's inventory, and he does not know why (ch. 24).