Chapter 44 of 89 · Book 7, This Inevitable Ruin

Chapter 44 — The Beautiful Place; Blood Hunter

Book: This Inevitable Ruin · Part: The Ramp-Up · Previous: Chapter 43 — Odette hosts; 'It's coming' · Next: Chapter 45 — Prepotente's rant · Floor: Floor 9 — Faction Wars · Series: the series

Opening

“Can someone explain to the new kids who that was supposed to be?

Summary

What was that? Odette reminds the audience it was only a changeling; Tagg calls it a childhood jump scare; Houston, in his element, explains: a personification of the Nothing and more, a creature with a scientific basis, theorised to be what some see at the moment of death, a trans-dimensional entity 'similar to the Apothecary', with an involuntary nerve reaction in some species to its very image and no proof that seeing it damns you. Cascadia: 'We're banned from using the Unwashed as a mob.' A thousand names — the Hag, the Unwashed, the Stalker, the Last Light, the Thirst, the Fell, the Inexorable — and the Viceroys', who study life and death, call it the Beautiful Place; 'Gaining access to this creature is my life's work.' Carl thinks of Juice Box's brother Henrik and his library of touched forms and of the AI's hunger to feel death, and wonders how Juice Box has this shape at all and knew to use it now; the Scolopendra warning and hers feel like the same thing. Donut: happy wife, happy life 'when your other half is an indescribable cosmic horror'. Cascadia is simply gone. Donut stalls with Princess TV — Golden Girls, then an exposé on Mongo's kills — and Odette, back on familiar ground, winks at Carl: the Sultanate owns entertainment assets and fielded several dramas this season through Blood Hunter Holdings. 'You guys made Blood Hunter?' Stalwart: 'that show was a failure.' It lands like a meteor. The nagas have almost no troops because they are already dead, and the Sultanate is hiding it — and Operation Snake Pit is already blown. Carl laughs until he cries while the table watches; Ferdinand laughs without knowing why. Donut works it out: the pterodactyl, the vampire hunter, Miriam Dom. To Vinata, for the first time: 'Oh, honey. And I thought I was going to be the one who killed you […] You done stuck your pecker in the wrong beehive.'

Characters

• Architect Houston — Names the creature, and his life's work.
• Juice Box — Gone through the wall; a shape she should not have.
• Odette — A wink and a company name.
• Princess Vinata — Frowns as her secret goes out live.
• Carl — Laughs till he cries: their army is dead and Snake Pit is blown.
• Princess Donut — 'Oh, honey.'
• Prince Stalwart — 'That show was a failure.'

Locations

• The production facility — The council, wrapping up without its showrunner.

Motifs

• The Nothing — The Unwashed, the Beautiful Place: a thing seen at the moment of death.
• The Krakaren — 'A trans-dimensional entity, similar to the Apothecary.'
• The Blood Sultanate — Blood Hunter Holdings; a dead army hidden.
• Miriam Dom — The show that killed her belongs to the Sultana.