Discount Dan

Hammer firmly in hand, Croc and I slipped out of the dilapidated classroom and into an equally run-down hallway with green walls, so pale they were almost white. There was ample debris scattered along the floor—bits of plaster, old soda cans, crumpled sheets of notebook paper—and the overhead lights dimmed and flickered in signature Backrooms fashion. The giggle of children came again, closer this time. The eerie sound sent goosebumps crawling along my arms.

I focused on the minimap in the corner of my eye and zoomed in, looking for any sign of hostile Dwellers. Despite the ominous child-giggles, however, the map showed nothing but me and Croc.

I dismissed the map and surveyed the hallway, which branched off with one path heading left and another going right.

To the right, the hallway continued straight as an arrow, going for so long that eventually it just faded from view. The left-hand path connected to a “T” intersection, branching left and right once more. Rows of rusty lockers adorned the left-hand corridor. A few of them were closed, but most hung open at odd angles, concealing pools of shadow. Anything could’ve been hiding in those things, and my Spelunker’s Sixth Sense quickly lit up, highlighting several of the lockers with a hazy red aura.

Traps—though what kind I wasn’t sure.

Scrawled on the wall, directly across from the rusted lockers, was a faded cartoonish mural, which had clearly been made by an army of small children. Or at least painted to look that way. There were several figures lined up in a lime green meadow with a huge yellow sun overhead. There was a gaggle of stick figure kids, each drawn to scale. They wore triangular dresses or boxy, square pants and shirts, marking each one as a little girl or little boy. The figures had large black eyes and crooked smiles that ran across round faces in odd ways.

Standing at their center was an image of the same nightmare clown I’d seen on the discarded paper in the classroom. Tall and gangly, wearing a baggy yellow suit with red puff balls trailing down his front. Spikey tufts of red hair poked out from the tops and the sides of his head, and in one oversized hand, the clown held a bouquet of balloons, all in a variety of different animal shapes. Everything about this situation put my teeth on edge, the mural most of all.

“This is so fun, don’t you think?” Croc said, tail waggling happily.

“In what way does this constitute fun?” I asked, glancing down at the dog.

“We’re in school, Dan. Personally, I never got to go to school, but I always thought it would be so much fun. Reading books. Learning about all the interesting facets of the universe. Making the best of friends who will stay with you for the rest of your life. High school seems like it would be a magical place.” The dog canted its head and looked at me. “Did you go to school, Dan?”

“Of course I went to school. Go Blue Devils,” I replied almost by reflex. “Never went to college or anything like that,” I added after a second. “The Marine Corps was the closest thing I ever got to higher education, but most kids in America at least spend a good chunk of their formative years with their asses stuck behind desks, learning to recite a bunch of bullshit they’ll never end up using. I can still tell you what the quadratic formula is, even though I’ve never once used it. Not since the day after I squeaked by with a C in algebra.”

“Wow, the quadratic formula,” Croc marveled. “I don’t know what that is, but it sounds very impressive. Did they have a lot of singing in your school, Dan? Because I feel like all the impromptu musical numbers would’ve been where I really excelled—if I’d gone to school instead of being born as a defective monster, destined to be alone forever.”

I frowned at the dog. “One, you’re not defective. You might not be like the rest of the mimics, but that ain’t a bad thing. We’ve already killed enough normal mimics to fill a dump truck, but you’re still alive and kicking while they’re dead and gone. If anything, you’re the next step in mimic evolution. And two, what in the hell are you talking about? Impromptu musical numbers? That isn’t a thing. Anywhere. Not even in those fancy, private liberal schools.”

Croc let out a shocked gasp. “Surely you’re not telling me that the award-winning documentary High School Harmonies was factually inaccurate? I based a core chunk of my identity around the ideas espoused in that film.”

I snorted. “Sorry, bud. But most of the things that you see on TV or read about in books rarely represent real life—even when it’s supposed to. That goes double, maybe even triple, for anything you find in the Backrooms. But if you want a tour of school life, I’m pretty sure the unspeakable horrors this floor has to offer are pretty close to the real thing. Come on.”

I fixed Howlers Hold in my mind’s eye and cast Unerring Arrow.

Blue light shot down the left-hand corridor—blurring right past the open lockers and the horrifying clown mural—then took a hard right at the “T” juncture before vanishing out of sight. Of course we had to walk by the clown mural. I’d been naive to ever assume otherwise.

“This is my surprised face,” I muttered, eyeing the mural again. Clowns. I fucking hated clowns. “We’re going thataway,” I said to Croc, jabbing a finger toward the left-hand path since only I could see the etheric blue trail. “But stay close and only walk where I walk. Lot of traps tucked away inside those open lockers.”

“I will be like your shadow,” the dog replied without an ounce of concern as I headed into the hallway proper. I moved slowly, glancing between the lockers and the shoddy linoleum tiles on the floor. Several individual tiles glowed with a subtle red aura, and I knew they were connected to whatever was hiding away in the lockers, working on the same metaphysical principle as the red Twinning yarn we’d been using to direct potential customers back to the store.

Curious, I crouched and tossed a loose screw onto one of the glowing tiles, just to see what would happen. The second the screw landed there was a click followed by a series of thwacks as a flurry of arrows exploded from one of the lockers. Except they weren’t arrows at all, I realized after a second. They were oversized pencils, each as thick as my finger and as long as my forearm.

As the explosion of pencils lanced the opposite wall, the innocent cherubic giggles I’d been hearing suddenly transformed into unholy wails and pained screams. The sound was so close and so loud I dropped my hammer in surprise and clapped my hands over my ears so the drums wouldn’t rupture. The crude mural drawings were writhing in place, their painted arms waving and flapping as the pictures peeled themselves off the plaster.

Dweller 0.738B – Funtime Doodle [Level 8]

The imagination of a child is a pure and wonderous thing. So powerful, in fact, that it can imbue life and whimsy into even the simplest of creations. A favorite toy, say. Or a cherished childhood blanket, threadbare and stained. Or even a drawing.

Unfortunately for you, the child who drew this particular mural isn’t one of those fun, adorable, gifted kids that you read about in the Smilebook Mom Groups. Little Timmy was one sick fuck. Broken home, addicts for parents, and with a penchant for playing “Surgeon” with all the furry little friends in the backyard.

So, instead of whimsy, these pictures are filled with little Timmy’s murderous bloodlust and insatiable desire for world domination.

Several of the stick-figured drawings had pencil-arrows jutting out from their chests or faces, with a good chunk of their HP already gone. But there were a half dozen of the doodles, all crawling off the walls and surging toward me like hungry zombies.

Even worse, they weren’t alone.

Slowly emerging from the wall was the looming form of the yellow-suited clown, with his bright red pompoms and his tufts of triangular spiked hair poking out like spearheads.

Dweller 0.7813A – Harold the Funtime Imagination Friend [Level 13]

If you thought the Funtime Doodles were bad, just wait until you meet little Timmy’s imaginary friend, Harold the Terror Clown. Thanks to a total lack of parenting or the intervention of any responsible adult, Harold is the pure distillation of Timmy’s murderous impulses. Harold is raw id all wrapped up in a cheap silk suit of confusion, anger, and pain for a childhood which ended far too soon. It’d be tragic if this fucking horror wasn’t going to juggle your organs like bowling pins.

I waved away the description as the first Doodle dropped its blocky shoulders and charged, its mouth contorting in a ravenous maw.

I thrust my left hand forward, fingers splayed wide, and activated Slippery When Wet, coating the patch of floor between us with a slick coat of sudsy water. The Doodle’s foot came down, and the creature promptly slipped, activating another one of the trap tiles glowing red in my vision. One of the lockers erupted with a colossal boom, and a spitball the size of a truck tire sideswiped the son of a bitch, plastering the Doodle against the wall.

The gooey wad of paper and saliva didn’t do any damage, but the stick figure was stuck fast, its legs dangling uselessly above the floor.

I unleashed Drain-O Bolt and activated Split Cast in the same instant.

A pair of bright blue lances of power erupted from my palm, one splattering the creature against the wall with corrosive magic, another hitting one of the Doodles in the chest with a sizzle. The dual spells triggered the Wild Surge ability baked into my stupid Versace bathrobe, instantly replenishing a huge chunk of Mana and duplicating the originally Split-Cast Drain-O Bolt, free of charge. Both blasts landed again, instantly killing the Doodle stuck to the wall, and dropping the other one down into the critical hit zone.

I didn’t have time to grab my fumbled hammer off the floor, so instead I pulled out my demolition screwdriver and slammed it straight into the Doodle’s stick-figure throat. I was not at all ready for the spurt of black ink that erupted from the wound—

And directly into my open mouth. It tasted like turpentine and made me gag.

I yanked the screwdriver free, snagged my hammer from the floor, then swiped the back of my hand across my lips, wiping away the revolting smudge of ink and paint. God this place was so gross. Each level was a brand-new study in disgusting, and I was quickly becoming a doctoral candidate in absolute nastiness.

Croc had swollen in size, rearing back on two legs as it swiped at one Doodle with a clawed mitt as big as a grizzly’s paw. The mimic’s hulking torso had split open, revealing enormous, spiked jaws. A pair of tentacles extended from Croc’s guts, holding another Doodle aloft and crushing its frail form like a constricting anaconda.

There were still two more Doodles on the loose, not to mention Harold—though, curiously, the clown loitered in the back and didn’t seem too keen to approach. But maybe that was because it didn’t need to get its hands dirty. A small cloud of shiny, rubber animal balloons were floating toward me at a rate that was far too fast to be normal. Not that there was anything normal about this situation. I raised my hand and unleashed another Drain-O Bolt at an encroaching green balloon in the shape of a frog.

The spell splashed off the shiny plastic, doing no damage and not even slowing the balloon down.

Damn it. The balloons were inorganic material.

Drain-O Bolt had the same core weakness as its first iteration—it only affected living matter. And naturally it was the only ranged spell at my disposal. But I was a Marine. Improvise, adapt, and overcome had been pounded into my head so often that it was now a part of my DNA. I pulled the tactical speed square from its holster, cocked back my arm, and hurled that son of a bitch like a ninja star with all the strength a ten in Athleticism could muster.

The speed square flipped gracefully, end over end, and hit the balloon frog with a pop.

The balloon erupted in a wave of emerald power that obliterated the nearby Doodle and swatted me through the air like the hand of an angry god. I flipped ass over teakettle and landed in a heap, curls of smoke rising off me as my HP bar strobed an angry shade of red.

“The balloons are bombs,” I said, hoping Croc would be able to hear me. The words came out as an inarticulate croak, my throat raw and bloody.

“Yeah,” came a pained reply from beside me. “Sort of figured that out when it blew off my leg,” Croc replied, still sounding remarkably chipper. The mimic was lying six feet away and had reverted back to its natural form—a blob of bright blue goop with too many arms to count, all covered with eyes and circular mouth orifices. A Health bar hung above its head, and the mimic wasn’t in much better shape than I was.

There was still one Doodle left, plus Harold and all of his fun balloons, which were drifting our way, carried by an unfelt breeze.

With numb fingers I fished out the Super Slammer of Shielding and plunked it down between me and Croc, whispering, “Let’s Pog,” under my breath. The golden birdcage erupted in a dome of brilliant sparks, just in time to intercept the oncoming Doodle and another of the balloon-borne IEDs. The last remaining Doodle—a girl in a triangular black dress with yellow pigtails poking out of her round head—bounced ineffectually off the shield.

A floating lion hit next, and I flinched as a wave of orange and red light bubbled out. The explosion swallowed the other balloons, which set off a daisy chain of rippling destruction.

Boom... Boom. Boom! BOOM!!!

The floors quaked and I was sure the roiling flames would charbroil us alive. But the shield held without so much as a flicker, rebuffing the destruction as the timer spun down.

The blast incinerated the last Doodle and obliterated the lockers, setting off the remainder of the traps. I used the time to get to my feet, retrieve my hammer, and pull two deliciously refreshing Zimas from storage. I handed one to Croc then chugged the other, tossing the bottle away into the rubbish decorating the rest of the floor.

Croc had gained its feet as well and was back in the hulking form of a dog-bear.

We had about fifty seconds left to go on the shield, but I wasn’t keen on wasting any more time. We still had to take out Harold the Terror Clown. Although the last round of explosions had detonated all of his explosives, the freak had more flaccid balloons hanging at his side and was already starting to inflate another. He was about thirty feet away, and we were never going to get a better chance to smoke him than now.

“I need a boost, Croc,” I yelled, a plan suddenly coming together in my head. “I’m gonna kick off your hands and you’re gonna hurl me toward the clown. You got that?”

“You want me to throw you, Dan?” the dog-bear asked, sounding legitimately confused.

“Yep,” I said. “Just aim right for that asshole. On three. One…”

I reached down and picked the coin up.

“Two…” I deactivated it with the arcane catchphrase of yesteryear. “That’s so ’90s…”

“Three…” I roared as the golden barrier vanished with thirty-two seconds left on the countdown timer. At the same time, I leapt up and planted my foot in Croc’s oversized paw, kicking off as I triggered Moving Walkway. Croc heaved, using the sheer weight of its body to hurl me through the air and directly at Harold.

The clown had blown up another balloon, this one a deep purple, and was already furiously tying it into a new animal shape. But I was too fast.

I was speed.

Between Croc’s throw, the force of my kick, and Moving Walkway—which increased the speed of my forward momentum by a factor of three—I was a bona fide human cruise missile. I funneled Mana into the hammer already in my hand, and it swelled in size and burned with a blue light that reminded me of a falling star.

Harold’s eyes went wide, and the stupid balloon animal was only halfway finished when I brought my hammer crashing into the side of his head, still in midflight. The fallout from the balloon explosions had already brought the clown into Gavel of Get Fucked range, and I triggered the attack without the smallest shred of mercy. This asshole had almost killed me and my dog—well, sort of dog—but for that I could forgive him. After all, this was a dog-eat-dog world, and it was kill or be killed.

But he was also a clown, and that was simply inexcusable.

Harold’s head exploded as the hammer landed, but instead of spraying blood and gore, a colorful geyser of party confetti erupted outward along with a pair of notifications.

[Level Up! x 1]

Research Achievement Unlocked!

Human Cannonball

Gravity, physics, and sheer fucking audacity: these are the three forces that govern your trajectory as you hurtle through the air, headfirst like a suicidal moron. Most ranged warriors prefer to fire things like bullets, or rocks, or hives filled with angry bees, but not you. You are the projectile. Launched skyward, foes can only watch in horror and amazement as you descend like a lumpy, flesh-colored meteor, bathrobe flapping majestically in the wind.

Reward: 1 x Silver Acrobatics Loot Token

Title: Human Cannonball – Decrease fall damage by 25% whenever you are bodily used as a projectile weapon.

I didn’t have time to read through the notice before I landed flat on my face, flipping and rolling several times before finally sliding to a stop on my back. The collision had knocked a fully twenty percent off my total Health, putting me at just above the fifty percent mark, and I’d broken a rib in the process. That would heal quickly, but man did it hurt like a bitch in the interim.

Worst of all, I was covered in colorful bits of confetti.

Problem was, the flakes of confetti were heavy and wet and strangely gristly.

Turned out clowns weren’t made of confetti after all. Their meat was just rainbow colored…