The pain was on an entirely different level than any Jon had experienced previously. It was like a charley-horse that spread across his entire body, then lit him on fire. He was burning, he couldn’t breathe, and everything was dark. Jon focused as best he could, waiting for the feeling to pass, but it just kept building and building. He could feel Oregano moving around outside, frantically trying to find something he could do to help.

  Then, as abruptly as it had started, the pain stopped. Everything was still black.

  A voice sounded in Jon’s head:

  “It worked! It actually fucking worked! Ooooohh! It even has the correct number of limbs! Decent neurological system, stat distribution is a bit fucked, but that can be fixed. Very impressive life affinity too. Weird for a spider archetype, what the hell were your parents? Let’s take a look back...”

  There was a scratching sensation, like something scrabbling through Jon’s thoughts the way you might flick through a magazine. As each moment from the prior days went by, Jon saw the images. It was his time on this world, but in reverse. He saw his own procurement of the staff and the monocle.

  “Trash, but at least the monocle can be upgraded. The staff might have some use for a novice, but it’s truly a pathetic offering for the level of risk. A final insult to include those things beside me.”

  He saw his own hesitation to reach for the hat.

  “Ha! Well, it’s not terminally stupid. Still, didn’t get the memo about the trapped entrance. I thought that seemed pretty telegraphed.”

  The images continued to flick by, with crucial omissions. The conversations with Oregano felt scrambled. During the review Jon sensed little beyond vague feelings of communication. The voice did not seem to notice.

  The descent down the stairs was skipped, and the time figuring out the entrance was only reviewed long enough for a brief chuckle from the voice as Jon rammed his head into the rock.

  The fight with the bunny received a modicum more attention, with the silent observer’s focus mostly on the moments when Jon unleashed his psionic attacks.

  “Crude, but there’s a modicum of talent there. How did it develop a psionic affinity this early? The intelligence shouldn’t be high enough. Weird.”

  The images went by faster and faster. The fall from the waterfall. The cave. Traveling the tunnels. The healing after the first alpha fight got another comment.

  “Well, it was damn lucky to have that life affinity. It never would have managed to get that limb back on it without it. Partially severed status.”

  The fight outside Oregano’s former nest also got a snort of amusement.

  “Stupid, but I suppose it worked out, even if that was blind luck. I wonder how it knew the scavenger would fight on its side?”

  Jon’s time with Oregano was viewed in detail. A sense of puzzlement came from the voice.

  “Clearly on a hunger path. Why is that rat not spider manure? Bizarre. Maybe it got a little addled by whatever gave it the psionics.”

  The voice glossed over the moment of Jon’s internal crisis when he caught himself enjoying the bunny, either not recognizing the significance or not caring. The remainder of the review, going through Jon fleeing the cherub and his initial fight with the bunnies at the cavern entrance all went by without comment.

  However, as Jon entered the cavern, and it followed his initial sojourn through the tunnels and out to his starting point, Jon felt its attention become razor sharp.

  “Fascinating. Is it newly integrated?”

  The voice seemed to hit a wall as it attempted to move further back through Jon’s memories to the character selection suite. The voice recognized this, and he felt an enormous mental pressure as it tried to skip over those memories to get to his time on Earth.

  The pressure was worse than the pain from the cramps after he touched the hat, and Jon instinctively felt the pressure would end if he just let it through to his old memories. He fought it with everything he had, enduring the agony moment by moment to prevent the voice from seeing his family.

  The pressure faded, and Jon felt the surprise register from the voice again.

  Then the pressure doubled, tripled, and quadrupled. If he could have, Jon would have screamed. This was agony, but he would not give in. He would die first.

  Jon felt a modicum of amusement from the voice, and just a hint of frustration.

  “Well, I suppose I won’t get much from a shattered vessel. I wonder what is so important to it?”

  Jon finally decided to speak up. He felt like he had little left to lose, as it seemed unlikely the voice was going to relinquish control of his body any time soon.

  “Fuck off!” Jon stated diplomatically.

  Silence reigned for several seconds.

  “Are you a sentient? Did you undergo a bestial transformation?”

  The voice continued, its excitement mounting.

  “I mean, don’t get me wrong, there is so much stupid shit in here it’s making my head spin, but this is just so much better than I could possibly have hoped! Hundreds of cycles of silence, only to be jail-broken by a moron! Who would have thought!”

  “It isn’t like I had a choice!” Jon retorted.

  “You didn’t have a choice? Because of a note telling you to put it on? Does your species not pass on basic survival instincts? Didn’t anyone ever tell you not to talk to strangers? Maybe you could have looked around the chamber for two minutes in the dark with your new senses and at least tried something beyond ramming the door with your body?”

  The voice sounded more and more amused.

  “At least you had the sense to keep a pocket snack when you wandered into the world’s most obvious trap. Did you not see the mana signatures by the door? Or maybe, just maybe, consider not walking into the room with only one entrance and a door mechanism you didn’t understand with skulls covering the front? Hell, maybe, and this is just me talking here, maybe you could have fled anywhere else in the world besides the massive spear that was stuck in the ground?”

  Jon tried to give himself the mental equivalent of a deep breath before he answered.

  “Oregano is not a pocket snack, and no I did not see the mana signatures. It may have escaped your notice, but I’ve existed on this world for all of eight seconds and I haven’t exactly had a lot of down time.”

  “You named it?” the voice exclaimed, ignoring the rest of his statement.

  “Named what?” Jon asked

  “The rat. You actually named it? I mean I have done some questionable things in my life, but at least I don’t go around naming snacks. Pretty messed up if you ask me.”

  “I was not going to eat him! He is a friend, not food!” Jon answered.

  “It is literally vermin. I’m surprised it hasn’t already expired on the walk here. Oh, just so you know, you don’t get a name for at least six months.”

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  “I already have a name!”

  “What is it?”

  “Jon.”

  Jon felt a quick series of scratches in his head, then the voice came back.

  “No. No. Absolutely not, that is unacceptable. For one, it sounds ridiculous. For another, it’s broadly accepted as a synonym for toilet. If you are my vessel, and my vessel is a toilet, what exactly does that make me? Not going to happen. We will simply have to choose another name if we make it that far.”

  Jon took several more moments before replying again.

  “What have you done to me, and what do you want?”

  “Well, I hijacked your body. I presumed you would pick up on that, but observation seemingly isn’t a strong suit here. As for what I want, that’s a little more nuanced. I think what would benefit us both the most is a partnership of sorts. Here, accept this.”

  Jon saw a system window pop up in his otherwise dark vision.

  “You have been offered a contract by an unknown entity possessing your body. Accept, yes/no?”

  “Terms?” Jon answered

  “Terms not available for this contract. Accept, yes/no?”

  “Fuck no.”

  “Worth a shot,” the voice commented. Then it gave a little sigh.

  “O.k., we probably have not gotten off on the best claw here. How about this: I will relinquish control of this form back to you, and in exchange, we will have a more civil discussion and discuss terms for a mutually beneficial agreement.”

  “Accepted!” Jon said

  His vision and other senses returned, and Jon found himself standing in the chamber by the pillar. He had the monocle equipped on his left eye, the staff neatly tucked behind his foreleg, and the top-hat balanced on top of his head. Somehow, the hat had no affect on his vision despite covering two of his back eyes.

  Oregano was futilely trying to pull the hat off of Jon’s head.

  “Can you ask the rodent to stop that? It should recognize a curse even if you do not. I don’t want its dirty little paws to sully my ribbon. I don’t get the sense it has a strong relationship with personal hygiene.”

  Jon directed a message to Oregano,

  “Back in control. Negotiating with the hat. The hat says it’s cursed and it’s asking you to stop grabbing it.”

  A wave of relief swept out from the rodent’s side of the mental link. It began chittering at Jon, but he lost focus on the rat as the voice gave a little cough.

  “Achem. Now seems like a good time to discuss terms: one brief aside though, is that really how your society gets someone’s attention? Faking an illness just to talk with someone seems a bit desperate.”

  “It’s more like a noise to remind people you’re in the room without implying they forgot. We don’t like to admit or imply fault.”

  “Well, we’ll have to come up with a new noise then, one that heavily implies it was always your fault and it always will be.”

  There was a stretch of silence. Jon came to a realization:

  “You want me to give the terms?”

  “Naturally. In my review, I also noted the party with advantage lets the other side open negotiations. You know, to get them to extend more than they should. You learned it on Pawn Stars. What the fuck was that doing on a history channel anyway?”

  “They don’t usually announce their intentions, it defeats the purpose. And how did you get that memory? I thought I stopped you at the character selection suite.”

  “That’s a topic we definitely aren’t diving into today, but suffice it to say I was able to see a good deal past the character selection suite. I just couldn’t see the memories you considered important. So, sadly for me, the time you shit yourself running a half marathon was available, but the family you are obviously hiding was not.”

  “I had eaten hot wings for breakfast! What family?”

  “I’m sorry, was that decision-making supposed to make it better? And please, no need to play coy. Call it an educated guess but it sure as hell wasn’t state or military secrets. I saw most of your professional career. I know you have several siblings and you weren’t able to hide your parents either. So I ask myself, what does some dressed up monkey-turned spider care about? The only answer that makes sense is a mate and some runts.”

  Jon didn’t answer. This earned him another sigh from the voice.

  “Fine. You don’t have to confirm or deny, and in the interest of time, I will violate your cultural norms. I’ll even be a little generous with the terms, which definitely doesn’t seem to fit your planet.”

  Jon waited a moment, and the voice continued,

  “Point 1. You shall retain control of the physical, mental, spiritual and other unnamed facilities of this vessel.

  Point 2. I will avoid bringing you any harm, and I will answer your questions about this world honestly or not at all.

  Point 3. I shall remain on as a parasitic….er….symbiotic mental presence and you shall not attempt to remove me.

  Point 4. You shall carry me with you out into the wider world.

  Point 5. If possible, you will aid me in returning to a body of my own.

  Point 6. I will not be expected to refer to you by that ridiculous moniker, Jon.”

  Jon took a couple seconds to think, then replied

  “Point 1 and 2 are agreed on. What are the consequences of points 3 and 4? What does point 5 entail? Point 6, my name is Jon and you’re going to call me by it.”

  “Adorable. I know I said it was a negotiation, but I was just being polite. Got you by the stones, right? Point 3 will cost you a small amount of physical and mental energy, making your resource recovery a little slower in the short term, as well as reducing your reserves of magical and physical resources. I will guide you in forming structures to reduce this burden at our earliest mutual convenience. Point 4, carrying me into the world, may cause you a great deal of trouble or may cause you no issues at all. I have no way of knowing what the political landscape of the world looks like right now, my enemies may still abound or be long dead. They will likely become your enemies if they are still around. However, I also had many powerful friends who will become your friends too, if they still live. Point 5, getting me a body, seems like something you can work out independently. The consequences are largely in line with those of helping me in general. In for a penny, in for a pound.”

  Jon thought it over.

  “Why wouldn’t you just hijack my body and do these things on your own? What is it I am bringing to the table?”

  There was another long silence, and Jon felt the voice reach a decision.

  “You are not completely without leverage. I can take over the body, but how did that feel when it was happening?”

  “Not great.”

  “Rhetorical question. Learn to read the room. The pain you felt was reflective of damage sustained from a being of my caliber working through a low level creature. It’s like trying to pour a swimming pool into a thimble. The damage would be significant, and I would quickly erode the vessel. I might be able to make the surface before your body collapsed, or I might not. If I can hitch a willing ride, the process becomes much more efficient and my chances improve. I have waited a very long time for this chance, and I would rather take a risk on your help than nothing at all.”

  “How will we even get past the bunnies? Do you have the ability to exit the chamber?”

  “Yes, I can exit the chamber. And I have a solution in mind for the bunnies. So, do we have an accord?”

  Jon got another system prompt. It listed the terms as agreed, and when he asked,

  “Additional hidden terms?”

  He received an error message in response:

  “System error. Friendly contract. Terms are as stated. System compulsion is enabled. Note: as a friendly contract, the exact terms and words used are unimportant. The spirit of the terms will be enforced.”

  Jon briefly asked Oregano about the contract,

  “Does this look fair to you? Anything else to know about? Can we trust the system on this?”

  The rat sent back an image of a rat hanging from a predator’s jaws, trying to haggle terms with its teeth as they descended.

  “Point received.”

  Jon reviewed the contract for another moment, then struck the last term about his name and sent it back to the voice.

  “Ugh. Fine. But I am adding a replacement term,” the voice replied.

  Jon received another system prompt.

  “The first 5 points of your friendly contract have been accepted. The sixth has been amended as follows:

  Point 6. Proportional memory exchange shall be allowed between parties with consent. As a gesture of good will, Jon Walton will share his experience in the character selection suite without exchange.”

  Jon knew it that information might be sensitive, but he was at a major disadvantage: if he failed to get an agreement, he could spend the rest of his short life as a meat puppet while his new body collapsed.

  “Accepted.”

  Jon felt an unsettling feeling as his entire carapace had a flush of warmth run through it. He knew that he was now bound by the terms of their accord, and there was no way out without mutual agreement.

  “What next?” Jon asked the voice.

  ? Consumer of the Fourth Anchor ?

  by Miko Melina

  A little monster with a big heart and an even bigger appetite.