Setup and Payoff
I leaped at the Director, but not only am I not a trained fighter, I still lacked the godlike powers he possessed. My fist passed through thin air, the target of my wrath a mere perspective illusion painted onto the floor.
I spun, off balance, only to glimpse the Director out of the corner of my eye, swiping his hand as if swatting at a fly. My leg shattered, spears of pain clouding all other senses.
When I opened my eyes again, the Director was standing over me. “Maybe we have been written, and maybe, as you seem to think, you are the protagonist. But the protagonist doesn’t always win, and your author wrote a world with rules, a world where I have been granted the power. To break those rules simply because he can’t make up his mind makes him as pretty shoddy author.” The Director flashed an exquisitely punch-able smile.
A hissing sigh escaped my clenched teeth. “If he’s anything like me, he’s not the deus ex machina type,” I admitted. I wracked my brain. Think like a writer. There had to be something I could use. Something set up for me beforehand. Some Chekhov’s gun.
I had it.
“Hey, butthead. There’s someone behind you,” I said.
The Director didn’t bother to look. “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice—” He never saw the flash of the knife that severed him from our reality.
Kelly dropped the knife and pulled the gag out of his mouth. “That was a nice touch,” he said, “writing that last part in Spanish.”
“I’m not sure if I wrote that or…wait…” I stopped, finally realizing. I was the author.
“You are part of this story, and most of what has happened to you these last few days was conjured up out of your own imagination,” Kelly explained. “To that extent, you are just a character. But you are also the author, and for some reason you decided to put yourself in this.”
I remembered. “This all started when I tried to promote the book I wrote. One thing led to another, and I got… sucked in, somehow.”
“That’s how writing goes, sometimes. Part of you was left above, and is still writing the story, while the part of you which descended is acted upon from the higher reality. But I think the distinction between the two of you is disappearing. Look at your leg.”
My leg was fully mended, as if it had never been broken. “What now?”
“The story’s about over. I suppose you’ll get up from your chair and do something else.”
“So…what’s going to happen to you?” I asked.
Kelly shrugged. “The story’s about over.”
“Does that mean you all die, or something?”
“Do all the characters cease to exist the moment a reader closes the book?” he said, putting on his hat and walking toward the door. He thrust his hands into his trench coat pockets as he whistled a tune to himself.
“Hey, Kelly!” I called to him.
He turned to face me one last time.
“You take care of yourself,” I told him.
He grinned, tipping his hat. “It’s been a pleasure.”
Whew. I had fun writing that. Not sure what I’ll do next. Hang on, there’s some guy wearing a fedora at the door.