180 Grace: Fan Club
He’s a Rafe loyalist. He’s the second to last person on this planet I want poking his nose into my affairs.
[Lyrielle’s Fan Club: 573 new messages.]
“I’m fine.”
[TIME: Are you drunk?]
Ten miles from our destination, I finally check it again, only to see:
Then another hour.
C
“Are you okay?” Andrew asks, finally breaking the silence.
[Grace Harper has accepted the invitation to join Lyrielle’s Fan Club.]
Maybe I shouldn’t have ignored all the buzzing.
Taking a deep breath, I tap on the app icon. The interface looks a little different today, but still says (Limited). But now there’s a new chat thread at the top of my inbox, saying “Lyrielle’s Fan Club” in bold letters.
[TIME: How uncouth.]
What the actual hell is this, and who the hell is Lyrielle?
[WRATH: Perhaps you should take the stick out of your hourglass.]
The white cat rolls onto its back, and I rub at its stomach without thinking. All four paws wrap around my wrist as it lightly chews against my knuckles. It acts like a perfectly normal cat, just like Sadie acts like a perfectly normal dog, but…
At a quick glance, it makes me think of Lyre. And it would make sense, because who the hell else do I know associated with this app? Except the strange, face–shifting ma
in my dreams.
We’re almost there, and storm clouds have begun gathering in the sky, dark and menacing.
“I don’t need you to be-” Cutting myself off, I suck in a deep breath. My annoyance
180 Grace: Fan Club
with him aside, he hasn’t done anything except ask if everything’s okay. Sniping at him only makes me the immature one here. “Nothing’s wrong. I just want to get settled in for the night. This storm’s making me nervous.”
Occasionally, Caine checks in via the walkie talkic, asking if I’m okay. Sometimes it’s
Ron.
[TIME: Maybe it was you in an alternate timeline.]
How do they know? No; they don’t. They’re guessing.
I scroll through the messages, my unease growing with every exchange. These people definitely know each other, and I have no idea who they are.
[WRATH: Was it you, you piece of shit? We said no more invites.]
I type out a quick message asking if she’s okay and to text back when she can.
Well–third. Ellie exists, after all.
My skin crawls. He reeks of stalker vibes.
I open my messages and frantically type out a text to Lyre.
Totally normal reaction. 2
My phone chimes again with another notification. Despite my better judgment, I check
- it.
[WRATH: Stop fucking with me. You know that shit makes my brain hurt.]
My head throbs, a dull ache building behind my eyes. Wrath. Time. Madness. Chaos. These aren’t just weird internet handles, not when Divinity Connect involves… well, divinities. These are entities. Forces. Or just people with really bad naming sense.
[CHAOS: This time, it isn’t me, little anchor. Do you miss me? I miss you.]
“Okay, okay. I was just worried.”
But Owen’s there. I’m sure he’s helping keep her in check.
I wait, watching for the read receipt, but it doesn’t happen. I’m not panicking, not exactly–this doesn’t feel like the bone–deep dread from before the last storm. This is just regular (I think) human anxiety about being contacted by strangers with weird
no.ca
25
<
180 Grace: Fan Club
names on a magical social media platform.
[MADNESS: Wasn’t me~]
[MADNESS: More importantly~ why isn’t she talking? Hello? I know you’re reading us~]
[WRATH
Who the hell is this? Who the fuck sent out an invitation? This is our safe place, remember?]
[WRATH: @Lyrielle was it you?]
A notification immediately appears.
My skin crawls as I consider the strange sounds in the background. No matter how I try to convince myself I might be mistaken, they sounded distinctly…
violent–against–people–y.
[MADNESS: Join the dark side, baby~]
“I’m fine.”
[WRATH: I’ll show you uncouth.]
We lapse back into silence.
[TIME: Perhaps you should stop living up to your name.]
I slam my thumb against the home button, exiting the app in inexplicable panic.
I pull out my phone, needing something to focus on besides my irritation. My thumb hovers over my messages app.
“You don’t seem fine.“–
The messages flood in within seconds, but not before I notice I have no access to backchat.
How long is it going to take for me to read through them all?
Awkward silence reigns in the car, and there’s no way I’m breaking it. Andrew’s tension
is palpable even from here, but you know what? He deserves to feel anxious and off–kilter after having the audacity to question my relationship with Caine.
But why are they in Lyre’s fan club?
180 Grace: Fan Club
The message changes to “Delivered“, but even five minutes later it still doesn’t show
“Read.”
[MADNESS: Yup~]
Speaking of which…
The children stay asleep through it all, even an hour into the drive.
[GRACE: Someone just added me to a chat called “Lyrielle’s Fan Club” on Divinity Connect. There are users called Wrath, Time, and Madness in there. Is Lyrielle you? Also, Chaos sent me a message and he sounds like a stalker. Should I be worried? Because I’m seriously worried. Please answer as soon as you can!]
Panic versus anxiety aside, the message keeps bouncing around my head like a stray ping pong ball. “This time, it isn’t me.” Isn’t what him? The storm? The invitation? But he used present tense, so he’s probably not talking about something that’s already happened. He’s talking about something happening now.
My gaze shifts to the notification I’ve been avoiding. The one about “Lyrielle’s Fan Club” on Divinity Connect.
My eyes widen. What the hell kind of usernames are these?
[TIME: Do you know what the word means?]
Then again, I’m not really sure anyone can keep Lyre in check outside of Divinity
Connect.
No new texts from Lyre.
My thumb hovers over it. Curiosity wins out, and I tap.
So, the storm. Right?
My phone keeps buzzing, but it’s always Divinity Connect, never Lyre. Andrew keeps giving me strange looks over it, but I don’t offer, and he doesn’t ask. It’s two hours of awkward nothing between us.
Maybe.
