The Publisher OCT: Round 1 (Part 1)

Maybe a part of her stomach had been left behind after she’d been taken apart and dragged through her phone, because somehow, a swarm of butterflies had found their way in and were now doing rhythmic gymnastics inside her gut.

Jay tugged once again at the watch around her wrist, but the strap didn’t budge. With a sigh, she pressed the middle button and glared at the three faces peering back at hers. Especially at one face in particular.

Because what kind of moron uses a wombat in a fight?

Tank was originally supposed to be a running gag for her half-orc character, Samarek. According to the backstory, every orc in Samarek’s class was given a wolf hound at graduation as a battle companion. Being a half-orc, Samarek was the last to choose her pet and as a result, there were no wolves left. Instead, she got a wombat too dumb to listen to commands with a bad habit of stubbornly bulldozing through anything and anyone in her path.

One of Samarek’s opponents had asked the exact same question in her story.

Oh, the pitfalls of being an author. You just never knew when trying to be cute and funny in a story could seriously backfire on you. Like when you actually needed to physically become a character in a fight to the finish.

Jay shook her head as she ran that thought through her mind again. Then, very carefully, she extended her right hand…and pinched herself hard.

“Ow!”

Well, just because it hurt didn’t mean it still wasn’t a dream. Maybe she just needed to try harder.

But before Jay could abuse her arm again, her senses focused on something else, something much more pleasant that convinced her it wasn’t a dream.

Pancakes?

Her nose twitched involuntarily as her salivary glands kicked in. Her stomach added its complaint as well, for good measure.

She could decide later if it was a dream or not. For now, there was a much more urgent and primal instinct that she needed to take care of.



What kind of interview is this?

Saku stared down at the object on her wrist, the Secretary’s words still ringing in her ears. Now that she thought about it, everything about this set-up had been sketchy from the start, from the obviously placed note, to the speedy arrival of a pick-up car, to the weird device that clamped a wristband on her. She rubbed at it again.

Competitors? Injuries sustained? Last one standing? She had to beat other people- fight other people- to get to The Publisher?

Saku didn’t like to fight. Call her a wimp, but she preferred to see it as a strength. Nothing was ever gained by hurting other people. Conflicts could easily be solved by talking things over. There was never any need to get physical!

But this time was different. The Secretary had made it clear that she had to fight this time, if she wanted to reach The Publisher.

And if she didn’t meet The Publisher, then she wouldn’t be able to get her work published. After all, she’d been working on her story for years. All that hard work was about to pay off. She just had to get through this competition.

“What am I going to do?” she sighed, sticking her hands in her pockets and walking along with her head down. She didn’t want to hurt anybody. She couldn’t.

She toyed with the wristband again. The Secretary had said that this device would allow her to become three of her characters. Pressing the middle button, she studied the three faces on the screen. She’d picked three of her favorites—they were strong and tough and good fighters, but how could she become them? And if she became her characters, would she be able to fight then?

Something shifted up ahead and she stiffened, but relaxed as a white cat peeled itself from the shadows and slunk past her, pausing only to briefly sniff her shoes before it disappeared the way she’d come.

Saku stared after it for a moment then frowned thoughtfully in the direction the cat had appeared from. The cat didn’t look like it belonged to this creepy place. It had probably gotten away from its owner somehow and now just exploring the place.

She straightened her shoulders and took a deep breath. Exploring sounded like a good idea. Maybe she’d run into some people and finally figure out what the heck was going on.



Every single corridor looked the same. Jay stepped into the middle of the intersection and looked both ways. On either side, the hallway stretched so far she couldn’t see the end. Identical offices were lined up along each side of the hall, mirroring each other so perfectly they seemed to meld into concentric circles fading away into the darkness. The patterned tiles appeared to stretch for miles.

She closed her eyes. Her head was spinning. How was she supposed to participate in this tournament when she couldn’t even find her opponents? Or even some food? Her stomach growled again to emphasize the point. She’d tried to follow the scent of those stupid pancakes, but she’d just ended up lost in a web of hallways.

And now she couldn’t even smell them anymore.

Maybe her wristband had a map or something. Jay pressed the button on the left, but all that showed up on the screen was a large tournament bracket, with thirty-two fuzzy faces lined up at the bottom.

The button on the right showed a smiling girl with large brown eyes and a striped hoodie. The name beneath the picture read “Saku” and on the left were three vague silhouettes depicting, Jay presumed, her opponent’s characters. She couldn’t tell much from the shadowy images, but Saku and her team seemed rather harmless.

She pressed the middle button and found her own characters staring up at her again.

Growling under her breath, Jay began rapidly pressing a combination of buttons, but the wristband only shifted between those three screens. In frustration, she slammed her fist down on it.

Jay suddenly had the sensation of being grabbed by the neck and stretched out. She glanced down at her feet and was surprised to see her sneakers replaced with leather shoes. Frowning, she reached up and tried to run her fingers through her ponytail.

Except short, thick hair met her hand as she reached back. And now that she thought about it, her t-shirt suddenly felt a lot warmer. She slowly reached her hands out and blinked at her leather-clad arms. Then she reached inside her jacket and drew one of the knives tucked into the bands stitched at her front. Peering into the blade only confirmed what she had feared.

Rowen’s face, with a foreign look of shock, stared back at her.

“GAH!” she screamed, dropping the knife in shock, only for his quick reflexes to kick in and catch it right before it hit the ground.

Smooth, babe.

“Who said that?” she demanded.

Me. Duh.

“Who’s ‘me’?”

A long-suffering sigh. It was coming from inside her head. And the voice. Low and husky with a hint of laziness. Exactly how she’d always imagined him to sound.

“Is that…you, Rowen?” she ventured.

A chuckle. Course it is, who else would it be? You’re in my body, you can hear me think.

“But…how?”

Who cares? Only thing that matters is that you’re hungry now and thanks to that, so am I. You’re going the wrong way. Come on. I’ll take us to the cafeteria.

Following his instructions, she turned around and propelled her feet down the hallway she’d come from. Once she reached the intersection, though, she kept going straight. To her surprise, the pattern of the tiles began to shift and the spaced out offices grew sparser until the corridor suddenly opened up into a large atrium. Finally, there were people milling around, some chatting to each other, others staring down at their watches, almost all looking confused.

Everyone looked like they’d been snatched out of their houses- there was a girl wearing scrubs- (was that Scarlette?). She thought she recognized Irene’s red scarf. And she could have sworn the girl with the bow and arrows looked familiar…

But she didn’t care about any of that. She’d spotted the large sign that read “Cafeteria” and made a beeline for it, changing back to her own body as she did, not even caring if anyone saw her. Her ponytail bounced against her neck as she skidded to a stop inside, the fresh smell of buttermilk pancakes washing over her. “Thank you, Rowen,” she muttered.

Anytime, babe.

Jay nearly tripped on her way to grab a plate and looked around to see if anyone had noticed. How was it possible? She’d turned back.

And she could still hear him.



After about half an hour of wandering around, Saku had heard a ton about The Publisher, but she was no closer to learning who he was.

“No one’s ever seen him, not even that Secretary lady, the one with the goggles who welcomed us.”

“I heard he sent out these invitations because he was concerned about a lack of creativity in stories. A weird chick sweeping the ceiling told me-”

“When I see that smug son of a bitch, I’m going to smash his face in. Didn’t even agree to this…”

Saku shrank aside to get out of the way as a girl wearing whale-patterned pants and armed with a bow stormed by. She’d been intimidated by the thought of asking people what they knew about The Publisher, but it turned out that she didn’t even have to ask.

“He never talks to anyone, except The Secretary, and even, it’s only by intercom or something.”

“He installed cameras and recorders all over the place. I think he’s watching our every move.”

Everything she learned made her more nervous, but also more excited. She imagined The Publisher to be a very wealthy man (he had to be in order to afford a building as big as this one, and all this cool technology), who was very powerful and very, very mysterious. It was a little scary.

Then she perked up as another thought entered her mind, along with visions of touring at Comic-Cons, signing autographs for endless lines of starry-eyed fans, and traveling all over the world. Someone who had that kind of money and power HAD to be able to make her famous! She just knew it. Not only would he publish her stuff once she won, he would make her name known worldwide. Beaming, she bounced slightly on the balls of her feet as she walked. This was the most exciting thing that had ever happened to her!

But first, she would have to win the tournament. Saku deflated slightly. That’s right, there was still the whole problem with fighting. Then the memories of slaving over her story for all those long years came into her mind and she clenched a determined fist. She could do this! It would be hard for her, but success only came through lots of hard work, right?

Who was her first opponent? Pressing the third button on her wristband, she carefully studied the dark-haired girl with the slightly impatient look on her face. She looked to be a little older than Saku, but she seemed pretty nice. The name under the face read Jejunum (Jay) Lin. Saku wondered if she disliked fighting, too. She had an interesting name. Maybe it was foreign or something.

Next to the photograph were three silhouettes of what Saku guessed were Jay’s characters. One appeared to be a girl with a long braid coiling over her shoulder. The second had short hair, but it was hard to tell if it was male or female. The third one...Saku frowned slightly. The third one had two little round ears at the top of its head. A bear? She shivered. It would be terrifying if she had to come up against a bear.

Well, there was no other way to do this. She would defeat her opponents one at a time! Moon Raven, Caleb Gem, and Seth Almar would never let her down!