Kano stepped into the room beyond and gagged. The air was thick with an acrid chemical odor. Fourteen cylindrical tanks, barely large enough to hold a person, had been placed within. Each one contained a version of Kano in various states of growth. Some were small malformed creatures that bore only a passing resemblance to her while others were almost exact replicas. But they all had one thing in common: their slack expressions and lifeless eyes.

One of the tanks had shattered, leaving a mess of glass, pale liquid, and a perfectly preserved corpse. Kano stared down at it, transfixed. So this was what she’d look when she was dead. Hopefully her death would have a little more… meaning or something to it than the pitiful end this husk must have met. Had they ever truly been alive? Kano doubted it. Why would they have been left to rot here if they were?

But it begged the question: Had she been grown like this? And if not, then how had she been created? Kano shook her head. No, even if they looked like her, it didn’t mean she necessarily had any connection to them. Though that excuse felt rather flimsy in the face of the mounting evidence.

“Oh shit,” Urick said, walking slowly down the row, eyes wide with horror. “Did you come from one of these tanks as well?”

“Shut up. We’re going.”

Kano never thought she could get tired of looking at herself so quickly but, full of loathing, she turned away from her duplicates. This confirmed what the blob had said—Karen must have been a necromancer. Who else would be willing to go to such lengths for something so selfish? At least they were dead. She’d dealt with more than enough necromancers recently.

Other than the other Kanos, the lab contained little of interest, just a bunch of tools and instruments Kano had no use for. Happy to leave it behind, she continued through the only other exit besides the one that led back to the… She struggled with how exactly to characterize the her she’d met before. Blob Kano? She nodded to herself. That would suffice.

Stepping through the door, she left the cold, foul-smelling lab behind and entered something from another world entirely. From floor to ceiling, the interior was covered in an illusory collection of lush green plants, clear streams, and flowers in bloom. It was the most color Kano had seen in a long time, discounting her blob-based replica. She almost wished it were real. It seemed far more peaceful than the world she lived in.

Then again, such a place hardly seemed to suit her, so she’d just have to make do with the real world. Was this the sort of dream the humans had hoped to live in inside their crazy network? She could see why they’d gone to such lengths, even if it was fake. Maybe this was how things had been for Thirty-Six, before the end. The thought brought a sad smile to her face, which faded as she refocused on the present.

Other than the false environment that filled it, the room was close to empty. There was a bed and a few pieces of clothing, but no other signs of occupation. Had this Karen died somewhere within this building? Possibly even within this room? Or had they left for an unknown destination before their body gave out? Karen’s room offered little in the way of answers, and it could easily be taken as evidence for either theory.

There certainly hadn’t been a necromancer here in a long time. Shorinstown would never have come to be otherwise. But that was just conjecture. Kano couldn’t recall much of the town’s actual history. She needed to find Nove already; she’d be able to remember. If there was anything Nove was good at it, it was remembering things. At least relative to Kano, not that that was any great feat.

Deciding she’d learned what little she could from this place, Kano thought she should really rescue Nove already. The notion that the abomination would be able to help her solve this mystery was a great motivator. This supposed creator of Kano still didn’t feel real, and she needed to know more about her and her past in general. If nothing else, finding the necromancer or her body would at least give Kano some sense of closure. Though she’d much prefer if they could give her answers instead. Whatever good answers would do Kano in the face of her rapidly approaching death.

Kano knew she should move on, but her thoughts were too twisted. They needed to be unwound before she could continue. He was hardly her first choice, but Urick was the only one here, so he’d have to do. After giving him permission to speak, Kano sat down on the corner of the bed and asked, “Do you think what that blob who called itself Kano was saying is true? That I was created by this necromancer?”

“It would make sense. Someone must have made you,” Urick replied, standing by the door. “Why not this Karen person? Especially if she made all those other versions of you.”

“How can you be so sure I was created in the first place?”

He shrugged. “Well, unless you spontaneously rose out of the ground of your own accord, someone must have made you. Which means a necromancer. Besides, your name matches up perfectly with hers and her other creations.”

“How so? Her name isn’t Kano.”

The ghoul stared at her in mute incomprehension while he apparently tried to fathom something about her response. “Yes, but… if you take the first two letters of Karen and the first two letters of Novak, you get Kano.”

Now that he mentioned it, it did seem vaguely familiar. “Oh, right. I guess I’ve just been too focused on everything else that’s going on to realize.” She wasn’t sure that was too good an excuse, but he seemed to buy it. Now that they were on the subject of creators, a thought occurred to her. One which was absolutely not an attempt to conceal her mistake by changing the subject. “Did you ever meet your creator?”

“Of course I did. She was right there when I first opened my eyes. I don’t know how long exactly I worked for her; it all kind of blurred together, but it must have been—”

Kano yawned loudly, interrupting him. “Okay, okay. I didn’t ask for your life story, you know? Let’s go find Nove and the children already, before you waste any more of our time.” When she reached the bedroom’s other exit, she added, “If they’re dead or part of some horrible experiment, it’s your fault. You got that?”

He grunted in what was probably an accepting manner.

“Good,” Kano said and opened the door. Having someone else to blame already made her feel better about all this. She knew there had to be some reason she’d kept Urick around.