Chapter 2: The Copy Cat's Order

Chapter 2: The Copy Cat's Order

The black ichor wouldn't come off the floor. Alex had tried everything—industrial degreaser, bleach, even scraping at it with a paint scraper—but the shimmering, oily stains remained, baked into the tile like permanent shadows. They were a festering reminder of the previous night, of Silas walking out of that freezer not in pieces, but merely annoyed. The memory haunted Alex, replaying in his mind with the nauseating repetition of a stuck record. The rules had been broken, and the world hadn't ended. That was, somehow, more terrifying than if it had.

He was scrubbing at the stains for the third time when Ryan’s pristine black shoes entered his field of vision.

“Leave it, Alex,” the manager said, his voice as smooth as polished linoleum. That unnervingly wide smile was plastered on his face. “Some messes are meant to stay. Reminders, you know?”

Alex scrambled to his feet, heart thudding. “Ryan, I—”

“Silas won’t be in tonight,” Ryan interrupted, inspecting his own reflection in the gleaming chrome of the milkshake machine. “Gave him the night off. Excellent work, handling that… pest problem. Truly above and beyond.”

A cold knot formed in Alex’s stomach. Alone. He was going to be alone tonight.

Ryan seemed to read his thoughts. He turned, his empty eyes fixing on Alex. “Don’t worry. You’re our expert, after all. You know the procedures.” His gaze drifted past Alex, toward the back hallway that led to the storerooms and his office. At the very end of the hall was a door, unremarkable in every way except for its featureless, plain white paint. It had no handle, no lock, not even a keyhole.

“Just remember the most important procedure of all,” Ryan said, his voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper as he gestured toward the door with his chin. “The Grimoire is very clear about that one. No one touches the White Door. No one asks about the White Door. And if you’re ever asked to clean what’s behind it…” Ryan’s smile widened, stretching the skin at the corners of his mouth. “Well, let’s just say we haven’t had to find a replacement cleaner in a very, very long time.”

He patted Alex on the shoulder, a touch that felt colder than the freezer’s mist, and glided out of the kitchen, leaving Alex with the sizzling fryers, the stubborn stains, and a brand-new abyss to worry about.

The first few hours of the shift passed in a haze of paranoid silence. Every hum of the refrigerator, every drip from the faucet, sent a jolt of adrenaline through him. He found himself reciting the rules from his notebook under his breath, a desperate mantra against the encroaching dread. He worked on autopilot, serving the trickle of late-night customers—the woman with too many joints in her fingers, the man whose shadow moved independently of his body—with textbook precision. He took an order for a Smiley Burger with extra pickles and a vanilla shake from a tired-looking trucker. It was the most normal transaction of the night.

Then, an hour later, the bell above the front door chimed.

Alex looked up from wiping down the counter (clockwise, always clockwise) and froze. The new customer stood perfectly still, just inside the doorway. It had the vague shape of a man, clad in a drab grey trench coat, but that’s where any humanity ended. It had no face. Where its features should have been, there was only a smooth, pale expanse of skin. And below that, a vertical slit that suddenly gaped open, revealing not a mouth, but a maw filled with hundreds of impossibly long, needle-like teeth that dripped a clear, viscous fluid.

A low, buzzing sound filled the air, a distorted recording of a human voice that seemed to emanate from the creature itself. “…Smiley Burger… extra pickles… vanilla shake…”

It was the trucker’s order. Verbatim.

Alex’s hand instinctively went to the notebook in his back pocket. His mind raced. This was a test. He’d read about this one, a brief, terrifying entry he had hoped he’d never encounter. Rule 82: The Imitator arrives without a face but speaks with a stolen voice. Its memory is perfect. Yours must be better.

What did that mean? His own memory was his greatest strength, the one thing that had kept him alive this long. He replayed the trucker’s order in his mind, every detail crystal clear. Smiley Burger, extra pickles, vanilla shake. That’s what the faceless thing had said. It was identical. His eidetic recall confirmed it.

Its memory is perfect. Yours must be better.

But what if… what if it wasn’t perfect? What if there was a flaw he hadn’t noticed?

The buzzing voice crackled again, a little louder this time. “…Smiley Burger… extra pickles… and a… vanilla shake…”

There.

A tiny, almost imperceptible hesitation. The word ‘and’ had been added, a conjunction the original customer hadn't used. The trucker, weary from the road, had simply grunted his order in a flat list. This creature had added a single, grammatically correct word.

It was a minuscule change. Insignificant. But in Smiley’s, nothing was insignificant.

Alex’s blood ran cold. This was the test. It wasn’t just about recalling the order; it was about spotting the imperfection in the copy. What was he supposed to do? Correct it? Ignore it? The Grimoire was maddeningly vague.

He flipped frantically through his notebook, his shaking fingers struggling with the worn pages. Rule 82… Rule 82… There was a sub-clause he’d underlined twice. Do not correct the flaw. Acknowledge only what is offered.

Acknowledge what is offered. Not what was stolen.

His heart hammered against his ribs. This meant he had to make the order exactly as the creature had requested it, with the tiny, flawed addition. It was a high-stakes gamble based on his interpretation of two cryptic sentences. If he was wrong, what would those needle-teeth do?

Taking a shaky breath, Alex forced himself to the grill. His hands felt clumsy, his movements stiff with terror. He cooked the burger, his eyes darting back to the motionless figure by the door. He placed the extra pickles on the patty, his fingers tapping a frantic rhythm on the counter. One, two, three, four… just like the trucker got. He went to the shake machine, his mind screaming at him. Is this right? Are you sure? Silas broke a rule and lived. What if this rule is a lie too?

He pushed the doubt down. Silas wasn’t here. All he had were the rules.

He prepared the tray: one Smiley Burger with extra pickles, and one vanilla shake. He carried it to the counter, his steps heavy. The faceless thing glided forward to meet him, its needle-toothed maw clicking softly.

Alex placed the tray on the counter, his eyes fixed on the logo of the Smiley’s bag, refusing to look at the horrifying visage before him. “That’ll be six-sixty-six,” he recited, the price for this specific combo meal after 1 a.m.

A pale, multi-jointed hand emerged from the trench coat sleeve and placed a pile of tarnished, pre-1945 coins on the counter. Alex carefully scooped them up, avoiding skin contact as per Rule 27b.

The creature picked up the bag and the shake. For a long, agonizing moment, it stood there. The buzzing sound stopped, plunging the restaurant into a deafening silence broken only by the hum of the fryers. Alex held his breath, waiting for the verdict, for the explosion of violence, for the end.

Then, with a final, soft click of its teeth, the thing turned and glided out the door, disappearing into the night.

Alex collapsed against the counter, his legs giving out. He was drenched in a cold sweat, his entire body trembling. He’d survived. He had to have survived. It took the food and left. That meant he’d passed the test.

But as the minutes stretched on and the adrenaline began to fade, a new, more insidious feeling crept in. There had been no confirmation, no sign he’d done the right thing. The creature’s silent departure was an empty space where an answer should have been. What if its silence wasn’t acceptance? What if it was a promise? What if he hadn’t starved a monster, but simply sent it away with a doggy bag, content to savor its true meal—Alex’s own sanity—at its leisure?

He looked at the empty doorway, then at the stubborn, dark stains on the floor. He had followed the rules perfectly, and he felt less safe than ever.