Bryan's Arc

Chapter 18 of 21

Bryan was almost at the archive door when something caught his eye back at the hollow tree. A small shape sat tucked behind the brushes, half hidden in the bark. He had missed it before. He stopped, turned, and walked back. Whatever his mentor had left inside that workspace, it had been placed where only Bryan would think to look. It was a small tablet, screen dark, propped against the inner wall. Bryan tapped it. A video began to play. It showed his own house from the outside, the window glowing warm, his own back hunched at his desk while he mixed red paint. The footage was steady, recent, and close. His mentor had not just copied his work. He had watched him make it. Bryan slid the tablet into the mossy box with the rest. He had wanted proof. Now he had more than enough to bury the man who taught him. But the tablet was not alone. Behind it sat a lumpy miniature, knee-high, slathered in clashing drips of green and pink and yellow. Bryan stared. It was a joke piece, painted with childish glee, signed on the base in his mentor's hand. A note was taped to its foot. For Bryan — this is how I started. Bryan's stomach turned. The man had left a confession and a taunt in the same breath. He lifted the ugly thing, tucked it under his arm, and walked out of the tree for good. The judges would see every piece of it. Outside the hollow tree, the carved shelves of the great library rose around him in a slow spiral. Bryan looked up once at the towering walls that had hidden the workspace all this time. Then he walked. The box pressed hard against his ribs. The ugly miniature swung at his side. He pushed open the archive door and stepped into the light. The chase was done. He had the tablet, the record card, the copied model, and the gaudy little confession. He would lay them all on the judges' table before the hour was out.