The Rabbit in the Labyrinth

The library exhales back into silence, as if swallowing the last echoes of Time’s heavy steps and Death’s crisp corrections. The clocks vanish. The marble sheen dulls back into wood. For a moment, it’s just us again. Three girls in a half-broken sanctuary pretending to be safe.

Then… Laughter.

It starts small, like a hiccup caught between the shelves. Then it multiplies, higher, sharper, bouncing between the spines of books until the whole library is cackling with a voice that doesn’t belong. Pages riffle backwards, as if an invisible hand is undoing every story ever written. The air smells faintly of static, sugar, and torn paper.

Something hops into view.

Not steps. Hops.

A figure bounces from one shelf to the next, landing on book spines like stepping stones, utterly unfazed by gravity or logic. She’s tiny, dressed in a ridiculous kigurumi shaped like a rabbit, complete with floppy ears that sway with every leap. Her eyes gleam a bright, unnatural red, and her grin is wide enough to split the world in half.

“Oops!” she chirps, mid-leap, landing on the top of a dictionary like it’s a podium. “Wrong shelf! Or maybe the right one? Hehe, who knows~”

I don’t even think. My hand clamps around my pen, knuckles white. The metal thrums faintly against my palm, eager, terrified, alive.

The Goddess of Chaos finally makes her appearance.

Beside me, steel hisses: Dalylah’s sword flashing free in a heartbeat, stance sharp as ever. Yuki doesn’t waste time either, her bow raised and loaded, her eyes narrowing like a hawk sighting something too fast to track.

And Chaos?

She just laughs harder. Not mocking, not cruel. Just… delighted. She hops down, twirling, ignoring the blades, ignoring the guns, ignoring me. Every move is like a child in a playground, except the playground is my library and the rules aren’t hers to break.

Except maybe they always were.

“Hostile reception!” she sings, balancing on the edge of a chair with one foot. “That’s how I know I’m in the right place. Oh, don’t look at me like that, long-ears didn’t choose this shelf. Or maybe I did. Maybe you did. Maybe the ink did. Isn’t it funny?”

Her laughter spills again, and the shelves tilt like they’re leaning in to listen.

“Put your weapons down, girls.” I say, my tone almost exhausted. “It’s just Chaos. Of course she’s the last one.”

Dalylah doesn’t lower her sword. Yuki doesn’t lower her bow. But I do feel their eyes cut sideways at me when I call the intruder by name.

Chaos claps, delighted.

“See? She remembers me! Oh, Aya, Aya, Aya, my little ink-smudged accident.” she hops down from her perch and lands with a bounce that rattles the shelves. “You’re not supposed to know me, really. Or maybe you were always supposed to. Cause and effect are such boring little labels, don’t you think?”

“I think you’re insufferable,” I mutter, still holding the pen like it’s a dagger.

Chaos gasps theatrically, covering her mouth with one paw-shaped sleeve.

“Insufferable! And after I did you the favor of a lifetime! No gratitude, no flowers, not even a fruit basket?”

Dalylah finally speaks, voice steady but sharp.

“Favor? You threw her here?”

Chaos spins toward her, ears flopping, grin stretching ear to ear.

“Oopsie~ Someone had to trip over the wires of fate, and she was standing in just the wrong spot. Or right spot. Depends on your taste. Perfect coincidence!” she twirls once, then stops dead, fixing Yuki with eyes too red to be playful. “I prefer to think of it as art. An edit in the draft of the universe.”

Dalylah snarls, stepping closer, sword raised like she means to cut through the nonsense.

“So you admit it. Aya’s suffering, her broken memories, all of this… Is it because of you?”

Chaos tips her head, rabbit ears dangling, and smiles wider.

“Yes. No. Maybe. She was always going to break. I just nudged her into the spotlight sooner. And look how fun it’s been! So many gods lining up to peek at her thread. Time, Death, Beauty, Knowledge… It’s like a party, and I got the first invitation. Or the last, hehe~”

I want to scream. Instead, I laugh - dry, bitter, exhausted.

“So I’m here because you tripped on destiny’s rug and spilled me into the wrong story.”

“Wrong?” Chaos echoes, eyes widening, tone sing-song. She crouches down in front of me, balancing on the balls of her feet. “It was the right one, the perfect one! After all, Aya dear, you’re still alive, aren’t you? Still writing? Still fighting? If that’s not coincidence wearing her prettiest dress, what is?”

The room tilts, shelves swaying in rhythm with her words. For once, even Yuki looks unsettled. Dalylah doesn’t sheath her sword.

And I clutch my pen tighter, because the only thing scarier than being lost by accident… Is realizing maybe it wasn’t an accident at all.

“So… I would die anyway? And I just… Didn’t? Because of you?”

Chaos laughs.

“Bingo!”

The floor bounces under my feet like a trampoline. Bookshelves fold into zigzags, staircases loop back into themselves, doors open onto… More doors. The library isn’t breaking. No, the library is playing.

And at the center of it all: Chaos.

She skips along the tops of shelves, her bunny suit ears flopping, her red eyes glowing like mischief given form. Each hop leaves behind a ripple that warps the space further.

“Catch me if you can!” she sings. “Or don’t! Either way, you’re already chasing me. Heehee~”

Dalylah growls, yanking her sword free.

“She’s mocking us.”

Yuki shakes her head, lowering her bow.

“No. She’s… Entertaining herself.”

I grip my pen harder, trying not to stumble as the floor beneath me tilts sideways, then rights itself like a swing slowing down. This isn’t hostile, but it’s not safe either. It’s… Pure, unadulterated nonsense.

Chaos twirls on a chandelier that wasn’t there a blink ago, dangling upside down like a child showing off.

“Threads tie better when knotted!” she chirps. Then she vanishes, reappearing behind us. “Two mirrors make infinity. Three make madness!”

Her voice is playful, but the words snag in my chest like half-remembered warnings.

She tosses a coin. It spins in the air, then splits into three, then five, then a shower of glittering disks that tinkle as they rain down around us. Yuki swats one away, but it turns into a paper crane midair and flutters off. Dalylah slices at another, and it bursts into confetti shaped like tiny carrots.

Chaos claps like it’s the funniest thing she’s seen all week.

“Heroes aren’t chosen,” she declares, sing-song, bouncing off a mirror that ripples like water. “They’re… Coin-flipped!”

She lands lightly on the banister of a stairwell that wasn’t there before, grins down at us, and winks.

“And guess what? All of you? Lucky tosses of probability! What do you do with that, though...”

The library groans, shifting again, and we’re pulled forward whether we want to follow or not.

We stumble into a room that should not exist.

The ceiling is the floor, the shelves hang upside down like chandeliers, and the books float between us as if gravity is just another joke Chaos decided to tell.

She stops suddenly, one bunny ear flopping across her face. Her red eyes gleam as she sweeps her gaze across us; then she points, finger darting like a magician picking volunteers.

“You.” she twirls toward Yuki. “Sharp string. Straight line. Always humming, always aiming. Not too tight, not too slack. Just the right tension to pierce through anything.”

Yuki shifts her weight, lowering her weapon an inch but not letting go. Her lips press into a thin line, then she huffs a quiet breath through her nose.

“…That’s one way of putting it.” She doesn’t sound offended, more like someone resigned to being seen through.

“And you.” Chaos pirouettes toward Dalylah, nose crinkling as if she smells smoke. “Burning coal. Always sparking, always angry, always alive. Perfect! Not perfect perfect - that’s boring. But fun perfect.”

Dalylah’s grip tightens on her sword, but she doesn’t move. Her eyes narrow, caught between bristling and… Listening.

Chaos claps, delighted, and hops backward onto the wall, which tilts obligingly to become her stage.

“Ohhh, what a pretty mess! See, Aya’s the center thread, sure. All tangled and scribbly and oh so interesting. But threads?” she tugs at the air, and strings of light ripple between us like a spiderweb. “Threads never weave alone.” her grin widens, sharp and sweet all at once. “Tug here, tug there… and ta-daa! You two are in the game now. Candidates. Don’t thank me.” she cups her cheek, mock-innocent. “Thank… Randomness! Coincidence! Chaos!”

The strings vanish in a blink, but the weight of them lingers.

Yuki shakes her head slowly, then glances at me. Her voice is steady, but not harsh.

“Well… Guess that means we don’t get to stand on the sidelines anymore. Not that we ever really did.”

Dalylah doesn’t answer. But she doesn’t look away from me either. Her sword is still drawn, but her eyes… Her eyes are full of something I’ve only seen directed at Roderick. Something dangerous. Something that looks a lot like belief.

Chaos giggles, bouncing from shelf to shelf as though our tension is her favorite game.

“Ooooh, I love this part. The moment when the coin is still spinning in the air. Heads? Tails? Who knows!”

Chaos twirls once more, bunny hood bouncing, as if the whole performance bored her now that we were finally listening. She skips along the shelves, humming something that sounds suspiciously like a children’s rhyme played backwards.

Then she pauses, crouches on the highest stack, and leans forward, eyes flashing crimson.

“Oopsie-daisy~! You don’t need to understand now. You’ll trip on the truth soon enough. That’s the fun of labyrinths, isn’t it?”

Before any of us can answer, she snaps her fingers.

The distortion folds in on itself. Shelves slam back into place, gravity stops playing dress up, and the library exhales, like it’s pretending it was never anything other than wood and dust and books.

But my stomach still feels unmoored, like a floor tilted just out of sight. Yuki’s jaw tightens as if she tasted the shift. Dalylah’s eyes scan the corners like she expects another trick. We all know: it wasn’t just a hallucination.

On the floor, where Chaos had been standing, lies a carrot. Not a real one - a crude doodle scrawled in thick red ink, edges smeared. Next to it, a scrap of paper, bent like it had been folded and unfolded too many times.

I bend down, pick it up. The handwriting tilts and wobbles, looping into itself like a dare:

“Back soon! Don’t die!”

I stare at it for a second, my mouth hanging open, then snort once.

“...Sure. Why not.”

The note disappears into my pocket. A keepsake? A warning? Or just another one of her coin flips, tossed into my lap.

I glance at Yuki and Dalylah, who are both still on edge. Their eyes are sharp, but they’re here. With me. With each other. That’s more than I could say yesterday.

I raise the corner of my mouth, exhausted but unwilling to let Chaos have the last laugh.

“Next time, I’m charging admission. Honestly, this library is not a playground for the Gods.”

Silence lingers for a beat. Then Yuki smirks. Dalylah snorts and shakes her head, muttering something I can’t quite catch. We all laugh, but we know, we can still feel it in our bones:

The Gods are not done yet.