Question Behind The Question Novels & Stories

My eyes lit up, immediately. “So this is the Wall of Puzzlement!” It had a nourishing aura coming from it that made one engulfed in a feeling of warmth. I was able to quickly put aside all the previous activities that replayed in my mind. Stepping forward, I observed the wall, and read out the first line of words on it. “In a world of distrust, who is your closest kin?” I shook my head in disbelief. Just what kind of stupid question was that. If even the first question was that absurd, how'd I be able to cover the others up.

Lord, how do I come up with a perfect lie under a tense moment like this? Then Aaron’s next question comes, the curiosity and suspicion heavier in his tone now. “You’re not Masked LRT herself… are you?”

He had turned it so she could see it — three columns, the questions from Section Four listed in the first, his answers summarized in the second, and in the third a series of single-word notations she had not seen him make. "The questions I'm missing," he said, "all have the same structure. Someone in the pack is not what they appear to be. The formal presentation of the situation is — legible. Addressable. But the actual problem is underneath it, and the actual problem requires—" He stopped. He looked at the columns. "It requires knowing that the formal presentation isn't the problem. Which means knowing there's something underneath it." She looked at the columns. She thought about several t

His statement carried an air of intensity, underscoring the gravity of the forthcoming inquiry and the impact it held upon our twisted relationship. With a palpable sense of anticipation, Alpha Dolph voiced the question that hung in the air between us, laden with an indescribable weight. "Is it true?" he inquired, his words resonating with a profound significance that seemed to echo deep within my being. Strangely enough, a peculiar sensation washed over me, as if I had somehow anticipated the nature of his query long before it had even been posed. At that moment, time seemed to suspend, as I contemplated the magnitude of Alpha Dolph's question. "Is that true?"

"Who are you?" He tilts his head. "That's the wrong question." "Then what's the right one?" He crouches in front of me. Close enough that I can smell him. Smoke and something rotten underneath. "The right question," he says softly, "is what do we want from you?" My heart pounds. "And what do you want?"

She lay there and let herself wonder for the first time, carefully, without letting it become anything more than a question yet whether the debt had been only what it appeared to be. Or whether there was something underneath it. Something her father hadn't told. She lay there with the question. Didn't answer it. Wasn't ready to answer it. Just held it. The way she held everything. Quietly. Alone. Until she knew what to do with it. Outside her window the city glowed faintly at the curtain's edge. She lay there and held the question. And somewhere downstairs the house was quiet. And somewhere in that quiet Michael was sitting with something too.

My heart still hasn’t slowed down. I don’t think it will. Because now there’s a question in the air. One I don’t know the answer to. One that no one dares ask out loud. But we all feel it. We all see it. What am I to him? And why didn’t he deny it?

And suddenly… I cannot ask the question anymore. I look at her carefully. At the softness in her eyes. At the quiet exhaustion she carries around every single day. I want to ask her why she hid this from me. Why she never trusted me enough to tell me the truth. But instead, I hear myself asking quietly, “Is there anything I still don’t know about you?” The question hangs heavily between us. Her eyes slowly lower. My fingers curl tightly beside me. Please. Just tell me. Tell me yourself. But then she speaks softly.

He deserves to be. Whereas with me, I- But what about me? It’s a question that sticks in the back of my mind. And it’s one I’m afraid to answer. What about me?

Like a melody he cannot quite hear because of how faint it sounds. "And what about it?" "Who are they?" Finally, he said it. The question that's been lingering in his mind. Bugging him everytime he closes his eyes. The image of their face, no matter how blurry the details were, was seared into his brain. "Why do you wanna know?" "I'm just curious." "Then I'm not telling you."