2 Weeks Later. 11:11 PM. Oregon.
The table had 9 chairs now.
The 9th chair appeared the night The Hunger left.
Empty. Waiting.
The book on the table flipped by itself.
New page:
_Season 9: The Other Hungers
Message received.
Location: Tokyo, Japan.
Table 2: Starving.
Authors: Missing.
Status: Please help._
Under it: a photo.
A white table. Blue rim. Cracked.
4 chairs. All empty.
Around it: black smoke.
Fritz: "That’s... another Authors’ Table."
Miri: "There are more of us?"
Alex: "And they’re losing."
Umi: "The Hunger lied. He wasn’t the only one."
Lila pointed at the 9th chair.
"Someone’s supposed to sit there."
DING
The Pen, The String, The Lens all floated up.
Formed a map in the air.
3 red dots.
Tokyo. São Paulo. Lagos.
3 tables. 3 cities. All starving.
The Book: _Rule: You can’t save your table by sitting at it.
You save it by helping others build theirs._
Umi: looked at her people "So we travel."
Fritz: "10/10 I did not sign up for international monster fighting."
Miri: "But we did sign up for each other."
Alex: "When do we leave?"
The 9th chair glowed.
A ticket appeared on it.
Salem → Tokyo. Tomorrow 11:11 PM.
Umi: picked it up "Then we go to Tokyo.
First table. First rescue."
That night they packed.
Not clothes.
Notebooks. Guitar. Camera. Piano sheet.
And bread. For 8.
Before sleep, the book wrote one more line:
_Warning: The Other Hungers don’t eat stories.
They eat the authors._