Alors!

Close to Heaven / 1

2024-04-10T03:40:30Z

The foreman told Cassidy it wouldn't be an easy job, herding cows by the mountains. At the age of 20, her desperate thirst for money though overruled her self-respecting reserve - where those pennies she'd earn from being a wandering troubadour tasted far sweeter than grinding a 9-to-5 job - along with the instinctual allure of her partner, Sean. Admittedly, he was quite cute; fresh out of high school from Seattle, he was standoffish in her presence as if he were mustering his energies just to deny his attraction to her. Little did she know he already had a girl (Lyla) on his heart.

It was Cassidy's third time being up close to the Rocky Mountains. (Her second time was when she brought her ex for a picnic.) Along with the clouds which caressed the snowy peaks, the beautiful scenery refreshed her spirits to the point where she'd roam off-track from herding the cows and strum her heart off through her guitar, which left Sean nonplussed. He was left picking up after her slack.

Sean was closed off, stern to the point of passive-aggressive. But Cassidy sensed a warmth beneath the tough facade he was putting on. She couldn't ignore that urge to prod him out of his shell. She'd smile and crack jokes, like a reminder to have fun and enjoy the sunshine they both share. When she pushed Sean onto the grass, he wrestled her also to the ground and ended up bonking her by the nose - where the droplets of her nosebleed stained Sean's sweater. Oh, that's just great.

As Sean tried rinsing the bloodstains off by the river, the Albertan weather decided to rear its manic-depressive side with a gust of heavy wind, bringing in snow flurries. It was the very first time he'd stepped in the same tent as her, as they both had no choice but to huddle near each other for warmth.

Cassidy found his scent intoxicating. Lying down on her sleeping mat, facing away from him to hide her blushing, she said nothing as the tension over him rose to a boiling point..

"Cassidy?" Sean went, facing the other way from her. "You got an extra blanket?"

".. y-you're out of luck." Her voice trembled, and Sean thought she was suffering from the cold. He huddled closer to her, and covered her with his blanket while bringing hers onto him, such that they resembled inadvertent lovers.

Up close, they could feel each other's bodies. Cassidy slid her hand to Sean's side, wanting to feel his chest and neck and how he radiated this gorgeous scent from his body heat, like ginger arising out of sand from a desert dimly-lit by a fading sunset. His reaction, like a delayed fuse, was electric as he jolted away from her like a panicked dog.

"Cassidy, what are you--" Sean was panting, but he soon caught the look in her eyes, that look where he knew she really wanted him. That dam which he'd been holding in for so long, it finally crumbled over, giving way to pure desire. His initial resistance gave way to curiosity, and his curiosity led him into kissing her through timid nibbles. The mere taste of her was more than enough, as they no longer felt the cold infringe upon their beings.

There was a song Sean knew, since he was young and before his little brother Daniel was born. In their intimacy, he sings a lullaby he recalls from his mami:

"It's gotta be love, sweet love
When you're near me
Ooh you make me happy, baby.."

How it made Cassidy blush all over, and how she took Sean's hand and cradled it upon her chest where her heart just leapt with pure joy. It was the sweetest love she'd ever known in her life, compared with when she had to struggle with her ex just to squeeze out an ounce of affection from his overly-controlling ass.

The next day, she saw Sean smiling. All the cows were herded by the grass fields, munching happily on the snowdew-laden vegetation - there was nothing else to do. Only thing is to sit back and enjoy life: Cassidy showed Sean a lake she'd discovered by wandering around. Sean had brought his scrapbook for lulls in this job, not expecting to include a nude Cassidy in those blank pages. He sketched her as she stripped off her shirt and bra - he'd sketched those video game babes in risque poses, but it filled him with an electric anxiety over the thought of anyone else seeing this art.

Cassidy was a perfect fit wading in the icy waters, and she beckoned Sean over: "See, the water's not so bad. You just have to take the plunge, and your body soon gets used to it." Her air of self-confidence was infectious, and Sean - plucking the notebook down - he was nervous taking off his sweater. She found this adorable (we're only human after all) and wading by the shoreline she helped him into the mysterious waters where slowly, he overcame the cold for her.

Against the backdrop of those snow-covered trees, nothing else mattered. He was here and so was she. The lake rippled as they danced across from one shoreline to the next, and the campfire felt so rewarding after what felt like an eternity too short for satisfaction.

When their last day came, Cassidy gave him her number - it just felt too awkward for her to ask for his, knowing how much she'd be calling him. The foreman paid them both a handsome amount, the weather and all things considered. She accompanied Sean by the bus stop where their conversation felt like one long, awkwardly-expressed goodbye, as she felt her chest well up with so many unspoken emotions that a single hug could not express.

As Sean disappeared from her life, Cassidy's chest ached with so much pain that she dry-heaved on her knees, alone in a destitute alleyway where her tears burned in solitude.

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Fiat Lux / 20

2023-06-26T18:22:10Z

Pino finds the steel chair too hard to sit on. Its brusque, rust-tinged edges almost seem to cut into her thighs. The shrill ringing of a telephone punctuates the soundscape of typewritten records - Pino sees the two detectives pass her by. She wonders if her family is going to be put in jail. It leaves her sad, thinking of her mom and dad, behind bars.

"I'm hungry.." Pino goes.

One of the detectives glances at an officer, who grabs a box of timbits off the fat, snoring clerk's plate and smacks it down by the tableside near her. How rude; Pino would think the police would be nicer people.

Still, she tries munching on the half-eaten chocolate pieces. Mmmph, tasty.

The fan's blades hover over the table. Lil's gaze is fixated on the rotational gleam the fan makes from the reflection, like the axles of a train. Gazing out the window at the sunset offers her little comfort; the freedom she's once known would easily turn into a torment.

She had little choice in the driver's death.. would she have been comfortable just hiding her family in the shadows? Possibly waiting an eternity for another car, while leaving her Pino at the mercy of the night's coldness?

She never meant to kill him. Intentions are like the devil – they drive you to action through promises, and if it goes horrible, no one would care that you meant only for the best. It was that truck driver who had reported her. How else would the highway patrol have known to go directly for the trunk? Oh, life has its ways of exposing your weaknesses in ways you'd never expect..

Lil retreats to that corner of her mind, where she'd once served as inspector. What would she tell them when they start talking to her? That the driver was under Antonioni's thrall? It would be opening up a can of worms, revealing the whole story about being under target by an old enemy.

From experience, she knows if the detectives have an agenda, they're not going to care about understanding her situation. (She's guilty of this herself, having accused people prematurely in her early investigations.)

It might be better to stay quiet..

With the door's creak, both detectives emerge. One is Paola, with microbladed eyebrows and a soft face which betrays shades of stern intensity. The other is Johnson, with his stocky frame and thin-framed glasses. They take seats right beside Lil, on either side of her like they're already good friends.

"¿Así que tienes una familia?" Paola goes.

Lil raises an eyebrow - not understanding a word.

"What my colleague means is, you have a daughter -" Johnson flicks his cigar into his mouth, slicing the top off it in automatic motion. "Pino. We passed her by, and she looks mightily unhappy. She must miss you already."

Lil winces. Pino.. how dare they use her against me!

A hint of a smile comes across Johnson. "We can make things go by in a pinch," he goes. "This wouldn't take more than five minutes with your cooperation. All you need to do is promise you'll answer honestly. Agreed?"

"About what?" Lil goes, her eyes shifting. "I'm not talking without a lawyer."

Paola talks with Johnson in hasty Spanish, like Lil isn't even here.

"You have your rights – Lillián Mayer, is that right?" Johnson pulls out his file folder to double-check, and Lil, letting her curiosity get the better of her, leers over to see a glimpse of what they've put on her record. She catches an apocyphal mention of a bludgeoned butler.

When Johnson looks up at her, she says "Lil. Yeah." They haven't even addressed the elephant in the room. Maybe they're trying to see what I'm willing to say before the subject is officially broached?

"Lil. If that's what you prefer. We can get you a lawyer – it will take time to find a court-appointed public defender. Possibly until tomorrow. We'll put you in a cell overnight if it takes that long – perhaps we'll ask Pino about what happened.."

Lil slams the table. "Enough with the mind games!"

"Tranqulio.." Paola says. "Johnson, esta perra está empezando a perder la compostura-"

"Hey!" Lil goes. "You think you can get away with talking about me cause I don't know Spanish, but I know enough that whatever style of interrogation you're practicing here in this shantytown, you're not going to make any headway with me this way."

Paola and Johnson exchange glances.

"There is no need to yell, Lil," Johnson goes, politely putting the folder away like a doting principal in front of a troublemaking kid. "You and your family are caught in a situation. An undeniable fact. We're not accusing you of anything – for all we know, you might have been unlucky and borrowed the wrong car that night-"

"He was going to kidnap us," Lil says, finally breaking the tension. "We were fleeing from our residence – we got a warning from an old friend, the mafia were going to attack my family, and so.."

"El mafia?" Paola goes. Her eyebrow raised, she mutters something to Johnson.

"Go on."

"We tried to hitchhike.. this driver was the one who picked us up. He was rude and somewhat creepy.. we stopped for a bathroom break, and I overheard him talking on the radio about bringing us over for payment- his mother's chemo-therapy. So, we.. knocked him out."

"By 'we knocked him out,' what do you mean?"

Lil closes her eyes, recalling that it was Pino who struck that fatal blow.. her gut is reeling from the thought of having pushed her daughter into murder.

"Vincent held the driver from behind, and I tried hitting him with the beer bottles. He was going to chew through Vincent's wrists-"

"Lillián," Paola says. "He is dead. The autopsy says he died from head trauma.."

An involuntary 'No' leaves Lil's lips.

"We can put you in for five years," Johnson says. "Involuntary manslaughter, if you admit that your confession is, to the word of God, true."

Lil finds the room's full-frame interrogation mirrors, reflecting herself, alone among an infinite regress of light and shadows, and enroaching darkness in its abyssal depths of reflecting everything – that nothing which permeates the pauses between your breaths.

".. what about Vincent?"

He'd thought he'd never find the taste of cigarette vapour soothing, but his nerves are shot from spending an entire night without sleep. Vincent coughs from the first puff, all while the nicotine already works its magic in his lungs – a wake-up call in his nerves. He coughs the vapours out in spurts, and it's far from the glamourous imagery of those noir serials. Still, he's thankful for the pack of Fortunas left on the table. Its musky aroma is as familiar to him as those morning visits to the bustling cafe, where you're greeted by smoke and coffee.

The shades are pulled over the window. From the rough manner which the officers have hauled him into this room, he is too intimidated to pull the blinds open. Anything a victim of contempt does could become reason for offense, so the only thing which illuminates is the lamplight, hovering over the table..

In a sudden thud, Vincent is blinded. He squints – they have switched the lighting on, full blast. He briefly catches the faint afterimage of a strangely familiar woman in the hall of mirrors, before the door slams open.

Paola smashes down a chair behind Vincent, while Johnson puts his rugged butt on the other side of the table, where it sags.

"Vincent Law," Johnson goes. "The five-time winning poker maestro. I'd bet a quarter of my life savings on you, every time! You never disappoint!"

"Gee, thanks," Vincent scoffs.

"Still not enough to keep me off this day-to-day work, sonnyjim. You've been caught with a body in the trunk. The actual owner of the car you were in. The last thing we'd expect is finding you in this mess – even though you've started a family of your own. That's where I get to tell you, 'I'm very disappointed in you, Vince.'"

"Are you going to put me on blast over that drunkard?" Vincent says. He feels the laser-stare of Paola, boring into his skull. "Did you talk with Lil already?"

"She said you held him from behind. We've found some blood from the driver's mouth which matches yours."

"We were under pursuit by Antonioni.."

A beat.

"Antonioni.." Johnson says, leaning off the poor table. "He's a big fish. We've tried nabbing his family for racketeering and gambling, but always, he eludes our grasp, the witnesses always vanish – or they kill themselves for no reason.. why would he go after you?"

Vincent sees the mirrors' infinite reflections, imagining the thought of Lil behind bars, of Pino alone. But a voice whispers to him that he's found the upper hand on these cops. In the depths of the mirror.. where the spotlight finally shines upon his face, illuminating his state of ignorance while the blue curtains, glimmering as they undulate, pull back to reveal the tall woman who's lurked beneath his awareness.

Amidst the morass of velvet flowers and vines, she waters the dried patches, holding her palm out and bringing a renewed order to the network of neural connections.

- It was you who was guiding me!

- What? I merely prodded you along to where you needed to be. It could have happened a thousand different ways over, the way your life unfolded, and yet, here you are. You have Lil, and you have Pino. And you're still alive, at least, for now.

- Why am I here, though?

- Because I willed it. Out of one chance encounter, when you had nowhere else to turn to for resources, I've kept you safe, in here.

The lady points to her head, while her other hand hovers over her heart.

- All this is my reality, and you are treading though my dreams. Softly, or however crudely you choose, you're always here.

- .. is there anything beyond this?

Vincent has only a faint inkling of the life he's had before. He knows this out of pure instinct. But trying to remember is like recalling a word – or a name – which is beyond the tongue's grasp. Even trying to talk with her has the efficacy of a fever-pitched clarity.

- Nothing of any value. You want to return to your family – to Lil and Pino, don't you? Let me tell you a secret..

Vincent ventures forward, enticed by what the lady promises. He feels the softness of the flowers under his feet, a cushion which caresses the skin with nectar.

- It is an improbability that a lawyer shall appear in the room you're in, let alone a lawyer who'd really care enough to aid you. But what is available is information, which shall appear at your feet like a long-lost memory, and what you will do is ask for total immunity in regards to Antonioni. It will protect your family from legal trouble, over the past transgressions you've committed.

- Immunity?

- Yes. There are two types of immunity: use immunity, and transactional. The former will only protect your testimony from being used against you in a court of law. The latter will save your family.

- And what will happen afterward?

- Good luck-

"Before I tell you that," Vincent goes, "I want immunity for my family. And not the cheap kind where it's just for this driver, but for everything that has to do with me and Antonioni. Transactional immunity."

Johnson gives it a moment. He looks at Paola, who is non-plussed about the turn of events. "Consider it done, Vince."

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Fiat Lux / 19

2023-05-17T04:27:56Z

Nowe and Vincent haul the wooden paddleboat, trudging along the shoreline to the waters. It gets easier when the boat finds traction with the ocean – Vincent calls out for Lil and Pino to hop on board.

He's anxious about the boat's ability to stay afloat with all their weight; it felt like it was on the verge of sinking when Vincent once tried riding it with a pregnant Lil. He'd all but forgotten about it until Nowe suggested the idea of doubling back onto the waters.

When he tries hopping on after lifting Pino up into Lil's arms, the boat almost tips over..

"Aaghh!" Vincent fumes, holding onto the lip of the boat.

At the same time, Nowe spots some headlights approaching, caressing the residence in an outline of harsh light.

"You have to go - now!" he says.

Lil clutches onto Vincent's hands, as if trying to cherish what could be their last moments together. In her adrenaline-filled thoughts, an idea hits her: "Vince.. are you fine holding onto the boat's edge?"

"I am. It's just.. c-cold.."

Lil puts Pino on the boat's opposite end, and the boat seems to hold its own. Then she grabs both of the paddles, and starts rowing.

"Nowe," she says, "thank you.."

"Just go!"

She frowns, even knowing his curtness is justified. As the boat goes into the distance, Lil sees Nowe shrink back into the household – while she feels Pino's arms tugging at her, she makes a silent prayer for Nowe's well-being.

In the house, it is stark without the warmth of family. Nowe pulls out his cerberus pistol, and dims the LED setting so the pistol doesn't give itself away. He stands by the wall by the television, his gun pointed out – and poses himself still like a statue, waiting to strike.

Unless you were really listening for it, you'll never know that the house is surrounded by mafiosos. Their footsteps are dim, without so much a hushed whisper.

Nowe spots the outlines of the men, just outside the kitchen window. They're cutting through the mesh, and are gently prying up the windowsill – he clutches his pistol, no doubt leaving so much sweat in his white satin gloves.

When they clamber inside, Nowe controls his breathing. He lets them stalk past into the living room, where he can get clean shots on the both of them..

After two flashes, he hears the collapse of a body, violently knocking over the glass table. It was then that all hope for total stealth is lost, as he hears the men outside agitated, expecting a shooter, their Sicilian tones crying for retaliation.

Nowe strides over to the second floor, where he finds the bedroom of Lil and Vincent. He hides under the mattress, brushing aside Lil's makeup bags and hearing the clatter of her lipstick, rolling on the hardwood.

His gun is held out. His thoughts race over where he'll move, as soon as he'll knock out the ones coming over.

Nowe is met with a tense silence.

Then he hears the march of heavy footsteps, up the stairs. His eyes wince, as a part of him senses it is Antonioni himself - no one else walks with such a pompous gait in a gunfight.

".. Nowe!" Antonioni says, remaining in the halls. "Something for your consideration.."

The click of a radio.

Nowe strains his ears – he hears what sounds like his own family, in whimpers, as Sicilian voices on the other end order the use of a scalpel on the girl's face, and then – screams.

"Your heart yearns to protect others, but I fear you may be saving the wrong people -"

"Stop!" Nowe shouts, recognizing his sister. "Antonioni! Tu bastardo!"

"I can stop it," Antonioni goes, as if jeering. "And every fibre of me wants to, if only you'd be so kind to tell me where our dear Vincenzo has gone."

The chills flood through Nowe's body: a guilt torn between two loves. He winces – imagining the joy of exploding Antonioni out of his old age, but as he remembers those years, growing up, knowing Eris's smiles and her laughter..

Nowe tosses his pistol by the doorway, with a light clatter.

"For the love of God, please – leave my family alone." He says this in heaving sobs.

Antonioni's men raise their torches on Nowe, blinding him. To stare back at the mob boss is like staring at the sun. Nowe goes down on his knees, much to Antonioni's satisfaction.

"Good."

In any other night, the starlit peace would be the cherry-on-top of rowing along the coast. But here, Lil feels her arms burning – the paddles steadily weighing heavy as she feels her muscles tire from the exertion.

"I- I can't hold on any longer.." Vincent whimpers.

Lil snaps out of her melodic trance, and checks on Vincent. Poor thing, his face is so pale and she could make out he's on the verge of fainting. She shifts the boat towards the sandy coast, where she gets Pino's help in carrying him out.

Vincent is soaked, bearing the reek of those moments before it rains.

Lil takes off his clothes, stripping him down to his underwear. Then she lays herself atop of him – warming him up with her own body, as she holds and caresses his shivering arms.

"L-Lil," he says, "this is where we first drove into town.."

She looks around, seeing the same palm trees wavering in the night like those years ago. The spark of nostalgic rememberance leaves her feeling bittersweet – like it had been just yesterday when they sweetly made love after that escape.

Lil sees Vincent, and finding him so vulnerable, she kisses him in one gentle nibble. Even in his numb state, it's still enough to really flood his skin with euphoria, and he holds her closer, wanting more of her kiss..

He opens his eyes.

"Hi," he goes.

"Hello." Lil breaks a smile.

Pino sees them – oh, they're having a grown-up moment.

While Lil waits by the road, Pino recites the story of the three chipmunks back to Vincent – it's her turn now to read aloud to her dad. He's started a fire in the garbage can, just to keep them warm.

"The three chipettes blew the stove-top off," Pino goes, "and my, it made a scene. All the kittens wandered in from the alley, their noses smelling the nice meatballs they were cooking. Brittany could hear them all mewling out the window – it was a horde of kittens, all of them hungry, awaiting with open eyes for some food."

"Oooh," Vincent says.

Pino grins, feeling proud of entertaining her daddy. "Brittany didn't know what to do. But Jeanette was smart enough to call the Milkman over, and when the truck drove by, full of milk, the kitties chased after it under the moonlit night.

"Finally, they were able to cook spaghetti. Brittany was so hungry, she went through three plates – Eleanor had hers with a lot of cheese pieces, and Jeanette watched the TV as she ate. It was a lot of dishes they had to wash, but boy, were they full!"

Vincent breaks into a chuckle, as he fetches his clothes which had dried over the improvised bonfire.

By the roadside, Lil shouts for the attention of the oncoming truck driver -

"Halp! Stop!"

The truck is too busy carrying its load of steel slabs to notice. Lil sighs; they can't stay here for long. It might be possible that Nowe had fended them all off, but it's not an idea she wants to entertain – Antonioni isn't one to be deterred by that boy's plucky spirit alone.

A car comes by. This time, pulling over for Lil.

"You look lost, lady," the driver goes – his grizzly beard has some cracker pieces on it.

"We need a lift outta town."

"We?"

"I have a family – it's a long story. We just need a ride out." Lil calls Vincent and Pino over. The driver studies them: they sure look harmless enough. With a willingness in his eyes:

"Hop in."

Vincent, still shirtless, falls asleep by the back, despite the abundance of disposed beer bottles. Pino stays wary, taking a dislike to the lingering stench of cheap alcohol. "Pee-yeu! It stinks!"

"I know," the driver goes, "thanks for reminding me, I really ought to clean this up sometime.."

"Pino!" Lil snaps. "Let's try to stay polite."

"Okay, Lil-Lil.."

Lil keeps herself awake chatting with the driver – it's nice to relieve pent-up stress in a conversation, though she is careful not to mention the danger of being under pursuit by Antonioni. Otherwise he'll have second thoughts about helping them, or worse, sell them out to the mob. If you've been alive long enough, you'll know how regular people, despite all apperances, can and will cave in towards acts of total pettiness, given enough pressure.

"Is he your hubby?" the driver goes. "He looks wasted.."

"He's been out swimming for a while. He's not the kind of guy who'd get drunk for fun, usually." Lil flashes a little blush, standing up for her sleeping husband.

"What about you?" the driver asks. "Do you party? You look like you'd be kind of wild when you let yourself go.."

"Ask me that again, I'll give your cheeks a party to remember."

"Okay, okay, well! I totally respect that, dig!"

The car veers by the hilly forest, when Pino calls out that she has to go pee. "Please, pretty please, I need to go.."

It doesn't escape Lil how the driver flashes a brief look of exasperation. He pulls over to the side, and Lil wakes up Vincent-

"Huh, are we here already?"

"No, it's just a washroom break. I'm going with Pino.. I think you should come too, cause it doesn't seem like there'll be another chance."

Lil follows Pino and Vincent down, climbing over the wildlife fence down the hill – where it's in total shadow. Her breaths shudder out in wispy vapours, while behind her, the driver is enjoying a cigar break near his car's high beams. For some reason, she feels elated just to be out of that musty car; the pine woods and shrubbery whisper unintelligible secrets that only the night comprehends.

A thought crosses her mind. While she hears Vincent and Pino in the distance, she decides to clamber back up to see what the driver does, when he thinks no one is looking.

She watches the driver pull out a walkie-talkie radio. He steps inside, shutting the door, and Lil strains herself to hear:

"You were right. They were right near the beach when I found them. Listen, I'm doing a pit stop cause the girl had to go for a piss.. you promised me the ninety thousand on arrival, yeah? I want a raise, give me $120,000. Yeah? My fuckin' mother is undergoing chemo-therapy, and I'm struggling with the bills as-is man, now gimme the raise or you'll never get to see these people."

Lil could not make out who was talking on the other end, but she's heard enough to know the driver means no good. As Vincent and Pino emerge from the bushes, Lil rushes down to them:

"I've overheard him," she says. "He's delivering us to Antonioni."

"Whaat?"

"Lil, is he a bad man?"

She solemnly nods – in trepidation over what they'll have to do. "We need his car.."

Lil escorts Vincent and Pino back into the headlights' visibility.

"Took you folks long enough-" The driver snuffs his cigar on the asphalt, but not before exhaling one last, massive puff of vapourized tobacco. "I want to be in town by the break of dawn, yo."

If the atmosphere in the car has changed, this time bearing a charged alertness, the driver doesn't appear to notice. Vincent is putting his shirt back on in the back seat, while Pino is kicking her legs in a sort of agitated rhythm.

"You folks seem like you've seen a bear down there or somethin'," the driver goes, pulling the car ignition. "What you all acting up-tight for, all of a sudden." The tension is borne high, as the driver tries to get the engine to turn over – Lil recalls how driving the Jaeguar would purr up on demand; that's truly a luxury car.

As soon as the car roars to life-

"Now!"

Vincent reacts, grabbing the driver's neck from behind in a chokehold.

Lil grabs one of the bottles and tries smacking the driver. Trying to knock the driver out isn't a pretty ordeal – amidst the driver's thrashing, Lil smacks the beer bottle's bottom upon the driver's face, expecting him to go out cold with each blow. She leaves bruises on his cheek, his brow, but even so, the driver is a rugged man, surprisingly deft; he latches onto her arms. "You naughty bitch!"

"Get him, Vince!" Pino shouts. "He's hurting Lil!"

The driver bites down hard on Vincent's wrists-

"AAaooouww!"

It's up to Pino! She tries doing what Lil does, which is to grab another bottle, and swiping the poor driver directly on the skull. The driver breaks free from Vincent, and he whips out a switchblade - nicking Lil by the shoulder.

But blood wells up in his eyes, crawling up to the irises like an infection.

The driver hits the driving wheel in an unconscious thud, all his body weight slumping over, and for the few awkward minutes before Lil is able to push his body outside, the car's horn is the only noise the highway hears.

"I'm hurt," Vincent goes, the teethmarks emitting gashes of blood through his sleeve. Thinking on her feet, Lil slices off a strip of her own dress using the driver's switchblade, and wraps that tightly over his wrist – adding a dainty knot at the end.

While Vincent recouperates, Lil enlists Pino's help carrying the driver over to the trunk.

"Is he dead, Lil?" Pino asks. "Did we kill him?"

"I hope we didn't.."

Lil lifts the trunk, where there's a bag of hunting gear. On the count of three, they roll his obese being into the compartment-

An incoming truck.

Lil struggles with packing the arms and legs, before she rushes to slam the trunk down. She hears the truck stopping; tensing, she turns around, facing the curious truck driver who's hopped out.

"Do ya need help with anything?"

"No.. no," Lil goes. "We just ran into some car trouble, that's all."

"Oh, okay. Cause it looks like you were packin' something heavy into your trunk-"

Her nerves are so shot – it's hard spinning a story when you've been battered by the night's ordeal. She looks over at Pino, who is fidgeting with her pockets.

"I thought you might have blown your tires out," the truck driver goes. "Maybe you could use a hand?"

"It's not the case at all," Lil says, nudging Pino to get back in the car. "Our luggage was wiggling around too much while driving. We're doing fine otherwise." She pulls off a smile, and the driver gives her a look, but he's convinced enough to head back and mind his own business.

Phew.. crisis averted.

Lil lets go of clenching up when she hops over by the driver's seat. She starts breaking down into tears..

"This is just too much," she goes. "I can't.."

Pino, who's by the passenger seat, goes over and hugs her.

"Lil – please don't cry," Pino says. "You've been so strong for all of us."

"It's just so much craziness over one night, and I- I can't believe we've reached this point where we had to beat that driver up.. Pino, please, I don't want you thinking that it's okay to do things like this to others. Okay? Promise me."

Pino pulls her pinky out with Lil – pinky promise.

"I can drive," Vincent goes.

The highway rolls on – every second, Vincent is grateful for the improvised wrapping Lil's put over his wrist, the pain dying down as the dawn paints the night away. The back seat, Lil sleeps, her breathing serene (she'd personally cleared out all the stray beer bottles, eugh!).

"I spy with my little eye.." Pino says, holding her head out the window for a cool feature in the desert. "Something green and spiky, and it has three prongs!"

"Hmmph, the cacti?"

"That's right!"

Pino is too excited about what the new town holds in store to keep sleeping. "Hmm, I spy.. with my little eye, something which goes 'Moooo!'"

Vincent is befuddled. There aren't any cows to be seen. "Cows?"

"You!" Pino grins. "Moooo!"

Vincent does his best impression of a cow, bellowing out his belly, and they both laugh.

But something catches his eye in the rear-view mirror: it's the green and violet flashes of the incoming highway patrol.

"Pino, look behind," Vincent goes. "It's the police." For a moment, Vincent half-wonders if the police are just merely passing by, before his question gets answered: the cruise blares its alarm, signaling to pull over.

Shiittt.. maybe we're flashing a broken light?

Vincent purrs the car aside, as Lil stirs.

"¡Apague su automóvil y salga del vehículo!"

Vincent has only the faintest inkling what the officer is saying out the cruiser's loudspeaker. He steps out, facing the cruiser and its blinding sirens.

"What's going on?" Vincent says, his hands raised.

The officer steps out: he's a bald, stocky fellow, with sweat gleaming off his head. He raises his pistol at Vincent. "¡Los otros pasajeros, sáquenlos!"

Pino shakes Lil back to reality, where it dawns on her that they might be in serious trouble. "We have to get out of the car, Lil."

So, when Pino and Lil hop out, a second officer corrals them, knocking Lil to the ground and thrusting handcuffs behind her back. Pino screams; though she tries fleeing, the second officer grabs her, lifting the girl onto his shoulders.

They're put into the cruiser's back; Pino huddles close to Vincent: "I'm scared.."

"Don't be - the police are supposed to be the good guys.. excuse me?" Vincent shouts past the grille. "What are we being arrested for?"

The officers ignore him, as they turn to the car's trunk. One of them heads over to the driver's side, popping the trunk open, and the other officer lifts it up, revealing the haggard corpse of the driver.

"Ayyy!" they shout, like they've found El Dorado.

Lil shudders. Look what you've done..

comments

Fiat Lux / 18

2023-05-09T04:23:13Z

Antonioni's lupara – an artisanal masterwork in execution – it hangs on the shelf of the limousine. The dim lighting gleams over the woodward stock, especially the silver braiding which decorates the spot above the trigger. His hands twitch, imagining the two-tiered sensation of pulling both triggers - one click which follows the other.

"Would you hand me two rounds of buckshot di radicalmente invasive?"

He half-expects his assistant, pulling out the ammo cabinet between his legs, to reply with a disappointing 'no.' But as luck has it, his assistant glees, passing him the remaining gold-plated shells.

"It's the last two, signor."

"Aah, very good."

He would have settled on using the knife, but as the years have worn on, he's grown a revulsion towards the delayed cruelty of butchering people like an uncivilized hunter. Perhaps it's the frailty of old age which has softened his nerves.

So the only question now.. who to take first? Justice is guaranteed to be an instantaneous affair when it's delivered by this gun. Should it be Lil? Let Vincenzo relish his last moments in anguish, allowing the one he loves to be ripped away.. or the other way around? The one who's left should be whoever deserves the real punishment. Seeing how Vincenzo has failed him twice – he'd given Vincenzo a chance to redeem himself – Antonioni pauses with this train of thought.

They have a child, Pino. Surveillence has let him know about how they'd started a family. Odds are, they've tried leaving behind the past.. especially their involvement with him.

A part of him feels for their young daughter. He doesn't have the heart to ruin her with the pain of losing both parents. But they must pay for the damage done; not only must his own family suffer the humiliation of losing at rigged poker, but on top of that, Bonanno has retaliated with war over the failed attempt at his life. It's a losing game.. the least he must do is this justice.

It can go like this: since it is Vincenzo who had primarily instigated this chain of events, he'll bear the full responsibility. He lifts the lapura from the stand, carefully.

The driver pulls up the coordinates of the Jaeguar.

It's by the sea.

Lil is preparing the dinner table – the meatballs still sizzle on the spaghetti plates (she'd tipped the delivery guy a good deal extra). She pulls the lighter to the candles, and it takes her a couple flicks from the quiver in her hands.

"It's so yummy..!" Pino is about to nab the first bite, but Lil swipes her hand off the fork.

Everything has to be perfect. Why? A good mood ensures the best chance that Vincent would hear her out.

The door pops open.

There's still soot under Vincent's eyes, but his usual routine of slugging his coat atop the couch is interrupted when he sees the beautiful set-up.

"Lil-?"

"You've been working hard, for all of our sakes. I figured we could treat ourselves out – it's Wester Friday."

It warms Lil's heart to see Vincent wolf down the spaghetti. If only she could learn cooking.. he tells her about how everyone at work was dancing, letting off some steam about being made to work overtime.

"What was the ceremony like?" he asks.

"Oh, it's a lot of dancing and singing-"

"We blew a huge bubble!" Pino goes. "It popped in everyone's faces!"

The dinner plates are all empty, and Lil puts them in the dishwasher. She looks at Vincent, who is tuned into the TV with Pino. When would be the time to tell him.. I can't keep what's happened after at the church a secret. I'll call him over in private.

"Vincent?" she goes. "There's.. something I need to let you know."

She calls him over, while Pino is absorbed by the animation.

"What is it Lil?" Vincent sees the bout of sadness in her eyes. "What's wrong?"

"I've.. had the church pastor come up to me. It'll sound like the most ridiculous thing to say.. he told me that Pino's the reincarnation of their holy saviour."

"Whaa-t?"

"He wants us to take Pino in with the church, to be raised as their messiah."

"That's just nonsense!" Vincent is fuming. "Pino's just an ordinary girl."

"Vince.. I also had this guy in white. He looked kind of familiar, for some reason. Right after the pastor spoke with me, he came over to Pino and scared her. I wasn't able to hear what he told her exactly, but it sounded like he was saying she's in some kind of danger. I took Pino into the car, and drove off – it was.. I felt overwhelmed."

"You did the right thing, Lil," he goes. "That's quite random, though. Why'd you say he looked familiar?"

"I think we've.. met before."

Vincent looks into her eyes, and as his thoughts froth, he has the recollection of hearing two deafening cracks upon that stage, with Lil (as Odeile) being shot by.. who was that kid? Could it be Nowe? No, it couldn't be. It's just a random creep who went over to Pino, that's all.

"Vincent, I'm starting to not like it here," Lil says, interrupting his reverie. "Maybe let's move somewhere else.."

"Nothing's perfect in this town," Vincent goes. "But let's keep some perspective: we've had it good since we moved here. People have been nice to us for the most part, compared with that other town. If it makes things better, let me go up to the church first thing tomorrow, and give Julius a piece of my mind. And that guy in white-"

Vincent smacks his hands together, as if kung-fu punching a wooden block into half. "Hi-yaaa!"

"Oh, Vincent.." Lil swoons. She falls into embracing him, into a feeling of reassurance as deep as those lavender fields she'd dreamed about. "Sometimes, I do let my emotions get the better of me.."

In her room, wearing her bunny one-piece, Pino puts the stranger's photo out on the little easel, with her desk lamp shining a spotlight over it. Her panda, Belle, wearing a top hat and cane from her doll outfit collection, is posed by the spooky image..

"We have gangsters on the loose!" Sergent Belle squeaks. "They're possessed and looking to frighten away our townspeople! Quick, I'm calling on you Rick to investigate!"

"Right away, aye-aye!"

Pino gets her Ricky doll to tap-dance towards the dollhouse.

"Excuse me, missus," Ricky goes, holding up the oversized picture to the lovely matron, Eggy. "I don't suppose you've seen these suspects around?"

"They're just terrible!" Eggy rests her hand upon her face, panicing in that melodramatic manner of those detective serials. "They've munched on all my pasteries, and now they're wreaking havoc by Betsy's saloon!"

"Come with me – this may be too big for me alone to handle; I could use a hand!"

Pino has the two hop on stuffed horses, and like Lil, they ride heroically across the carpet to the crime-in-progress.

The little saloon is a cardboard box, which Pino had painted daisies on and had Lil's help cutting out the windows. Now, Pino shakes the box to simulate the saloon in distress, and she tosses Ricky and Eggy inside the holes – she shakes the box harder, and some of its contents spill out, including plastic figurines, spoons, and a Victoria Saint plushie.

Finally..

"Gotcha!" Ricky goes, hauling out the dastardly villains responsible for the mess – the two muskrat ninjas.

"Aw shucks! You caught us!" they go, with the nasally timbre of a Brooklyn accent. "We was only trying to have fun!"

"It's off to jail with youse!" Ricky has the two of them in tow, as he lugs them back to the police station – zippity-zip!

"Richard!" Eggy blushes, kissing Ricky all over his face- "You'll always be my hero!"

"I couldn't have done it without you, Eggy.."

Vincent inches the bedroom door open. Through the crack, he watches her play, adoring the way she brings everything around her surroundings to life – the power of a child's imagination. He imagines her growing up into an accomplished artist; how proud he'd be of her! Then he nudges forth into her playspace.

"Pino," he says, "what sort of trouble did you put Richard into?"

She perks her head up - the bunny ears droop over her back.

"He's been looking for these two dastardly muskrats," Pino goes, as she lays her Ricky on the ground. "They made such a huge mess in the saloon, look!" She points at the box, whose contents have spilled out onto the floor.

"Wow -" Vincent acts on his urge to help Pino clean up the assortment of lain toys and trinkets, however amazing the scene may look to her mind's eye. "They sure had their fill. Let's try to clean this up, alright? I don't want you tripping over poor ol' Betsy when it's lights out."

"Okey!"

Pino scrambles, putting back the Victoria Saint plushie. Soon, the toys are tucked away in the saloon's rooms, and Vincent gives her a gentle pat on her head, before hugging her with all of his heart.

"It's almost bedtime," he goes, before his eyes fall upon the easel, with the photo lying in wait. "Wait- what's this.."

Even before he turns the lamp on, he feels the back of his scalp tingle – as if knowing what the photo has in store already. When he's able to make out the black and white silhouettes of the mobsters, recognizing Antonioni among them – he feels his gut lurch, as now he picks the photo and scrutinizes its details with the alertness granted by a mounting panic.

The table which has their current address on it.. the way the caporegimes are stern, as if having ordered a death sentance.

"Pino.. where did you find this picture?"

"A strange man showed it to me outside of church today. He said he knew my mom.. and that his name was Nowe.."

Nowe. The innocent boy who wanted to free his family from Bonanno's clutches. He's alive and well after all..

"What else did he say!?"

"He said that we're in danger. Mama told me he's a loony.."

Vincent picks Pino up, as he looks out the window – the moonless sea roaring with a receding tide. "We have to move, Pino- Lil!"

As he carries Pino out to the hall, he calls out for Lil, with each cry more desperate than the last.

"Lil! Where are you?"

He hears the flushing of a toilet – Lil staggers out of the washroom to meet him. "Did something happen with Pino?"

"It's Antonioni.. I think he's coming to get us."

"Antoni- that old geezer? Impossible! Where's this coming from?"

Then Vincent procures the photo. "It was Nowe, Lil. From Bonanno's party. He tried to warn us earlier.."

Lil takes the photo, and without really looking at it, realises how it spells an ill-omen, and how everything clicks together from an abstract anxiety into a concrete doom.

"No, I – that's why I had such a weird feeling!" Lil exclaims. "Vince, I'm so sorry.. I didn't realise it earlier."

"It's alright.. is the Jaeguar parked outside?"

The doorbell rings.

Vincent hands Pino over to Lil, and tells them to stay in the shadows, as he finds a nearby weapon – a metallic water bottle that's left on the counter. He approaches the front door, wreathed in the night's shadows, his heart beating rapidly, a fear whelming his nerves, treating the door like an entryway to uncertain hell.

Upon the second ring, he hears a familiar soft-toned voice:

"Vince, Lil – if you can hear me, please open up!"

Vincent hurriedly swipes the door open, and hauls the fellow in by the collar. Nowe – he's still dressed in the same white suit as earlier. He brushes his chest off, as if negating the insult of being hauled in so abruptly, while he turns the lights on like a courtesy.

"Nowe! How did you find us here?" Vincent goes, while Lil and Pino inch out from the corner.

"It's the car you've stolen from Bonanno. It's equipped with a homing device.. listen, I'm real sorry about scaring you so earlier. But now, you only have precious few minutes left. Antonioni's in town already.. he's on his way here. He'll stop at nothing if it means your heads."

Lil has Pino huddled in her arms, rocking her to and fro – as if hoping to calm both their spirits down.

"You.. you shot me!" she goes. "Vincent, I still don't trust him. This could be a ruse to bait us into trouble."

"I won't blame you for that sentiment." Nowe spits those words out of his core. "Ever since that one night, I've asked myself whether it was the right thing to have raised the gun towards you – I knew I was going to lose.. even though I wanted so badly the chance to be with you. Even now, I still feel my heart coveting you. You are out of this world, Lil. It was Vincent who won the duel, because after all, your heart was already tied to him.."

Lil winces, his penetrating grasp of her affinity with Vincent. "Why are you really here?"

A tear escapes out Nowe's eye.

".. I want to save you."

comments

Fiat Lux / 17

2023-04-18T04:33:55Z

Amidst the birds' chirping, the bells resound, heralding the cermony's end. Some leaves rest upon the pavement, lightly tustling under the brisk breeze as the churchgoers walk out the archway's steps.

Among them, Lil can still taste the soapy sweetness on her lips. It was a really big bubble they've blown earlier, and it burst in a splash which covered everyone with 'holy' residue, oh my. Her hair tustles in the wind..

I should attend church more often. It's so much fun.

"What'll we have for lunch?" Pino asks, hopping along in her pink-and-blue attire. "I want some more Spaghetti-Os! Vince makes 'em taste soo nice-"

Lil once tried frying some meatballs on her own – somehow, she ended up with fireballs. It was not pretty.

"Let's get take-out, shall we? I hear Spachiini's making some good pasta." She'll save rehearsing her culinary skills for another day.

"Lil?"

It's Julius. Looking like he's spent himself on a basketball court, he wipes his brow.

"Hey," Lil goes, while Pino wanders off by the flowerbeds.

"You're still new to our neighbourhood, and I want to take this time to tell you how much we appreciate your presence here. Your daughter Pino is so well-mannered."

"Thanks." A glance at Pino, pulling out her dolls and it makes her blush. "I've been really enjoying myself here."

"It's part of our great tradition. If you're not having any fun, you won't know God."

The bells have struck their last.

While everyone else has gone, there is Nowe, waiting by a nervous distance from the two of them. Should he step in now to warn her? It's a matter of life and death for this beautiful lady he once fought over with Vincent – but he feels anything this important would need her full, requited attention. Especially because he's been the unlucky one who's still a stranger to her, by virtue of pure chance. He can wait..

"What's at hand is Fate itself," Julius goes. "You've arrived here to live a new life with your lover. Little did you know, you may have vindicated our many years of waiting.."

Lil stares at him, unsure.

"I've looked you and Vincent up in the news: he was once a poker champion, you were a model. An unlikely pair. If I may be so bold, you have.. fallen for him – both posing as characters beset by evil men, placed on a mission where your paths have intertwined.. only for you to see past each others' facades and when you've least expected it, found love."

How does he know that? She looks as if she's just had her clothes ripped away.

"Jonas 2 : 45."

Her eyes flutter. ".. you think my daughter is your saviour!?"

"Lil—" The hand Julius rests on her shoulder is of little comfort to her. "Life – your life isn't by blind chance; it has a purpose. The soul which inhabits your body strives for fulfillment. You've already found it in meeting Vincent.. and now, your daughter bears us all a wonderful gift. In her stout heart, the gift of hope!"

Lil glances at Pino, with the newfound shock of revelation shooting in her mind. It can't be. She's not going to be some pawn who's been played into this sick prophecy – there has to be something else! There must!

"You're lying! Who the hell are you to tell me who my daughter is going to become-"

But Julius hushes her, and in her silence, it dawns on her the overall sense of confusion with all the events which has led her to Vincent, and up to now. As if there had been an inexplicable, magnetic pull, which she obeyed and it brought her to this point.

"It's not something we expect you to accept right away. Sooner or later, you must be told this great news. Now, you can take the time to reflect upon what you've gone through, and if you sincerely believe we've made a mistake, that you're not anything except a mere extra in this tale, you can feel free to town-top again. Maybe you'll find better welcome than what we've offered you. But when you've come to decide what's right for Pino, we'll await you both with open arms."

The breeze envelops the two of them, and the chill dives deeply into her nerves, as the leaves are blown clear from the pavement.

"Just leave me alone, please.."

Julius departs – looking upon her gazing away in thought, feeling satisfied that the idea is planted in her mind, already taking root. The bells ring again, hollowly echoing in Lil's chest.

Pino has her petite fingers wrapped around her two dolls. There's Agatha, who has a raspberry beret and likes her tea dabbed, not stewed. Tea-time is especially nice when you're under the sunflower bed. Then there's Ricky, who has a fluffy basketball that's attached to his hand by a little spring. If you wind his turn-key up, the basketball ricochets back and forth, and you can make him do a slam-dunk anywhere he goes.

"Do you want more tea, Miss Eggy?" Pino goes, a slight British accent, lowering her voice to suit Ricky's gentlemanly nature.

"With as many orange peels as you can plop in my cup!" (high-pitched)

"Consider it done!"

She dabs Ricky's basketball – it's orange – into the little porcelain cup (dab dab dab!) then gets him to lay the cup nicely onto Agatha's lap. It's a really cute scene, which Pino plays out under the sun. But a shadow crosses upon her, creeping on the delicate facial features of the dolls..

Since being shot and knocked into a coma, Nowe's shortened his mullet into a sharper, slicked-back haircut, with the fleur-de-lis signet on his lapel a recent addition to his wardrobe. He can still feel a deep, chafing ache in his chest from where the pellet had struck him, especially if he arches his shoulders forth.

"My name is Nowe – you must be Pino. I've seen you blowing bubbles with the other girls on stage. You must be truly blessed, indeed."

In a polite bow, his hand is outstretched, and Pino shakes it giddily.

"Nowe! I like your name."

"I knew your mother from the other town.. she's still the beauty I've always remembered her to be." He shakes his head, as if brushing aside a silly impossibility. "Never mind. You are in danger, Pino. Your mum and dad especially. You must find someplace to run away."

"W-why? D-don't say such scary things!" Pino says, huddling her dolls closer. "We're not in danger. There are no spiders here!"

As if needing to say things which go beyond words, Nowe lurches forth, reaching his inner pocket. The collection of photos unfurl in his hand. Black-and-white snippets of Antonioni's underlings, who have been caught planning the re-capture of Lil and Vincent, down to their address pinpointed on the map. Nowe has taken great pains, ingratiating himself with the rivaling Spaccatelli family for the sake of finding out what's happened since the party.

All of this would have been lost on little Pino, as she doesn't recognize any of the faces. Only that these photos look eerie, with all of their faces sharing in common that same sullen look, the pruned cheeks sunken over the skull from being all too used to inflicting submission, at any cost.

"Not spiders.. from these wicked men."

Already, Pino is looking to turn away back to Lil, at a total loss over this newfound intrusion into her life whose darkness falls past a child's comprehension.

"Pino!?" Lil rushes by her daughter's side, picking her up. "What are you doing with her?!" The funny feeling she's had in the sermon hall, now bears a deeper foreboding as she finally sees the source of her worries. A faint ember of recognition stirs in her though, where his face which has now lost most of the hallmarks of youthful innocence. But this gets lost on her though, when she sees Pino crying.

"Mommy, I'm scared-"

Nowe stands, dignified. "I don't have time to introduce myself again, but if you're to save yourself and your family, you must do what I say. There's not much time – the Familia are already on their way here.."

Lil shakes her head, only half-listening as she carries Pino away. She's heard enough crap for the day, and she's not about to have any more of it – not from this oddly well-dressed weirdo, anyway.

The more Nowe protests, the more Lil dismisses his ravings as that of a lunatic, as she tucks Pino in the safety of the Jaeguar's passenger seat. She jerks the ignition, thanking the reliability of whirring to life in an instant after all these years, and hauls away back home, wheels screeching. The figure of Nowe shrinking in the rear-view mirror, still standing with an outstretched arm, as if in a last, desperate pleading for her to turn back..

Lil's fingers tremble over the steering wheel, as she fights the urge to cry with Pino around. Her thoughts reverberate, as if she's juggling what to really believe about the metaphysical dilemma they're in, now that the illusion of total happiness has been irrevocably shattered. Or what she should tell Vincent when he gets back home.. if she should even tell him as he arrives, bearing this half-tired look in his eyes where he only wants to relax his exertions away by the open TV.

I don't know what to do..

As she stops by an intersection, she plugs the radio – drumming her hands on the wheel, humming along to the Southern Freeez. Anything to distract from her newfound fugue state.. how about some ice cream.

From her pocket, Pino pulls out one of Nowe's photos. She's nabbed it as it slipped from Nowe's hand when he'd been distracted by Lil. Now, holding the glossy print in her little hands with the same wide-eyed novelty as the clover necklace's dazzling green hues. On TV, they'd play these spooky detective serials.. that's what Pino can try out! Ricky can play the detective, and Miss Eggy can be the poor victim whose beautiful clover treasure has been stolen!

She looks out the window. The car isn't going the usual way home..

One of Lil's favourite flavours is strawberry, with a whipped vanilla topping. She gets Pino some fudge chocolate at the counter also.

The chocolate is gooey and delectable, and it makes Pino so happy, while the drive leads them both to a new neighbourhood they haven't been before, with one-storey flats and rows upon rows of trees, entwined with electrical poles. Entranced, Lil drives, obeying an autopilot without a destination.

Soon.. a clearing where a playground awaits in its solitude, when the residents are out from home. Lil parks the Jaeguar's wheels somewhat too close to the curb.

The grass concedes under Lil's heels - the tall strands caressing her nyloned feet.

"Let me push you," she whispers. "Here, I'll help you onto the swing."

Pino wiggles her legs into the sockets, before Lil passes her back the half-melted fudge cone. She licks some of the melted chocolate off from her fingers, briefly sharing the same joy with Pino in its sweetness.

"Are you ready?" Pino nods back at Lil, and the smile her daughter gives dissolves what remaining grief lies in her heart. "Make sure you don't drop your cone!"

And from the playground's forlorness, tenderness. With each swoop of the swing, Pino's giggles get carried by the wind, as Lil dutifully settles into a rhythm, bearing a faint smile which is all she could muster against that looming uncertainty.

"Mama," Pino goes, after finishing her ice cream, "why were you sad?"

The pushes stop.

"Because—" Lil's breaths go in a shudder. "I love you so much.."

She takes Pino back up, and holds her.

"I don't know what's about to happen," Lil goes. "But I won't let anyone hurt you. No matter what, you're my little dear angel, you'll always be my angel, Pino. A part of me – a part of Vincent, will always be.. here.."

With a finger, Lil touches Pino's chest. Right away, it's as if Pino is whisked away in Vincent's arms again, in the air flying among the clouds, and she closes her eyes in Lil's sweet embrace, knowing how much she is loved.

From the giant furnace, the molten steel showers into the casket, in an inferno of sparks and steam. The heat wave is massive and unbelievable, shimmering the air into gyrating distortions. Vincent, in his mask and full-body suit, is soaked in sweat.

Among Pablo and his other co-workers, who work with a particular grace under the enormous pressure of delivering today's quotas, Vincent helps prepare the last batch of the alloy. Noting the casket's pressure level on the kiosk's gauge, he strides along the catwalk to the valves, where he spins his arms, feeling his joints ache from the chronic stress as the casket's sluice gates slide open.

From out the hatches, the molten alloy is funneled along a network of troughs, sludging forth into the confines of cylindrical processing units. They'll process the steel into buttery-smooth slabs and billets, accordingly, where they'll then be shipped off.

As Vincent stretches, he's poked from behind. He turns; Pablo is taking advantage of the slight pause in the workflow to re-enact the dance with the others. Though Vincent has been concentrating hard for the entire day, it's a much-needed moment of light-hearted relief, as he only thinks of going home – bearing the satisfaction of overtime pay, and extra vacation hours.

As well, on the up-town road, a limousine revs, its piercing xenon headlights leering forth over the hill, before the car shirks back – a stalker who contemplates its prey before once more dipping into the cowardice of obscurity..

"Dios mio!" Pablo goes, walking with Vincent out to the pick-up zone. "When I be gettin' home, I'm going to be taking the longest, most satisfying shit of my whole life – gawd-damn!"

Even after all these days working, Vincent could never get over hearing the after-ringing of such a noisy environment. The clanging, the shrieking, as if he's grown a permanent indentation of the industrial soundscape in his eardrums.

"We should celebrate, meng," Pablo says, while Vincent waits for the omni-cab. "I gotta take you out for some Paella, and you're gonna come home to wifey – she'll be begging you to take her for a ride, just one night.. another night, another dream it's always you.. it's gonna feel so good."

Vincent chuckles, while emitting a hint of a scoff. "Not tonight, I'm afraid. I gotta make it up to Pino for missing out on her baptism. A rain-check on your offer, though!"

"Damn meng, the boys were really hoping you'd show."

"Sorry to disappoint."

With the sun disappearing behind the mountains, the clouds blanket everything in that meditative transition towards the night. From up on the road, the omni-cab arrives. Its headlights pour over the pallid fences and detritus, arriving for Vincent to take home.

comments

Fiat Lux / 16

2023-04-09T19:08:56Z

So, Pino is showered with gifts – there's banquets of peach tarts, bowls filled with meat turnovers and cheese pies called pirozhki and vatrushki (baked by the cook just hours ago). On the top of this heap, they've left the empty baskets wrapped with pink ribbons. Lil is left ablush from everyone's kindness.

At the fair, she feeds Pino small pieces of peach tart. It's so sweet - she knows it because she's tasted it already, so it's a delight when her toddler munches on them all. Lil wipes the crumbs away with the pastel-striped bib around Pino's neck, as she turns a glance towards Vincent, hammering rounds at the targets.

He hears the siren blare. Pulls the trigger. The pellets rip through the board, covering the outline of a monsterous rabbit in fluffs of wood.

Vincent manages to take a good look when the gun clicks empty. It's not a bad attempt, considering he's managed to slice across the poor rabbit's neck.

"Forty points!"

The ride operator hands him a fluffy panda bear, with a pocket in its back. As Vincent is about to head back, he spots out of his eye a lucky clover necklace, dangling among the prizes. There's something about it which really appeals to his eye: whether it's the deep green hues it has, or the intricate gold emboss pattern. He gets the idea of sneaking it inside the bear..

"Vincent!" Lil shouts, rising from the table. "Sorry, Pino, he's having too much fun with the gun. Vince!"

"Vin-cuu.." Pino goes, a blush spreading across her cheeks.

Hurriedly, Vincent rushes over to the family. He sees Lil's eyes grow agape; she's fawning over the bear.

"- that is so.. adorable!" Lil says, cradling the stuffed animal in her arms. "Pino, see, he got this for you. Vincent.. my darling, what should we name it?"

Vincent gives the panda's buttoned eyes a glance. Under the sun's gleam, he recalls his co-worker Pablo who'd meet him in the locker room, being chatty about the latest gossip at the mill.

"He looks like a Pablo," he goes.

"Pablo?" Lil blinks, before looking at Pino (as if for her approval). Something about the name doesn't sit right with her; there was this crime lord she'd read from one of the history books, and she didn't want to be reminded of the horrendous acts he did to others.

"How about, why don't call it a she.. how does Belle sound?" It rolls off the tongue better, and Pino is giggling, grabbing the panda and hugging it. "You love her already."

Even though Vincent is non-plussed about the name picking, who would want be irked, when your daughter is beaming joy and it feels like the whole world for you? Just to spend these wonderous moments with your family..

Lil has always dreamt of horseback riding, like the way those frontiersmen do from the old tales. Outside of town, a field ranch near a lake, where the sunset glimmers easily atop the waters and the lights beam through the cacophony of pine trees.

The chestnut horse is a stalliant beauty, with its black mane, long and flowing as you see it trod over the wheat. Lil rides atop on the saddle, her hands over the reins as she grows used to the horse's rocky, uneven motions – this isn't like sitting in a carriage, you know. Her felt hat, with its wide brim and finely-laced covering, lets her see the field without being blinded by the glare, but the laces never catch in her face.

Then she approaches the path by the lake, where it meanders uphill to the mountains, and Lil, indulging in the urge to embrace the wild, implores her horse to go faster, and faster.. past the point where the passing trees are just whirls of undefined motion.

Soon, in a whirl of momentum as she encounters the open hill, she's joined by a cavalry of cows, who barely manage to keep pace with her. A horde of 'Mooos' and cowbell noises, as the cows are herded by the farmer's pig, and she presses her horse further onward – onward – as if determined to outrun a pursuing avalanche.

She arrives at the top, where she meets Vincent and Pino, waiting for her by that lone tree. By then, the sun is a diminishing blur, and in a few more minutes, the stars would emerge. Even when she struggles to haul her other leg over the saddle, a graceful flow in her movements, and where Vincent holds her steady as she hops off, he finds that pang – that inexplicable pull, as he feels with his own being her radiant, entrancing warmth.

"I almost had you worried, didn't I?" Lil says. Vincent's face, under the golden hues, it makes him look perfect as he tells her "No," while she knows deep down it's another white lie. The little hint of a smile she gives, it is worth waiting an eternity for.

And soon, the dusk gives way to a starry night. The fireflies twirl by in a dance – and Lil falls asleep resting by the tree with Vincent, while Pino is kept awake a little longer by the serenity of it all.

For Pino, as young as she is, on some nights she'd find intimations of thoughts from some faraway place – where it's troubling, dark, and cold with an impression of being ensnared by a spider. She'd wake up crying in her crib, and it would be Vincent who'd tell her she's sound asafe.. where no one would dare harm her, and no spider would get by without being squashed.

"Vince, do you love me?" she goes.

"With my soul."

"And if you die..?"

To calm her, Vincent would haul her up in the air, a dance of just the two of them, with an unspoken promise that he'll never leave her, ever. Not as long as the sun would shine, every day. The stars on the bedroom walls would become as majestic as that special night on the hill, and the sensation of flying in his arms would lull Pino back happily asleep.. he'd be in the same room as her – until morning, when the fresh sizzle of eggs and pancakes would make Pino hungry.

"Feed some to Belle too!" Pino says by the dining table. She tries stuffing the panda's mouth with the eggs, and it would only spill out (stuffed pandas aren't meant to eat).

It's so adorable, Lil snaps an instant photo, catching Vincent making bunny-fingers over Pino's head. She'll have it in the memory scrapbook, though it means having to rinse poor Belle by hand afterward, leaving the frizzled panda out to dry by the porch. And if you'd ask Belle what she'd thought of the eggs, she'd tell you nothing but the joyous sun beneath the heavenly blue on the garden, for stuffed pandas don't think – they just are.

The bishops tap their canes upon the floor, and a hushed silence from the attendees, who were avidly singing and dancing, moments ago. The altar and candleabras are gone, as today is a special occasion: Wester Friday.

Lil and Pino wait with the other mothers backstage, all dressed in white, and all waiting with their daughters to be anointed with the Holy Mother's blessing. Pino clutches Lil's fingers, her nerves heightened by that air of hopeful anxiety.

"Lil-Lil, what's gonna happen?"

"They'll give us holy bubbles to blow," she says, recalling what the visiting bishop had told her at the doorstep. "We huff, and puff, and our bubbles are going to clump together in the air—"

Her mouth pops. "It'll be fun Pino, just you wait!"

Then she imagines Vincent, toiling away at the mill. It's a holiday, but sadly, the mill has called all their workers for overtime. It's a shame he can't be here. Lil lets out a momentary sigh to herself.. at the back of her mind, still recalling sharing the taste of that fateful kiss which pushed them to a frenzied and passionate surrender (it's like a memory which never fails to leave her trembling), she'll hold him in her thoughts for the ceremony.

I hope he won't come home too exhausted.. he's begged and pleaded over the phone last night with the company to be with us, but they wouldn't budge an inch over the matter. These Latino bozos, are they really that desperate for help?

"Bubbles!" Pino's eyes widen, already picturing a thousand bubbles in a pink sky, with peach tarts and cherry blossom leaves. "I want to blow some!" But Lil hushes her.

"They're going to call us up any moment.."

When you think of religious ceremonies in general, you'd think of pompous moments, stuffy incantations, the organ thunderously piping out these baritone notes – and it would just feel stretched out so slowly as to be solemn, dignified.

But this church, being a distant off-shoot from the Hellenic orthodoxy, the members celebrate in terms of joy and cheer, and beneath the hushed tones of the attendees, there's an emotional explosion just brimming beneath the surface – a fuse, waiting to be set off exactly by their lead pastor, Julius Trigg.

"On this holy day.." Julius goes. His words echoing and falling over the sermon hall like a blanket. "Chaos, darkness and confusion once ruled ceaselessly over the world. Our people, our fore-mothers, grappled over each other because there was no more faith to be had in love, in honesty and in placing any trust in our fellow humanity. Imagine, if you will, if your friends and loved ones lost all faith in you to the point of contempt, and likewise you with them. The idea of Spirit fell to destitution, and you could not blame your neighbour if they gave in towards the heinousness of betrayal, lying, bloodshed, cannibalism, rape and carnage!

"Being born back then was a travesty. Life itself meant nothing, except suffering. So our Lady, Tetiana, proclaimed to us a saviour, and her name is Manah!"

Upon shouting out Manah's name, the entire hall erupts in a fervour. Even the organ music jumps the gun, but Julius – looking upon all with a confident smile – uses a simple gesture of the hand to get them sitting down again.

"Manah.." he goes, tearing up, "saved us from ourselves. She gave her life, put herself on these bloodstained lands, so that we – all of us, each and everyone – we.. could find it in our hearts to cherish.. each other. To cherish what it is what makes life worth living: love, arising out of sacred femininity."

The organ plays, joined in by the rock band, and all the mothers arrive in single file, with Lil and Pino, holding hands to form a circle around Julius. Now the hall has erupted into such song and dance, it is impossible to resist joining in on the joyous atmosphere, as the sun itself seems to beam directly through the stained glass, bathing the people under a multi-hued glow.

Let me tell you now
I got a feeling, I feel so strange
Everything about me seems to have changed
Step by step, I got a brand new walk
I even sound sweeter when I talk

I said, oh, oh, oh, oh
I said baby, oh, it must be love

Even Lil – as private and reserved as she tends to be, lets her social guard slip away. She joins in, wavering her arms with the others. This whole community is like her extended family; you don't have to draw solely on yourself just to feel safe.

She catches Julius's eye, while he passes her, and she uses this little opportunity to ask a simple question:

"Hey, this is being broadcast, right? My husband.. I don't want him to miss out-"

"He won't miss anything, my dear. If he's welding steel, they'd be taking breaks to celebrate with us on this sacred day."

Lil's innate alertness has her finding that the venue is being filmed by three cameras, perched amidst the crowd. And there's a funny feeling too – she swears there's a face from the past she recognizes.. but her attention turns back towards Julius, handing out bubble wands to the daughters.

If she's had a second longer, she would have had her instincts proven right. It's Nowe, standing at the back, whose expression of dismay is terribly out of place.

For he's travelled all this way to warn her about an impending strike on her family, as ordered by Antonioni.

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Desolation

2023-03-03T06:19:40Z

Elyra feels her back tearing open from the whip's lashes. The barren desert under the red giant's sunset is a particular shade of orange, reminding her of the colour dyes her grandmother used to imbue her dresses. For a moment, she could recall the taste of chewing on freshly-peeled oranges..

"Tell us you're sorry!" her two captors yell.

She wonders if the pain would go so deep as to end her unwilling two-month pregnancy. That would be the lucky outcome. Once, she tried deliberately inhaling some of the noxious fumes by the detritus, such that the poison would sicken her body and put an end to her wretched life. When John and Vishnu found out, they bound her limbs with barbed wire for a whole week.

"Say it! SAY IT!"

It's a test of how far her spite towards those men would carry her, until her nervous system caves in and she's reduced to primal, animalistic cries. Soon, she hears John tire from the way his breaths quiver. The whip is handed over to Vishnu, who pummels Elyra in the face with the handle as he throws the full weight of his torso behind the blows.

As it turns out, the small and yet vital part of her, longing for its own continuation – she breaks down crying, submitting finally to their will. Her tears are like crocodile tears at this point, knowing full well that there isn't another soul on Earth who'd ever offer her sympathy. Is this what she'd deserved?

Before the end began, she left someone hanging..

"I'm sorry that I hurt you," she wrote him in a letter. "I know you adore me like a beautiful flower in a jar, and I've mistakenly given you a kiss which you treasure in your memories. But I don't know you. Thanks to you, my day is worse whenever I see your face. I do my best to blot out everything you say to me, or do for me.. you're nothing, now. Go away."

In the days which passed, his absence is like a vacumn in the air which she gingerly ignores, as she carries on with her life, though there's a small pang of regret when she encountered a news article about how he'd taken his own life from heartbreak. Only a small pang, though.

When John and Visnhu have fallen asleep in a stupor after indulging themselves with vodka, Elyra pulls out the little bone from her rags. She'd fashioned the baby elephant's tusk into a knife over the last weeks; grinding the bone against any nearby rock she'd find – not too long though, or else she wouldn't have the energy to endure the next day.

Her makeshift knife is now sharp enough that by pricking her finger on the edge, it slices cleanly through the fingertip.

The thing now is to muster up the courage to flip the Monopoly board over.. Elyra cries out for a washroom break.

She knows Vishnu has a soft spot; when he's not obeying John's barks for the next thing, sometimes his vulnerable side pops out as he confides to her his growing resentment towards John; how it seems like John knows everything as the unquestionable narcissist – a self-proclaimed messiah who sees the future of humanity in raping Elyra. Usually after hearing Vishnu out, his fury boils over the next day, taking it out on her with a fervent force when an excuse arises as to pin a wrong upon her. As if he was weaseling himself out of feeling any gratitude for her listening to him like another person.

Vishnu stirs, while John clutches onto the vodka jug like a beloved teddy. Elyra calls out again, and finally, Vishnu stirs forth – his movements slurred like in a sleepwalk. He undoes her chains, and he stands by – following a habit of standing guard while she does her stuff.

And briefly, Elyra hesitates, as if starting to feel sorry for Vishnu and what she's about to do to him. But she's able to muster the cold hate she's harboured for so long, and her makeshift knife jams through his eyes.

Vishnu convulses on the ground, with the knife still protruding from his eyelid. All Elyra has to do is wiggle the knife a few inches deeper, before Vishnu is still. Turned into a decaying marionette.

Elyra follows up with John.

As she wanders the desert, she grows thirsty. The water pitchers are empty, after she's relished the freedom of downing entire loads without anyone slapping her face in anger. With the multiple stains on her dress, a fresh one marks the end of the life she's been made to carry in John's name. What a shame, since only John knows how to felch water from under the sands.. it was his expertise that allowed him to wield such control. Well, he knew. He wouldn't let her or even Vishnu learn.

Elyra senses there won't be anything to encounter for a while. You could see the broad swathes of flatness, extending into the farthest distances..

Still, she carries on lugging the wagon towards the sunset, with nothing else left to do.

Eventually her legs give out, and with her mouth left aching from the arid heat, she thinks she sees a tree in the distance. She lets go of the caravan's handles, and squeezes out step after step, over to that long-barren trunk. She leans her back against it, and as the sunset recedes – as her vision grows faint, she recalls faces. Family. The smiles of those everyday strangers as she'd board the metro.

The person who she'd rejected.. who told her she was like a beautifully-winged fairy who's been pulled out of the picture books into real life, and clung onto her with that wondrous illusion. Her thoughts devolve into a haze. As the stars begin to twinkle amidst the clouds, Elyra whispers an unspoken prayer.. asking to be forgiven for her heart's fickleness. If she'd known any better, she wouldn't have left him with that letter.. but a hopeful embrace in person, pouring all her heart behind it.

But the wind blows, indifferent to what once was. The dust breezes past the remains of civilizations, and soon, her body slowly topples over.

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The Intimacy of Snow

2023-01-14T01:20:50Z

Once, Clare felt on her fingers the rosy hues of snow, melting upon her touch. When it left her hand numb, she brought her hand over to her lips. Her only respite from the cold was in gently nibbling upon her fingertips, feeling the warmth and condensation of her breath until she could feel, once more.

In the night, an unexpected snowfall. Raki trudges onward, his footsteps leaving deeper trails upon the pine-encrusted path. He tries to ignore the shivering of his legs as he knows that Avignon is only a half-hour further.

Clare spots a dense covering under the forest. The snow hasn't gathered there.

"Let's camp," she goes.

"I'm fine.."

"I don't want you to freeze, Raki."

The boy sees that she means it, so he resigns and in the spot where the wind does not blow, he unloads the sack of firewood and sets the arrangement up in flames. The fire's warmth envelops his body like a comfortable bath, and he realises how right she is.

Soon, the snow evolves into a drizzle and Raki leans into the fire, poking the wood to coax out every last vestiges of heat it has to offer. He settles into a rhythm that leaves him drowsy, and pulls the fur blanket over.

Raki hears a heavy thunk – it's her sword. Oh, she's leaning into it for a rest too.

He looks over and she's laid it over against the tree. She undresses out of her armour, slipping out of her skirt and setting her pauldrons aside. Without them ornamenting her body, Clare looks emasculated. The wet uniform clings onto her breasts while she tends to the dying fire – the frost upon her hair drips as it melts..

He pretends to sleep, watching her.

Clare pushes her body out, arching her back with her arms outstretched. What she does in private to relieve the day's tension. There is something about her lithe form which is graceful as a ballerina's poise in dance, and though Raki is loathe to admit it – he is growing excited, watching her. It's his second time; the first was when he came back to camp after peeing, and he saw a flash of her breasts underneath her torn uniform. Her rosy areola..

The fire wavers under the sudden gust, and Raki shivers, huddling himself inward in the blanket. He feels his nose drip (as if he'd caught the flu), his heart skipping beats, and yet, he holds back the urge to moan, not wanting to let go of looking upon her.

Clare senses something's wrong. Usually, she can hear Raki tossing in the blanket, but he's unusually still. Peeling back the blanket, she finds him balled up like a dormouse in a nest of tattered leaves. He's frightfully close to hypothermia. If she exerts herself, she'll be able to carry him to the town.. she'll be at a loss of energy for tomorrow. Just that she can't stand seeing him suffer.

In her arms, Raki is carried like a baby. The woods whirl by with a stallion's blaze. He looks up at her face – her eyes are set on the distant townlight. Her hair flutters, while the branches of those barren trees stand out against the starless void. It feels like an eternity when your awareness is fading out of present reality.

Avignon – it's white with festivities. A few dancers pass by the tree on the icy arena, but all Clare could care about is bringing him indoors. The locals gawk at her, with some opening their mouths over what she might have done to the boy. Numbness is the worn cloak she usually wears towards being an alien to people, but tonight, her heart overrides the distance from others, beating with a tune both new and yet primally familiar.. love, and fear.

The inn Clare finds – firewood burning; brewed ale spilled on the floor. She asks the innkeeper for a room, and when he tells her how much it will cost, her eyes widen in realisation that in her panic, she's left behind all her funds at that camp.

"What? You've nothing to give? Not even hospitality is free, girlie.. especially not from me this time of year."

"I just need to keep him warm. Please.. he's sick from the cold."

Her pleading does nothing to sway him, though desperation leeches out from her voice. Finally, Clare brings Raki over to the pub, where the noise is overbearing – the jeering of its drunken patrons being no comfort as she gazes upon the fireplace.. the uncertainty with which the flames unfurl.

At least, he'll be safe from the cold. Clare touches her wrist to Raki's forehead; he is running a strong fever. It's a pub; they should have tea too.

"On the house, dear."

Clare reaches for the cup, before the barkeep closes his hand over hers. She glances at him, almost ready to pounce.

"That boy – what 'appened to him?"

"We were on our way here, before a blizzard stopped our path.. I thought he'd be alright if I set up camp."

"He looks like he needs medicine."

Clare finds a possible foothold. "If you could offer me a room, you'd have all my gratitude. I left my purse behind, and.. I don't know where else to go."

One of the patrons begs for the barkeep's refill, while the barkeep locks eyes upon Clare, studying her. Then he shows her the stairs upward to the attic.

It is musty, with dust having settled over the barrels. The barkeep is nice in giving her a few candles and some blankets. Moreso, peace. Clare gives Raki more sips of tea..

"Aren't you tired?" Raki asks, sensing the motions of her hands growing mechanical.

She looks upon him with a detached fondness, as if the real her is absorbing the moment from a distant world while her body goes through the motions. His eyes take her back in, and in a breath, she drinks from the same cup she'd spoon-fed him.

In closing her eyes, she recalls those rose petals which drooped from the branches, with the forest path shrouded in shadow. This is what the tea tastes like.

"I'll be fine when you're asleep," she tells him, as a burst of regret surges from her chest. "I.. I'm sorry, I shouldn't have left you in the forest."

"Don't be," Raki goes. "I thought the cold wouldn't be so bad.."

The candles dim.

Clare still makes out Raki, an illuminated silhouette in the dark, and it's in the privacy of the night that she ends up crying. The stress pouring out of her – how it always did when she endured the brutal regime of the Organization's training, where the instructors were as relentless on her body as her childhood captor was.

"Clare?"

She stifles her tears. "Raki, I'm fine. Go to sleep, please.."

"Why are you so pretty?"

It's the last thing she'd expect Raki to say.

"What are you talking about?"

"Whenever you think I'm not watching, you always do a dance. Every night, by the campfire. I don't know why. Only that it's pretty.. and that I feel good, looking upon you."

Clare is startled. She's often been called scary, intimidating, and even witch-like.. but never pretty. A word she's used to describe a doll collection she's once had.

"Why do you dance, Clare?"

It takes a moment for her to remember why.

"It's my way of letting go of the day," she says. "My body aches, so I stretch and move – a friend taught me this."

"Clare.."

She hears the faint quiver of Raki's voice, yearning for her. When she touches him by the forehead this time, he brings her hand over, down to his soft cheeks, and over to his lips, where he kisses her fingers with a tenderness he's held within him, which had blossomed over those days he's grown to know her.

When he sucks upon her fingertips, an electricity jolts through her arm which sends tremours though her entire being. A moan escapes her – and it's an involuntary moan she doesn't realise she's made. Clare exhales out the tension which she'd held in her lungs, when she didn't realise she'd stopped breathing out of trepidation, encountering the intimacy which she'd deeply wanted, all along.

"Raki, stop.."

But the truth is, she's always wanted him. He's young, though, and she didn't want to take advantage like that.. to be no better than a yoma, just craving flesh.

He's still nibbling at her hand, like a kitty when she pulls herself away.

"Clare – please, don't leave me.." he goes.

Raki strains to make her out in the night, before he hears her breath, quickening with a swelling need. His hand gropes in the dark, feeling nothing but thin air, before he finds her hand over his.

"I'm here," she says, gently.

Clare puts his hand over her neck. He feels her swallow, before she guides him just how to press around her throat - two fingers over her windpipe, and his thumb on her thyroid. Not so much pressure as to choke her, but just enough that she's able to let the breath steadily hiss out her mouth.. her vision tingling with blue sparkles.

Then she lets her head swoon over his wrist, where she closes her eyes and simply indulges in the latent senations it brings forth in her. Maternal tenderness. A young girl's need for affection. The connection of one isolated heart with another who needs it.

Soon, besides feeling her hair brush upon his arm, Raki feels her tears over his stimulated hand. Is this just a fever dream? It's happening all so fast.. the layers of Clare, his saviour and guardian, unravelling to reveal a lover.

With the night's unending coldness poring through the attic, Raki brings her closer in an embrace. As he inhales her, it's like the rustic grounds he knows, where as his older brother toils on the fields, he could find the scent of the lively earth. Her hands crawl upon his back – a spider exploring, weaving an elaborate web over his skeletal structure.

Finally, Clare discovers his face. She recalls his look of piqued interest, at first meeting. How she rebuffed him, at first. He'd reject her, like the rest of the world did, so there seemed no point in caring about him back, despite the faint hope otherwise.

She regrets it deeply, now. The way she'll make it up to him is in a kiss, kept secret from everyone else. A kiss where her lips find traction with his mouth, and she starts to move her tongue in tandem with a silent language, only whispered through touch..

Raki, as if struck by her passion, delves into her mouth faster, and harder – new to the experience of love, but she's taken aback.

"Mmmph.." she says, withdrawing from the kiss. "Slowly.."

She brings her fingers around his jaw, and they go on kissing, easily forgetting how they were subjected to the blizzard earlier.

There is no choice who you end up loving in life. Undressing her, Raki feels her skin sheening with sweat. His fingers trace over her body – the same ectomorphic body who's stirred the throes of lust in him. There are old scars across her back; those rough spots which haven't fully healed, bumpy to the touch. Otherwise, her skin has a sumptuous softness, like fresh petals just waiting underneath frost.

"How much did it hurt?" Raki asks her.

She dwells upon the pain she's long harboured in private, which pushes away all the injuries she's endured in comparison.

"As much as I've allowed it.."

Clare has stripped off Raki's pants. He's hairless.. except for his genitals. It's almost funny seeing his erection, like a miniature leg that is trying to grow.

"It's so soft.." he whispers. She realises his hands are atop her breasts.

As Raki fondles her bosom, she holds him by the arms, her eyes closed as she allows the gentle sensations – the way he kneads around her nipples - to bring forth a soothing chill throughout her body, euphoria spreading down her spine and letting her own vulva be flush with heat.. and desire..

She pulls him in closer.

It's reaching the point where the tension she's held in her stomach, which she's long taken for granted, is gradually unwinding. Oh, it just feels so wonderful..

Then Clare jerks his hands over where it aches.

"Unnn-ohh!"

A vulnerable whimper which spills out of her, which feels like everyone in the world could hear, in spite of the festival noises which grows ever more faint to her. Clare puts her mouth over her hand as to stifle any further cries, amidst her tachypnea (the ragged gasping) which longs for further oxygen to burn.

Raki is amazed by how wet she is. How feverish she is, as if his hand – slipping deeper in, would just melt into her being. Every touch, each timbre of pressure upon her like a raw song, spun out of her soul. Only just.. how would it taste like? Her smell is so radiant, so infectious, hitting his nose sharply like burnt toast, it's unmistakably hers, overriding the damp, alcoholic musk lingering in the attic with her body heat.

Pulling his hand away, Raki finds her wetness - congealing over his fingers. Clare, still recovering from the rush she rode, watches him in an enthrall as he licks her. He is timid about it, like a young child hesitantly trying out a strange meal.

But only at first.

With his heart continually throbbing, as if he's compelled forth across a tightrope over a mountainous crevasse whose depths are as unfathomable as it is dark, Raki begins to savour the taste. Her vulva has so many reserves of flavour, all depending on the way he dances his tongue over the honey. Sweet, floral.. sometimes metallic, like sucking upon a copper penny.

When he swallows, it's like when he ingests his own snot during those times he'd feel sick or cry, but instead of the familiarity of himself, it gives him a little warmth doing so.. swallowing her, the fuzzy sensation infecting his whole body.

"How do.. I taste?" Clare asks, sincere in wanting to know just how she'd be received, and truly felt by another. The self which she'd nurtured all along in private.

"You're – so gorgeous.."

It's hard for her to make out his face; his eyes are hard to read, indistinguishable in the dark, but she hears it in his voice.

"Raki," she says. ".. won't you kiss me there? Kiss me, until I.."

It couldn't have been a more enticing request to make. Raki burrows his face where he's touched her. Her thighs, hugging his skull with as much restraint she could muster from crushing his face in altogether. It's just so good, like an aching itch in her core he is scratching.. just right.

It starts to chafe her to the bone for Clare to keep holding this position, so she leans upon her back, locking her knees to her chest with her arms. Raki holds her steady, kissing her and letting his tongue prod the folds of her vulva. She lets the sensations carry her mind over to strange, evocative places.

An especially sharp, protruding sense of rawness when he turns to her clitoris..

"Aa-mugm—!" Clare pushes Raki away.

"What's wrong?" Raki says, among throaty gasps for breath. "Did I hurt you?"

"No, it's.. hold on.."

Clare reaches for her own uniform, where she stuffs the sleeve into her mouth as a sort of gag. She nudges Raki to continue, and without a word, Raki knows what she really means, as he concentrates his mouth upon her sensitivity.

The sleeve muffles her voice, as her moans start to intensify and deepen into ranges of animalistic baritone, while the orgasm, like a pregnancy of held-up tension that's gestated in her the whole time, is starting to pour out finally. A bag which cannot hold everything in any further.. the seams erupting open, in a cascade of torrential release.. wave after wave of blissful pleasure, rhythmic in its contractions.

Her legs, like savage and uncontrollable animals, slip out of her arms, which push forth upon the ground while the white-hot immensity of her climax is flooding her nerves.

She's known some of the worst pain, inflicted upon her in life by so many others, scarring her being. But never this ecstasy which penetrates past all the barriers she's erected in herself, flooding through those cracks to burst open her heart, which she thought she'd pushed away into numbness.

(so this is what it's like to love)

Clare remembers to breathe again. Amidst the sensation of floating down, like a leaf dancing in air currents, she realises how stretched out her limbs are. Reaching for the sleeve she's clung onto by her mouth, she finds that the sleeve is torn all the way through.

She's bitten so hard, her teeth have ripped it..

It could matter less.

Soon, she realises that she isn't the only one who is panting.

"Cl-Clare.." Raki goes, feeling spent and laying down beside her.

"Ra.. ki.." Her voice is a dim, husky whisper, as she finds his hand and caresses it. "I would have never known – how long I've been waiting to really.. know you, like this." She moves his hand over to her chest, which rises and falls as she feels her breathing carry on a much more open, relaxed feeling.

Then she turns over to face Raki, as she feels drowsiness settle in her.

"Clare.. I'd do anything for you.."

As a young girl, Clare felt it was the most silliest thing just to tell someone 'I love you.' There's just something cheesy about saying out a feeling which is too great for even words to encompass. Either you'll know it already – like a thought which nervously creeps into your awareness, or a glance from a person who can convey so much in their eyes alone - or you don't.

".. I know.."

As she holds him dear to her heart, Raki hears her silence. Then soon, her snores. He closes his eyes also, steeping with her into a shared serenity.

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Fiat Lux / 15

2022-10-21T07:02:38Z

"Computer," Kristeva goes, "retrieve exhibit 108-9C."

You've never set foot in here before.. you watch from behind glass by Raul's side – while the gigantic precipice Kristeva stands over is a pale chasm of prisms, each varying in a psychedelic radiance. This is the vault, where artifacts and tidbits linger in stasis. Sometimes for centuries.

The retrieval arm, it whooshes down, descending fathoms before linking with the right inode holding the metadata of your collection.

Kristeva turns her attention on the matter synthesizer, which is a flat platter. A holographic image of 108-9C's contents is beside it. She raises her hand on the platter's controls, before her fingers extend into hydra-like appendages, worming an automated sequence for the command interpreter..

"Attention!" It's Romdeau's city-wide alert systems. "There will be an impending blackout by the Intelligence Bureau. Power will resume momentarily.."

The lights drain, and you're left in awe as the platter erupts into a cacophony of light, electricity jolting and forming outlines of things you've known. Raul shields his eyes, while your vision is left stunned by inverse afterimages.

Finally, everything hums back into life, as you just now see your items intact (with smoke simmering on top). So, that explains the occasional blackouts – not because nobody has bothered fixing the power grid by Intelligence, but because it takes an exorbitant power to re-create matter out of data..

Kristeva brings the platter out into the hall with you two. The vault doors hiss shut behind her, with an emphatic air-tight whine.

"This virtual world," Raul says. "This theme park, made by a proxy to keep the minds of everyone occupied.."

He's more amused by the idea than anything, while you sift through your belongings, finding the neural patches. "If we've ever needed more proof that we cannot just leave ourselves resigned to their whims, we needn't look any further. Being caught in an endless dream, never to see the real sky, it's.. suffocating, to say the least."

Finding a nearby bench, you have Raul sit.

"So," he goes, "what does it take to meet this Proxy of Dreams?"

"All in good time."

The patches attach to his temples, and he make a little wince. Then he glances at you, a look of ever-mounting apprehension in his eyes as he's just realising how he's now in your hands – about to take the first step into your private world.

"It's bonding with your temporal lobes," you go, not hiding your excitement. "Give it a second."

It's technology Tetiana helped you engineer, giving you the schematics of interfacing with her worlds from miles away. You've almost forgotten just how the first surge was like, as you felt disoriented – transitioning from laying down, to being right in the midst of a music festival. Your attraction began with reading the libretto of the opera singer you were about to witness.. it blossomed, hearing her soothing voice as she stood solo on the summer's stage.

Ultimately it turned into love when you had to share this dream. And all the possible joys it held, with Lil.

This is what you're hoping Raul will know..

"What you do now," you say, "is you close your eyes. Relax. It's just like the transition between soberity and drunkenness.. it'll come.."

Raul does just that. Then the most vital question pops into his head, all too late..

"Wait, how do I leave when-"

He looks at you, and the light fades out of his eyes as they roll up, into a series of violent REM seizures. You've never seen what the process is like from the outside, and now you know.

His body relaxes. Shoulders, arms, legs.. he seems to sink into the wall, and you glance at him for a moment while Kristeva evaluates his condition. He's not going to feel a thing in the real world, so you pose him nicely on the bench, such that it looks like he went for an opportune nap.

"Daedalus," Kristeva says.

His entourage seems to lock eyes on you, as you just now realise what you've really done. Is she going to place a security alert?

"I'm.. terribly sorry about what Raul did to you earlier," Kristeva tells you. "Normally, it's not my place to contradict him while he's around. But he's grown dangerously out of line for being director of the Security Bureau.."

You're surprised. An autoreiv, showing sympathy for you. "You're not saying you hate him, do you?"

"No. I am duty-bound to serve the Director and his wishes, however much how my initial programming may contradict his will. Recently – since the loss of his wife and daughter, I've witnessed his erratic tendencies brim to the forefront. As if a fantasised self which he's kept hidden, even from himself, is replacing what little rationality he has left.."

She says this with all the certainty of an accountant. "I find it fascinating, really. People have dreams. Imagination. Those mental faculties which are usually denied us. And already, from Raul, I am reminded of the worst of humanity. Rashness.. cruelty.. fanaticism.. the desiring for what is beyond impossible.. the willingness to risk a stable order for all, even if it means sacrificing the well-being of those around him."

If only Kristeva has lungs, she'd sigh with the heaviness of a poet, confiding secrets to someone she'd least expect.

"Kristeva," you go, reaching out to her. "I can't imagine.. I never intended on trapping Raul in there."

"You were eager to show him Zaporizhzhia," she says. "That, I can understand. If I only could join Raul also – I'd really like to know what it's like to live life as a person, flesh-and-blood. The environment you were in.. it emulates sensations, yes?"

You nod, recognizing her curiosity before recalling how she's seen you in lovemaking with Lil. You can't help but smile awkwardly, while furtively breaking free from her eyes.

".. I have to get Lil and Vincent," you say. "They're trapped in that same dream that Raul's in."

"What's so bad about that dream?" Kristeva asks, with a child-like curiosity. "What were you doing in there before?"

"I was-"

You let out a gulp, hesitant over those self-indulgent, pornographic moments you've had with Lil. But it's Kristeva.. at this point, what's the harm in letting her in on your bottled-up fantasies, of all people?

"I made love with the regent's daughter," you go, as your body sort of pivots away from her, arms shuddering, the blood tentatively rushing to your penis again. "I shouldn't have. It just didn't feel fair that she'd stop loving me like that, like I'd unwittingly passed through a one-way gate in her heart.. an exit out that paradise that I'll never return to.."

"Oh."

You stare at each other in a limbo, a pregnant pause where you'd expect her to unleash a barrage of outraged condemnation in your face, as anyone else would. Some of your thoughts hover over the anthropology you've absorbed, and you realise that Life is unremittingly brutal, especially when it comes to courtship – on the fairest joys, there's always thorns looking to barricade, denying the weak and undesirable the right.. no, the luxury of reproducing; for every star that's shone brightly in history, there's a million who resign themselves to an eternal obscurity.

Animals don't possess that self-consciousness - the impending awareness of their frailty, mortality, eventual death.. and that of their loved ones – people do.

"Unlike Raul," you go, pointing out how chill he looks, "they're hard-wired to that system against their will. Every second which passes, Tetiana is siphoning life out their bodies. I don't know.. how much longer they've got -"

You begin to shiver in front of her, possessing all the familiar despondency of seeing Lil in that medical pod, so weak from a hopeless disease. Then she rests a hand over your neck.

"There is the royal hovercraft," Kristeva goes. "We normally reserve it when Donov needs to serve as Romdeau's emissary.. I'm calculating the distance to Zaporizhzhia."

Her eyes flutter. "At 1,894 km, it'll take five hours to arrive under optimal conditions. I presume you want to bring them back home?"

You nod.

"I'll order enough provisions to last for two days. There'll be hibernation chambers if they need dire medical assistance-"

"My FP bullets too," you go, as you tremble over facing Tetiana.

"A word of caution: the ship's engines are not well-insulated from radiation storms. We were flying home from Londo, and our instrumentation suffered multiple soft errors – not even the autopilot will save you from being frozen for hours on end; the marauders are always on the hunt for straggling travellers.. you must fly manually. Avoid signs of mutara particles at all costs. Here, you'll need this-"

She hands you your lanyard from the platter, and you notice her eyes are a little bloodshot. She's infected with the cogito virus..

You're about to head off, when you look back at her. "Kristeva.."

"Go! Don't linger here. At any rate, I must look after my Raul.."

Your footsteps echo in the halls, as you run, approaching the sunny light at the end. Your lungs burn, and your chest quakes. If only you could bring yourself to thank her, for giving you hope enough to carry forth.

If only.. you'd realise how much terror Raul would inflict in that dream, seeing his eyes almost gouging his eyelids out.

There's no more time to look back, anymore.

There's only the next step. And the next..

The ship awakens to your presence, as its interior lights slowly brighten like candlelights and you feel yourself lost in the rococo of the delicately-crafted furniture. A bed that's fit for a king, with silk comforters and curtains.. it isn't what you've expected. It's far from the sleek aesthetic of the offices you're used to.

There's a musty air of spice and incense, as you remember that Donov once liked to smoke heavily. It stings your lungs, and you want to cough..

It was startlingly easy to get to this ship. When you met with border customs, you feared they'd raise an alarm from your arrest record. But Kristeva had forged an acquittal on your behalf, and thinking on your feet, you told them you were merely going on a research expedition.

"How long will you be out for?"

"A day, maximum."

"A day for researching fault lines in the geography? Daedalus, say whatever we want about you, you're helluva dedicated to science – just be careful. We've had reports of an Eastern snowfreeze blowing in hard from the Adriatic dunes.."

The ship itself – a sleek and angled figure lying in shadow - was guarded by autoreivs, waiting like statues by the dock. You didn't know how you were going to make it past them, until you stepped forth and they confused you with Donov himself, bowing down and hailing the departure of the dome's regent.

What's remarkable about the craft is how antiquated it is, passed down from the Carolingian era when WombSys produced polymaths to advance technology and lay down infrastructure. You've only read about it, until now..

You stumble forth to the open cockpit, without the protection of a canopy. It's a two-seater - and already, you hear the alerted shouts of the human guards, coming from the dock..

Startled, your hands soon find the ignition control lever. A metallic pump between the seats which you twist around, then depress into position.

A giant cloth parachutes outward from the sides, before it's pulled taut over the cockpit, enveloping you in darkness.

You only hear your breaths, trembling amidst the backdrop of a faint hiss, before the actual cockpit controls emerge – luminescent switches on the dashboard:


check flit control
fuel flow verification
life support
engine buffer diagnosis
secondary services

Starting this beast up is not as straightforward as it is in modern crafts. You flick the switches on in order (each with a noticeable resistance to your fingers that gives in to a loud "thud"), one at a time:


Computer Flit control .. OK!
Fuel flow injection and processing .. 79% optimal
Life support systems .. OK! (O2 current capacity: 350L – estimated depletion time: 5.83 days)
Power generation from engines .. OK!
Secondary services .. enabling autopilot, cartography, communications – OK!

The craft hums, and you feel lifted up in the seat as if in an elevator. Then you see the holographic view of the outside world fizzle in, projected upon the cloth canopy..

The dock's hatch slides open, as the guards have surrounded you, standing on the piers with their rifles, supported by flying drones.

A heartbeat later -

They fire upon you, the gunfire muted and distorted as if outside your protective bubble. You only inch the stick forward – and the craft accelerates with such gravitas, that you're pushed against the seat.

You fly past the shanties built outside the dome. In a matter of seconds, the last traces of Romdeau and civilization are left behind..

And in the vast wilderness of this polluted planet, with an endless reservoir of darkness waiting ahead of you, you fly alone, guided only by that diminishing hope of ever finding her alive.

To let her know that out of all the things in this world, your love for her is real.

comments

Fiat Lux / 14

2022-10-15T05:40:40Z

It has been a strenuous, humiliating ordeal – the way Raul ripped your badge lanyard from your uniform and stripped you of all authority. The way you wanted to clutch at your heart when the security bureau tore through your home, your offices.. like rabid animals hungering for flesh. (Hell, they flipped your couch upside down.) All the log entries of every little thing you've done, laid bare for Raul to scrutinize.

Now you are nobody. No one – nothing.

Only a piece of meat, waiting in the cells while they're debating how best to dispose of you and find your replacement. The harsh lighting, casting no shadow anywhere – it never ends..

Why is each passing second a torment? It's not from want of sleep, though you feel your temples aching.. your brain chafing as if someone is slowly stuffing chili power into your skull. Your thoughts flitter on the way you've longed for her, or that you were this close to selling your love out for the selfish pursuit of your own tranquility. That you've failed your duties as the dome's medical officer – and now, because of you..

Lil and Vincent are going to suffer forever at the hands of the proxy who heard your longings – who, out of anyone, most understood your heart..

"Aaa-AGGHHH!"

The bed is a slab – as solid and dense as your closed-up fist will get to know. It really hurts, and you end up slicing open your palm on the bed's sharp edge. The blood spills out, painting the cell with drabs of red. It's a brief moment of catharsis – you almost adore how red your own blood is. Rich with oxygen, blood-type 'O+'.

As it turns out, the alarm blares, and the guards wrap you tightly in a straitjacket while the autoreivs wipe away the traces you've left in the cell, their movements mechanical and efficient. Just like how a fellow citizen should be. If only the WombSys hadn't cursed you with this mind, trapped in the confines of a flawed human soul – if you were born as someone else.. life right now wouldn't be a torment. Would it?

Your hand is starting to itch..

"Daedalus," Raul says, summoning you to his office. You've been wheeled over – your limbs clasped to the wheelchair. On the way, a pale reflection of yourself: your hair has grown out. There's stubble over your chin. You no longer resemble the youthful scientist, holding yourself in high regard. Instead, a scruffy outcast, who looks back upon you.

The leers you've received from others, while the auto-reiv wheeled you out from the car.. an subject of disgust.

"Daedalus, are you listening?" Raul asks you. It takes a moment to really focus on his eyes, as you're filled to the brim with shame. "I think I'll have Kristeva get you a cup of coffee.. Kristeva!"

As she hands you the cup, Raul asks: "Do you take cream? Sugar?"

You think for a moment, observing the staccato-like ripples of the coffee's surface. The rustic scent of the steaming drink throws you back to when Lil shared her jasmine tea with you in the courtyard.. the reason it'd tasted just right in its sweetness – Lil said that white sugar leaves a bad aftertaste, like you're tasting your own spit long past the sweetness.

Instead, it's honey which is the secret..

"Kristeva – give our man a pinch of honey!" Raul whistles to his autoreiv, waving his fingers like a lasso before culminating in a snap. "You're also a man of fine taste, Daedalus. I like that." He bites his tongue, holding back a pointed remark about Lil.

You're not allowed out of the restraints, so it's Kristeva who holds the cup by your mouth, and you sip it.. it goes down smoother than one of Raul's liqueurs (when he personally toasted to your career).

"Oh-hhh," you moan, tasting your first real respite from purgatory. "This is good.."

"Cool, isn't it?" Raul glees, deriving pleasure out of watching you. Countless hours, he's spent getting Kristeva's drink-concocting skills honed. "You can have all the coffee you want, Daedalus, it's not going to change the fact.."

Raul rests his hand on your shoulder, playfully squeezing it. You wince – he grins, knowing you can do nothing. If only these restraints aren't holding you back, you'll happily grab the cup from Kristeva's grasp and smash his smug fucking button-nosed face in, with the same intensity of his inexplicable attraction to you. One of the great mysteries of life you ask in private is whether Raul enjoys being aroused by pain.

"You are continuing to leave the entire medical office, the regent, and really everyone – disappointed."

Disappointed. The word echoes in your hollowed-out chest. For an instant, you ask yourself if this whole thing is your retaliation for how your own underused heart is left.. disappointed.

"In case you feel like asking," Raul goes, "we combed through your records. With your history of exemplary service and breakthrough medical science.. there is no better way to put it: you are a living paradox, indeed. On the one hand – the brilliant brain you lovingly hold."

He caresses your skull, and you wince away as best as you can from his touches. Then he holds your head in his arm with a vice grip, the pressure squeezing, as if saying: Don't fight me, Daedalus. I am your master.. and every futile thing you do to resist is only exciting me.

"I'd ask Kristeva who would best exemplify humanity's inventive spirit-" Raul says, his breath spilling over to your ear. "She spoke of Da Vinci, Nikola Tesla, and I'd retort with Oppenheimer and Niemann.. it's the pursuit of destruction, of crushing all your enemies into pulp which is the only true impulse we've followed in history. Just like how you're struggling against my restraints, people have struggled against being subjugated – at the mercy of unfair rulers, by and by.

"Yes.. you want to kill me. I can feel the hate swelling in you..

"To give you credit, the FP rounds you've produced is about the best we have so far in reclaiming our destiny from the proxies. Ergo Proxy, Monad.. they think they can rule over us all with their powers – but we don't need them! Not anymore!"

Raul puts an FP bullet on the table. The blue gelatin fluctuates with a barely contained energy, as if ripe to ignite chaos in a single touch.

"By the time Vincent arrives home.. if he ever does, he will learn to obey – or else we shove this up his ass, and he'll endure the same mortality we've had to face our entire existence!"

You see the maniacal glee.. that harsh twinkle in his eyes. What you've gone out of your way to invent to protect Lil, Raul now twirls amidst his fingers – caressing the cartridge case, perverting your invention to his aim. It's a shame though: you're at a loss to explain how without the proxies, all of Romdeau and life would be good as gone.

"Before we get carried away, let's not forget how you've lusted after the regent's sole daughter.."

Your eyes narrow over the mention of Lil, dreading it. Suddenly the coffee tastes like bile in your stomach, and you urge to vomit it out..

"Don't," you whisper.

"Ahh, the one pressure point I can count on, your neediness. Isn't that right?" Raul picks at that gaping wound with a knife. "Daedalus.. Lil's secret admirer! It's like in those romance serials broadcast to the ladies; a perpetually hopeless fifth wheel in a love triangle. Shall I read one of your unsent love letters to her -"

He scrolls through the terminal, picking a file. "Oh, Lil," he goes, his eyes mirthless. "My unwitting, darling angel. The least that I've wanted is to find a chance to redeem myself to you. Loving you from afar is a burden – nay, an agony I must bear each day, in silence, as we go on talking behind the veil of professionalism."

".. shut up, shutup SHUT UP!" you scream.

"I am sorry about how I am-" Raul speaks above you, "my body, my face.. my irredeemably awkward and shy personality. I'd wish a hundredfold that I was a better man, a stronger and more assertive man in every respect, so that I could naturally enrapt your attention as you did mine. But it's a dream that's proven to be more impossible than finding the cure for your terminal condition.

"I'm sorry how I've grown to adore you above everyone else, as my mind internalizes every perfect detail about your being.. and that the only conclusion to draw is that you are either descended from the heavens, or that fate has been so kind with WombSys as to grant the regent.. a daughter who is worthy of a king- oh, Daedalus, stop it please, this is making my heart blush, you should have been a ghostwriter!"

He is perverting your words also.. what you've written in a solemn privacy. It's enough to make your mouth frothe; some of the coffee drips out from your lips, which Kristeva is kind enough to wipe.

"Lil – when I touch myself, imagining your caresses, the bliss I'd feel is oh, so indescribable .."

That's when you fight hard in the wheelchair, the springs squeaking while you struggle like a caged animal. Raul glances up at you, running a wicked smile, and he walks over.

"Kristeva," he says, "let this part be off the record."

"Understood."

Raul crosses past his table, his eyes intent on yours. That glimmer you initially mistook for malice, it is blossoming now into full-blown desire.

It frightens you.

"Daedalus," he says, as he kneels by your side, "I won't hide this from you any longer. I've.. held feelings for you also. You baffle me.. you, being one of the best and brightest Romdeau has produced.. and you want to toss all that away for her? Out of all people?"

".. especially you?" you go.

Raul's eyes widen. "My, Daedalus, you catch on so quick. That's what I adore about you.."

His finger brushes over the bristles of your chin, before his hands dive upon your body – sliding under your straitjacket to feel the skin of your chest. Searching for your areolae and nipples, and upon finding them, he rubs.. his hands are surprisingly soft, warm. An electricity to his touch that is undeniable.

"How long.." you sputter.

"How long have I loved you? At first, I tried brushing off those feelings as just respect for a colleague. You were always so reserved, and I asked what it is.. what secrets lay behind your pretty brown eyes. When my wife.. died.."

Raul tears up, the flashbacks of her abrupt death still painful. "I was at a loss. Who could I love after, when my heart's light faded away? Or so I thought, until one day.. I found you in the royal courtyard. You were alone, an angelic serenity over your face. That day.. I offered you a drink.."

It was liqueur – meant to brighten your spirits. The concentrated intensity of the alcohol was too much for your tongue to handle, but like a lost virginity, you was eventually able to discern the taste; the sweet grapefruit, the oak which it had been fermented in..

"It tasted like nothing I've ever had before," you huskily say.

"You dreamt of kissing Lil again – a liqueur unfurls like a kiss. It's a shame.. the passion you're saving for her, you will never willingly show me. The only thing left, for both our sakes, to say goodbye. It's off to the recycler for you-"

"Wait—"

Raul looks down at you, having a tense grip upon the wheelchair's handle. "What?"

You gulp – fearing the disgust you'll have to endure for survival's sake.

"Don't make me leave you, Raul.."

You lean in, beckoning him to come hither to your lips, as a single tear escapes your eye.

His mouth slowly meets yours in ragged breaths. As you kiss him, your tongues sliding over one another, you try your best to imagine that it's Lil.. as if she'd taken a couple swigs already. Your hesitancy soon melts away into compassion, as you give in to meeting Raul's heart straight on.

When he draws away from you, his eyes slowly flutter open. "Why did it take so long for this moment.. to happen..?"

Kristeva stares at the both of you; her eyes blank without comprehending.

"Why should that even matter?" you go. As you feel the heat, how it radiates off your face, you start to realise how much sweat you are expending.. how the chronic aching and itching has gone away. "This little time we have together, Raul, it's made for you and I.. please, untie me. It'll be awkward otherwise if we do end up going.. all the way.."

A beat – Raul's hand hesitates over your thigh. You can feel your erection uncomfortably pressing against the fabric; you arch yourself up to him like a willing model in front of the camera.

You want him to notice it.

Nothing escapes those eyes which are enrapt by desire. As if petting a cat to calmness, Raul strokes your bulge, and the muffled sensation offers tremors, surging from your legs up through your spine – you groan..

"Daedalus!" he exclaims. There's a raspy gait to his exhales which you recognize in yourself. "You're.. amazing.."

The sweat is collating where the wheelchair's clamps hold you steady. "Raul, do you want to know just what it's like, having me hold you in my arms? Let me out of this chair, and I'll give you what you've only dreamt of in those lonely nights." Your pleading is as sincere as you can muster.

He looks you in the eye. His other hand strokes your oily, unkempt hair.

"Never. You're perfect where you are."

Raul reaches under. It's as much of a violation as you've feared, and then some. He gropes and each squeeze renders you as much of a victim of sexuality as his control.

"Raul-!" you go. "S-stop!"

Your protests are interrupted in a kiss, as Raul holds you close and you jerk your hapless body in a sporadic intensity.. the wheelchair rattles, moans trapped in privacy, and the orgasm, like precious amber sap out of a tree you frequent in moonlight, is verging near.

All you can do to preserve your last shreds of dignity is pretend it's her – anything so long as your intimate cries aren't.. with him..

Instead of post-coital warmth, you are flooded with chills.

"Daedalus," Raul says, rummaging his drink cabinet. "As long as you'll love me, you shall remain at your post." He pours two glasses, the red drink swirling under the amber-lit room. As he turns towards you, his lapel still has some residue on it.. "Everything will be normal again. That's how we solve problems.. both yours and mine."

Kristeva has un-done the binder on your right arm. You struggle to hold the glass steady.

"Salute!" he goes, and he downs the wine – his glass raised to the ceiling. With no other recourse, you take his drink and sip it also, ever so lovingly. It's good enough to make you want to hold back the bile.

".. salute," you half-heartedly whisper.

Raul wheels you to the balcony to greet the night. You feel the crisp wind, a brisk air-conditioned product of Romdeau that barely replicates the actual feeling from Tetiana's worlds. It's a nostalgia for a past that's never really existed.

"Romdeau," Raul says, leaning over. "We're like an anthive, despite all our intelligence. Everyone fills out their little niche, everyone lives out their happy, ignorant lives with the autoreivs, and that's how it'll go. It's the ones who can bear knowing the horrible truth about our existence – people like me and you – who deserve to wear the mantle of Godhood. To prove to all the eons that we'll rightfully helm our destiny."

The wind brushes by his hair. "You understand me well, right?"

A beat.

"Daedalus?"

"It's a dangerous game," you go, still clutching the empty glass. "You're not talking about just us; it's about everyone's survival. By enslaving proxies.. those beings we're not even close to understanding, you're presuming that we'll all become masters of the world again."

Raul does a spit-take. "Without presumption, we'd still be left in the Stone Age, my boy! We don't need to understand them to know that proxies, like any other, balk in fear for their own lives; you've seen that in Monad already. There's us, and there's them. And we'll get them to make the rest of this wretched planet habitable.. and us, free of this curse of reproductive sterility.."

"If you've studied history," you say, "you'll know slaves eventually steal the whip from their masters."

"Yes," Raul says. "You didn't let me finish my sentence. When our demands are met.. we'll wipe the proxies out, every single last of them out of their fucking misery – and then we'll be totally free.. no slaves, no masters. No more resentments, no more living like caged animals in this goddamned zoo! Our freedom! Won't you taste it with me, Daedalus?"

He rips the glass out of your reluctant hand, and tosses it out into the air – where you watch it whirl down like a skydiver in freefall..

"Oh, not to worry," he says, gleeing. "I'll have Kristeva synthesize me another one- first, we need to put you back to work, first thing-"

Your eyes dart, recalling the freedom of Tetiana's compassion. And past that, the sheer desperation of Lil and Vincent's entrapment, their lives far past anything resembling control. "Raul, I'll do anything that you ask. But let me show you something first.. in case you're still curious about what I've been really doing, before my arrest."

"Before you do," he goes, his hand over your arm, "do you think I should trust you?"

You gaze at him, mustering that same serenity which Tetiana has willingly shared with you. "We're lovers now, Raul. What are you even asking."

Silence. Before he heartedly laughs.

"Of course."

comments

Fiat Lux / 13

2022-10-10T22:19:17Z

It only dawns on Lil, as she witnesses the ultrasound on the hospital monitor, the staticy blob which has an eye, that she is going to be a mother. Earlier, she's been vomiting at home, with a queasiness that she's never experienced before.

"It's a her," the technician goes.

"Vincent.." she says - he stands beside her laying on the bed, his eyes tearing up while he clasps her hand. "She's already beautiful.."

For the past months, Vincent has been setting up a new life for Lil's sake. For their child's sake. Running away to a southern tropical town, all the prize money, and the money he's embezzled from Antonioni – it's gone towards a house that overlooks the sea. The home they've bought; Vincent has been able to get for cheap because it's been abandoned for the longest time.

The floorboards are worn, the wallpaper tearing. But with a bit of elbow grease, Vincent is able to refit the home to a pristine state – Lil spending hours agonizing over the right shade of purple for her room..

And every day, it's a joy. Under the blue skies, the people here – although they speak mainly in Spanish, they're so friendly, and so very supportive of them. When they've caught the news of their pregnancy, they are showered with gifts: a crib, a doll collection, a set of nursery books..

And every night, Lil clasps her dear Vincent by her side when she sleeps. Her dreams run wild with fantasies of spending happy moments with her daughter – she'll name her Pino.

In the mornings, she writes in a journal about her latest dreams. One of which is riding amidst the horses across the valleys – by the time Pino's here, she'll never miss the chance to regret leaving Pino without the best memories. What excites her, besides revealing her inner, private thoughts with Vincent's acceptance, is that she just knows it'll come true, a hundred times over, a re-assuring blanket which bridges over the skies to the stars.

"Vincent.." she says, wistfully, one night in the fields as they see the streaks in the sky. "Will you take me to see the moon.. and Mars?"

"I will." His palm is feeling how her heart beats, sliding down to the fertile swelling of her belly. "If not tomorrow, then someday."

On the cutting board, Lil slices beef – preparing a juicy dinner; Vincent has spent the whole day fashioning a workshop when she begins to feel the contractions.

"Ohh-hhh—"

The knife clatters, falling to the ground, as Lil keels over, feeling the water spill out between her legs. Vincent's outside – even though he has the buzzsaw on, slicing through 9x4s, he senses Lil's cries.

"Lil.. Lil!" he goes, running to find her laying, clutching her belly. Her face is contorted with an immensely splitting pain, so he musters all his might to carry her up.

The drive to the hospital is marked by looming clouds, threatening to form a tornado amidst the hills. Dust crackles over the windshield, and Vincent turns the wipers on – hoping to see the road ahead.

Hoping for deliverance.

Although Vincent wouldn't call himself religious – he'd met the grey-haired pastor of Our Lady of the Immaculate Lake, who spews out sermons about accepting life's turns with an open-hearted spirit. Even if our Lady seems like at best an abstract concept, she'll listen to your prayers in times of trouble, for sinners and non-believers alike.

The energy from the church is unbelievable, with choir singers praising the Lady's faith to the tune of flamenco dance. It's an entertaining watch, but what caught Vincent was the pastor's particular interest in him, and Lil's pregnancy..

In private, as everyone congretates after the sermon -

"Praise the Lady!" the pastor Julius went. "She's blessed you with this upcoming child! I just know you'll be starting a wonderful family.. it's another darling light, shining in our community."

Vincent smiles. "You make me feel right at home, already."

"Everyone's been talking about it. The talk is unavoidable, even if I plugged bananas up my ears. Might I offer you a little prayer, for your daughter's sake?"

Vincent finds a respite in that memory. Julius is so earnest, and very eager to please – his energy's infectious.

As a train stops his way, Vincent repeats that little prayer - Lil wipes the Jaeguar's windows with her feet as she feels her uterus contracting some more, her cries for respite unbearable to hear.

They arrive; it doesn't take long for the hospital to accept the pregnant patient. In fact, it's as if the staff have already expected their arrival..

"Please! I have to be there!" Vincent shouts. The hospital staff lift Lil onto a stretcher, while she reaches out for him – an outstretched hand, missing his.

"No."

The big nurse stops him from following Lil into the halls.

"Nonsense!" Vincent goes, trying to slide his way past her. "I promised I'd be there when Pino's born!"

"But you are here already. Tranquilo.."

The nurse shoves Vincent down to one of the waiting seats, with an effortless strength. He hears Lil's cries growing dimmer, and tries getting up; the nurse easily keeps him down by the shoulders.

"Are you going to let me see them when it's over?" Vincent asks, with baited breath. "Lil and Pino?"

"You just have to wait," the nurse goes. "Giving birth isn't as simple as holding your loved one through to the end. There's sterilization, placenta disposal.."

"Really?"

When it comes down to it, Vincent is clueless about how a woman's body is. He's never had sexual education – only that it just feels good, as she's able to bring down the barriers he's erected around his soul to experience the vulnerability and tenderness of loving her.

"Oh, yes," the nurse goes, as she holds his hands, examining them, brushing some residual sawdust off. "These hands.. they're so roughened.. you've done a lot of things with them. Wait. You are Vincent Law, aren't you? The poker player?"

"Formerly one. I've won enough prizes for a while.."

"That's why you look so familiar. I see some of your games on television, during the night shifts – you play soo bueno..ah, si, this reminds me. I need you to fill out this sheet."

Vincent fills out the complicated mumbo-jumbo, which basically asks for his legal information. By the part which asks their relationship status, Vincent realises he hasn't even thought of wedding her yet, after all these months. Isn't loving her enough? If he attends the church and asks to officialy join them in holy matrimony, the gospel dancers can throw fabulous moves for their sake.

He puts down 'common partner.'

"Muoy bien," the nurse says, as she takes the form. Then someone radios to her in the romance language which Vincent has yet to grasp (besides bits and pieces: i.e. chinga tu madre). "Vincent, your daughter Pino, she's just waiting for you.."

Argounova shows Daedalus the seer's observation abilities – this panoramic sphere which charts everyone in her realms. The sensations of many people breeze by in the hazy clouds: voices, actions, varying emotions and shades of colour, all congealing together in vortical harmony, while she and Daedalus are a focal point of the storm.

For her, it's a ripe moment. In her lifetime, she's only let one other venture in this place of intimate voyeurism, early on. That almost killed her; the man rushed to place his family ahead into riches and nigh-immortality, and spread misfortune over the people he disliked.. the result was plunging 70% of the population into psychosis. Years of reversing the damage wasn't fun.

The difference with Daedalus, although he's a flawed boy with an unrequited obsession over Lil, is that she knows his weakness.. for now, he'll have read-only access.

"It's.. I can't make sense of it," Daedalus goes, as his eyes psychotically dart fro and to. "It's too much. It's like my focus is pulled upon a thousand things, and it's slipping past what I can comprehend. Where do I even begin?"

Tetiana ponders – even with his tier of intelligence, she knows he doesn't have her processing ability, at least not yet. He is a formerly blind boy who could now see, so this'll take time. Soon, he'll accompany her in making her world more lively.

It doesn't mean she can't lend him a shoulder up in the process, though. She rests her fingers over his skull, offering him some of her mental composure.

"When you were in the school halls," she goes, "how were you able to pick Lil out from the other girls?"

"I.. see her." Daedalus shivers from the way Tetiana lifts the example from his earlier days. It's hard to deny the lopsided intimacy: she knows him, but he still doesn't know much about her.

"And when you see her, it's because she is not everyone else.."

Daedalus peers at the tenuous panorama. He is beginning to recognize how the swirling chaos possesses an order. Whatever he sets his attention upon, the seer answers to his desire in kind. With faith in that, he closes his eyes.

Vividly picturing when he was lucky enough to have kissed her. Her face.. how it feels to comprehend Lil in his awareness. His heart swirls with the innocence of those times; the seer is gliding past landscapes now, past oceans and dancing stars and whirling comets – he is narrowing upon a coastal town -

(is this where you are, Lil)

(she's giving birth)

(you ungrateful cunt)

And with delight, the jealousy also comes like a familiar venomous bite; the aching after tasting deliciously poisoned honey. The pain re-surging again in his heart, as if in anticipation of what he's going to see. Daedalus keels over, his arms clasping at his chest while stormy, demonic clouds form in on the town, from the edges..

"I can't bring myself to look upon her," he goes, tearing up. "Even from this distance, I can already feel her childbirth pain. Vincent's hope and anxiety, the life they'll be cherishing.. he's driving her to the hospital, isn't he?"

She nods. "You're getting a knack for this."

The seer is paralyzed, hovering over the singular vision of the Jaeguar – a train that interrupts its way on the road.

Daedalus reels from his bout of shameful yearning, too used to hiding his emotions. If he'd ended up crying while on medical duty, he'd be sent over to the psychologist, where his frailties would inevitably be laid bare before review (well, it's already happening). But in her world, when he's around Tetiana, an acceptance he'll never have in reality – yet he knows Romdeau's Security Bureau will soon strip away his connection to the dome.. and it'll be over.

His precious few moments of being alive, chasing after a dream.

"It's pathetic, isn't it?" he whispers. "I'm trapped in my obsession with a woman who, in reality, wouldn't give me the time of day. Anyone else would have moved on." He scoffs, drawing upon his scientific rationality which is supposedly deaf to emotion. "So you toss them away.. just like they did to you – that's what a model citizen does. That's how I'll let go.. I must not love her anymore."

He slumps like a shriveled flower, rooted in a place barren of sunlight.

"Tetiana," he goes, with a desperation leeching out from his voice. "I'm not any better than those countless lovers you've seen over the years.. please, help me take this pain away, for once. You can change memories at will - I don't want to remember her anymore!"

She kneels down by him. "No, I won't do that."

"Why?! How could you give Lil and Vincent their happiness, but not me?"

"They may look happy to you, but it's merely simulacra that keeps the nervous system pre-occupied in the end. An illusion – surely you haven't forgotten that?" She is sardonic.

".. even a good stage play still makes people cry in the end," Daedalus says.

A faint smile crosses her lips.

"In your case, you're asking me to wipe out a person's entire existance from memory so you can be happy again. But it's beneath you, Daedalus. How weak-spirited must you be to let go of her, just like that, when your devotion is tested – when once, you went all the way to save the woman you've loved from death.

"Without her – without love,for the rest of your days, you'll slave away as a cog for a society which cares only what you can do for it. Your inner life.. forever glossed over, while your God-given soul is left to rot, slowly and inevitably within your mortal shell.. there awaits your happiness, Daedalus. Okay?"

She is offering with her outstretched hand. Mist emerges around her fingers – he tentatively goes for it, before cowering away.

"I.. God!" he cries, realising what he's going to surrender. "I can't do it.."

"You little fool."

Daedalus looks at the sphere – at Lil who is laying on the hospital bed, surrounded by doctors, screaming and unrecognizable from the sweat and pain of childbirth. There had been a wall; a glass wall that's kept her separated from him these last few years, and now he gets to look at her from the one-way mirror. The apotheosis of how he's felt.

"I want to be able to see her live happily," he whispers. "Let me love her once more.. like how I did, when my heart wasn't tarnished by weariness."

In the sphere, Tetiana has found a kindred spirit at last.

As Lil makes one final push, the baby's cries echo out in the ward, and she feels all the tension she's held in her belly finally giving way – to relief, to euphoric joy.

"I want to hold her.." she says, as the doctor cuts the umbilical cord.

When little Pino is in her embrace, Lil looks upon the beautiful face who is at her breast and she rocks the baby to and fro, her eyes tearing up.

Daedalus feels his heart pouring through all those walls he's put up, the sinews of feigned indifference breaking apart – until he's crying also with Lil. If he's there with her, he'd protect her happiness always like an angel lurking in the shadows. His heart is still caving in..

The doctors begin to kneel.

"Wait.." Daedalus goes. "What's happening.. why are they kneeling."

"Watch."

The pastor Julius bursts into the ward, with his bishops. He sees Lil with the child, and knows that the holy event that he's long been waiting for – it has now come to pass. "It's.. a miracle.. Pino, our saviour is born!"

"Hail, Pino!"

Lil looks around confusedly. "What-? I don't-"

"You've carried the child to term," Julius says, attending by her side, "but we didn't tell you out of fear you'd panic and do something rash. Our bible proclaims that a saviour, borne out of unexpected passion, would come from a couple who'd wander into our town, looking for sanctuary.. let me anoint her, please."

Lil shakes her head, pulling Pino away from the eager Julius. "She's not yours. She's mine and Vincent's. I never asked to be part of your religious folktale."

The bishops murmur into Julius's ear, and he smiles with an undeterred delight. "Nobody ever asks to be born, let alone be a part of the grand tapestry life weaves. But we will never mean your family any harm. If there's anything you need – if your child is wanting or hungry, we will be there to provide.. only please.. let us come adore her, with you."

Lil sees the bishops, in their violet robes, carrying incense lanterns which replace the stench of the hospital's sterile ammonia with a warm, white musk..

As she holds Pino, it's as if a strange halo is surrounding her, while time comes to a standstill.

"What's going to happen to Lil?" Daedalus asks. "Is Pino going to grow up alright?"

Tetiana remains tight-lipped.

"Please, tell me," he goes, pleading to know about their fate. "This is your world, Tetiana, and you know down to the last atom what'll happen. I've trusted you since we've first met .. won't you trust me back?"

"They'll be fine, for now," she says. "In her first months of life, Pino will get to experience all the joys that's humanly possible. But then, the Antonioni family will seek vengeance upon Vincent – as they believe he's double-crossed them. A loose end who's humiliated the family, first on the botched poker game, and the failed attempt on Bonanno's life.."

"I thought Bonanno had died with the heart attack," Daedalus goes.

"No. He recovered in the hospital and found out about how Lil and Vincent were used like pawns against him. Vincent will die to save Lil and Pino, leaving her widowed – and Pino fatherless.."

"How could you.."

Daedalus sees his vision scramble; the signal to Zaporizhzhia is finally starting to terminate. He fights with all his will just to stay, as he sees the painting of Lil and Pino filling with a tragic doom.

"Tetiana – you whore!" he screams, as he finds reality's sensations returning. "I won't let you do this to them!"

"It's already happening," she says. "You wanted it from the start; so that you could hop in and steal the role of lover from Vincent.."

He is shaken with absolute horror when Tetiana and the sphere fades away – to be met by the security bureau's guards, who have barged into the sanctity of his room.

Kristeva yanks the patch from his forehead. "Dream's over, kiddo."

comments

Fiat Lux / 12

2022-09-27T17:12:14Z

Upon the bed, Lil adores the touch of Vincent's hair. The night's excitement has grown too much for her nerves, and so she's awakened from her dream. No longer was it those lavender fields she's so familiar with, but something new: the sunset. The shades of orange in the sky, giving way to the forlorn night. Vincent had lain with her by the trunk of the oak tree, and she trembles knowing that the same yearning which had pulled her heart, the restless yearning to chase after that dying light with all her breath; he'd felt it too.

She strokes his hair – running her fingers through the tufts, and letting the strands brush across. As soothing a motion as it is when she once hugged her teddy bear during those lonely nights. Oh, why does it feel so good to hold someone you love in your arms.. and he's so innocent when he's asleep.

When moments earlier, the way they'd clung onto each other is like something entirely new, with those ripples of pleasure erupting from some deep, unexplored fathom of her being. She loves the savage animal who had poured all of himself out to her, and the meek mask of his he'd use to hide it in front of others. They are both him.. different sides of him. Lil thinks she hears Vincent purring (it's really him snoring), and he squirms over against her warmth, and she is astonished.

There's only one thing to do: in a profound and irrational sense, she purrs also. The delight she feels is overwhelming. She barely holds herself back from just kissing him – lest she'd disrupt his state of tranquil sleep.

The doors burst open. Lil recognizes the porter who'd been wheeling Bonanno, and she brings the bedsheets up over herself.

"Y-you!" The porter raises a quivering hand, pointed accusingly at her. "Bonanno had been watching you two.. thanks to your excitement, he's suffering a massive heart attack!"

"Wha.."

As it dawns on Lil that the whole time, other eyes have been peering on their intimacy, she feels a great wave of self-conscious chagrin and anger washing over her, like a sacred moment that had been secretly and perversely put out on stage for eyes to leer over.

"My master is about to die!"

She looks over at Vincent, who stirs. "Vince!"

Through the fog of waking drowsiness, he grows cognizant of their conundrum – while the porter raises a revolver in their direction. "Bonanno.. he took me in when my own family didn't have the guts to murder me as a a kind man. A loving man. A grand man, whose life-saving generosity I owe back for all the little moments I'd savour. That's snuffed over now. He'll never get to see the shrine I promised for him, all thanks to you two.."

Vincent sees the quivering eyes behind the barrel, barely able to contain the rage. "Your old man was going to die anyways," he says.

"You.. have no fucking idea!You two.. why don't you just die with him.."

Vincent, at first stunned, musters up the will to save her. He pushes Lil from the bed, right as the deafening report of the gun explodes the pillows. A thousand feathers jet into the air, an outburst of falling cherry blossoms while he engages the porter – mano-a-mano – over the gun.

Their arms shudder.

The porter is surprisingly strong, and Vincent starts to feel his arms bending back, facing a Mediterranean torque his nude, slender frame isn't equipped to deal with.

"Lil!" he screams.

Behind the bed, Lil's nerves cry out over the sight of the porter, vastly overpowering Vincent in brute strength. She looks for anything in the room for a weapon; there's no way she could deal with him as-is.

Vincent caves in. His legs buckle over and he falls to the floor. While the porter holds Vincent's mouth open with one hand, he inches the revolver into his mouth, the barrel's cold chrome just sliding over the tongue.. his eyes are agape, the tears watering. He is gagging from the barrel pressed down by his uvula, and all he can do is helplessly thrash.. until he comes to his senses that he's one trigger-pull away from death. The porter relishes his display of helplessness.

"When you meet Bonanno in the afterlife," the porter says, his finger hovering over the trigger, "let me hope he extends you the same kindness as he did me. Ciao, Vincento-"

"- it was me!" Lil shouts.

A huge part of her is relieved to see that she's diverted the porter's attention away.

"I killed your precious Bonanno," she goes. "Not him. It could have been any other man who's been together with me – you're just directing your anger at the nearest punching bag, like the dunceboy you are."

The porter considers. "Oh, is that so? It's double the pleasure then – I'll kill him anyways, so you can suffer my loss too-"

"No-!"

The revolver goes off.

For a split-second, Lil sees the smoke and blood, gushing out near Vincent's mouth. Her cries – so muffled by the pent-up tension in the bedroom.

Why is the porter crying out in pain?

With all the adrenaline filling your heart with panic, it's hard to see things play out clearly. But if Lil isn't mistaken, the porter is now missing his entire hand.

Vincent has both of his hands on the revolver; the blood-stained barrel is still smoking.

"Aaa-ouuughh!"

The porter is crying out like a child, as blood spills out of the stump he's had for a palm. Paralyzed by shock, he resembles a statue of a war-torn hero whose last moments of life involve an inglorious amputation.

Vincent plugs the revolver again.

His jaw is torn wide off.

Shaken by his impending demise, the porter screams out with his voice gurgling, almost choking on his own blood. He jumps upon Vincent, an animal whose last dying instinct is to take its oppressor down with it.

Then Lil golf-clubs the porter's skull with a vodka bottle – a loud, resonant pang – putting him out of his misery for good.

Seconds pass by. Maybe minutes, even. Lil helps Vincent up, and they hold each other tightly as if to offer respite from the horror they've participated in.

"Lil.. thank you," Vincent goes, his arms still involuntarily shaking.

She only smiles – wiping away some of the blood from Vincent's brow, as you hear distant panic and frenzied chaos outside. They can't stay here for long.

"That's two you owe me, Vincent."

Dressed now, Vincent follows her past the startled crowd – many of whom are focused upon the procession of Bonnano's body by the ambulance staff. Some of whom murmur about hearing some gunshots, some screams..

"The garage should be nearby," Lil goes, hurriedly brushing past a few suits and dresses in the night's veil. As her figure gets caught under some spotlights, Vincent sees the blood stains that they both share, with the combined sweat of their hands dripping some of it down..

His heart in his chest – pounding eagerly and excitedly and with anticipation, as opposed to the fearful, chilling panic minutes ago. They're going to get out of here.. to where, it doesn't matter. Any place far, far away from here.. somewhere beyond the reach of other people.

Vincent stumbles over a fallen wine glass. He falls atop a lady, who he stops his fall with by clinging onto her arms.

When the mansion's spotlight comes on them, it's unfortunate that the blood is a huge contrast on the lady's white dress – the people nearby see.

Then they scream. Bloodcurdling and shrill, so it's like an undeniable wail from out of nightmares.

The mansion's guards, mistaking the blood as a sign of guilt, bark for the apprehension of the man and woman. The rottweilers sniff the trail of sweat, and they're on the chase, their feisty mass pummelling through people – panting, hungry, and somewhere up ahead, the couple who appear to their sensitive noses like a concentration of lingering delight.

"Vincent, run, RUN!" Lil goes, seeing the approaching paws.

Vincent pushes away the woman, whose outrage has her lingering on him, and he chases after Lil –

They burst into an old garage (or maybe a car museum), where the fluorescent lights flare on in their presence. Vincent slams the door shut behind him, holding it closed while he slips down to the ground – as if barring entry to his worst fears, chasing behind.

Many of the cars have been draped. There is one nearby, a grey Jaeguar in pristine condition which Lil helps herself to. The keys are up in the visor, and – thank God, there's still gas – the car whirrs into being.

The dogs burst the door open..

Vincent hops by the passenger side, as the rottweilers bump into the door, rabidly clawing at the window, breaths condensing on the glass..

He exchanges a glance with Lil, a trust that goes past mere survival, before she shifts gears forward. A little press on the accelerator – the Jaeguar springs forth from its nine-year long slumber, carving a path out the den's overhead door.

The guards – firing in the night, blowing holes. All over the car's glass and body, which rattles Lil and Vincent when the bullets crack the air.

Lil rams a few guards out of the way, their bodies thudding aside as she sees ahead the mansion's gates, those bars, closing in. Her gut says she'll make it.

When she floods the pedal, the Jaeguar jets out fire from its exhaust; breaching the gates in a torrent of sparks, bent metal and a trail of flames.

Finally, the Jaeguar sits there, peacefully inert amidst the beach's dunes. The waters still roar upon the coast, as loudly as they would during the day, while Vincent's eyes flutter from sheer exhaustion. He stands, leaning against the car, while watching Lil stretch out her arms under the moonlight, before she undresses herself – scattering all the parts of her outfit close to the tide. Not a care in the world in her graceful movements.

He sees her nudity, a dim and yet sensual figure, as she wades into the waters.. Vincent isn't too tired yet, so he walks over, and he tears away his own three-piece suit, so that he can let the salty breeze caress his body in goosebumps and tranquility.

He hurriedly joins up with her, as she turns to see him. The water is just about lapping over her breasts.

"There's blood.. on your arms, Vince," Lil goes. "Let me wash it off.."

She rubs her palms over the spots, until the stains dissipate in the water. For the second time, Vincent is naked with her.. but now that he's perfectly content, he holds Lil close, and kisses her all over like a cup which has long adored the lips of a woman – his fingers rippling through her hair..

Lil takes him underwater with her.

The vistas of a thousand coral empires drift by them, as they drift aimlessly with the fish and aquatic life – breathing the water in as effortlessly as the spring air. All the while, Lil inhales Vincent.. his pulse, his heartbeats.. and breathes out her tranquility, wanting to be lost in this perfect dream with him.

comments

Adolescence Repose / 5

2022-07-28T16:36:27Z

It's morning when the yacht arrives by the docks of Tokyo, with the smog-filled ocean horizons. Utena gets off, and she shows her forged passport to the clerical officers, who muster a pregnant, eyebrow-raising glance, before letting her through.

Once, she'd watched the fishermen reel in hordes of koi amidst the glittering waters, before she'd set off for Ohtori Academy. Though she recognizes the modernized piers, albeit faintly, the hallowed mood of the faint, overcast sunrise sets her mind upon this world which has progressed forth without her.

She picks the first double-decker passenger bus from the queue. Her thumb purses over the Nokia phone, like an uncertain lifeline – she catches eyes with another woman, a blonde model, who could easily pass for Juri with her fey features.

When the bus drives off, Utena lets her thoughts dawdle, her eyes gazing past the skyscrapers at the mountain, which once held so many mysteries to her..

Wakaba.. would you ever forgive me for the pain and sullen withdrawal I've pushed you away with over those years? I swore that I'd never break your heart, and leave you, like how my own family had left me.

But life happens.. it just does.

(and all that's left of your roses are those withered, barren branches in the winter's sun)

Suddenly, you're over thirty-years old, a grown-ass woman, while a vital part of you still clings onto remaining seventeen: young and aching, and so vulnerable on the inside. Realistically speaking, you wouldn't hold on to someone who stopped mattering to you anymore. So why do I still think of you? Why can't I let you go, even now, like you did over me – remorselessly dropping me off that misty cliff where all I am to you is something that's better left forgotten? An untouched, undervalued memory, gathering dust ..

I don't entirely trust Souji. I've dealt with enough nonsense to just know he's not being entirely straight over helping me find Anthy again. After all, he did prey on those poor students in his Black Rose cult, all those years ago, pressing upon their personal insecurities, to have them all hound me in those duels. Why would he be any different today? He's a manipulator. That's what he does.. and I've seen enough movies to know it never, ever ends well – complying with a dubious partner true to the end.

I don't know where his self-proclaimed benevolence for me ends.. and his self-interest begins. I don't want to find out by the point where it's too late. I'll have to find a way to trip him up, one way or another..

Wakaba, I need you by my side. I really need you to be my friend again. A familiar face, anyone at all besides this electronic ghost of Christmas Past who knows me.. because I'm lost, spiritually adrift in time and space. Once I find your sweet eyes again, which had once given out so much delight and kindness, I hope.. you' ll find it in your being to hear me out, at least.

To know that I bare my heart when I say.. I still love you.

Utena's legs chafe after wandering past the crowded Buddhist temples. She's checked on Wakaba's feeds, enough to know that she lives around, or at least frequents the Asakusa prefecture with her newfound family – when she'd take photos by the river with her two kids, or dine-out by Sometaro when it's a joyous occasion.

But not enough to know to a certainty if Wakaba would even be around, if Utena should look by the river or the general area.

Her Nokia rings that trademark tune..

"Utena!" Souji barks. "Just what do you think you're doing?"

Jeez, he's quite demanding.

"Oh, I'm admiring the area.." Utena goes. "I'm looking for Wakaba. What, is that any of your business?"

"This is no time for you to dally off! Need I remind you that you are being hunted down by INTERPOL agents? That forged identity isn't so you can relax off on memory lane, you know."

Utena sighs. "She can help us with finding Ohtori – you do know what friendship is, right? Maybe you can find out where she's at?"

"Perhaps you mean she can help you in reconnecting as a friend?" (She bites her lip; he's not exactly a mind-reader, yet..) "There is nothing in her social media posts which indicate she even misses you, let alone think of you."

While Utena presses the oversized phone over her ear, there's a family nearby who's letting their boys play soccer in the streets. The ball whizzes between her legs, but what especially arrests her eyes is the way the wife looks on adoringly over her children, before receiving her husband's kiss. Utena touches her own lips in kind; what she'd give to be kissed lovingly in return, in a city of millions..

"Utena," Souji goes, "whatever you might think of her, she's not relevant to our mission. You are to proceed towards the University of Tokyo – I've had my lackeys prepare you a little something, which will aid us in our eventual confrontation with Akio..."

"Oh blah blah blah!" Utena says, blotting out the earpiece with her hand. "Listen, Souji, if you want me to trust you, then all I ask for is a little trust in return. Can you tell me where she is?"

"Yes, I could.. even though it'll be most counter-productive."

"Will you tell me?"

A beat.

"She's not anywhere on the streets, but at home."

The doorbell rings, and Wakaba's daughter, who had been giving her mother a back rub on the sofa, ends up answering the door..

"Hi, is err.. Wakaba at home?"

"Hold on – Mama! There's this lady who wants to talk with you!"

It's been raining for the past 10 minutes; Utena relishes being under the rainshade's relief, running her fingers through her sopping wet hair – dripping by the ends, squeezing out the moisture. She's dreamed of this moment, and with trepidation in her heart, it is happening..

"Hallo?" It's Wakaba. Utena glances over her former friend, who's in her bathrobe wearing hair curlers. Wakaba has settled into being a housewife. "Can I help you?"

She musters all the strength in her being to hide her swelling emotions..

"Do you remember Ohtori?"

"Ohtori.. I've studied there. Why? Are they having a class reunion?"

"In a sense, yes." Utena's acting instincts are kicking in. "I'm going from door-to-door, finding classmates who've graduated in 2000. Are you Shinohara Wakaba?"

"I don't go by that name anymore – it's Gwang-Jong Wakaba now. Oh, I know, my husband, he's a former boy-band singer from Korea, and he's just the best.. you've simply got to try some of his noodles!"

"Well, might I come in for a brief interview?" Utena gestures at the rainy streets behind her. "I really hate having to ask you this of all people – you're too nice, it's just I wasn't.. I didn't bring my umbrella."

Utena hovers over the family portraits, where Wakaba has married by the Shinto steps with her coquettish lover. And centre over the shelf of incense, it's a picture of her mother -

"She died three years ago from brain cancer," Wakaba goes. "God rest her soul."

Wakaba's Alexa blares out: "You requested – 'God Bless Our Soul'. I am searching-"

"Shaddup! Sorry. I need to get that thing fixed. I swear, it overhears every word out of our mouths.."

Utena sighs. "I wish I could have been there for you.."

"Eh?" Wakaba sips her tea.

"Ermm-" Utena says, "I'm terribly sorry about that. Even though Ohtori Academy is no longer offically around, we'd still like to honour everyone who's attended – and I'll be sure to put a word in so that you'll receive financial compensation for your loss."

"Really?" Wakaba's eyes glow, and Utena sees her old classmate emerging. "But.. I don't know if I could accept this.."

Then Wakaba pauses – spotting the ring upon Utena's hand. "Wait, that looks familiar – I've always told my old friend how pretty it looks on her. Can I see?"

Utena raises her hand out; Wakaba fawns over the little piece of jewelry, to the point where it slips off her finger, resoundly clattering onto the floor. "Oops." The housewife kneels to pick it back up, before catching a forlorn gaze from the visitor, out the corner of her eye.

"Wakaba," she goes, laying a hand over Wakaba's shoulder as they meet each other's eyes. "I'm Utena."

"It can't be – how'd- why'd you come all the way here?"

Utena rests her back upon the wall, trying to come up with a nice explanation. And it's weird – to think of a moment, and to actually live it are two different things entirely. In the end, she simply says: "Because I need your help."

Then Utena, warily looking at the Amazon Assistant that's perched on the table, walks over and grabs the sucker – tossing the thing out the window into the rain.

"What was THAT for!?" Wakaba goes, fuming. "You don't just go to someone's home and just- just do that! What's wrong with you, Utena! What's happened to you?"

"Wakaba.. I can tell you a million different ways how sorry I am – how I haven't been the person you've once fondly known, growing up, and all that's apparently left is this moody-ass, self-absorbed bitch who's just pushed you, and everyone away these past years. But he's listening.. Mikage Souji."

"Souji?! He's been dead, Utena, I think you might be off your meds-"

Utena pulls out the black Nokia and the fake ID. "He gave me these. He lives on as some.. spooky spirit on the internet. That's how I knew where to find you.. damnit, I can't even explain myself properly without sounding like a loon.."

Her thoughts race – would Wakaba even believe that she met Souji over Fortnite® of all things?

"Utena, why don't you try to calm down, and explain from the beginning what's going on?"

"I can't.. you wouldn't believe me no matter how hard I tried."

Utena sits upon the couch, her hands squeezing her knees as if her kneecaps hold the hidden answer to life. As she does so, Wakaba's daughter peeks around the corner – staring at Utena with heavy suspicion.

"What I can say is," Utena says, "I met him by accident online. Ever since I've gotten involved with him, the police are on my tail. Now he has me caught in a chokehold, and he wants me to head over to the University to receive some kind of gift.. because he's got this score to settle with Ohtori and Akio. I- I don't blame you if you decide to call all of this what it sounds like, utter lunacy."

Wakaba seems to soften, as if filled with pity over her former friend. "It sounds like you're sure in a lot of trouble."

"I am," Utena goes, while Wakaba's daughter sneaks over to poke her mom. "And now that I see you and your beautiful family, oh, it pains me with the thought of even getting you involved in my mess."

"Mami.." her daughter goes, tugging at Wakaba's dress. "You gotta see this-"

"Later! Go back to the living room, we're having grown-up talk!"

"Wakaba—" Utena says, her real emotions breaking out, "for as long as I've known you, you've always been a sweet, caring and supportive person. I just wish I had someone to be by my side again, like when I'd lost my parents, because now I'm rolling along this road.. all alone in the dark, and I don't know anyone else who'll pull me back from the brink when I fall off-"

"Utena, this isn't you!" Wakaba shakes her back to reality. "You're a brave prince! You stood up for me so many times in Ohtori – get a hold of yourself! I don't think you went all the way through.. whatever it is that's happened, just so you can end up feeling sorry for yourself on my couch!"

"Then won't you be my friend again?"

Wakaba is torn with paralyzing indecision. She turns her head aside to see her daughter run around the corner, before looking back on Utena, who is pleading.

"What do you need me to do?" Wakaba asks.

"Go with me to the University," Utena says. "Then the resting place where Ohtori once was. If anything happens, at least you can call the police and tell them what really happened.."

Suddenly, the TV is on full-blast. What you can hear is the news reporter, mentioning Utena by her full name..

"Mama! She's a pedophile!"

Like an entranced deer, Wakaba heads over to the living room, where the news is broadcasting a special bulletin regarding INTERPOL's newest fugitive: Utena Tenjou.

"It's hard to realise how a child predator, not to mention a hacker associate, could easily lurk among us, posing as a regular citizen. They could be your neighbour, your boss, your co-worker. Real monsters will never tell you what monstrous and vile deeds they've done in the dark. Upon scavenging the hard drives of Utena's personal computer, authorities have discovered shocking footage, depicting several children being ordered around in some kind of basement."

Utena herself peers around the corner, a mounting dread in her stomach, while she sees Wakaba frozen still in horror.

"One of the identified victims in the video, Raki, is now live with us.. Raki – what can you tell us about Utena?"

Raki is awkwardly caught in the camera's gaze. "Raki, do you have any words to share regarding your so-called friend?"

"Umm.. the last time I saw her, she told me she had to go away on a trip somewhere, and I just said goodbye to her, that's all."

"A trip. Well, thank you so much Raki, for being brave. Victims of sexual assault will occasionally repress their traumatic memories, but you can see it in Raki's eyes that he's endured quite a horrifying ordeal while in Utena's clutches-"

"Bullshit!" Utena screams. "That's complete bullshit! He- he planted that on my hard drive!"

In the living room, Wakaba's husband, who has just gotten off the phone, and is visibly rattled upon seeing Utena. "You were Wakaba's friend from Ohtori, right?"

Despite his slender K-Pop frame which has taken on a couple pounds since marriage, Utena is terrified that such a sweet, kind man who's been a loving husband to Wakaba – is already transforming into a homicidal maniac, out for her blood.

"No.." Utena backs away, feeling the last vestiges of family warmth drain from this home. Wakaba holds her daughter protectively, while it isn't anger or abject hatred which leeches out from her face, but sheer disappointment.

"Did you just come here so you can end up kidnapping our daughter?" The husband grabs the nearby bust of one Yukio Mishima, and wielding it like a cudgel, lunges for Utena. He misses, leaving a huge dent in the wall. "GET BACK HERE, you sick, demented child-obsessed freak!"

Utena almost stumbles, scrambling to grab the fake ID and phone off the table. The husband lands a glancing blow on her arm, which has Utena howling in pain.

"Get her, daddy!"

"I'm not a monster!" Utena cries out, as the husband lands a good hit on her back, keeling her over on the ground, crawling. "H-help.."

When Utena rolls over to see her attacker, he's about to land the finishing blow on her face – the coup-de-grace, when Wakaba intervenes, grabbing her husband enough to have him lose grasp on the heavy bust.

"Utena!" Wakaba struggles to contain her hubby's wrath. "Just run, run before the police arrive.."

As Utena picks herself up, she wipes the blood from her nose.

"But mama," Wakaba's daughter whines, "she'll get away!"

"She's my friend.."

Little does Utena realise, shutting the door behind herself, that she's left her rose signet behind in that house. She can hear the sirens coming around the corner – going back onto the street isn't an option. So she musters her last reserves of energy in clambering over the side fences, from home to home – knowing that the police are forming a perimeter. Soon, a helicopter would be called in, and by then it'll be too late for her to flee..

She is a fugitive.

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Duet

2022-07-28T16:35:13Z

When Lil went into the Rabbit's cabin, she saw Vincent stepping out of the bathroom, water dripping down his hair onto his bare chest. He was naked, save for the towel around his waist. When he saw her enter, his face rose up with a blush which hid his impending embarrassment. He held the towel up in her presence, a fact which didn't escape Lil's gaze.

"I spoke with one of the survivors," she said. "They had all taken mandatory injections in Romdeau. A few of them suffered fits and convulsions."

Vincent slipped into the dressing shade. He breathed a momentary sigh of relief, before putting on his pajamas.

"I'm really sorry.." he went.

"What for?" Lil left her ermine coat on the bed as she relaxed herself beside it, removing her boots. She saw Vincent's faint silhouette going through the motions of getting dressed, before she noticed him pausing.

"My people are dying. It's my fault."

"They're dying from the airstrikes, from the poisonous atmosphere and that botched attempt to inoculate the citizenry. Raul and Daedalus had done this. Not you."

"I left them, Lil." Vincent stepped out from the dressing shade, his emerald eyes sullen with regret. "I abandoned my people, my dome. I ran away like a coward all because I was disappointed in myself-"

"Vincent!" Lil went up to his face, suppressing the impulse to slap some sense into his cheeks. "I don't want to hear this self-pitying crap out of you.. ever. There's always things you'll have said or done, that might have seemed reasonable then, but later you've come to regret when you realise in hindsight what it actually really means. Missed opportunities. Losing people you've come to care about. The only thing you can do.. is live right here in the now, with me.. because you're far, far more than all your past mistakes.."

Her voice had dipped into a soothing whisper, as if her maternal side had emerged while she'd let him have it, and all there was left was that she loved him. Without realising it, Lil's hand rose to caress him by the neck.

"I'm sorry," Vincent said.

"I know."

Sighing, he leaned into her palm. And Lil held him for what felt like ages, like she was petting a lost puppy who only wanted someone's affirmation. It was soothing for her, watching Vincent simply get lost in her touch as she felt his breaths, like rhythmic flushes of warmth over her wrist.

Then Lil recollected herself. "I gotta get ready for bed, Vince."

She brushed by him to the bathroom.

○ ○ ○

And when she'd had enough of washing the grime off her body, with all the steamy goodness, Lil put on the bathrobe. She'd started pampering her face with a cooling, leave-on mask (hydrating facial, with hyaluronic acid) before she sensed something was amiss.

When she peeked outside, there was Vincent by her bed, holding her coat up to his face. He was inhaling it – her scent, rather, that she'd generously left upon the fur when she'd worn it for the day. She remembered what she'd felt when he'd burst into her washroom the first time, as an unrecognizably savage and feral figure that had left a stain in her memories since. Her heart skipped a beat. Oh, Vincent..

Lil crept out with a cat's silence in her steps, as she dreamt of a million ways she could tease this hapless proxy unawares. Even throwing a hand out and pushing him onto the bed, so she could hear his little yelp of surprise again. It was her most tempting option.

But in the end..

Vincent felt hands creep around his waist from behind, and he yelped – he'd almost expected Pino, who'd go "Booo! Gotcha!" and he'd have to come up with excuses that he was mmm, just checking her coat for any rips and tears. But it was Lil, who steadied Vincent in her slow embrace and she'd turned him around to face her.

A blush flashed across his cheeks. "Oh."

Her breast and torso protruded from the bathrobe. Vincent sat there in awe of her partial nudity, and Lil didn't give him any time to react, before she leant in and pulled his hand up to her face. She held his thumb, and gently inched it over her face, down to her lips, as she'd closed her eyes in re-experiencing the electric sensation of his fingertip – the little friction, the momentary fear and vulnerability, as she rubbed it over the corners of her mouth. Even sucking on it, with her lips nibbling in soft kisses..

When she drew back, her bathrobe having crumpled away, Lil caught a glimpse of Ergo Proxy's eyes, shimmering and wanting for her, within the guise of Vincent. "This is how I've always dreamed of being with you again.." she whispered. Flush with endorphins, she held Vincent's other hand and guided it down between her legs.. allowing the orgasm to finally rush up to the surface and overwhelm her good senses in vivid cries, for a while of being content in his arms.

When she came to, she recoiled from him in shame, averting her eyes from the fact that she'd just used him like a glorified sex autoreiv. It was Monad who had been steadily emerging within her, after all. "I'm sorry, I should stop. I.. I just can't help it."

"I never said I didn't like it," Vincent said, his voice lengthening. Like lightning, he pulled her down to the bed.

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Fiat Lux / 11

2022-06-11T17:42:46Z

A hand rushes up to Lil's chest – her own – as if to steady her own rising pulse, acutely felt like the panic and awe one feels under the leering gaze of a grizzly bear. His Venetian mask glimmers as the fires do. If you peer deeply enough, you might make out the green of his eyes. How they dilate over her.

They remain still, locked in a perpetual gaze that only intensifies as Vincent approaches the lady, who has his entire being helpless with the singular desire of pressing his body upon hers, and feeling more.. much more than merely just the touch of her naked skin upon his – with her lips promising all the sweetness of a ripe plum upon your mouth.

For Vincent, the mask he wears offers him a solace in anonymity, bringing out a raw, animalistic urge in him (arousal). Even so, he tries to muster the will to look back at the door, and just walk out before things get messy.

But another step forth wouldn't hurt him.. it wouldn't hurt Lil either. Maybe she doesn't need to know..

Lil has been reading the man's movements; she gets surprised when he stops in his tracks. What gives?

Is he pausing to admire her? Or to collect himself?

When she starts breathing again, she recalls that she's supposed to play the role of a seducer, so.. might as well enjoy it. (She'll ask her Vincent for forgiveness later, during an opportune time.)

"What's the matter, Vince?" she asks him, playfully leaning forth. "Cat got your tongue?" It's not much of an icebreaker – especially not during a sexually tense moment, but it's the least Lil could say in the standoff.

"My- what?"

Vincent is taken aback; he hasn't expected the albino-haired Odeile to turn so coquettish, when she'd been so demure just earlier. His surprise leaves her laughing all of a sudden, as she finds it funny how fast he'd gone from arousal into confusion.

"Miaou?" she goes, doing her best cat impression and wiggling out her tongue for him to see - Vincent grins, bursting out into giggles over her antics.

"'Miaou?' You're sure in a frisky mood," he says. "Woof-woof."

Lil feels her cheeks gushing with warmth - it's comforting to know he can really laugh; otherwise she'd enjoy the prospect of blue-balling him (until he wails). She looks up at his face, her thoughts titillated by who she'll find under the mask. Well, Vincent is a fairly common name among people, right?

"Why don't you take that silly-looking thing off," she says, as she gets up from the couch, doing a little pirouette.

"Silly-looking thing?"

"Your mask, I mean. So I can get to know you better.."

His fingers waver briefly over the ceramic facade. "I'm a little self-conscious," he goes. "Let me leave it on.. forgive me."

"Fair enough."

She comes up to him and without further ado, she lets her hands go - caressing the naked, revealed part of his face.. then his neck.. and then his shoulders, and his chest.. all the while adoring how solid he's built as a man, as she runs her hands around towards his back.

Up close, Vincent inhales her scent: a nasal landscape dotted by oranges and lilies, underscored by the faint musk of her own arousal. The shuddering of his belly swells – his breaths trembling uncontrollably with each passing second of her touch, as he lets her go over him in a willing surrender.

(so vivid)

Soon, it gets too much for him to endure. He lets out a moan – a sound from his lips, a noise that is as spontaneous as it is honest.. and yet as deep as his maddening hunger – over her.

"Are you good?" Lil says, despite wishing how she could have asked him: "Do you like it when I make you feel good?" She feels tingling from her scalp, a sensation which gradually progresses down her back in a series of electrifying euphoria.

When he opens his eyes, he is enamoured by her fingernails.. how glisteningly white they seem. Like a fresh stratum of snow in a moonless night. He looks up at her – a face full of artifice and an innate beauty which is melting him to the core. "Y-you have.. no idea.." he croaks, entwining his trembling fingers with hers. How soft they are to the touch.. and so warm too.

In a slow dance that's shared between the two by way of sensual adoration and longing, they hold each other in the night's veil.

Then Lil hovers her hands upon his belly; she unbuttons his vest – peeling away his overcoat and simply letting them crumple next to his feet on the glossy ceramic tile. And likewise with the remaining layers of his outfit, her motions possess the eagerness of a young girl, just dying to know what is hiding under all that wrapping. Inch by inch, she pushes herself closer to that line that straddles what she's yet to experience.. and her wildest desires.

Their breathing grows fervent.

Vincent struggles with her black bra. In an accident, he fudges the piece of underwear down, leaving one of her breasts protruding out in the open. Her rosy areola is exposed – her nipple is revealingly erect -

"Oh.." Lil has just come down to his undies, when she pauses – realising what he's just done. Did you really just..? Her areola is starting to chafe from the room's chill, when she realises just how vulnerable she's about to be, for this stranger's sake.

Unwilling to restrain himself any longer, Vincent lunges and violently kisses her by the nape of her neck, as if his lips are in a desperate search for her carotid artery, carrying her throbbing pulse. It's difficult to put into words what he's able to discern, tasting her, but all he knows for certain is that she is beyond anything he could have ever dreamed of.

Whatever sense of composure Lil has left, it's slipping away, and her legs begin to quiver as she's helpless in his vampiric enthrall. The moans which escape her mouth are so frantic, screaming a desperation that she's never before out of herself; it actually frightens her.

At the same time, a reluctance to just give in..

"S-stop," she goes, tapping him on the shoulder amidst her panting. "Vince – stop, please..!"

He doesn't seem to hear her, apparently deaf to her pleading. While he caresses the back of her head, his other hand has already gone for her breasts.. oh, it's so soft in his palm, and the way her nipple rubs along his carpal..

"Unnngh- get OFF me!"

It takes him all his strength just to obey her, even while she shoves him off.

Lil gets on the couch, her knees curling up as she seems to stare out into blank space. Trying to sift through all her turbulent emotion. But it's too much.

She cries. She isn't ready for this.

"I'm sorry.." Vincent tells the lady. "I didn't mean to hurt you."

"It's not you. I just can't.. I have another man. I love him.. more than you could ever know. Just give me a minute – I'm so, so sorry, Vince. I don't mean to turn you off like this."

Lil's breaths come out like wheezes, as she still shakes. Something in him just hates seeing her like this -

He looks around the room, wanting to comfort her in any way he can. There's a cabinet by the pond, full of various liquor bottles. Aaugh, putain de merde they're all alcoholic; definitely not what anyone needs. But there's nothing here that's even close to a sobering drink..

Vincent settles for the minty green bottle - absinthe green (Jacques Senaux). Despite drinking on the occasion, he's never actually tried absinthe in particular, though a friend told him that it's what the high-class artists and bohemians take, bringing themselves into a jovial mood, ripe for any act of creativity. He grabs two glasses of it, already smelling the rustic spices of the drink as he pours it straight with ice and marshmallows.

As he sits beside Odeile, he daintily covers her with the bathrobe that he's taken off just moments ago, in what had been a salvaje lovemaking session he's already ashamed of. She eyeballs the absinthe-filled glass for a little bit. All the marshmellows have smiley faces on them, as they dissolve into efferescence.

She tries a sip, and it's – way too strong -

"Ppppufffttt—"

The table is all covered with her spittle, and Vincent recoils, flush with embarassment. He catches her flashing him a dirty look, as it only just occurs to him that perhaps he ought to dilute it first. How was he supposed to know? (Read the back label.) "I'm not a bartender," he goes. "As you might tell.. hehe.."

"My tongue's burning!" Lil goes. "You fucker-!"

Vincent nervously takes the glass from her. The night is all but completely ruined.. then she guffaws out loud over how ridiculous everything's gotten.

"But you only wanted to make me feel better.." Lil mutters (more to herself), looking up at him – his partially glistened body - she realises she's also covered some of his chest and legs with the spat-out drink. "You're.. kind and gentle, and yet.. somewhat wild. Well, thank you anyway for the effort, Vince. I'm so sorry about the mess. Here-"

Lil carefully wipes away the spittle from his skin with her sleeve – a part of her is inexplicably hung over the way his underwear is stained. She has a faint inkling of how much his boxers had just struggled to contain his arousal.. the mere thought of it alone has her pulse surging again in her throat, almost to the point of intoxication, which she gingerly tries to ignore.

She takes the glass off his hand -

"Wait.." Vincent says, almost pleading to her. "Before you go.. won't you tell me about the one you love? I'd.. I would like to hear about him."

Lil pauses. Considers the masked stranger, who she's left in this state of near-nudity. "I'm not going, silly."

She's poured the both of them a real drink, this time around. It's just some bourbon – but it's what she enjoys in those cloudy days when there seemingly isn't anything to do. It always leaves her stomach feeling warm, unknotting it and loosening up her usual tension. She hopes it'll do the same for him also.

"He's kind of shy," Lil goes, lounging by the pond – letting her toes dip just so into the water. "Nervous. Wimpy too. I had to pull him out of trouble, like he's a little lost puppy to look out for. At the same time.. my heart just goes out to him. He'll do anything and just give it his all, if it means my well-being. You know, you really reminded me of him when you brought the absinthe.."

"Mmhmm, he's a surefire keeper." Vincent is beside her, sitting the other direction. "What else can I say? What are you doing out here though, with someone like me?"

The koi fish scatter wherever her toes break the surface, and the little ripples jet out, with webs of refracted light, dancing and wavering from some otherworldly plane of existence. It's like those swimming pools in a summer's afternoon that has always piqued a feeling of tranquility in her..

"I have no choice," she goes. "They're holding him hostage.. and I dunno where." She lays the bourbon aside, sighing to herself as she curls her fingers into a ball – she wasn't even strong enough to wrestle off Antonioni, that old mob boss. "On top of it all, now I'm attracted to you, Vince.. I know it's wrong.. I honestly wish I wasn't. It would make it so much easier for me to breeze past this night, just – please believe me when I tell you this is far out of my control."

Vincent is at a loss for words. He's not sure how to take her show of honesty, as he sips a little mouthful of her bourbon. She's in the same spot as him, as he inwardly quivers over the thought of Lil, poor Lil, hanging at the terrible mercy of Antonioni's gangbangers.. what can he do for her?

"Odeile.. I believe you," he says. "Look at me, please. I need you to look at me.."

Lil has to peel her eyes away from the koi pool, to realise that the stranger's eyes, behind the Venetian mask, are a pale shade of green.

The same as her Vincent's.

A wave of relief washes over her. It can't be him.. can it? It's so far-fetched.. how is it even possible? She shuts her eyes momentarily, just finding it difficult to reconcile the two separate people as the same. Why, that feral, savage energy -

"None of this is your fault," the stranger goes, with his voice a notably lower timbre than her Vincent. "Your being attracted to me, you being here, or anything. As a matter of fact, I'm.. supposed to be killing a mob boss right now, hehe, only.. I hadn't expected to be put together with you in the same private bedroom. Even now, I'd be lying to myself if I tried to deny how you wind me up, oh, so very much inside.. from the moment I've first laid my eyes on you.."

An unexpected welling emotion surges out in Lil, as her lips flutter, her vision of him blurring into a thousand bokeh circles –-

"Vince.. why are you so.. good.." she goes – her chest is starting to heave.

"You're oh, so incredible, Odeile." Holding her in his arms, Vincent wipes away the dripping tears from her face with a gentle kiss. "I would give anything in the world, just to be that special someone who's ended up in your heart. But right now, I'm not.. and to be honest, I probably never will. So, I'll just try to live with that .."

Lil breaks, burying her face in his shoulders. It's so painfully beautiful, knowing she shouldn't have him. She grabs onto his arm, holding it and holding it like a person about to drown from a deep, tumultuous ocean, and she just cries and cries her heart out, while Vincent cradles her.

It seems like forever before she manages to recover any semblance of self-control; she looks upon him - rests her hand upon his, brushing his wrist, her fingers stroking upward and leaving in their wake a trail of goosebumps and aroused body hair.

"You know.. we can still do it. The two of us.."

"We don't have to.."

".. I want to," Lil whispers. She slides his palm – underneath her bra where he tore it away, hoping somehow that he'll feel just how her pulse is flaring up, pounding in her chest. "I really want to. Let me be.. your special someone, Vince. Just for tonight.. At the very least, I could say.. I did my job."

Her voice has grown fraught with steam, while her eyes beckon him, a steady pull of his eros into her waiting thrall. Vincent's mind tries to come up with a reason.. any reason to resist her at the last moment. But his thoughts only jumble up, always veering rapidly into an unanswerable blank. The only thing left, finally, is the warmth that has flooded his stomach.. the insatiable pauses between breaths, and just a mere taste of (that sweet oh sweet surrender) her lips..

"Alright," he goes.

And for the first time in her life, Lil finds herself kissing a man in the mouth. It seems to her like pressing her face upon a mirror giving back her own image, and that her tongue is excavating the inside of a statue's granite head. Yet this being an act of hunger - of a culpable hunger – she knows she is committing adultery.

The bed is a wide open canvas for their bodies. The masked Vincent lays his head on the bedrest, while Lil has clambered atop of him - he's like a mythological figure seemingly possessing the body of an Olympian, and the face of a jester hailing from some bygone court.

Thankfully, the mask doesn't impede Lil meeting his lips – meeting in gentle, prolonged little touches. Allowing him to savour her bliss. Allowing herself to directly taste his moans. She pulls away from him, opening her eyes so she could gauge hi-s reaction.

So far, he is just adoring every second.

Lil crawls directly atop of him in a more comfortable spot (so she doesn't have to prop herself up with her arms), and she reaches for him – kissing him, while she's free to hold his neck, his head to her hands' content. It's fascinating to her, really; how multilayered his mouth is for her to explore.. besides the way she lets his tongue dance with hers in that little claustrophobic intimacy, or the way his saliva melts away with hers, she's struck by how the taste of him just unfurls (like an exquisite, artisianal perfume) as they go on kissing.

She ignores how his penis, stuck underneath his underwear, is pressing against her belly button. There is just the kisses so far, and that's okay. It already means the whole world to her.

It's not like fruit or chocolate or anything, where there's a definite taste. No, it's the indefiniteness of another person, who unlike an inanimate piece of food, has emotions, moods.. ever changing, ever growing..

When she hears- no, feels him start to gurgle and choke on their combined spit, Lil draws back again, this time getting her own tongue stuck amidst his teeth, owhh-!

Vincent is coughing out, dripping some wetness down the contours of his mask. In normal circumstances, it'd be gross, but when it comes to it, it's another reason to be aroused. "Sorry.." he musters; for an instant, Lil catches a bubble of spit in his mouth..

She licks her tongue, and then smiles; the pain is nothing to her, just a small blemish on the joy she shares with the stranger. "It's alright.." she huskily breathes, licking the spit off his mask, and stroking him on the cheek for what he's given her so far. "You're doing good."

They kiss some more, when Vincent starts to fondle her. Her gorgeous breasts, so modestly sized, and yet – perfect. They are delicately soft, and yet radiating bodily heat by the spades, like he's holding a part of her that is very vulnerable and tender and only expects gentleness in return.

It feels so good.. but just one thing bugs her.

"Here," Lil goes, "hold them from under-" as she rotates Vincent's hands around, so that his fingers probe her more sensitive underside. Guiding his hands still, she mimes his palms rubbing around in a little circular motion, feeling the intense pleasure derived from the sensation of her nipples, being stimulated this way. So now, it's up to her standards..

"Like that?"

She doesn't answer him, getting carried away by his touch.

"Odeile..?"

"Yes.. just like that. Whatever you do, don't you ever think about stopping.."

She doesn't need to hold his hands anymore, as he very easily gets the idea, and goes on pleasing her out of his own volition. It's different when you let someone else play with your body, an added dimension of unforetold excitement, as it's left up to their devices – their playful, personal touches in what would otherwise be a familiar masturbation. The soothing tingling spreads outward from her chest, to the rest of her nerves.. rupturing out into a spike of euphoria that takes Lil by total surprise: "Ougnnhh-"

Vincent, seeing how her breasts are almost right there in front of his face, and how rosy they've turned, just leans forward and buries his face right into her.. oh god, how he could die a thousand times over! He puts his mouth over her breasts, wrapping his lips around and he kisses them, nibbles them.. sucks on them.

Tenderly. Contentedly. Urgently.. Feverishly.. Violently..

He sucks them, and he's in heaven. A contented sputtle escapes his mouth, and Lil

(don't stop)

Lil cries out from the insane jolts of her nervous system, coming out of her like a whimpering scream, clutching the stranger's hair as she realises something is starting to come out, like a relief. Gosh, it really tingles..

As if in a sudden emergency, she yanks him off her, and already, even before seeing it, she knows what has just happened.

It's milk. A drop of it is still budding out of her tender nipple.

She reaches for it and rubs the droplet in-between her fingers, feeling the somewhat creamy texture of it.. examining how it spreads over the tips of her middle finger and thumb, while Vincent watches on in a sort of awestruck bewilderment. Lil's innate curiosity gets the better of her; she licks her finger, as if wanting to find out what it is that has driven him into such a frenzy.

It tastes vaguely reminiscent of vanilla.

Vincent snags her fingers and he runs his mouth over them also. All he has to say for Lil to laugh her ass off is "I want some too!"

Lil's quite familiar with the male anatomy, having seen those steamy erotic videos and reading some mmm, what a lot of people would call tasteless literature – but not in the sense of really getting personal and hands-on with a man. Not yet, at least. For starters, she's always found it weird how a man could urinate and ejaculate out of that same pinprick hole. Or how someone like Vincent deals with getting hard.. when it's an inopportune time. Maybe he tucks it under his belt when nobody's peeking?

She pours over his underwear's bulge, inspecting that makeshift tent. There's a moist stain where the tip of his erection is – analogous to her own wetness.

Her face is hovering close. She inhales..

It's musky, yet not at all what she'd imagined it to smell like. Almost.. it's almost like flowers. There's just something very pleasant about it that leaves her craving after him. It looks uncomfortable though, the way the cotton on the verge of tearing at the seams, like a snake in desperate need of sloughing off its old, worn skin.

Frowning, Lil reaches under the waistband and hastily fits him through the fly – Vincent groaning from her bursts of movement.

It's almost like what she had pictured him to be. His dick (yes, she could call it his penis, but honestly, that word is straight out of a medical textbook; it's such a boring and clinically formal term), which vaguely bears resemblance to an arcade joystick – the way it elegantly curves – and..

With her two fingers, Lil straddles his dick – lightly stroking over the length of his shaft, caressing with the webspace in-between.

Down..

Then up..

Then down again..

Her gaze is clinical, almost like she's finding out for herself what it is like to hold one in her hands, feeling his shaft noticeably flush with warmth. Unknownst to her, Vincent finds her soft touches like torture. Why? Because she's teasing him with a feather. It really aches, and his belly dry-heaves just out of the seemingly innocent touches she's giving him. Lil looks upon his eyes, he is whimpering..

"More?" she goes.

There is grunting from Vincent when she twists it, and squirming when she rubs her thumb around the top (gosh, it's so wet there). It's an uneven effort though, with frequent shifts in her motions and the amount of pressure applied, as Lil's palms grow heavy with sweat.

The animal in him is emerging..

"I- I want.." Vincent musters, with a look behind his mask that is redolent of a werewolf's terrible lust.

"Eh?"

A finger goes over to Lil's face, adoring the tip of her nose, and down over to her lips – before he proceeds to shove his penis into her mouth. It takes her by complete surprise; a gasp briefly escapes out of her, before being eclipsed by gagging, muffled cries, and embarrassed sobbing. He fervently pushes his hips over, as he really feels the corners of her mouth – oh, just how hot the inside of her is – pushing, holding her head as he ravishes her.

"Uauangh.. aahhuhg-!"

Lil is choking, as she tries enduring that gag reflex, her cheeks growing sore, while so much of her spit threatens to enter her lungs, which sputter for oxygen..

He's so incredibly close to climaxing. His fingers are really clutching into her hair..

(fuck)

This isn't what she'd envisioned-

(how do I stop him)

(it hurts so much)

She bites down, feeling her teeth rip against his shaft, and Vincent cries out, howling as he withdraws from the courtesan – the gelatin-like drool sticking from her mouth in tendrils. Lil coughs out, her eyes stinging from tears, as her makeup has washed off, leaving streaks of glitter that's congealed on her cheek.

Amidst his desperation for more, a small, yet vital part of Vincent stops to reconsider the woman he's been with, as her makeup's costume has worn thin. His eyes widen with an undeniable recognition; it can't be.. no!

".. Lil?" he goes, with a newfound terror over himself, realising what he's done to her.

She hears her own name; the humiliation she'd just undergone – the anger she has aimed at him for having violated her so like that, it dissipates into a newfound understanding when the voice at the back of her mind that had kept hush finally gets heard. "Vincent.."

Peeling his mask off, there he is. It's Vincent. Her Vincent -

".. it is you.."

He sees her expression morph into something that grows dangerously beyond arousal. It registers on his subconscious -

"Lil, I didn't kn-"

It is far too late, already. A kiss that has lunged for him, so unapologetic and feverish and seeking to burrow down to find the taste of his essence. Her thought and sense of reason, or whatever semblances of it she's clung onto so desperately since entering this room, it's suffocated out like air bubbles..

Upon the bed, they devour each other, yearning to fill that bottomless hunger that only gnaws deeply..

(I cry)

so imperatively..

(you cry)

because no matter how much, too much is never enough

(more)

(more!)

Eventually, Vincent capitulates to her in one total, final outburst; they indulge in a primeval paroxysm that is as indistinguishable from sheer, beautiful agony as it is from pinnacle ecstasy – a blinding, searingly white-hot surge that stretches out long enough for Vincent to feel like he's floating in heaven, far, far above the planet with her together. The stars blaze past their eyes, while their bodies only now start to free-fall, back into the reality of the bedroom..

Vincent's back is left like a crude line tracing of freshly dried blood. The blood glistens under her fingernails..

Lil copes with the ear-ringing, the shuddering.. those immensely pleasurable aftershocks which arrive out of nowhere. The way Vincent still contracts within her. He looks so out of it.

"It- it," she tries saying, but it just comes out like involuntary, twitchy blubbers. "It's- alright.. it's.." She's coming off like a broken record – it's useless to talk – so the next best thing to do is to embrace Vincent in a kiss. This time around, the kiss is to soothe him, to calm him (and herself) down, while a beautiful, indescribable warmth starts to envelop the two of them, spreading out into their entwined hands, the fingers, and upward into their faces, as a blush.

Vincent.. I don't know what to say. This entire thing feels too good to be true. But I've wanted this. Since I've first laid my eyes on you, I've always wanted this. My heart has thought of nothing else but to just be by your side.. as if our souls are one.

I'm yours, Vincent. I'll stay with you as long as my heart continues to beat. Always and forever. If anyone ever tries to hurt you, to take you away from me, I swear, let me protect you with all of my strength. Because I want to save you. I want to be the light who'll drive away your loneliness and desolate confusion..

I love you.

(I'll gladly die with you)

Don't ever leave me..

A blush that she still feels, long after surrendering into a comatose sleep.

Where she hopes to find him, all over again.

comments

Fiat Lux / 10

2022-05-16T16:52:13Z

Upon the screen, Daedalus has pulled up files on Lil. He does not resist the temptation of giving her profile another look, as he hovers upon the numerous photos of her, taken during various candid moments from her life. Some when she was Donov's adorable little princess, where you could tell that once, she innocently carried a zesty sparkle for the world. Others as she's grown older, a patina of cynicism in her eyes which gives her a somewhat intimidating quality.

Daedalus still feels like a pervert when it comes to having access to Lil's personal data. In his younger years, he's dreamed of knowing her intimately; now he can't help but feel proud at the mention that Lil has been saved from Sinclair's rot.

Today though, his thoughts dwell on what kind of perfect environment would suit her, and him together. Argounova promised him a paradise to live out his dream together with Lil, but only in the hellish layer of her world.. where anything is possible.

After going through her personality profile and deriving no new insight into Lil's desires, he shuts the terminal off, sighing as he kicks the floor, spinning his chair around in circles. Yes, he could have her work as his medical assistant and make love with her in the off time, however he wants, but he doesn't want just a mere second life, constrained by practical concerns or anything –

One of her favourite memories: waltzing in those fields of lavender. Daedalus can extend that vista out, mingle it with his own so that they'd have an entire space to live out their dreams. He'd add in mountains, a lake and surrounding forest – a castle for the both of them to reign over. And as he becomes king, he could offer salvation for the poor souls in hell who're willing to lay their lives down for him, their fealty in exchange for his benevolence..

Then he gets wracked with shivers.

What's the matter Daedalus? This is what you've really wanted, isn't it? To be with your beloved by leaving her trapped her in a false world, where nothing is really of any consequence? Where she'll possibly live out the rest of her days wrapped in a cocoon, while you stop by and visit, using her like a doll to comfort yourself with in private..

He takes a deep breath, trying to recover his composure. His thoughts up to now must resemble that of a madman, moreso than any respectable scientist. But aren't scientists just glorified madmen, until their intuitions and intelligence end up proving them right, vindicating them from ordinary judgment? No – I'm only rationalizing..

Would she truly love me back?

It's like peering at himself from the outside-in, penetrating past the egotistic veil he's worn for his entire life. Thankfully he's alone in his own office, where there's no one to witness just how naked he is feeling.

His fingers rubbing his eyebrow, Daedalus finds his own reflection on the terminal's empty glass surface. A crease has been steadily forming under his eyes, since Lil's departure of the dome, and he senses that crease isn't going to go away anytime soon. He knows it's just a part of adulthood, but only now, does it hit him how so little of his dreams in his younger years has ever materialized, and now that he's serving as chief medical officer.. where do his responsibilities end, and his chances to fulfill his soul begin?

Daedalus gets a notification – it is Raul Creed, who requests his immediate presence.

Fuck.

"I'll give it to you straight – records indicatate you've been shirking your duties, Daedalus."

The Regent's security officer seems to arch over Daedalus, who tries his best not to be fazed by Raul's comments. Instead, the doctor pours his gaze upon Raul's office – the polished placard upon the desk, the shelves full of replica novels and statuette busts, and a bystanding Kristeva whose blank, eyeshadowed eyes offer him no sympathy, whatsoever.

"A month ago, I asked you to oversee the resurrection project. You were supposed to deliver me the scoop on Monad's rejection of Romdo, three days ago! Explain it to me.. what have you made of her so far?"

Daedalus could only think of the way those kisses with Lil had left him awash with a joyous afterglow.. let alone how she felt in a total bodily embrace, wholesome..

"ANSWER!"

Then the good doctor musters an equally cold gaze at Raul. "The reason I have for the delay is just that – science isn't omniscient. I thought you'd have realised it already, Raul; the amnita cells left by Monad have decayed, so the answers I have to give you are only vague, at best."

Raul shoves his fingernails into his thumb, as he runs his hand over his desk's smooth mahogany. "So your option is to pour over Lil's personal files and make unauthorized connections outside the dome?"

Bummer. Daedalus has the mental wind knocked out of him, as he's really at a loss for any words. "I- I don't understand."

Raul's hand slams down onto his desk, a fist shut into a deafening thunder. "ARE YOU PLAYING.. with me, Daedalus!? Kristeva has snuck by your office, seeing you laying there for God knows how long – sometimes with your prick pressing up under your coat! Knowing how smart you are, I bet you might have even fooled the regent into this role-"

(a nerve is struck)

"You're only fooling yourself," Daedalus says, the words rolling out his tongue in a way that holds back the spittle he wants to hurl into Raul's face. "Who are you to get on my case? You know jack about what's truly going on; there's life and mystery out there, Raul. Other proxies, other worlds we don't know about. I'm not wasting time on a dead-end case that you insist about -"

"You don't know that Lil is a copy of Monad, do you?"

Daedalus freezes. "What?"

"For the brief time you've served as medical officer, the regent has restricted this information specifically from you. Donov knows about how obsessive you've gotten with his daughter – it's what's served you well in that quest of curing the rot from everyone, but it won't do you any favours to have your adoration of her be justified. At least, not from his point-of-view."

It's like an ice pick has been wedged down his sternum, flooding Daedalus with a morass of.. swirly emotion, as he feels Raul's room lose all sense of orientation..

"What's wrong, Daedalus – you thought it was all a secret, you and Lil?"

Raul touches the doctor on the shoulder.

"Don't fucking touch me!" Daedalus goes, trying to shrug off the man, but he ends up stumbling and falling down on his back, with Raul hovering close over him in such ragged breaths – Raul's garlic breath is just replete with recently-drunk whiskey and cream. It's quite unpleasant to soak your lungs with.

"Now listen here, bud," Raul says, his lips almost touching Daedalus's in a repugnant kiss. "I personally don't give a damn what you think you're doing. But if we don't get a suitable replacement for Romdo, and soon, our civilization is going to go ka-put. You know, I could get it on with you right here, and no matter how hard we fuck, it's the same result as with any woman – get the concept?"

Daedalus nods his head, knowing full well how he could almost feel Raul's bulge. Then Raul strokes him upon the face, brushing aside the loose bangs of hair. "Attaboy. Wouldn't want to disappoint everyone, least of all your lover's grandfather, would we?"

Daedalus spits out the minty foam; his third time doing so. When he brushes his teeth this time, he wants to just throughly rinse away any traces of that taste out of his mouth, as he resists every urge to just gag. He looks at his reflection in the mirror, his face dripping with fluids. He's so worn out.

Then, after a drink of jasmine tea, where he could feel more like himself again – Daedalus slinks his way back to his medical office. He glances up at the ceiling, noting how it doesn't matter anymore about trying to hide his involvement with Zaporizhzhia. They know. They already know. What more are they going to do to stop him..

"Here's to it," he mutters, as he pulls out the patch and lays it over his frontal lobes. As Daedalus drifts off, the reality of his medical office slipping away, and his mind fluttering off once more into the world of fantasies..

Oh Lord, I beg not for thy forgiveness, but for thy strength.

In the asylum's office, which has all but been cleared out – Daedalus calls out for her to appear: "Argounova! Where are you? We gotta talk!"

It takes a little, but like a feverish hallucination, she's there.

"Yes, my dear?"

The hazy sunlight glimmers past the window blinds, such that Daedalus feels its warmth all over upon his neck and upper body. "Argounova.. I'm in trouble. The regent and security bureau know of my involvement with you. I don't know how much they know.. oh God -"

She listens attentively, her gaze half-facing out the window.

"I don't know what's worse.. the way I allowed Raul Creed to thrust himself over me like a depraved animal, or my own damned selfishness.. allowing Lil to be trapped in here with you! All this role-playing, our talking of fear and desire and FOR WHAT?! So that I could just leave her caged, a bird who'll sing to our whims until she dies?"

She catches his eye. "You haven't mentioned Vincent Law at all.. isn't he a person you'd contend with?"

Daedalus is panting, already letting his emotions that would otherwise have been kept close to the chest be brought forth. "I've actually forgotten about him.. and I don't care. This isn't right, Argounova."

"Why have you changed your mind? I thought by now we'd both get what we've always desired – you having a chance for Lil's heart once more, and for me, an equal. As you may see.."

She waves her arm over dusty air, wiping a circular vision into view. It's hard for Daedalus to make out the silhouette, seemingly suspended in amniotic fluid and wires connected upon the little child-sized body, but his eyes adjust, and he recognizes.. it looks like a young girl. Not a real girl, an autoreiv..

He's seen that model advertised from the boutique stores, and Raul even had one with his wife, before the freak accident in the mall..

"What is this?" he asks.

"Her name is Pino," Argounova goes. "Once, she accompanied Lil and Vincent in their journey through the wilderness. Now, she will be my surrogate child."

"Surrogate- she's just an autoreiv..!"

"Like I once was?" Argounova flashes a look of disgust as she says so. "In my world, impossibility is only a stretch of imagination away.. just watch."

The vision shimmers, and it's a scene where Lil, laying upon a couch, is steadily being approached by a masked man, who's much in the guise of the Ergo Proxy. Already, Daedalus's heart is trembling far out of control. "No, are they going to-"

"Oh, справді.. together, they'll conceive Pino."

Daedalus won't stand another second of seeing them about to engage in the act. "Okey, I get the idea, can you turn it off or switch it to something else-"

"You sure you don't want to witness it? A man and a woman together can be such a beautiful thing.. like out of a nature documentary, in the right frame of mind.."

"I just can't. I envy Vincent too much for me to bear it."

"At least you're honest." Argounova shuts off the portal in an instant, so that it's just a file cabinet in its place, with the top drawer slightly ajar. And then slowly, as a cat would cautiously approach a piece of leftover tuna, she wades closer to Daedalus – in the real world, her exoskeleton and pulsating veins would make any normal person revolt in horror. Here.. Daedalus wants to believe that the woman he sees, steadily approaching him is the soulful essence of the proxy, made flesh. (In the olden days, they'd call her a classical Slavic beauty.)

"I want to read your thoughts," she whispers, as now she's face-to-face with him. Daedalus stands still, letting her run her hands – all over his skull. Her touch is that of a gentle masseuse, leaving fluttering butterflies where her fingertips trail, and all he needs to do is close his eyes, and find calmness in his own breaths while his recent memories get untangled out of his unconscious, one at a time.

When she's done.. Daedalus pops open his eyes, gasping as if he had been the recipient of a warm kiss, full of darkness in a slow, eventual buildup towards an orgasm. "Please," he pants, "I want more.."

"I cannot." Argounova shakes her head no, as if in disappointment. "I'd risk mental damage to you if I delved any more."

A beat.

"I understand better," she goes. "Out of respect for you, I won't voice what drives you outright – because no one ever wants to be fully transparent.. not to anyone, especially not themselves. But Daedalus.. you're not the first to have wanted to run away from a seemingly harsh world, into the realm of fancies where at the very least, your own thoughts make sense in a privacy beyond the reach of others. Have I ever told you.. my first name, Tetiana?"

"Tetiana.." he mutters, enjoying the sound of her name.

"Yes. Nobody has called me that in over a hundred years.."

The birds are chirping outside. "Do you ever get lonely like I do," Daedalus goes. "Where you get so absorbed into something, like the way the human skeleton is just so elegantly made, and your.. your heart swells.. if only you had someone by your side, who also understood too..?"

"All the time," she says, so wistfully that it betrays how much her heart aches.

Without a word, Daedalus reaches for her hands – the same fingers and joints which had caressed him – and even touching them is the start of something genuinely electrifying. He glances over how smooth she has made her alabaster skin, and how her fingernails have been clipped to perfection. Part of him thinks that maybe Lil could have something to be jealous of, even though it's only an imaginary beauty..

His hands then crawl over her wrists, and run slowly up her arms – there is something statuesque in the way Tetiana is poised, ever so patiently, while she is taken aback, receiving love for the first time from another human being.

And then, when his hands go all over her back, Daedalus does not hold back himself any longer, and he embraces the proxy by his side in a hug, long-awaited.

It's different from when he'd held Lil. Tetiana is more full-bodied – taller than him, with her breasts as voluptuous as those of the old Roman statues. As she returns his hug, Daedalus rests his head upon her chest.. there is a strange hollowness that he could detect, as if he could tap upon her, and hear his taps resonate through hollow space. But all the same, it's a rare moment in his life, where he feels that it is OK just to simply exist and be – it must be like how a newborn baby must feel, carried in the arms of its mother.

Daedalus feels a warm wetness pour out of his eyes, his nose. Is he catching his allergies again? No – he's outright crying. Many times, he's wanted to let out his own emotions.. but there has never been a time he could recall, when he's ever felt safe enough to do so.

And maybe he's put too much of his emotional side, entrusting that onto Lil, who has been his only love. It's really an unfair burden to place upon someone, but there's just so much of the soul that could only go on without another..

He cries and cries his heart out, until his energies subside, and he looks up at Tetiana whose dress has gotten all dirtied up, a moist stain in the vague shape of a face. When she smiles at him, it's a smile with a quality of eternal reassurance – as if she'd faced the world with all the coldness and indifference it has to offer, and then willingly filtered all of that out as she concentrates on you with an irresistable prejudice in your favour.

And then she leans into Daedalus, kissing him.

If Tetiana had been a statue before, now she is all over him, an animal who is re-discovering the joys of bonding with another of its ilk – this is a person who she's come to respect out of everyone else who's been birthed and then later recycled, who'd go through the rigamarole of daily life and routines until eventual death, and never bother to ask if it had ever meant something against the backdrop of an all-pervasive void.

comments

Fiat Lux / 9

2022-05-04T06:50:10Z

Lil was a last-minute entry applying to be Odeile. With the personal approval of Bonanno, she's substituted in for Sofia, who's inexplicably fallen sick at last moment. It was troublesome applying the makeup and decoratives upon Lil to suit the role, as she struggled with the trembling of her limbs - courtesy of the methamphetamine cocktail the Antonionis gave her to spice her up. Twice did the contact lenses have to be reapplied, until the make-up artists resort to a dirty trick of offering her propranolol to calm a jittery model down.

As she gazed upon the mirror during her transformation, Lil grew intoxicated by her own looks, witnessing her own beauty as a wintery princess. Soon, as she put on the re-fitted dress, she was all but unrecognizable as herself. It was simple, really; she didn't need to speak – just stand regally and presentable while the contest happened.

She'd never imagined getting knocked down by a bullet to the cheek.

"Are you sure you're OK?" the paramedic asks, as Lil sits up against the bannister. She nods her head, feeling the sting of the paramedic's laser, working its magic in sealing up her facial wound. Her eyes are more focused on the mysterious masked man, talking privately with the staff, who had saved her life from the younger one.

The bullet's impact lingers in her mind. Lil had been centimeters away from death, let alone facial disfigurement. Her hand goes over to her cheek, where she feels the scar. And when she shuts her eyes, she half-mutters out a word of gratitude to God who has spared her from a horrid fate. God's a weird concept; He allows people to suffer and die, even good people who have done everything right in their lives. Sometimes He leaves desperate pleas for help unanswered. Tonight, even if Lil doesn't usually believe in such things, she feels like owing her life toward someone who has been watching over her. Moreso, she hopes that watchful eye goes out to Vincent also.

The announcer had called him Vincent. It can't be the same Vincent Law.. can it? The towering demeanour of that man, as she watched him hold out the revolver in her name – it's a far cry from Vincent's mild-mannered timidity.

Something in her stirs over him.. an arousal, which she doesn't even want to admit to herself. Much as she tries to look away, she always catches him out the corner of her eye, and then she follows through with temptation, letting her gaze catch his cloaked figure and letting her mind go wild over what body awaits underneath his clothes. She hasn't been able to get a good look at his face; if only she could see his eyes..

The wheelchaired Bonanno stops in front of her. His assistant twiddles thumbs on the handles, while the don's wrinkled face musters a cold smile – his eyes darting over Lil, almost saliviating. She buries the urge to recoil.

"You looked very dashing on-stage, Lil," he goes, "and you've handled yourself remarkably well. Especially in light of the firing mishap, which I must duly apologize for. I'd have never expected – why, the nerve of that Nowe chap! Shooting a woman to spite the rivalry! How are you right now? How's your face?"

"My face is fine-" Lil taps her cheek. "See, good as new."

"That's good. But your job isn't over yet; if you've recovered, we'll need you up in the main bedroom. What is a victor if he doesn't get his reward?"

She understands, all too much. Lil's stomach lurches, and she looks away with a hesitation that has Bonanno raising an eyebrow: "We'll give you contraceptives after it's over, if that's what you're worried about."

If only this were just a dream she could awaken from.

"Lil - out of all the other substitutes for this role, I've chosen you. Yes, you are undeniably nervous and that's understandable when it's your first time. But you are also gallant, energetic, intelligent. And though you may not know it yet, an affectionate, loving and tender woman. A woman like yourself deserves a moment of great joy, spent in the arms of a gentleman who's stood his ground. If I were you.. I wouldn't let this night go to waste."

The moonlight gleams through the window where Lil looks. Outside, the courtyard's fountain – the water almost shimmers as it spills out the archer's bow. In a way, it reminds her of arriving back home. Her grandfather had once chastised her when she'd thrown a pebble out the car's window, narrowly missing one of the flower pots that hung by the shed's windowsill. How lucky she was, that the pebble ended up shattering the window; Donov lectured her on thinking before you take action: "Even a second's thought can spare you the regret of doing something rash. But sometimes, even that won't save you from regretting your silences and inaction.."

Lil sees the masked "Vincent." He locks eyes upon her in a slow-motion stride, her heartbeats undeniably reverberating beneath her chest, and it only takes about two seconds for her to forget

(Vincent I'm sorry)

any inhibition

(forgive me)

about yielding to him.

The bathrobe's cotton texture is so cozy.. and so soft over her arms and body. Lil wouldn't allow the staff to undress her entirely, but here, in the lonely bedroom, as she tries finding a spot to pose herself for the masked man's desire – could she sit upon the bed? Or try laying upon the couch? She's done erotic photoshoots before, but it was always under the photographer's direction on how best to arouse the viewer.

This room is so luscious; a small pond with koi fish, a bedside cabinet full of liqueor.. the king-size bed with its brass railings.. a sense of jealousy comes over her with the degree of tasteful aesthetic they've picked out for this bedroom.

Worst of all, she knows that she's being watched; whether by hidden camera or one-way mirror, the awareness of a peeping tom really spoils the intimate mood. (Unless it's by someone who she really adores..) It's best just to try forgetting that fact.

Sitting down, Lil closes her eyes. She musters the sensation of catching the masked Vincent's eye, and her repressed desires about wanting to be the recipient of all his desires. It's dirty, but the mere thought has the blood rushing through her whole body.. her skin quivers, the goosebumps forming all over her, and the desire just to quell the deep, primal hunger swelling in her being..

It's almost unbearable, simply waiting for those doors to open.

She finds her hand travelling down, slithering through the robe's opening to rub herself down there – an itch, and scratching it, over and over and over with the thought of him, it feels oh, so right.. and yet, so wrong, like she is already betraying her own Vincent who is out there somewhere.

She hasn't really promised him anything. So nothing is really broken, right? But her heart says it's false of her to just give in to this stranger, as if a long-forgotten vow that's made, long ago, is urging her to reconsider.

Her fingers stop. Lil's breaths come out in trembles, as she tries reconnecting with that rational part in her which has helped hold all her shit together.

The double doors creak open - the sounds of a party briefly spilling through before she hears them shut.

It's the masked man. He stands before her, seeing her sprawled out upon the couch, and when Lil makes out his eyes, that glisten in candlelight with so much longing, and the way how his breaths turn into ragged, uncontrolled pants..

".. b-be gentle with me," she says, clutching her bathrobe.

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Kompromat (excerpt)

2022-04-29T06:42:10Z

As Yana watches Ry scream and cry out for his life, a faint echo stirs from the depths of her mind. She's supposed to look down upon this.. animal, who she doesn't even know. So why is she perturbed? Why doesn't she look away like with the other people placed in the incinerator?

In the echo, memories that were almost forgotten. In those memories, those moments - joyful, exciting, sometimes sad, sometimes mundane - that seem to take on another meaning entirely. Much of them were with this person, from another lifetime ago. His name is Ry.

Her thoughts fly, a heart overwhelmed by rediscovered love. There's only one thing to do: Yana shouts out for the incineration process to be stopped, just seconds before Ry gets burnt away into ashes. Her subordinates look upon her order, wondering why the sudden change of plan, but all the same, they stop it.

Ry's breaths come out in shudders. He asks if this is what it's like to have died. His eyes wide shut as he looks back upon the entirety of his life - wondering if it was all just one fluke after another, or if it really meant something to have chased after the woman who touched him so.

The starship rises from New York, which lays half in ruins. It goes beyond the stratosphere, beyond the reach of conventional missiles to a place where even sound fails to carry over.

Ry wanders, disoriented by the ship's alien, cathedral-like abysses, and the sudden absence of anyone. He finds a window outside; he's in space, seeing Earth from above with his own eyes. He'd never realised how gorgeous and peaceful it is, like being in heaven above and seeing the beauty that people simply take for granted. Then the thought of being far from home pulls at him.

"Ry?" A familiarly soothing voice calls to him. It's Yana, who approaches him with that gentle manner when she knows his soul is aching. With a good look, Ry sees how little she has aged since.. the beauty mark is still there upon her cheek, accentuated by the regal makeup - but those many years of torment she'd spent under their mindwashing have taken their toll as her eyes now barely possess that lively spark for life they once had.

Alone together in this dreamy space, they are two dark figures who could only gaze at each other, unintelligible, as if the night is trying to further delay their fateful meeting.

Ry's the first to break their silence. "You're still beautiful," he goes.

"Don't be silly, Ry, I'm old. Please don't look at me like that. Why did you come here?"

He thinks about her question. It seemed so straightforward before, as she stands beside him, but the reality of so many questions he'd beat himself over the years with is hard for him to eluciate. Ry scans her eyes for any answer, and picks what ails him the most: "I couldn't let you just disappear from the world. What those bastards did to you - wasn't right. Without you.. all the colour had gone out of living, and those days would pass by quietly without any meaning to it. Without you.. I'm alone again. My chest heaves with aching every morning I have to wake up from my dreams, because I can't breathe without you, Yana.."

"But you weren't alone. You had friends. People who loved you dearly. Other people who'll cherish you, more than I ever can. And I envy you for it, to the point of jealousy. Even if Boris hadn't taken me away, inevitably I would have ran off on my own. Not because of you or anybody - but because my heart would have imploded from all that joyous happiness that I wasn't meant to have. I've murdered so many people, and hated people for the ugliness that I've experienced in my life. Ry, please don't blame yourself for any of that; you only made me happy.."

The tears stream down Ry's face. A haunted look in his eyes, as what she's said strikes him as grotesque, and then he shakes his head, letting his anguish break free. "You have no idea how much I dreamt of you, even hearing your voice in my ears. Or the amount of pain - even as the years passed, I wouldn't even consider having another woman. I looked only for you. There was always something missing.." His sadness dissolves into quiet, almost childish tears.

Yana is startled by his reaction. She realises how selfish she has actually been, and the connection she'd made with Ry from the very first time he'd laid eyes on her bandaged body. No amount of words would make up for the damage done, so she follows her gut and holds him in her arms, caressing him passionately, delicately. They embrace and remain like that, with her face buried upon his neck, while he catches whiff of her bergamot-scented hair - his tears staining.

When Ry calms down enough, Yana gives him a faint smile. The moon is coming into view, steadily flooding the chamber with radiant moonlight. "I don't expect your forgiveness for what's been done," she says. "As powerful as this ship is, I can't turn back time. Those years I've dwelled under cryogenic sleep, waiting in that darkness, a part of me always wanted to change the past, always regretting the pain and heartbreak I relive over and over in my memories. I'm sure nobody would ever welcome me back in the world - they'll condemn me and call for my head, first thing. But if I'd ever dreamt for something to come true, I'd wish.. for another day spent with you. If only I could have grown up together with you, Ry, oh, I'd.."

"There's nothing to say sorry for," he goes. "I'm so glad just to have known you.. you're indescribably wonderful, and nothing will ever change that. What only matters is that I'm here, with you. Don't ever leave me, Yana." He gives her a look of utter longing, of desire -- and now, Yana is the one holding back her sobbing. She is deeply moved, and goes to embrace him fully.

In the pale moonlight, they kiss with heartrending tenderness, with the same passion of their first kiss shared together amidst the partying and celebratory fireworks of the Harlem Rouge, so many years ago. Their kisses turn into making love, fingers interweaving in a frenzy which subsides into a deep, turmultuous pleasure - of immense loving and immense grief.

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Fiat Lux / 8

2022-04-21T05:50:34Z

When they ask the candidates to pick a dance partner, Vincent is at a loss, as the other princes-to-be seem to easily wade through the crowd, the women all swarming to be with them as the spotlights scatter. His throat tightens. Trying to pick someone isn't the same as being an attractive magnet.. and people are having murmurs about the guy in the white Venetian mask. They can smell a new fish.

The announcer comes over to him, whispering: "Do you not have a dance partner?"

Not wanting to fail his mission (and only hope of meeting Lil again) Vincent ignores that question; he steps down the stage to the nearest girl he could find. "I'll choose you, is that ok?"

"U-uh, sure," she says. "I'm not much of a dancer though.."

It could be worse. Anyone is better than no one, but when it comes to it – the same dexterity and confidence which had carried Vincent through his card games is now virtually absent.

But he sees his partner, who's shuddering in his arms. Deciding to comfort her.. "Do you want to wing this and call it a night? We can stumble together."

("Take your places!")

"Oki."

It's later that he'll realise this event is an ordeal that needs months of planning. The other dancers carry a natural grace that's picture-perfect because they already had dance partners, with many hours of practice placed in perfecting their rhythm, their bodily articulation, and all those nuances that lend to passionate embrace.

Here, as the music plays, Vincent and the woman just fumble. He's looking to his side, trying to copy what the other dancers do, only to feel foolish and evoking bits of awkward laughter from the audience – with camera flashes pointed directly at him.

"Damn this crap," he whispers, while his partner begins to giggle uncomfortably. Everything is just going terrible. Then a thought: he conjures up his earlier moment of winning against Majin Buu. The kind of focus one needs to persevere under high pressure. "Just look upon me," he tells her, "and my eyes only. Don't mind everyone else. The world right now is just us two, in each other's arms. Even if it's the worst tango.. I'll dance it with you!"

He catches her eyes beneath her mask – she begins to believe in him.

They end up bumping into that same red-haired prince (whose name is Touga), where Vincent catches intimations of his sneering, before he returns to his smile for the cameras during his graceful waltz. These people certainly don't make it easy for newcomers, do they? Touga's partner lets out an airy giggle as they begin moving in pas de deux fashion.

It feels almost like an eternity before the dancing segment is over, with Vincent stopping to catch his breath.

"That was kinda cool," his partner goes, as the other dancers head backstage. "At least I'll have a story to tell tomorrow. Good luck winning the role." It's a small consolation while Vincent hears hushed murmurs – most likely about his awkwardness – as the curtains fall. He feels his sweat seeping through the layers of clothes, and already..

Upon the refreshments table, a glistening fruit punch pitcher. The ice floating upon the pink surface, and the condensation upon the glass drips down the curves..

He rushes over to pour himself some. It's so good, like the best of peach and watermelon rolled together, to the point where he feels the crushing need to inhale after gulping down so much of the fruit punch.

"Vincent?" It is the young lad who had been harassed by Touga - Nowe. "Is this your first time competing?"

"What is it to you?"

"Well, I just wanted to say thanks for sticking up for me earlier.. this is only my second time, and I'm merely 22. But people think I'm still too young to try going for don." Nowe pours a glass of fruit punch, and the way he sips it is like a grateful child, being blessed by the simpler pleasures derived from life. "You're not from around here, are you?"

"Why do you ask?"

"It's – you have these tailor-made clothes, but you move as if you don't really fit them. As a matter of fact, your dancing ability is quite surreal, to say the least. I've never seen anyone fumble a waltz like you have.. this is a competition, see who can fit the role of leading the entire Bonanno family. Cause their patriarch is getting quite old.."

"Everyone gets old," Vincent goes, matter-of-fact. It's up-close that he notices Nowe's tattoo by his neck, in the form of a flying lizard, and he realises that maybe this kid isn't as innoceous as he first seems. "If you're young, and you've been practicing for this, what is becoming the don going to do for you?"

"It's not about me," Nowe says. "My familia, my friends, they all live in an area where Bonanno oppresses them. He has them paying 'taxes' as part of his protection fee. It's so hard just struggling to stay afloat these days - if they try to run or escape, he'll have his men blow them away. Replacing him would mean I could put a stop to that. I'll use the power of the Bonanno family for good! Help the poor and destitute who need a lending hand."

It's a terribly naive answer, but it's earnest. Having power over people is like a barrel of wine, with just a sip leading to.. maybe this kid could help him.

"Suppose if I told you I'm here to kill Bonanno tonight?" Vincent goes, as if letting out a secret.

The look in Nowe's eyes shifts – "Really? I never took you for an assassin. You look too much like you'd suit that role with your mask. What's your grudge against him?"

The other contestants are busy chattering among themselves, so Vincent keeps his voice down to a hush. "I bear no grudge, Nowe, but the woman I care about is in danger. If I fail to do this.. I'll lose her. Not to mention, my own life. I'm sorry if I can't explain it better."

Nowe blinks. He looks as if he's been slapped by a revelation. "You're not even interested in taking the mantle? Killing Bonanno now – there'd be nobody to receive the oath of fealty from. The family will have no successor.. and their whole empire will split apart! That's talking crazy! Is it not possible for you to wait until the next few days?"

"No." Vincent bows his head down in regret. "But your loved ones will be free from this family's tyranny."

"That's true.." Nowe ponders about the lost opportunity of the family's influence. "If you pull it off, Vincent.. you'll have my eternal gratitude."

"Where is Bonanno, usually? Is there a chance for me to have a toast with him?"

The contestants are called out for the second round, and Nowe lurches up. "He's watching from the high balcony. He'll be there to personally congratulate the winner - the other contestants just head on straight home."

Damn. The pain of flubbing the first round stings especially. "Nowe," Vincent goes, as the curtain call cannot be ignored further. "I stand little chance of winning. What I have here, this pill, it'll be our salvation." He palms the little love bomb into Nowe's pockets. "I'll place my hopes with you, Nowe. Pour a toast for Bonanno with this- and don't linger around if you doubt that it works."

The revolver handed to Vincent is loaded with blanks. So they've told him. It is ornamentally-laced with a gold emboss upon the wood handle, and a lengthy chrome barrel that would make any gun nut saliviate.

The weapon taken from the box, Vincent tries to quickly grow used to the revolver's weight, its sense of balance and imagined sense of recoil. But who is he supposed to shoot with it?

He stands aside on the stage, out of view of the audience, as the fat, pudgy announcer goes:

"You've seen our fine gentlemen dance, with their ability to radiate grace and charm. But now, see how they perform under duress – when they face off against one another! Witness how your prospective leader will face off against danger from a forsworn enemy, whether it be in defiant bravery, or if their knees shall buckle under the pressure!"

A spotlight pops upon Vincent, like a visible nudge for him to step out. And another spotlight – who is his opponent?

It's Nowe. Innocent, well-meaning Nowe.

And like that, the gun in his hand quivers.

"To have our Vincent and Nowe contest life against one another, they must have a good reason! Oh, but what must this reason be? Could it be jealousy over a woman?"

The stage has been shrouded in darkness up to now, but the ambient lighting increases to reveal a dramatic scene in a city square.. set under a winter's snowfall. Looking at his feet, Vincent sees the snow clufts gathering over his boots, one snowflake at a time. Then at Nowe, whose revolver glimmers under the phony stage lighting – look at him, he's just as scared of having to use it on a friendly face.

"Our sweet darling Odeile," the announcer goes, "why don't you reveal yourself?"

As if descending with the snow, a woman is lifted down, her white hair flowing under the same air that has the snowflakes dancing. But what stops Vincent's breath isn't her amethyst crown, complementing her fanciful dress, non. It's her face – her supple face, youthful and radiant, and those white eyes.. her lips whose depth you'd fall forever into..

She's so beautiful.. but I don't want to betray Lil. I musn't. I won't. My heart though, how it quivers for her!

When Vincent's eyes flicker back towards Nowe, he finds the boy as shaken – certain that Nowe has the same maddening pangs of desire, surging.

"The one whose hand is most steady, whose aim holds true on its target, not only shall they win the favour of Odelie – they shall get to spend a very memorable night with her! Duellists, take your positions!"

There's operatic music, bellowing from some unseen source, as Vincent is impelled to step upon the highlighted area of the stage. Now he's face-to-face with Nowe, a designated rival, while Odelie has stepped to the background – she watches on humbly.

"Nowe.." Vincent goes, reluctant to raise his gun. "Forgive me. I wish we didn't have to face each other. I wish you were that Touga person instead. It would make it so much easier to pull the trigger. Even if these bullets were real blanks.. I won't dare point my hand at you. I'm sorry."

"Don't say sorry." Nowe nods back at his opponent. "One thing I've learned, is once you're in the spot, you can't weasel out of it. All you do is accept where you happen to be in life – and make the most out of it. A woman may have her beauty, but a man, his honour!"

Then Nowe aims his revolver – not at Vincent, but towards an onlooking Odelie.

"No!"

It happens before you even know it. Both shots ring out from the stage, piercing through the silence offered by a rapt audience. Odelie goes down, while Nowe feels a genuine coldness spreading out from his chest. The blood just gushes out of his wound, and he struggles, before the pain shoots through his entire system – the young lad collapses.

Some of the audience just gasp from sheer shock.

"NOWE!" Vincent screams, the gun slipping out his hand as he rushes over to the fallen boy, half of his own being in shock and half in total remorse. "Why did you make me shoot you? Why?!"

"B-because you love her," Nowe croaks, for lack of any better words. His blood-soaked hand reaches for his pocket, and puts the love-bomb pill back in Vincent's hands, before Nowe fades off – the paramedics arrive to tend to the boy, while Vincent's arm gets taken by the announcer.

"Our victor, Vincent! His show of valour will be forever remembered by the family!"

The initial trepidation of the audience is jolted into a massive applause, but Vincent knows he hasn't acted out of valour, when he'd pulled the trigger on an innocent person – only a mere, selfish urge. That is what haunts him, while behind, Odelie recovers from a grazed cheek.

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Fiat Lux / 7

2022-04-10T15:46:19Z

Daedalus finds his reflection's eyes in the window, agast with familiar shame, conflicted over the intensity of his naked desire for Lil, and that voice at the back of his mind that he's long stifled – his conscience, always taunting him with doubt. Turning away from that, he faces Vincent once more.

"I'm about as jealous over her as much as this hospital can be called a paradise," he goes, tight-lipped. "In other words, hardly at all."

The level of denial from Daedalus is about as overt as a door slamming inches away from the face, but the curt and dismissive way he says it would almost make you think he truly believes his own words. (Almost.)

Vincent feels his teeth, grinding with palpable indignation, as he watches the doctor proceed towards the console – and towards the eventual lobotomy that awaits him. Within Vincent, his mind skips over that monstrous identity that he's internalised from that manga, Ergo Proxy, whose fearsome visage he would love to assume and bring a swift and justified end to the life of this quack.

His heart is racing. There's not much time. These violent, almost megalomaniac urges that he's had to suppress for those good-boy points – now it's as far away as the youth of a childhood long past. But still, a remnant of that spark remains..

"Oh, Vincent," Daedalus goes. "It pleases me when I finally look over you, as helpless as you lie now. What you're feeling right now is but a taste of what I've had to endure for so long. Desire, and liberation with it, all out of reach."

"Daedalus, I'm sorry.."

These words surprise the doctor. "What did you say?"

"I'm sorry. I never asked for Lil's kindness. But who in their right mind would turn her down? You're caught in an unfamiliar, bureaucratic hell, and there's a face amongst many, who shows you something that others wouldn't – not cold, calculated rhetoric that's only meant to keep a patient under supervision, or the crazed ramblings of these lunatics, but an open heart. Someone who'll listen."

Vincent pauses to think a little bit; some of these words he's said feel as if drawn out from another place, residing beyond his current body. He notices the doctor's lip begin to tremble. "Daedalus, even if you do to me whatever it is you're thinking of, it's not going to change her mind about you. Lil'll still feel the same regardless.. she won't love you-"

"WRONG."

Even Daedalus himself is taken aback by his fierce shout, as if the entire room and the world with it has contorted in light of his sudden rage. His breathing has grown manic. "You've no idea how wrong you are, Vincent. I've poured my soul into ensuring Lil's survival. The fact that she's even there, her heart alive and beating, is because I saved her from a terminal illness."

Daedalus's paces grow further. "Not you or anyone else. Me. Once you've had a taste of her love, waiting within her hardened persona, oh, you'd do anything if it means feeling contentment once again, a magnificent woman whose warmth and depth you deeply cherish as you hold her in your arms. She was mine before you came.."

The restraints throb over Vincent's flesh, tearing over the skin as his fear – his growing sweat drips over the leather. As he sees the look of deranged obsession in Daedalus (one which Vincent self-consciously recognises), a revulsion takes hold over him.

"You don't deserve her," Ergo Proxy says. "You never did."

"Deserve?" It's as if a knife has been jabbed behind Daedalus, the wound twisting. "I've not had anyone tell me who I deserve to be with, least of all you. In fact, you're probably just as jealous over her as I am – only, you're less honest about it. Oh Vincent, don't you kid yourself. In love, there's always a flip side to this coin which holds devotion, faith, adoration on its sleeve.. there is doubt, jealousy, envy, vengefulness, and even outright hatred. If you aren't even willing to admit that to yourself yet, perhaps you haven't traversed far enough down that road. Perhaps it's only a matter of time, before you suffer what my heart has suffered over her, and you're willing to admit that you are my rival."

The scientist loosens the straps on the patient; sharp movements which carry venom. No words need to be said for Vincent to realise it's not a magnanimous gesture. In his newfound freedom, a new fear - like having been set free from prison, never knowing when the executioner will show up to cut short all your dreams.

"If you're doing this to prove a point.." Vincent goes. "I won't be like you. The so-called love you hold for her is just your insecurities, needing to be assuaged."

"I wouldn't be too sure of myself."

In a blink, Vincent is alone. The silence, filling the void where Daedalus once stood is unnaturally oppressive – where Vincent hears his own heartbeats so clearly, as if he's the only one left left moving.

"Hallo?" he goes, panic seeping into his voice. He feels a deadening chill come across his stomach, moving about and his footsteps clacking on the linoleum floor. It's like if he doesn't concentrate enough on landing his feet just right, then he'd crumble down. He wanders past the giant laser, over to the hallway where the orderlies had forced him through – now it's empty, and it's eerie as if traversing past those gothic figurines perched over the mausoleum.

Vincent spots a light at the end. It's a beacon, shimmering and almost beckoning him to join. So he goes forth, and each step he makes, he feels the hospice's halls fade, until there is nothing more but the autistic darkness, as vast and as brimming with uncertainty as the unformed ether before genesis.

But ahead, still awaits the beacon – now resembling a woman, skipping away. You can see her wavering motions, slow and graceful like a dance, leaving behind in her wake those evening embers. Vincent ought to know who she is, but it's a word on the tip of his tongue.

When he follows her, he experiences various images from his life. The officer greeting him in Romdo; the way the rust seems to stick to his hand when he operates the machinery; the harsh, sand-crusted winds as he lets go of Romdo and renounces his citizenship – alongs multiple obscure memories.

Pino, giggling and playing the harmonica.

Lil.

Hundreds of images, voices and sounds circulate in his mind, drowning each other out in cacophony. It should frighten him, but there's something reassuring about the woman he's following, as if she's infusing everything in his life up to now with a renewed purpose and hope.

Then she turns around, and he isn't able to make out her face, but she is truly beautiful. She looks back at him, before she dissolves into the lattice of his memories, a dimensional figure melding into a surface..

A black light emerges in the midst of this twisting tunnel, and swallows up all the images and sounds like a bottomless pit..

all the while, he feels hands going over his skull

his neck

the pressure in his head is ever-mounting

It's morning. Vincent awakens upon the bed of his cell, finding that there's freshly-folded clothes laying on the chair beside him. There's no more scribbles on the wall over Ergo Proxy and doubting reality. He pulls up the t-shirt and cargo jeans, and finds that they're slightly mismatched to his size, but he puts them on anyway – forgoing the white hospital gown.

He goes out into the halls, where the diffused sunlight sprays through the window, revealing patients who are playing in the courtyard.

"Vincent?" he hears his name called. "Vincent Law?"

It's Lil. She greets him with a courteous smile, with a clipboard in her arms. "Well, today's your lucky day. You've been cured."

"But I don't feel any different.." Vincent goes. Like I was sick in the first place.

She ignores him. "Thanks to Dr. Yumeno's treatment, we've seen a marked change in your serotonin levels, and your overall brain activity. Now you're as good as any normal person out there-" As she talks, she feels a strange vacuity in her own memories – not knowing if she'd once felt fondness for him, over anyone in this nuthouse. "I miss you, Vincent.."

He perks his head. "You miss me?"

"I'll miss seeing you around, that's what I meant. Sorry, tongue-tied. The place won't be the same without you. All you need is to sign here – the release form. And you'd better press down hard; this pen's got its quirks."

Vincent has his items returned in a beat-up suitcase, and soon he's waiting outside with one other person – a young fellow, Santiago. Waiting for the cab to arrive.

"You don't have any family?" Santiago asks him. "Or any friends?"

"No, I don't know. Besides Lil, I have no memory of anyone else."

"Man, this asylum's did a number on you! But at least you're still alive, and you made it out. Just remember to chill, and I'm sure you'll find your footing. You know the funny thing is I don't think I've seen you around much – I'd recognize anyone in a heartbeat, but you, oh, I can tell you've got something special in you. That's why she likes you very much."

Vincent is chuffed by his upbeat energy. "You mean Lil?"

"No, I'm talking about the tooth fairy. YES, Dr. Mayer – or Lil, since you're on first-name terms with her. She secretly gushes about you, doodling on her notepad when she thinks no one is looking. I snuck a quick peek after she released you."

The omnicab arrives. With the rear popped open, Santiago helps prop Vincent's belongings beside his own wares, and as they sit, he pulls out a bar of chocolate.

"You're anxious, bud," he tells Vincent, who gazes back at the asylum. "This'll help calm your nerves – it's got 10% indica, give or take two percent standard deviation."

Vincent takes no notice, as he tries peering past the sunlit glare, hoping to see Lil one more time.

"Yeah.." Santiago peels off a piece and thrusts it into Vincent's hand. "There's tons of women out there you're finna meet. Yep, we're going high-speed.. flying through the clouds, and the rainbows pourin' down your bliss.."

As the cab takes off, there is Lil, who from the second-floor window gazes outward. She holds her fingers on the glass, waiting to exhale out a wistful sigh, over a person who shouldn't matter that much.

"It's crazy, right?" Daedalus shakes the fish flakes over the aquarium, watching the newly-placed koi dance over the simple joy of being fed. "People joke all the time that we keep patients in here, until their health insurance coughs up and then we release them. With my revolutionary laser technique, it'll be a matter of a week before we have this whole facility cleared out.. all the patients are outta here, while we hop over to bigger things."

Lil is filling out medical forms, approving more patients for the transfer to laser intervention. She's only half-listening, while her thoughts dwell on the idea of realising her ambitions – that there is more to life she could find, outside of serving as a doctor here.

"Bigger things," she goes. "What are you thinking of?"

"Me? I'd look into serving as chief medical advisor to the county. More pay, more value to my work. Won't you come with me too, as my deputy? I'd hate it if you lose your way down career hell."

"I'll consider it. Just give me some time, cause I feel like this is happening so fast.."

When Daedalus peers up, he looks at Lil – saliviating over how she'd felt in intimacy last night. She doesn't remember a thing of it, let alone her connection with Vincent; the way she had looked afterward, she was blushing and dazed, as if embarassed of her beautifully animalistic self. It would have been better if she didn't recall, so he could try a more subdued, tender approach and re-experience her virginal reaction all over.

He goes up to her, a hand over her shoulder. "Don't worry about the paperwork; here, have a drink." With his other hand, he offers her some absinthe in a cup – just freshly poured.

"Oh, is this.." Lil tries a small sip. "This is good."

"It's our little secret," Daedalus goes in a hushed whisper, putting the bottle back in the cabinet. "A toast to success, and life's rewards." After clinking their glasses together, the drink has the two of them glowingly ineberated. Lil slouches upon the table, and Daedalus goes up between her legs, and he hugs her. "Mmmm," he goes, "I truly have no words for how much.. I adore you so, Lil.. ohh.."

When she looks him back in the eye, she catches a whiff of her own perfume – now doubly so when mixed with their combined body heat. She drifts off to those lavender fields, and has the faintest recollection of reading to a boy a poem that left him coy.

"Hold still, Daedalus," she says, as he's about to lean in for a kiss. "Let me try something with you."

"Alright."

So she lays her fingers underneath his chin, like in her memory, and she leans forth and caresses his lips in a prolonged, gentle kiss. After slowly drawing away, she sees Daedalus is so red and sweaty, he can barely conceal it with the way his breath shudders – like recovering from a sudden chill. It's like that time in their youth when they both shared that love.

"Your lips.. oh, they're driving me mad," he says to her, as he recovers, but she silences him with another kiss – which flushes Daedalus with so much light-headedness that he keels over. For all his doctorates, he's like a hapless boy again, laying on the floor – begging for more of her with all his panting. "Please.. come down here with me.."

Lil suddenly laughs – it's funny when the good doctor acts like he's at her mercy, when really he's the one who incited this whole scene to begin with. But she follows suit anyway, and she slithers over him like a cat who toys with its prey, before saddling upon his body, allowing them to indulge in sensual eroticism against each others' aroused nether regions.

The cab crosses over the bridge, suspended over the chasms of fog and rock. Vincent has snacked upon a few bites of Santiago's bar, while beyond, the city – its tower buildings leer like stalagmites of a cave.

"Alors, it's the big O!" Santiago goes, pointing at the upcoming tunnel. "You gotta say it with me now, it's tradition – oooohhhhhhhhHHHH-"

Vincent mimes Santiago's "Ohhhhhh" as he feels the breeze intensifying, the tunnel swallowing up the cab – as water suddenly splashes out from all over, flooding the road and plunging everything into an aquatic darkness.. the water is seeping inside, and it's cold..

He lets out a gurgle of air, and violently belches out the contents of his lungs in a pained scream, as he flails his arms. But a force is holding him under, while he struggles.

Then, relief -

Vincent's head is yanked upward, and he finds the neon reflections of all the venues, scattered upon the foamy water which pushes towards him, and recedes out into the dark night. He's about to make sense of where he is, before the mafiosos plunge his head down into the ocean yet again, and it seems as if his lungs are about to implode with the effort to not drown.

"Let him up, let him up!"

Vincent is a mess, his face bruised, his lips stinging from the residual salt of the seawater dripping out of his mouth. If he'd thrown that poker game, he'd probably be sound asleep right now and Lil would have been fine, wounded pride be damned. Now, he ended up getting her involved, and they've taken her somewhere.

For what, he could only fear the worst..

"You are this close to death," they go. "Your lifeless corpse fed to the waters, for all the fish to enjoy. You don't want that.. and we don't want it either."

"Then just let me go.. please.. what are you doing with Lil anyways?!"

"Like we know. It really depends on your willingness to cooperate with us this time, given how you've flouted that card game throw."

Vincent seems in a daze, with his eyes wavering between the figures who hold him captive - realising that he has no choice. He can't fight his way out of this one.

"What must I do?"

One of the mafiosos shows a grin. "That's the spirit laddie, that wasn't so hard now – come here, let's grab our pal Vincenzo a corn dog."

If it weren't for the fact that they threatened Vincent with drowning earlier, it could easily pass for a tranquil beach scene. By the wooden table, he shudders, the mild air amplified into a chill as Vincent recovers from the involuntary splurge. The corn dog is still steaming, and it's one of the best meals he's ever had, as he chews through the salty cornmeal layer and almost bites through the wooden stick which holds the meat steady.

Then he becomes aware again of the henchmen who sardonically watch him eat. Vincent is now their dog. The leash has not yet tightened..

"You know, we never really took Antonioni for his word, but you sure are a handsome fellow," they go, much to Vincent's astonishment. Behind the men, the wonder wheel shines, the lights eminating out its radii as it slowly whirls in never-ending cycles. They have been studying his face. "We're doubly sorry about what we had to do. A wiser man than yourself would have known better than to go on disrespecting the will of an old empire."

Vincent munches on the last of his snack. He'd never realised how hungry he actually was.

"Do you know how to waltz, Vincenzo?"

"Huh?"

"Are your feet as graceful as your card-playing skills? One of our rivals is hosting a midnight gala soon. They're voting for bachelors. It's a chance for us to rid ourselves of a pesky opponent.. and you'll be the one to carry out the death sentence!"

"D-death? I'm not a killer.. I don't want to kill anyone!"

"No? You won't kill anyone? Not even someone who has ruined the lives of many citizens with his endless cravings? His death would mean that people would live happily. You'd only be killing a parasite.."

Suddenly, Vincent is no longer hungry – he feels a reeling in his stomach. "Anyone can call anyone else a parasite," he goes. "It's not up to someone to decide if another should be killed."

"That decision is already out of anyone's hands. Yours or ours, or the victim to be. It is fate's necessity, and following through with destiny is what has driven all human history. Otherwise, we execute you on the spot. Here, have some ketchup while you think about it."

The suit clenches upon Vincent's physique. Under layers of undershirts, vests and overcoat, he is dressed to charm. He sees himself in the mirrors, almost admiring this handsome man they've managed to bring out of him, while the dressmaker picks out a suitable mask for him to wear. As if they'd needed another way to hide his facial bruising..

"No, the mask is not for your bruises. It is a special gala, where the guests forget their old, mundane identities and embrace the pleasures of anonymity – where they are free to live out their fantasies. You'd know Vincenzo. Isn't it tiresome being seen as that card-shark on television?"

The chevalier carriage carries him uptown, to the wild forests where lanterns show the way forth. And soon, he is let go, left to his own devices as he anxiously wades past some drunken dancers to the front gates of the compound. There is distant cheering.. the love bomb pill in his pocket which the mafiosos gave him, it steadily weighs Vincent down, even though it's just as light as a tic-tac. A tablet which has an embossed red heart on its faces, it'll rapidly melt upon the tongue and dissolve into the bloodstream.

For the victim, it will feel as if you are suffocating in the most cherished moment, the air seeping out of your lungs as your last thoughts mull over your first taste. The taste of what? Of a forbidden ecstasy..

Vincent pulls out the mask which the dressmaker has handed him. A Venetian face that is awkwardly split down the middle, with white strands that stretch out like hair. Inwardly, Vincent shudders, as he recalls a sense of deja vu. (The dressmaker did have a keen eye for fitting clothes to someone's character.)

He enters the atmosphere of neon-lit luxury, and far from feeling at ease, he feels awkward – a total stranger in this place of fantastical people. Some who look like Roman kings, and some women who wrap themselves with silk laced with white ermine. Some who appear entirely headless, and some who are like bipedal animals. All of them radiate a magnetic energy that leaves you imagining that anything tonight is possible, as the various perfumes intoxicate your senses..

By comparison, Vincent feels self-consciously mundane – as he only experiences himself from the inside-out. He gets looks from people, as they eyeball him from toe to head. But when he catches the women's eyes, they glimmer as if in approval. It makes him feel better about being here. Then he remembers why he's here, and the turmoil in his head continues. He could run away, with apparently no one to stop him. But even so, if he could evade Antonioni's men, they still have Lil. It's something he won't live with, letting them have their way with her. He only hopes the family is as honourable as they pretend to be.

Every single bachelor in the town
They pray to be invited to the ball

So where is this Bonanno he has to dispatch? The mafiosos showed him a picture, a spindly old man who is photographed in his hoverchair. Once Vincent signs up backstage for the bachelors programme though, he could spike a drink for Bonanno to share. A celebratory toast.

Since he's of old age, and Vincent still young, the love bomb won't be lethal for Vincent – just a small sip or two won't do anything, much.

Every Willard, Markus and Alfonso
Would come by coach or boat to be here
Most would swim the moat to be here
Just to be at this historic gala

The girls would walk around or even crawl
Rumour is that at this joyous scene tonight
The don will likely pick his future heir tonight..

It doesn't take long for Vincent to enter himself in as a bachelor. A quick interview that basically asks if you think you have what it takes to earn the don's affections, before you're lined up in the spotlight – being asked to perform duties to prove your worth. There are a horde of other men, standing by the marble pillars, who could all pass for a prince.

"Hah! Just look at that doofus!" The red-haired fellow points at a boyish lad, who's all dressed with a shoulder pauldron. "You look too young to even be here. Are you over twenty-one?"

The boyish lad says nothing, just lowers his head and tries to pass his silence off as poise.

"Leave him be," Vincent says.

The red-haired fellow leers over Vincent, doing a side-take to his nearby friend, before walking over to that masked stranger – a newcomer he doesn't recognise. "Who are you, dude? You must be.. oh yes, my upcoming business associate, dude. You'll be begging for my forgiveness soon enough, as I send you off to do all my errands."

Sheesh. Vincent rolls his eyes, while his mask shadows his disgust over the nerve of some of the people here. He catches the eye of the boyish lad. It's a look of mild appreciation.

"Ladies and Gentlemen.. at this moment, we are proud to reveal our lineup of fine men, who have graciously volunteered their services in honour of our 8th anniversary of public service! The Bonanno family thanks you all for coming, and our tonight's proud sponsors include P. J. Morgan, Calimocho Ltd., the Mont and Fairlie association.."

A drumroll.

"Let's give it up for our bachelors!"

The backstage dims, as Vincent realises they're standing before the velvet curtains. When they pull up, the harsh stage lighting catches them all – at first, blinding an unprepared Vincent, before his eyes adjust and he is met with the cheers of a thousand audience members, wreathed in darkness.

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Fiat Lux / 6

2021-12-09T07:21:34Z

Daedalus pries open Vincent's jaws, attaching the mouth gag while Vincent struggles against the restraints, helpless as he lays like a child on the dental engine.

"Vincent.. I've seen you've been incredibly naughty."

As Daedalus speaks, he still recalls Lil being able to leave Vincent a parting hug, before she'd left him to the hospital's devices. This simply must not be; even thinking about the way she looked upon him makes a rage boil over his heart, as Daedalus's hands tremble, hovering over the various scalpels upon the table. "Dr. Meyer has shown you her generosity, but mistaking that for a sign of leniency from our rules – running around after hours.. drinking from my aquarium like a dog-"

Daedalus had to beg Argounova to get that room totally spic. Even in this dream world, his urges for cleanliness is undeniable.

"Quite frankly, it's about time you had an intervention, Vincent."

The spotlight, aimed directly at his face, blinds the hapless patient. If only Vincent could shut his eyes from the painful aching of his pupils shrinking – shut his mind away to that other dream. But there is no escape. He can only groan.

Daedalus brings down the hulking laser machine from the ceiling. Wires and cables twist in bundles, feeding the machine the necessary energy to penetrate past the dermal cells and bone. The good doctor has tested it on a few dozen patients; successive treatments has resulted in a permanent cure from psychosis, or whatever Daedalus finds is troubling the subject.

Vincent sees the doctor finally approach him, bearing that mischievous, scientific grin. The fear surges in his heart, as he uses up all his strength to tear himself free.

He only manages to wiggle off the mouth gag, now able to speak..

"Daedalus- why? All this because I was thirsty, and looking for a drink?"

"I'm merely applying my brand of treatment to you, Vincent. You should consider yourself lucky. If all goes well, in a matter of a few days, you'll be free – cured of those putrid thoughts about proxies and.. away from my Lil.."

"Your Lil..?" Vincent looks in those eyes of the mad doctor, now that he's practically breathing in his face. The realisation hits him: "This isn't about helping me, or anyone at all. Are you jealous about her, Daedalus?"

The mad doctor reels. Suddenly he is all too vulnerable, as if stripped naked (of all pretense) and now his worst private thoughts are revealed in the open. Stepping away from Vincent, Daedalus's eyes rest at a point beyond his reflection on the window - where the night seems to languish under the colour of rust. "Like you would know, Vincent.."

Even now, he cannot forget how Lil.. slowly crept into all the imaginative crevices of his mind, since the day he'd first met her when they were both younger.

Daedalus had been so absorbed reading about how DNA strands, so delicately intertwined, could form so many varying qualities in humanity, as compared with the rest of the animal kingdom. He didn't ignore the shimmering beauty of the royal courtyard. It was like a background balm to his mind, really, where he relished that feeling of tranquility that was otherwise sorely lacking in Romdo's mechanised life.

He had first tried to ignore the girl, who Donov walked with on the weekends. Despite her prettiness, he'd think: what would someone like her know anyways about how the world was like? But as the weeks passed, Daedalus grew aware of the fact of his own loneliness – as he'd seldom talk with those other kids in his classes. Compared with him, they're sheep, who'd small talk about getting passing grades, and play around in silly games.

Still though, he had really wanted an equal to confide his thoughts with. He had to at least try with her.

Finally, he looked up at Lil who'd pass by the bench, and to his benefit, this time she sat down beside him – if only to drink her tea..

"Hi," he said. "I'm Daedalus.. I attend the science academy."

Lil sipped some of that warm tea. "Hallo. Is your tablet thingy broken today? You aren't looking down at it anymore."

"No, I-" Already, he felt awkward around her. "I just finished reading a chapter on human evolution. Now I'm mulling over the principles. Did you know that once, we ascended from the species Homo Neanderthalensis - they were cavemen who hunted for food, and hid underground for safety. This is what they looked like.."

He showed her the images, and she pored over it. "Do you read everyday? This is kinda cool."

"I guess it is," Daedalus went. "What's your name?"

"Lillián. I'm Lillián." Her earnest smile sealed the deal in winning him over, as he felt a glowing of his own body, warmth flushing all over through his heart, as though life didn't truly have a meaning.. until this point. But he didn't know what to make of these inexplicable feelings, as she went on about serving her grandfather proudly – growing up into being the city's reigning princess. "This is my courtyard you're sitting in," she said, her voice haughty. "But let me be nice today for you. Want some of my tea?"

"I'd- yes, I would." He was averse of the fact that she'd drunk out of it, but he took a sip anyways, and it was sweet – perfectly sweet, without being sugary. "Golly, it's so good, Lillián."

"Just call me Lil, please," she went. "Though I'm royalty, I just feel weird, being called by my proper name."

When Daedalus re-read that chapter about DNA in private, he thought of how someone as good as her, could be borne out of the same material that would craft an otherwise normal person, let alone himself. Before he knew it, his thoughts drifted over to her given the chance, and it soon grew difficult separating his curious mind from a passionate heart, verging on (dare he call it) romantic. He hadn't the heart to tell her his feelings outright, but in solitude, was he able to feel his longing for her. The other kids noticed him growing more restless, even though he'd grown used to hiding his thoughts in public. Soon, he turned to including romantic literature – where he'd picture himself as the hero, and Lil the girl of his dreams.

On an ordinary day, Daedalus was eager; it was his first time skipping class, knowing that Lil was on her leisure time. He spotted her doing her makeup in a mirror, and with a "Psstt!" he lured her over to the medical bay (a place he'd frequent when he's bored), where you'd see surgeries and autopsies performed live. Nobody but autoreivs.

"Is this your idea of an adventure?" she asked, more out of jest than astonishment. Of course, she'd adore that this smart cookie would dare go out all this way for her. Other boys would write her letters, but he was the first to muster up the courage in taking her out on this sudden date. As they were witnessing the surgery of some man, getting cataracts removed from his eyes, Daedalus said that it's because of excessive drinking, that you develop these things in an advanced age. It was cool to him, but he felt Lil tugging at his arm – she was nervous and eeked out, so they went off to the courtyard.

There, by the pond, Daedalus whipped his tablet out. He wavered over his choice of what to read out to her – until Lil snatched the thing from his hands, and skimmed over the titles: "Hmm, let me pick. Some of these I've read already.. how does the Song of Solomon sound?"

It was something that he'd hardly think of picking, but she read it out to him anyway. "My beloved, who is white and ruddy. His head is as the most fine gold, with his locks as bushy and black as a raven. His eyes.. are as the eyes of doves by the rivers of waters, and his brain so absent-minded he'd bump into a pole."

Daedalus blushed as she said that with a smirk.

"He is altogether loveable," she went, "but he'll still remain a nerd. What a shame, as I'll adore him always.."

He felt time run to a standstill, as all that mattered then was the pounding of his heart, as he leaned in and stole a kiss from her. It felt like forever, holding each other, and yet forever was too short for the tenderness shared between them.

Then, they heard Raul Creed calling out for her. "Lil? Your grandfather's asking for you! It is urgent."

"I've got to go," Lil went, laying down Daedalus's tablet like a beloved book. As she got up though, he held onto her by the hand, as if begging her to stay for a little longer. So many thoughts had rushed through his mind – even though he didn't know her as much as he'd have liked, he'd look forward to the next time they'd meet. "I guess I'll see you around," he said. (Lil..)

But it was not meant to be. Later on, Lil showed him an inexplicable coldness – where he had expected her to sit down beside him, she now merely waved politely, leaving the young scientist baffled in a way that Lebel's hypothesis didn't. What had happened? It was as if the more he reached out for her, the more she recoiled away.. to the point where he was outright barred from visiting the courtyard, by some autoreiv of all things.

Daedalus would usually ignore the rumours in the academy about him; now it got to the point where he'd be shot with mock lovey-dovey looks, as they whispered about his love for the high count's daughter. He'd find handwritten letters, written in Lil's name which begged to see him again, that would have his hopes surge up – only for him to be met with pelted food and derisive laughs. "Silly Daedalus, you'll never have her!"

Then, as it snowed in Romdo in celebration of Christ's Mass, Daedalus had wanted to meet her, once more. Lil had just turned 16 a week ago, and he couldn't go empty-handed; it was a time of giving and appreciation, and he had some credits to spare. Knowing her, he bought a deluxe make-up kit from the boutique – the same kind which the professional models used. It was gift-wrapped by the store owner, who commented: "My, my, I'd love to meet that very lucky lady who's receiving this."

"It's my last chance," Daedalus muttered, not enough for the owner to hear. In his fur jacket, he took a taxi to the Meyer estate, where he waited by the worn gates, waiting for admittance, the white snow catching in his hair.

"State your business," he heard from the intercom. Daedalus hesitated – his lips uncertain on what had been so clear on his mind, moments earlier. Then he said: "I'm Daedalus. I'm just here to give a present to Lillián.. is she here?"

There was only silence, agonizing silence, and then he heard the gates buzzing, opening up much to his relief. An escort took him up the hill – inside the mansion's comfort, the family autoreiv took his coat and offered him some tea as part of its polite routines. The gold-gilded portraits revealed all the aristocratic Mayers, along with a family tree which traced their heritage back at least a century. Daedalus felt dazed by the splendour, to the point of dizziness – he was out of his element here, and could only feel humbled in the home of the one who held his heart.

Donov strode down the stairs, upright even while relying on a cane. "Daedalus Yumeno.. my daughter spoke well of you. But I cannot permit you to see her."

"Why?" More questions arose in him. "If she still speaks well about me, why is she staying away? Did I do something wrong? Whatever it is, I'm sorry – I only mean the best for Lil."

"She has fallen ill to Sinclair's rot.. she's laying upstairs, asleep."

Sinclair's rot! A very rare illness which struck 0.1% of the populace, only rising its ugly head during late adolesence, leaving the bearer with a sudden collapse of their cardiovascular system. Daedalus had heard of it; it remained an unsolved problem in medical science. The current solution was to put the patient under palliative care, where they could live their lives out, yes, but it wasn't really living – only borrowed time.

An urge overwhelmed the boy; he had to see her for himself.

"Daedalus!" Donov shouted. "Where are you going?!"

He ran past Donov, like an animal who had all but abandoned reason. Stumbling from room to room upstairs, Daedalus soon found Lil – in her cozy room laying in a glass tube, intubuated, pale, her hair in a tangle.

Lil awoke; opening her eyes from that dream she had, where she waded in that field of blossoming lavender flowers, she saw the boy in a hazed, almost hallucinatory-like vision. "Dae.. dalus?"

He pressed his hand over the glass, trying his best to muster up that smile he'd practiced for her. "I'm here Lil.. I brought you a present. You'd really like it.."

"Oh, you shouldn't.. have.." The words come out of her in rasps, as she coughs and dry-heaves. "I don't-"

"Don't what? What is it?"

"Don't.. want you to see me like this.." I'm a princess, after all, and princesses would never falter from their beauty or strength.

As Daedalus processed the moment, he found the taste of salt in his mouth, as his chest heaved like it was going to cave in from emotion. The present he had held in his arms fell to the floor with a thud. If he had cried in private, feeling sorry for Lil's seeming abandonment – his sadness was ballooning far beyond any control, as the girl he loved was.. she was dying.

When Donov entered the room, he found Daedalus with his tears staining the glass.

"Your Grace," Daedalus went, as Donov comforted the young scientist with his fatherly strength. He mustered up the remains of his composure. "I- I'm.. I'll do anything for her. I'll rip my own beating heart out if it means she'll be fine again!"

"You've already done enough, lad," Donov said. "I know you've made my daughter very happy. It's all I would ask for from you.."

"No, no, there must be a way! I will save her, goddamnit!"

A year passed. Daedalus had dropped out of the academy entirely, devoting his time into resolving a cure for Lil's sake – a way for the cardiovascular system to regenerate itself, without the veins bursting. The solution required a robust method, one that would spread through the patient's body and neutralize the faulty genome that had caused it. By then, he had solved the genome issue at its core, but it was only half the solution; you can birth a new body with the fixed genome, but you cannot affect the genome of an existing one (yet) without causing adverse, possibly even more dangerous mutations. And there was no such thing as "consciousness-transfer," either.

Lil wouldn't be recognizably Lil anymore.

Providence came, just when all hope was lost, as Daedalus went into the royal courtyard, just to think of Lil amidst the cherry blossoms. Life was simpler when he'd only thought about scientific principles, and the way the world worked. Now, he had to contend with the complicated reality of human relationships.. emotions.. especially love.

How did that cherry blossom tree grow back its leaves again, when it had shed them all during the winter and took on the appearance of being dead? It sensed the change in climate, no.

The first principle underlying that.

It was pressured into doing so. Just like how DNA, when 'pressured', results in puberty from childhood.

"YEAAAAH!" he screamed, as the inspirational flash struck him. He would send Lil into a second puberty, where he'd inject her with customised mRNA proteins, and then with a dose of hormones, trigger her body into replacing its veins. His scientific mind cautioned him of danger (don't you confidently wander off a cliff) – so he ran a test run simulation of this action, which only confirmed his intuition.

Standing by Lil's side again, Daedalus held his breath as he pulled out the syringe from his briefcase, and with Donov's approval, he put the serum into her IV.. waited an hour for it to circulate fully in her body, and then the gonadotropin + estrogen mix.

God, let me be vindicated..

Lil was dramatically seizing up, as if her limbs were jolted under a sudden electricity. This wasn't supposed to happen – her vitals were erratic, her heart rate shooting through the roof. At this rate, the blood would burst out her capillaries and she'd basically implode.

"No," Daedalus uttered, "No! NO!"

He couldn't bear the weight of his failure, his shame, so he ran away from her, out of the room like some lowly, fucking coward – crying, and just shaking himself back and forth while he leaned over the railing. "I killed her.. I killed her.." Perhaps he'd end it all – his life would amount to nothing more than this. The next day would have no meaning for him anyways, let alone any passage of time, and so he felt his emotions fading away into the ether.

"Daedalus.." he heard Donov call out to him.

"What?!" he barked, the force of pent-up rage erupting out of his throat. "What do you want from me?" But something was different – there was a look of gratitude on Donov.

"You've saved her, my dear.. oh you saved my Lillián.."

And true enough, as Daedalus wandered back into that room he'd left, where she'd adorned her bookshelves with bronze busts.. the glass was lifted up, and Lil had the rosy colour flushed back into her cheeks. She was still asleep, but she was well.

And he'd go on to save so many others who had lost all hope for a normal life.

Daedalus was appointed the role of chief physician. But more importantly, he'd fulfilled his own dreams of being that romantic hero, who could save the one he'd cherished. He met Lil again, by chance at the city hall. In her maroon coat and black eyeliner, it took Daedalus a moment to recognize her – she looked far more mature, while he still was the same boy, just with a lab coat on.

"You look dashing today, Lil."

"Oh, thank you." She eyed him. "My, aren't you proud of yourself – you get to look after our entire dome!"

"What about you, Lil? How've you been?"

"I've been good. I'm going into the investigation department, learning how to resolve crimes and unsolved cases. It's been a knack of mine, logical deduction."

This took Daedalus by surprise. "I thought you'd still be a princess."

Lil circled her head, letting her hair waver. "In a way, I still am. But I'd rather make something of myself, as opposed to just wallow forever with something I was born into."

The real question lingered at the back of Daedalus's mind, which he always wanted to ask her. "I still remember those golden days. I always wanted to read out a romantic tale to you, but you took my tablet. Your kiss - it still haunts me. It's too bad we couldn't go on with it. I'd honestly thought you'd left me without even saying a word. Lil.. would you love me, like then?"

"I'm seeing someone else, Daedalus. He's a fellow investigator, like me, and he's got quite the wit – especially when you need a good laugh."

The clock had just struck noon.

"I have to go now," Lil went, and Daedalus had his hand outstretched – this time, his fingers held nothing but air, as he watched Lil go off. He felt ice numbing his limbs, as he hung there for minutes beyond a reasonable excuse. It was the cold stab of jealousy.

comments

Photographie / Moonlit Beach

2021-09-25T19:34:16Z

This is unashamedly plagarized from the Moonlight script (p. 52-53).

Slowly, nearly unconsciously, with Gio going weak, he leans upon Katya, their weight supporting one another on the sandy beach. The night envelops those two, as close as they've ever been.

They are facing each other, with their noses nearly touching -- eyes locked in an eternal gaze.

While they hear the waves lapping near their feet, they are on the verge of crossing over into uncharted waters; the culmination of invitations they've sent to each other since the day they've met.

Katya's open lips brushes Gio's. It startles him.

He leans in..

Their kissing grows heavy, much deeper than just the mere meeting of lips. Time seems to melt away out of existence in their longing embrace -- as the hunger surges, like waves of electric anticipation through Katya's nervous system, she feels herself growing wet, and her hands guide his over, beneath her skirt.

A gasp from Katya. Gio's hand disappears beneath, and there is sensation. Pressure. Rhythm. From his fingers, he has Katya's breath catching in her chest, while her head is fully leaned into his neck; while her hand is atop his, showing him how she wants to be touched, her other hand trembles for a grip upon the sand.

There's more caressing, and pulling that goes deeper, and deeper. And deeper.

Then finally, an eruption.

..

With hearts trembling erratically, Katya seems to be holding onto Gio for dear life, while she feels her breath almost choking on the salty breeze. Gio removes his hand, looking upon the residual wetness that gleams under the moonlight, before he wipes it upon the sand.

"Oh, I'm.." Katya goes. As sudden as it's happened, it's over, with tears welling in her eyes. "I'm sorry.."

"What you gotta be sorry for?" Gio looks upon her with the kindest, most open face.

Katya considers that. Deeply so.

The ocean waves still lap in the night.

comments

Fiat Lux / 5

2021-06-08T07:13:46Z

As Pino has crawled under a hatch, she feels the instant relief of having escaped the dead city's oppressive gloom. The little autoreiv struggles with the ladder steps which seem too big for her legs, and falls mid-way through, landing into the sewage.

Glug.

Glug.

It feels like an eternity as she feels the semi-solid wastes leech through her bodily pores, corroding her inner circuitry. When she emerges from the sludge, her arms flailing over a ledge, Pino feels awful - drained of her usual lively spirits. She grabs hold of some tangled vines which have slithered out of some piping, and hauls herself onto a dry platform.

She sits, her legs dangling just over the oozing wastes. It's a moment in her life where she's thankful for shutting off her sense of smell (peee-uuu, it really reeks!). Her petite hands fumble when it comes to wiping off the grossness, and she takes off her clothing, leaving her trembling in the sewer's chill, as she has no one's hand to clutch and guide her.

She yearns for Vincent's displays of shyness, for Lil's hard-nosed decisiveness.. the tears pour out of her eyes, and she won't stop crying. Though Pino may be an android, she's still just a child in a totally foreign world.

Even so, she's got to find them! Save them from that spindly woman..

The sewer's passageways are cramped, with several layers of small piping overlaying the walls and ceiling. There's no lighting, so Pino resorts to infrared to navigate – some of the pipes are red-hot, saturating the air with steam, so she follows them down the corridor.

The pipes lead Pino downward, and a deep, reverberating thumping can be felt through her whole body. Then she comes across a vast chamber, so enormous, and so cold. She sees all the little flakes drifting down from the moonlit cupola, like the black snow from the wilderness, but here.. they glisten in the dark. It would be tranquil to gaze at, except the cold is freezing her joints.

The lone bridge extends outward towards an unseen edge.. it looks scary, as if Pino would fall forever if she'd stumble over.

So she turns around, and behind her, she finds Argounova.

"Lost, are you? My little dear.."

Argounova stands tall, a lithe figure huddled under the archway. She's like a ghostly presence who's materialized, her eyes set on Pino. When she steps out into the chamber, her loose wirings ripple with the wind.

In terror, Pino waddles back, onto the bridge.

"St-stay away, you bad lady!" Pino goes. "Please don't come near me!"

Argounova doesn't relent; she proceeds forth, slowly, studying Pino's paralyzed fear, and in the meanwhile, almost taking pity on the little autoreiv's haplessness. "Why shouldn't I?" she asks Pino.

"Because.. you hurt Lil and Vince! You hurt my friends and took them away!"

Each step Pino takes back has her finding the bridge more icy and slippery. Soon, she has to grasp the railings, which feel like velcro icicles as she struggles to peel her hands off the surface.

"They're still here," Argounova goes, effortlessly traversing forward with her hooved legs. She barely suppresses the urge to say "in me," since that would be too conceited of her. "They're in a safe place, dreaming their grief away. I imagine you want to see them again, don't you?"

"I do.." Pino is piqued by the offer - she's learned from those fairytale stories not to trust witches. "You're going to trick me like you did with them, aren't you?"

The thumping rises, and like a heartbeat that is now palpitating under strain, you can start to make out the collective murmurs of all the dreamers, sotto voce. Argounova nears Pino, almost close enough to touch her.

"You're frightened," Argounova goes. "You have nowhere else to go. Someone like you wouldn't last another five minutes – your joints are frozen already. Child, let me take you in."

"Go away!"

"I am your only salvation." Argounova's chest, which is like a ribcage wrapped over armour, bursts open – you could see her internal organs, the intestines and muscle tissue. From her guts, she spews out tendrils, each individual strand all craving for Pino.

Pino screams. With the last reserves of her body, she runs further down the bridge. The icy catwalk and the gales blow the little autoreiv forth, sliding without any control, and she tumbles to the bridge's edge. The railings stop her.

Argounova lets her chest tendrils caress the poor child, feeling the frosted skin, the torn clothes, the stiff hair, and everything. As Pino comes to, she finds the tendrils ticklish, and squirms in Argounova's elongated embrace. The proxy shushes her, and reels Pino in like a fishing line, until at last Argounova is able to hold Pino in her arms.

What is this feeling that's washing over Pino now? Warmth, tenderness, innocence.. and love.. the things she's deeply craved for so long, in those months wandering the barren desert. The emotions come so unexpectedly, like a balm over skin that's mainly known roughness.

Pino relaxes in the proxy's embrace, no longer fretting, as all her worries and fears seem to vanish away, and she's like a newborn baby. When Argounova leans down to kiss her on the forehead, the blushing is so much to bear, that Pino ends up giggling.

"Oh, you're so cute," Argounova goes – carrying Pino. That emotional void that Argounova's had to endure for too long is melting away. A maternal love. She's witnessed so many people in her dream worlds bearing children, and it's like a glass wall separating her from ever experiencing those joys first-hand. Only in proxy, could she have it, linking her awareness with someone else's nervous system, to be able to see and feel as they do.

With this autoreiv.. it's in such bad shape. And it's been so long – much too long that Argounova has employed herself as a seamstress. She can still do it though, healing the scratches, the accumulated wear-and-tear.

Upon carrying Pino to a safe spot in the maintenance halls, Argounova reaches a tendril into the autoreiv's ear, and deactivates the child.

("Hey, what are you-" Pino went. "That tickles-")

I'll give you the ultimate gift. The chance to live a life as a person. Not confined to your robotic shell or your programming, you'll flourish in the world I'll lay at your feet.

You'll grow. You'll explore.

Most important of all, you'll be my child. I will watch over you, the way God watches over His brethern. And I will love you – until the end of all Time.

comments

Fiat Lux / 4

2021-04-24T06:07:31Z

At night.. Vincent is awoken by low, reverberating thumps - as if someone is beating a drum in the deep.

He faintly recalls the coziness of resting in her bedsheets, wrapped in by her arms in a reassuring embrace, but perhaps that's just his mind thinking funny. For he's alone again in the ward – not in that dank padded cell, but with his familiar collectibles. Lil has been kind enough to put in a word for him.

His head aches with a mixture of drowsiness. It's what happens when you're awoken abruptly from dreaming. What he needs is a glass of water..

The walls almost seem to throb in time to the invisible beat, as Vincent navigates the ward halls, feeling the dread of everyone's absence. Despite the sterile chill, there's an uncomfortable layer of humidity which pervades the wards, leaving his gown clinging to his goosebump-riddled skin.

The kitchen is by the communal foyer. Usually a hotspot for the gossipers and housewife-types, the stovetop is left with residue of dried-up porridge, and the faintest scent of almonds (for they love messing around with the dough and other spare ingredients).

Vincent grabs a cup from the lower cabinet, and tries getting water from the tap.

The faucet lurches, as if struggling to belch up its payload from deep plumbing, and finally the water jets out – it is muddy rusty. Vincent tosses the water out – in disgust over its gross, metallic stench.

He tries opening the fridge, in hopes of finding some milk or juice instead, and much of the sandwiches inside are spoilt, to the point where he decides against it.

What do I have to do to get something nice to drink?

A door shuts closed, and Vincent sees the nightly nurse, making her rounds as she patrols the halls – her nightstick scratching the walls. He sees her come, and he crouches down under a table, instinctively knowing that a beating would follow if she catches him out..

As he hears her footsteps fade, an idea occurs to him; whether or not the staff are intentionally negligant about their patients' hygiene, there's no way they'd stoop to drinking the same disgusting water! And with Vincent's parched gut driving his movements in the night, he peeks out, and stalks the nurse out into the staff area.

Vincent catches the door right when it's about to slam shut, and surprisingly enough, the nurse doesn't notice. It's just that the halls are blindingly bright, and he stumbles back into the first office whose door is ajar.

Inside.. the fish tank softly bubbles, and casts the office in blue and violet hues.

He feels his chest begin to lurch from the thirst – as though his heart would threaten to implode on him, the blood sapping away from his head as his ears ring, and every other noise is just a blur. Vincent hastily pops off the tank top, and he plunges his head into the waters.

The water tastes off-kilter, but this doesn't stop him from almost lapping up the goldfish – Vincent spits the poor fish back out. It seems to flop uncannily on top of the water surface, as if carried afloat by a force unknown, then the fish sputters beneath, where it lays still, before its body dissolves in a fury of bloody mist.. enveloping the tank in a state of terminal sunset.

Vincent is taken aback by the little horror. The other fish hurriedly swim away from the bloody epicenter, but all the same, they sputter as their gills inhale the foreign yet familiar blood of their own – and die.

And because it is so dark in the office room, with only a slit of hallway lighting through the door to contrast with the fish tank, Vincent does not make out his own true reflection upon the glass, the masked arbiter of death.

At least though, his thirst is sated, and the buzzing of his body goes away.. and then the door creaks open.

Vincent awakens, huddled on the couch with blankets over his body. He wonders why it feels so cushiony, until he remembers that he's been taken to the home of his benefactor, Lil. He breathes in the crisp, conditioned air, which is a far cry from his danky apartment. The living room is so dim, still at night, that he only makes out the silhouettes of palm trees from the grandiose windows.

Oh yes – she won't let him sleep in her bed; Lil was very touchy about it.

Then he realises that the taste of muddled water in his mouth won't go away. On the tabletop is some jasmine tea, leftover from Lil, and though it's gone cold, he indulges in its sweetness and finds a relief from tasting that half-remembered dream. He still feels tired, and yet so restless.

Then he hears something, coming from upstairs. It sounds like Lil – moaning.

Vincent tip-toes over to her room. He passes by the aquarium embedded in the wall, where the goldfish swim under an eternal twilight, before he pulls the bedroom door open to find her writhing in bed. Her bedsheets slip off. As her body contorts, sweat billowing out through her pajamas, her hands grip her bedsheets.

"Lil?" He feels a cold sweat on his brow, like he's witnessing an inexplicably uncanny event. The moans and eventual screams which escape her mouth carry a wild and frenzied quality, and Vincent rushes to her side – he grabs her by the shoulders and shakes her awake. "Lil, wake up! Lil!"

Her eyes jolt open - Lil's eyelids flutter with such a release of tension, and it takes a while for her to simply breathe, as she turns to Vincent who's there with her, wordless as she recovers from her orgasm.

"You were shaking, Lil," he says.

"Oh – ohh," she goes, as she brushes off Vincent and fetches her glass of wine off the stand. "I feel.. weird." Her breasts – particularly her nipples feel especially tender, so she goes up to a mirror and checks them. They look fine, but that face that had vanished just now from her awareness still haunts her, his hands relishing in coveting her body.

"Did you have weird dreams too?" she hears Vincent say, and it gets her out of her moody reverie.

He sits down with her on the bed, and catches her musky scent. He doesn't have the gall to tell her about it though, and then she leans into him, resting her head upon his shoulder, and a jolt of panicked adrenaline enters his heart. But she's able to forget about her nightmare all the same, here with Vincent.

"I do, actually.."

A strange warmth envelops the two of them, as Lil finds comfort in feeling the steady rise and fall of Vincent's chest, his breathing. If she could take him to those lavender fields embedded deep within her soul, it'll be absolute bliss. But the best she can do is listen, as Vincent describes his dreams of being in an asylum, the goldfish he ate, and an alternate version of her who's been so cruel, yet so kind.

Admittedly, her thoughts start to drift off – vividly remembering every little moment he's mentioned with her in it, down to seeing him as a poor, misunderstood thing.

And then she recalls being hit in the face, by a spindly autoreiv, with a little girl (Pino-?) screaming and cowering down.

"Pino!" Lil says, leaping up from the bed as if zapped by electric shock.

Hearing Pino's name also has Vincent rummaging around in his mind, as if the name has tapped a corner that's all but forgotten.

"Vincent, we were on a train," Lil goes, as her eyes rummage in thought. "We needed spare parts for the Rabbit.. but the woman attacked us."

"I don't quite get it," Vincent goes.

A car drives by outside, with headlights gleaming through the window, before fading away.

"That feeling where we know each other, it isn't random." Lil starts pacing around the bedroom, flicking the lamp lights on so you could see her face – still a little pale, without makeup, and yet her eyes betray a fierce, hardened awareness. (The vulnerable girl in her is just a luxury she can seldom afford.) "Because we do. And Pino, she was with us!"

Vincent imagines a girl, her hair wavering under her rabbit hood, smiling as she skips around his legs. "Vince!"

"Where is she?" he asks. "Where are we, anyways?"

"I don't know. Only that whoever's behind this, they wouldn't want us remembering our original selves. Aughh, I feel like I'm trying to recall different songs, when I've only heard them for the first time.. anyways, our best bet is if we act like we don't know. Keep it hush between us, until I can get to the bottom of it all-"

"Or let's run away." Vincent gives a serene smile. "Maybe the answers don't lie in this town, but beyond – where we haven't ventured before."

The idea has Lil's heart thumping with excitement, and though she doesn't yet recall Vincent's real nature as a proxy, she trusts him.

"Oki."

Then they hear another car driving by, and the headlights menacingly stare through the window, as if probing at Vincent and Lil in the room.

Lil's instincts kick in.

"GET DOWN!"

He hops to the floor before a fusilade of bullets shatters the wallpaper, the dresser, throwing fits of feathers from the bed into the air – holes just where he's been sitting. The gunfire crackle is deafening, and so is the silence left after in its wake.

Vincent coughs from the lingering debris, and before he can recover his bearings, Lil hauls him into the halls, where the home invasion alarms blare the loudest and the floor is wet from the punctured aquarium. The uncomfortable footing leaves Vincent almost slipping, and then he feels something mushy under his feet - it turns out he's stepped

over one of her goldfish..

The front door gets blasted open, and men in trenchcoats pour in, with flashlights attached to their shotguns. Lil and Vincent, descending the stairs, quickly get caught under their spotlight – and they freeze, only expecting the worst (being blown away).

But luckily, it doesn't happen.

Instead, the old mob boss Antonioni comes striding in, taking off his hat to reveal his wizened head. He smiles at them.

"Vincenzo..!" his wispy voice goes. "And your lady friend! I hope we did not interrupt anything-" He eyeballs them, regards the fact that they're still clothed, and then continues: "Ahh, yes. Do bring them down, per favore."

Lil struggles under the henchman's bear-tight hold on her arms, while Vincent goes down more placidly.

"I must apologize for the mess-"

"Mess?" She eyeballs them. "You tried to kill us!"

"Believe me, my dear Lillian," Antonioni goes, "if I wanted you both dead, you'd have died in your sleep. We merely wanted your utmost attention – there's a matter of grave urgence to discuss. Take them into the car, and fast, before the rest of the neighbourhood awakens."

The Rolls-Royce Phantom II is like a limo, where there's room for middle seats which face sideways, while the henchmen occupy the rear and the front. Vincent's ears still ache from the earlier gunfire, but he's able to make out the distant sirens and all the dogs barking, as he's shoved head-first into the middle seat with Lil.

As the car veers off, Vincent makes out Lil's house smouldering in the night, before his attention fixes on Antonioni at the back.

"First things.. Vincenzo. I know you still worry about your debt to us; it will be forgiven. The money yielded from the card tournament is peanuts!"

Vincent doesn't comprehend the sudden change of heart. "Peanuts – next to what?"

"Next to – well, there lies the rub," Antonioni says, slowly inching them into his mindset; in his world, respect is garnered through favours people don't refuse. "Suppose you live in a house, with a nice family, and everyone is harmonious. Then, you have another family, who are left destitute out of misfortune, and are looking for someone's hand to help them up from their troubles. So you offer them that hand.

"They move in with you, and you think it may be just a matter of days before they'll be on their merry way. But your generosity serves as a pretext, as they end up claiming rooms.. your food, your finances – until your family is an unwanted stranger in their own home. Every time you try to take back what is yours, it is one step forward and three steps back.

"Now," Antonioni says, "we have the Luciano, Bonanno and Corleone families who thrive.. while we are reduced to taking scraps, petty gambling deals. Our men are losing faith in us, and some are starting to renounce their loyalty – but Lil, you feisty woman, your presence is a great boon for us-"

"Shut your mouth, old man!" Lil goes. "I'll do nothing for you! You'll let me and Vincent go, and that's that!"

Antonioni's mouth curls into a slight frown, as if he's expected this disappointment.

"Yes, I think we will let Vincenzo go-"

When the mob boss taps his window twice, the car hurdles to a stop, in the midst of a jazz city by the harbour. There, the burly henchmen in the car haul Vincent out into the streets, and Antonioni shuts the car door as Lil screams out Vincent's name.

It is all so sudden, as their car veers into dense traffic, and Lil struggles against Antonioni's surprising show of strength within the passenger cockpit. He batters her head down against the leather seat, her face blushing red in a helpless fury under his arm, while her arms are awkwardly pinned under the entirety of his body.

"Are you finished yet?" he goes, his calm voice betraying no exertion. "I would hate to talk to you about your upcoming ordeal, when you are like a wild animal whose leash I must regretfully pull."

With the blood constricted in her neck, sending rhythmic pain that shoots her nerves, Lil ends up submitting to Antonioni, and a few tears escape her eyes.

The mob office is lit under a chiaroscuro incandescence, with a few capodecinas who are seated around the poker table – not covered in cards and playing chips, but with written diagrams of various families, a city map that's heavily annotated with their operations, and black & white photos of a grizzled man, caught in a multitude of various poses.

"Come," Antonioni beckons to Lil, who is still in her pajamas, in trepidation, as if she's breathing an unfolding nightmare. The other capodecinas have their gazes turned on her, and behind their eyes, she feels them probing her nakedly – as they're ascertaining her looks, her demeanour, and more generally, her ability to perform compared with her liability to them. Antonioni gestures to each of the officers in his regime. "This is Salvatore, this is Leduc.."

They nod in her direction as each of them is introduced, yet it doesn't make her feel any better. Not with her Vincent held in their hands, with them doing god-knows-what out of her sight.

Antonioni goes: "Bonanno is a man known for his fine tastes," with his spindly finger taking a stroll over the photos of the man. "With wine, food, the artworks hanging in his compound.. it also includes women too. He indulges himself in them, and he is very particular about who he lets near him. With you Lillian-"

"How do you know my name, anyway?"

The capodecina named Leduc taps on the table, and there, much to Lil's surprise, are photos of her – the most provocative images as photographed. "Nothing escapes our gaze when it comes to someone we're interested in."

She feels an intense inner revulsion over letting the likes of these guys pore over her body.

"You are a renowned supermodel," Antonioni goes. "Someone who he'll least suspect, let alone be able to resist your charms by the time he lays his eyes on you." With a telling gaze, Antonioni perks an eyebrow up, and it hits Lil what lays in store. "Once he likes you, first thing is that he likes to watch for a while.."

"No, no, I'm not doing this.." Lil backs away, with a flood of chills emerging out her stomach.

"And once sufficiently aroused-" The mob boss grabs a cane that's leaning against the wall, whacks it onto the poker table, and slides it ever so slowly off so that the cane makes this tense, curling noise. "You will let yourself melt all over him, caress him with a lover's embrace until he climaxes, and then kill him. I trust.. that you will follow through?"

Think of Vincent.. they'll kill him.. even though I can't do this, I must!

"Y-yes," Lil goes. "I'll do it."

"Swear to us," Leduc says. "Please say it out once again, with sincerest feeling. Even the slightest hint of hesitation will lead Bonnano to doubt, and doubt is the last thing we can ever afford."

And Lil has to suppress a gulp to utter out: "I will do it."

Already, she feels the dread of her unwilling decision, and more than ever, she'd like to tear her soul out of her own body if it means defying her fate.

comments

Fiat Lux / 3

2021-01-07T19:01:45Z

Vincent finds the revolver's barrel right in his nose. The gangster is poised to pull the trigger.. except his attention is rapt on the newcomer girl – this dashing woman who has stumbled across the crime scene.

Now, Lil. Although she's just supposedly a model, an inner confidence is arising within her over beating those cockroaches over their silly heads. And seeing poor Vincent, huddled down by the lockers, it is setting her off.

"Lady, this guy's nothin' to ya! It's your last chance, missy, cause we won't hesitate to put a bullet into your thick skull, if you don't turn around and fuck right off-"

Lil grabs the first nearest guy, and with surprising strength, she breaks his arm in one swift stroke. The boss leader, Antonioni, just gazes on in shock as he sees this woman striking his men out in curt movements, and a thought occurs to him; he could use her for one of his own. But what could he offer her, if she does not worry for her well-being like so many others do?

The guy holding the revolver in Vincent's face is shaken, and as he falls, the revolver slips out of his hand – onto the tiled floors.

By then, Lil is panting, shaken by the effort, her hair frizzled up from the fighting. She just has this wizened man to stare down..

"I'm Don Antonioni," he goes, smiling. "And it's an honour to meet you, miss.."

"You're not getting my name." Lil pulls up Vincent, who is in even more shock than before as he's seen the brutality of his saviour. "Let's go." It's almost as if she's hauling him out of this mess, and when Antonioni is left to survey how his men are left groaning in pieces, he mutters a cantrip to himself, before calling in an ambulance.

"You didn't have to go all this way for me.." Vincent is huddled in the passenger seat, while Lil drives the car, almost swerving into a light fixture as she's getting the hell away from the stadium.

"Yes, you're right, I don't." Lil plucks the radio on, with some house music to distract from all the worries. "But you're the source of my questions. Why does it feel like I've always known you?"

"Wait, what about my winnings? I've just won the whole pot.."

"It's your life, Vincent. You're a world-class champ, there'll always be more to win down the line."

The car drifts into the calm suburbs, populated with tight-knit driveways, towne homes, with a healthy dose of cedar trees, and after a few turns, Lil is by her front-door porch, where she idles the car before it shuts off. Then she lets out a huge sigh of relief, resting her head over the wheel as if signifying the end to a long and weird night. As Vincent gets out, he lets the wave of cricket chirps wash over his ears, feeling the crispness of freshly-cut grass. So this was what being in a rich neighbourhood was like – being surrounded by peaceful scenes, like a luxurious blanket that's pulled all around, insulating you from the dust and worn carpet.

Inside Lil's home, there's chandeliers atop giant halls. She takes Vincent's coat off and hangs it in the laundro-cabinet, where it'll get dry-cleaned by the next day. And while she heads into the kitchen to make nighttime tea, Vincent eyeballs the tall posters of Lil, all in various and seductive poses.

He thought she was fairly nice before, but oh boy – she was stunning. It was almost enough to make him salivate, when Lil comes by, with a teacup for him.

"How long have you been doing this?" he asks.

"Modelling?" Lil tries to recall. "About five years." She isn't flustered when it comes to the more revealing photos of her, as though it's perfectly normal, while Vincent struggles with his obvious blushes. His cup quivers as he tries the tea out, and the elixir is sweet in his mouth (like the embodiment of a kiss) – a surge of bodily warmth arises in him.

"It's good.."

But it's also too much for Vincent to take, so he finds the nearest seat. A red velvet couch. Lil, her eyes lulling on her house guest, sips her tea, before noticing some of the wounds left on his face. The men have beaten him, what sore losers!

He is resting on her couch like a bruised dog, that she's taken in of her own volition, and now, she has an urge to tend to his wounds.

"I've got to get you some stitches," Lil goes. "Won't you follow me upstairs?"

"But I'm fine—"

"It'll get infected. And besides.. I can't stand seeing you like that." There's a faint trace of a smile, which Vincent doesn't quite catch.

Lil is daintily wiping the grime and sweat off his cheeks, as she has Vincent sitting over the toilet seat. She's done makeup over her own face, and has allowed the MUAs to touch her up so many times, but it is the first in a long while that she is touching the face of a young man.

"Hold still, you baby," she whispers, as Vincent grimaces – the hydrogen peroxide seems to fizzle over his bruises, in those places where they've pounded him into dirt. He tries holding his breath, but ends up faint-headed over the effort.

Lil throws the gauze away, and simply puts band-aids over the bloodied areas. Her calm breathing is a balm, with Vincent looking up at her. If he took her right here and then in a kiss, his mouth would end up falling forever into her lushness, miles deep. She pretends not to notice – only slides his shirt off, and goes to the bathtub where she plugs the hole and turns the tap on.

Is she really wanting me to..?

Vincent rises from the toilet, about to step into the bath-

"What, do you always take baths with your trousers on?"

He hesitantly waits, caught under her gaze while he feels his erection pressing undeniably against his pants.

"I won't look," Lil goes, as he unbuckles his pants. "I promise." She hears his clothes hit the floor, as he wades into the steaming tub, now bubbling and frothy. He lets his whole body soak into the water, and it is scathing at first – but only at first, for soon, all of his daily worries just melt away while he grows easily accustomed to the bath.

Lil hands him the shampoo bottle, and sets some music on the speakers, before she heads out into her own bedroom – finishing her tea, but also giving herself a breather to think what would happen in the next day, let alone the next five minutes. Already, she's treated Vincent far better than most of the people in her life, and.. it's just happening so fast, how close she's getting with him!

On the other side.. Vincent is rubbing the vanilla shampoo out of his eyes – "Agghh!" as it stings so much, even though it smells just like her. A childish enjoyment emerges just from playing around with the dainty bubbles, while the music is like a cherry on top.

In reality, still onboard the train, Pino peeks her little head out of the cupboard. Frightened as she may be, she's seen the spindly woman steal away Vince and Lil. It's up to her to rescue them! So Pino waddles out into the empty caboose, where she accidently rattles a broken teapot by her feet, and ends up leaving some stained footprints from the puddles she's stepped in.

The train has stopped, and when she steps out, it is a city that's caught in perpetual stillness, with so many of these buildings lit only under pale moonlight.

Pino is getting the sprinkles in her tummy. What if Vince and Lil are embodied under these numerous cobwebs, spread before her feet in the streets so endless? She stumbles over a mound, and looking back, it's an atrophied body, still caressed by the little spiderlings.

Pino is glad not to end up like that.

"Vince! Lil!" she calls out. The stuffed bodies go on forever, and Pino's waddling is more frantic, as she tries uncovering the cobwebs, looking for the familiar faces of her friends – but they are all strangers, in varying stages of sloth.

And there's dust.. dust in the air.

"Vince.. hello? Please wake up!"

She hears something around the corner. It sounds like rattling, and when she creeps around, it looks like a man in the shadows – naked, emancipated, and just struggling to walk.

"Hello?" Pino approaches him. "Can you help me? Find my friends?"

He is wobbling, and Pino gets unnerved; she steps back.

"W-who?" he rasps out. "Where is my family? My son – he still needs me!" It is as close to screaming that a voice can get, after thirty years of cigarettes. Then he sputters out a violent cough, hacking the air from the deepest recesses of his lungs.

"I.. don't know you!"

Pino squirms, and she runs, as fast as her little legs can carry her. She runs, and it seems like there are faces from the walls, watching, and the fields of webs are so endless that she's lost track of where she's come from – as all her footsteps are just broken webs which are hard to distinguish, like wading through silky haystacks.

Eventually, she feels tired, and she curls down into a little ball, huddling herself like when her caretakers would get into a very bad argument.

"Vince.. Lil.. I'm very scared.. help me, please.."

Then she hears a distant rumble. She even feels it to her bones, and when Pino gets up, she spots atop the city's former skyscrapers, an intricate, giant web, spun by giant spiders. No – not that..

The shadows around Pino grow more definite, and the rumbling isn't stopping – she looks up at the web, and something is arising behind it. It's bright, white and round, like the domes in the wilderness, and Pino would call it the moon, like in those little stories she'd read.

The moon glimmers, casting all within under its mesmerizing light.

Pino gasps, as she finds that her hands and arms emit streaks of starlit brightness. As well, the entire web network's nature is revealed – as pulses of exchanged energy, resembling the meandering paths of several lightning bolts. In a way, it's beautiful, but Pino is distracted by her own glow, as she finds numerous fireflies in her vision, and it's not going away.

When she runs, it's like a girl set alight in fire, and she ends up through a doorway – where inside, the fireflies stop.

In that moon, sits Proxy Argounova. Her head is entangled in a mesh of webs, like velvet curtains draping over her skull, as she sits atop her rightful throne – watching over her land of fears and desires. In one half of her awareness, she relishes the total joys and ecstasies of her inhabitants, and in the other half.. their pain and suffering. And especially now, it is truly fascinating for another Proxy to be under her spell, as a once-in-a-long-while chance to see the fears and joys of another like her.

But she feels an anomaly. Some of the neural connections have been tangled up by an unknown agent, as if someone has been stepping over her crops – and as a result, people are waking up, people are having cross-tangled memories, it's no good.

So, for the first time, Argounova brings the Seer in search over the grounds. In her vision, she sorts the broken webs – their times and locations - into a path. It seems logical to imagine that a person has been sneaking around. But.. how? She could sense the tinest fluctuations of human energy, for as much as the dome surrounds.

A sense of doubt arises in her. The order that she's spent so long developing, in bringing the whole city to stasis.. in seeing so many people lost to the first trials.. in being a voyeur to the endless lies she's enveloped them in..

No. She will not lose it all.

There's two likelihoods: (1) that Vincent, the Proxy of Death, has subconsciously taken control over the dream, and is spreading chaos every passing second. An unlikely one. For Argounova has dealt with another proxy, many years ago, even to the point of making him believe himself as an ordinary man, flesh and blood and weakness, and seducing him in the world as – her lover. Her Equal.

And her love for him was so strong, so full of yearning, that it's ended up sapping the poor lad of his entire virility, god bless his soul. (Even now, she misses him.)

The second possibility is that an agent she did not detect has snuck onboard, when she took in Vincent and Lil. There is such a thing called AutoReivs, who have some semblance of autonomy, but who are not humans. Argounova has never believed in such artificality (despite the hypocrisy of her make-believe worlds); why allow in something that she cannot manage? Through the history of her dome, AutoReivs were denied, and it's one fact that she's proud of to this day.

She's willing to lean into the second possibility – and what a nightmare for her, as none of her senses would aid her.. she'd have to search for the damned thing in person.

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