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Almost a week since he and Elena had boarded the train had passed. A week for them. Pluto’s stasis magic had really been working its… well, magic. Jae-heon currently stood in, what had been a “week” ago, a normal train car once filled with bright-eyed and naive traingoers who had thought their 10 second journey on the Warp train would end at that. Now, it was a sick and depraved crime scene, organs still beating and moving wrapped around lumps of flesh who had long since lost their minds to the infinite time. He thought making them into these terrible things would make them easier to deal with- but he couldn’t have been more wrong. Within the week they had changed the Love Townspeople, he had learned a new level of annoyance he had never felt, both with Elena and the former passengers, as well as being covered in more stains on his coat than he could count. Yep, the life of a Reverberation Ensemble member wasn’t an easy one by any means.
“Elena. Do you think we’ve done enough time already?” He turned to her at the other of the car, trying to take the veins out of some Townsperson.
“Hm? Nah, Argalia said we’d have to stay after sending at least two Invitations for a bit.” She yanked the flesh quickly, netting her her reward for a drink. “Didn’t you hear him?”
“I don’t listen to a majority of the things he says. Zoning out is easier than listening to him for real.”
“You say that even knowing how he’d treat you if he heard you?” Jae-heon had been about to respond- when the pause in the conversation allowed for a pathetic voice to make itself known. Feeling something at his feet, he listened as it whimpered to try and begin its words.
“D… D-Daaaa..d..?”
Frantically, he spun around at the Love Townsperson that was wrapping a small pointed appendage around his ankle. It started to mumble the word again- only to be met with a swift spin and stomp from his other heel, caving in its skull and pushing it away. It wasn’t dead, as these amalgamations couldn’t die- but the impact caused it to cry out in pain and wail uncontrollably. Crying like a child, for comfort and reassurance it hadn’t done wrong, as they all did. Yet… even with the regression of these creatures formerly known as people, there was some sincerity to its voice, which terrified him. It saw him as a parent, someone to look to for love and affection. They had never called him that before.
The realization filled him with rage and despair.
Approaching the crying mass, he looked down at it for a moment. Wet from tears and blood, it whimpered and almost tried to move away from him. It had no idea what it had done to draw his ire, but he didn’t have sympathy for something like that. Just a hastily sewn together mound, only made this way because he didn’t want to deal with the actual people on the train. It had nothing to do with their mission. Incoherent sniveling flesh could only respond one way to being kicked- to try and learn from the punishment.
Stomping on it again and again until his breathing slowed, he ground his heel into it before realizing Elena was probably staring at him from behind.
“Uh… You alright there, man?” It was less a sincere question and more a half-joking one.
“Shut the fuck up.” He spat back at her, speed walking to the next car over to try and escape the pathetic sobbing of the Love Townsperson. The lumps of flesh that had once been the other people on the train watched him, some trying to catch his attention with noise, but most staying quiet to avoid his wrath.
Going through the train’s doors to the next car, he slumped in a bloody seat. Of course this godforsaken mission had to get worse. First, having to deal with annoying people begging and crying for him to give them salvation and change them- irritating at best, but when they all had begun to view Elena and him as parents, he felt something in his heart stir in the worst way. Of course this just had to be how it ended. Catharsis from mangling the first-class passengers was all well and good, but it didn’t erase how hollow he felt after sending them off to die in the Library, then having to return to the town undisguised. The second worst part began there- the townspeople sobbing and crying to Elena about where the doctor had gone. They’d proved it from his voice, but by then, he was at his limit.
He sat there, in the pit of despair and frustration thinking the same hateful thoughts over and over about the first-class passengers, how he should’ve done worse- until the doors behind him slid open and there Elena was, hands in her pockets, her bag discarded. “Good idea, Jae-heon.” She began speaking, walking over to his seat. “Taking nice break from them?” She smiled at him in the most knowing yet non-malicious way. Kicking aside luggage from the cleared car’s isle, she stopped right about where he was sitting.
“So, your kid up and leave you or something? Go off to some Nest job before you could say goodbye? I thought you more mature than someone to freak out over that. Clearly it bothered you.” Elena half-chuckled, looking at the floor as she sat on the other side of the aisle from Jae-heon.
“He died, Elena.” His tone ellicited a ‘tsk’ from her.
“People die all the time in the City. Your point?”
“Can you have some goddamned tact for once in your life? Jesus Christ, Elena! It… he…!” Jae-heon gestured wildly with his hands, then immediately brought them to grasp his face, sighing heavily. “I didn’t have a chance to say goodbye. I got no time to mourn. All that was left of him was mangled flesh. I didn’t have the money to bury him, but… At some point I thought I wouldn’t have to.” His voice grew pained as he spoke, then went quiet. When he didn’t speak again for a moment, Elena tried to put the pieces together.
“Is that when you got your little… hobby?” She tilted her head questioningly.
“I had finally perfected the way to see him again, if even only for a moment… But then someone we both know all too well went on a rampage and stole it all away. I hadn’t done anything wrong. I had just wanted to be happy.” His hands moved from his face to his lap, balling into fists as he spoke.
“This City doesn’t allow us to indulge in our pleasures, whether it be of life or gluttony… Just how it is.” She closed her eyes and leaned back in the seat, kicking her feet up. “As for that someone… The Black Silence, no?” Her hatred for him hadn’t particularly been long-lived, as it was less a rage at how she was struck down and more a rage at the fact she’d been considered so unsightly to begin with. Taboo was stupid- she was just trying to live too. If Nest-dwellers could indulge in fine food and drink, and enjoy life to the fullest, why couldn’t she? Because her tastes were different than everyone else? Idiotic, really.
Jae-heon kicked at the seat in front of him upon hearing her speak his name. That bastard had taken everything that had given him a reason to live from him, only out of wayward wrath and misguided hatred. He hadn’t had anything to do with the Distortion, so why should he have had to pay for the sins of another? Sure, the City had never been fair to anyone- but was it a sin to hope for happiness? To believe that he could’ve had his own family in his own way… it was a foolish hope.
“Forget it.” He sighed, getting up from his seat. She wouldn’t understand his problem, not without twisting it to her own vision instead of trying to sympathize directly. Those bonds didn’t mean anything to her, who had probably lived longer than all of the current Ensemble’s ages combined and multiplied. She’d lost that long ago. Shoving his hands in his pockets, he started in the direction of the first class car.
“Hey.” Elena spoke from her relaxed pose in the seat. “I hope you find a spare passenger to make a puppet outta, yeah?” It was a weak way of saying that she hoped he’d find something to help him deal with it all. Somewhat appreciated, in a weird way. “If you can find more than one, save one for me. I’m gettin’ real thirsty over here.” …And then she’d go in ruin it, in typical Elena fashion. He only nodded in response. He’d left a couple passengers untouched for this purpose, anyhow.
The Puppeteer was a strange man with many odd hobbies and feelings, at least to Elena. She could only wonder why Argalia had sent them both. Yet, there was a strange dynamic she could not deny.