OsakanOne
Retired Member
I've rambled with the worst of them
Fell in love with a harlequin
Saw the darkest hearts of men
And I saw myself staring back again
And I saw myself staring back again
The Divine Comedy - Bartholomew
Keib couldn't stop staring on the thing on his desk. Even though he'd spaced what he'd removed just three days ago, something from his past had coalesced upon his desk, and he couldn't ignore it. It kept on bleeding atop the emitters for the holographic screen and it wouldn't stop grinning. "Just leverage, right?" It taunted as it thrashed on his desk - pulsating and oozing like a chewed up dog-toy. "I had a life ahead of me to live. All you and your men got were a medal, a pat on the back and congratulations from the High Priestess herself, for destroying enemies of the Matriarchy!" It was cackling on the last words and it descended into horrible laughter at Keib's psychosis.
"I didn't make the call." Keib replied to the thing on his desk, finger pointing at it. It wasn't his call, and he would've been executed for insubordination if he'd gone against it. "I didn't kill your mother. And I killed the man who killed you and your mother." It was his way of atonement at first.
"You facilitated it, and you helped to plan it you tactical genius you." It retorted, pointing a mangled finger at him. "You had the power to stop it and you just let it happen. You were 'just following orders', you were just doing what you were meant to do from the beginning." It let out a sickening, gurgling chuckle. "Why run from it? Maybe you should've died there on the spot with your honour intact rather than feigning it for the past twenty five years!"
He'd changed his face, changed his name, burnt his records and took so many drugs - and yet he could never be rid of it. The brain was a resilient thing indeed.
Suddenly a knock on the door could be heard. Two thuds, attempting to get Keib's attention. Breaking the silence and pulling him back from wherever he was.
It all melted away from his desk when someone let themselves into his office. The colours dulled and the lights stopped shimmering from a dreamlike trance and the world regrounded itself in this horrible reality that he had to live with. "Come in." He croaked, pleased that the derranged fetus had gone.
The doors slid to the side. Behind them was a chest, then Mars bent down to come through the doors, which frame was just too small for her. She slowly walked in towards Keib's desk, saluting the man. "Sir!" She greeted him, keeping it official for now. "I heard that Four is in medical and that you cared for her. What happened?" Straight to the point, as usual.
He poured himself a cup of water and motioned for her to sit down. He then poured another cup of water for the towering Fyuunen - in a larger glass of course. His expression was dour.
Mars slowly lowered herself on the chair in front of Keib. It could take her weight, but she was still looking rather silly, like an adult on children's chair. She did not let that phase her though, as she looked at Keib. Her face was quite serious and Keib surely knew, that Mars learned to care for the white helashio by now. Worry was written all over her face.
Keib was wondering how to say it - there was simply no way to make the bad news go down well and he didn't want to delude himself. "Four Six had a miscarriage."
Mars blinked. Then she blinked for seconds time. Her hands laying on the chairs armrests, taking a firm grip on them. Then she squeezed, obviously distressed with what she just heard. Her muscles strained as she unconsciously crushed the rests with her fingers, showing once again what power she possessed and how dangerous it could get on her bad side.
She then blinked again, her eyes looking down as if she just noticed what she did to the poor chair. "I apologise," she said and let got, showing the rests, being crushed. "I-I... miscarriage?" She still could not believe.
He leaned in, and put his hands down on the desk. He'd forgotten to take the gloves off and the blood had dried on them, rusted and gleaming crimson - for . "Three evenings ago she walked into my office." He clapped his hands together. "Now, I gather that you and her went to the armoury - you saw the scar on her belly, correct? Bullet hole, puncturing uterus, destroying one of her ovaries, and an unborn child." He pointed to the relevant area on Bastion. He had the bullet preserved in the med lab.
Mars leant forward, putting her hands on his table. Her blue eyes looked right into his own slate coloured eyes. She took a deep breath and then asked. "Do you know who did it to her?" Her voice was cold, almost freezing.
He only had a name and a single lead - they weren't even verified or conclusive. "LSDF Ar'esr, Captain Her'vak Hunter New Tur'Lista. That was the one digital fingerprint that stood out, and its the only other person I know monstrous enough to do something like this."
Mars replied him with a nod. "Good," she said. "I will contact my aunt, she will tell me how important that guy is and how missed he would be." She said, clearly showing Keib what she planned to do. Punish the evil.
If only it were that simple - the kid was in a high place and surrounded by like-minded people - his mother was on a high ranking council seat to boot. Nepotism, lies, slander and 'good service' to the Matriarchy would make this person difficult to unseat and harder still to kill. What Keib did not know was that Mars did not plan to unseat that person, but rather shoot them in the head.
"Did you get to talk with Four yet?" Mars then asked, moving on from plotting an assassination. "When I was in medical, she was always asleep and Mer'lon would not let me see her. Or tell me what was with her, that was why I came here."
"The first thing I did for her when I made the discovery was knock her out. I didn't want her to feel a thing." He stated. "And then-" He held up his hands - still gloved and rusted over with old blood. "I had to do it myself. There was no time to waste, and no assistant." He contemplated his hands, almost putting his face into them.
Mars nodded, then she gently reached forward, grabbing his hands and sliding the bloody gloves off. Mars could not imagine how gruesome it was for Keib, what he was coming through. She did knew he did not deserve it, and everything reminding him off it needed to go. Gloves were first thing. She did not even threw them in the bin here, but put her in her pocket. She will dispose of them later, somewhere where Keib could not find them.
"When was the last time you had a shower or good sleep Keib?" She then asked, finally letting the formality go. They knew each other for years and there was no one else around right now. Not even Greg.
He still smelt of the blood from days past and days even further in the past that he'd rather have forgotten. His hair was a mess, and black bags were beneath his slate grey eyes. They'd cultivated this sort of madness for the use of productivity in mental tasks - of course, it backfires spectacularly when you have some things you'd rather not remember. "Uh... sixty? Seventy hours?"
"I'd call it seventy two," a low rumbling tickled along the back of Keib's neck. The sound was coming from between his temples. A familiar voice but not one he could place immediately. Whatever 'it' was, 'it' was in the room with him. But where?
Mars gave him a warm smile. "Well you should get one right now," The tall fyunnen, held his hands a little longer, keeping his attention on her. "Come on, I'll wash your hair." Sometimes, the rank did not matter.
"Condescending bitch" the rumble sounded again. Keib could feel his lips trying to mouth the words invoulintarily. The sound echoed, like wind, an icy blanket that wouldn't go away - growing pricklier as Bastion grew closer.
"I...I can do it myself." He mumbled, trying to take his hands away from Bastion's grip and standing up. They were friends, but some things just had to be done on one's own. "Really, I..."
Mars did not let go right away. "It really shook you up," Mars simply replied, watching Keib. "But don't worry I am here."
The noise in his ear hissed - the noise almost deafening. It left the walls vibrating, blurring as the room's very edges began to round like some twisted fish-eye - enlarging Mars' features, emphasizing parts of her that would only be seen under a microscope - every disgusting pore, scratch, scar, making her eyes look beady and her features sinister.
It was almost like jealousy - marred and dirty. He felt dirty. Unclean. Wrong. And then it snapped back, like an elastic band - as if it were some show of force. Keib thought for a moment. Was it a warning?
"No, please, I insist." He stated as he tried to offer more resistance, trying to wrest his hands away from the Fyuunen and moving himself towards the shower. "I'm a grown man, damn it." He mumbled more as he took off his coat and discarded it, falling with a jangle.
He could hear it smiling down his neck.
Mars let go as he started really resist. There was not reason to force anything. "I'll wait here." She said simply and let him leave. Her eyes then went to look over things on his table.
He almost stumbled over himself as the Fyuunen let go, and looked behind himself as he moved into the ensuite bathroom. He closed the door behind him and gave it a click. Not for privacy's sake, but for the sake of being alone. With the thing that would not leave. He pulled the door open and turned the shower on. As he waited for it to warm up and as he was getting undressed, he turned around and saw the mirror.
His reflection wasn't quite his. Something seemed off, luring him closer. Eyebrow raised, he let the shower run and turned around in full, peeling his shirt off. He could see a black-eye on one side, as if he'd been through a bar-fight - a cut along the same cheek. Keib could feel a hand raising to check to see if it was really there. It wasn't. Steam lapped at his ankles like a clammy breeze on a summer's day. He checked his hand for any sign of blood. Nothing. He removed his pants and underwear before he looked back up at the mirror.
It was brief. A flash: The thing that stared back wasn't him. Or rather, wasn't quite him. Its eyes were deep black pits - a smile stretched beyond what cheeks were capable of - row upon row of teeth as the thing grew closer, filling Keib's vision in a sharp motion - a scream of white-noise deafening him that sent his shoulder-blades against the tiles and under the water with a sharp jolt as if he'd been electrocuted.
And yet it was gone as quickly as it had appeared, making him question what had happened. But some gut feeling, something inside insisted he couldn't look back at the mirror: It would happen again - whether it really would or not.
The glass in the shower door fogged up and obscured the mirror, his breathing was still feverish, but he was under the water - he didn't care that it was a touch too hot, making his skin go red against the heat.
Mars meanwhile sat in the chair, waiting for Keib to get back. She saw what was on his table and placed it into her memory as something to find out more about later. Or maybe never. Keib would be furious if he thought she was spying on him. Friends do not spy on each other. Maybe she could just ask? But bringing up past right now would be bad idea.
Mars sighed, she was quite puzzled, not sure what to do. Keib was not just someone who she could hug and scare the bad spirits away. With Keib the troubles were much bigger. And that was sad, because he was good man. One of the best there were.
"Get up" the haze between Keib's ears said.
The man peeled himself off the tiles, he could feel something holding him back subconsciously, like hooks restraining him. As each one broke skin he could feel a shiver run up his spine - even against the water. Pop. Pop.
Keib half expected to hear some sort of affirmation, for doing as he was told - like a child or trained animal. Nothing came. Silence. Maybe silence was the reward. He blinked, grabbed a bar of soap with one hand, and wiped a layer of condensation from the glass that separated him from the mirror with the other - looking for another signal. He could see another face, one behind him - pale, mellow, calm - almost dead - its eyes blank like a doll. A marionette. He blinked into the mirror and turned his neck around slowly to identify the face.
Once again, nobody was there. But then, a definite hand on his shoulder, from the side he was turned away from. It was impossible to ignore. It stood in his reflection, as if stood infront of him. Shorter. Familiar. Its features were a strange blend of people he knew, the mixture constantly changing and roiling like a fractal. The dice finally rolled to a stop. Snake-eyes.
It was Aiesu. Smiling. Very calmly. As if everything was fine. He could almost feel the back of her body against his front. Warm. Soft. Pliant. Nude. He could even smell her hair. But it felt wrong. Those small arms slowly reached up - admiration in those cerise eyes as her hands -- in the reflection alone -- wrapped about his neck, fingertips intertwining behind as the small and malnourished figure lifted up onto the tips of its toes. He could make out the gaps between its ribs, where the skin sank, biting between them. There was nothing but love in those eyes - a kind you only find in animals and small children - or the lobotomized - as if he could do no wrong.
Yet she looked battered. Left for dead. With the water matting her hair back, he could see the scarring where her ears should have been - a tall thin slit either side with stapled metal - more metal beneath, as if it were a rushed job, leaving thick scar tissue either side and a faint protusion. At some point, the doll had been broken and put back together by someone who really didn't care. Over it, the figure had worn a head-band, the plastic slipping beneath the skin in a sickly way - tall thin rabbit-ears extending up against his chin that were fluffy, like clouds.
He could feel her skin. It wasn't sexual. Rather, he felt ... Protective. As if whoever this was, he had to protect them. Looking back into her eyes in the reflection, they weren't Aiesu's - but someone Keib thought he'd almost forgotten.
"Help me? Please?" The voice wasn't Aiesu's and neither were its eyes.
"... ..." He was stammering as recollection was whirlpooling in his head. More of her features began to change - a weird merger of the two. "... Mel'an, why?"
Cracks formed along Mel'an's porcelain cheek, where tears should have been. Every time he tried to remember, it got worse. As the water tickled off its face like tiny fists of water, features grew muddier, slowly blurring as her texture was stripped away like cheap paint. What wasn't by Keib's feet slipped into the trenches of the cracks, darkening them.
"Why aren't you helping me? Why aren't you helping me?"
Whatever it was, it was on the brink of tears. It sent a sharpness through Keib's throat. Mars would almost swear she could hear sobbing beneath the sounds of the running water.
"Was it something I did?" its voice sounded desperately - cracks forming across its belly as it distended and burst like a zit. Keib could feel the hot rush, like rotting fish as thick syrupy fluid sat between his toes.
"What did I do wrong?"
The thing leant back, the softness of her backside rolling against his hips now - sending a thrilling cocktail that panged of disgust and excitement through his belly and lower as his blood moved elsewhere. He croaked as he could feel the fluid on the floor tickling him.
"Stop it." the figure repeated in a delicate whisper, as if being tormented. Over and over again, growing louder as its features contorted in agony. Keib mouthed these words.
Mars could hear something. A distant sound, muffled by the running watter. But she had good hearing. What was it? Was Keib crying. Mars slowly stood up and walked to the doors. The red-light indicated they are closed. She tapped on it once. "Keib?" She said loudly to be heard. "Are you okay?"
He didn't hear it over the sound of its voice.
"Stop it, you're hurting me..."
Keib could see the beginnings of rust - pale perfect flesh corrupted into a dark flakey red - like the blood dried on his gloves - creeping deeper away from the hollow of her belly like a lobotomized egg. Slowly, it fell away like rotten meat in thick meaty slops against his feet - piling up as her insides and even her skin began falling away.
It started to cry.
"Please stop?"
Bastion could not hear any response. That was strange. She bashed at the doors a bit louder and almost shouted. "Keib!" She was a bit worried, there was no reason for him to not answer.
In his reflection now, Keib could see his own arms strangling the figure, her small feet not even meeting the floor now as they began dissolving like cheap sandstone - soon leaving stumps well past her knees. It hissed for air, muscles of its child-throat crushed my thick adult fingers intent on killing it.
But. Something was inconsistent. Slowly, Keib's attention fell from the mirror, staring along his hip at his gloved hand. It hung limply at his side, not around its throat. Slowly, he felt it ball into a fist - the rubber squeeking as it squeazed the water away - knuckles white beneath it. He could hear it choking.
And then it hit him: It wasn't real. None of this was. He didn't want to see these sights any more. He never wanted the reminders. Betwen Aiesu and Four Six, old wounds had opened. He was leaking, out into the world.
He heard it before it had happened - his arm outstretched - a spiderweb of fractures dividing his reflection into tiny forms that stared back - compound eyes, insect-like. The image was gone.
She heard it. The bang. No response, just a crack of something. Mars was puzzled, should she break in? What if something happened to him? Did he try to kill himself? With glass? No, he could not get so far. But still, she did not like it. Taking a deep breath, she pulled her hand back, clenching her fingers into a fist. As she breathed out she punched forward, hitting the lock on the doors and breaking it into the pieces. She then took the doors and slid them to the side by force.
"Keib!" She shouted, rushing in to see what was going on.
What she saw was a sheared sheep of a New Tur'lista - all the pomp and circumstance stripped away to reveal a meagre framework that was not made to handle these stresses. Drips of red leapt before settling on the floor, dripping from a broken fist and pooling around it. He looked as though he was unable to support his own weight for much longer with one arm supporting him against the puddle. His eyes were fluttering, a dim moan creeping from his throat to underscore it.
Outside, a figure had heard the shouting - or what sounded like shouting, peeking through a crack in the door. Cerise eyes had been watching silently as events unfolded before them - listening intently.
Mars gasped for air, seeing Keib on the tiles, marking the shower's floor. She noticed the broken mirror, and blood. Not waiting a single more second, she knelt down to him, not caring one bit for the cloying, bloody water that marred and rusted the porcelain. Mars reached and grabbed Keib's shoulders pulling him to herself into embrace. "It is okay Keib, I am here." She said softly, hugging him and trying to calm him down as the water poured on them both from the showerhead.
He groaned as he was squeezed by the Fyuunen. In the back of his mind, he did hope that she knew her own strength. He wasn't focused, he saw Bastion's blue eyes for a moment, but found a different shade further away. Cerise. And then they met his. And with that, they were gone, a flicker of white hair behind them as the door slid closed with an audiable click, seconds before the announcement came as if they had some special knowledge of the future. Not that they did but the timing was unsettling.
"Attention, crew of the Akahar - We will be approaching Tange in thirty minutes." One of the bridge crew announced over the ship-wide intercom. "Please man battle stations, and make necessary preparations once we fall out of hyperspace. We hope any preparations made prior have ensured your future success." The intercom crackled out, with its message made.
Mars kept hugging him. For someone her size and strength she was strangely soft and held him carefully, not hurting him at all. "I am here," she repeated, ignoring the announcement. Keib needed to calm down first. "I am here." Mars was worried about him, she will have to talk with Greg, to never leave Keib's side for long.
Where was Greg anyway? Well. Ever since the operation, it'd found more comfort in tagging along with Aiesu than with Keib - bloodied hands and all. On a subconscious level, the smell of its own kind's blood intersped with hormones only it could interpret made it avoid its master like a plague. Quiet and perenially mumbly, its ears flattened against its skull when he looked up at those cerise eyes, clearly worried for his teacher even though this woman wasn't far behind either.
Mars's hand landed on Keib's hair, softly stroking it as she was calming him down. "Everything will be fine. Everything will be fine." She said as some kind of mantra, trying to get something good into man's mind and chase the bad thoughts away. All he could really do was offer a squeeze to the Fyuunen in return. It was as simple a message as he could provide.
Moving through the corridor as the announcement sounded, Aiesu paused to note Greg, stopping in her tracks. She watched from afar before continuing as normal to the med-bay - overtaking him as she walked. A few minutes later, she paused, looking back over her shoulder to see Greg following her like a lost puppy. She clicked her tongue in distaste.
Fell in love with a harlequin
Saw the darkest hearts of men
And I saw myself staring back again
And I saw myself staring back again
The Divine Comedy - Bartholomew
Keib couldn't stop staring on the thing on his desk. Even though he'd spaced what he'd removed just three days ago, something from his past had coalesced upon his desk, and he couldn't ignore it. It kept on bleeding atop the emitters for the holographic screen and it wouldn't stop grinning. "Just leverage, right?" It taunted as it thrashed on his desk - pulsating and oozing like a chewed up dog-toy. "I had a life ahead of me to live. All you and your men got were a medal, a pat on the back and congratulations from the High Priestess herself, for destroying enemies of the Matriarchy!" It was cackling on the last words and it descended into horrible laughter at Keib's psychosis.
"I didn't make the call." Keib replied to the thing on his desk, finger pointing at it. It wasn't his call, and he would've been executed for insubordination if he'd gone against it. "I didn't kill your mother. And I killed the man who killed you and your mother." It was his way of atonement at first.
"You facilitated it, and you helped to plan it you tactical genius you." It retorted, pointing a mangled finger at him. "You had the power to stop it and you just let it happen. You were 'just following orders', you were just doing what you were meant to do from the beginning." It let out a sickening, gurgling chuckle. "Why run from it? Maybe you should've died there on the spot with your honour intact rather than feigning it for the past twenty five years!"
He'd changed his face, changed his name, burnt his records and took so many drugs - and yet he could never be rid of it. The brain was a resilient thing indeed.
Suddenly a knock on the door could be heard. Two thuds, attempting to get Keib's attention. Breaking the silence and pulling him back from wherever he was.
It all melted away from his desk when someone let themselves into his office. The colours dulled and the lights stopped shimmering from a dreamlike trance and the world regrounded itself in this horrible reality that he had to live with. "Come in." He croaked, pleased that the derranged fetus had gone.
The doors slid to the side. Behind them was a chest, then Mars bent down to come through the doors, which frame was just too small for her. She slowly walked in towards Keib's desk, saluting the man. "Sir!" She greeted him, keeping it official for now. "I heard that Four is in medical and that you cared for her. What happened?" Straight to the point, as usual.
He poured himself a cup of water and motioned for her to sit down. He then poured another cup of water for the towering Fyuunen - in a larger glass of course. His expression was dour.
Mars slowly lowered herself on the chair in front of Keib. It could take her weight, but she was still looking rather silly, like an adult on children's chair. She did not let that phase her though, as she looked at Keib. Her face was quite serious and Keib surely knew, that Mars learned to care for the white helashio by now. Worry was written all over her face.
Keib was wondering how to say it - there was simply no way to make the bad news go down well and he didn't want to delude himself. "Four Six had a miscarriage."
Mars blinked. Then she blinked for seconds time. Her hands laying on the chairs armrests, taking a firm grip on them. Then she squeezed, obviously distressed with what she just heard. Her muscles strained as she unconsciously crushed the rests with her fingers, showing once again what power she possessed and how dangerous it could get on her bad side.
She then blinked again, her eyes looking down as if she just noticed what she did to the poor chair. "I apologise," she said and let got, showing the rests, being crushed. "I-I... miscarriage?" She still could not believe.
He leaned in, and put his hands down on the desk. He'd forgotten to take the gloves off and the blood had dried on them, rusted and gleaming crimson - for . "Three evenings ago she walked into my office." He clapped his hands together. "Now, I gather that you and her went to the armoury - you saw the scar on her belly, correct? Bullet hole, puncturing uterus, destroying one of her ovaries, and an unborn child." He pointed to the relevant area on Bastion. He had the bullet preserved in the med lab.
Mars leant forward, putting her hands on his table. Her blue eyes looked right into his own slate coloured eyes. She took a deep breath and then asked. "Do you know who did it to her?" Her voice was cold, almost freezing.
He only had a name and a single lead - they weren't even verified or conclusive. "LSDF Ar'esr, Captain Her'vak Hunter New Tur'Lista. That was the one digital fingerprint that stood out, and its the only other person I know monstrous enough to do something like this."
Mars replied him with a nod. "Good," she said. "I will contact my aunt, she will tell me how important that guy is and how missed he would be." She said, clearly showing Keib what she planned to do. Punish the evil.
If only it were that simple - the kid was in a high place and surrounded by like-minded people - his mother was on a high ranking council seat to boot. Nepotism, lies, slander and 'good service' to the Matriarchy would make this person difficult to unseat and harder still to kill. What Keib did not know was that Mars did not plan to unseat that person, but rather shoot them in the head.
"Did you get to talk with Four yet?" Mars then asked, moving on from plotting an assassination. "When I was in medical, she was always asleep and Mer'lon would not let me see her. Or tell me what was with her, that was why I came here."
"The first thing I did for her when I made the discovery was knock her out. I didn't want her to feel a thing." He stated. "And then-" He held up his hands - still gloved and rusted over with old blood. "I had to do it myself. There was no time to waste, and no assistant." He contemplated his hands, almost putting his face into them.
Mars nodded, then she gently reached forward, grabbing his hands and sliding the bloody gloves off. Mars could not imagine how gruesome it was for Keib, what he was coming through. She did knew he did not deserve it, and everything reminding him off it needed to go. Gloves were first thing. She did not even threw them in the bin here, but put her in her pocket. She will dispose of them later, somewhere where Keib could not find them.
"When was the last time you had a shower or good sleep Keib?" She then asked, finally letting the formality go. They knew each other for years and there was no one else around right now. Not even Greg.
He still smelt of the blood from days past and days even further in the past that he'd rather have forgotten. His hair was a mess, and black bags were beneath his slate grey eyes. They'd cultivated this sort of madness for the use of productivity in mental tasks - of course, it backfires spectacularly when you have some things you'd rather not remember. "Uh... sixty? Seventy hours?"
"I'd call it seventy two," a low rumbling tickled along the back of Keib's neck. The sound was coming from between his temples. A familiar voice but not one he could place immediately. Whatever 'it' was, 'it' was in the room with him. But where?
Mars gave him a warm smile. "Well you should get one right now," The tall fyunnen, held his hands a little longer, keeping his attention on her. "Come on, I'll wash your hair." Sometimes, the rank did not matter.
"Condescending bitch" the rumble sounded again. Keib could feel his lips trying to mouth the words invoulintarily. The sound echoed, like wind, an icy blanket that wouldn't go away - growing pricklier as Bastion grew closer.
"I...I can do it myself." He mumbled, trying to take his hands away from Bastion's grip and standing up. They were friends, but some things just had to be done on one's own. "Really, I..."
Mars did not let go right away. "It really shook you up," Mars simply replied, watching Keib. "But don't worry I am here."
The noise in his ear hissed - the noise almost deafening. It left the walls vibrating, blurring as the room's very edges began to round like some twisted fish-eye - enlarging Mars' features, emphasizing parts of her that would only be seen under a microscope - every disgusting pore, scratch, scar, making her eyes look beady and her features sinister.
It was almost like jealousy - marred and dirty. He felt dirty. Unclean. Wrong. And then it snapped back, like an elastic band - as if it were some show of force. Keib thought for a moment. Was it a warning?
"No, please, I insist." He stated as he tried to offer more resistance, trying to wrest his hands away from the Fyuunen and moving himself towards the shower. "I'm a grown man, damn it." He mumbled more as he took off his coat and discarded it, falling with a jangle.
He could hear it smiling down his neck.
Mars let go as he started really resist. There was not reason to force anything. "I'll wait here." She said simply and let him leave. Her eyes then went to look over things on his table.
He almost stumbled over himself as the Fyuunen let go, and looked behind himself as he moved into the ensuite bathroom. He closed the door behind him and gave it a click. Not for privacy's sake, but for the sake of being alone. With the thing that would not leave. He pulled the door open and turned the shower on. As he waited for it to warm up and as he was getting undressed, he turned around and saw the mirror.
His reflection wasn't quite his. Something seemed off, luring him closer. Eyebrow raised, he let the shower run and turned around in full, peeling his shirt off. He could see a black-eye on one side, as if he'd been through a bar-fight - a cut along the same cheek. Keib could feel a hand raising to check to see if it was really there. It wasn't. Steam lapped at his ankles like a clammy breeze on a summer's day. He checked his hand for any sign of blood. Nothing. He removed his pants and underwear before he looked back up at the mirror.
It was brief. A flash: The thing that stared back wasn't him. Or rather, wasn't quite him. Its eyes were deep black pits - a smile stretched beyond what cheeks were capable of - row upon row of teeth as the thing grew closer, filling Keib's vision in a sharp motion - a scream of white-noise deafening him that sent his shoulder-blades against the tiles and under the water with a sharp jolt as if he'd been electrocuted.
And yet it was gone as quickly as it had appeared, making him question what had happened. But some gut feeling, something inside insisted he couldn't look back at the mirror: It would happen again - whether it really would or not.
The glass in the shower door fogged up and obscured the mirror, his breathing was still feverish, but he was under the water - he didn't care that it was a touch too hot, making his skin go red against the heat.
Mars meanwhile sat in the chair, waiting for Keib to get back. She saw what was on his table and placed it into her memory as something to find out more about later. Or maybe never. Keib would be furious if he thought she was spying on him. Friends do not spy on each other. Maybe she could just ask? But bringing up past right now would be bad idea.
Mars sighed, she was quite puzzled, not sure what to do. Keib was not just someone who she could hug and scare the bad spirits away. With Keib the troubles were much bigger. And that was sad, because he was good man. One of the best there were.
"Get up" the haze between Keib's ears said.
The man peeled himself off the tiles, he could feel something holding him back subconsciously, like hooks restraining him. As each one broke skin he could feel a shiver run up his spine - even against the water. Pop. Pop.
Keib half expected to hear some sort of affirmation, for doing as he was told - like a child or trained animal. Nothing came. Silence. Maybe silence was the reward. He blinked, grabbed a bar of soap with one hand, and wiped a layer of condensation from the glass that separated him from the mirror with the other - looking for another signal. He could see another face, one behind him - pale, mellow, calm - almost dead - its eyes blank like a doll. A marionette. He blinked into the mirror and turned his neck around slowly to identify the face.
Once again, nobody was there. But then, a definite hand on his shoulder, from the side he was turned away from. It was impossible to ignore. It stood in his reflection, as if stood infront of him. Shorter. Familiar. Its features were a strange blend of people he knew, the mixture constantly changing and roiling like a fractal. The dice finally rolled to a stop. Snake-eyes.
It was Aiesu. Smiling. Very calmly. As if everything was fine. He could almost feel the back of her body against his front. Warm. Soft. Pliant. Nude. He could even smell her hair. But it felt wrong. Those small arms slowly reached up - admiration in those cerise eyes as her hands -- in the reflection alone -- wrapped about his neck, fingertips intertwining behind as the small and malnourished figure lifted up onto the tips of its toes. He could make out the gaps between its ribs, where the skin sank, biting between them. There was nothing but love in those eyes - a kind you only find in animals and small children - or the lobotomized - as if he could do no wrong.
Yet she looked battered. Left for dead. With the water matting her hair back, he could see the scarring where her ears should have been - a tall thin slit either side with stapled metal - more metal beneath, as if it were a rushed job, leaving thick scar tissue either side and a faint protusion. At some point, the doll had been broken and put back together by someone who really didn't care. Over it, the figure had worn a head-band, the plastic slipping beneath the skin in a sickly way - tall thin rabbit-ears extending up against his chin that were fluffy, like clouds.
He could feel her skin. It wasn't sexual. Rather, he felt ... Protective. As if whoever this was, he had to protect them. Looking back into her eyes in the reflection, they weren't Aiesu's - but someone Keib thought he'd almost forgotten.
"Help me? Please?" The voice wasn't Aiesu's and neither were its eyes.
"... ..." He was stammering as recollection was whirlpooling in his head. More of her features began to change - a weird merger of the two. "... Mel'an, why?"
Cracks formed along Mel'an's porcelain cheek, where tears should have been. Every time he tried to remember, it got worse. As the water tickled off its face like tiny fists of water, features grew muddier, slowly blurring as her texture was stripped away like cheap paint. What wasn't by Keib's feet slipped into the trenches of the cracks, darkening them.
"Why aren't you helping me? Why aren't you helping me?"
Whatever it was, it was on the brink of tears. It sent a sharpness through Keib's throat. Mars would almost swear she could hear sobbing beneath the sounds of the running water.
"Was it something I did?" its voice sounded desperately - cracks forming across its belly as it distended and burst like a zit. Keib could feel the hot rush, like rotting fish as thick syrupy fluid sat between his toes.
"What did I do wrong?"
The thing leant back, the softness of her backside rolling against his hips now - sending a thrilling cocktail that panged of disgust and excitement through his belly and lower as his blood moved elsewhere. He croaked as he could feel the fluid on the floor tickling him.
"Stop it." the figure repeated in a delicate whisper, as if being tormented. Over and over again, growing louder as its features contorted in agony. Keib mouthed these words.
Mars could hear something. A distant sound, muffled by the running watter. But she had good hearing. What was it? Was Keib crying. Mars slowly stood up and walked to the doors. The red-light indicated they are closed. She tapped on it once. "Keib?" She said loudly to be heard. "Are you okay?"
He didn't hear it over the sound of its voice.
"Stop it, you're hurting me..."
Keib could see the beginnings of rust - pale perfect flesh corrupted into a dark flakey red - like the blood dried on his gloves - creeping deeper away from the hollow of her belly like a lobotomized egg. Slowly, it fell away like rotten meat in thick meaty slops against his feet - piling up as her insides and even her skin began falling away.
It started to cry.
"Please stop?"
Bastion could not hear any response. That was strange. She bashed at the doors a bit louder and almost shouted. "Keib!" She was a bit worried, there was no reason for him to not answer.
In his reflection now, Keib could see his own arms strangling the figure, her small feet not even meeting the floor now as they began dissolving like cheap sandstone - soon leaving stumps well past her knees. It hissed for air, muscles of its child-throat crushed my thick adult fingers intent on killing it.
But. Something was inconsistent. Slowly, Keib's attention fell from the mirror, staring along his hip at his gloved hand. It hung limply at his side, not around its throat. Slowly, he felt it ball into a fist - the rubber squeeking as it squeazed the water away - knuckles white beneath it. He could hear it choking.
And then it hit him: It wasn't real. None of this was. He didn't want to see these sights any more. He never wanted the reminders. Betwen Aiesu and Four Six, old wounds had opened. He was leaking, out into the world.
He heard it before it had happened - his arm outstretched - a spiderweb of fractures dividing his reflection into tiny forms that stared back - compound eyes, insect-like. The image was gone.
She heard it. The bang. No response, just a crack of something. Mars was puzzled, should she break in? What if something happened to him? Did he try to kill himself? With glass? No, he could not get so far. But still, she did not like it. Taking a deep breath, she pulled her hand back, clenching her fingers into a fist. As she breathed out she punched forward, hitting the lock on the doors and breaking it into the pieces. She then took the doors and slid them to the side by force.
"Keib!" She shouted, rushing in to see what was going on.
What she saw was a sheared sheep of a New Tur'lista - all the pomp and circumstance stripped away to reveal a meagre framework that was not made to handle these stresses. Drips of red leapt before settling on the floor, dripping from a broken fist and pooling around it. He looked as though he was unable to support his own weight for much longer with one arm supporting him against the puddle. His eyes were fluttering, a dim moan creeping from his throat to underscore it.
Outside, a figure had heard the shouting - or what sounded like shouting, peeking through a crack in the door. Cerise eyes had been watching silently as events unfolded before them - listening intently.
Mars gasped for air, seeing Keib on the tiles, marking the shower's floor. She noticed the broken mirror, and blood. Not waiting a single more second, she knelt down to him, not caring one bit for the cloying, bloody water that marred and rusted the porcelain. Mars reached and grabbed Keib's shoulders pulling him to herself into embrace. "It is okay Keib, I am here." She said softly, hugging him and trying to calm him down as the water poured on them both from the showerhead.
He groaned as he was squeezed by the Fyuunen. In the back of his mind, he did hope that she knew her own strength. He wasn't focused, he saw Bastion's blue eyes for a moment, but found a different shade further away. Cerise. And then they met his. And with that, they were gone, a flicker of white hair behind them as the door slid closed with an audiable click, seconds before the announcement came as if they had some special knowledge of the future. Not that they did but the timing was unsettling.
"Attention, crew of the Akahar - We will be approaching Tange in thirty minutes." One of the bridge crew announced over the ship-wide intercom. "Please man battle stations, and make necessary preparations once we fall out of hyperspace. We hope any preparations made prior have ensured your future success." The intercom crackled out, with its message made.
Mars kept hugging him. For someone her size and strength she was strangely soft and held him carefully, not hurting him at all. "I am here," she repeated, ignoring the announcement. Keib needed to calm down first. "I am here." Mars was worried about him, she will have to talk with Greg, to never leave Keib's side for long.
Where was Greg anyway? Well. Ever since the operation, it'd found more comfort in tagging along with Aiesu than with Keib - bloodied hands and all. On a subconscious level, the smell of its own kind's blood intersped with hormones only it could interpret made it avoid its master like a plague. Quiet and perenially mumbly, its ears flattened against its skull when he looked up at those cerise eyes, clearly worried for his teacher even though this woman wasn't far behind either.
Mars's hand landed on Keib's hair, softly stroking it as she was calming him down. "Everything will be fine. Everything will be fine." She said as some kind of mantra, trying to get something good into man's mind and chase the bad thoughts away. All he could really do was offer a squeeze to the Fyuunen in return. It was as simple a message as he could provide.
Moving through the corridor as the announcement sounded, Aiesu paused to note Greg, stopping in her tracks. She watched from afar before continuing as normal to the med-bay - overtaking him as she walked. A few minutes later, she paused, looking back over her shoulder to see Greg following her like a lost puppy. She clicked her tongue in distaste.
