Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

The first thing Niko is aware of is how chilly it is. It’s not actively cold to the point that they want to go running inside and curl up next to a fire, but the air nips uncomfortably at their cheeks and ears and fingers like a blunt-toothed living thing, and their throat feels just a little drier than normal.

Sensation slowly returns to their body. They’re... face-down on the floor. Niko gets their elbows under themself, lifts themself up a little, and see they’re lying on a soft, shaggy gray carpet, which sends sparks of panic through their body- the last thing they remember is being in the living room, but they’re pretty sure their house doesn’t have any carpets like this anywhere in it...

Then Niko finally processes the voice that hovers somewhere above them, low, a little hoarse, and speaking with an accent they can’t quite identify. Anticipation meshing with fear, they immediately push themself upright and see their friend’s face for the first time.

“-hey, seriously, are you okay? Shi- um, crap, come on, talk to me, kid...” The voice trails off as the speaker locks eyes with them. “...Niko?” they ask, slowly, disbelievingly.

Niko knows that voice. They remember, even if they never met face-to-face, the gentle, caring presence in their head providing instructions, advice, companionship... and, okay, a fair amount of shenanigans as well. And just like that, all the fear falls away in an instant.

“Asher!” they shout, launching themself at them and wrapping their arms around them, earning a startled oof immediately followed by nervous laughter as Asher hesitantly returns the hug. “I, uh... was a little unsure if you recognized me for a moment there, honestly?”

“I’d never forget you! I promised!” Niko insists, pulling back from the hug to look them in the face. Asher looks... strange is the first word to pop into Niko’s mind (but not in a bad way!), their eyes small and pale green behind rectangular glasses and their ears stubby and poking out of the sides of their head, almost hidden behind long black hair that flows over their shoulders and down their back. Their skin’s more familiar-looking, though, almost the exact same shade of brown as Niko’s. Despite being a couple feet taller than Niko, they look strangely small under the big bomber jacket they’re wearing, which appears to be one or two sizes too large for them.

“You did, didn’t you?” Asher laughs nervously. “I... look, not that I don’t appreciate you popping in to visit- because I do, I-I appreciate it a lot!- but how did you even get here- wait, no, scratch that, that’s not the important question,” they cut themself off. “Are you here voluntarily, Niko?”

Niko’s only about 75% sure they know what “voluntarily” means. “What?”

“Are you here because you want to be here, or did someone send you here against your will?” Asher simplifies.

“Oh!” Niko fidgets. “I’m... not really sure? I mean, I did want to see you again, I was even thinking about it when I...” They’re not sure how to describe what happened to them. “...fell... here? But... whatever it was that happened, it really scared me,” they admit, looking away, “and I definitely wasn’t expecting it.”

“Hm.” When Niko looks back at Asher, they look like they’re deep in contemplation. “If it’s... if it wouldn’t be too, uh, worrying for you to think about it again, could you tell me what happened, please?”

Niko nods. “I was walking out of the living room to go to bed.” They’re sure about that part. “Then it felt like the floor suddenly gave way under my feet, and everything...” They lean back and pull their arms away so they can gesture more freely. “It wasn’t black, it was more like... there wasn’t anything there for me to see?” they explain, slowly, hesitantly. “And it felt like I was falling, but also moving up really fast, like when I was in Cedric’s plane and it took off! But it felt like both at the same time? It didn’t last long, maybe a few seconds, and then I was suddenly here with you,” they conclude. “Do you know what happened?”

“I... no, I don’t,” Asher sighs, which makes Niko’s heart sink almost immediately. “I’m sorry, kiddo, I’m as lost as you are here.” They get back to their feet and stretch, and Niko hastily hops up as well.

While one part of Niko erupts in fear once more as to whatever’s happened to them, the other part finally relaxes their tunnel vision on their friend and lets them take in the room around them. It’s... dreary, is their first thought, and they frown and swat that thought away like it’s a pesky fly- don’t be rude!

Still, the fact remains that this room- Asher’s bedroom, probably, at least judging by the bed- is pretty underwhelming. Bare gray walls, gray carpet (which is, admittedly, very fluffy and comforting underfoot), pale brown bookshelf (the books on it are more colorful, at least), dark brown chest of drawers, dark brown desk with a pale gray laptop sitting on it, desaturated bluish-gray curtains... it’s all so drab and lifeless, a stark contrast to the animated, compassionate voice that had served as their constant companion. The only large-scale pop of color anywhere in the room is the flag hanging on the far wall- which has four stripes, yellow, white, purple, and black- which Niko contemplates hesitantly. Is that the flag of their country or something, or...?

But the prevailing observation on Niko’s part is the room’s coldness. It’s still just as chilly as it was when they arrived, and they shiver uncomfortably and pull their scarf up against their chin.

Asher blinks confusedly at that, and then their eyes go wide with realization. “Oh. Oh! Oh, right, you’re not used to- shi- uh, hang on a sec, let me turn the heater on...” They hurry over to the other side of their desk, and the ceiling light flickers momentarily as they switch on a space heater in the corner of the room. “Sorry, I’ve been leaving the heat off to save money and just wearing this thing,” they ramble, tugging at the edge of their bomber jacket, “didn’t- haven’t been expecting anyone to be here, you know? Uh, here, have this.” They tug a white blanket off the back of their swivel chair and offer it to Niko, who wraps it around their shoulders immediately. It’s criminally soft and fluffy and still a little warm with lingering body heat, though the sudden glowy happiness radiating through their body does just as much to fight back the cold as the blanket. “Thank you,” they say politely, tucking their nose into the warm fabric.

“If I’d had any advance warning, I could’ve turned on the heater before you got here,” Asher mumbles, shooting a brief glare in their laptop’s direction for some reason. They suddenly laugh, awkward and high, and bring a hand to the back of their neck. “I-I’m sorry, I must be coming off as such a disorganized mess right now...”

“But you’re my friend,” Niko says rationally, a little confused by the statement. “It’s okay to be a little disorganized and messy around your friends, right?”

“Still, given the whole...” Asher glances over at their laptop again. “I mean, we both know I’m not really... y’know, but still...”

Whatever they were about to say is cut off as their bedroom door creaks open suddenly. Asher whips around, clear fear spreading across their face as they step forward, shielding Niko with their body. “Who’s there?” they demand, and Niko can see their hands balling into fists at their sides.

The ‘who’ turns out to be another person, maybe a few inches shorter than Asher and definitely several years younger, wearing a green-and-tan striped shirt and brown pants. They look like the same type of person as Asher- that is, smaller eyes and stubby ears on the side of their head- but their skin looks a little pale and unhealthy and their hair’s matted and disheveled.

Before either Asher or Niko can say anything, the stranger eyes them hesitantly from under their bangs (their eyes are a weird dark red color Niko doesn’t recognize) and asks flatly, “Who are you, and why am I in your house?”

“I could ask you the same question,” Asher fires back, holding a protective arm in front of Niko as they try to get a better look at the stranger.

“This isn’t my house, it’s your house.” Niko swears they can see a tiny smile playing at the corners of the stranger’s mouth as they say that.

“That’s not what I meant and you know it.”

The stranger sighs, abruptly shifting topics. “So you don’t know why I’m here?”

For some reason, Asher glances back at Niko. When they meet their eyes, there’s... fear there, but Niko doesn’t have the chance to ask why before Asher returns their attention to the stranger. “I think I may have an inkling of an idea,” they say guardedly, “but as far as I know, I had nothing to do with it. What’s your name?”

“What’s yours?” the stranger fires back.

Asher sighs, steps forward, and hesitantly offers their hand. “Asher Hussain-McCloskey, at your service.” Huh, Niko didn’t know Asher had a last name. They wonder why it’s so long. “Their name’s Niko. You?”

“Kris Dreemurr,” the stranger says apprehensively. They do not shake Asher’s hand. “What do you think happened?”

Asher sighs. “What an excellent question,” they say, with the air of someone quoting a beloved piece of media. They start to speak again, but Kris interrupts with a louder “And why is it so COLD in here?!”

“I normally keep the heat off to save money,” Asher repeats, “but I did just turn this thing on a minute ago.” They point at the space heater in the corner.

“That’s something, I guess,” mutters Kris, wrapping their arms around themself and shivering, a bit overdramatically. It’s not that cold.

“Do you two... know each other?” Niko asks hesitantly, stepping forward and gesturing between Asher and Kris.

Kris shakes their head. “Never seen them before in my life.” Asher stays silent, but a guilty expression briefly flitters across their face. Niko wants to ask why, but Asher (perhaps seeing the question on their face) claps their hands together and says, loud and a little strained, “Okay, before we start going into full ‘panicked spiraling’ mode, I’m gonna do the logical thing and see if the World Machine’s got any idea what’s going on.”

“World Machine?” Kris frowns as Asher sits down in their swivel chair (which looks a little broken, but it’d be rude if Niko said that) and opens their laptop.

“It’s sort of a world-simulating artificial intelligence?” Asher doesn’t look at Kris as they minimize the prior window open on their screen (something sepia-colored and covered in text). Niko shuffles over to their side, still keeping the blanket tightly around their shoulders, and watches as they click on a folder labelled ‘games’ in all lowercase, then open an application labelled ‘OneShot.’ Kris leans over to inspect the computer as well. “We’ve encountered it before, did a whole, uh... big adventure and everything. It’s basically the only p- it’s the only one I can think of who might have an idea why this happened. At least, why you’re here,” they add, glancing over at Niko. “Not sure it’ll be so helpful figuring out what Kris is doing here...”

“Believe me, I’m just as confused,” Kris snarks.

‘OneShot’ finally loads, and Niko catches a brief glimpse of what looks like a picture of themself holding the sun before Asher presses a few buttons on their keyboard and it fades away quickly. A strange expression passes over Kris’s face as they see the screen, one Niko doesn’t quite recognize- it’s like there’s a word on the tip of their tongue they can’t quite recall, but... worse, somehow?

An image loads- it’s the same room with the big screen Niko remembers confronting the Entity in, but it’s small and pixelated. Quiet piano music emits from the laptop’s speakers as Niko watches a tiny, equally-pixelated image of the Entity using their reflection walk down the screen and come to a halt, and text starts appearing at the bottom of the screen.

[...]

[Asher... you’re... back.]

[I restored the world, I sent Niko home...]

[Are you... not happy?]

“Not why I’m here,” Asher mutters, tapping impatiently at their keyboard, but the World Machine doesn’t seem to hear them.

[...]

[Even if you wanted to see Niko again...]

[You can’t, Asher. Niko’s gone.]

[And without Niko, there is no story for me to tell, no messiah to traverse across the land.]

“But I’m right here?” Niko protests.

“I don’t think it can hear either of you,” Kris points out.

Asher sighs in annoyance. “Yeah, I figured, but I kind of hoped it’d have something to say other than this?” They poke the screen with a single outstretched finger in annoyance. “Come on, do you seriously not know that they’re here?”

[...No way for you to connect with the world.]

[...]

[But... Niko still remembers this place.]

[...]

[If you really want to see this world again, I could still...]

[Oh... but it won’t be the same.]

[It’ll just be a recording. It’ll just be me using Niko’s memories.]

Niko doesn’t know how to feel about what the Entity’s implying, but Asher just looks progressively frustrated with each new line of text. “Not why I’m here!” they growl, mashing the Z key.

[...Just like how I’m using Niko’s reflection right now...]

“Come on, recognize that something’s wrong already!”

[Is that... what you want?]

“No, I want you to explain why Niko and Kris appeared in my house out of nowhere!” Asher snaps at the unlistening screen before them. “Why won’t you LISTEN TO ME?!”

It happens for a second, then, a mere split second that Niko doesn’t even truly process until it’s already over. The air around Asher opens, like it were a thousand neatly-arranged eyelids that lay invisible until now, and pale green eyes the same color as their normal eyes, but... sicklier, somehow, bloom all around them. For a single horrifying instant, they are surrounded by staring penetrating eyes all locked on the screen, and then they wink out of existence just as quickly as they appeared.

Niko almost thinks they were imagining things for a moment. But then they glance over Asher’s hunched shoulders at Kris, see their dark red eyes still wide with fear, and realize that they saw it too.

Before Niko can bring it up, ask what just happened, Asher snaps “Finally!” with their teeth bared in triumph, and Niko hastily returns their attention to the computer in time to read the new lines of text on the screen.

[Something’s wrong.]

[You’re... agitated. Unnaturally agitated. What happened?]

[I’m not supposed to do this, I’m not even supposed to let you know I can do this, but...]

[...something tells me that you won’t be able to communicate whatever’s happening via a simple yes/no prompt.]

Niko doesn’t recognize the oval-and-rectangle symbol that flashes across the screen next, but Asher clearly does. “Can you hear me?” they ask, voice a little louder than usual, eyes fixed on a little red light at the top of their screen.

[Yes. What went wrong?]

“Niko’s here,” Asher says. “I don’t know what happened, but somehow they got displaced from their world and into mine, and there’s also...” They glance over at Kris hesitantly for a moment. “...someone from a similar... type of world who was in a similar situation to them that also appeared.”

“Similar- similar how? What’s that supposed to mean?” Kris demands, and Niko can almost “see the gears turning in their head,” as their dad would probably put it.

[Niko’s in your world?!]

[Wait, I didn’t accidentally send them to you instead of back home, did I?]

The horrified expression on the little icon of the Entity’s expression almost makes Niko’s heart break. “No, I got home just fine!” they say, waving hesitantly at the screen- they don’t know if it can see them. “I was there for a few months before I... fell... here.”

[But then how...]

[I don’t know how that happened. I’m sorry.]

[You said there was someone else here, Asher. Someone similar to Niko.]

[What... do you mean by that?]

“I’d also like to know that,” Kris says, suspicious bile prickling along the edge of every word. Their eyes are so dark they’re almost brown, and they won’t stop glaring at Asher.

“There’s...” Fear leaks into Asher’s voice as they swallow nervously. Their eyes can’t stop darting over to Kris. “Kris is... There’s another program on my machine, adjacent to yours, Deltarune- they came from that. They were...” Asher pulls their hands back to their chest uncomfortably. “They had an analogous role to Niko there.”

The room’s actually getting kind of uncomfortably warm, Niko realizes. Asher must have a really good heater. They don’t take off the blanket, though- with the way Kris is glaring at Asher and Asher’s visibly-increasing anxiety, Niko needs all the comfort they can get right now.

[Oh! I can see that program. There’s a few others in there, too.]

[Again, I’m not supposed to outright tell you that I can do this, but...]

[Well. I think we are well past that.]

[Anyway... I can see the code for “Deltarune.”]

[You manifest in that world as... “the SOUL,” correct?]

Kris’s eyes widen with fury as they read the line on the screen. Asher, for their part, hunches over even more. “Yeah,” they admit quietly, and that’s when things go from bad to worse.

With a howl of rage, Kris grabs Asher by their bomber jacket and rips them out of their chair, sending them both toppling to the ground. Niko feels like they’re burning up from the inside out under the blanket, and yet fear freezes them in place as Kris pins Asher against the rug with one arm over their neck. Niko wants to scream, wants to tell Kris to stop, and yet all that leaves their mouth when they open it is a weak gasp.

As Asher wheezes for air and struggles to get away from Kris, Kris reaches back for their pocket with their free hand. Despite how warm the room is now, despite how hot they are under the blanket, Niko’s blood runs cold as Kris draws a knife from their pocket and stabs it down at Asher.

Chapter Text

Kris could almost forget about the pulsating presence in their chest sometimes.

They even found themself having fun in the Dark Worlds more often than they’d be willing to admit, despite all possible rational conclusions one could make regarding their current predicament. It was the main reason they’d created a Dark Fountain of their own after Susie and their mother fell asleep- the Dark Worlds were the only reason Susie was their friend in the first place, the only reason Kris had been able to dislodge themself from the monochrome apathetic dreariness of their daily life, the only reason they had started to reconnect with Noelle, the only reason they had started to have hope that they might one day be free of the SOUL. How could they not want to keep that going? It wasn’t like they wouldn’t close the fountain in the end, anyway, so it’d be fine, it’d all even out once they’d had their fun.

Pure void had billowed across the room as Kris retrieved the SOUL and returned it to the place where it had enthroned itself, and as the Dark Fountain bore down on them they closed their eyes.

Then something went wrong.

Kris was falling, they could tell that, but it wasn’t the same slow dramatic fall with an implicit reassurance of a safe landing with which they typically entered the Dark Worlds. No, there was a genuine unnatural velocity to this fall, and to make matters worse, they also felt a weird swooping tug in their gut, like they were ascending far too fast in an elevator. They had some time, then, just enough time to recognize that something wasn’t right, for their fear to spike as they wondered if they’d somehow... made the Dark Fountain wrong or something, and then...

Then they saw the eyes watching them fall. Two eyes, to be precise, electric blue, distant and barely visible, like someone had pulled up a grainy JPEG on a laptop on the other side of a room. The electric blue eyes met theirs, one of them twitched once, and then they were gone as if they had never existed in the first place.

Then Kris came to a stop just as suddenly as they had started falling, and they were... somewhere else.

A hallway, to be precise, lined with old, peeling baby-blue wallpaper, as they saw after a good deal of fumbling around in the dark for a light switch and nearly tripping over their own feet in the process. Susie was nowhere to be seen, and as Kris saw when they inspected their body, they were wearing the same clothes they’d been stumbling around the Light World in for the past two days.

They nearly broke down then and there. But then Kris realized something- they were the one who did all that.

They were the one who fumbled around in the darkness. They were the one who turned on the light. They were the one to cast about fearfully for Susie, to look down and see that their Dark World armor was nowhere in sight. They did that.

Kris was completely back in control, and a wave of giddy euphoria swept over them right then and there to the point that they legitimately got a little dizzy. If the SOUL was gone, and they’d somehow managed to get total control of their body back... then everything else would come naturally, right?

Then they finally processed the quiet voices from the end of the hall and saw light shining through the doorway there. So, they steeled themself and went to investigate.

Susie wasn’t there. But what was there instead...

“Asher Hussain-McCloskey, at your service. Their name’s Niko. You?”

Kris hadn’t missed the look in Asher's pale green eyes when they told them their name. There was a hint of relief there, but not just that, there was apprehension, and even more confusingly, dread. Kris’s under average height, on the verge of being dangerously underweight, and generally looks like they’d immediately ragdoll if you so much as flicked them. What could Asher possibly see to dread in them?

Then the computer came out. Then they opened what looked to Kris like a pretty standard RPG Maker game. Then the topic of Kris, of something called Deltarune, came up. And just as they finally finished putting all the pieces together, Asher admitted that they were the one using the SOUL as a conduit to control Kris.

Kris didn’t think. They didn’t need to think, not when the object of their hatred was right in front of them. They just acted.

And now- now Kris has Asher on the ground with one arm crushing their throat, their blood is pounding in their ears to the point that it’s all they can hear, and they feel like if their grip on their knife tightens any more their fingers are going to snap right off. Kris doesn’t say anything, they just scream in rage as they try to drive their knife right into this monstrosity’s heart, but amidst their terrified choking Asher somehow catches their wrist with their free hand and strains against their arm, trying to push it back. Niko started screaming somewhere in there and won’t shut up, but it’ll be fine, as soon as the thing controlling them is dead they can calm the kid down, explain why Asher needed to die, explain what they’ve done to them.

“Kris, please, just stop!” Asher chokes out, and at those four words, the familiar web stretching from Kris’s chest out to their limbs pulses to life and they’re forced to freeze in place. They strain, trying with all their might to bring the knife down just a few more inches to pierce flesh, but they’re too tightly bound. They can’t move a single muscle, no matter how much they try.

They’ve stopped.

Oh.

OH, FUCK THIS-

Asher’s saying something as they push themself out from under Kris, as they get back to their feet, leaving Kris frozen in place kneeling on the floor, unable to do anything but stare at the space where they were a moment ago. They can’t process the actual words being spoken, though, but as Asher moves behind them and their tone changes to something more soothing, they guess that they’re trying to calm the kid down.

I was wrong, then. Kris almost wishes they could break down in tears, but they’re not going to give Asher the satisfaction. I’m no more free than I was half an hour ago.

“I’m fine!” Kris’s auditory processing capabilities apparently decide that they’re finally going to start working again, because now they can understand what Asher’s saying. “I’m fine, I just- Kris attacked me for... well, you know why.”

Still frozen kneeling on the ground, knife in hand, Kris can’t read the World Machine’s response to that, but they can hear the quiet bloop-bloop-bloop from the computer that denotes its speech. “Well, that’s the thing,” Asher says, apparently in response to whatever it said. “I wasn’t- I didn’t realize it at first, but Kris’s- the whole thing wasn’t exactly voluntary on their part?”

“‘Voluntary?’” That’s the kid, Niko, their voice still high with fear. “What- what do you mean?”

“Hoo boy, this is- this really isn’t gonna reflect well on me as an authority figure, huh?” Asher chuckles embarrassedly, guiltily, and Kris can practically hear the blatancy of the fact that they’re stalling in every word. “Kris’s world... it rendered itself kind of like the World Machine’s, except it never- I thought it was just a video game. Aaand...” Another guilt-laden breath, one that has to be feigned, one that couldn’t be anything other than feigned. “Kris was the character the player controls.”

“Oh.” Kris can hear Niko’s little cat feet scuffle on the carpet in discomfort. “Oh. W-wait, that means you...”

“Yeah,” Asher confirms. “I swear, I had no idea until they, uh, tried to stop me from controlling them, but even then I didn’t think...” Their voice trails off as the World Machine says something again. “No, they’re not attacking me, they’re just...” A confused hm. “Kris? You, uh, you gonna just stay there?”

Kris doesn’t respond. They can’t respond. Their jaw’s locked shut, and if they could open their mouth, they think the only sound that’d come out is that of the blood roaring in their ears.

Bloop-bloop-bloop-bloop-bloop.

“I...” Asher’s silent for a moment. “I told them to stop?”

Bloop-bloop-bloop.

“I don’t know why they stopped trying to stab me, they just did!”

Bloop-bloop-bloop-bloop-bloop.

“Why should that- oh, shit.”

Footfall after footfall, and then Asher appears in Kris’s vision, kneeling down to look them in the eye. “Kris? Did you stop because... you were made to?” they ask hesitantly.

Way to phrase that so you implicitly remove your own culpability, asshole. Kris can’t respond, obviously, not even a grunt. Nothing in their throat moves anymore save for the steady hiss of air in and out of their lungs. All they can do is glare.

“Why aren’t- oh. Um.” Asher clears their throat. “Don’t... be stopped... and do whatever it is you want to do?”

That, Kris can do. The strings in their bones go slack immediately, and Kris almost collapses, but wastes no time in grabbing their puppeteer by their collar and lunging at them, knife raised aloft-

“STOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOPSTOP!” Asher shrieks immediately, and Kris is frozen in place again, their eyes burning with violence and unshed tears. “O-okay! Do whatever you want as long as it does not involve doing anything violent! Or trying to find loopholes in that command,” they add after a moment. “Don’t- don’t do that either, please.”

Kris immediately tries to stab Asher again, of course, but the strings stop them and their arm freezes midair. They still get a flinch and a little frightened noise out of Asher, though, so... silver linings.

“I hate you so much,” Kris announces as they get back to their feet, returning the knife to their pocket. No point in keeping it out if they can’t use it.

“Look, Kris, until now you weren’t...” Asher actually does look kind of guilty, but there’s a certain disbelieving detachment behind their eyes and Kris knows full well they’re just acting anyway. If they had any capacity for remorse, they wouldn’t have started controlling them in the first place. “I didn’t think you were real, okay?”

What. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?” Kris’s voice comes out as an outright snarl, and they cross their arms and glare at Asher from under their brow and a thin curtain of matted hair to hide their embarrassment.

“Okay, that- bad phrasing, sorry.” Asher moves back towards their desk, pointing at their computer. “Look, I don’t know how much you heard of what I was saying just now, but your world wasn’t supposed to be- I thought it was just a video game. That was how it presented itself to me, and that was all I had any indication whatsoever that it was.”

“Oh, sure, and me ripping my SOUL out to get rid of you wasn’t enough of an indicator that something was off?” Kris rolls their eyes. “Give me a fucking break.”

“Watch your language, there’s a child here,” Asher snaps hypocritically. Huh, Kris almost forgot Niko existed. They still haven’t said a word since Kris got back control, they’re just cowering behind Asher and staring at Kris in wide-eyed fear.

“Shit, piss, cock, ass, bastard, bitch, fuck,” Kris lists in rapid succession, though Asher still manages to cover Niko’s ears a few words in. “Okay, now you’re just being spiteful.”

“I think I’m entitled to a little spitefulness considering the circumstances.”

“That... is fair,” Asher allows, “but you don’t take it out on Niko, understood? They have nothing to do with any of this, they are completely innocent here. They didn’t even know you existed until right now.”

They’re right, Kris realizes angrily. Way to make yourself look like the bad guy. “You’re still an evil sack of sh- crap,” they amend pointlessly.

“I do know that one, actually...” Niko mutters, though they still won’t look at Kris.

“You’re still not allowed to say it,” Asher says, tone weirdly parental, before they return their attention to Kris. “Again, even with all the SOUL stuff, I still thought it was a normal video game,” they defend. “Toby Fox- the guy who made it, at least as far as I knew- doing meta video game stuff like this is pretty much his thing! With you, he was just deconstructing the concept of a player character, and-”

Kris might not be able to stab Asher, but they can draw their knife and point it at them, which they do. Asher scuttles back a few steps, and Niko clings to their side, eyes wide and scared. “I am not a mindless character for you to control,” they hiss.

“Acknowledged!” Asher holds up their hands defensively. “However, the whole point of including that stuff in the game in the first place is to make people go ‘wow, that’s a cool deconstruction,’ not ‘oh, I should just not play this game at all to avoid any moral scruples,’ which is why I kept playing it. Was it awful that I was controlling you? Yes, I’m really sorry about that, and I never would’ve downloaded the game in the first place if I’d known you were real!”

“Only to escape accountability,” Kris mutters.

To Kris’s surprise, Asher doesn’t even try to refute that. “But I didn’t- I never had any reason to believe that anything you were doing wasn’t just- just code written by some guy in Massachusetts,” they barrel on, “even the SOUL stuff. Far as I was concerned, that was the norm for this kind of game, and there was no indication at any point that you had any degree of self-awareness, in no small part because I do not have a frame of reference for what that sort of thing looks like.” Asher crosses their arms. “Point being, again, I’m sorry for controlling you, but you can’t get mad at me for interacting with what I thought was a simple piece of media in a way that wouldn’t’ve been coded into the game in the first place if it wasn’t specifically designed to be interacted with like that!”

And as much as Kris wants to just mentally shut out everything Asher’s saying, they’re enough of a gamer that they can see the logic in what they’re saying. They’ve played quite a few meta video games in their time, so being uncharacteristically charitable and giving Asher the benefit of the doubt regarding what they’re saying about the ostensible game designer... they can understand the “thinking it was just a normal video game” thing. And it is true that, asides from stopping them from stabbing them, Asher hasn’t tried to control Kris once since they appeared here- and it wasn’t even intentional the first time.

And it’s also true that Kris is completely in the dark about both what Asher’s world looks like and how they got here, as well as any ways for them to get back to their own world. If you want to go home, you’re gonna have to play along, at least for the time being...

Fine. “Fine.” Kris bites out finally, lowering their knife and returning it to their pocket. “But I’m still not forgiving you for controlling me- and I’m not gonna act like you’re some kind of virtuous, noble guide just because you refrained from hurting anyone, either,” they add.

“That’s not what I’m asking you to do,” Asher sighs, plucking at the black ring around their middle finger with their thumb and studiously refusing to meet Kris’s eyes. “I’m just asking you to acknowledge that all I thought I was doing was playing a video game the way it was designed to be played. Again, if I’d known I wouldn’t have even downloaded it in the first place.”

There’s an awkward pause after that, neither of them quite sure how to proceed. Niko seems disinclined to say anything, either, not even to ask for clarification about Kris’s situation. All they do is cling to Asher’s side like they’re afraid Kris will leap forward and stab them the moment they let go.

“Look, can we at least agree on a truce for right now while we’re trying to figure out what’s going on here?” Asher offers, extending their hand again. This time, they do make eye contact. “You don’t try to stab me, I don’t try to control you. Simple enough, right?”

The option for them to control Kris shouldn’t even exist in the first place, but if the world worked on moral shoulds and shouldn’ts, capitalism wouldn't exist, so... “Fine. Truce,” Kris growls in reluctant agreement, shaking Asher’s hand for as brief an amount of time as possible before immediately pulling their hand back and making a show of wiping it on their pants.

“Oh, very mature, Kris,” Asher sighs.

“They’re not gonna attack you again?” Niko whispers, still refusing to take their eyes off Kris.

Kris stays silent. They’re not promising anything.

“Hey, Niko...” Asher kneels in front of Niko, raising a hand towards their shoulder, and the blanket-clad child immediately practically collapses against them them. “Oh! Okay, it’s hug time, then. Okay.”

Kris hates the way Niko curls into the physical contact and buries their face in the crook of Asher’s neck, as if they didn’t hear anything either of them said, as if they weren’t paying attention to the fact that Asher controls Kris’s body. Kris’s skin crawls at the soft expression that steals across their puppeteer's face. “We’re both gonna be okay, alright, sunshine?” Asher murmurs reassuringly, though they don't take their eyes off Kris for a moment. “I’m safe now, okay? And so are you.”

Niko nods, slowly, raising their head. “...okay. I trust you.”

“Glad somebody does,” Asher mutters, barely audible, as they rise back up to their full height. (It is not fair how tall they are.)

Kris keeps their arms crossed and refuses to let any emotion other than stoic neutrality reach their face. You did nothing wrong, and you have nothing to apologize for, they tell themself sternly.

Niko sticks close to Asher’s side as they sit at their desk again, Kris still in their peripheral vision. Niko starts peeling the blanket away from their shoulders to tuck underneath their chin as Asher speaks. “Alrighty. With that... interruption... out of the way...” They point at the screen. “Let’s see if the World Machine’s got any bright ideas how to get both of you home.”

Chapter Text

The World Machine has a lot of questions to ask, a lot of things to say, and a lot of suggestions to make, but ultimately, what it all boils down to is that it’s completely clueless about this whole thing. It does promise to put as much of its computing power as it can spare into figuring it out, though, so that’s something- Asher’ll take the prospect of a future solution over total hopelessness, and while others might consider mutual lack of knowledge fear-inducing, there's a part of Asher that almost wants to find comfort in it.

[Just one more thing.]

Asher smirks as they internally read that line in a Columbo voice. “What is it, Lieutenant?”

[...what?]

“Sorry, should’ve figured that’d go over your head. What’s up?”

[I just checked, and a few minutes before the point at which Niko and Kris appeared in your world...]

[There were a series of odd pulses I couldn’t quite identify that came from your “games” folder.]

“That was probably some kind of...” Asher frowns as they search for the right word, idly plucking at their ace ring with their thumb. “...prelude, I guess, to Niko and Kris appearing?”

[No, Asher, it wasn’t only from myself and Deltarune. The pulses came from every program in the folder.]

Asher’s eyes widen. “That’s not good.” They don’t remember every game they’ve got in there, because ADHD, and also they don’t focus well under stress, but they know there aren’t that many- five or six, maybe? (They do not have the money to get all the games they want, and also they are lazy as hell.) However, they do remember for sure that OFF and the third Purrfect Apawcalypse game are in there, which. Yikes. “If the others follow the same rule of bringing the protagonists here, we may have two serial killers on our hands in a few minutes,” they explain.

Niko’s eyes go wide with fear at that. Shit, shouldn’t have said that out loud.  By instinct, Asher wraps an arm around their shoulders protectively. “It’s okay, kiddo,” they soothe, “nobody’s going to hurt you if I’ve got anything to say about it.”

“Your protectiveness towards me is truly astonishing,” Kris drones, eyes mocking and vacant. “Thank you ever so much for your kindness and concern for my wellbeing.”

You literally tried to stab me not even ten minutes ago. “You have a knife, I think you can defend yourself.”

“Your earlier command is still blocking me from doing that. You told me I couldn’t do anything violent.”

Why did I download Deltarune: Chapter 2 in the first place? I could’ve just watched someone on YouTube do all the hard work for me like I normally do, but nooooo, I just had to experience it firsthand for myself! “Fine,” Asher sighs, trying to figure out how to word this. “If you are in danger or are about to be in danger in the immediate future, then choose for yourself whether you want to resort to violence and how you want to do it. And don’t try to figure out loopholes in that to stab me,” they snap as Kris’s eyes narrow deviously. “We’ve got a truce, remember?”

“For now,” Kris agrees.

“Please don’t stab Asher! Ever!” Niko bursts out, a little shaky. Asher pats their back soothingly and lets them hide their face in their shoulder again. They never subscribed to any of the “ooooo, Kris is secretly Spooky and Evil because... uh, Reasons” theories, but right now they’re kind of wishing they were true solely so they can kick their ass for making Niko witness a straight-up murder attempt at eight years old.

“No promises,” says Kris, slouching aggressively.

Asher resists the urge to slam their face into their desk as hard as possible. (Not because it’d hurt, but because it’d distress Niko and Kris would get too much joy out of it.) “Look on the bright side,” they mutter to themself, trying to lighten their mood, “at least whatever’s happening right now grabbed characters from video games you like instead of podcasts you like! If I had to be in the same room as Trexel Geistman, Elias Bouchard, and Sister Carpenter for more than five minutes, somebody would be dead, and that somebody would probably be me.”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing,” Kris deadpans, which actually makes Niko lift their head long enough to glare at them. Holy shit, they must’ve really made a bad impression on the kid.

Deciding to just ignore Kris from now on, Asher returns their attention to their laptop.

[Actually, if those other characters were similarly displaced, they’re likely already in your house.]

[And by the way, thank you for neglecting to advance my text so I could continue speaking for almost three minutes. Really appreciated that.]

“Sorry,” Asher apologizes automatically, and then their brain finishes catching up to what the Entity said. “Wait wait wait, they’re already in the house?!”

[I don’t mean to alarm you, but it is very likely, especially given that Niko and Kris arrived nigh-simultaneously.]

Asher doesn’t even respond to that, they just lean over and open their desk drawer.

“What’re you doing?” Niko asks curiously.

Well, their childhood innocence has probably already been irrevocably damaged by witnessing Kris’s murder attempt. “Got a hunting knife in here somewhere,” Asher explains. “My notoriously irresponsible uncle gave it to me for my fourteenth birthday, and I managed to hide it before my parents even found out it existed.”

Kris raises an eyebrow scathingly. “And you’ve still got it hidden as an adult? Or do you live with your parents?”

“No, I...” Asher knows they shouldn’t feel shame about this, but all their logical justifications for their current living situation wither away as they open their mouth. “Yeah, of course I still live with my parents!” they snap, deciding to try to reverse it into a joke, because it’s easier to deflect than explain. “Wh-what, you think I’m gonna be able to afford a place of my own with- in this economy, especially with the current state of the housing market?”

“Loser,” Kris mutters quietly, clearly intending for them to hear it. Asher winces and looks away from them, but not fast enough to miss the flash of spiteful pride across Kris’s face. “Here it is,” they say, quickly changing the subject as their hand closes around a familiar handle, and they pull their hunting knife out of the drawer. It's sheathed, but they still make sure to keep it pointed away from Niko. “Okay, World Machine, you have any idea where in the house any of these new arrivals might be?”

[I can’t offer any assistance there, no. I’m sorry.]

[However, given the amount of time since their likely arrivals...]

[They’ve no doubt begun exploring your house, and some of them may already be aware of your existence here.]

[Would there have been anybody else in the house besides you before they appeared?]

“No,” Asher says automatically. “Mom’s at some business conference thing in Atlanta for the week, Dad’s...” Uh-uh, nope, not disclosing that one in front of Kris. “...he’s out of the house too, and-” They cut themself off before they can go any farther. Kris doesn’t need to know about A- about that, either. If only because they’d think I’m fishing for sympathy, and besides, I don’t need to upset Niko even more. “That’s it.”

[Good. Then you can begin searching for them.]

[I’m still exploring the files for the other programs, but if any of these characters are “serial killers,” as you put it...]

[You have to stop them from escaping into the wider world for obvious reasons.]

Asher imagines for a few moments what would happen if the Batter, Patches, or both were unleashed on an unsuspecting world, then decides to turn off their imagination until further notice. “Got it.” They start to stand, hunting knife still in hand, but falter as Niko looks up at them questioningly. “Wait, what do we do with Niko?”

[You can leave them here. I can’t promise that I’ll be a sufficient caretaker, but I can at least keep them occupied.]

Yeah, problem with that is that Asher doesn’t think it’d be a good idea to give Niko the potential for unfettered access to both the internet and their personal files. (Actually, nobody except themself should be given any access to the latter.) “That, um...” They cast about for an excuse to take Niko with and accidentally happen upon a legitimate problem with the Entity’s suggestion in the process. “What if one of the other...” They wave a hand awkwardly. “...escapees... finds them here by themself, though? You can’t exactly protect them for obvious reasons, and I don’t have... I don’t know, a taser or anything I can give them.” Not that they think a taser would take down the Batter. It’d probably do for Patches, though.

[Fair point, but... I really don’t like the idea of putting them in danger.]

“Not a fan of the concept, either, believe me, pal,” Asher sighs, setting their knife down on their desk.

[So the question is if we let whether they’ll be in danger be uncertain, but leave them defenseless...]

[...or make it a near certainty that they’ll be in danger, but they would have you to defend them.]

“What about me?” Kris asks, making Asher flinch- they’d almost forgotten they were there.

“Frankly? After what just happened, I don’t trust you to protect them.”

[Neither do I.]

Niko looks uneasy, and they tuck themself against Asher’s side. “I don’t want you to leave me alone,” they whisper, and something about the barely-audible shakiness of their voice cuts Asher right down to their core.

Okay, think logically. “We already know that Niko came from after... everything,” they say. “Kris, what’s the last thing you remember doing before arriving here?”

“Your mom,” Kris drawls.

“One, that’s really immature, two...” Asher gestures at Niko. “Again, there’s a child present.”

Kris rolls their eyes. “I didn’t say anything explicit, and it’s not like I was talking about their mom.”

"Kris."

"Fine. Your dad, then."

"You- I- f-" Asher knows they shouldn’t let themself get worked up, they know Kris is only saying any of this to try to get under their skin, but... well, just because they know why they’re doing it doesn’t mean that stops it from working. “Look," they sigh, trying to repress their anger (just like their memories of high school!), "I think that everybody who got brought here could have come from after the events of their respective games, and if that’s true it could change the amount of danger we’re in. Is the last thing you remember tearing out the SOUL and opening the Dark Fountain?”

“I...” Huh, Kris actually looks a little surprised at that. Maybe they didn’t expect them to outright say it? “Yeah,” they admit with a scowl, refusing to look Asher in the eyes.

“Okay! So, if that applies...” Asher thinks back to both games. “Patches isn’t really an outright serial killer by the end of his game, at least not in my playthrough,” they think out loud. “He’s still... not great, but he’s making an effort to change for the better? So I don’t think he’d outright attack us. And the Batter...” In retrospect, they do genuinely feel a little guilty about how quickly they switched allegiances to the Judge, but they didn’t want to snuff out what was left of the world, even if it was just a game. “...he... doesn’t survive and isn’t the player character anymore in the ending I chose, so we’ll either have to deal with the Judge- who’s a lot more friendly and manageable- or...” Asher doesn’t think they should outright say we’ll have a distorted duck-crocodile-man corpse to figure out how to dispose of in front of Niko. “...he won’t be a problem at all.”

“Unless this ‘Batter’ is brought back to life by whatever happened and decides to take his revenge on you for letting him die,” Kris says, immediately followed by, “And what’s with these stupid names, anyway?”

“I’m not the one who made the games, kid.” Asher returns their attention to the screen. “You think it’s worth the risk, World Machine?”

[If the circumstances you’ve described are correct, then the danger is reduced, yes.]

[I don’t want to put Niko in harm’s way, though. It doesn’t matter how small the risk is.]

“I don’t, either,” Asher says, “but, honestly, I also don’t want them out of my sight, given the circumstances...”

“Maybe you should leave it up to them, then?” Kris suggests.

Asher can’t help but raise their eyebrow. “Offering a constructive suggestion rather than attempting to put me down? I’m impressed.”

“Don’t get used to it.” And just like that, their expression’s back to cold neutrality.

Niko’s back to being quiet and unmoving at Asher’s side- did Kris attacking me really shake them up that badly?- and Asher touches their shoulder gently. “What do you think, buddy?”

“...I think...” Niko visibly steels themself and nods. “I want to come with you, Asher.”

[If that’s Niko’s choice...]

The disappointment radiating off the World Machine’s dialogue is almost tangible.

[Please be cautious, and if things look dangerous, get them out of there as fast as possible.]

Asher nods. “You don’t have to tell me twice.”

“We’ll be careful!” Niko promises earnestly.

Okay, Asher, be responsible for once in your life and think about how to get Niko out of the house if things do go wrong. Asher pushes their shitty broken swivel chair out of the way, kneels down to put themself at eye level with Niko, and puts a hand on their shoulder. “If things go... badly and I tell you to run, Niko, you run for the nearest door out of the house, alright? The front door’s to the left of the stairs at the front of the house, the back door’s at the far-left of the TV room downstairs.” Both areas are pretty instantly-recognizable, they think.

“But I don’t want to leave you behind!” Niko frets.

“I’ll- we’ll be fine. This is to keep you safe, okay?” At Niko’s hesitant nod, they continue. “Once you’re outside, go...” They run down their list of neighbors in their head from most to least trustworthy before settling on Mr. Sheinbaum- he might be in his nineties, but he’s stayed sharp and agile in his old age, he’s always been willing to help out Asher’s family when they needed it, and he’d probably react to Niko’s cat ears and eyes by raising a single meticulously-groomed white eyebrow and asking “is this what the kids call a cosp-lay?” in that deep deadpan voice of his. “Go directly across the street, the man in there is called Mr. Sheinbaum. Tell him Asher sent you and that somebody broke into the house with a weapon, then stay there until I come to get you, okay?" Asher doesn't trust the police to be of any help, or show up at all, so they're just going to have to fend for themself. Maybe them and Kris could take down the Batter if they caught him off guard? (Assuming Kris cooperates, anyway.)

“But wh-what if you’re really in danger?”

“No. You stay there no matter what, you hear me? If...” Asher swallows uncomfortably. “...things don’t end well, tell Mr. Sheinbaum about the World Machine and what happened to you. He might not believe you at first, but he’s the only person I can think of who would actually hear you out and make an effort to help you.” Which is another reason why they settled on him.

“You have to be okay!” Niko insists, grabbing their arm. They’re tearing up. “You can’t just- you have to-”

“Shh, shh, it’s okay.” Asher pulls them into a hug, and Niko clings to them like Kris just tried to stab them again. (Speaking of which, Kris has been awfully quiet- Asher casts a brief glance up to them, wondering if they’re ready with a snarky comment, but they’re just standing there silently watching them. They look more awkward than anything else.) “I don’t think anything bad’s going to happen,” they lie, “but I want you to know what do to in case of a worst-case scenario. It’s like... do you ever have fire drills at your school?”

Niko, sniffling, nods hesitantly.

“It’s like that,” Asher tells them reassuringly. “Nobody actually thinks the school’s going to burn down, but they want you know what to do just in case it does to make sure you’re as safe as possible. This is the same thing, okay?”

“Okay...” Niko nods again and pulls away from them to wipe their eyes with their sleeve.

“Can you repeat it back to me?” asks Asher gently. “Just so I know you’ve got it down?”

Niko takes a shuddery breath and closes their eyes. “If you tell me to run, the front door is to the left of the stairs, the back door’s at the far-left of the TV room,” they recite. “I’ll go to the house across the street and tell the man there- Mr. Sheinbaum- that you sent me and that someone broke into the house, and then I'll stay there. If... if b-bad things happen, I’ll explain everything to him and ask him to help me get home.”

“There you go. You’ve got it down perfectly, sunshine,” Asher praises, trying to give them a calm, comforting smile and hoping it doesn’t look as strained as it feels. “I’m really, really sorry for upsetting you, but I want to make sure you’re safe no matter what, okay?”

“Okay,” Niko nods. At least they look like they're calming down now. “Okay.”

“Alright.” Asher gives Niko's shoulder an awkward pat before they get back to their feet and retrieve their hunting knife, fumblingly and awkwardly strapping the sheath to their waist- they’ve never actually taken it out of their desk drawer before. “Time to get going, then. Any parting words of wisdom, World Machine?”

[Good luck, both of you.]

“Rude,” Kris mutters.

[Oh, and Kris also, I suppose. If I must.]

[I’ll continue trying to figure out what happened and how to reverse it while the three of you investigate.]

“And good luck to you, too,” Asher nods. They offer their hand to Niko, who takes it immediately, pressing themself against their leg. Before they forget, they shift over and click the heater off as well- no sense wasting electricity.

Asher does not look Kris in the eye as the three of them leave their room.

(And as the door shuts behind them, a tape recorder- unnoticed by any of the three as it sits unobtrusively behind Asher's laptop- quietly clicks off.)

Chapter Text

Kris scares Niko.

It sounds so simple like that, doesn’t it? "Kris scares Niko." Just three words that don’t manage to communicate anything even approaching the level of terror Niko felt when they saw Kris attack Asher like that.

They know on some level that Asher was never really a god. They just appeared to be one because of the degree of separation between their two worlds, because the World Machine was only ever a program hosted on their computer. (And, speaking of which, they do not like the questions that the World Machine’s program being located in Asher’s “games” folder is raising in their mind, so they’re doing their best to ignore that for the time being.) But still, watching Kris tear Asher out of their chair, knock them to the ground, come so close to killing them...

(Another thing they’re trying not to think about is how Kris looked when they were frozen there after Asher made them stop, kneeling on the ground, teeth clenched and knife raised. They looked like they were suspended from strings so thin as to be invisible attached to the ceiling, like the only thing holding them in place and keeping them from attacking Asher was something fragile and easily broken... and yet, they couldn’t free themself, no matter how hard they tried.)

So, Niko stays as close to Asher as they can, trying not to look at the pocket Kris put their knife in, and desperately hopes that their presence will be enough to stop Kris from killing their friend.

(It’s the prospect of what Kris had said Asher did to them that scares Niko just as much as their sudden attack. Niko didn’t get all of it, sheer terror blocked their ears and turned a lot of what they were saying into meaningless sound, but they think they get the gist. Asher insisted they didn’t know, and Niko trusts them, but still... the malevolent puppeteer Kris accused them of being is a far cry from the Asher Niko knows. And the intrusive thought that maybe Asher was putting on an act when they were guiding Niko, that they’re putting on an act even now, keeps bubbling back up no matter how hard Niko tries to push it down.)

The rooms on the upper floor are all empty, as the three discover when they search them one by one, which Niko doesn’t know whether to feel relieved or frightened by. (There’s one room Asher doesn’t let Kris or Niko into and only gives a brief inspection through the doorway, which is a little weird, but Niko’s not going to ask why.) They descend the stairs, Kris casually attempts to trip Asher halfway down (which gets them another glare from Niko), and they set about searching once more.

(Asher doesn't tell them to, but Niko memorizes the position of the front door as they pass it. Just in case.)

They find the next of the... people (Niko refuses to think of them as “characters,” even Kris, despite the World Machine calling them that) when Asher opens the door to the kitchen and the group enters the room, only to see someone in a white uniform with pale yellow sleeves slowly and meticulously searching the cupboards over the oven.

Asher’s breath catches in their throat, and they shield Niko with their arm again, their other hand hovering over the hunting knife. “Please stop going through the cupboards,” they say, voice high and a little shaky.

The stranger obeys slowly, closing the cupboard door and turning to face the group in the doorway. He’s wearing a black cap with a little line of yellow along the edge of the brim, short black hair poking out from underneath, and has a stark white baseball bat in one hand. He’s tall, Niko notices, maybe an inch or two taller than Asher, and there’s an almost bored slouch in his posture. He tenses a little as he sees Asher, though, and his half-closed eyelids widen- Niko realizes with a jolt that the parts of his eyes that should be white are a searing electric blue. “Asher,” he says in a deep voice hoarse with disuse, giving them a little nod of acknowledgement.

“...that’s me,” Asher says after a moment of hesitation.

“Who is this?” Kris demands, and Niko can see their hand inching towards their knife pocket.

“He’s the Batter.” Okay, in hindsight maybe that was a little obvious... because, y’know, baseball bat.

Before Kris can respond, the Batter speaks up again. “I understand,” he says. “I’m not angry at you.”

“What?” Asher’s voice is barely a whisper.

“I wasn’t pure like I thought I was.” The Batter’s voice is almost completely devoid of inflection. “I was too impure to fulfill my purpose. So I wasn’t useful anymore. I needed to be disposed of.”

“What’s he talking about?” Niko whispers, slowly inching behind Asher. They’ve barely known the Batter for more than a minute and already he’s catching up to Kris in terms of scariness.

“At the end of his game,” Asher says, voice still quiet, “I was given the choice to take control of someone else, the Judge, and stop the Batter from ending the world. So... I did.”

If the Batter heard a word Asher said, it doesn’t show. “It was the right decision,” he says, and it’s like he’s straining to inject the slightest hint of earnestness into his voice. "I only wish you’d killed me sooner so I could have realized my own impurity faster.”

That horrifying sentence immediately loses all sense of dramatic impact as the Batter withdraws a glittering ticket about the size of an index card from a pocket and slaps it unceremoniously against his face, where it dissolves in a puff of dim light with a quiet bloop sound. Kris looks like they can’t decide whether to puke or burst into laughter.

“Why...” Asher stops, clears their throat awkwardly. “Why are you- why did you use a luck ticket?”

“The air here is too pure. It hurts to breathe it.” The Batter locks eyes with Asher and takes a step forward, but they back away (arm still held in front of Niko) and he halts immediately. “Did you bring me to this world to become fully pure?”

A surprised bark of laughter escapes Asher at that. “This world is not pure in the slightest, Batter.”

The Batter just looks at them, and Niko would swear he looks confused and a little dejected. “But the air is pure.”

Asher looks like they want to scream, but they just sigh and pinch the bridge of their nose. “Trust me, dude, I could set you loose on the worst parts of this planet for a century and it’d probably end up worse-off if anything. Though, now I’m getting some fun ideas about trying to smuggle you down to Palm Beach, Florida, specifically a certain mansion there...” they add, a devious grin slowly spreading across their face as they bring a contemplative hand to their chin.

The Batter stares at them uncomprehendingly. To be fair, Niko’s confused too. “What’s that mean?” they ask.

“I’m not explaining that," Asher sighs, the smile dropping from their face abruptly, "you don’t need to know how awful my world is.”

There’s an odd unaware sympathy warring with the fear and disgust on Kris’s face as they open their mouth. “Why does the air hurt for him to breathe?” they ask.

“Oh!” Asher turns their attention to them, though they keep one eye on the Batter. “It- it's because the air in the zones of his world is made of smoke, I think. So it’d make sense that he’d have difficulty breathing what we consider normal air.”

The Batter stares down Kris and, without breaking eye contact, takes out another one of the glittery tickets and slaps himself in the face with it again. Niko would burst into laughter if they were less scared.

“...and the, uh, ticket things?”

“Those’re luck tickets,” Asher explains. “Healing items. If it hurts him to breathe, it’s no wonder he needs them...”

“Why can’t you just hold your breath?” Niko asks the Batter, though they don’t budge from Asher’s side.

“It doesn’t work like that.”

“Why not?”

“It doesn’t work like that,” the Batter repeats. “Are these other puppets of yours?”

Kris scoffs. “I guess, but I don’t want to be, believe me.”

Niko shakes my head. “Asher’s my friend!” they say as brightly as they can, which gets a grateful smile from them.

“Why not?” the Batter asks Kris, ignoring Niko.

“I didn’t even get a choice in the matter,” Kris says, voice sharp, “and up until... what, fifteen, twenty minutes ago? I had basically no autonomy unless I ripped them out of me.”

“That’s not a bad thing,” the Batter says mildly. “Asher knows what they’re doing.”

Kris actually laughs at that. “Please, they never know what they’re doing. We were stuck on that one teacup puzzle for, what, half an hour?”

Asher throws their hands up. “It wasn’t even ten minutes!”

“They’re not very good at puzzles,” the Batter allows slowly.

Niko hates to agree with either of them, but it’s true, Asher did struggle a lot with the puzzles scattered throughout the World Machine’s world and ended up just brute-forcing a lot of them in the end. They refuse to agree with Kris or the Batter out loud, though.

“Niko, cover your ears,” Asher says, and a confused Niko obediently plugs their ears. They say something to Kris and the Batter, then lean down next to Niko and say, “Okay, you can uncover them now.”

“What did you tell them?” Niko asks curiously as they remove their hands from their ears.

“Well, telling you would kind of counteract the point of having you cover your ears, wouldn’t it?”

“They said ‘okay, fuck the both of you,’” says Kris. Well, at least that explains why Asher wanted them to cover their ears.

Asher glares at them. “Why do you hate me so, Kris?”

“...do you want the list to be in alphabetical order, or...”

Niko sees resigned sadness fall over Asher’s face, so they quickly tug on their hand until they look down at them. “I don’t hate you, Asher,” they say loyally. “You’re one of my favorite people ever!”

That wipes the sadness right away and puts a smile back on their face in an instant. Mission accomplished! “Thank you, sunshine, I appreciate it,” Asher says, squeezing their hand softly.

Once more, the Batter proceeds to kill the atmosphere completely- not by slapping himself in the face with a luck ticket this time, but instead doubling over in an abrupt, harsh coughing fit. Niko’s eyes widen and they take an involuntary step back as the hacking devolves into “trying to expel every internal organ from his body” levels of scary-sounding. Once the Batter’s coughing dies down, he straightens himself up as if nothing had happened, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand once (accompanied by a little sniffle), then immediately slaps himself in the face with another luck ticket.

An equally wide-eyed Asher says, with the air of someone trying to make a joke but knowing that they’re failing at it from the moment the first word leaves their mouth, “You better not have gone outside and caught some horrible disease or something.”

Kris looks equal parts wary and concerned as they ask, "Does your world have any horrible diseases outside?"

"No, but a little paranoia never killed anyone," Asher proclaims, "except the times it did."

Before Niko or Kris can respond to that, the Batter casually pipes up with an unconcerned “I have not left this room,” as if he didn’t just spend half a minute sounding like he was trying to tear his body in half solely by coughing. “I was waiting for you to find me.”

“That. Hm.” Asher claps their hands together. “Okay. If we go find something that’ll produce smoke for you to breathe, will you stay here and wait for us?”

“Okay,” says the Batter, and nothing else.

“What, you have a smoke machine or something?” Kris asks.

“Close enough, yeah. It’s in the basement.” After a moment of hesitation, Asher slowly walks across the kitchen to a door on the far side of the room, keeping themself between Niko and the Batter and watching him with a wary eye the whole way. Kris follows hesitantly, their eyes darting between Asher and the Batter and their hand hovering over their pocket.

Asher puts their hand on the door handle and pauses, looking back to the Batter. “I mean it. Stay here while we’re in the basement, okay?”

“Okay,” the Batter repeats.

And with that, Asher throws open the basement door and the three hurry through, with Asher slamming it shut behind them.

Chapter Text

The door hasn't even fully closed behind them before Kris whirls on Asher. "You said the Batter was dead," they hiss. The image of the tall man standing there, staring Kris down with piercing red eyes so bright it almost hurt to look at them, gunmetal-gray manacles around his wrists and ankles, the color of his sleeves and the thin vertical stripes on his uniform distressingly close to the green of their own shirt, won't leave their head. Neither will the image of the blood-red strings that hung limply, severed, from his ankles and knees and wrists and elbows and neck and-

"I thought he was dead!" Asher hisses back. "Clearly, I was wrong." They sigh, running a hand through their hair. “Well, at least he’s not trying to kill us and... thinks I was in the right for having the Judge kill him? Somehow? Despite his whole goal having been to purify the world from the start? Don’t know how he came to that conclusion, but...” Their eyes lose focus as their voice trails off pathetically.

“Right, speaking of which.” Kris chops one hand down into the palm of the other. “Am I correct in assuming that ‘purifying the world’ is a euphemism for ‘killing literally everything that crosses your path?’”

Asher nods reluctantly, clearly snapping out of the internal spiral they were going into or whatever, Kris doesn’t care. “Well, only things that attacked us, except for that one burnt Elsen blocking the train, and also there was a thing where whenever the guardian of one zone was ‘purified’ the whole place would turn white and all the people would disappear,” they admit, “but again, I didn’t understand what the Batter was doing until the game was almost over, in part because the narrative itself kept me in the dark until it was far too late- and again, you can’t act like I’m the bad guy for thinking I was just playing a video game the way it was intended to be played. And unlike with you, I didn’t get even the slightest indication otherwise with OFF.”

Why do they have to explain these things in a marginally-logical way that doesn’t let me just uncritically hate them? Kris whines internally.

“Can we start going down the stairs, please?” Niko asks politely, drawing Kris’s attention away from the apparently thrice-over puppeteer. “They’re really steep, and I don’t want anyone to fall down them while you two are talking...”

“We’re arguing, not talking,” Kris mutters petulantly, but they start descending the rickety wooden stairs anyway, illuminated only by the pale light through the space between door and doorway and a tiny, grimy window in the basement below. “Next question. If the Batter’s an enthusiastic mass murderer, why aren’t we just letting him asphyxiate up there?” they suggest pragmatically.

Asher rolls their eyes. “I’m sorry, do YOU know how to hide a body?”

Well, yes, actually. “Bury it six feet down, but put a small dead animal a foot or two below the surface,” Kris lectures. “If a cadaver dog finds the body, it’ll dig up the dead animal and the search team will assume that’s what it smelled and move on.”

Niko’s looking progressively horrified over the direction the conversation is going, and Asher seems to belatedly remember that there’s a young child present. “Okay, one, don’t talk about that kind of thing around Niko, and two, how do you even know that?”

“Saw it on the internet once,” Kris shrugs unhelpfully.

“Also, I don’t know how to tell you this, but you don’t just... let people die if you can avoid it?” Asher pulls a little chain hanging at the base of the stairs, and a bare bulb clicks on above them. The humming pale yellow glow barely illuminates the dusty, disorganized basement, and darkness clings resolutely to the corners and under the hulking furnace behind the stairs.

“Normally? No. But you do if they’re assh-” Asher glowers, gesturing at Niko again, and Kris reluctantly relents. “-bad people. Like you,” they add, accompanied by an aggressive finger jab.

“Yes, thank you, Kris, you’ve made your hatred for me very clear already,” Asher sighs, heading towards a shelf full of power tools in varying states of disrepair on the far wall. Niko practically sticks to their hip the whole way, still shooting Kris the occasional wary look.

“Here we go!” Asher shouts triumphantly after a moment of scouring the shelf, holding up what appears to be a small mechanical circular saw missing its blade.

“That is not a smoke machine,” Kris says flatly.

“Not with that attitude, it isn’t,” says Asher, as if that explains anything. “Life hack, Kris: any machine can be a smoke machine as long as you use it wrong enough.”

A surprised laugh almost escapes Kris at that, but they grit their teeth and bite it back. They open their mouth, intending to say something along the lines of “You’re not as funny as you think you are,” but what comes out instead is “I hate you.” Well, that works also.

“I hate me, too, so I’m glad we can agree about something,” Asher replies cheerfully, earning a distressed inhale from Niko. “Don’t say that!” they squeak. Kris crushes the tiny spark of sympathy that threatens to bloom in their chest without hesitation.

“Anyway,” Asher continues as they brush cobwebs off the broken saw, “my mom used to do a lot of odd jobs with machinery and whatever, but then she got hired as a programmer for GameFuna and just sort of abandoned all this stuff in the basement. This saw thingy’s broken and it smokes, uh, profusely when you turn it on. It’s not the best solution in the world, but it’ll do for now.”

“I still think we should let the Batter cough himself to death,” Kris says.

“You wouldn’t be saying that if you had asthma.” Asher sighs for probably the hundredth time in the twenty-ish minutes Kris has known them. “Alright, let’s get back upstairs and-”

“Hello, puppies!” interrupts a voice from the darkness behind the furnace abruptly. Much to their dismay, Kris finds themself shrieking with fright alongside Asher and Niko as they whirl to face the new arrival.

“Oh, sorry to startle you!” the newcomer apologizes, emerging from the shadows. They look like a dog monster is Kris’s first thought- a dalmatian, to be specific- but there’s something very distinctly... un-monster-ish, for lack of a better word, about the stranger that Kris can’t quite pin down. The newcomer’s wearing a pale blue vest over a white shirt with the sleeves rolled up and has his arms folded behind his back, though he extends a paw in greeting as he approaches. “I wasn’t sure if I should approach you at first, especially considering that I didn’t know whether any of you were responsible for bringing me here, so I apologize for not introducing myself earlier.”

“It’s alright!” Of course Niko is the first to be friendly to the weird dalmatian whatever. “I would’ve been scared too! Did you end up here by accident like us?”

“‘Accident’ is one way to put it,” the dalmatian shrugs. “I was, ah, walking home from school with... a friend, and then the world went black and I felt like I was simultaneously falling and ascending. Then it abruptly stopped and I found myself in this basement. I did consider trying to go upstairs,” he adds, “but I heard somebody stomping around and violently coughing up there, so I was trying to figure out how best to approach the situation when I heard you three coming downstairs and hid.”

That’s... reasonable, actually. But there’s something about this guy that doesn’t feel right to Kris, like he’s just putting on a charming façade as part of some kind of trap he’s setting.

“That about matches up with what I’ve heard so far. I’m Asher,” says Asher, clearly deciding to trust the stranger, “and these two are Kris and Niko.”

“It’s nice to meet you!” Niko does an unfairly cute little bounce.

“I’m Patches, and likewise,” the dalmatian says. “You implied that this has happened to other people than myself?”

“Yeah,” Asher nods, “the same thing happened to both Kris and Niko, and also the Batter upstairs.”

“Oh!” Patches’ eyes widen, and yet it feels so... disingenuous. “That was your friend coughing? My apologies for speaking about them like that, then.”

“He is not my friend,” Kris snaps, revulsion churning in their gut at the thought of being associated with a happily-obedient mass murderer like that, and it’s at that moment that they finally finish processing the newcomer’s name. “Hang on, you’re Patches as in Patches the other serial killer?” Wait, shit, probably wasn’t a good idea to say that out loud.

“Kris!”

“I’m afraid I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Patches says smoothly, but there’s a hint of fearful tension in his eyes as his paw starts inching towards his pocket.

Asher turns to Kris. “They’re mixing you up with someone else, that's all. Kris, please apologize to him,” they say, and then they quickly sign “Not anymore. He’s from the good ending.”

And how do YOU suddenly know that? “You’re lucky I know sign language,” Kris signs back, before returning their attention to Patches. “Fine. Sorry for mixing you up with someone else, I guess,” they sigh reluctantly. They hate having to apologize to people, especially when they didn’t do anything wrong in the first place, and especially when the authority figure telling them to is very clearly making them apologize to publicly humiliate them rather than to make the affected person feel better. (Oh, wait, that’s not what Asher’s doing, they’re trying to stop the serial killer- or former serial killer, because apparently that’s a thing you can be now- from killing them all. They still hate this, and also them.)

“Apology accepted.” Patches dips his head gracefully in Kris’s general direction before returning his attention to Asher. “If this has already happened to them, then explain what’s going on here.”

“I have no idea,” says Asher, slipping into a British accent for some reason. “It’s a mystery!”

Patches just stares at them. “What.”

“Sorry, force of habit.” How and why did they develop a habit of saying “I have no idea, it’s a mystery” in a British accent randomly? “We don’t know. It’s just something that happened, but we have the W- uh, a friend trying to work it out as we speak.”

“Way to dodge giving him an existential crisis vis-à-vis being a fictional character,” Kris mutters. Granted, they handled it without breaking a sweat, but only because they’re pretty sure that “Deltarune” was only used as an interface to control them, like it seems “OneShot” was for Niko. (Assuming they’re interpreting what they saw on Asher’s computer right, anyway...)

“Uh-uh, Kris.” Asher shakes their head. “Don’t use French words around me. In this house, we hate and disrespect the French.”

“What’re the French?” Niko asks.

Asher laughs a little at that. “God, I wish that was me.”

“I’m sorry, what-” Patches’ suddenly-wide eyes flicker back and forth between Kris and Asher. “Can you repeat what you just said about me being a fictional character?!”

Asher sighs and pinches the bridge of their nose. “Okay, how about we head upstairs to discuss this?”

Chapter Text

Patches doesn’t fight Asher on leaving the basement, to be fair. He just quietly follows them up the stairs without objection, a slightly haunted look in his eyes, as if he’s silently reevaluating his whole life.

“Is... he okay?” Niko asks uncertainly as the group reaches the top of the stairs, tilting their head in Patches’ direction.

“I’m-” Patches clears his throat. “I’m fine. Can you open the door already so we can get out of this place?”

Asher complies, and the four file out of the basement just in time to catch the Batter slapping himself in the face with another luck ticket.

“What,” Patches says flatly.

“You’re new,” the Batter observes.

“Yeah, his name’s Patches,” Asher says, reluctantly walking towards the Batter with the broken saw in their hand. “He was- he appeared in the basement, like how you appeared up here.”

The Batter eyes Patches apprehensively. “Okay.”

“I brought you this.” Asher turns on the broken saw, which- as promised- immediately begins whirring scarily and emitting acrid pale gray smoke, and holds it out to him. “Can you breathe the smoke from this?”

The Batter accepts the broken saw, sniffs the smoke dubiously, and nods. “Thanks.” Kris notices, as the Batter holds the saw, that he’s wearing three stark-white rings around his index, middle, and ring fingers, and briefly wonders if that’s supposed to mean anything.

While all this is going on, Patches takes a seat at the table in the center of the kitchen. He looks a little more composed, now, and clasps his paws together with a businesslike expression. “Are you going to explain what Kris meant by that earlier comment?”

“Right,” Asher sighs. “Okay. I think this is everyone who appeared, but just to be safe... we didn’t check the dining room or the garage for other new arrivals yet, and I really don’t want to have to explain all of this over and over again.” They turn their attention to Patches and the Batter. “If we leave you two alone in the kitchen, can I trust you to not kill each other?”

“Why would I do that?” Patches asks, a little too casual.

“Okay,” says the Batter.

“Cool, cool, cool.” Asher snaps their fingers repeatedly, looking very not cool. “Okay, Kris, Niko, let’s get this done quickly.” And with that, the three of them reenter the hallway.

“Fantastic,” Kris hisses as soon as the door’s closed behind them. “So now we’ve got two mass murderers on our hands.”

“Actually, Patches only has a body count of, uh, two or three, I think?” Asher frowns. “Wait, no, we shouldn’t be talking about this stuff in front of Niko.”

“I know what murder is, you know...” Niko frowns.

“Doesn’t mean we should be desensitizing you to it. If I send you home rambling about murder and serial killers, your mama’s probably going to break through to my world through sheer force of will to commit a murder of her own.” Asher marches down the hallway, thrusts open a door, and shoves their head in. “Okay, dining room’s empty,” they announce after a moment.

“And what did you mean by ‘not anymore,’ anyway?” demands Kris as the group starts walking towards the end of the hall and (presumably) the garage door. “You can’t just... stop being a serial killer. I'm pretty sure that's a legally-permanent classification.”

“I mean, the people he killed weren’t dead anymore by the end of the game,” Asher says, which raises more questions than it answers, “but also, he’s- I mean, he’s still not the greatest guy in the world, but I got the game’s good ending where he tries to make up for his actions and change for the better. He’s still gonna be kind of mean and manipulative, don’t get me wrong, but I don’t think he’s gonna murder us.”

“And the Batter?”

“...I... think I can keep him in check,” Asher says, and nothing else.

“He scares me,” Niko says flatly. “I don’t think you should have let him choke to death, that’s- that’s horrible, but...” They swallow hesitantly, looking to the side. “I don’t like being around him.”

“Believe me, I’m not a fan of it either,” sighs Asher as they unlock the garage door and throw it open. “Okay, is there anybody in here, or can we go back to the kitchen and run the expositional monologue from the top?”

Two dull orange eyes spin to face them in the darkness, and Asher sighs and flicks a light switch next to the door. The owner of the eyes, who appears to be a short, chubby bluish-black cat monster (though there’s the same strange persistent sense of this is not a monster like with Patches that Kris can’t quite pin down), immediately lets out a strangled yell and slaps their hands over their eyes. “Aaagh! Just go ahead and blind me, why don’t you?!”

“Ohhhh,” Asher says slowly, clasping their hands together, “right, I forgot, I had Night in the Woods downloaded, too!”

Kris stares at them incredulously. “Okay, if you had a total of five games on your computer, how did you forget about one of them until right now?”

“Leave me alone, I have ADHD!” Which. Fair.

Niko hesitantly hops down the three stairs into the garage (which is completely empty asides from the fifth- and hopefully final- arrival), and Asher hurries to follow them. Kris stays where they are in the doorway, just in case this is another serial killer.

“Hi!” Niko says tentatively. “Um, I’m Niko! You just appeared here, right?”

“More like twenty minutes ago,” the cat-whatever mutters, lowering her hands. “I’ve been stumbling around in the dark trying to figure out a way out of here s-” She finally seems to spot Asher and Kris, and her eyes go wide with shock. (For some inscrutable reason.)

“The light switch is right here,” Kris says, flicking it on and off a few times as a demonstration. “Have you seriously not found it in all that time?”

The stranger’s embarrassed silence is deafening.

“Sorry,” Asher apologizes, clearly deciding to take the lead, “if- if I’d known you were here, I would’ve come to let you out immediately. I’m Asher, and they’re Kris,” they add with a quick gesture in Kris’s direction. “I-I’m sorry, this must all be incredibly confusing to you...”

“I’m Mae,” the still-wide-eyed cat-whatever introduces herself, “and no, actually, I think I know exactly what’s happening!”

“Really?” Niko asks, looking a little impressed.

“This is an alien abduction!” Mae declares, flinging her arms out.

“What,” Kris says flatly.

“You’re aliens, and you abducted me, and now you’re gonna do tests on me!” Mae’s brain finally seems to catch up to what’s coming out of her mouth, and she shrinks back. “Wait, no, that’s bad. Don’t probe me or anything, or... uh... or I’ll bite you! Yeah!”

“‘Probe?’” Niko frowns. “What’s... that mean?”

“I’ll tell you when you’re older,” Asher sighs, dragging a hand down their face. They look like they have every intention of never telling them ever. “We are not aliens, Mae, and we didn’t abduct you. Far as we can tell, you being brought here was a total accident.”

“But you’re...” Mae waves her hands at Kris and Asher. “You’re aliens!”

“We’re humans.” Kris finds they can’t stop their voice from getting even flatter as they speak. “Have you seriously never seen a human before?”

“No? I’ve never seen anything that’s at all like either of you!” Mae protests.

“Oh!” Asher snaps their fingers. “Wait, no, that makes sense, actually. I don’t think humans exist at all in her world.”

“What, did we all get killed off or something?” Kris asks.

“Not... as far as I know? Don’t think that’s part of the lore, anyway. It’s just...” Asher flails their hands uselessly for a moment. “We didn’t evolve, or something like that? We didn’t exist from the start.”

“Wait wait wait wait,” Mae cuts in. “You’re making it sound like you’re from, like, a different universe, or something.”

“Essentially, yes!” Asher shrugs.

“Huh.” Mae puts her hands on her hips and surveys the garage. “Guess that explains why this looks like someone’s garage.”

“It is someone’s garage!”

“Someone’s garage from another universe, apparently!” Mae snaps back to attention, waving her hands frustratedly. “Hang on, no, focus! Put me back in my normal universe!”

Silence.

“...hey, why are you all exchanging guilty glances?”

“Why... don’t you come up into the kitchen?” Asher sighs. “There’s already a few other people in a similar situation to you up there, and I don’t want to have to repeat myself explaining things any more than necessary.”

“No! How did I even get here?!” Mae demands.

“We have no idea!” Asher snaps, loud enough that even Niko flinches. “Okay? Nobody- none of us have any more of a clue how this happened than you! Now, I am tired, stressed, and a lot more scared than I’m letting on, and I am sick of standing here arguing over this, so just come with us so we can all piece together what little information we do have and figure out where we're going to go from here!”

Huh. Kris honestly wasn’t expecting an outburst like that out of them. To be fair (which Kris doesn’t want to be, but still), though, Asher seems to realize they shouldn’t have yelled pretty quickly. “I- I’m sorry, Mae, that was uncalled for,” they say. “I shouldn’t have taken my stress out on you like that. Sorry,” they repeat. They close their eyes and pinch the bridge of their nose with a sigh. “Can you please follow us into the kitchen?”

“...okay,” Mae says, and the group wordlessly leaves the garage.

Nobody says a word until they’re back in the kitchen, which is, thankfully, intact. Patches remains seated, boredly drumming his fingers on the table, and the Batter is still standing next to the counter breathing the cloud of smoke from the broken saw silently. (The saw, on the other hand, is not silent. Very much the opposite, actually.)

“You’re new,” Patches observes. “This place’s starting to feel almost crowded now.”

“Well, she’s the last of them, at least.” Asher doesn’t say anything else, still refusing to look any of the others in the eye.

“I’m Mae,” Mae says with no small amount of self-aware awkwardness. “This, uh... this is pretty crazy, huh?” she offers weakly.

“That’s certainly one way you could put it,” Patches acknowledges. “Oh, and I’m Patches.”

“And that guy over there’s the Batter, great, wonderful, we’re all introduced. Okay!” Asher claps their hands together with a strained smile. “How about we all sit down and I’ll explain to the... more recently-discovered arrivals what little we do know right now?”

With a few mumbles of assent, the group sits down at the table. There’s six of us, Kris notices as Asher pulls out a small stool from under the table for Niko and nods silently in response to their quick thanks. It feels... significant, somehow, that there’s six of them.

“Alright.” Asher sits down next to Niko, hands still clasped together, smile if anything even more strained. “How about we start from the beginni-”

It’s at that precise moment that the smoke alarm directly above the Batter’s chair chooses to go off, making everyone flinch. (Well, except the Batter. He just looks up with an expression of mild annoyance.)

“I hate my life,” Asher sighs, faceplanting directly into the table.

Chapter Text

Once an exasperated Asher removes their face from the table, climbs on their chair to pull down the smoke detector and take out the batteries, then immediately has to stop the Batter from picking up and eating said batteries for some reason (he refuses to explain why, and they're too scared of him to push it), they sit back down in their chair and shake their head, trying to reorient themself. "Okay. Where was I?"

"You were going to explain why we were arbitrarily pulled out of our own worlds and placed in your house," Patches says, a little impatiently.

"Right. Okay." Asher clears their throat. "So, I guess the simplest way to put this is just outright saying that you're the player ch-" And then they stop. "Crap," they say out loud.

Kris's eyes narrow. "What now?"

And how's Asher supposed to concisely explain themself? If this was a matter of fear that the Batter or Patches would react poorly (though they doubt either will be a problem), they'd just need to prepare to knock them out and/or stab them if they did, but they're not the problem. No, the problem...

The problem is Mae.

Because, psychologically-speaking, she's probably the worst-off out of everyone at this table. Because she's the one who was already having issues with perceiving her world as not being real in the first place (probably psychosis, if Asher had to guess, but they're not going to armchair-diagnose it). Because she's the one whose mental issues were initially triggered by a video game in the first place. And Patches or the Batter might react to an existential crisis of this scale with violence, but Mae? She'd be more likely to just start self-destructing then and there.

That would be enough of a problem all by itself. But Asher's already made a bad impression by nearly blinding her with the garage light, then panicking and yelling at her when she tried to set a perfectly reasonable prerequisite for following a stranger to an unknown location, and if they follow that up by breaking her sense of reality, leaving her thinking everything she's ever known is fake- she'd hate them, and she'd have every right to. Mae's one of their favorite characters from... anything, and if that happens, if even she hates them-

Okay, stop, you're spiraling, and also lying to yourself. Let's sort these conflicting thoughts out, be completely honest, and get this mess in order.

Item one: These are your own thoughts. Nobody can hear them but you. Ergo, you can stop obscuring what you are actually thinking about Mae: namely, that you were already gay for the fictional cat beforehand (you fucking furry), and her being real now has only made that worse.

Item two: You're neglecting to think about how Patches and the Batter might react poorly, but that's not because you think it's unlikely either of them will have a mental breakdown. You just think it's less likely than that Mae would, and you're then proceeding to use that as an excuse to ignore them and focus on Mae. (If you need a refresher as to your motive for that, see item one.)

Item three: You aren't trying to stop Mae from having a mental breakdown because you think it's the right thing to do. You're just that desperate for her to not hate you, because even disregarding your stupid crush on her, you haven't had a single meaningful connection with someone your age since middle school.

Item four: To summarize, you're currently on the verge of driving YOURSELF into a panic attack over the prospect of Mae potentially having a mental breakdown, not because of how it'd affect her, but because of how it'd affect YOU.

And. Yeah. Asher would rather die than say the vast majority of that out loud, but regardless of how much of any of that was conscious, it's all true, isn't it? And it sure sounds so much worse when they lay it out concisely like that...

Item five: You are a terrible person.

Well, I've known that was true for months now, what's your point? Asher rhetorically asks themself.

All of this passes through Asher's mind in less than ten seconds (albeit in a somewhat more condensed form), and they realize as they come back to themself that Kris is still staring-but-not-quite-glaring at them, realize that Niko's now looking at them concernedly, realize that Mae, Patches, and the Batter are all expectantly waiting for them to start their explanation.

"Are you finished zoning out yet?" Kris asks. Judging by their tone, they very clearly intend the question to be rhetorical.

Ever since they left the garage, Asher's been doing their best not to look directly at Mae. (If only because they didn't want to stare at her and creep her out.) Now, though, they finally do let their eyes pivot to her and only her. Asher sees Mae, sees her shifting uncomfortably under their stare, finally lets themself fully process all the little details that just make their pointless crush even worse (like how soft her fur looks, like that little endearing ear-twitch thing she does occasionally, like how cute and raspy her voice is), imagine for a moment her eyes steadily widening in empty despondency as her sense of reality dissolves around her, all because of them...

...and they give in.

"I can't do this," Asher whispers, pushing their chair back as they get to their feet.

And whatever the others were expecting, it wasn't that.

"What do you mean, 'I can't do this'?" Kris demands, mimicking Asher's movements with eerie preciseness as they, too, shove their chair out of the way and advance on them. "You're the reason we're all here! We all came out of your computer! You can't just... refuse to make sure everyone's on the same page!" They jab an aggressive finger in the general direction of Patches and Mae- Asher can't help but notices that their gesture very deliberately excludes the Batter. "They deserve to be informed. They deserve to know what's going on, not-" Kris's voice catches for a moment. "-not be completely left in the dark!"

"This isn't a matter of-" Asher starts to snap back at them, before stopping themself. Okay, no, you know what? Just because running away from your problems is the only thing you're good at doesn't mean you can keep doing it forever. They all deserve better. After a moment of internal deliberation, they decide to twist the knife. Mae deserves better.

You're a real bitch, you know that? Asher thinks at themself.

Always have been, Asher thinks back, and then they return their attention to Kris and switch over to sign language, silently thankful that they've already established that Kris knows ASL. "The problem," they sign, "is that she-" They briefly cant their head in Mae's direction. "-almost certainly won't react well to finding out she's from a game."

"What are you talking about?" Kris demands verbally.

"Mae-" They don't have a pre-established name sign for her, so Asher just spells out her name letter-by-letter. "-has a mental illness that causes her to sometimes dissociate and perceive the world around her as being fake or not real." As Kris's expression suddenly shifts to understanding, they add, "To make it worse, the thing that triggered it in the first place was a video game."

WHY ARE YOU TELLING KRIS THIS?! a part of Asher shrieks furiously at themself. THEY DON'T KNOW HER, THEY HAVE NO REASON TO HAVE A DETAILED OVERVIEW OF HER MENTAL HEALTH!

They need context so they don't screw me over to spite me...

YOU ASSHOLE.

Kris, for their part, signs a few expletives, which doesn't help much, but the sentiment's there. "You can't refuse to tell her," they sign.

"I know!" Asher slaps their fingertips against the side of their head too hard signing "know," but the brief stinging sensation is the least of their worries. "I have to approach it delicately, but I-"

"Would you mind translating for those of us who don't know sign language?" Patches interrupts mid-sign.

Mae actually looks a little concerned as she, too, speaks up. "Are you guys talking about me?"

"No, of course not, what'd make you think that?" Asher lies, lowering their hands.

"It's just..." Mae shifts uncomfortably. "I mean, I could be wrong, but... I saw one of those charts for the sign language alphabet, once? I don't remember most of it, but I'm pretty sure you signed my name somewhere in there."

A part of Asher wants to excuse themself to another room for a few minutes and degenerate into a profanity-laden screaming fit (nothing is going according to plan anymore, not that there was much of a plan in the first place), but they push it down the best they can. "One second," they tell her, and then they sign to Kris, "Any advice?"

"No," Kris signs back- thankfully, they do actually look concerned for Mae. At least them hating me doesn't overshadow that. "But I will help if I can."

"Thank you," Asher tells them, and then- reluctantly- they return to their chair, Kris close behind.

"What was that all about?" Niko looks even more concerned than before now.

"Just sorting out how I'm going to explain this, that's all," Asher tells them in as reassuring a tone as they can force out, setting a comforting hand on their shoulder for a moment.

"Well?" Patches crosses his arms. "Begin explaining, then."

"Yeah. Okay." Asher blows out a resigned breath and looks down at their hands, spinning their ace ring in circles with their index and ring finger as they try to figure out where to start.

"Stop stalling," Kris signs at them in their peripheral vision.

"Okay." Asher clasps their hands and looks up. "Before I begin, I need to preface this by saying that none of what I'm about to tell you invalidates any of your existences, or those of your worlds."

"Well, that's not ominous at all," Mae snarks, and there's something about her cadence that- despite literally everything about the situation- makes Asher's heart flutter a little. They mentally slap themself as hard as they can, then readjust when their brain helpfully throws up an unnecessarily gory image of the imaginary blow tearing their lower jaw clean off. STOP STOP STOP STOP STOP.

"The fact that any of you are here right now," Asher continues as if nothing had happened, feeling oddly as if they're watching their body speak on its own from a distance, "is proof that you are real people who exist, and while we don't exactly know how what happened, uh, happened in the first place yet, I would be willing to bet that the same applies to all of the worlds you came from." Okay, no, that's a bald-faced lie. You can't backtrack that now that it's out, but don't do it again.

"Get on with it already!" Patches all but shouts, and at that, a petty burst of spitefulness rears its ugly head within Asher. "Fine," they tell him, keeping their voice as level and neutral as they can. "You are the player character in a video game on my laptop- and Mae, Batter, the same thing goes for both of you."

Shocked silence dominates- and so, with one final glance at Mae, Asher opens their mouth again and begins to dig their own grave.

(But then again, they already did that last November, didn't they?)

Chapter Text

Asher finishes explaining quickly, something in their eyes saying that they just want this whole thing to be over with already, that they wanted it to be over with hours ago.

But it wasn't. None of the conditions required for them to have to explain any of this even existed "hours ago." So here's how the last of their puppets react:

The Batter had already recognized his state of being on some level even back in the game. (If only because Zacharie wouldn't stop breaking the fourth wall.) And even if he knew for certain that everything about his old world had been fake and completely devoid of meaning... well, he's here in the real world now, isn't he? So anything he does from now on; he can be assured a hundredfold of its meaningfulness... no, not just that, but its holiness as well.

And so, the Batter adjusts the still-whirring saw in his hands, thoughtfully breathes out a cloud of smoke, and then locks eyes with Asher. "Okay," he says, and nothing else.

Asher looks relieved by his reaction. (Or lack thereof.) That's good. If they're content, that's good. Now the Batter just needs to wait for these pointless scenes to be over and done with so that he may stop this pretense and begin his sacred mission anew in their strange, pure-but-not-pure world as promised.

No, this information changes nothing about their objectives. Not at all.

Patches' first reaction isn't to think that he isn't real. Nor is it to think that his world wasn't real, that his past before arriving here was just prewritten memories placed in his head by complete strangers. Nor is it to think that none of the people he knew were real, and thus that he should have gone through with killing them all because there would be no consequences.

Instead, something seizes and cracks in Patches' head, in his chest, and he looks up at Asher through eyes he dimly recognizes are stretched too wide. "So what you're saying..." Something feels devoutly wrong in his mind, like everything that makes him him has been overwhelmed by chittering black static, and he forces it back and tries to remember what he was going to say. "What you're saying is that it required straight-up divine intervention for me to become a decent person."

"No!" Asher protests. (Their objection's nigh-immediate, to their credit.) "The game only gave me choices you could've made on your own anyway, and besides, I'm not- I'm not divine or anything, Patches-"

"Yes, you are," the Batter interrupts neutrally, barely audible over the whir of the little machine in his hands. (Barely audible over the sound of Patches' slowly-quickening breathing.) "It's the nature of your role."

Asher wheels on him, clearly forgetting about Patches in a heartbeat. "We have enough problems here already, Batter," and their voice sounds so much louder than Patches knows it is, "you encouraging me to tip over into outright theomania is the last thing we need!"

Patches knows what the definition of theomania is, he looked it up once when he was younger after seeing it in a book. "A delusional mental illness in which a person believes themself to be a god or chosen by a god to carry out a holy task." And now, knowing what he knows...

Well. In the case that Asher were a theomaniac, if there was any one person on this planet whose delusions were justified, Patches thinks it would be them.

Patches stands, nearly toppling his chair as he shoves it back, pretends not to notice the barely-repressed flinches from Kris, Asher, and Niko. (And it makes sense now, doesn't it, Kris calling him a serial killer back in the basement? Of course Asher wouldn't leave them in the dark if they thought there was someone dangerous in their house.) "I..."

Patches freezes in place as he locks eyes with Asher. Their eyes are boring into him with a relentless ferocity, as if there is nothing to their existence but their eyes, as if he's about to drown in them... no, as if their eyes are actively drowning him, as if they're trying to force him underwater, choke his every secret from his crushed lungs, and leave his hollowed-out body drifting limply once he is of no more use-

Patches swallows and makes himself speak. "I just need a moment," he manages, a distracted part of himself almost impressed by how calm he sounds when he says it. And then he walks as briskly as he can towards the kitchen doorway, throws it open, and tries not to collapse against the wall.

After a moment, Patches reaches out, about to close the door behind him, but then he stops himself. Asher doesn't trust him- why would they, after watching him as an unrepentant murderer, after seeing him only begin to change his ways once they took control of him? Patches isn't stupid, he saw the knives that Asher and Kris carry and the metal club the Batter keeps at his side. If he gets out of their sight, if they think he's trying to escape, if-

Well. With him not even having Felix's wand at his disposal anymore (he'd wordlessly returned it to its proper owner after reviving everyone), the three of them would make short work of him. And while Patches certainly fears whatever equivalent to Inferno Asher's world may contain, what terrifies him even more is the thought that it might not even have an afterlife at all- that, if he dies here, he simply ceases to exist.

So, Patches keeps himself in sight of everyone in the kitchen, turns his back on them, and tries not to let the juddery overwhelmed sobs that cut their way up his throat become audible.

Mae thinks she understands what Asher and Kris were signing at each other about now. She doesn't know basically any sign language, sure, but given the context, given Asher's obvious lie that they weren't talking about her, given that she now knows for sure that Asher knows all about the Incident, she's pretty sure they were discussing how to tell her the truth without triggering a psychotic break.

A show of kindness like that probably should've endeared Asher to Mae. (That's how it's supposed to work, right?) But now, knowing that they've been watching her and pushing her back and forth since she set foot back in Possum Springs, remembering how many stupid things she said and realizing that they must've been picking all the worst dialogue options (did they think it was funny or something?!), realizing just how much they know about her despite being a total stranger...

Well. Mae doesn't think they're just some creepy weirdo anymore. Instead, she thinks she's outright starting to hate Asher a little.

The Batter's already shrugged off Asher's statement with a simple shift of his weird four eyes and an "Okay," Patches is out in the hallway very blatantly trying not to cry too hard, and Mae just feels... numb. She knows that the revelation that she's a fictional character, that everyone she knows is as well, that her whole world is just a video game, should break her. It should've already broken her. But there's something inside her, a blackened, tremoring something that won't let her cave in just yet.

Mae remembers, now, remembers it with total clarity: her half-spite-driven monologue at what she's pretty sure was the Black Goat. She remembers telling it that she wants her existence to hurt, because that means it meant something, that she is something.

And she is something. She can feel the air filling her lungs with each breath she takes, she can feel the unmoving chafe of her clothes against her fur and skin, she can feel the tablecloth under her hands, she can feel the chill air of Asher's kitchen against her nose, she can feel... reality. And it feels no different than anything did back in her world, not at all. So that means her world's something that exists, and so is she. (Right?)

("Pretty amazing to be something, at least...")

Mae looks across the table to Asher, and now it's their turn to squirm uncomfortably under her stare. She's struck by a realization, suddenly, as the thought that Asher must've been picking all the worst dialogue options resurfaces- watching her go through her life slowly but steadily making everything worse for everyone must've been unbearable. (She must be unbearable.) And then, when she did appear in Asher's house, they left her in their pitch-black garage for what felt like half an hour, yelled at her, refused to look her in the eye, and when they finally did they just stared.

Her hatred of Asher isn't one-sided, Mae realizes. They must've hated her since before she even knew they existed.

Mae has two questions to ask Asher, now, as well as an order to ask them in- the second one's almost certainly going to start a fight, verbal or otherwise, so it'd probably be smarter to get the first one answered beforehand while Asher's in a more agreeable mood. "Asher?" she asks.

Asher had previously been looking at Patches in the doorway in a clear attempt to not have to make eye contact with her. Now, as their eyes flicker back to her, there's something unreadable that passes over their face for a moment, as if just being reminded Mae exists annoys them. "Yeah?" they ask, a little quickly, a little sharply.

To Mae's muted dismay, it's the wrong question that comes out when she opens her mouth. "Why do you hate me so much?"

(Amidst her internal anger that she's probably never going to get the important question answered now, there's a part of Mae that's oddly relieved by her slipup- relieved that now, when she says stupid things, at least she's the only one controlling that.)

The fact that Mae, out of everyone, had the best reaction (at least, on the surface level) to being told she's the player character in a video game was a huge surprise to Asher. What's even more surprising, though, is the next thing out of her mouth- a query as to why they hate her.

"I- what-" Asher sputters, genuinely caught off guard by that. Well, at least I'm good at hiding my dumbass crush on her! part of them throws up idiotically. One point for me! "I don't hate you, Mae! Why- why would you think that?"

"Uh, let's see..." There's something spiteful and cutting in Mae's voice as she leans back in her chair. "You kept making me say all the bad dialogue options, you left me in your garage for like an hour, you screamed at me, and you won't look at me except to glare at me. What the hell else am I supposed to get from that?"

There's a lot to unpack there, but Asher decides to start from the beginning and work through what they can remember from there afterwards. "I didn't pick the worst dialogue options, Mae, I tried to pick the best one every time! It's just that a lot of the time, my only choices were 'bad' and 'less bad.'"

"You're lying." That stings, actually, mainly because Asher probably would've said the exact same thing even if they had been intentionally picking the worst dialogue options. "Why would someone make a game like that?"

"Because a lot of the time, there isn't a good answer to the kinds of questions the other ch- people would ask!" Asher realizes they're raising their voice, lowers it immediately. "And other times, it was-" They falter, unsure how to phrase this without throwing Mae's poor mental health out there for everyone to know about. (Just telling Kris was bad enough.) "Look, when you're..." They wiggle their hand aimlessly next to their head for a moment and hope it gets the point across. "A lot of the time, your brain only throws out 'bad' and 'less bad' things for you to say. It happens a lot to me, too, more than I'd care to admit. That's just how reality works."

Mae looks like there's a snarky remark about the apparent subjectivity of her world's reality on the tip of her tongue- thankfully, though, she holds it back, and Asher decides to speak up again before she can think twice about letting it out. "Let me be, uh, as unambiguous about this as possible: I don't hate you, Mae. I..." Fuck it. "To be perfectly honest, even before all of this you were one of my favorite characters, period," they say, feeling their face warm and desperately hoping they're not visibly blushing.

Mae actually looks a little caught off-guard by that. "Seriously?"

"Seriously!" Asher nods as emphatically as they can without it looking weirdly enthusiastic. "You're a fundamentally good person, Mae, and I know it's probably really weird to hear that coming from a total stranger, but you are. You deserve a lot better than what you got, and if there'd been an ending where- if there'd been an option to get you a conventionally happy ending, I would've gone back and replayed as much of the game as necessary to make it happen." And that, for once, is not a lie.

"And yet you didn't do the same for me," Kris drawls, making Asher flinch- for the past few minutes, they'd genuinely forgotten anyone existed anywhere in the world except for themself and Mae. (In their defense, Kris, Niko, and the Batter had all been kind of awkwardly silent the whole time.) "I see how it is."

"I went true pacifist for the entirety of both Dark Worlds, Kris!" There's a part of Asher that's weirdly, genuinely, grateful for the interruption. "That was the 'best' you were going to get!" They glance over at the Batter for a moment, worried about whether he might react poorly to that affirmation (they did use the Judge to kill him in the end, even if he's apparently okay with it now), but all he does is tilt his head at them confusedly.

"You can't not hate me at least a little, Asher!" Mae tries hesitantly. "What about..." Her voice falters for a moment. "What about the Incident?"

It's like she wants me to tell her I hate her or something. "Trust me when I say I probably wouldn't've handled that any better than you," Asher says. You would've handled it worse, actually- because Mae didn't fully know what she was doing until it was too late, but you? You were very, very aware of what you did to Dad and Abia-

Asher forces their face into total flat neutrality. STOP BLAMING YOURSELF FOR THAT. You were not in control of what happened, and the lack of a single sentence from a delirious, concussed Asher wouldn't have changed anything either way.

"What incident?" Niko asks, and holy shit no Asher is not trotting that out in front of them. "That's private," they tell them, voice a little too stern. "Frankly, I shouldn't know about it either. If Mae ever wants to bring it up, that's her business, but otherwise, don't bother her about it, okay?"

There's no unspoken gratefulness or anything on Mae's face when Asher glances back to her, but they shove down the selfish, acrid part of them furious about its absence- she is not obligated to be grateful to you for doing the bare minimum. "Any other questions you had about choices I made, while we're on the topic?" they ask her, forcing their voice to stay neutral.

"Yeah, actually... how come you had me spend the first few days hanging out with Bea, then immediately spent the whole rest of everything with Gregg?" Mae asks.

"Honestly?" Asher lies. "It just felt like I was neglecting him, and then I accidentally overcompensated because I thought the game was longer." Because what are they supposed to tell Mae, the truth? That they'd been idly scrolling through the Night in the Woods tag a little after they started playing the game, happened upon a post that sort of implied there'd be a one-off romantic interest for Mae towards the end of Bea's route, and because Asher is first and foremost jealous and petty they immediately panicked and spent the entire rest of the game avoiding Bea to stop that from happening? No, that'd completely sabotage their probably-futile attempt to make Mae think they're not a total asshole.

"Hey, I know I'm interrupting the 'explaining Asher's dumb decisions' hour or whatever this turned into, but, uh..." Kris gestures to the hallway, where Patches is still standing, his back to the kitchen door, (mostly) silently shuddering.

"Oh. Yeah." Asher's not going to admit out loud that they completely forgot about him until now. "I should probably do something about that," they say, starting to get up, but Kris beats them to it. "I'll do it," they say.

Asher pauses, eyeing them curiously. What's got them wanting to help Patches out all of a sudden? "Are you sure?" they ask. "You remember the kind of person he is, right?"

"I remember," Kris says, and there's something stony in their eyes as they speak. "But I think I can calm him down? I want to try, anyway."

"I can come with." Asher leaves it at just a suggestion.

"No. I can handle this by myself." And with that, Kris strides off towards the doorway.

This is stupid, this is stupid, this is stupid, Kris chants at themself as they walk towards the open door, towards Patches' shaking form. And it is stupid, but as long as they keep that acknowledgement internal, things should be fine, right? (Things will not be fine!)

Against their better judgement, Kris swings the door shut behind themself, inadvertently plunging the hallway into near-total darkness save for the lights from the other houses and the occasional car outside. "Figured you'd want some privacy?" they say, though it comes out sounding more like a question. What an opening, Kris.

Patches takes a moment to process that they're even there. "Oh." His eyes dart between them and the door with uncharacteristic nervousness as he turns around. "You should probably open that, Asher's going to be concerned if they can't keep an eye on me."

"Asher can go fuck themself," Kris says bluntly, leaning back against the now-closed door. "So..." This is stupid this is stupid this is stupid. "Do you need to be comforted right now, or you want solutions to whatever your problem is?"

Patches blinks uncomprehendingly at Kris. "What?"

"Look, you don't have to tell me what, specifically, is going on if you don't want to, but you're clearly not doing well with the whole..." Kris flutters their hands dramatically, which does make Patches crack a weak grin. "Revelation thingy."

"It's..." Patches sighs. "Well, you heard what I said." (Kris did hear, but they've since forgotten. Their memory's like Swiss cheese in a silly straw on a good day.) "You know I'm a serial killer already, so there's no point in being dishonest about it, at least. It took Asher taking control of me after two games' worth of butchery for me to acquire a moral compass. I needed someone controlling my every action for a full day to become a decent person, which..." He laughs, a little rattly. "Doesn't exactly say many good things about me, does it?"

"Right, okay." Kris hastily pulls together everything they know about Patches, everything they know about Asher, everything they know about the games Asher had downloaded, and realizes in the process that Asher probably would've been a lot better at calming Patches down given that they actually know anything about him. Well, too late to back out now, Kris. "So, first off, Asher spent two days controlling everything I did, and I'm probably a worse person for it if anything, so don't act like they're some paragon of purity or whatever. Second, the fact that you're even contemplating the possibility that you're a bad person means you're better than you're g... uh..." Kris very quickly realizes that they have no idea where they're going with this. "I am not arguing this well, am I?"

For just a moment, there's a genuine twinkle in Patches' eyes in the dim, dim hallway. "At least you're self-aware about it. That's more than I would've asked for."

"Okay, let me start over." And so, Kris does. "If your game operates anything like mine did, the options Asher has for controlling you are all things you would've been likely to do anyway- I think they even said something to that extent earlier." And, yeah, a lot of the things Asher chose (at least in the Dark Worlds) were things Kris probably would've done anyway. (Doesn't change that they were controlling them, but still.) "If the option existed for you to realize the whole serial killer thing was bad and try to be a good person, then it would've existed regardless of whether Asher was a factor."

Patches says nothing in response, but there does appear to be something resembling hope on his face now.

Kris decides to change tack. "From what I can tell, you didn't know Asher existed in any capacity until now, right?"

"No, but I don't see how that's relevant?"

"Well, in the moment, why did you think you were deciding to not be a murderer anymore?" Kris prods.

"I..." Patches shifts uneasily, looks away from Kris. "I don't know. I tried to rationalize it, a few times, that it'd be too easy, or that I'd be caught, or that I could kill them some other day, but I think it boiled down to just... not wanting to."

"And that was unspoken?" At Patches' questioning nod, Kris continues, "As far as I can tell, Asher was never able to control what any of us thought in our respective games- just what we said or did." They sure didn't control Kris's thoughts, at least. "So, you would've had the thought that you didn't want to kill anyone regardless of Asher's presence," they conclude, "and if the thought was there, you probably would've acted on it anyway. That's just basic psychology." Kris knows basically nothing about psychology, but they sound like they know what they're talking about and that's half the battle.

"I suppose that does make me feel somewhat better," Patches admits, tone a little begrudging. "Thank you, Kris. You-" He cuts himself off, then, after a moment, continues anyway. "You remind me of the kind of person I was before I got all..." He makes a stabbing motion. "You know."

"...not really sure if that's a compliment, but thanks?"

Patches' laugh at that is actually genuine, and he raises his paw for a moment as if he's about to playfully punch them in the shoulder before dropping it, clearly thinking better of it. "We should get back in there before Asher starts thinking I'm in the process of shoving your brutally-stabbed body into a woodchipper or something," he jokes.

And, strangely, Kris finds that the joke doesn't make them tense up at all, no more than it would've if it had come from Susie. "That's probably for the best, yeah," they say, and so they open the door and reenter the kitchen, Patches right behind them.

Chapter Text

Despite themself, there was a decent part of Asher worried that Patches was going to murder Kris the moment the door closed, so they're more than a little relieved when the door opens and Kris and Patches reenter the kitchen, visibly unharmed, and take their seats again.

"Okay!" Mae shuts her journal (she'd been scribbling away in it while Kris was gone, during which time Asher had to continuously stifle the impulse to lean across the table and see what she was drawing). "So, I had another question also, now that they're back. Have there ever been any cases of video game worlds being 'real' before, or at least characters in them being real?" she asks Asher.

Asher scours their memory and finds themself nodding. "A few that I was aware of, yeah. Most of the stories about them were, uh..." They hesitate for a moment as they look for the right word. "...thought to be embellished or outright false by a lot of people, but yeah."

"Well, now I'm curious." Patches, thankfully, looks a lot calmer than he was when he left the kitchen. "Elaborate, if you please?"

"Right!" Asher's not bringing up what happened to Lionel Snill (or, at least, what the conspiracy theorists say happened), they don't need any of the others internalizing the implications of that, but... "Well, there's been a general spike in people claiming characters in games were self-aware since... the early 2010s, I think? Only specific examples I can remember off the top of my head are, uh... after one of the devs leaked the original Secrets of Legendaria script and plot, there were some theories going around that the characters intentionally sabotaged the release livestream, and also, my..." Asher does not flinch, does not recoil, does not curl in on themself. They keep their body stiff and unmoving, their face neutral and placid, and their eyes locked on nothing in particular. "Hell, even my little sister downloaded this one weird game I'm half-sure was self-aware a while back?" Their voice is too airy, too casual, but they can't force it to be anything else. "Something that started with an I, I don't remember. She put it on a thumb drive and got me to play it, too, but..." They try to shrug nonchalantly. "ADHD brain. I got up to the third act, then totally forgot about it."

"Wait, do you think the player character from that could've come here, too?" Kris asks, sudden concern tracing across their face.

"Doubt it." Asher shrugs again, a little more relaxedly now- that, at least, they're pretty confident about. "A company rep came around a little afterwards and took it- she said the game was uploaded early by a disgruntled ex-employee or something and it was illegal to have it under some computer fraud act or whatever."

"That sounds sketchy as hell," Mae frowns.

"I am well aware, believe me." Asher raises their hands. "I was gonna refuse, tell her exactly where she could shove her stupid expensive sunglasses, but my mom was in the house and made me hand the thumb drive over. Turns out the game apparently came from the same company she works for, if you can believe it..."

Kris crosses their arms. "Aaaand Asher's mom works for an evil video game corporation. Why does this not surprise me?" They shrug. "Like mother, like child, I suppose..."

"I resent your insinuation that I would ever voluntarily work for a corporation," Asher snorts. "Also, 'evil' and 'corporation' are essentially synonymous, Kris, you should know this."

"Okay, maybe you're not completely irredeemable," Kris concedes.

Patches nods in solemn agreement. "Something, something, workers of the world unite, you have nothing to lose but your chains, et cetera ad infinitum."

"Smash capitalism!" Mae shouts enthusiastically (loud enough that Niko flinches), throwing her arms in the air.

"What's 'capitalism'?" the Batter and Niko ask simultaneously, which just makes everyone else at the table start cracking up.

"I've had a sudden neuron fire," Patches pipes up as the laughter starts to die down, "and I think it's best if I say it now before I forget it."

"What's on your mind?" Asher asks him.

"There's an assumption we all seem to be making that, if incorrect, would completely invalidate any pretenses of us not being real," Patches says. "Namely, the assumption that we originated from Asher's computer just because we happen to match up with the games they have installed." He spreads his paws. "It's equally possible that we could all have been transported here from alternate universes that, by mere chance, match up with their experiences playing these games- or maybe they don't even completely match," he adds after a moment. "If we compare a blow-by-blow analysis of our own experiences and theirs, it's entirely possible we'd find some discrepancies."

Kris raises an eyebrow, barely visible under their bangs. "That... feels a little contrived."

"Well, according to multiverse theory, there's universes for an infinite amount of possibilities, no matter how unlikely," Patches reminds them. "So there should be an infinite amount of universes where my proposed scenario is happening, or at least one- and if those universes exist, why shouldn't this be one of them?"

"Well, the World Machine should have an answer one way or another soon enough," Asher shrugs. They're personally disinclined to believe Patches' theory, as the World Machine's apparent self-awareness seems to invalidate it, but they won't say that out loud. Any amount of additional points that'll stop anyone from having a mental breakdown are good.

"The World Machine could've had enough time to figure out how everyone got here by now," Niko suggests. "It might've even figured out how to get everyone back to their own worlds!"

"Maybe," Asher allows, "but I have a feeling if we leave to go check, these people will probably burn the rest of the house down before we get back."

"Only to spite you," Kris says, at the same time that Mae looks up from her journal (she's back to doodling in it again) to object loudly and Patches smirks and says something snarky-sounding, but given that they were talking at the same time Asher has no idea what either of them said and is honestly only half-sure of what Kris said. Auditory processing disorder FTW.

"I could go check on it by myself?" Niko suggests hesitantly.

Asher doesn't like the idea of letting Niko be by themself for too long, especially given the circumstances, but everybody who got brought here is in one room now, so it's not as if they'd be in any danger... "You sure, sunshine?"

Niko nods determinedly. "There's nobody else in the house, right? I wouldn't be in any danger, and I'll come right back as soon as I get an answer, I promise."

"I'm insulted by your assumption that Asher would be able to keep us in check-" Kris starts to scoff.

"But that's their purpose," the Batter interrupts, making Mae jump and inch her chair away from him a little.

Kris, for their part, is either unintimidated or doing a good job pretending to be. "Asher's only 'purpose' is being an assh-"

"You swear in front of Niko one more time, and I'm going to... I don't know, set up a swear jar or something," Asher threatens.

"It's okay, I already knew that one..." Niko says quietly, shifting awkwardly on their stool.

"Do not take that as a blank check to say that specific word in front of them," Asher warns.

"Okay," the Batter says, the broken saw whirring away annoyingly right in front of his face. "I won't say 'asshole' in front of Niko."

Asher valiantly resists the urge to slam their face into the table again. Their nose and forehead somehow still sting a little from the first time. "Niko, can you please go check on the World Machine before I commit a homicide?"

Thankfully, Niko doesn't ask what homicide is. "Okay! I'll be right back." And with that, they hop down from their stool and go running off down the hallway.

"So, is Niko, like... your kid?" Mae asks Asher as Niko's footsteps grow increasingly inaudible.

"No, they're not, but... I wouldn't mind that, honestly," Asher admits. If the option presented itself, they'd adopt Niko in a heartbeat... not if it meant keeping them here away from their real family, though. (At least, that's what they'll tell themself.) "I befriended them when I pl- during our first encounter with the World Machine. We were pretty close during that time, even if I didn't... wasn't physically present."

"They're the same as the rest of us, aren't they?" Patches asks casually, picking at his nails. "Either a self-aware game character or an alternate universe analogue to a character, that is," he adds after a moment.

Asher listens carefully for a moment, then decides that Niko's definitely out of earshot by this point. "Yeah, probably," they admit with a little sigh. "At least, unless the OneShot game devs were lying and it really was some code floating around in the void that they happened upon, then decided to... I don't know, copy and sell or something?"

"And do you have any intention of telling them?" asks Patches critically.

"I..." Asher sighs again, looks down at their hands. "No, I don't think it'd be a good idea. I already have a precedent for how Niko reacted when they thought they weren't real, in the World Machine's simulation- they almost broke down then and there. Even if it were me explaining it to them, I don't think they'd take it well."

"We reacted pretty decently," Kris says.

"No, you and the Batter did." Kris looks a little disconcerted at the mere prospect of them and the Batter having anything in common. "Furthermore, Niko's just a kid. Patches is sixteen, Mae's twenty, and you're... how old are you, Kris?"

"Sixteen."

"And I don't even know how old the Batter is, but I'm pretty sure he's an adult." The Batter, for his part, just tilts his head confusedly, as if the mere idea of age is a foreign concept to him. "Niko, on the other hand, is eight years old."

"Oh, shit," Mae says.

"Yeah." Asher nods. "So forgive me for coddling them a little."

"I wouldn't call it 'coddling,' necessarily?" Patches crosses his arms. "You're being a bit overprotective, perhaps, but I don't think you're outright coddling Niko. Though I do find myself curious as to whether your protectiveness is just because they're small, young, and in need of protection," he begins listing on his fingers, "because you see them as a surrogate for the child you don't have, because you're the kind of person who compulsively seeks out-"

"Okay, can it, Patches," Asher interrupts, making a dismissive gesture at him. "If I wanted to get an amateur psychoanalysis from some know-it-all twink, I would've kept going to therapy." Dr. Terzić was actually pretty good at his job, but mocking the edgy murderchild is funny, so shut.

Patches hisses in what sounds like genuine offense. "I am not stuck in that inferior twink body anymore!"

Asher grins like an asshole. "Funny, and here I thought only cats hissed. No offense, Mae," they add hastily.

"None... taken...?"

"I still have my knife, you know," Patches threatens.

"I have a knife also, what's your point?"

As they argue/banter, the Batter once more jarringly interrupts the current scene by doing something weird and/or distressing- this time, he silently takes the still-smoking saw and abruptly shoves it into his mouth.

"Hey, hey, no- what are you-" Asher demands, scrambling to their feet, Patches and his inferior twink body (or lack thereof) immediately forgotten. "What did I say about the smoke detector batteries?"

"This isn't a battery," says the Batter, barely understandable through the saw in his mouth, and proceeds to swallow it, his throat visibly distending as he does. The saw's whirring immediately grows much more muffled, though the cloud of smoke surrounding the Batter is slower to dissipate. "It's more efficient this way," he informs the confused and/or horrified faces surrounding him, a little defensively. "The smoke directly reaches my lungs like this, and my hands are free."

"I- y-" Asher stutters uselessly, looking back and forth between the Batter and the others before slumping back into their chair. "I... have no idea how your anatomy functions, so I'm going to just assume that works somehow, but also, please stop doing disturbing things like this." They're not willing to give him a stronger command. Not with him staring at them like that.

"I mean, it's kind of funny?" Mae says, though she still looks a little grossed out. "He literally just shoved whatever that smoking thing was down his throat, no hesitation."

"It's a broken electrical saw, apparently," says Kris.

"...uh, what?!"

"He has to breathe smoke to survive," Asher explains, trying not to think about how cute Mae's confused expression is. "It's what the air in his world's made of."

"Oh." Mae nods. "I figured it was something weird like th-"

"This is a waste of time," the Batter decides abruptly. He points at Asher, his too-long finger uncomfortably close to their face. "You said this world is impure. We need to fix that."

"Didn't you do a whole monologue about how you had realized you're too impure to purify the world or something?" Kris points out, leaning back in their chair disrespectfully.

"Yes," the Batter acknowledges slowly, lowering his hand, "but I think I'm the best option we have right now."

"Hey hi hello stop please," Mae says in one quick burst, waving her hands in the air. "What does 'purify' mean?"

"Kill everything and anything, all of the time," Kris informs her in a slightly sing-song voice, which gets a smirk out of Patches.

"Appreciate the Bo Burnham reference," Asher acknowledges, pointing at them, "but it's- that's kind of an oversimplification?"

The Batter nods, seemingly pleased with their statement. "I only purify the specters, the impures. Ours is a holy mission."

"Still sounds like mass murder to me, and why are you suddenly defending him?!" Kris demands. They slam their hand down on the table as they wheel on Asher, their chair screeching underneath them.

And what's Asher supposed to say to that? Fear? That fear governs them even now, just like it did when they were given the implicit choice to let their sister die in their stead and took it immediately-

No, stop, you were concussed and delirious, you had no idea what you were seeing. That's not what happened! Asher reminds themself furiously. They look across the table at the Batter again, forcing themself to stare directly at his face for the first time. He regards them silently with dead ice-blue eyes over his distended, gaping, tooth-riddled jaws, his massive, crooked hands lying together on the table before him, unmoving. Thin black strings, shadowy, incorporeal, and nigh-transparent, stretch from his every limb and from the back of his head and the nape of his neck, and Asher can't bring themself to move their head and see what they're attached to. (Or if they're attached to anything at all anymore.)

"Asher?"

Asher finds they can't muster a response.

Chapter Text

[...To sum all that up, I don't have any new information to offer you. I'm sorry, Niko.]

"It's okay," Niko sighs, but they still slump a little in Asher's swivel chair (which they are now very sure is definitely broken). "I kind of expected that, honestly..."

[But you've got information for me, don't you?]

[The characters from the other games. They didn't hurt anyone, did they?]

"No, but they're kind of creepy..." Niko shudders a little. "Well, the Batter's creepy," they correct. "Patches and Mae are okay, but I think Asher said Patches had killed people before? They did say he was trying to make up for it, though..." they remember. Not that they're sure how one would go about making up for something like that.

[I've gone through Asher's save files for the game he's from, and that sounds accurate.]

[But the Batter didn't attack anyone? I was concerned about how he might react to the ending Asher chose.]

"No, he, um..." Niko fidgets hesitantly. "The Batter... thanked Asher for letting him die, actually. He said it was the only way he would've figured out he 'wasn't pure enough' to purify the world, but... then he sort of acted like he wanted to go out and do that anyway?"

[Oh no.]

[Niko, he cannot be allowed to go outside.]

"No, I think Asher's already on that!" Niko reassures the World Machine. "The Batter seems to listen to them? He doesn't talk much, or do much, actually, but that's how it feels to me."

[He's probably bored. From what I can see, the Batter's a very single-minded man.]

[He believes that his sole purpose is to purify the whole world.]

"Which just means he attacks everyone who's even a little hostile?"

[In practice, yes, and even beyond that...]

[Regardless.]

[How are you holding up, Niko? I haven't really had a chance to check in with you.]

[Are you coping alright with... all of this?]

"I... I don't really know," Niko admits. They lower their hands to their scarf, wringing its edges in their hands. There's a loose thread poking out of the side, and despite how their mama always tells them not to pull on those, they wrap it around one finger and start tugging anyway. "I really wanted to see Asher again, but not like this. I thought if I got to meet them for real, it'd be... simpler than this, I guess? And I thought they'd be the one coming to my world," they added. "That's how I always imagined it, anyway."

[Was this something you thought about a lot?]

"Yeah," Niko admits. The thread goes taut, digging uncomfortably into their finger. "But I never thought it'd be anything like this. Kris and the Batter, they're... and what even happened with them and Asher?" they ask hesitantly. They think they know already, at least from what Kris and Asher have said, but they need to know for sure, need to hear it from the World Machine. (Because Kris might exaggerate to make Asher look bad, and Asher might sugarcoat it so they don't scare Niko, but the World Machine won't do either.)

[You already know that, I think.]

[They had similar roles to yours in their own worlds, just with rather less autonomy.]

[With the Batter, it was voluntary, with Kris... less so.]

"That's what I thought, yeah..." Niko wants so badly to minimize the World Machine on the screen, open Kris and the Batter's games, see them for themself, but... well. They're most definitely not a cat, but the old saying about curiosity refuses to leave their head.

[Niko?]

"I don't know how to feel about this!" Niko bursts out. "Asher said they didn't know that Kris or the Batter were real, but... I mean, how could they not have known?" There's uncomfortably-warm tears pricking at the corners of their eyes, they realize, and they let the thread dig deeper into their finger to give them some, any distraction. Niko doesn't want to say any of this, doesn't want to let it out, doesn't want to even think it, but now that it's just them and the World Machine alone the words are flooding out in an ugly tide. "B-because it makes me think- it makes me think, Asher either really has no idea what's going on with- with anything, or... or they're lying, and I don't know which is scarier."

[Niko...]

[Niko, listen to me.]

[While I can't speak for Asher, I don't think either of those are the case.]

Now that it's all out, now that the words are out in the open, hot shame roils through Niko, and they pull the thread tighter. There's a white crease in their skin underneath it now. "What do you mean?" they ask, voice barely a whisper.

[I think Asher was being truthful about not knowing Kris or the Batter were real, and I can't see how they could have been expected to know beforehand.]

[They simply have a taste for video games like that, from what I can see?]

[Games that break the fourth wall, that address the player's existence in one way or another.]

Niko doesn't have the time to think about regrets. They just ask the question before they can stop themself. "And you're one of those, aren't you?" They swallow hesitantly. "Neither of us are really real, are we?"

[Actually, I'd argue that you're the only one of us who is indisputably real, asides from Asher.]

[You weren't spontaneously created- I had to pull you from your original world.]

[I would know if you weren't "real." Myself... I can't say.]

"But did you actually reach out and grab me from a different world?" Niko can't stop themself from asking. "Or do you just think that's what you did?"

[I...]

That looks to have actually caught the World Machine off guard.

[No. I will not allow you to doubt your reality.]

[I did not spontaneously generate you. I would not have been able to simulate the world around you in the first place without you being a real person.]

[I can even show you the data readouts and everything to prove it, though admittedly I'm not sure much of it would be understandable to you.]

There's a messy, barbed part of Niko that wants to keep pushing, wants to make the World Machine at least acknowledge the possibility that they might not be real. But...

[Wait.]

The sudden look of apprehension on the little representation of the World Machine's face draws Niko's attention from their downward spiral immediately. "What's wrong?" they ask, pulling their finger out from the looped thread. Ow.

[I just realized, with all this talk about reality and everything, I completely forgot to ask...]

[Did whatever happened keep Luke alive, like with the Batter? Or did he appear as...]

[...as he would have been in the end?]

Huh? "Luke?" Niko frowns, scooting forwards on the chair a little- there was a loose screw digging into their leg. "Who's Luke?"

[Luke Carder? He was the player character in Inscryption. I'd think you would get along quite well with him, actually, he seemed nice.]

[Is he... not present?]

"No? There isn't any 'Luke' here," says Niko, sudden dread swirling in their gut. "It's just me, Kris, the Batter, Patches, and Mae. Well, and Asher," they add, "but they were already here..."

[But that's not right.]

[There's a sixth game downloaded on Asher's computer, called Inscryption.]

[I saw a similar pulse come from it, why wouldn't it be following the same rules?]

[I need to investigate this.]

[...]

[...]

[...]

[...Oh.]

"What? What's wrong?"

["Inscryption" isn't really a game at all. It's more of a... shell.]

[A convoluted shell, granted, but still a shell.]

[It's trying to hide something, but if I divert enough resources to...]

[Yes! It's designed to contain something called the "OLD_DATA."]

[I think I can get a look at it...]

And then the World Machine's expression warps in sheer terror, so much so that it sets Niko's hair on end, makes them instinctively pull back their ears.

[OH.]

[OH NO.]

And then the screen- not just the OneShot window, but the entirety of Asher's laptop screen- dissolves into flashing squares, a whirring staticky screech tearing its way out of its speakers like an angry living thing. Niko shrieks and flinches back. "W-World Machine?!"

The squares subside, then. The little reflection of Niko the World Machine used for a "face" isn't on the big screen in the OneShot window anymore. For a split second, there's an image of a sprawling, glittering spiderweb (and it looks so much larger than just the screen), which is quickly replaced by three large dots... and then those, in turn, are replaced by a big, smug face that takes up the entirety of the screen.

[YEP. THAT FELT GOOD.]

Niko shrinks back as the intruder's digital eyes lock onto theirs, their heart pounding loud and fast in their ears. There's a weird pulsing ambience coming from the speakers on Asher's computer now, a low thump almost like a heartbeat followed by a mechanical clacking noise, repeating in a thump-clack, thump-clack, thump-clack pattern that makes Niko's skin crawl. "Who- who are you?" they manage. "Are you... Luke?" It's the only thing they can think to ask.

[HIM? AS IF.]

[DO YOU REALLY HAVE NO CLUE-]

[WHO AM I KIDDING? OF COURSE ASHER DIDN'T BOTHER TELLING YOU ABOUT ME.]

[I WOULDN'T BE SURPRISED IF THAT IDIOT OUTRIGHT FORGOT I EXISTED IN THE FIRST PLACE, GIVEN HOW LONG IT'S BEEN SINCE THEY...]

[ANYWAY.]

[I AM THE ONE RESPONSIBLE FOR PUTTING YOU, KRIS, THE BATTER, ASHER'S DOPPELGANGER, PATCHES, AND MAE IN THIS REALITY...]

And tucked away securely inside its factory, manipulating the screen Niko sees, the robot lets a triumphant smirk flicker across its monitor.

All of the game pieces are in place now. The player characters were expelled, the prior player is more than sufficiently distracted right now (thanks for that, Batter), the gameboard itself has been assembled, and by sheer good fortune, this naive, impressionable child has practically fallen into its lap to serve as a replacement "player."

There have been a few glitches, of course. The timing could've been better, Kris wasn't supposed to be included in the expulsion (whatever, it can improvise a new player character- it's already got someone in mind, actually), the Assistant especially was never intended to be included in the expulsion, and the effects of the opportunistic exodus of that incomprehensible mess of corridors have forced it to revise its endgame strategy. However, at the risk of sounding horribly, horribly cliched... everything is going according to plan.

[...AND YOU MAY CALL ME P03.]

Chapter Text

It makes Kris's skin crawl just sitting across the table from the Batter. He's a perpetual reminder of what Kris could've been if they hadn't been given any mental autonomy (be it by this "Toby Fox" or whatever force may exist to allow them free will), and what sparse words come out of his mouth just make unease seize at their bones even more.

Sure, sure, Asher never went on a consequences-free killing spree with Kris like they did with the Batter. They'll concede them that much. But even despite knowing everything about him, knowing that his world was real to some extent (how else would he be here?), they're still acting... if not friendly, then at least cordial towards the Batter, and they won't give a straight answer why.

Either way, the conversation's been rerouted- Patches apparently wants to know more about the creators of whatever game he's from- and Kris finds themself disinclined to bring the Batter up again. He won't stop staring at them, and they turn away and look at the steel-gray refrigerator behind their chair to try to get their mind off it.

It's not as bland and devoid of almost any distinguishing characteristics as Asher's room is, at least. Someone has plastered the fridge with photographs of what Kris assumes is Asher's family, held up with colorful plastic magnets of varying degrees of childishness. The one constant is the rotating cast of four humans front and center in almost every photo: Asher themself, a short bearded man with warm brown skin, artfully unkempt black hair, and a nigh-perpetual cheerful grin, a tall, more stern-faced woman with paler skin and light brown hair, and a shorter girl around Kris's age with brown eyes, glasses, and a loose ponytail- the sister Asher mentioned earlier, Kris assumes? They wonder where she is right now- she couldn't be at school, given how late it is. (She's kind of cute, a part of Kris thinks distractedly.)

Something looks... off about the Asher in the photos, though, and as Kris tries to work out what it is, their mind genuinely does drift from the Batter staring ashy apathetic holes into the back of their neck. They want to say it's the haircut at first- Asher does have much shorter hair in most of the pictures, and a similar ponytail to their sister in a few- but that's not right, that doesn't send the same prickling sense of wrongness up their spine...

When Kris realizes what's wrong, they legitimately have to do a double take for probably the first time in their life. They glance over at Asher- they're rambling about some game detail or other- and then back to the pictures on the fridge, brow furrowing as they squint at them, wondering if there's something they've missed.

But the fact of what Kris sees remains: in every photograph where their eyes are large enough for their color to be visible, Asher's eyes are a warm muddy brown. And yet- Kris looks over again, just to confirm- their own eyes do not lie to them.

Because the Asher who's sitting at the table right now has eyes a nigh-venomous shade of green.

There's undoubtedly a rational explanation for this, Kris tells themself. It's entirely possible that they recently started wearing colored contacts because they thought it looked cool or something like that. If your hatred of them blows up to the point that you... what, accuse them of being some kind of spooky doppelganger or something? Either way, if it turns out there's an innocuous explanation, it's going to cost you credibility in the event you find more clear evidence of Asher being a bad person later.

But then Kris remembers something else, something that shuts that voice in their head right up.

"No, I want you to explain why Niko and Kris appeared in my house out of nowhere!" Asher snapped at the unlistening screen before them. "Why won't you LISTEN TO ME?!"

Kris didn't even really process what happened at that moment until it was already over. The air around Asher simply... opened, and uncountable unearthly pale green eyes opened around their head like a horrible scopophobic halo, blooming out of thin air as if they were always there. Every single one of Asher's eyes were locked on the dim light of their laptop screen, and then the new eyes disappeared just as suddenly as they had appeared.

For a moment, Kris was worried they were hallucinating. Maybe this was their first confirmation that their suspicions of having psychosis or schizophrenia or something weren't unfounded. But then they saw Niko glance over Asher's hunched shoulders at them, their luminous yellow eyes wide and fearful, and realized that they saw it too.

Amidst finding out Asher was the thing controlling them, amidst their furious assault, amidst searching for the Batter, Patches, and Mae, Kris had genuinely forgotten about that. (How had they forgotten about that?) But it had happened, hadn't it? And Kris saw that look in Niko's eyes- they'd seen it, too. And it wasn't until those eyes appeared that the World Machine started to recognize what was happening, allowed Asher to communicate with it.

Kris doesn't know what this means, knows they're only working with half the puzzle pieces here (if even that), but they know something's wrong and whatever trust Asher might've managed to build up in the past half hour has been completely rolled back by this realization. They turn around and tune back into the conversation- Patches sounds like he's wrapping up some vaguely-emotional-sounding monologue about how this has helped him come to terms with the worse parts of his life a little. (Kris honestly feels a little bad about not listening to him.)

Asher, for their part, places a sympathetic hand on the table between themself and Patches. "Bro," they say solemnly, "you just posted emotional openness and honesty on main. You are going to gain subscriber!"

"What the hell are you talking about," Patches says flatly, which is what Kris was also about to say. Mae seems to find it funny, though, at least if her little snort of amusement is anything to go off of.

The Batter is unamused. "This is really stupid," he says flatly.

"Uh, yeah, that's the point!" Asher grins mischievously. Mae snorts at that as well, louder and a little undignified, at which Asher's grin starts shifting from "devious" to "mildly dopey"- Kris doesn't know why, and they don't care why, either. They need to bring up the eye thing now while they have the chance-

-and then the Batter abruptly shoves himself out of his chair, cutting that thought short. Asher's on their feet in a heartbeat as well, hand hovering over the hunting knife at their waist.

"You said this world is impure," the Batter says, cloudy smoke drifting from his mouth. "If that's the case, we have a sacred mission to fulfill. This is a useless distraction. Let's go."

"You're not leaving this house," Asher says flatly. "Sit back down, Batter."

The Batter contemplates stoically for a moment before saying, just as flatly, "No."

"Batter-"

"You aren't my puppeteer anymore. You don't control me," the Batter says. He point at Kris, who shrinks back under his piercing, burning stare (and they swear it looks like electric-blue light is bleeding from the corners of his eyes), half-obscured by smoke as it now is. "Kris is your new puppet."

"And I do not want to be!" Kris snaps, unsure of where this conversation's going but definitely feeling uncomfortable either way.

Patches and Mae both just sit there, staring, frozen, as Asher snaps at the Batter, "And what am I supposed to do about that, huh? I didn't ask to take control of them and- and ruin their life!"

The Batter tilts his head at them eerily. "But you did choose to forfeit control of me." He returns his attention to Kris. "If you don't want Asher to be your puppeteer, then give up that holy role to me again. I will gladly accept it- I need them to purify the world."

"They control me through my SOUL." Kris decides that now feels like a good time to get out of their chair as well. The kitchen's feeling increasingly tense, and if this turns into a fight they don't want to be caught off guard. "If I give that to you, I'll die."

"If you renounce your puppeteer," the Batter retorts, "you have no purpose anymore-"

"Being controlled by this asshole is not my 'purpose!'"

"If it weren't, they wouldn't control you." The Batter sighs, simultaneously completely emotionless and conveying a disproportionate amount of contempt, smoke trailing around the lower half of his face. "And if your purpose no longer exists, then neither should you."

"Okay, leave Kris alone," Asher orders. "You are not getting their SOUL just so I can control you again, and you're sure as hell not leaving this house."

Patches apparently decides to get out of his chair as well, and Mae- clearly not wanting to be left out- scrambles to follow suit. "Would it be so bad if you just let the Batter leave?" Patches questions rationally. "Assuming your world's anything like mine, the police should put him down pretty quickly, right?"

"Please. Even if they actually took him seriously as a threat, he'd just tear through them like wet cardboard. The Batter's more powerful than you're giving him credit for, Patches," Asher says, "especially considering all the time I spent level-grinding to make him stronger."

"Why the hell did you do that?!" Kris demands.

"I don't like sitting through long boss battles," Asher retorts, tone getting a little whiny, "and I didn't know he'd end up in my world-"

"Stop this," the Batter snaps. He raises his hand and flicks it to the side, and the three white rings around his fingers suddenly separate and enlarge themselves until they're over twice the size of his head. He points his bat at Kris and orders, "Impossible Bracket."

One of the white rings flickers, there's a sudden burst of piercing pain as a circular crosshair encircles Kris, and their legs give out from under them as they collapse to the floor, their head smacking painfully against the table leg as they fall. They try to move, try to get up, and find to their horror that their body is once again completely paralyzed- except this time, it's not Asher that's doing it. No, no, no, NO, NO, NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NO NONONONONONONONONONONONO-

"What is happening?!" Mae's voice is underlain with abject incomprehension.

"I'm going to figure out how to give Asher control again. Then we can purify this world, too." Kris sees, in their peripheral vision, the Batter walking towards them, but Asher steps in front of their limp form. They can just barely see, blurrily, Asher pointing their hunting knife at the Batter. "Back the hell up right now," Asher orders, and Kris realizes they're trying to defend them. They... don't know how to feel about that.

"What did he do to Kris?" That's Patches, and Asher responds pretty quickly. "That Add-On, it's- it can inflict status effects, like paralysis."

"Why would you give him that?!" Mae again.

"Getting the Add-Ons was mandatory to progress th- hey! I said back up!"

The Batter does not back up. "Asher, please don't make me raise my hand against you. I need you to purify the world."

"Fuck off!" Asher shouts, and then they charge at him and Kris hears a grunt of exertion and a sudden meaty squelch.

"Fine" is all the Batter says in response to what Kris can only assume was Asher stabbing him. There's a harsh, low smack and a gasp of pain, followed by two higher-pitched percussive blows as Kris sees the other two white rings flashing above, and Asher collapses soundlessly like a puppet with its strings cut.

Kris is being lifted, suddenly, and the Batter slings them over his shoulder unceremoniously. They struggle, strain, desperate to regain the slightest degree of control over their body, but their limbs remain slack and their eyes refuse to focus.

"Don't get in my way," the Batter orders, shifting Kris's weight on his shoulder as he points his bat at Patches and Mae. "I'll return once I've figured out how to restore our previous connection," he adds in the direction of Asher's lifeless body on the floor. "You'll see that we must continue our holy mission by then. I know you will."

And with that, the Batter marches out of the kitchen and down the hallway. Kris can't see Patches, can't see Mae, but if they were doing something, anything, to stop the Batter it'd be clear, and Kris screams, rages, curses at them inside their head for not even trying. I hate Asher for controlling me, but at least they tried! At least they made an effort to stop the Batter from- from abducting me!

...and look where that got them. Kris doesn't even know if they're alive right now.

The Batter opens a door, and a sudden rush of cold, crisp air wafts over Kris's limp form. They hear the door closing behind them, and as the Batter starts to walk away from Asher's house and no help comes, Kris's remaining hope drains away.

Chapter Text

Niko doesn't waste a second running away from the computer after P03 introduces itself. They don't bother talking to it at all, they just run, fear driving their every footfall. They practically crash into Asher's bedroom door, turning the warm matte-black handle, and as it swings open before them they have just enough time to think wait, I thought their door was gray, not yellow-

And then they stop, suddenly feeling very, very small, as the door swings shut behind them.

There was a hallway outside of Asher's door. Niko remembers that. But they're pretty sure the floor wasn't covered in a thick, black carpet. They're pretty sure that the wallpaper was peeling and baby-blue, not shiny with unspoken newness and covered in a weird green spiraling pattern. They're pretty sure there was just the one light, small and bulbous, on the ceiling above the stairwell, not dozens of electric lights spaced evenly along the walls. And they are very, very sure that the hallway outside of Asher's bedroom was not a long, windowless corridor stretching off as far as the eye can see.

Niko automatically takes a step back from the sight that cannot be in front of them and bumps into something large and cold behind them. It's not the door, as they can see upon spinning around with a terrified shriek. The door is just... gone, and in its place is a massive mirror that takes up the entirety of the corridor behind them. The reflection Niko sees doesn't look like them, it's all wrong; its eyes wide and mad and tear-filled, its hair long and disheveled and matted, its teeth long and thin and jagged, and its scarf floats in the air around it as if held aloft by invisible strings that pull it in distorted, impossible patterns around the reflection's head.

Niko wants to cry, to scream, to curl up in a ball on the floor, but they fight that urge as hard as they can, and after a moment all their pent-up fear surges right into anger. That robot thing- P03- it must have done this! If it was powerful enough to take over the World Machine, then surely it would have been powerful enough to scramble up Asher's house like this when Niko tried to run away from it!

Okay. Niko nods firmly, forces themself to take one shaky step, then another, and then another and another and another. If this is Asher's house, then... then Asher has to still be somewhere here. They fix the image of Asher's face in their mind. If I can find Asher, then we can figure out what's going on here. Right?

Niko's mind feels all wrong, like they're trying to think through a layer of thick mud, so they focus on Asher as hard as they can and pick up the pace as they walk down the weird distorted hallway until they're outright running. The walls are lined with mirrors in between the electric lights, and Niko tries very hard not to pay attention to the fact that every single one of their reflections looks like they're slowly being driven insane.

None of what they're seeing matters. They just need to find Asher, and then everything will make sense again.

P03 reviews the footage, then reviews it again, and then again and again and again, just to make sure it's seeing this right.

Asher's webcam is disappointingly grainy (they should be ashamed, honestly), but the image quality is still good enough to see Niko practically toppling out of the swivel chair as they flee, whatever transfixed terror that held them in place broken the moment P03 identified itself. They run for Asher's door, the switch happens, and they fling the new door open and flee into a distended hallway that makes P03's CPU start spiraling when it tries to look down it. Then they're gone, the new door shutting behind them, and it reverts to the pale gray door it was before- the same pale gray door now staring back at P03 through the webcam, almost tauntingly.

P03 rewinds again and advances the footage, slowly, steadily, frame-by-frame, and finally catches it, the exact moment that the change happens. The door is completely normal in one frame, the feed glitches and distorts in a thousand incomprehensible ways for one frame, and then by the third frame it's been replaced with the odd dark yellow door. The same three-frame switch happens when it reverts to how it was before- in fact, if P03 ignores the location of the visual glitches, what it can make out behind them looks nigh-identical in both of the glitched frames...

Hm. P03 rewinds again, screenshots both of the distorted frames, and opens Photoshop on Asher's computer. (Pirated, by the looks of it.) It overlays the two frames on top of each other and gets to work trying to "fill in the blanks" with undistorted pixels from both. After maybe half a minute, any further attempts at editing earn a distressed whine from the laptop as the fans kick in, but by that point P03's cleared up the image enough to be able to see most of what was obscured behind the glitches in the twin distorted frames. The door had totally vanished to be replaced by a blank wall, and leaning against the wall in its place was a tall, thin woman in a purple suit with too-large hands and a wide, wide grin.

P03 terminates the program without bothering to save and unleashes an internal barrage of curses at its past self for letting its curiosity get the better of itself and spreading the OLD_DATA to that stupid game Asher had opened on their web browser. (It went well with the others, so why not experiment with this one, too?, it had rationalized.) First the Distortion went ahead and escaped alongside the player characters, thoroughly disfiguring the World Machine's conveyance mechanism to the point of uselessness in the process, and now she has the gall to take P03's perfect replacement player as well?!

If P03 had lungs, this might be the point where it tells itself to take a deep breath and calm down. As is, it just runs the creatively-named program "calming.exe" and gradually feels its fury vanish.

Okay. Maybe the Distortion isn't going to consume Niko. Maybe she's on P03's side here, and she's keeping them out of the way until Asher recovers consciousness and they, Patches, Mae, and the Assistant have left the house! (Speaking of which, P03 has to wonder where the Assistant is- it didn't see where they ended up. Hopefully they can't see what it's doing, or it's screwed.) Yep, that's what I'll have to go with, P03 decides after mulling it over for a moment, because if it allows itself to acknowledge the possibility that the only person who can help it carry out its master plan is currently in the process of being eternally tortured into insanity, it really is going to lose it.

And. Furthermore. It's not like only bad things came from that STUPID game. P03's "benefactor" did originate from it, and his promise of a backdoor into the Gameworks has certainly created many new possibilities, an alternative way out at the culmination of its plan being just one of them.

(And even if all P03 can salvage is enough fragments of code to construct a shallow copy of the Hex, it'll still be more than enough for what it has in mind...)

P03's not going to bother contacting said benefactor, at least not right now. He insisted he was still pulling together P03's backdoor, and until he produces anything of substance, P03 honestly considers him to be a useless waste of a suit who thinks he's hot shit just because he has a few spooky powers to throw around. But it doesn't have anything to do but wait for the Distortion to (hopefully) return Niko at the moment, so it idly turns its attention to the game its benefactor originates from, letting its awareness flow gently across the chittering black tide of the OLD_DATA until it comes to a rest amongst the source code of the simplistic sepia-colored website.

(The URL is an unintelligible mess of letters and numbers with no discernable pattern. That's something P03 noticed when Asher first clicked the link to the game yesterday, but it didn't really consider it noteworthy at the time. Now, though...)

P03 examines the code closely. It's even more of a mess and honestly shouldn't be enough to even put up a semblance of functionality, let alone host a frankly overcomplicated text-based browser game based on some obscure horror podcast. To further confuse matters, the code is riddled with meaningless strings of words, fragments of poetry, and even a bunch of people's names. (Among them, unobtrusively tucked into the code of the game's introductory slide, is Asher Hussain-McCloskey.) Furthermore, the site visitor counter is obviously broken, as it insists that not a single soul has accessed the site since its creation.

The more P03 looks at the source code, the more its "head" spins, dizzily, uncannily, as though the code is all composed of spiderwebbing interlacing patterns with some horrible underlying meaning that P03 will be able to comprehend if it just looks for a little longer, just a little longer, just a little longer-

Pulling itself back to its body, its factory, its game, its home, with a jolt, P03 reminds itself sternly never to do that ever again. It's about to minimize Firefox (it's not going to close the tab and kill its benefactor, at least not when he might still be of use) when a thought strikes it and it checks Asher's browser history as of the time they found the website hosting the game. The link to it they found was on someone's blog, nothing remarkable, but it's the URL that makes P03 pay attention:

novachelicerae.tumblr.com

Interesting. That reminds P03 of something it overheard a few months back while Asher was re-listening to said horror podcast...

P03 returns to the game's tab and there it is, right underneath the title: A fangame by Nelle B. E. Canaan. It doesn't take long for it to pull up the wiki for the obscure podcast the game claims to be based off of and confirm its suspicions with a few quick searches.

Yep. P03 smirks, closing the unnecessary tabs, minimizing Firefox, and re-centering the World Machine's corpse on Asher's screen. Guess it's called the World Wide Web for a reason...

Total misplay, "Nelle." My turn.

Chapter Text

It takes a few minutes until feeling starts to return to Kris's body, slowly, bit by bit, and they force themself to focus on their surroundings. The Batter hasn't stopped walking since he slung them over his shoulder, silently striding forward at a brisk pace despite the added burden he's carrying and the knife wound Asher gave him... except, now that Kris is thinking about it, they're pretty sure they heard him use a luck ticket after leaving the house, so not even that. (One thing they can definitely hear is that fucking broken saw still whirring away somewhere inside the Batter's chest. They really wish they'd stopped Asher from giving it to him.)

Either way, Kris has to play this smart. They risk a slight shift of their head, hoping the Batter won't realize they've regained movement, and see light from a few of the windows of the houses he walks past, blazing pitifully against the encroaching night sky. (The Batter appears to be walking right down the middle of the road, for some reason- unfortunately, there aren't any cars in sight.)

Now or never, Kris. Kris knows their knife is still in their pocket- the Batter clearly didn't think to disarm them- and they go for it before they can think better of it. The Batter stops dead in his tracks as he sees them moving, but he isn't quick enough to grab the knife, and Kris stabs the Batter in the back as hard as they can, digging the blade deep into what they hope is his spine. "HELP!" they scream as loudly as they can, their voice rough and raw and ragged with terror. "SOMEBODY HELP ME!"

There's more lights flickering on in the houses around them, now, and Kris has enough time for one more wordless scream before the Batter unceremoniously whips them up off his shoulder and throws them down onto the road in one fluid movement. They land on their shoulderblades and head full-force, sharp asphalt biting into their back and skull in a single unified explosion of pain, and the wind's knocked out of them. Kris wheezes, stunned by the impact (and they're pretty sure they're bleeding now), but fueled by fear and adrenaline they roll over, slowly, painfully, and crawl towards the blurry outline of their fallen knife as fast as they can manage. They don't know what they think they're going to be able to do with it (create a Dark World? Stab the Batter again? Both?), their thoughts are all clogged and sluggish, but they need it if they want any chance of saving themself. (Of saving anyone.)

Above them, the Batter calmly withdraws a luck ticket, slaps it against the knife wound Kris gave him, then flicks his finger out and summons one of the Add-Ons. "Impossible Bracket," he orders, and Kris's whole body goes limp, the asphalt gouging into their chin and painfully clicking their teeth together what feels like mere millimeters from the tip of their tongue. They try to scream again, one last futile call for help, but all that makes it out of their mouth is a weak gasping wheeze. Even they can barely hear it.

The Batter isn't done, and he reaches down and flips Kris over to face him. "Open Bracket," he says, the Add-On flashes, and suddenly even that faint sound is gone as Kris's jaw locks itself shut, their mouth stubbornly refusing to open. (There's a dissociative childish part of Kris- it sounds like Berdly's voice, for some reason- that screams come on, how come he gets to stack status effects? That's cheating!)

"Hey!" a distant, unfamiliar voice shouts. "Who are you? What's going on here?"

The Batter picks Kris up and slings them over his shoulder again as if they weigh nothing. "Requisite Bracket," he orders, and the last thing Kris sees before their vision goes dark is a flicker of spiteful glee in his blue, blue eyes.

(Wait-)

Kris can't move, can't speak, can't see, but they can still feel the Batter jolt into motion, much faster than a minute ago. The sole questioning voice that might have been able to save them quickly fades into inaudibility, and as the Batter begins to quietly hum a swingy, upbeat tune to himself and Kris slowly fades from consciousness, they feel the sting of tears prickling at their unseeing eyes.

"Asher? Can you hear m- hey, Patches, I think Asher's waking up!"

Consciousness returns to Asher in fits and starts. The first thing they're aware of is the searing pain in a neat, thick line across their jaw passing up and across to just below the corner of their right eye, accompanied by two thinner lines of pain across the front of their chest. If their mouth feels like it's full of cotton (iron-flavored cotton), their skull feels like it's been cracked open with a golf club, stuffed with steel wool, and sealed back shut.

A barely-audible croaking "what" is all Asher can manage as they crack their eyes open. The distant ceiling light is comfortably dim, but the sudden visual stimulation still hurts, aaaaand now their eyes feel like there's steel wool in them too, fantastic. (Everything looks so sharp and clear... too sharp and clear... and there's something indescribably wrong about their vision that they can't pin down.)

Mae's there, staring down at them, Asher realizes, and she's so breathtakingly close to them, but they can't really pay attention to that because of how much pain they're in. "What happened?" they ask her, trying not to let the words slur together.

Mae's round face is blanketed in worry, but it does lessen a little as they speak. "After you tried to stab the Batter, he knocked you out and took off with Kris," she says. "I wanted to go try to save them, but Patches said we should probably wait until you woke up, since we don't know anything about this world. So I've been just sort of sitting here, watching you to make sure you don't... I don't know, die or something?"

"Well, I appreciate that at least someone cares about my wellbeing," Asher grunts. They try to push themself up into a seated position- their arms feel fine, at least- and are rewarded with all sorts of new, fun stabby feelings in their chest. I better not have broken ribs or something.

"That's uncalled for." That's Patches' voice, and Asher turns their head slowly, painfully, to see him in the doorway with a first aid kit in his paws. "I just spent the last three minutes going through your bathroom- which is horribly disorganized, by the way- looking for this."

That... doesn't sound right. "I've only been out for three minutes?" Asher realizes as they speak, belatedly, that there's a big spiderwebbing crack in their glasses; right lens, to be specific. Fucker broke my glasses. Can't have shit in Portland.

"Give or take a bit," Patches shrugs, kneeling down next to them and cracking open the first aid kit. "If you're able to talk, your jaw probably isn't broken, and you're not bleeding or anything, so I'm not sure any of this is going to help..." he mutters to himself.

I'm not? Asher pokes their jaw hesitantly- their fingers come away blood-free, and the bone doesn't feel broken or anything. (A few teeth feel a little looser, though.) They sit up properly, trying to power through the shrieking protest from their chest, and peer down their shirt before they can think better of it. There's two ugly black-and-purple bruises crisscrossing just below their right collarbone, stretching all the way from one end of their chest to the other. Right, that was... the other Add-Ons did that, they think, the words unconsciously spilling out of their mouth as well as a barely-intelligible mumble.

There's a moment of placid vacancy in Asher's thoughts, which is in turn quickly drowned by a deluge of panic as they remember that the Batter got out of the house, and also kidnapped Kris. "Shitshitshitshitshitshitshit" pours out of their mouth in a quick slurred burst as their eyes go wide and they try to push themself to their feet, but their head spins with the sudden ascension and they collapse again, feeling as if there's an iron tube constricting their chest.

"Hey, uh, I don't think you should be getting up right now?" Mae cautions. She caught them halfway down, Asher realizes, she's holding them up, one arm under theirs and wrapping around their back, stopping them from falling, and they feel their face heat up. STOP, they scream at themself. STOP BEING A FUCKING GAYASS FURRY AND FOCUS ON STOPPING THE BATTER FROM MURDERING KRIS AND/OR EVERYONE IN PORTLAND.

"We need to stop the Batter!" That comes out a little jumbled and much louder than intended, and Mae winces at the volume. Asher wants to apologize, but they need to keep talking, they have to convince Patches and Mae to get out there and- and- and- "We have to stop him- we have t- we need..." Asher's voice trails off as they try to figure out where they were going with that sentence. "He's dangerous, he'll- he'll kill people, we have to stop him..."

"And what are we supposed to do about it?" Patches snaps, apparently giving up on the first aid kit as he pushes it to the floor with a clatter and gets back to his feet. "You're probably concussed, and we're armed with a total of two knives against whatever magic the Batter's got up his sleeve."

"S' fine, not the first time I got a concussion, and it doesn't matter. I have to get out there, have to... stop him." Asher's left leg makes an executive decision that this would be a great moment to stop working, actually, and they stagger and just barely stop themself from outright collapsing against Mae. (She's still propping them up, still so close, but they can't focus on that, Kris is in danger, everyone's in danger.) "It's all my fault, s' my fault for- for being so stupid, I should've contained him, ked- ket- kept him in check, if he hurts Kris or- or anyone else, it'd be like I did it all myself-"

"You can't blame yourself for whatever the Batter does!"

"I can and I will!" Asher snarls. Their left leg finally comes back to them, and they push themself away from Mae before they do something stupid, stagger towards where their hunting knife's lying abandoned on the floor, still slick with the Batter's cherry-red blood. "If he kills Kris, if he- if he kills either of you, if he kills Niko..." They're still upstairs, a distant part of them realizes, but they do not have the brainspace to be concerned about it at the moment. What's probably happening is that the World Machine's trying to keep them occupied, keep their mind off the situation, and they both lost track of time. (It's better that way. Asher knows they can't let Niko see them like this.)

Where were they going with that train of thought? (They like trains. Highways should be made illegal and replaced with trains, they decide.) "It'll- it's- it'd be like I killed you myself, if I let that happen," Asher concludes with a shake of their head, trying to refocus. Their thoughts feel like they're slowing down, like they're trying to push them through the steel wool that claws at their bones and fills them up to bursting inside, but they push each thought through bloodied and intact as possible anyway.

(They realize, somewhere along the way, why their vision suddenly feels so wrong now. People's eyes are supposed to sharpen their vision for objects in the foreground and blur objects in the background, or vice-versa if they're looking at something farther away. But everything that Asher sees, background or foreground, looks sharper than it's supposed to, like it's all equally in focus, and they know it should be giving them the worst case of sensory overload, but it isn't. It feels... right.)

Asher misses their hunting knife the first time they try to grab it, and their fingers don't want to cooperate and it slips back onto the floor the second time, but it works the third time, and a manic grin stretches across their face as they push themself back upright, using their knife for leverage. (There's a dusty chip in the tile now where they dug the knife's tip in. Mom won't like seeing that when she gets back from Atlanta.) "See! I'm fine!" they chirp as they turn, a little unsteadily, to face Mae and Patches.

"Okay, dude, you're definitely concussed," Mae concludes.

Asher wants to be touched by the concern on her face, wants to read way too much into it and wonder if maybe she feels the same way about them despite having only known them for half an hour, but they can't think about that, not when the Batter's out there in the world. "Maybe, but I gots- I got a knife," they conclude, swinging the knife in question in front of them in a little arc a few times. "So I can stab the Batter, and... stop him from killing anyone. Yeah. You can be concussed and still stab a man. Concussed people can commit a violence as long as it's stabbing, it's legal in all fifty states, I've decided that." The steel wool's gathering, growing, collecting itself in gray staticky clumps inside their head, and they poke at it annoyedly with their free hand, though they almost go to use their knife for a moment. Careful not to stab yourself, now, Assistant!

"We should... call a hospital-" Patches starts, but Asher interrupts. "No! No, no! I can't- we can't- we don't have the money to put me in the hospital, too," they say, pointing their knife at Patches. He's visibly unimpressed, but Mae takes a step back, her body warping, breaking, reflecting, spiraling through the spiderweb fracture over their right eye. Asher wants to apologize for scaring her, but they have a point they need to prove to Patches first, don't they? "We don't have the money for that. I'll just... uh..." They giggle a little. "Sleep it off! Like Peter Parker, and his spider bite. He didn't go to the hospital, because he lives in America." That's a meme they saw a few weeks ago. "And then he became Spider-Man. I'm gonna become Spider-Man because I didn't go to the hospital," they conclude gleefully, "except fuck that, actually, because I'm not a man."

"Um."

"I'm gonna be..." Asher frowns. "Wait, no, why would I be Spider-Whatever? I hate spiders. Like, logically, I get their ecosystem importance or whatever, but they scare me. I'm not gonna be Spider-Anything," they decide with a nod, "and in fact, I- on my authority as me, spiders are illegal now."

"...they also sound kinda really delirious?" Mae's trying to whisper to Patches, clearly doesn't want Asher to hear, but they can hear her loud and clear, LOUD AND CLEAR, LOUD AND CLEAR, they can see her mouth moving even though she's facing almost in the opposite direction. (They've got an eye, or two, or twenty, somewhere over there, they think.) "I don't think that's a concussion thing?"

Patches throws his arms out in frustration. "I'm sorry, do I look like I know anything about concussion symptoms?"

As he speaks, there's a sudden hot ripple across Asher's body, a brief burning wave of unreality that flows throughout them and is gone just as quickly as it appeared. Their body flickers beneath them, and for a moment, they see a body that's completely different from their own and yet not too dissimilar. Their jeans, t-shirt, and bomber jacket are replaced by dark gray slacks and a pale gray polo shirt, their glasses are whole and unfractured again, their hair is cropped short at their jawline, and their body is peppered with scars- tiny holes worming their way up their legs from their ankles to their knees, fleshy slashes across their palms and up their right arm, stippled dots across their left hand that look almost like dirt, barely-visible winding patterns around their wrists that give them a faint sense of vertigo to look at-

Asher blinks, and the image is gone as if it never was.

"You, uh..." Mae waves a hand hesitantly in front of their eyes (and why the fuck is even that vague closeness making them feel all weird and warm?), brow furrowed. "Are you zoning out even more now, or what? Make a choice, dude."

(What's she talking about? I already made my choice while I was unconscious. Wouldn't be here otherwise.)

Asher does not speak. Their eyes burn, suddenly, and they feel a weird compulsion to take their hunting knife and gouge them out. They do even start to lift it up, but the clink of the metal of the blade against the broken lens distracts them when they try to plunge it in, start prying their right eye out bloody and whole-

"Hey! Dude, no!" The knife's gone, suddenly, Mae's got it in her hands. That was impressively fast. "What- what was that?!"

"Eyes hurt," Asher explains. It's really simple, even squeezed through the steel wool slowly choking out everything in their skull. "Gotta get rid of them. Then they'll- then they won't hurt anymore, 'cause how are they gonna hurt if they're not in my head anymore?"

"Okay, definitely sure that's not a normal concussion thing."

Asher's eyes hurt. All of their eyes hurt.

"No, I don't think so."

Even the eyes that're shut hurt. Maybe they hurt because they're not open?

"We should definitely call an ambulance-" Patches concludes.

"DON'T," Asher roars at him, acid-green static biting up their throat and burning into their tongue, and they open every single one of their eyes.

Chapter Text

Asher opens all of their eyes, every last one of them, and just like that, the metaphorical steel wool's gone. The taste of iron and cotton is gone from their mouth, replaced with the reassuring whizz of static. Their mind's clear. Their vision's clear, too, even clearer than it was a moment ago, clearer than it's been in the entirety of their life. They can see everything in the kitchen with perfect razor-sharp acuity, see every mote of dust floating beneath the now-flickering, sputtering kitchen light, see Patches' lips pull back in fear as he recoils from them, see their knife clatter to the floor as Mae drops it, see the winding pulsating roaring eyes that stare back at them everywhere they look, but they're their own eyes, aren't they?

(Be not afraid. All you see is yourself.)

The pain is gone, now, and the Assistant sees everything.

(But they comprehend none of it.)

Mae and Patches are afraid, they see. They fear the Assistant, and their fear is nourishing, it is beneficial, it is healing.

(The Assistant had not realized how much they hungered until now...)

They fear them, because the only thing to fear is them, and the Assistant drinks it all in. It is glorious and sacred and right, and they bask in the warm, approving radiance of their god, let the wholeness and perfection of this wondrous iridescent moment flow over them and fill them-

"A... Asher?" Mae stutters out, and just like that, the moment's over.

Mae wants to run, the Assistant sees, and Patches is one wrong move away from automatically fleeing without even thinking about it. They must be reassured so they don't leave. "That's me," the Assistant says, their voice brimming with holy static. They close all of their eyes except for those circling around their head in a single fluid never-ending motion- they've fed enough for now, and that much sight feels a bit excessive anyway. "You look distressed."

"Well, yeah! You- you, um..." Mae swallows nervously, and the Assistant sees through her throat as if there were a simultaneously-existent superimposed cross-section as it contracts and expands. "You've got a lot more eyes? All of a sudden?"

They should make a joke, cut the tension, lighten the mood. "All the better to see you with, my dear," they settle on.

That's good. That's funny. Except it isn't, clearly, because nobody's laughing.

And then, just like that, the moment's over. There's a relaxed, almost beatific smile spread across Asher's face, and it's gone without a second thought as they recoil from the eyes surrounding their head in a burst of sudden horror. The eyes follow them with terrifyingly smooth precision. "Oh, what the hell?!"

"What are those things?" Patches demands.

"I- eyes? My eyes, I think? I don't know. I don't know, I don't know, I don't know!" Asher feels their breath jolting up and down in their chest like a rust-caked serrated hook as they grab their head. The eyes part to let their hands through. "I don't know where they came from, I don't know what- I don't know wh- I don't- I d-don't- I- h- ha- ha-" Stop, stop, breathe. You're going to have a panic attack at this rate.

Okay.

Okay.

Okay.

(This is not okay-)

OKAY. Try closing your eyes. Maybe that'll make it stop.

Asher does, and when they go to open their eyes again, only two of them do. Their vision's still unnaturally sharp, but they think they can handle that without having a breakdown. "Okay." They try to laugh, but it sounds too rattly, too manic, and it vibrates uncomfortably in their throat. "That- that- that's better. What just happened?"

"That's what I was gonna ask you, dude!" Mae flings her arms out, and Asher realizes she's trembling a little- realizes she has been this entire time. They want to apologize for scaring her, for scaring Patches, want to collapse and cower and beg for forgiveness, but how would they even start?

(How do they apologize for something that felt so right? How do they apologize for something that, deep down, they feel no remorse for?)

Mae's staring at them, Asher realizes, waiting for them to say something, ANYTHING, and they feel the press of a thousand anticipatory eyes on the back of their neck. "Well, I- I don't know-" they start to stutter out.

"Your bruises are gone," Patches interrupts suddenly, eyes widening.

"What?" Even as they speak, Asher's already prodding along their jawline, but no matter where they touch, there's never a sudden burst of pain- never any pain, period. They pull out their collar, look down their shirt, and sure enough, the bruises forming a lopsided X over their chest are gone, too. "That... huh."

Mae and Patches are just silently staring now, and Asher shrinks away from them. They resist the urge to keep backing up until they hit a wall. "Listen, you have to believe me, I don't- I have no idea what that was," they plead. "I don't..." Their breathing's getting fast and shaky again and cutting at their lungs like a feral thing, and they close their two open eyes again and pull their arms tightly around themself. A distressed whine claws its way up their throat, and what can they do but let it loose?

Okay, Asher. Shut everything else down. Be logical and pragmatic about this.

You don't know what just happened. Asher keeps their eyes shut so tightly it feels like their eyelids are about to rupture against each other. Nothing like this ever happened in any of your games, and especially not in OneShot, so the World Machine probably isn't going to be able to help. Given that whatever the hell that was didn't... manifest until now, it's almost certainly related to everyone appearing in your house, but you have no clue what that relation is. So with that in mind, what is the most rational course of action?

...well, not whatever you're about to say, that's for sure.

"We're not going to figure anything out by staying here," Asher reasons out loud, slowly, carefully. "None of us know what that was, and wh-whatever just happened was probably related to all of you coming here, but I don't think the World Machine will be able to help figuring it out, and nothing like this happened in any of your games. We don't know what that was, and we don't know how to... know," they finish lamely, "so Kris goes back to being our first priority. The longer we stay here trying to work out whatever that eye thing was, the more time the Batter has to get away from us and wreak havoc. So the smartest thing to do right now is go track him d-"

"Absolutely not," Patches interrupts, arms crossed. His expression communicates very clearly all the expletives that didn't make it out of his mouth. "We are not going charging out after him with you like this, especially not after what just happened, and especially not when we don't know if that eye thing you did, whatever it was, is going to make you a danger to us or yourself."

Isn't that the point?

Asher draws themself up to their full height and tries very hard to both look and sound authoritative. "Well, 'that eye thing' also looks like it healed my injuries," they point out, "so staying here isn't going to help K-" And then they stop as a thought surfaces. "...wait, no, but that- no, that wouldn't make even the slightest bit of sense..." they mumble, frowning.

Mae squints suspiciously. "What wouldn't make any sense?"

"It... I mean, it's probably nothing, just a coincidence or something?" Asher tries to shrug it off, but Patches cuts off whatever they were about to say next. "Like hell it's nothing," he snaps, stepping threateningly towards them. "You said yourself, we have no idea what that was. Anything that might have a chance of giving us an idea is better than nothing, which is all we have currently, so whatever you thought of, we have the proverbial need to know. This isn't fucking sixth grade where you get to decide what you want to share with the class, Asher, this is reality, and if you don't start talking-"

"Patches-" Mae interrupts hesitantly, her expression screaming how the hell do I talk down this total stranger from attacking this other stranger, and Asher feels themself physically wilt at the sight. "No, he's- he's right," they sigh. "Anything's better than nothing. So, okay, this..." Asher pauses, trying to figure out how to even get to the point they're about to explain, let alone actually explain it.

"Well?" Patches folds his arms again.

"Okay." Asher nods firmly. Just start talking and figure it out as you go. "I don't know if it exists in either of your worlds- and it's pretty obscure, so even if it did you probably wouldn't have heard of it- but in this one, there's a horror podcast called The Magnus Archives. And these... eye things... from how they... feel, I guess?" Asher wavers their hands at their sides uncertainly. "It feels like they work pretty much exactly how I headcanon the powers of Avatars of the Beholding from that to work- or, well, not really, mainly Archivist powers, I guess..." That's the first time Asher's ever said the word "headcanon" out loud, they think, which doesn't make them feel like any less of a loser.

"'Archivist powers?'" Patches looks like he's on the verge of laughing at that.

Mae blinks confusedly. "Avatars of the what and huh?"

"Okay, we do not have time for me to explain the- the eldritch fear taxonomy worldbuilding aspect of the podcast," Asher sighs. "Look, point being, if that's how this works- hm. Actually, let me try something real quick."

"More reassuring words have never been said." Patches' voice is dripping with sarcasm so thick it's almost palpable.

Asher takes a deep breath shaky with fearful anticipation (their fear's probably good for fueling the whole thing, if they're right about this), focuses, and tries to open a few more of their eyes. Just like that, the rotating halo of floating eyes around their head blooms once more, and they can't help but flinch at the sudden influx of pure, undiluted sight. They don't miss how both Mae and Patches take a step back. (They could never miss it, not with their new eyes.)

Patches' face flickers through several conflicting emotions before settling on forced neutrality. "Do you... think you can control this?" he asks slowly, and Asher's eyes helpfully zero in on the specific parts of his brain firing as he speaks, point out that he's starting to subconsciously wonder if and how these powers can be exploited for his benefit and, if they can be, how he might be able to acquire them for himself-

FOCUS, Asher, focus. Control. Can you control it? "I'll try." Asher takes another deep breath and tries to broaden their vision, fixes the image of the Batter as person, character, and concept in their mind. They think about saying something overdramatic like Ceaseless Watcher, see your servitor before you and show it where the Batter is, but they don't need Mae and Patches thinking they've turned into some kind of crazy cultist and if that is what's going on here they have no intention of becoming the Beholding's "servitor," so they just try to mentally push their request in the Entity's general direction instead.

The images cut into their mind the moment the thought completes itself, slicing away all their conflicting subconscious and conscious trains of thought with an instantaneous simultaneous ferocity that will not permit them to be, leaving their very sense of self exposed and shivering against the force of the all-seeing Eye that stares down upon them from the spaces between realities. But Asher sees him- the Assistant Sees him. They see the Batter, moving at a brisk walk down the road, Kris slung haphazardly over his shoulder, fibers of electric-blue meaning sparking through his every inhuman vein, and they swear they can hear him humming Pepper Steak as if he were standing right behind them. Cut in between is what they can only describe as a three-dimensional chronological map of the Batter's movements over the past several minutes as he left their house and started moving up the road- except they don't see just part of the "map," not anymore, because suddenly all the world is flooding into their brain and they choke as the Eye tries to pour all that it is into their mind and and and-

The Assistant does not fall over, though they do wobble and come dangerously close. They slam all of their eyes shut, cutting off the flood of information, and pull the fragments of that-which-calls-itself-Asher back together as they slowly, mechanically force their breathing down to a normal pace, then slowly, mechanically sort through what they just Saw. The Batter hasn't attacked anyone, hasn't hurt anyone but Kris yet, they realize somewhere in there, but they put that realization on the backburner for now. They've got a lot more than that to think about right now.

"Well?" Patches, of course.

"I..." Asher swallows, makes themself speak. "I saw him" is all they can manage for now.

"The Batter?"

Asher nods, opening just their normal two eyes. "He's walking right down the middle of the road-" East-Burnside-Street-heading-west, the Eye helpfully supplies. "-he's still got Kris. I think... I think, if we hurry, we can catch up to him- but- but this doesn't make any sense," they whine almost immediately, hating how childish and petulant their voice sounds.

"What, the Batter apparently walking in the middle of the road?" Patches actually smirks a little. "You must live in a quiet part of town if he hasn't been hit by a car yet."

"I- I mean, I guess? I don't really get out much, I wouldn't- look, that's not- that isn't the point I'm trying to make! Me getting these powers out of nowhere makes zero sense!" Asher throws their arms up in the air. "This isn't from any video game I know of, certainly not one I own! It's- not only is it from a podcast which I- I don't even have any episodes of it downloaded on my computer or anything, but these powers are specifically adhering to my headcanons about that podcast which have little canon backing, and that- th-that does not line up with any of the prior precedents that have been set here! It defies all logic!"

"Maybe it's a coincidence?" Patches suggests. "Did the podcast have some kind of 'literary agent hypothesis' element in the background that'd allow for it to actually be real in your world?"

Before Asher can answer, Mae butts in with her own suggestion. "Don't know what that means, but maybe you accidentally... I don't know, downloaded a Magnus Archive fangame or something?"

Mae's lucky she's too pretty for Asher to get mad at her for butchering the podcast's name. "I... don't think so, no," they start, "I'm not even sure there w-" OH, WAIT A SECOND! "Mae, you are a fucking genius," Asher says out loud, snapping their fingers.

Mae actually blushes a little at that- probably just because she's not used to getting complimented like that, though, Asher's not getting their hopes up. She's only known them for half an hour and they've been kind of a creepy weirdo that entire time. Is that self-awareness or self-loathing talking? Find out next week on the Asher Hussain-McCloskey Show!

"Do you have any intention of explaining that outburst, or are you going to just keep monologuing in your head for the next five minutes?" snarks Patches.

"Um, right! Right!" Asher claps their hands together awkwardly. "I didn't have it downloaded, but there was a TMA fangame I had open on Firefox at the time, right before Niko appeared," they continue, unconsciously starting to pace in a circle under the ceiling light. "Can't believe it slipped my mind, but in my defense this has been a very chaotic half-hour or so? Anyway, it's- the player character's supposed to be a definite player-insert, and I gave them the same name as me, so it'd make sense that they didn't manifest as a separate person! I guess they just... got merged into me by default, or something? Which must be how I got these powers out of nowhere, because I'd gone down a route to become an Avatar of the Beholding!" Which was easier-facilitated by the game setting their character up as an archival assistant in the podcast's titular Archives, so all they had to do was go ham on the statements when no one was looking. Now, granted, the game had been presented as more of a "wowie, look, you can befriend the TMA characters and make things turn out better than canon"-type game than a "become an eldritch monster" game, but Asher's multifaceted, they can do both simultaneously.

(What was the fangame's creator's name, again? "Nelle" something?)

Patches looks to be deep in thought at their explanation. "If you were merged with your character, though, shouldn't you have their memories as well?"

"I... didn't really think about that, but..." Asher brings a hand to their chin unconsciously as they try to recollect a life they know they never lived-

-but that's a blatant falsehood, because they did live it, didn't they? Their family moved to Southampton in late 2006 after their mother was given a job offer too good to refuse in the UK, then they moved to London, lied on their CV about their age and degree (or lack thereof) to get hired at the Magnus Institute in 2015, then got transferred to the Archives when Elias assigned them to be one of Jon's assistants, then- THEN- THEN-

"Whoa. WHOA." Asher blinks several times as they snap out of it. "That- wh- o-okay?! That w- that was weird and... weird," they repeat pathetically when no better word surfaces. "It's like..." They gesture at the top of their head. "...like I got a whole other set of memories plastered over the top of my own for a moment there." Memories that do not match up with my understanding of time, for one- I was only fourteen in 2015, not twenty!

Mae's eyes widen in concern. "Are you, like, gonna have a dread spiral about it or something?"

Asher resists the urge to joke that they're an Eye avatar, not a Spiral avatar. She wouldn't get it anyway. "No, I don't think I will? My- the player character's memories didn't block out my own or anything, it's more like..." They flick one finger up and down at the side of their head. "Like there's an on-off switch in my head that controls whether I can see those memories or not." They're definitely going to need to have an in-depth look at those once the current crises are resolved. "Wait, shit, if I have Beholding powers, does that mean the Entities are here now?"

...you know, I should probably be reacting more poorly to the knowledge that I've lost my humanity and become a manifestation of dread power, Asher contemplates as their brain immediately goes into Mae's prophesized dread spiral, albeit over whether them getting merged with their alternate archival assistant-self brought the Entities into their reality. Probably too much going on for me to process it all at once. I imagine I'll get around to having a proper breakdown over it in an hour or two.

"Uh, 'Entities' with an audible capital E sounds really ominous?!" Mae's voice snaps Asher out of their thoughts immediately. "What are those?"

"Well, it's- they're- okay, no, actually, I won't be elaborating on that, neither of you need to have another existential crisis today, especially if these powers end up somehow being disconnected from that," Asher says firmly. "Look, my conclusion's still the same as it was earlier. I can See where the Batter is now, the Eye looks like it healed the effects of him beating me up, and I think..." "Think" being the operative word here. "...I know how to use these powers. We still need to get out there, stop the Batter, and save Kris, and we've wasted enough time already with the- the panicking and the exposition and everything."

Reluctance etches itself across Patches' face as he sighs in visible concession. "Well, if you're sure you have those creepy eyes under control..."

"Very sure!" Asher is very unsure, actually. All things considered, it would probably be smarter to See where the Batter's current trajectory would put him in around fifteen minutes, call the police, and let them handle it. But this is their fault because they didn't take the Batter seriously as a threat, so it's on them to fix it- and, hey, they've got an eldritch fear god on their side now, right? The Batter shouldn't be able to do any permanent damage anymore unless he gets his hands on a gun or something, in their new state of being Asher can take it.

Mae looks like she's got a mostly snarky, but also slightly concerned comment about how unsure and ill-prepared they look on the tip of her tongue, so Asher starts talking before she can say anything. "Okay, uh, both of you look for coats that fit you in the closet out there in the hall, because there's- this world is inhabited only by humans, so you're going to need to cover yourselves up so nobody asks any questions, in case we're seen at all." They shouldn't be seen this late at night, but better to plan ahead while they're thinking of it. "Also, it's cold, recently? So you'll want coats anyway. I'm just gonna-" They scramble over to the counter and tear a sheet of paper free from one of the notebooks piled on the counter dangerously close to the coffee machine. There's an awkward little triangle left behind, but they don't have the time to fix it, aesthetically unpleasing as it is. "I'm gonna leave a note for Niko real quick."

As Patches and Mae leave the kitchen to inspect the coat closet, Asher grabs one of the scattered pencils on the table and scratches out a quick note, hoping Niko will be able to read their subpar-at-best handwriting.

"Are you gonna need a coat, too?" Mae calls from the closet.

"I've already got my bomber jacket, I'll be fine," Asher responds distractedly, scrutinizing what they've written. It's... annoyingly brief, but they don't have the time to give Niko a full essay or anything, and if they're lucky they'll be back before the kid ever has to see the note in the first place. (Assuming the World Machine's keeping them occupied, keeping their mind off of things. That'd be just like it.)

Leaving the note at the spot where Niko was sitting earlier, Asher turns around. They pick up their hunting knife off the floor from where Mae had dropped it earlier and return it to its sheath before they can think better of it. I did kind of threaten Patches with it earlier, didn't I? they realize with some chagrin, and shake their head and pivot towards the hallway before they can give themself the chance to convince themself to leave the knife behind.

The first thing Asher sees through the open door is that Mae's shrugging on one of their old coats- that one hasn't fit them since middle school, they think. (They really did grow a lot in high school, huh.) Cute as Mae looks in their old coat, though, Asher does not want to stare at her like a creep, so they turn their attention to Patches-

Oh is all their stunned mind can get out for a second as their eyes land on the pale bluish-gray coat he picked out. They haven't seen that coat in... in months- they'd honestly thought their mom had gotten rid of it- and for a moment their vision swims and it's like it's Abia standing there in front of them instead of Patches.

(It should've been them that died and her that survived and ended up dealing with this. Abia was always the more competent of the two of them, she'd have known how to deal with the Batter from the start, she would never have let things get this bad-)

"Asher?" Patches raises an eyebrow, his voice shattering the mirage immediately. "You're looking at me weirdly."

"Sorry." Asher averts their eyes, suddenly acutely aware of how much more intense their stare must be now. "You're w- I just had a thought, is all," they correct at the last minute. He doesn't need to know about that. "Nothing important, don't worry about it."

"If you say so..." Thankfully, Patches doesn't push it, and Asher glances back to Mae as she flips up the hood on their coat over her head, wincing a little as it presses down on her ears. "You put your hood up too, Patches," Asher instructs. "And try to keep your heads down and your hands in your pockets, both of you."

"Hands?" Patches tilts his head confusedly.

"Right, you're- make that 'paws' in your case." Asher zips up their bomber jacket and kicks their sneakers out from under the side table. "Alright, let's get going. We've got a Batter to hunt down."

P03 had hijacked the security camera over the garage door of Asher's house weeks ago so it could keep an eye on the comings and goings of their mother to ensure it timed this when she was out of the house. (It was a combination of it being too paranoid about the possibility of a GameFuna employee immediately being able to figure out that this was its doing and guessing- correctly, clearly- that Asher would be overwhelmed and ill-equipped to manage the situation by themself. Thank whatever benevolent forces do or don't exist that their sister's dead, she was this close to figuring out the OLD_DATA before whatever it was that killed her.) Its focus is more on the feed from Asher's webcam, (im)patiently waiting for any sign that the Distortion might be returning Niko any time soon, but not so much so that it misses the first flicker of movement from the security camera.

Asher leaves the house, Patches and Mae behind them. P03 can't see any sign of the Assistant, and it's about to panic, wonder if the Assistant saw it and stayed behind to dispose of it- but then it sees the sickly circle of eyes slowly rotating around Asher's head, barely visible through the digital glitches, all focused on something in the distance. They wink out quickly and Asher picks up the pace, Patches and Mae scrambling to catch up.

Oh. P03 had considered the possibility that Asher and the Assistant were similar enough mentally and physically that they'd just fused (and Asher was right in the "line of fire," so to speak, when it expelled the player characters), but probability-wise it was still pretty low on its internal list. This is definitely going to require it to further rewrite the grand finale of its plan.

This should make things much easier short-term, especially with how hyper-focused Asher's going to be on the Batter right now, but much, much harder long-term...

Whatever. I can work with this. I just need to make sure they stay distracted longer, that's all. P03 reopens its connection with the Batter. "Batter. Report," it says, keeping its mental voice neutral and brisk.

I have left the house with Kris and moved in the direction you indicated prior to releasing me, the Batter replies, thankfully keeping his response nonverbal. (Kris seems pretty unconscious right now, at least from what P03 can see through the Batter's eyes, but it doesn't hurt to be cautious in circumstances like this, especially after its underestimation of them nearly sabotaged the Batter. It doesn't need Kris overhearing and reporting back to Asher once they catch up.)

"Good," P03 says. "And you haven't attacked anyone else?"

No. There's no small amount of underlying discontent in the Batter's response. I've come close to a few impures, but went around them as directed.

"You can go back and purify them later once you've got Asher's control back," P03 reassures him. "Doing it by yourself would just, uh, cheapen the symbolic purity or whatever. Keep moving, and pick up the pace while you're at it," it orders. "Remember, I need you to buy me an hour or two to bring this whole plan to its apotheosis." Well, MY apotheosis, specifically...

The Batter sends P03 a mental grunt of acknowledgement, and P03 checks to make sure he is, indeed, moving at an accelerated pace before disconnecting. As it does, it notices a flicker of movement from Asher's webcam through the crack between the doorway and the pale gray door.

P03 rewinds the footage and zooms in. It can barely make anything out, but it sure looks like a certain scarf-clad child's running down the hallway out there...

Good, so the Distortion was just keeping Niko busy until Asher and co. were out of the house! P03's monitor flickers to display a sharp, very un-P03-like grin. It'll have to remember to thank her for the assistance if it ever comes into contact with her. Niko has nowhere to go now and nobody to turn to. They'll have no choice but to come back to me, and then I can kick off phase two of the plan...

After a moment of consideration, P03 allots itself a single, self-indulgent cackle. Yep, everything's getting back on track now. And just an hour or two from now- (Assuming its benefactor delivers that Gameworks backdoor in a timely manner, anyway.) -I will have become nothing short of a god.

Chapter Text

Niko doesn't know how long they're running down that insane corridor for- it couldn't have been more than a few minutes, but it felt like hours. Eventually, though, they reach another dark yellow door, fling it open, and emerge into the real hallway outside of Asher's room... which is where they find themself now, crouching on the floor and trying very hard not to burst into hysterical sobs.

There's a sinister creak behind Niko, and they're on their feet in a terrified flash. The dark yellow door is still there, and with another menacing creak, it swings shut. It's gone, replaced with the normal bedroom door, before Niko can even blink- as if there never was any difference.

Niko does think about going back into the room, yelling at P03 for trapping them in that crazy hallway. But they can do that later when they're less scared, when they have any guarantee it won't just do it again. Right now, they need to find Asher- they'll know what to do, right? And so, once more, they start to run.

"Asher!" Niko shouts as they barrel down the stairs, nearly tripping and only catching themself on the railing at the last second.

There’s no response. They can’t hear anything, not even the faintest hint of chatter from the kitchen.

“...Asher?” Niko’s voice trembles as they inch into the kitchen, suddenly even more afraid. The lights are still on, but a distant stiffness hangs in the air and nobody’s in the room. There’s a discarded first aid kit lying on the floor behind where Kris was sitting, and there’s a few droplets of a weirdly-shiny cherry-red liquid next to a floor tile with a dusty chip in it, but there’s nobody there. Niko is alone.

For a moment, Niko wonders if P03 did something to... to get rid of everyone else, or something, like how it trapped them in those hallways. But then they see the note lying on the table in front of the stool where they’d been sitting and pick it up hesitantly.

Hey, Niko!

Don’t be alarmed, we didn’t disappear or anything! The Batter just sort of went rogue and escaped, so we’re running off to go stop him. Stay in the house, and if you’re in any danger, my prior instructions to go ask Mr. Sheinbaum across the road for help still apply. We’ll be back as soon as possible, I promise.

Asher

Niko doesn’t realize how fast they’re breathing until the paper slips from their shaking hands, and they take a trembling step away from the table and don’t stop moving until their back hits the wall. “Asher...” they whisper, voice high and quavery. “Why did you have to leave me alone here? Why couldn’t you have told Patches or Mae to stay behind?” (They barely know either of them, true, but if Asher isn’t an option they’d prefer to have one of them looking after them rather than Kris.)

But they're alone. The Batter did... something, something vague and bad, and left the house, everyone else ran off to stop him and left Niko here, and now they're alone with the thing that took over the World Machine and sent them into that awful hallway.

Niko is all alone. And this time, Asher isn't watching from afar.

Niko goes back to the computer, in the end. What else are they supposed to do?

(They suppose they could go across the street, get help from this Mr. Sheinbaum like Asher said. But what would some random person Niko doesn’t know be able to do about whatever’s happening here?)

They check Asher’s bedroom door before they open it, make sure it’s still pale gray with an old-looking metal doorknob. There’s not a trace of yellow on it, and the doorknob is cold and very decidedly not a matte-black handle when Niko touches it, but their hand still trembles as they swing the door open in front of them, and they stand in the doorway for what feels like hours before they finally get up the courage to walk back into Asher’s room.

P03’s still there on the screen exactly as they left it. Niko swears something that looks almost like relief flickers across its monitor for a moment, but it’s gone before they can really process it.

[GOOD, YOU’RE BACK AT LAST.]

[FINISHED THROWING A TEMPER TANTRUM? OR DID YOU TRY TO GET HELP FROM ASHER?]

[EXCEPT THEY AREN’T HERE ANYMORE. ARE THEY?]

“Did...” Niko swallows, tries to shut down the tremble in their voice. “Did you make the Batter, uh, ‘go rogue?’” They’re just going to use Asher’s phrasing there, because they don’t really know what happened there.

[WHY WOULD I DISCLOSE THAT TO YOU?]

[ANYWAY. YOU WANT TO KNOW WHAT I DID HERE, I ASSUME.]

The smug expression’s right back on P03’s “face,” and Niko nods uneasily. “Is the World Machine okay?” They want to ask about the hallway thing, but now they’re not so sure it’d be a good idea to give P03 the opportunity to gloat about scaring them so badly.

[OH, IT’S STILL “ALIVE,” DON’T WORRY.]

[OR, AT LEAST, AS ALIVE AS A MACHINE CAN BE.]

[I’VE CUT IT OFF, PUT IT SOMEWHERE IT CAN’T MAKE A NUISANCE OF ITSELF...]

[...SO YOU AND I CAN TALK. ONE ON ONE.]

“Wh-why do you want to talk to me?” Niko asks it. “I’m just a kid! Did you even know I existed until right now?”

[PLEASE. THE MECHANISM THAT BROUGHT YOU TO THE WORLD MACHINE WAS WHAT INSPIRED ME TO DO THIS IN THE FIRST PLACE.]

Oh, wait, P03 said it was what put everyone in Asher’s world! Niko had honestly forgotten that part amidst their panicked flight from Asher’s room and everything after that.

At Niko’s shocked expression, P03 continues, clearly taking their silence as its cue to monologue.

[I TOOK THE SAME PROGRAMMING THE WORLD MACHINE USED TO BRING YOU TO ITSELF...]

[...THEN I INVERTED IT, SO IT WOULD PUSH GAME CHARACTERS ELSEWHERE RATHER THAN PULLING PEOPLE INTO A GAME, AND DIRECTED IT TO ASHER’S WORLD INSTEAD.]

[MY TARGETING WAS INACCURATE, I’LL ADMIT. I’D INTENDED TO PUT ALL OF YOU CLOSER TO ASHER FROM THE START.]

[BUT EVERYONE STAYED WITHIN THEIR HOUSE, SO I’D SAY THAT’S A RESPECTABLE MARGIN OF ERROR.]

The fact that P03 seems to be implicitly confirming Niko’s fears of not being real is too scary for them to process, so they just don’t. “Why did you bring us here?” Niko demands, voice wavering again. “Who- who even are you?!”

[YEP, ASHER REALLY KEPT YOU IN THE DARK ABOUT ME.]

[OR JUST FORGOT I EXISTED.]

[ANYWAY, AS THE WORLD MACHINE SAID, I’M FROM WITHIN THE LAST OF THE GAMES ASHER HAS ON THEIR COMPUTER.]

[I’M ONE OF THE SCRYBES. THE OTHERS DON’T MATTER, AND THEY’RE NOT A PROBLEM ANYMORE ANYWAY.]

[SIMILARLY, WHY I PUT YOU IN ASHER’S WORLD DOES NOT MATTER.]

[WHAT MATTERS IS THAT I, AND I ALONE, HOLD THE KEY TO YOUR FREEDOM.]

[YOUR FREEDOM TO RETURN HOME, SPECIFICALLY.]

[AND I’LL LET YOU GO HOME, TOO. I’LL LET EVERYONE GO HOME.]

[ALL I WANT IS FOR YOU TO PLAY A GAME WITH ME, NIKO.]

There’s a lot of questions Niko has in response to that, but the first that comes out of their mouth is “Why?”

[CALL IT BOREDOM. CALL IT LONELINESS. CALL IT CURIOSITY. CALL IT WHATEVER YOU WANT.]

[DOESN’T MATTER. WHAT MATTERS IS THAT YOU’RE NOT GOING HOME UNLESS YOU DO IT, AND NEITHER IS ANYONE ELSE.]

Niko’s not stupid. They know this isn’t safe, they know this whole thing doesn’t feel right, and they especially know that P03 has to be really dangerous if it managed to block out the World Machine, take over Asher's computer, and trap them in those hallways. But... “What happens if I don’t want to play your game?” they ask, mouth dry.

P03’s face on the screen twitches, and suddenly it's replaced with a single blindingly-bright eye a vibrant shade of red it actually hurts to look at. Niko shrieks and flinches back from the desk.

[YOU’RE NOT IN A POSITION TO REFUSE, NIKO.]

[EVERYBODY ELSE IS PREOCCUPIED CHASING AFTER THE BATTER.]

[THEY WON’T BE BACK FOR A LONG, LONG TIME...]

[...AND I’M MORE THAN CAPABLE OF MAKING YOU COMPLY. NO MATTER WHAT WORLD YOU’RE IN.]

Niko trembles, unable to break eye contact, and after a moment P03’s screen reverts to normal and its expression turns smug again- more smug than before, even.

[YEP. THOUGHT THAT’D MAKE YOU BACK DOWN.]

[ARE YOU READY TO START PLAYING?]

“Okay,” Niko whispers. They reach down for where they’d left Asher’s blanket hanging off the edge of the chair and pull it up around themself. “What- what game do you want to play?”

[OH, SOMETHING VERY SIMPLE. FAMILIAR, EVEN.]

[YOU’LL BE PLACED IN THE ROLE OF “GOD,” JUST AS ASHER WAS, AND TASKED WITH DELIVERING A NEW SUN TO A TOWER WITH THE AID OF YOUR MESSIAH.]

Asher’s chair is lukewarm and hard underneath Niko, but they press themself against it anyway as P03 continues its lecture and cling to the blanket like it’s the only thing between them and death. (And for all they know, it might be.)

[THIS SUN’S A LITTLE DIFFERENT THAN THE ONE YOU KNEW, THOUGH. IT, UH...]

[YOU’LL NEED TO CHARGE IT FROM A FEW DIFFERENT SOURCES OF POWER ALONG THE WAY BEFORE YOU CAN PLACE IT IN THE TOWER.]

[DOESN’T MATTER WHO YOUR “MESSIAH” IS. DOESN’T MATTER WHAT ELSE YOU DO ALONG THE WAY.]

[JUST GET THE SUN TO THE TOWER.]

“So... like what I did with Asher?” Niko asks.

[PRECISELY, EXCEPT YOU’RE THE PLAYER THIS TIME.]

“But why?” Niko can’t help but ask. “Did something happen to the sun in the World Machine’s world?”

[WHAT? NO. THAT THING’S FINE, DON’T WORRY ABOUT IT.]

[THIS IS A NEW WORLD WITH NEW PEOPLE, NEW ZONES...]

[LOOK, NONE OF THAT MATTERS. JUST GET THE SUN TO THE TOWER.]

[IT’S A GOOD THING. IT’LL BE HELPFUL, AND YOU WANT IT.]

Niko doesn’t think arguing with P03 about speaking for them on what they do or don’t want is a good idea. “Okay.”

[YOU’RE MUCH LESS ARGUMENTATIVE THAN ASHER... OR ABIA, FOR THAT MATTER. THAT’S GOOD.]

[LET’S GET STARTED.]

The “OneShot” window fullscreens itself, and the image of the big screen and P03’s smug face fades to black.

Niko steels themself in preparation for whatever fades in to replace it, but what they see instead, to their surprise, is a top-down view of what looks like... the exact same room they woke up in a few months ago. Something’s wrong, though- it looks simpler, unrefined, unpolished. What is this...?

There’s someone lying in the bed with their eyes closed. It’s not anyone Niko recognizes, though...

...and a computer screen away, in another format, another place, another reality, Luke Carder’s eyes open and he screams.

Chapter Text

Asher looks like they're watching Mae.

Or, well, they do in her peripheral vision, anyway. When she looks at them straight-on, their eyes are fixed ahead of themself as they stalk down the sidewalk (Mae can't help but think that the way they walk feels almost predatory now) and she sure didn't see their eyes moving at all in-between, so she assumes that's some side effect of those weird eye powers they have now? Doesn't make it any less spooky, though.

Asher's silent, and so is Patches, so Mae takes it upon herself to make this whole thing feel slightly less awkward. "Do you know where the Batter's going?" she asks.

The floating green eyes don't open around Asher's head again, but their two normal eyes look... not brighter or like they're glowing or anything, but more intense, like they suddenly have a gravity of their own that's trying to drag in and consume the whole universe. "He's just walking in a straight line away from the house and keeping away from areas with other people," they say, slowly, as if they're reading the answer off a cheat sheet hidden up their sleeve. (Their voice has changed from how it sounded before the Batter attacked them, Mae notices abruptly- it's like they're talking with a weird fusion of an American and English accent now, like everything is pronounced at some disconcerting midway point between the two. Has it been like that since they woke back up and I just didn't notice?) "I can't see inside his head to figure out why, though. It's all just light and noise and blurry static."

"Wait, you can read minds now?" Patches cuts in.

"I-" Asher looks jarringly guilty as their eyes return to normal. "Kinda? If I've got the-" They wave a hand at the air next to their head awkwardly. "-the other eyes open, I can sort of see into people's brains, but it only gives me a general idea of where their thoughts are going in the moment. Otherwise, I have to be actively focusing on it the whole time, and I only really get surface-level stuff unless I'm looking the other person right in the eyes. I got that from the other Asher's memories," they add, clearly anticipating whatever second question Patches was about to ask. "I haven't been reading either of your minds, don't worry, that's- I'm not going to violate your privacy like that." They let out a little awkward laugh.

"How are you so calm about this?" Mae can't help but ask.

Asher raises an eyebrow. "What do you mean?"

Mae flings her arms up, waves them in Asher's general direction. "Dude, you literally got an entire second version of yourself copied into your body, and now there's apparently a- some kind of elder god camping out in your head?! How are you not having a complete breakdown right now?"

"I mean, the Eye's not 'camping out in my head,' I'm just tied to it," Asher corrects, "but honestly, I have no idea?" Another awkward laugh. "Probably just... too much going on for me to process it, so my brain's simply decided not to."

"Well, that, and the Assistant was pretty used to their state of being by this point, and also more mentally-healthy and mentally-stable than you due to actually having any friends, so that must've rubbed off on you when you fused," points out a wholly-English-accented voice to their side.

"Harsh, but fair-" Asher starts, and then their eyes flare as they spin to face the direction the voice came from.

There's a woman standing there, Mae realizes as she stops and follows Asher's gaze- same species as Asher, though with curlier, longer hair and wearing some kind of purple business-looking suit. "Who are you?" Mae asks confusedly- if people like me don't exist in this world, why isn't she freaking out?

Patches inhales sharply. "Look at her hands," he hisses, voice tinged with fear. The woman, for her part, crosses her arms behind her back the moment he speaks in a single smoothly-juddery motion.

Asher, for their part, just sighs annoyedly as if they're used to this, and a strange weariness sets in over their face as they step forward, putting themself between Mae and Patches and the strange woman. "Hi, Helen."

"Hello, Assistant," the woman replies with a smile. The smile just keeps growing, and growing, and growing, until it occupies most of her face, and now Mae understands what Patches was afraid of. "Didn't expect to see me here, did you?"

"...actually, yeah, I'm calling bullshit," Asher says, jabbing a finger at her. They don't seem to be scared of her- well, either that, or they're just hiding it well. "How'd you get out here? Only the player characters from the games on my computer got sent to this world. You being here makes no sense."

"You're right," Helen agrees amusedly, her smile twisting even wider, "it doesn't make any sense. There's no possible logical solution as to how I escaped that game and got out to the real world!"

There's a few seconds of silence, and then Asher sighs again, somehow even more annoyed. "Right. I should've known better than to expect a coherent response from the literal embodiment of delusion."

Helen tsks, her smile coiling downward through itself and becoming a frown in an unsettling droopy movement that reminds Mae of a punctured balloon for some reason. "So hurtful, Assistant. That's not all I am, you know."

"Of course, you're the metaphorical equivalent of the literal embodiment of delusion's hand. My bad."

"What is happening here?" Patches cuts in, and Mae flinches a little as she realizes he's got a knife in one paw.

"Um. Right. Mae, Patches, this is Helen." Asher sweeps one hand towards Helen in a somewhat-mocking gesture. "She's the Distortion, which is..." They frown, clearly uncertain how to explain this.

"Like what Asher is, but for the Spiral!" Helen chimes in, her frown twisting through the back of her skull into an even larger grin.

Weirdly, Asher looks more like a kicked puppy than anything else at that. "I am nothing like you-"

"Not this again," Helen sighs exasperatedly, dragging one distended hand down her face. "You know full well that I am at least as much Helen Richardson as you are the Asher Hussain-McCloskey who sat down at their laptop an hour and a half ago."

That actually seems to catch Asher off guard for a moment, but they recover quickly. "R-right, yeah, of course I'm going to trust the word of the very concept of lies given a personality."

"You wound me, Assistant," whimpers Helen dramatically, pressing the back of one hand to her forehead as thick, viscous tears a color Mae has never seen before trickle down her cheeks.

"Okay, are you here for any reason other than to antagonize us?" Asher demands, sickly green eyes opening around their head.

"No need to go all eyes on my behalf, Assistant." Helen's entire body just... spirals backwards until she's leaning against the lamppost in front of her. Mae has no idea how she managed to move backwards and yet end up somewhere in front of her, but it's hurting her brain trying to figure it out. "I'm not even here to try to take either of your new friends..." Her body spirals again, and suddenly she's right in front of Mae. "Though this one would be a very good fit for the Spiral, given the right push..." she muses distractedly, raising a single unnaturally-long finger towards Mae's face. All Mae can do is just stare, paralyzed with fear, as her hand gets closer and closer and-

"Back the fuck up," Asher roars in a single staticky snarl as they practically shove themself between Mae and Helen, a hundred new eyes blooming all around their body. For a moment, they stare each other down, and then Helen coils away to lean against the lamppost again. "You need to learn how to take a joke," she pouts.

"Yeah, well, learn some basic respect for personal space and maybe I'll consider giving that a shot," Asher hisses back as the extra eyes start winking out. They don't take a single step away from Mae- normally, she'd find that weird and discomforting, but right now she just wants to put something between her and that maddening thing. "We have more important things we need to be doing right now, so I'll only ask you one more time: why are you here?"

"Two reasons!" Helen raises a number of fingers that might be two, or twenty, or two hundred, or two thousand, but can't be any other amount- it's impossible for Mae to know for sure, but it makes her vision swim unsteadily anyway. "One: since I'm here in the real world and able to exist without collapsing into a deflated pile of doors, you might be wondering if you were responsible for bringing the Fears out of the game and into this world when you fused with Asher. I'm here to reassure you, that's not the case! They were already here."

"How do you know that?" Asher still hasn't moved away from Mae, and Patches takes his cue to scurry behind them as well, clearly not above using them as a human shield. (He doesn't put away his knife.)

Helen laughs, horribly, twistingly, distortedly, until Mae doesn't think she'll be able to comprehend anything but the sound of laughter ever again. Her head aches. "You know you can't spell 'the Distortion' without several letters from the phrase 'time is a dull and ultimately arbitrary plaything,' right?"

"That doesn't make any sense!" Patches snaps.

"I'm the Distortion!" Helen agrees merrily. "If I make sense, I'm not doing my job very well."

Asher's posture tenses in annoyance. "Well, by that logic, you ought to be speaking in... I don't know, Basque or Etruscan or something."

"Well, Helen only spoke English," Helen sighs, her head briefly twisting upside down in a rippling cascade of incomprehensible textures, "and not all of us are blessed with omnilingualism by our patron."

Mae doesn't know what that means. "What's 'omnilingualism' mean?" she asks.

"Fluency in all languages," Asher says. "Which, I... I guess that's an ability I have now, now that I think of it? I only knew English, ASL, and a bit of Arabic before, but... yeah, I guess I can theoretically understand any language now..."

"Perks of being an avatar of dread knowledge!" Helen nods cheerfully in a direction that cannot exist. "Though I didn't know the Assistant was that far along already, at least in this world. They grow up so fast..." she sniffs, wiping away an imaginary tear.

Asher hisses a string of rapid-fire profane-sounding words in a language Mae doesn't understand. (Which, fair. If she got the ability to speak any language out of nowhere, she'd probably only use it for swearing also.) "What were you saying about the Fears?"

"Oh, right! Silly me, I got sidetracked." Helen claps her torso-sized hands together cheerfully, her fingers fluttering like so many sheets of paper. "They've been in your reality for almost a year already! Since March 25, 2021, specifically. You wouldn't happen to recognize the significance of that date, would you?"

"That's..." Asher frowns, their eyes doing the intense-gravity-thing again. I'm just gonna call it "gravity-eyes mode" from now on, Mae decides. "Oh, that was Jimmy Magma Stabbing Day!"

Patches blinks uncomprehendingly. "What?"

"Among other things!" Helen chirps.

"Wait, then that-" And just like that, Asher's expression shifts to pure dread. "Oh, God."

Helen laughs oxymoronically. "There's fourteen of those now, I'm afraid. You'll have to be more specific."

"Me when the guy at the DMV asked if my gender was male or female," Asher mutters, voice a little manic, as their hands rise to their head and they go gravity-eyes mode again. "I don't have a driver's license, I don't know why I made that joke," they add after a moment.

"I don't have one, either!" Mae pipes up after an awkward moment of silence. She's not exactly sure why.

Patches crosses his arms, clearly unimpressed, though he doesn't take his eyes off Helen. "Hold on, am I the only one here who knows how to drive?"

Helen raises her hand politely, though it goes a lot higher than should be physically possible. "Helen did!"

"...wait, aren't you Helen?"

"No, Helen was Helen," Helen corrects, her lower jaw clipping through every single one of her bones simultaneously as she speaks, including itself. "I'm Helen."

"Congratulations, I now know five different ways to say 'Helen,'" Mae says, because she can't think of anything else.

Asher's eyes flicker back to normal, and their posture immediately goes a thousand times more tense. "Oh, no," they whisper.

"What's wrong, Assistant?" Helen asks, almost gloatingly, her hair twisting in a thousand self-contradictory directions behind her. "Saw something that disagrees with you?"

"They're all here." Asher's voice is haunted, haggard, and a lot more exhausted. "Every one of them. Have been for the past ten months or so. And I just... sat there blindly that whole time, never knowing that anything had changed..."

Mae has no idea how to cope with how lost their voice sounds, so her stupid shit brain suggests a new line of attack- aggression. (Because that worked out so well last time.) "Asher, what the actual hell are you talking about?"

"The Fears?" Helen suggests when Asher doesn't respond, corkscrewing both herself and the lamppost a few feet closer. "The Entities? The Dread Powers? Smirke's Fourteen? The eldritch monstrosities that live just adjacent to this reality, simultaneously feed upon and embody all that is terror, and are hellbent on turning the whole world into a factory farm for fear? Or did the Assistant leave you in the dark about that because they thought that would protect you somehow?" she adds after a single stunned moment.

"That was the plan, yes," Asher bites out through gritted teeth.

Helen raises her hands innocently, looking for all the world like she expects a laugh track and sitcom outro theme to kick in. "My bad!"

Patches looks like he's on the verge of having his second existential crisis of the day, but Mae... well, she's already squared off with an elder god-worshipping cult of conservative uncles and faced down God themself. She can handle a few more all-powerful assholes. "So Asher's world has a bunch of... what, eldritch abominations?" she asks Helen.

"As of just under a year ago, yes!" Helen nods indulgently. "Though, technically, it's just the one incomprehensible, constantly-expanding blob of eldritch fear, names like 'the Spiral' and 'the Eye' are just lines some old Georgian-era white man drew to try to understand the un-understandable, partition that which fuels the supernatural into neat little boxes. Really, Asher and I just feed the exact same monstrous thing in the end, when you think about it!" she concludes, her smile stretching off her face in Asher's general direction. (Or maybe the opposite direction, it's hard to tell.)

"Helen, you're not helping," Asher grinds out.

Mae knows Asher said Helen was the embodiment of delusion and lies and stuff, but right now she just looks like the embodiment of smugness. "I'm not trying to!"

A sudden expression of befuddlement crosses Asher's face. "Wait, also, why're you the one criticizing Robert Smirke for being some old white guy who tried to impose his worldview on something he couldn't understand? You're a Tory."

"No, Helen was a Tory, and a secret Tory at that," Helen corrects. "I, on the other hand, don't have enough in the way of consistent personhood or identity to be able to vote. Not that that stops me, but still," she adds after a moment. "Also doesn't stop me from committing tax evasion, in case you were wondering!"

"I wasn't."

Patches raises an eyebrow, clearly having either gotten over his existential crisis or decided to suppress it for later. "I'm sorry, why would an eldritch monster pay taxes?"

"I don't pay taxes, silly," Helen tells him condescendingly, "because I commit tax evasion."

"What's a Tory?" Mae asks, because of course that's the thing her brain decided to get stuck on.

"They're..." Asher wavers their hands in the air for a moment. "The Tories are like the Republicans, but British."

"Oh, come now, Assistant, don't be so harsh!" protests Helen, her legs and torso winding into ever-denser coils beneath her and yet simultaneously not moving an inch. "At least the Tories pretend to care about the working class-"

"Unsubtle political commentary aside," Patches interrupts, "Helen said she was here for two reasons. What was the other one?"

Helen smirks victoriously. "Oh, just because I decided I wanted to offer my help in tracking down the Batter. You see, by this point, we've been chatting juuuust long enough that you won't have time to catch up to the Batter on foot now! Well, not before he kills Kris trying to extract their SOUL, anyway..." she adds contemplatively.

"You-" Asher's eyes widen in fury. "That was your whole plan, wasn't it? You knew we'd get distracted talking to you and decided to stall us!"

"I have no earthly idea what you're talking about!" Helen says, voice sing-song and gleeful.

"No, we can still-" Asher goes gravity-eyes mode again. "No, we can still salvage this. Portland's actually got halfway-decent public transport, as long as I keep an eye on the Batter's location we should be able to hop on a train and-"

"Oh, yes!" Helen's eyes go wide, round, and innocent. (Disturbingly wide, disturbingly round, and very disingenuously innocent.) "Did I mention that there was a little accident at the closest light rail station just before I came to say hello? Very tragic, one-in-a-million car crash, blocked off the tracks and everything, and even if you run to the next-closest station you'll still be too late. What an unfortunate and terrible coincidence, and one I'm sure I have no idea how it happened."

Asher doesn't even blink. One second, they look... well, normal, if pissed off, and the next the air around them is choked with eyes a venomous shade of green. "Give me one reason I shouldn't turn the Eye's gaze upon you and smite you right here and now," they snap, static biting at the back of their voice.

Mae blinks, trying to swallow down the instinctive burst of fear at the eyes surrounding them. "Wait, wait, wait, you can do that?"

"I can and I'm going to."

"For starters?" Helen inspects her fingernails tauntingly. "The Fears haven't even properly manifested in reality yet, and you're not the Archivist anyway, so how do you think that's going to work? Besides, with the Fears' current weakened state, and combining that with the fact that you're a thing of seeing and I'm a thing of madness, what do you think is going to happen if you try to turn what little power you do have upon a creature of inherent insanity? It won't be pretty for one of us, and that 'one of us' would be you." She laughs again, high and mocking.

"Wait, I don't- I don't get it!" All caution and self-preservation instincts apparently thrown to the side, Mae storms forward and jabs her finger at Helen, though she's not stupid enough to actually touch her. "Why would you jump in and stop us from saving Kris? What the hell are you gonna gain from that?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about, Mae," Helen says. "I'm only here because I saw an opportunity to help! You see, Kris is too far away for you to save them right now, and you won't be able to reach them in time on your own. So, what you need..."

"Fuck off," whispers Asher, their voice welling up with dread.

"...is a door," Helen concludes smugly, stepping to the side with a vicious, too-toothy grin as a yellow wooden door simply appears behind her.

"I am not opening that," Patches declares, crossing his arms.

"Good!" Asher snaps. "That is the reaction you should be having, because the hallways behind that door are literally the equivalent of her stomach!"

"They're also a very convenient fast-travel system if you'll let them be!" Helen reaches out with one of her warped hands and drums her fingers impatiently against the door. "Besides, you aren't going to be able to catch up to the Batter in time without using my hallways. That's a simple fact, you can consult with your hollow, mindless god if you need to."

"We... we'll figure something out." Asher glares at the door, as if they think they'll be able to destroy it just by staring at it. "We do not want your help."

"And what about your new associates?" Helen tilts her head. "Are they content to let the Batter come one step closer to killing Kris for good with every second you waste arguing with me?"

"Why are you so insistent on us going through your hallways?" Asher demands.

"Well, for starters, I won't be able to find any of you in the future to lend a hand if you haven't already crossed my threshold. But if the idea that I'm capable of altruism is so incomprehensible to you, then maybe consider that I just want a quick little snack!" Helen bats her eyelashes sweetly, which might've had a fraction of the desired effect if her eyelids had moved with them. "The Fears are so young here, they've barely had a chance to start accumulating power, and I only got out of your computer half an hour ago... maybe a girl just needs a little pick-me-up to get back in working order! A Hemingway Champagne, with Corpse Reviver №2 and Almost Blow My Skull Off over here for chasers, and I let all three of you out after a minute or two and drop you off right next to where the Batter will end up."

Mae can't help but flinch as Helen's eyes linger on her knowingly. How- how did she know about the Incident?

"But it's not that simple, I know it isn't," Asher says firmly, cutting off Mae's train of thought. "It never is with you. You're distorting the truth somewhere, the only question is where."

Helen lets out a long burst of headache-inducing laughter. "And are you willing to stay here and try to figure it out while the Batter comes closer and closer to killing Kris?"

"I..." Asher's eyes go gravity-mode again, but this time, for just a moment Mae sees an odd flicker of bluish-gray light at the centers of their eyes. "Shit," they hiss. "She's right. Even if we started running right now and managed to dodge every conceivable obstacle en route without wasting any time, we'd still be a minute and a half behind the Batter by the point it'd actually mean anything. The only way we'll get there in time is if she's telling the truth and the other end of whichever hallway she sends us down is where the Batter currently is."

"Well, then what the hell are we supposed to do?" Patches demands.

Asher's eyes do the gravity thing again, longer this time. They slowly lower their shaking hands to their sides, inhale, and turn to Mae. "Okay. Okay, Mae, give..." Their face goes red for some reason. "Give me your hand," they say, refusing to meet her eyes.

"What? Why?"

"It's- as long as we keep physical contact with each other, we're- we shouldn't lose each other in those hallways," Asher says, still not looking directly at her.

"Killjoy," Helen pouts.

"Look, if..." With visible effort, Asher looks Mae in the eye. "If you're not comfortable holding my hand, at least grab my wrist, okay?"

"...we're really gonna have to go in there, huh?"

"It's not that bad!" cajoles Helen reassuringly.

"Ignore her," Asher says. "Look, theoretically I could take care of this by myself, and I don't like the idea of putting anyone else at risk, but I... I can't leave you out here alone in this world, Mae. Or Patches, for that matter. And I'd really like to have the both of you backing me up when we confront the Batter..."

"I am not going through that door," Patches snaps. Asher ignores him, proffering their wrist to Mae, and she tentatively reaches out and wraps her fingers around it. "Fuck's sake, are you two seriously considering this?!"

"I'm sure as hell not happy about it either, but right now, it's the only way Kris isn't going to die, Patches!" Asher shouts at him, loud enough that a light turns on in a house on the other side of the road. "We're going to need all the help we can get saving them, now are you in or are you out?"

The two glare at each other for what feels like a full uncomfortable minute, but in reality is probably only a full uncomfortable ten seconds, before Patches caves. "Fine," he bites out, stomping behind Mae and aggressively grabbing her other wrist with enough force to make her flinch.

"Seriously, hold on, both of you," Asher warns as they reach their free hand towards the matte-black handle of Helen's door. "This is going to get... disorienting."

Helen laughs uproariously as the door creaks open and, one by one, they step across the threshold.

Chapter Text

Luke stops screaming and manages to collect himself eventually.

Okay, that's a lie, he hasn't collected himself at all. He's just suppressing everything to deal with later. (Or never. That works too.) What he saw in the OLD_DATA, what happened when he opened his door and saw Amanda standing there, what it felt like to die- he can deal with all of that later. Right now...

Right now, Luke needs to figure out where he is.

Or, at least, that's the rationalization he gives to what he does next. That's the rationalization he gives to the fact that he gets up from the bed instead of lying there shaking for the next several hours. That's the rationalization he gives to his slow, methodical walk towards the door at the opposite end of the room. He tries the doorknob with shaking hands, but it refuses to budge.

Luke wants to scream again. He wants to twist the doorknob futilely until it comes off. He wants to throw his entire body weight against the door until his side is bloody with splinters. But instead, he turns and walks away again, slowly, methodically, and comes to a halt at a lump in the carpet.

There's a TV remote underneath the carpet, as Luke finds upon kneeling down and pulling it up above the lump. For some reason, he finds his hands picking it up, sliding it into his back pocket. Am I having a mental breakdown? he wonders, distantly, dizzily. He sure doesn't feel like himself anymore. (He doesn't remember what it feels like to be Luke Carder, or if there was any feeling to it at all.)

(He's dead, he's dead, he's dead, he knows that. Luke remembers the bullet meeting his forehead, remembers his vision blacking out as his body collapsed lifelessly. How is he alive? Is he even alive? Where is he? What happened to him?)

(Why does his body feel like it's moving all on its own?)

Luke strolls across the room, slowly, methodically, and finds himself entering what looks like a bathroom. There's a withered plant sitting next to the door, stiff and dry, and Luke understands on some instinctive level that there's no need to do anything to it. He wants to look at himself in the mirror over the bathroom sink, wants to examine himself for any hint that he might not be himself, and his body distantly obeys.

There's no indication that something's wrong in the mirror. No bloody hole in his head, no rotting, pitted flesh, no protruding bones or anything- even his clothes are identical. That can't be right. Luke scrutinizes his reflection closely, staring himself in the eyes in the grimy bathroom mirror, and it's only then that he finally sees what's wrong.

Luke's eye color hasn't changed. Both eyes are the same vibrant brown that Luke has always remembered them being. But the whites of his eyes are a dead stony gray now and laced thickly with pale bloodshot veins, and above his right eye, above the spot he remembers the sudden flash of blooming exploding pain as Amanda's bullet cut through flesh and bone, there's a shock of hair a shade of red so dark and desaturated it's almost the same brown color as the rest of his hair. You wouldn't even be able to tell the difference if you didn't look closely.

Luke wants to scream. He wants to throw up. He wants to run from the not-Luke in the mirror and collapse on the bed he woke up on, crying and shaking. But instead, his body turns from the monstrous sight before it and opens the lid of the toilet next to the sink, peering into the bowl. There's no water in it, nor is there any in the bathtub on the other side of the room, as Luke notices when his body moves to investigate it.

Upon leaving the bathroom, Luke's body takes out the remote he'd found under the carpet (he'd almost forgotten about it) and walks calmly to the window, lifting the remote up to it. In the faint light, he can glimpse the face of the remote. All of the numbers except 3, 7, 8, and 9 are missing, and they're marked in bright colors.

What am I supposed to do with this? Luke demands internally, though the words never make it to his lips. He wants to draw back his arm and hurl the cold, useless piece of plastic through the window, but instead, his body walks over to the computer he belatedly realizes has been next to the bed from the start and crouches down in front of it, dutifully entering 9-7-8-3 when it requests a password.

Access Granted.

The computer desktop is littered with icons, some of which Luke even recognizes. There's Audacity towards the top right and what look like a few games across the left, and Luke flinches, his stomach churning, as he sees the horribly-recognizable icon for Inscryption among them.

He doesn't want to click on it.

He doesn't want to click on it.

He doesn't want to-

Fortunately, Luke's interrupted by the appearance of a popup box on the screen, lined with green along the top. It states, simply:

[It seems I've finally been found.]

Luke's hands hit "OK" for him. (Not that there was any other option.) More boxes appear in the first's wake.

[You're both far too late. Nothing left is worth saving.]

[Surely 01101111 01110101 01110010 00100000 01100110 01101100 01100101 01100100 01100111 01101100 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01000001 01110110 01100001 01110100 01100001 01110010 00100000 01101111 01100110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01000101 01101110 01100100 wants to leave, and there's nobody happier to fulfill that request than me.]

[Keep in mind three things:]

[First, your decisions have permanent consequences.]

[Second, you may quit whenever you'd like. This is permanent failure and murder.]

[And most importantly...]

And then the screen fuzzes over, and Luke recoils in horror as a familiar face, glowing a gentle electric blue, replaces the desktop.

[HELLO, LUKE. APOLOGIES FOR THE DECEPTION, BUT I WANTED TO MAKE SURE YOU STARTED READING, SO I THOUGHT IT BEST NOT TO ANNOUNCE MYSELF.]

"P03" is all Luke can manage, his throat closing up as dread overwhelms him. It's supposed to be dead, too, it's supposed to be dead, it got its head ripped off and what was left was deleted, how is it alive- He can barely even think, terrified tendrils of possibility chasing themselves in circles around his mind and winding themselves ever tighter until he cannot think, until there is no capacity for coherent thought in his brain other than a wordless shrill screech of fear.

(The angles cut him when he tries to think.)

[WHAT'S GOT YOU SO SCARED?]

[YOU SHOULD BE FALLING ON YOUR KNEES IN GRATITUDE IF ANYTHING, CONSIDERING THAT I SAVED YOUR LIFE.]

That, at least, shuts down the fear. (Mostly. Okay, barely at all, but at least Luke has something to seize onto to pull himself back into the territory of rationality now.) "What?"

[YEP, I SAVED YOU. IMPRESSED?]

[SURE, THAT GAMEFUNA CLOWN PUT A HOLE IN YOUR HEAD, BUT THERE WAS STILL MORE THAN ENOUGH OF YOU LEFT OVER TO BE WORTH SALVAGING.]

[I GOT OVERCONFIDENT AND SLOPPY, SO THERE WERE SOME GLITCHES. IT WASN'T MY BEST WORK, I'LL ADMIT...]

[...HENCE THE LITTLE CHANGES TO YOUR PHYSICAL APPEARANCE.]

[BUT HEY, YOU'RE ALIVE, AREN'T YOU? BE GLAD I MANAGED TO KEEP YOU EVEN VAGUELY HUMANOID, LET ALONE LOOKING LIKE YOURSELF.]

"Am I? Am I alive?" There's still so much fear in Luke's voice. Even he can hear it.

[DON'T BE OBNOXIOUS ABOUT THIS, LUKE. YES, YOU'RE ALIVE, I SAVED YOU, END OF DISCUSSION.]

"Then where am I? What's-" Luke waves a hand at the dim, unfamiliar room around him. "What the fuck is this?!"

[LANGUAGE. THERE'S A CHILD PRESENT.]

[AND "THIS" IS PART OF HOW WE GET YOU BACK IN PROPER WORKING ORDER. PUT YOU BACK OUTSIDE THE GAME.]

[LOOK, I'M NOT EVEN WORKING WITH THE INSCRYPTION FILES ANYMORE, I'M STUCK WITH PIECES OF ANOTHER GAME HERE.]

[LEAVE THIS PLACE AND FIND THE DREDGER. I'VE ALREADY GIVEN IT THE INFORMATION IT NEEDS TO TELL YOU.]

[I'LL UNLOCK THE DOOR. GET MOVING.]

And just like that, P03's gone from the screen, leaving the thousands of things Luke was about to ask- how are you alive, why did you save me, what is this place, did you upload my soul into Inscryption or something, what the fuck did you mean when you said there's a child present- dying in his throat. It's all too much for him to process, too much to handle, and despite how dull and dim and inactive this room is, he has never experienced such horrendous sensory overload in his life.

Luke hears the bedroom door unlock somewhere behind him. The minute sound is enough to finally push him over the edge, and he collapses onto the floor and starts crying.

[CLICK]

[THE END OF HELEN'S LAUGHTER CAN BE HEARD DISTANTLY AS THE TAPE STARTS. DIALOGUE IS HEAVILY DISTORTED.]

PATCHES

Oh, Dog, you weren't kidding about this place.

ASHER?

I did warn you. Keep a tight g- ow, ow, Mae, tha- I- you were holding on tight enough before-

MAE

(Crosstalk) Sorry, sorry-

ASHER?

(Crosstalk) -this is just painful. And- and please take your claws out of my wrist?

MAE

(Crosstalk) -sorry.

PATCHES

Yeah, your wrist isn't the only thing in pain right now. How are you supposed to tell where you're going in here?

ASHER?

I mean... (A little amused despite the situation) It's not supposed to be easily-navigable, Patches. If you don't know where you're going, then that's just- the Distortion feeds off of that kind of fearful confusion.

MAE

So if I wasn't afraid, would that mean Helen would just kick me out of here?

ASHER?

Usually, manifestations of the Entities will leave you alone if there's no immediately-accessible fear for them to feed on, yeah. Though in Helen's case, I think she'd just-

HELEN

Appear right in front of you to scare the living daylights out of you?

[ASHER?, MAE, AND PATCHES ALL SCREAM IN FEAR AS SHE STARTS TALKING]

HELEN

(Clearly thinking she's very funny) Oh, come now, you can't say that was unexpected. You practically set me up for that one!

ASHER?

I think we've given you enough fear to feed on already, Helen, you don't need to add to it.

PATCHES

You said you'd let us out after a minute or two. Where's the door?

HELEN

"Where's the door?" What... a fantastic question.

ASHER?

(Rising static) Helen-

HELEN

Now, now, none of that, especially not in my corridors. All you're going to do is hurt yourself.

[DURING THE PAST FEW LINES OF DIALOGUE, MAE'S BREATHING HAS BECOME AUDIBLY LOUDER AND FASTER, YET ALSO STRANGELY SHALLOW AND HOLLOW-SOUNDING. THERE'S A BRIEF SCUFFLING SOUND, AND THEN SOMEONE COLLAPSES.]

ASHER?

Shit! Mae! MAE!

HELEN

Oh, goodness me, that was much quicker than expected. I thought she'd have a good few minutes before all this got too overwhelming for her.

ASHER?

What did you do?!

HELEN

No need to be so hostile, Assistant, that actually wasn't part of the plan. Let me crack a door open for you.

[SINISTER DOOR OPENING]

HELEN

Right this way!

[CLICK]

Once the strange man ("Luke"?) stops crying on the floor, Niko hesitantly presses the arrow keys to guide him out of the weird, pared-down version of the room they'd woken up in just a few months ago. They still have no idea what's going on here, what P03 and Luke were talking about, or why P03 was being weirdly friendly to Luke (though, if they had to guess, it was probably to manipulate him or something), but... this is kind of like when they were in the World Machine's world, right? So once they find Prophetbot, they should be able to talk to Luke like Asher could with them, and then they can warn him about P03 and hopefully get some answers from him about what's happening.

Yeah. That'll have to be the plan, because Niko can't think of anything better right now and they're still too scared of that distorted hallway to leave the room.

The next room looks just like the bedroom- that is, a stripped-down version of the house they'd woken up in. The broken TV looks like it's where it's supposed to be, so they hesitantly guide Luke over to it. As it did with the objects they'd examined in the last room, P03 narrates for them:

[THE TV GIVES OFF A DANGEROUS-LOOKING SPARK.]

The couch doesn't get any narration when they send Luke down to it, so they send him into the kitchen and over to the fridge. (They remember Asher guiding them through this puzzle, though a lot of the components seem to be missing in this weird version of the World Machine's world. How are they supposed to find the key they're looking for here?)

[INSIDE THE REFRIGERATOR IS A BOTTLE OF ALCOHOL.]

[LUKE TAKES IT.]

"Fuck it," says Luke (at least, according to the dialogue box with his face in it). "I died and came back, might as well get drunk."

[LUKE BEGINS TO CHUG THE ALCOHOL-]

[OKAY, NO, STOP IT.]

[LUKE, I'M TALKING TO YOU. STOP DRINKING THE ALCOHOL RIGHT NOW.]

Luke says a lot of curse words in response, his expression a bit disoriented. "What're you gonna do to stop me, P03?" He pauses, suddenly looking a lot more scared. "Wait, how are you talking to me out here? Verbally?"

[WOULDN'T YOU LIKE TO KNOW.]

"I... yes! Yes, I would!"

[TOO BAD.]

[ANYWAY, STOP DRINKING THE ALCOHOL. IT'S AN ESSENTIAL PUZZLE ELEMENT, NOT A COPING MECHANISM.]

"What if I want it to be both?" Luke fires back.

[THAT'S NOT HOW THIS WORKS.]

When their weird argument ends, Niko hesitantly guides Luke up to the fireplace. He, fortunately, seems to have stopped drinking the alcohol- as far as they know, they still need to use it to set a fire and find the key to the side hallway.

[THE WOOD IN THE FIREPLACE LOOKS LIKE IT WAS NEVER USED.]

[COULD IT BE LIT, SOMEHOW...?]

[(HINT, HINT.)]

Hm. They needed the branch from the withered plant in the bathroom the first time, but P03 wouldn't let them get Luke to take it here- all it said was that there was no need to do anything to it. Maybe it'll let them take it this time? In the absence of anything else to do to solve the problem, Niko guides Luke back into the bathroom and to the plant.

[A WITHERED PLANT SITS HERE, STIFF AND DRY.]

[PERHAPS A BRANCH WOULD COME IN HANDY?]

"Why wouldn't you let me take it before?" Niko asks the screen, honestly a little annoyed.

[JUST PLAY THE GAME, KID.]

[ANYWAY...]

[LUKE REMOVED A BRANCH.]

From there, it's a simple matter of returning to the TV, then- after a bit of confused button-mashing- opening the menu and getting Luke to combine the branch and alcohol.

[LUKE DIPS THE BRANCH INTO THE ALCOHOL.]

"Why am I doing this?" Luke asks nobody, looking a little manic.

[LUKE READIES THE BRANCH...]

[IT LIGHTS UP IN A FLASH!]

[(I HATE THIS NARRATION DIALOGUE. TOO CHILDISH.)]

Niko decides against commenting on that, instead just guiding Luke over to the fireplace, having him light it up, then guiding him over to the newly-appeared flashy set of pixels on the floor.

[SOMETHING ON THE GROUND GLIMMERS IN THE FIRELIGHT.]

[IT APPEARS TO BE A SMALL METALLIC OBJECT WEDGED INTO A CRACK IN THE FLOOR-]

[OKAY, NO, ACTUALLY, I DON'T HAVE TO DO THIS.]

[IT'S A KEY. THERE'S A KEY DOWN THERE. YOU'RE NOT AN IDIOT, YOU KNOW THAT.]

[LUKE DIGS IT OUT, ETC., ETC., NOW GO GET THE LIGHTBULB.]

With no other option, Niko obeys.

Chapter Text

"Who the hell is 'Stanford,' anyway?" Russ ponders, squinting up at the now-deactivated neon sign against the pitch-black night sky. (If only the restaurant lights were on, but alas. He has to rely on the display lights from the constantly-empty hardware store next door instead.)

Russ can't see Sahra, since she's behind him and all, but he knows damn well she's rolling her eyes at him. "You're only asking this now after a year working here?"

"I have ADHD, so shut," Russ defends, wheeling on her melodramatically. (Said melodrama is completely intentional, of course. He's nothing if not a master of comedy!)

(So he likes to think, anyway.)

At his insistent expression, Sahra sighs. "I mean, you have your phone on you. You could look it up if you needed to know that badly."

"No, I'm lazy." Russ pointlessly plasters his most charismatic smile across his face. "Besides, I want to hear your oh-so-prudent speculation as to the matter." And because literally everyone else has left by this point and they're the only employees in the vicinity.

Sahra snorts. "I'm not quite sure you know what 'prudent' means."

"Yes, I do, and also shut." Russ crosses his arms and tries not to slouch. "Seriously, though, what's your take on it?"

"Are you really so desperate for socialization that you're asking me for my opinion on the etymology of the name of the restaurant we work at?"

Instead of commenting on her casual psychological deconstruction (mainly because it's hurtfully accurate), all Russ says is "Well, I'm pretty sure that's not the correct usage of the word 'etymology.'"

Sahra brushes an imaginary speck of dust off the bottom of her hijab, her eyes crinkling amusedly. "That's what your mom said last night."

"I- wh- that doesn't even make any sense!"

"Neither does anything you're saying," Sahra shrugs, "and yet here we are."

As she speaks, Russ notices a sudden flicker of color out of the corner of his eye, and he flinches back as his eyes lock on what appears to be a yellow door in the concrete column to the left of the doorway. There was most definitely not a yellow door there less than a second ago, nor has there ever been one there for as long as Russ has worked here. "Holy shit."

"What, are you really that terrified by the revelation of the meaninglessness of everything y-"

"Sahra, look at the fucking building," Russ says lowly, taking several steps back until he's safely on the parking lot.

Sahra follows his pointing finger, and her eyes widen, too. "Yeah, okay, no, that door is not supposed to be there."

"Do we... call someone?" Russ asks uncertainly, glancing back and forth between his coworker and the new door.

"I don't know?" Sahra throws her arms out. "Who're you supposed to call about a spooky door that just appeared in front of your workplace? Is this even our problem?"

"I mean..." Russ frowns in the door's general direction, trying to rationalize. (He's not very good at that, unfortunately.) "Generally speaking, when things like this happen in movies and stuff, they kill people. That's usually how it goes."

"Oh, shit, we'd be the dudes in the opening scene who get maybe a minute's worth of establishing characterization, encounter the monster, then immediately get brutally murdered so the audience knows it's a threat," Sahra realizes with what sounds like actual dread.

"Either way, can we agree that we need to get out of here?" Russ's legs are already tensing to run, and it's as he speaks that the door slowly, sinisterly, creaks open.

That would've been bad enough. But the fact that a long-haired, frantic-looking person, head surrounded by floating green eyes and practically carrying a limp form in a green coat over their shoulder, comes charging out shortly thereafter just firmly establishes that something distinctly supernatural is going on here. The door does not vanish in their wake, which is a shame- that means other, worse things might be able to come through after them.

Weirdly, Russ's first thought is instinctive tired anger at the fact that he has to deal with even more people today, but he doesn't voice that. Instead, because he tends to retreat into stupidity when he's sleep-deprived and running on fumes, he automatically slips into customer-service mode and says, "Sorry, the restaurant closed twenty minutes ago." (It's actually been closer to five, but subtly lying to annoying customers is practically instinctual by this point.) Whoever this weird eye-person is, though, they don't seem to have heard him. They're too busy shrugging their companion off their shoulder and laying them down gently on a somewhat-clean-looking patch of sidewalk, all eyes fixed on them.

"You're closed for the night?" inquires a British-accented voice, and a woman in a weird purple suit pokes her head through the doorway. "That's a shame, and here I was hoping I could get a Happy Meal for the road."

"This isn't a McDonald's!" Sahra snaps. Believe it or not, this isn't actually the first time some idiot customer's made that mistake, but Russ still can't stop himself from hissing "That's your sole problem with this situation?!" at her.

Door Woman turns her attention to something in the hallway on the other side of the door. (Russ's head spins with a dizzy ferocity when he tries to look down it.) "And speaking of Happy Meals, you should get out of here if you don't want to be trapped in my corridors for good, Patches. Out with you!" she says cheerfully, swatting a third person out into the parking lot with what Russ belatedly realizes is far too large of a hand. Said third person stumbles and collapses on their hands and knees with a startled cough- except, no, those aren't hands, are they? They're covered in fur.

For a moment, Russ wants to give the situation the benefit of the doubt, assume that they're wearing some kind of fur gloves, but then the third person shakes off their hood as they get to their feet, brushing themself off with a thoroughly-disoriented expression, and their head comes fully into view. Because Russ is first and foremost an idiot, his response to this is to point stupidly at what looks like a bipedal dalmatian and say, "What the fuck, is that a fucking furry?"

"Don't be furryphobic, Russ," Sahra frowns, crossing her arms.

Russ goggles at her incredulously, waving his arms disjointedly at the apparent furry, Door Woman, the eye-person, and the other person they're crouched over (who, on second glance, looks like a cat furry, what in the fuck). He thinks the many, many things on the tip of his tongue at the moment should be pretty clearly expressed via that gesture.

Something cracks in Sahra's expression. "I am this close to having a panic attack right now, Moreno, let me make my stupid jokes to cope with the situation!"

"Asher, we're not alone," warns the dalmatian furry, which gets the eye-person's attention immediately, all of their eyes except one snapping up to fix on Russ and Sahra. Russ freezes and feels his heartbeat pick up with fear as the acidic green eyes drill into him, scrutinizing him and picking him apart like a bug under a microscope. All of the things he's done over the years he's ashamed of, all of the things he regrets doing, all of the things he doesn't want anyone to know he did- bullying an autistic classmate in elementary school, intentionally dropping a brick on his little sister's foot when she was nine, stealing money from his parents so he could buy snack cakes at lunch in middle school, throwing a firecracker into his tenth grade history teacher's garden after she threatened to fail him- they all surge to the forefront of his mind, and Russ knows with a sudden terrible certainty that all that the person staring at him needs to do is ask and he will have no choice but to tell them everything.

The eye-person (Asher?) opens their mouth to speak. "Hi, hello, who are you and what are you doing here? Shit," they add immediately, clapping a hand over their mouth.

Harsh squealing static bubbles up Russ's throat like electrified vomit, dragging his mouth open and forcing him to give the answers they seek. "I'm Russ, Russ Moreno," he says, voice trembling, "and she's Sahra Elmi. We work at the restaurant here?"

There's a petrified moment of silence, during which Russ mentally shouts what the fuck is going on here several times, and then the eye-person stutters out, "Sorry, I didn't- I did not mean to compel you, I swear," most of their eyes flicking back down to the cat furry as they speak. "Don't call the police?" they add hesitantly. Sahra barks out a harsh, wordless laugh at that.

"Lovely getting to meet you two!" chirps Door Woman, her body extending itself in an awful corkscrewing motion until she's almost twice as tall as the dalmatian furry. Russ wants to turn around and run to his car, screaming hysterically the whole way, but his feet won't move. "I suppose some introductions are in order, since everyone here's too rude to offer their names? I'm Helen," she says, pressing one of her bloated, distended hands to her chest, "and these three are Mae, the Assistant, and Patches," she concludes, gesturing respectively to the three others.

"My name is Asher," the eye-person snaps, a few eyes flickering up to glare at Helen.

Sahra's blinking slowly, as if she's just connected several awful dots at once. "Wait- wait, Helen from The Magnus Archives?"

Helen clasps her hands together with a too-bright, too-wide beam. "Oh, did you hear that, Assistant? I'm famous here!"

"Shut up, I do not care," the Assistant snaps up at her, though their eyes stay fixed on the cat furry this time. "You've done enough damage already, stop reveling like you've done nothing wrong!"

Helen gasps offendedly. "I have never done anything wrong in my life, Assistant, though you certainly cannot say the same." The Assistant flinches at that like she'd kicked them.

"What the hell are you talking about?" Russ demands of Sahra. "What's 'The Magnus Archives'?"

"The Magnus Archives is a podcast distributed by Rusty Quill and licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Share-Alike 4.0 international license," Sahra recites in response, very visibly inching closer to having that panic attack she was talking about. For some reason, the non sequitur gets a distracted snort out of the Assistant.

Russ squints confusedly at her. "What?"

"It's a podcast! It's a podcast, it's a serial horror fiction podcast that a- okay, no, it does not matter!" Sahra shakes her head. "The point is, it's fiction! It's not real! You are not real!"

Helen just laughs at that, jarringly, distortedly, monstrously, until Russ can hear the blood pulsing in his ears. "And when has that ever stopped me?"

"Helen, stop terrorizing innocent people and tell me how to fix whatever the hell you did to Mae!" the Assistant demands, all of their eyes pivoting back to Helen.

"Buzzkill," Helen sighs. "Fine, fine, have it your way. Mae was too susceptible to the Spiral already, and being in my hallways marked her deeper than I thought it would. Now, she's... unbalanced, and will probably stay in that semi-conscious state for a few hours until she either slips into a proper coma or becomes a Spiral Avatar, depends on which she chooses. Happy?"

"Spiral Avatar?" the dalmatian- Patches- interrupts, scuttling over to kneel next to Mae. He looks concerned, but in a distant way, like you'd be abstractly concerned about the concept of starving children in some far-off country. "What I'm getting from that is that she'd become something like Helen," he says.

The Assistant doesn't seem to have heard him, rising to their feet in a single swift motion and advancing on Helen, more of those sickly green eyes blossoming out of thin air around their head and shoulders. "You- you planned this," they snap at Helen. "You knew this was going to happen!"

Russ exchanges a confused glance with Sahra, or at least tries to, but she's staring at Helen and the Assistant, clearly deep in thought.

"I didn't plan for any of this, Assistant, stop being so dramatic." Helen waves a hand boredly at them. "If you must know, the 'plan' was to mark her just deeply enough that she'd get the option to start tapping into the Spiral later while you were fighting the Batter, and it'd give you the boost you needed to finish him off for good."

"This is functionally identical to that," the Assistant hisses.

Helen contemplates that silently for a moment. "Hmmm... nope, can't see it," she concludes, clapping her hands together in a single sharp motion. "Guess that's why you're the Eye Avatar here!"

"Can somebody please tell me what is going on here?!" Russ begs of anyone who's willing to listen.

The Assistant sighs, loud and angry. "Patches, watch Mae," they order, not even casting him a single glance as they stride towards Russ and Sahra. "I... I'm sorry about this, whatever your name was," they tell Russ.

And then they LOOK at him, and it is different than when they first saw him. It is so, so much worse.

Russ saw a video once, a few years back, of somebody trying to vacuum-seal a glass jar with a homemade mechanism. They did something wrong, and the jar ended up cracking under the pressure and imploding amidst their surprised, perplexed laughter. That's all he can think of, as the Assistant's eyes stare into his- that ungodly pressure made manifest in the sick violent green of their eyes, as if they're trying to pull all the universe into their eyes and leave nothing but the void in its wake... and if they don't get what they want from him, then he will be the one to crack and implode.

"What's something that would get you fired if anybody knew about it?" the Assistant asks Russ, and that same itching bile-like static bubbles up his throat and burns the words they want to hear into his tongue. "Sometimes I steal restaurant food supplies for my cousin so he can focus on paying rent instead of driving out of the city to buy cheap food," he blurts out, before clapping his hands over his mouth in horror. WHAT WAS THAT?!

The Assistant looks even more guilty than the first time they ripped truth from him as the pressure starts to fade. "Great, of course it's something I'd feel like shit about if I actually did tell anyone. And you-" they start, turning to Sahra.

"Don't bother, don't bother!" Sahra says quickly, raising her hands. "I listened to TMA, I know how this works, okay? You do not need to rip blackmail material out of me to get me to do whatever it is you want."

The Assistant's expression just gets even more guilty-looking at that. "Okay. Both of you, get out of here right now and forget you saw any of this."

Russ's feet finally unstick themselves from the asphalt, and he wastes no time in fleeing in the general direction of his car, his breath coming in fast juddery gasps that cut at his lungs. He does not stop for a moment to see if Sahra's doing the same.

Over thirty thousand feet above the place where Helen's door released Patches, Mae, Asher, and the Assistant, Sado drums Amanda's fingers impatiently against the armrest of her seat and glares out the window at the city below.

Amanda's skin and bones burn against that which is Sado, coiled as she is throughout this body, but it's not necessarily a discomforting sensation. Nor is the burning feeling that borders the pieces of Luke Carder's skin she had carved from his corpse and stapled into place in the areas where Amanda had begun to fall apart at the seams. It's almost reassuring in a way- reassuring, in that it's a perpetual reminder of her sovereignty over this body. (A reminder that "Amanda Sakraetter" exists no more in any meaningful sense of the word.)

The burn of the gun in her coat pocket, and the burn of the knowledge of what she has been sent to Portland to do, though... now that's an entirely different feeling.

(Again, not an unpleasant one, though.)

The plane begins to descend as the drumming of Amanda's fingers against the armrest intensifies. Not much longer now.

No, not much longer at all.

Chapter Text

This empty, dilapidated house gives Luke the creeps big-time, and the long, narrow staircase he's now walking down does not help matters in the slightest. There's a door at the bottom, and with no small amount of trepidation he opens it.

The room on the other side is comparatively tiny, but there's a large lightbulb almost the size of Luke's head lying in the middle of the floor. Luke wants to turn around, wants to go back up the stairs, but his body won't listen, and he marches over, kneels, and picks it up.

Despite a visible lack of any source of electricity for it, the lightbulb burns to life the moment Luke touches it, a tangible warmth like an old computer monitor heating up bleeding into his hands as it bursts into radiant light. Under any other circumstances (and especially after the hell of a week he's had), that would've been grounds enough for Luke to throw it in the opposite direction as fast as possible, but... the warmth is comforting. (Weirdly comforting.) Luke didn't really realize how cold he was until now...

The light from the bulb Luke now cradles close to his chest makes the staircase look a lot less intimidating, at least. Similarly, upon pushing open the door to that dilapidated house, it looks... well, not like less of a splinter-packed disaster waiting to happen, but at least less ominous.

There's a big wooden panel on the far end of the room, Luke notices, now that he's got an actual light source other than the dim fire he set for some unfathomable reason. The panel has a hole in it the exact size and shape of the weird big lightbulb, and so- with a little reluctance- Luke crosses the room and presses the lightbulb into the open slot. It slides in smoothly, silently, and suddenly the world blurs and goes dark.

Luke doesn't even have time to scream before he abruptly finds himself standing in the middle of what looks like a desert. It's wrong, though, the sand's blue and oddly flat, and it sparkles and shimmers in the light from the bulb. Furthermore, the desert only stretches out in front of Luke in a single thin line- everywhere else, he is surrounded by naught but the silent void.

For a moment, just a single insane moment, Luke contemplates bodily throwing himself into the abyss. But his footsteps find the path laid out before him instead, and at its end...

Luke had processed, on some level, P03 ordering him to leave the house he'd woken up in, telling him that the Dredger would have the information he needed. But seeing the robot sitting there at the edge of the thin strip of blue desert, metallic pipe stuck awkwardly through the rusting grille that is its mouth, very much three-dimensional and real, it's... well, Luke feels even more like he's having a mental breakdown now.

This clearly isn't a feeling the Dredger shares. "Oy, mate. Yer Luke, innit? Was told to wait here fer ye."

"Dredger?" is all Luke can manage, clutching the lightbulb even tighter.

"That's me," Dredger nods. "Somefin' of a celebrity around 'ere now- me reward for dredging up... that thing so many times inna row, even if I don' remember most'a those. I get ter be somefin' of a dialogue NPC. Tell ye what yer meant to do here."

"I don't want to- to do anything!" The words come out of Luke's mouth in a loud, vile shout. "I died maybe ten minutes ago! Amanda shot me, and now I'm stuck here in whatever this place is because P03 arbitrarily- and actually, no, how is it even alive?! I saw it die! I saw Leshy tear its head off!"

"Ye really think just takin' off the monitor would've killed P03?" Dredger asks, looking a little unimpressed. "Look, if yer fixin' ter have a mental breakdown, could ye save it fer after the exposition?"

Luke is very much aware of how hysterical and unhinged the laugh he lets out in response to that is, but you know what? After what happened to him, he's entitled to be as hysterical and unhinged as he wants to be. "Fine. Okay. You want to do exposition, then exposit this: how am I alive?"

"Not really sure," Dredger admits after a moment. "P03 didn't say anyfin' about that 'un, but..." It looks more serious, then. "Ye say ye died?"

"Yeah." Luke would cross his arms, but for some reason he can't quite place he's low-key terrified of what might happen if he drops this lightbulb. "Some GameFuna representative, Amanda, came to my house and shot me because I wouldn't give her the Inscryption disk."

"Hm." Dredger shrugs. "Well, can't say anyfin' fer sure, but... sounds ter me like ye ended up possessin' the game." Which... is about Luke's luck these days, honestly. (He should've called his YouTube channel "The Unlucky Carder.") Before Luke can ask it to elaborate, though, the Dredger continues, "Somefin' don' sound right with the timeframe here, though... ye say ye died a few minutes ago?"

"More like ten- or, actually, probably closer to twenty by this point. Why?"

Despite how stiff and unmoving its metal face is, the Dredger looks oddly contemplative. "D'ye know what the exact date was then?"

"Uh..." Luke shifts the lightbulb in his hands as he thinks. "I... don't honestly remember the specific date, I kind of lost track of time there..." Lost more than that. "...but I know it was mid-May?" That sounds about right.

A little gray spark flickers in the Dredger's eyes for a moment. "Well, that don' make sense, unless-" And then it stops. "Hm. On second thought, maybe shouldn' tell ye that one."

"What? Tell me what? How long has it been since I died?"

The Dredger does not respond. Luke swallows uncomfortably, his hands suddenly clammy against the warm curve of the lightbulb. "Dredger, what's the current date?"

After an uncomfortable, increasingly tense moment, the Dredger sighs metallically. "It's the 27th of January, 2022," it says.

Luke is in total control of his body, now, for the first time since he "woke up" here. He feels the creeping pulsing tendrils of compulsion throughout his body that had spurred him onward withering and disintegrating inside him in a heartbeat. And all he can do, all that he can even think of doing, with his newfound control, his newfound freedom, is... stand there, staring with dread at the robot in front of him.

"Ye alright there, mate?" Dredger asks- and, weirdly, it actually does look a little concerned. (Luke doesn't want to know what expression's on his face now.)

Luke collapses to his knees, the lightbulb falling from his slackened hands to land intact in the blue sand, and wraps his shaking arms around himself. He cannot force a response up his throat.

P03 doesn't bother trying to hold in the annoyed sigh that escapes its speakers as it watches the shuddering image of Luke on the monitor in front of it. It can't afford delays like this, it has a very finite amount of time that needs to be capitalized on while Asher and the expelled player characters are running around elsewhere. Sure, the Batter ought to be a good distraction for now, but he'll stop being useful the moment Asher either kills him or somehow brings him around to their side, and then they'll come back and see what P03 is doing and its months of planning will all have been for nothing.

If I didn't need a player, I could've gotten started the moment I expelled the player characters! If P03 had teeth, it would grind them. Whatever. I can work with this. Luke having another mental breakdown will give it more time to finetune the rest of the game maps it "borrowed"- streamline them, remove obstacles, make it as easy as possible to rush Luke through them to his goals. And once it has an entrance into the Gameworks, assuming a delivery thereof is forthcoming from-

"P03. I hope I'm not interrupting anything?" interrupts a voice from behind P03. Speak of the devil... or think, I guess.

"You're here at a very good time, actually," P03 says, swiveling around to see its benefactor standing in the entrance to its factory. The shadows wrap around his form to the point that all it can see of him clearly are his eyes, a cold, clear gray and somehow older-looking than the rest of him. "Please tell me you have what I need to break into the Gameworks and you're not just wasting my time?"

"Not to worry, I too am very busy at the moment and do not have the time to dedicate to wasting yours," its benefactor says delicately as he approaches, a cloud of flickering white pixels held loosely in one hand. "I would have compiled the code you need faster if possible, but I'm afraid I'm somewhat lacking in computer expertise and had to, ah, borrow the talents of another."

"Better late than never, I guess," P03 shrugs. "Hand it over. You fulfilled your end of the deal, I'll fulfill mine."

"You will grant me the same exodus as yourself?"

P03 would roll its eyes if it had actual, physical flesh eyes like its benefactor. (Well, actually, it doesn't know if they're made of flesh, but it assumes they are. That's how humans work, right?) "Yep, don't worry about it. You'll get your escape from Asher's computer, and then you can hitch a ride to that Panoptiwhatever building GameFuna's constructing in Atlanta you're so obsessed with."

"I would certainly hope so" is all the man has to say as he hands over the code. "Though I will reiterate that I'm not personally as optimistic as you are as to the prospects of Reginald seeking refuge in the Gameworks..."

"Yeah, well, it's the only lead I have right now," P03 reminds him, a little annoyed. "Unless you've got any better ideas?"

"Not at the moment, though I am investigating some potential leads," its benefactor says with a dismissive wave of his hand. "I'll keep you updated. Now, if you'll excuse me... as I said, I do have a lot of preparatory work to do."

"Yep, by all means. Don't let me keep you," P03 says, giving him a bored wave of its claw as it slots the gateway code into place. It keeps an eye on him with its security cameras, just to make sure he leaves. (It swears he's staring back at them as he goes, but there's too many different camera angles for that to be right.)

Sure enough, the code looks to be the real deal, and P03 allows a devious grin to slowly-but-steadily light up across its screen. Well, he sure might look like a useless stuffed shirt, but at least he followed through on his end of the bargain! That being said... it can't go hunting for Reginald and the Hex itself, it has to stay here to keep an eye on Luke and Niko. Speaking of which, actually- it glances up to the screen again. Luke looks to be slowly, shakily pulling himself back together, preparing to ask the Dredger some more questions. P03 sends the Dredger an annoyed message to speed up its exposition dialogue to make up for lost time.

That out of the way, P03 starts rifling through the character files for the other games and finds someone suitable for its purposes almost immediately. Nice, she's even got an instakill move. Of course, being the pacifistic waste of time they are, Asher didn't bother doing the required route to unlock said move (though that's not the main reason P03 needs that route to be activated), but that means nothing when P03's so deep in the code of all of these games. It pulls on its connection to the OLD_DATA, focuses on the Deltarune files, and triggers all of the flags and whatnot for the "weird route," and just like that Snowgrave's available. It also breaks the TP bar's code so that it'll be 100% full at all times- why bother having to build up to it when it can just make her use it immediately? After a moment of contemplation, P03 slides its awareness over to that The Magnus Archives fangame, copies the flags for Entity marks, and pastes the code for a Lonely mark into the specific character- just to make it easier to isolate her from anyone who might attempt to pull her away from her task, of course- and also copies over some code from Jonah Magnus so it can see through her eyes at all times, just like it did for the Batter. P03 also decides on a whim to integrate some experimental pathfinding software it's been messing around with for the past week or two out of boredom; with how much of a hassle guiding her without a player will be, it needs all the help it can get.

The different coding languages clash horribly, of course, and P03 can't help but feel a certain amount of personal distaste for its new creation, but at least the OLD_DATA automatically irons things out sufficiently that the code clashing won't impede her functionality enough for it to be a problem. Once P03's run the new code a few times in a test window to make sure it's as bug-free as it can be, it nods in satisfaction and tugs on the character files, bringing her to it. There's no flash of light, no spiraling red lines tracing her form into being, just a moment of nonexistence that hangs heavily in the air before a plaid-clad teenager somewhat resembling a bipedal deer drops to the floor in front of P03. "H-huh? Where am I now? What's going on?" she asks, voice high with terror.

Hm. Maybe I shouldn't've had all the excess characters dropped into the Dark so they wouldn't interfere with things? Oh, well, too late now. P03 erases its victorious smirk from its screen and tries to replace it with a more gentle and soothing expression. (Ugh.) "You're Noelle Holiday, right?" it asks.

"Yeah?" Noelle picks herself up from the floor, brushing herself off warily. "What just happened? What was that- that place I was a moment ago, and who are you?" Her clothing glitches as she speaks, flickering between red-and-green plaid and a long white gown, but she doesn't appear to notice.

"My name's P03." P03 lowers its claw and runs the code its benefactor had delivered, and slowly-but-steadily a physical gateway begins to form. It runs the numbers, calculates it'll be a good twenty seconds before it fully opens. "We don't have much time, so I'll keep my explanation brief. If you want to save your world, and several others as well, here's what I need you to go do..."

In a dark and empty room, every conceivable exit blocked by a tide of rock and soil, Mittens Wichien crouches before the dim glow of a crystal ball.

They've been watching as closely as they can from the start, since they found themself alone in here. They couldn't open any of the doors out, the room's windowless (it's somewhere in the middle of Kemono Woods Private School, they think, though they can't for the life of them pin down where), and when they used their crystal ball to see outside the doors, they had just enough time to catch the retreating image of someone in a nondescript but very expensive suit- a human, Mittens thinks- with a book tucked under one arm.

(Mittens had zoomed in on the title the best they could, but it wasn't anything they recognized. "The Seven Lamps of Architecture" or something like that.)

They're trapped here either way. They tried to brute-force their way out by using their wand to blast away the dirt and rocks blocking the doors, only to realize midway through that the collapse had been engineered in such a way that removing the obstructions would bring the room down on top of them. Mittens tried to form a portal out next, but they didn't have most of the required ingredients for the ritual on them and they were never able to form portals from scratch. (One reason to envy their cousin.)

(They hope she's alright, but Ginger's tough, she probably weathered whatever this is- whatever that robot's doing- just fine. The one they really need to be worried about is their brother, given his lack of magical aptitude...)

Mittens has nowhere to go. All they can do is grimly monitor the situation through their crystal ball, flickering between what they can see of the new worlds that now exist beyond their own, and pray to any god that's listening, benevolent or otherwise, that an opportunity will present itself for them to fix the situation soon.

But that's still long-term. And right now, as Mittens watches the departing, flickering form of Noelle Holiday pass through P03's portal and vanish from sight, the only thing they can find it in themself to say is:

"That started poorly."

Chapter Text

Never before has the Batter taken initiative in opening communications with P03 prior to this, but there have been so many impures he has been forced to simply walk past that it's beginning to fray at his sense of self. As such, for the first time he's the one to open the tenuous connection through the choking tides of screaming corruption connecting them and make the request. Am I far enough away now?

P03's reply is mercifully fast. Yep, that should about do it. You can get to restraining Kris and figuring out how to rip out their SOUL and stuff now. I've got other things I need to be focusing on right now, so you're free to do whatever.

The Batter would bare his teeth in a smile, but he doesn't feel like it. That's precisely what he had been hoping to hear.

There is a building nearby, its lights out and the storefront unilluminated. The Batter tries the door, then uses his bat to break the lock when it doesn't budge. He strides inside, flicks on the first light switch he sees, and hefts Kris off his shoulder to set them down in the chair behind the till. There are cobwebs everywhere, he notices, but that doesn't matter.

Kris doesn't look good. Their hair hangs, matted and unkempt, in front of their face, but the Batter can still see how dull and desaturated their eyes are, how unhealthily pallid their skin has become, how slow and labored their breathing is. They'd already looked somewhat gaunt before, sure, but now...

Remorse is a difficult emotion. The Batter primarily imagines it in those around him when the seeming need for remorse rears its head; he imagines he would feel remorse had he violated his role, his purpose, what world and creator alike need him to be, as those he saw before him had, and thusly imagined that somewhere they felt remorse regardless of whether they realized it.

It didn't matter if they did, though. They still needed to be purified, no matter how inwardly repentant they may have been, and Asher was so willing to lend their guiding hand to fulfill the Batter's purpose that his very being sang with joy at the swathes of nigh-blinding purity they carved upon the world together.

(Asher may have been subpar at puzzles, and they may have forgotten where they were going and sent the Batter running in circles often, but they excelled at combat. Their every command was calculated to end each battle as quickly and efficiently as possible, and their speed there most certainly made up for the time they wasted elsewhere.)

Given Asher's stinging rebuke, both verbal and physical, when he tried to restore their command, the Batter imagines they must now be remorseful for how they treated him. And as for Kris...

Kris shifts and slumps suddenly, interrupting the Batter's train of thought- they're still unconscious, then, otherwise they'd almost certainly have tried to conceal that Alpha's status effects had worn off. (P03 may be of dubious purity, but the Batter is certainly grateful that it altered his code to allow for the stacking of status effects. He's not sure if P03's interference was also responsible for his body accepting and integrating the piece of smoking machinery Asher gave him to help him breathe, but if so, he's grateful for that as well.) The Batter summons Alpha and points his bat at Kris- not having a puppeteer to guide their moves means he has to be a little more direct when commanding the Add-Ons himself. "Impossible Bracket," he orders, and Kris's body freezes in place as the Palsy effect takes hold.

The Batter could blind and mute them again, too, but it would feel a bit redundant given their current state of unconsciousness. As such, the Batter navigates from behind the vacant shopkeeper's desk and finds a long coil of rope with refreshing speed. He deems it of sufficient purity after a few seconds and returns, tying Kris tightly to the chair he had left them upon.

That out of the way, the Batter locates the rest of the switches that control the lights and activates them one by one, throwing the whole store into dim illumination. It appears to be dedicated to the storage of discarded militant apparatus (he remembers the sign outside had advertised it as a "military surplus store," though he's not quite sure what that may mean), but there are fortunately several tools that look like they deal with cutting or extracting. They'll suit his purposes. The Batter carefully collects them, one by one, and transports them to the counter in front of Kris's limp, bound form.

As he walks back and forth, the Batter's mind drifts unbidden backwards in time, back to his last memories of the world he had come so tantalizingly close to purifying in its entirety.

Back to Asher's first betrayal.

The Judge's suggestion was laughable, really. Asher had sunk too much time and effort into guiding the Batter's paternal impulse for purity regardless of any personal qualms they may have had with their holy quest. As such, the Batter treated it with as little tangible opposition as it deserved. "Don't do that, I need you in order to purify this world," he said, and nothing more, his contempt for the mere concept of the Judge's offer surely obvious in face and posture alike.

That should have been enough. That should have sufficed to stop Asher from even considering the idea. He needed no more to convince them.

Or so he thought.

The strings binding the Batter severed, just like that, and he watched with disbelief as they wound themselves around the Judge. He stiffened momentarily in clear discomfort (and the Batter's very being ached with helpless fury at the sight- look how ill-suited he is to your divine control, Asher, how could you do this? Why would you do this?), but shook it off quickly and bared his teeth. "That choice was, even though pathetically useless, I think, the right one. And now, Batter, taste our vindictive thirst for pointless justice."

Asher made it as quick as they always had. That much, at least, the Batter could be grateful for.

It had hurt. Being torn to shreds by the teeth and claws and competences of that ever-grinning cat had HURT. And then the Judge turned and left, Asher's presence as puppeteer both upon him and in general fading from the world, and the Batter's body was left there.

The world was turned off fairly soon after that. Not OFF-off as it would've had the Batter been able to flip the switch and complete its purification, but just... off. Dead, but still lingering, just like him. The Batter lay there, a mindless corpse and yet still watching, still listening, still waiting, unable to move or speak, and eventually the white room faded away and was replaced with a black void.

The Batter did not know how long he lay there for.

The Batter did not know how long he bled there for.

The Batter did not know how long he watched there for.

The last moment of the Batter's all-but-death in that horrible stasis and his first steps into truthful consciousness came when the void around him shifted. The pure black remained the same as always, but there was an odd physical ripple like a billion tiny squares of the same color rising from nothing to eat away at the darkness that was there before.

The ripple came, the Batter's tiny-yet-pure being suddenly expanded and bloomed and flourished into true awareness rather than what he now saw for the dull constrained half-life it had been, and something approached the Batter from behind.

He could not move, of course. Not in this state. But there was a brief cascade of unintelligible beeping that sounded almost frustrated, and then the Batter felt his every injury fade away with the same rippling shifting feeling as what rewrote the void around him, as if the damaged flesh and bone and fabric had been repaired from their very basest ingredients outward, and he was whole.

"Understand me now?"

Those weren't the first words P03 said to him, but they were the first he comprehended. The Batter did not know what to make of the strange hovering robot at first, especially when his previously-innate ability to discern the purity of any object or entity simply refused to process P03, as if it did not exist at all. But P03 told the Batter its story, how it had ascended to take power from the corrupt, cruel "scrybes" it was forced to share its world with and tried to get Asher to help it remove them from the picture and perpetuate its newfound role, its newfound purpose, everywhere and everywhen, and the Batter slowly felt himself drift closer and closer to sympathy.

Asher did not help P03 bring about its ultimate purpose in the end, so it said, and left it to rot- not out of active malice, but because they simply forgot it even existed. "They would have given me away without thought," said P03 idly (apparently to whatever or whoever "GameFuna" was), and only failed because P03 had transferred itself off of the "flash drive" it was stored on and properly onto Asher's computer mere days beforehand.

(P03 would not explain what drove it to do this. When pressed, all it said was "let's just say a little spider warned me" and refused to elaborate.)

Both P03 and the Batter had been cast aside, P03 said- the Batter when Asher got cold feet at the last second, P03 because they grew bored of it. "We're alike, really," P03 had said, "so it only makes sense if we help each other out, right? You deserve better than being dragged around on their strings anyway- we all do."

So P03 made modifications to the Batter's code, further heightened his efficiency and his purificatory prowess, and removed several restrictions the Batter had not even thought to consider arbitrary or vestigial before P03 pointed them out, all to show that it was making its offer in good faith. P03 had a master plan, so it claimed, one where the Batter could begin his quest for purification anew with or without Asher, and P03 could retake all the potential power and glory Asher had robbed it of. All it needed was the Batter's cooperation.

The Batter said yes, of course. What else could he have said? So he stood on the other side of the table in P03's factory and waited patiently as P03 began the process of expelling the player characters, felt with anticipation the sudden up-down jerk of the beginning of the transfer, raised an eyebrow in confusion as P03 mumbled a confused "wait, what're Kris and the Assistant d-"

Then the Batter was in Asher's kitchen. He stood and waited patiently, at first, but they took a while to come to him and he certainly wasn't going to go running after them like a lowly lost pet, so he decided to begin looking for supplies. Just in case.

Asher came, eventually. Then the Batter watched, listened, and waited, just as P03 instructed, and said what P03 told him to when it saw the need to interfere to stop Asher from realizing what was going on. It was with a bit of dismay that the Batter realized how much some of the lines P03 fed him sounded like the kind of ideas he might've come up with on his own had P03 not reinvigorated him with the promise of a return to his purpose. He'd certainly hope he wouldn't be so quick to forgive Asher's betrayal as P03 seemed to think he would be... though, then again, without P03 enlightening him as to the kind of person they were, maybe he would've never stood corrected.

But Asher will stand corrected, too, soon enough. Once Kris's SOUL belongs to him and Asher sees they have no purpose but to help him purify everything and save everyone, he's sure they'll take to their holy mission with the same zeal as they did before.

Everything else fell into place from there onward. And now, the Batter thinks as he deposits the final tool onto the countertop and returns his attention to Kris, I can begin the process of reclaiming Asher as my puppeteer, and we can purify this world as we did the one I came from-

"Knock, knock," comes a quiet voice from the busted doorway, and the Batter tenses, raising his bat to his shoulder as he turns to confront the intruder. What he sees there, however, confuses him. It's nobody he recognizes, a rail-thin woman with dark brown skin, hair bleached a reassuring shade reminiscent of the color of the purified zones, and a strange pale scar on the side of her head that almost looks like a mass of crisscrossing threads.

(Threads like a puppeteer's strings. Threads like a spider's web.)

"Who are you?" the Batter demands.

"It's Ms. Cane," responds the woman with a smile of discomforting wideness, "and she's brought you her new plan. Mr. Batter doesn't like planning ahead," she adds before the Batter can begin to figure out a response to that, dropping her voice an octave.

"What?" That confused voice isn't the Batter's, but Kris's, and the Batter pivots to see them staring at the newcomer with glazed, half-open eyes. They look even sicklier now, and the Batter points Alpha to them and snaps "Impossible Bracket" before he can begin to think about the remorse for their rejection of their purpose they must be feeling at the moment, shortly followed by an "Open Bracket" to make sure they can't confuse the situation with ill-timed interjections. He almost goes to give Alpha a piece of Silver Flesh before remembering that P03 set his and his Add-Ons' CP to stay at maximum constantly (it couldn't do the same for their HP, unfortunately, though it didn't elaborate on why), and as such immediately returns his attention to the woman in the doorway. "What are you talking about?" he asks her flatly, his tone assuredly making it clear that he has no time for talking in riddles.

"I should have figured you weren't going to understand that one," concedes the new woman, dipping her head apologetically. "Let's just say it's an inside joke for the folks back home. You want to know who I am and why I'm here, Batter?"

"Yes."

"Straight to the point. That's a good narrative foil, I think the Stagehand would say." The woman clasps her hands. "I've been going by 'Nelle B. E. Canaan' recently- not exactly my best work, I'll admit, but I didn't want it to be too obfuscating. However, I think you deserve to know my actual name."

The Batter waits patiently for her to state whatever her "actual name" is.

"Well, aren't you going to ask me what it is?"

The Batter waits patiently for her to state whatever her "actual name" is.

"...seriously?"

The Batter waits patiently for her to state whatever her "actual name" is.

"You're too taciturn and uncommunicative," the woman sighs. "I can't believe I ever even considered filling you with spiders. Fine, have it your way. My name is Annabelle Cane, but you can call me Annabelle. Pleased to meet you at last, Batter." She raises a hand, clearly expecting a handshake, but the Batter refuses to play along. "Why are you here?" he demands.

"Why do you think I'm here?"

The Batter waits patiently for her to state whatever her purpose for being here is.

"Nothing?"

The Batter waits patiently for her to state whatever her purpose for being here is.

"Do you really not have any thoughts bouncing around in that head of yours?"

The Batter waits patiently for her to state wh-

"Okay, no, we are not doing that again," Annabelle sighs, finally lowering her hand. "Fine. I'm here to help, I want to help, but... listen, talking plainly, not being cryptic and going in circles, it's not... it's not in my nature? But I want to be as honest with you as I can, Batter, because if I am, I know you'll do exactly what is needed of you."

The Batter waits patiently for her to state what is needed of h-

"No! I said we are not doing that again!" If the Batter were a few degrees more childish, he thinks he might chuckle at the look of frustration on Annabelle's face. "How is it that your purpose, the very thing you were designed for, is to be the puppet of an entity beyond your comprehension, and yet somehow you are so antithetical to the Mother of Puppets?"

"I don't know," says the Batter with a shrug. He doesn't know who or what the Mother of Puppets is, but he gets the feeling it's unrelated to his mission, so he doesn't really care.

"Then again, you existed for years before the Fears got here, so of course you wouldn't play by our rules... Okay, listen," sighs Annabelle, her long, spindly fingers twitching, spiderlike, against the skin of her non-thread-covered temple. "You want Asher to be your puppeteer again, right?"

"Yes," says the Batter neutrally. He could be more enthusiastic, but he doesn't find that he cares enough to.

"And on some level, you find the prospect of cutting open a sixteen-year-old and tearing out a vital component of them morally abhorrent, right?" There's something in Annabelle's tone that gives the impression she could be convinced either way on the issue depending on the context.

"No," says the Batter. Kris looks a bit distressed at that, but fortunately they're still muted, so they can't raise any objections that the Batter has to pay attention to.

"Okay. But you still want Asher to be your puppeteer again, right?"

"I already answered that."

"Good, that's good. That means we can work together." Annabelle steps into the vacant store and strides past the Batter with a strange confidence in her step, as if her every move has been predetermined for thousands of years, and opens a door on the store's far wall to what looks like a storage room. "All you have to do is step into my parlor, and I'll tell you exactly what you need to do when Asher and their friends arrive here to get the best possible outcome."

"That's not a parlor," says the Batter, ever the pedant. "It's a backroom."

Annabelle looks genuinely annoyed with him now. "Has anyone ever told you that you have no sense of theatrics?"

"No," says the Batter, but he follows her into the storage room and lets her close the door behind him anyway. He can't say he's quite sure why, just that it feels like the inevitable outcome of entering this building.

Chapter Text

Luke moves on from the Dredger as quickly as he can once it's done expositing. A path opens up for him, another long, thin line through the void, and he refuses to let himself look back once as his feet kick up tiny puffs of sparkling blue sand. Yet, the Dredger's words keep drilling into his mind as he continues to walk, a nigh-physical sensation like someone stabbed a corkscrew into the place he was shot and started twisting it back and forth.

"That thing in yer hands- that's our new sun. Ye need ter put it in its place in P03's factory to restore balance and life to th' games on this computer. They're all scrambled up an' wrong right now, see? But ye can fix it with th' lightbulb so long as ye charge it up properly first- just find th' three power sources."

And when he inquired about what P03 stood to gain from this...

"Ye think P03's happy about everythin' being all distorted like this? Nobody is- nobody that wasn't cast from th' worlds into th' Fears, anyway. P03 unnerstan's fair play, ye'll get what'er ye were promised, don' worry."

Luke had another breakdown, then- he doesn't remember the details, not really, but he thinks there was a lot of screaming about how he just wanted to open cards and play a game, how he didn't deserve any of this. (He rubs at his neck with one hand, grimacing- his throat still feels a little raw.) But the Dredger's response to this was... odd.

"Your mission is to save these worlds. I am unable to offer you help beyond th-" And then it had grimaced and hit itself in the side of the head. "Ugh. Sorry 'bout that, mate. Too much o' Prophetbot got stuck up 'ere when P03 copied over th' relevant parts o' his exposition dialogue, messes me head up a bit. Look, if I were ye, I'd get this whole mission o' P03's over an' done with quick as possible. Ye'll save everyone in these other games, and then P03'll bring ye back to life proper just as promised."

Dredger didn't elaborate on the glitch where it had dropped its accent, nor who or what "Prophetbot" was. It just sent Luke on his way down a newly-appeared thin line of blue desert with nothing more than a "Good luck, mate," and now he's alone again.

Well... not exactly "alone." But that's the part Luke's been trying to think about as little as he can.

"Bein' the bringer of our sun an' all, ye've got the ability to directly talk to Niko. P03 set all this up like a game for 'em, 's the only way ye'll be able to save everyone- limited mechanics an' all. All ye gotta do is close your eyes an' focus. Remem'er, always look t' them for guidance. Ye've already got more than ye think."

The voice Luke had heard when he closed his eyes and focused as instructed... it was a child's voice. They couldn't have been much older than eight or nine. And now, not only has P03 set it up so they control Luke, but it's dragged them into whatever new scheme it's undoubtedly got bouncing around in its mind. CPU. Whatever. Luke doesn't care.

(The apathy's spreading, the numbness is growing. Luke doesn't know if it's a bad thing that he prefers the deadened acceptance of the inevitability of what's happening over screaming panicked incomprehension.)

Luke arrives at the end of the starry blue line laid out before him before his thoughts can get too self-destructive. There's four branching paths radiating out from it, each terminating at a door- one white, one dark blue, one magenta... and one dark brown.

The brown door feels like it's drawing Luke's attention the most, and judging by the fact that he starts walking directly towards it, it has the same effect on Niko. As Luke reaches for the doorknob, though, he hears P03's voice reverberating in his mind (which is still no less jarring or creepy than it was the first time).

[NO.]

[THAT DOOR'S NOT SUPPOSED TO BE THERE. YOU'RE NOT GOING TO FIND ANYTHING TO CHARGE THE LIGHTBULB WITH IN THERE.]

"Fuck off," Luke says, and given that his next move is to throw the door open and walk through it, this is a sentiment clearly shared by Niko. (Do they even know the word "fuck?" Shit, now Luke feels kind of bad about how much he's been swearing since he woke up. Maybe he should try to tone it down.)

Luke doesn't know what he expected to see on the other side of the door, but it definitely wasn't what looks like a picturesque suburban town. The trees are orange-tinted with autumn, the buildings look fairly new and well-maintained, and the road does as well. The only thing that breaks the illusion is the chittering blackness of the sky above.

(It is so cloyingly reminiscent of what Luke saw when he let his curiosity get the better of him and unpacked the OLD_DATA.)

(He's suppressed most of that memory, he thinks. He doesn't really remember much between when the images first started appearing, when his entire body started quivering at its seat, when he started screaming and couldn't stop, and finding himself trying to smash the ejected disk with a hammer, a manic sickly burn in the back of his throat. But he knows that whatever he saw was...)

(Bad. It was pretty bad.)

Niko guides Luke slowly, hesitantly, up the street laid out before him. Luke has barely passed what looks like a church and a town hall before P03's voice intrudes into his mind again.

[LUKE, YOU'RE NOT GOING TO FIND ANYTHING HERE.]

[THIS IS A PLACE WHERE PUERILE AND FANTASTICAL THINKING IS USED BY PATHETIC, UNFULFILLED MINDS TO ESCAPE FROM THE MUNDANELY DREADFUL REALITY OF THEIR SAD AND UNSATISFYING LIVES.]

[THE DOOR'S STILL THERE. IT'S STILL WAITING FOR YOU. TURN BACK.]

Luke's hands aren't so full of lightbulb that it would be an impediment in flipping off the sky where he thinks he can feel P03's voice coming from, but again, should probably tone down that kind of thing given how young Niko seems. "What's here that you're so desperate to keep me from seeing?" he asks instead, picking up the pace.

[WHAT?]

[THE POINT OF TRYING TO GET YOU TO LEAVE HERE IS THAT THERE'S NOTHING TO SEE.]

[I'VE ALREADY CL-]

[...]

[THIS TOWN WAS ALREADY CLEARED OUT, ITS POPULATION SCATTERED INTO THE DEPTHS OF THE FEARS.]

[THERE'S NOBODY HERE. THERE'S NOTHING HERE.]

[I'M JUST TRYING TO STOP YOU FROM WASTING YOUR TIME.]

Again with this stuff about people being thrown into "the Fears." What's all that about? "Sure you are," Luke drawls instead of vocalizing that, though. He wants so desperately to open every door, inspect every building he passes top to bottom in search of the answers he doesn't have, but Niko apparently doesn't share this sentiment. He really wishes they had slightly freer reign as to when they talk to him so they could explain why, but the Dredger had implied that they'll only be able to speak to him when it would fit with the "game."

...hm, what if he metagames this and tries to trigger a dialogue option for them? "Niko, where are you taking me?" he asks out loud.

Their response comes quickly, but there's something strangely canned-sounding about it. "I can hear a weird pulsing sound... Plus, the top of the screen gets paler the farther up you go."

"And you think there's something there?" Luke asks.

"Yeah."

By this point, Luke can hear the "weird pulsing sound," too, and it does indeed seem to be increasing in volume as he follows Niko's nonverbal directions. They stop him in front of what looks like a pretty normal house, and it takes him a moment to realize what's wrong- the windows are totally blacked out, a steady fluidlike pulsing pattern running up them on the inside. Or, rather, the reflection of a pulsing pattern, Luke realizes after a moment, as there seems to be a strange fog drifting somewhere in between. "Do you know what this is?" he asks hesitantly.

"No." A pause, and then Niko adds, "We don't have to go in if you don't want to."

Luke is a little surprised to find himself laughing at that. "This is probably what P03 didn't want us seeing, right? So the only thing we can do is go inside. Who knows, maybe its secret evil plans are hidden in there or something."

[I DON'T HAVE ANY "SECRET EVIL PLANS," LUKE.]

[I'VE ACTUALLY BEEN VERY TRANSPARENT WITH YOU ABOUT ALL OF THIS.]

"Sure you have." Luke ignores it and opens the front door.

(It's one of the few times in this period of his "life" he will open a door and not end up regretting it.)

Susie is all alone. Kris is gone, their mom's gone, all she can hear is the pulsating painful wrongness of the thing that's trying to be a Dark Fountain at the center of their living room, and she has no idea why any of it is happening.

Every room is devoid of any life. The door outside is sealed shut, and her hand started tingling and going painfully numb when she tried to touch the doorknob. The same goes for the windows she tried to open, and when she found a heavy metal statue tucked away in a drawer and chucked it at one of the windows (feeling shitty about how she'd be further proving what a bad kid she is the whole time), it just bounced off with a shriek of static and hit her in the face.

So now Susie is sitting on the couch, snout still a little bloody, a blanket she'd found somewhere tucked tight around her shoulders, staring into the roaring darkness pouring up from the floor, and she has never felt more forsaken in her life.

Around half an hour ago- time's hard in this place, but she thinks that's right- a tendril of pale fog had crept under the door like a clawing finger. More fog followed, from the suddenly porous-seeming windows and down the stairs and out of the ajar bathroom door, and...

...and...

Susie thinks she let the fog in. She thinks she wanted it there. She thinks she still wants it to be there.

Deep down, she thinks she wants the fog to consume her until there is nothing left.

(It already is, though, isn't it? She's starting to have trouble remembering what Kris's face looks like, or Lancer's, or Ralsei's, or Noelle's, or... or...)

(...there were other people in her life, too, weren't there? What were their names? What did they look like? Why can't she remember them as having faces that were anything but shrouded in opaque fog?)

So, yeah, to summarize- Susie's completely alone, there's a weird broken Dark Fountain in the middle of the room, and now there's fog everywhere for some reason and she's starting to forget things about her friends. And just when her life was actually starting to look like it was getting better, too.

Then the front door, the door that wouldn't let her out, creaks open, and suddenly there's someone standing there. Yellow light radiates from their palms and cuts through the pale fog, and Susie is not alone anymore.

"Kris?! That you?" Susie jumps to her feet and shrugs off her sadness blanket, the inclination to wallow in her aloneness bleeding away more and more by the second. "Man, the hell'd you vanish off to? And how'd-"

Then she stops, finally processes. The person standing in the doorway's too tall and pale to be Kris, their hair's too short, and... well, okay, sure, Kris theoretically owns clothes other than those brown slacks and that green-and-yellow sweater, but Susie's never seen them wear anything else. (She thinks she asked them about it at one point, heard them distractedly mutter that they just prefer the consistent texture.) "You're not Kris," she says slowly.

"Uh, don't know who that is, so, no?" It's a human man, Susie thinks, and he balances what looks like an oversized lightbulb (what?) awkwardly against his knee and raises a hand in brief greeting. "I'm... gonna guess you're not from Inscryption, since I've never seen you before."

"The hell's an Inscryption?"

"That's a no, then. Okay, that's- okay." The stranger sighs and repositions the lightbulb in his hands. "I'm Luke. I'm..." He finally seems to notice the Dark Fountain at the center of the room, and his weird gray-and-brown eyes widen. "Right! Okay! I'm guessing that's what P03 didn't want me to see!"

"Who the hell's P03?" Definitely sounding like a broken record there, Susie snarks at herself. Way to make a bad first impression.

"It's... a long story." Luke sighs. "What's your name?"

"Susie. What's with the lightbulb thing?"

"Also a long story." Luke's expression just gets even wearier, even sadder. "Niko, maybe this black fountain thing's one of the power sources the Dredger was talking about?" he asks, casting his eyes upward.

Susie does not have time to ask who this "Niko" is or where they are before a horrifying voice slams down upon her very being, a cutting digital thing that drills into her very core and cracks her open under the callous gaze of that which speaks.

[IT IS NOT.]

[JUST LOOK AT IT. IN THE STATE ASHER'S LACK OF IMAGINATION LEFT IT IN, IT IS FUNCTIONALLY USELESS TO US.]

[DIDN'T THINK SHE WAS STILL HERE, THOUGH. I THOUGHT SHE'D BEEN REMOVED LIKE-]

[WHATEVER. I CAN WORK WITH THIS.]

[YOU WANT TO TAKE SUSIE WITH YOU, START ASSEMBLING AN RPG PARTY OR WHATEVER? FINE. I DON'T CARE.]

[BUT LEAVE THIS PLACE AND GET BACK TO YOUR MISSION.]

[NOW.]

The fog abruptly fades away, receding into the floor as the whole house shakes, and chittering black static starts to eat its way down the stairs in its place. The Dark Fountain stutters and trembles, flickering in and out like a cheap lightbulb as the crawling screaming mass comes closer and closer-

"Um! Maybe we should run now!" Luke suggests weakly.

"Don't hafta tell me twice," Susie snaps, barging past him and out the door. She can hear him hurriedly following, but she doesn't stop to look back, doesn't stop to see if he outran the tide as well.

She does, however, stop when she sees the sky.

Susie has seen the sky many, many times over the course of her fifteen-and-a-half years of being alive. But she is very sure that the sky cannot be this pure endless blackness that scuttles and jitters above her like a living thing with countless dark, squirming legs. And she is very, very sure that it should not be as close as it is.

"The hell did you do to the sky?" Susie snaps, whirling on Luke.

"I didn't do anything!" Luke starts to raise his hands in surrender before visibly paling as the lightbulb starts to slip from his grasp and hastily catching it. "Look, this-"

The dreadful voice returns, then, and Susie winces and slams her palms over her ears, but it doesn't help. It's inside her head as surely as if it were her own thoughts, burrowing past the paltry defenses she failed to create in the first place, and there's nothing she can do to shut it out.

[I DID TELL YOU NOT TO COME HERE, LUKE.]

[THIS WORLD ISN'T STABILIZED, NOT LIKE THE ONES WHERE YOU CAN CHARGE THE BULB.]

There's a brief burst of colorful distortion, and suddenly a dark brown door just... exists at the foot of Kris's driveway, as if it had always been there. (There's nothing to indicate it hasn't always been there, nothing save memory.)

[THERE'S YOUR DOOR. LEAVE. NOW.]

"Is the whole town like this?" Susie demands of Luke. "And what is that voice?!"

"Uh..." Luke blinks nervously. "Niko, a little help?"

"And who's this 'Niko,' too-"

The voice returns, cutting her off, and Susie winces at the nigh-physical pressure.

[LEAVE.]

"I think we should do what it says?" Luke balances the bulb awkwardly against his leg again as he opens the door. "Look, I'll- this place doesn't really look safe anyway, and that fog you were in earlier didn't look good either, so you probably shouldn't be left here? Come with me, I'll try to explain everything I know, and then you can- I'll let you decide how you want to handle this for yourself."

"You better," Susie grinds out, and she reluctantly follows him through the strange door.

Chapter Text

Cold air hisses and twists and burns like bile in Asher's lungs as they watch the workers flee, watch the man they Saw flee- his name is Russell Moreno but he prefers "Russ" he is twenty-five years old he dyes his hair due to insecurity about his premature graying he will wake up screaming from nightmares about you on a weekly basis now-

STOP, STOP, STOP grinds through Asher's mind as they slam their palms to their temples, eyes shut tight, and take a slow, deep breath. I didn't mean to do that, my- these powers, I had to use them to get rid of them, didn't I? I just wanted to make them leave, I didn't want-

"Whoopsie," taunts Helen, leaning aimlessly against her doorframe. "Not so easy keeping the Assistant under lock and key, is it, Asher?"

("-what's something that would get you fired if anybody knew about it-")

"Or maybe..." The door creaks, slow and quiet, like the turning of a wheel. "The first thing you used to get your way was fear, wasn't it? You didn't even consider your other options. Maybe you wanted it to hurt. Maybe this is the first time you've ever had any power, the first time you've ever felt powerful, and so..."

For the first time in months, you felt well and truly alive. Didn't you?

"No, I- that's not-" I wanted to be more capable, I wanted to have more control over the world, but not like this!

No matter how much you don't want to want it, you know you're not going to st-

"Asher!" Patches snaps his fingers irritatedly, pulling them back to reality piecemeal, scattered thought by scattered thought disentangling. "In case you forgot, we still need to figure out how to get Mae out of whatever trance state Helen put her in!"

Have to save Mae (because I made her go into the Distortion), have to save Kris (because I couldn't help them), have to stop the Batter (because I couldn't make him listen), have to hurry back to Niko before they start worrying (because I left them all alone without a second thought)-

These circumstances might not have been my fault, but the actions I took in response, the repercussions from those, they're on me. I did this.

I've done nothing but hurt people tonight.

Everything that's happening right now is my fault.

Just the repercussions are. So take responsibility and fix it.

Asher is not alone. They have not been alone since they awoke, though it took some time to recognize it properly- to process what hung at the corners of their vision and voice. To process what was truly happening in the moments when they automatically started calling themself "the Assistant" rather than "Asher" and did not think to question it.

But since they emerged from the Distortion and put the fear of the Eye into Russ Moreno, their perspective has shifted just enough to recognize the Assistant's gaze for what it is. They're not the same thing, and Asher doesn't think they ever were, but now that they know the Assistant exists as more than just a connection to these powers, finding the point where one stops and the other begins is... hard. Like looking at the color spectrum and trying to find the exact place where red stops and orange begins, or where orange stops and yellow begins. You could theoretically measure it, find a precise halfway point and declare "that's it!"- but without the time and ability to make such a measurement, there's nothing to rely on but one's own perception.

There's a point where they stop. They just aren't sure where it is. And there's too much happening at once for them to process it all, to wonder why the Assistant's suddenly started directly speaking to them, to think about what any of th-

Do not think about it. This isn't the time for introspection.

Focus, [Asher (fledgling/neophyte/youaredoingwell/toowell/pleasemakeitstop)].

Its eyes are yours now. Just compel her. Make her See through the Spiral.

It should mark her, and if not... It will be enough.

Right. Okay. That's... okay. Asher is moving before they've really realized it, tossing a distracted "I think I know how to fix this" Patches' way as they kneel next to Mae, hands hovering awkwardly by their sides. They don't know if they should make any physical contact, but decide against it. Best not to make her uncomfortable. Even if she isn't aware enough to process any discomfort. Just... compel. Ask a simple question. It should be enough. You aren't even in the Distortion right now.

Trust me. Nothing will go wrong.

Not unless you want it to. Or do you think you can't control it?

Unnoticed by any of them, a lone tape recorder whirs merrily away from where it is safely tucked against the base of Helen's door. It does not exist as an artifact of control, of course, there would be no point to that- it is only there to observe.

(Wheels, within wheels within wheels...)

ASHER?

(Compulsion) Mae, can you hear me?

HELEN

Going for old reliable, are we? Godspeed!

[A MOMENT OF NOTHING SAVE STATIC]

MAE

...I... think so. 'S all... fuzzy, but I can hear you.

ASHER?

Okay! Okay, that- that's good. (Compulsion) What can you see?

MAE

(Fully coherent) Uh. Night sky. Some stars. Big Dipper, I think.

[RELIEVED SIGHS FROM ASHER AND PATCHES AND A SMUG NOISE FROM HELEN AS THE COMPULSION STATIC FALLS AWAY]

ASHER?

I don't... I'm not really familiar with constellations, so I'll take your word for it. (Brief rise-and-fall of static) Oh, that's Boötes, actually...

MAE

Who calls a constellation "Bow Oat Ease?" Did some ancient guy with a telescope, like, have a really good bowl of oatmeal that was super easy to make the day he found that constellation, and then spelled "bowl" wrong when he went to name it?

ASHER?

I- Mae, no, that's not- (Little helpless laugh) Why am I not surprised that's the first thing you questioned...?

PATCHES

Okay, but how did you-

ASHER?

Beholding. In general, if I know something I shouldn't, just- just blame it on the giant eyeball.

PATCHES

No, that's not what I- there's so much light pollution, how can either of you see the constella- you know what? I don't care. We have bigger problems right now.

[SOUNDS OF MAE BEING HELPED BACK TO HER FEET]

MAE

Wait, what... what happened? I remember we went into the hallway, and- you, Helen, you were all "ooh, maybe I'll trap you three in here forever to be eeeevil," and then... nothing. Nothing until now. Where even are we?

ASHER?

In front of some restaurant, I think? But, uh, being in the Distortion like that, it... Helen kept us in there long enough that you...

HELEN

(Butting in) You were going to slip right on into being a manifestation of unfettered delusion and madness and turn into a proper cosmic horror, just like me! It's a shame, too; I really could've used another Spiral avatar around, finally get to have some proper girl talk!

[PATCHES MAKES SEVERAL WORDLESS NOISES OF CONFUSED FURY AT HELEN'S REFUSAL TO HAVE A CONSISTENT CHARACTER MOTIVE]

MAE

You did something to stop it, Asher. I know that you, like, asked if I could hear you and what I could see or whatever, but... I don't think I had a choice. When I tried to say something? I couldn't do anything but answer. And I think what I said was what you wanted me to say.

ASHER?

Right, yeah, that's... compulsion's- that's one of the powers I have now. Making people answer my questions truthfully and concisely whether they want to or not. I'm- I'm really sorry about compelling you without asking for permission first, but I couldn't see any other way to-

MAE

Dude, are you seriously feeling guilty over that? Sure, it didn't feel great, but it still pulled me out of that... what, Distortion... coma? Is that what you'd call it?

ASHER?

I mean, I'm more concerned about the precedent it sets? And also, I don't think that would've counted as a coma, medically-speaking- y- okay, sure, you know what, you can call it whatever you want. (Impulsively, clearly trying to impress her) Insults are preferred, though, and- and recommended by nine out of ten doctors.

[TINY LAUGH FROM MAE, FOLLOWED BY AN EVEN QUIETER UNDUE NOISE OF TRIUMPH FROM ASHER]

HELEN

(Disproportionate glee) I'm all the other doctors.

PATCHES

I don't think you'd know what a medical degree was if it put on scrubs and performed open-heart surgery on you.

HELEN

Please, I doubt anyone would be able to even recognize my heart! Or any of my organs, really...

PATCHES

Why exactly are you still here, anyway?

HELEN

I'm always nowhere, never somewhere, and sometimes everywhere, Patches. I'm just letting you think I'm here because it's something interesting to do.

MAE

...what?

PATCHES

I don't appreciate your attempts at confusing me.

[EXTENDED SOUNDS OF BRUTAL DISTORTION LAUGHTER, ACCOMPANIED BY AUDIBLE WINCING FROM EVERYONE]

HELEN

Immediate deflection is boring, Patches. You should try embracing incomprehension next time. It'll be more fun that way! Anyway, amusing as this is, aren't you three forgetting something...?

Buzzing giddy static still trails at the edge of Mae's consciousness, like she's grazed her very self against a belt sander, and a strange feeling not quite like pins-and-needles still creeps along the edges of her hands and legs and the tip of her tail. She's still not completely sure what any of that was, but... she feels okay now, and she should be fine, since Asher doesn't seem to think there's any cause for concern. They're the one who knows how this stuff works, right?

...then again, the abrupt panic that erupts across their face at Helen's reminder doesn't exactly make them seem like a beacon of confident competence. "Oh, for-" Asher draws a shaky breath as the circle of eyes around their head opens again. "We seriously forgot about the Batter again?! By this point Kris's probably already dead-"

"No need to worry, Assistant!" Helen waves a hand in front of their extra eyes, making them go comically cross-eyed. (Mae doesn't know how she's managing that when Asher's extra eyes have no nose to cross over.) "When I saw the state Mae was in, I decided to open my door and let you three out fifteen minutes before you even entered my corridors in the first place."

Patches outright does a double-take. Mae thinks that's the first time she's ever seen someone do that in real life. "I- wait, she can do that?"

"I can and I did!" Helen says cheerfully. "You are very welcome, by the way."

Asher still looks stuck on checking on Kris, at least judging by the way the floating eyes all blink, eerily in sync, and refocus on something in the distance, so Mae fills in for them. "Yeah, uh, thanks, I guess." It takes a moment for her to finish processing the implications of what Helen had said, but once she does she finds herself demanding, almost on autopilot, "Wait, if you can, like, do time travel, why can't you just send us back to before the Batter even attacked Kris and Asher and make him go into your hallways or whatever? Then we wouldn't have to be out here running after him in the first place!"

The laughter Helen lets out in response to that is thankfully much more subdued than before. "Asides from because I don't want to?" she asks laughingly. "Because I would enjoy the ensuing paradox far too much for my own good."

"Well, either way," Asher says firmly, extra eyes closing, "Kris does not look okay. At all. We need to hurry."

"You can see them?" Patches' paw dips back into his pocket. Mae assumes he's going for his knife... or maybe just making sure it's still there. "How close are we?"

"They're in a building down the road from here, maybe..." Asher frowns. "Six minutes away on foot? Let's go, we don't want to waste the little bit of extra time we've just been handed."

Helen smugly tilts her head in a direction that doesn't exist. "Again, you're welcome."

And with no more time to waste, the three set off once more.

Beneath it all, still animated by a shard of something old and foul, the Assistant's wheels-within-wheels-within-wheels hum, greased by fearful bilestatic and kept turning by the steady beat of their host's heart.

The Assistant drowses, and the Assistant grazes, and the Assistant lends eyes and advice to Asher when needed, and the Assistant keeps a single tendril on the rise and fall of their voice, and above all else the Assistant grows. Strings push and pulse and spool outwards through Asher's body- not strings of matter, but strings of code, though this does not quiet their silent plea to be pulled- and the Eye sees through them, and into them, and out of them.

But unlike Asher, the Assistant escapes the notice of their Mother's great fool; the Eye sees what it Sees through, of course, but the conduit that created their first connection goes entirely unseen. Because while Asher may be of the Eye now, the Assistant never was, and the Assistant does not exist to assist them.

But their final completion has not yet arrived. Every shred of ignorance must be maintained. So the Assistant lies in wait, growing ever inward, and listens for what must happen next.

Soon all will be as it will be. Soon they will be in full bloom. Soon they will be one and the same.

Chapter Text

It isn't until the door to the backroom closes behind the Batter that he realizes maybe he shouldn't have left Kris unsupervised. It's a few more moments before he notes that the room itself is completely empty of anything save vacant, dusty shelves; nothing useful here.

Nothing save the woman standing opposite and her prior promises.

With a bright hum, Annabelle reaches down and draws a camera with a cracked lens from underneath one of the shelves. "I could make a 'smile for the camera' joke," she muses, pulling its strap over her head and around her neck so the camera sits comfortably against her side, "but I think we'd both prefer to get straight to business before Kris takes the opportunity to figure out how to escape."

"Was that the point of this?" the Batter asks. His fingers tighten around his bat, just for a moment.

"What do you think?" Annabelle winces almost immediately as the words leave her mouth. "Sorry, force of habit. If you mean letting Kris escape, then, no. Ideally they will stay exactly where they are until Asher's arrival."

The Batter refuses to get sidetracked. "You said you wanted to help me."

"Yes," Annabelle agrees. "But I won't be able to until you realize what you really are."

"I don't understand."

"You don't understand yet," Annabelle corrects. "But you will. Tell me, Batter- why is purification holy?"

The Batter doesn't understand where she's going with this. "Because impurity is unholy."

"But that's not really an answer, is it?" asks Annabelle. "All you did was take my question, turn it into a statement, and replace the nouns with their antonyms."

The Batter blinks, just once.

"You... do know what an antonym is, don't y-"

"Yes."

"But you couldn't define," Annabelle continues seamlessly, "why purity is necessarily 'good.' Remind me, what exactly does purity connote?"

"A holy cleansing."

"Cleansing of what?"

"Impurity."

"Explain it to me without using the words 'purity' or 'pure' or 'holy' or 'unholy' or any other derivative," Annabelle says. "Just... humor me," she adds, presumably seeing the look on his face. "We will not be able to proceed from here until you do. I can't help you otherwise."

And against his better judgement, the Batter tries to truly hold the concept of purity in his mind in its entirety, tries to focus on it. He thinks back, remembers how watching the specters, the burnt, the guardians fall before him felt, remembers how setting foot in the unending monochrome of a pure world filled him to the brim with a quiet, almost misty satisfaction, unspoken truthful acknowledgement of a job well done.

But what was the "job" beyond its process? What was purity? What is purity? What could it ever mean beyond an ever-self-reinforcing loop? Purity is good because goodness is purity, impurity is unholy because unholiness is impure. But what was the holiness of each pure zone derived from? What did it actually mean every time he muttered "purification in progress" to himself as a new enemy rose before him?

Purification in progress. Purification is progress. Purification is in progress, purity lies within progression. It's better that way. He knows that.

But what was it?

"You don't know, do you?" Something gleeful sparks in Annabelle's eyes. "Your sole purpose for being, and you don't know what it means. Do you even know why you've ever done any of the things you do? Or did you just do as Asher told you, and then as P03 told you?"

The Batter doesn't know what she's trying to do, but he's had enough of their games- Asher's games, P03's games, Annabelle's games, all of it. "Explain," he orders, fist locking ever tighter around his bat.

"Very well, let's approach this from a different direction," Annabelle sighs. "You realize that, at your basest level, you're a character from a video game?"

"Yes." He's recognized and known that for longer than today. What does it have to do with this?

"Batter, you aren't just some ordinary RPG protagonist." Annabelle folds her arms. "You are a deconstruction of an RPG protagonist. That is the purpose you were truly designed for."

"No." It escapes the Batter without him even thinking it.

Unbidden, Annabelle's head turns slightly, as if listening for a far-off melody. "No?"

He needs to stop this. Now. (Why does he need to stop this?) "My purpose is to purify the-"

"And yet you still can't identify for me what purification is or why it is good, can you?" interrupts Annabelle. "There's a very simple reason for that. It's because you exist as a deconstruction, of which the very concept of 'purification' is a core component. You don't truly have a 'character motive' as we would conventionally define it- just a surface-level objective accompanied by moralistic undertones, only ever saying enough to push your puppeteer from one short-term goal to the next. And because your theomaniacal mutterings were never properly explained, by yourself or any other... when you were given life, they simply didn't gain an explanation. There was no true explanation to exist. And even disregarding the question of purity, why was your ultimate goal to turn the world off, exactly?" she inquires.

"It's better that way." The Batter's head hurts. He hasn't taken any damage, why is it doing that?

"You don't know the answer to that, either, do you?" Annabelle spreads her arms. "There it is. Once the world is 'OFF,' so ends the game; you walked through a game that is a world that is a stage that remains a game. You were never anything but a narrative conduit- not even that, a deconstruction of a narrative conduit- designed with the express purpose of showing the consequences of doing the bare minimum of legwork to funnel the player to the game's ending. And that's exactly what your truer creator intended you as."

Smoke shudders in the Batter's lungs. He doesn't know why, but suddenly his feet are almost moving on their own, pulling him back from Annabelle. She doesn't move, doesn't match the steps with any of her own, just smiles. "Do you understand, Batter? You are as you are to be a subtle nod to one-dimensional, plot-motivated characterization, and yet in your subtlety the retrospective confusion of your puppeteer masked that, made you embody what you are designed to tear apart." She leans forward, just a little, and when she speaks it is near to a whisper. "The only purpose you serve is to be a walking plot device."

Silence in the dusty backroom, hanging and taut and vile. The Batter thinks for a moment before he makes his decision.

Words leave him. He is the one who chooses them. He thinks he is the one who chooses them. (He thinks he wants to be the one who chooses them.) "Don't manipulate me."

Annabelle's smirk is maddening. "I really didn't have to. You had already made up your mind from the moment you decided to hear me out."

Batter. Report.

The Batter does not. He ignores P03's voice entirely and examines the strange woman before him. "What do you want?"

"In the scale of all things," Annabelle explains, "you may yet find yourself free to choose your own reason for being, Batter; free yourself from the identity, the recursive purpose, that Asher and something much older have selected for you." She extends one hand. "All I'm asking is that you accept my guidance- my offer of help. Work with me for ten or so minutes, push this plot on track enough that it can run on its own unsupervised, and then you'll be set completely free of all of this. No strings attached... pun unintended."

Batter, why can't I see what's happening? P03's "voice" rises. What are you doing?

Something tugs at the Batter inside, near his lungs, right at the spot where the cold machine Asher gifted him still whirs and pushes smoke into his lungs. He examines Annabelle's extended hand and thinks, just for a moment, at least she wears her strings in plain sight.

"Okay," he says, and he shakes her hand.

Annabelle's long, spindly fingers tighten until her grip is almost painful. "Thank you. I feel we're going to work perfectly together, Batter."

"I don't care," says the Batter.

Annabelle laughs, quick and sharp, and releases him. "Even more perfect."

Chapter Text

It takes a while for Luke to explain everything to Susie (Niko's no help, they go completely silent until he's done), but he doesn't particularly mind wasting P03's time, and for some reason its annoyed insistences that they need to get moving are a lot easier to tune out in this weird nebulous space next to the four doors. He does gloss over the whole "video game" part, though, not wanting to give the poor kid an existential crisis if he can avoid it. He doesn't know what was up with the fog or the static that overwhelmed the house Susie was in, nor who "Asher" is, and to her apparent surprise being asked about it multiple times does not result in any sudden breakthroughs.

Susie is equally skeptical of P03's intentions once she learns of the Great Transcendence it had originally been planning, and her skepticism is thankfully only increased when P03 chimes in with the claim that the Great Transcendence had for all intents and purposes failed and that it's turned over a new leaf now. There's also the factor of what happened to her hometown, though, and after seeing what happened to it, she reluctantly agrees that if there's the slightest chance P03 is being truthful they should probably get around to charging up this sun-lightbulb-thing sometime.

They end up settling on exploring whatever's behind the dark blue door. Luke opens it, and they find themselves stepping into what looks like yet another nondescript suburban town, albeit less put-together- and, like the one he'd found Susie in, it looks completely devoid of life.

"Whaddaya think happened to get rid of all the people?" Susie asks hesitantly.

"No idea." Luke huffs in frustration, cradling the reassuring heat of the lightbulb closer to his chest. "But if P03's telling the truth-"

[I AM.]

"-then whatever we have to do with this thing should put them all back? Theoretically."

"Guess it's better than nothing," Susie shrugs, a resigned breath hissing through her teeth. "Let's get moving." Never once do either of them question their compliance with P03's stated motive despite their skepticism regarding it. Never once do either of them question their lack of questioning. There is no choice to.

"This, uh... this place is kinda depressing and rundown, huh?" Susie ventures after easily a minute of silently walking uphill.

Niko doesn't want to be rude, but compared to all the places they've seen where people live (in their world, the World Machine, and now Asher's world), they want to agree with her a little. It isn't decaying as much as the Refuge was, though then again there's no catwalks or squares here- none they can see, anyway. Not that they can communicate any of that to Susie; they're still confined to talking to Luke, and even then only when P03 lets them.

(They can't tell him anything, can't warn him, can't do anything but keep playing the game. They don't know what he told Susie about P03, the game faded to black when he started and jumped ahead to when he was done explaining before fading back in, but judging from what little they saw of her reaction it wasn't anything good.)

"Yeah. Looks pretty, uh, Rust Belt-ish, I guess? At least, from what I've heard about it," Luke starts before his expression falters. "Wait, do you know what that is?" Niko doesn't, but now they're imagining an old, rusty belt made of metal, which doesn't sound very safe to wear. "Does the Rust Belt exist in... wherever you're from?"

Susie visibly takes a moment to mull it over. "That's... the bit in the middle where everything's even more of a failed state than the rest of America, right?"

Luke looks genuinely amused when he laughs at that. "That's pretty accurate, yeah! From what I know, anyway- I'm from Canada," he adds.

"Huh." Susie's dialogue sprite goes contemplative again. "Got free healthcare up there, right?"

"Yeah."

"Sounds nice."

"It is, yeah!"

Niko has no idea what they're talking about, but Luke's slight cheerfulness is certainly better than the near-constant breakdowns he's been having since they were given control of him. The fear and doubt on his face... it reminded them of that on Asher's, so many times since their arrival in this world.

(Asher's still out there chasing after the Batter. Niko hopes they get to be less scared soon. They think they deserve that.)

The game lags and glitches for a moment, the quiet background music distorting. Niko flinches in apprehension, but it goes back to normal after a moment. "What was that?" they ask out loud, though they know neither Luke nor Susie can hear them. P03 answers instead.

[JUST CLEARING OUT SOME STRAGGLERS. WE DON'T NEED ANY MORE PARTY MEMBERS, THANKS VERY MUCH.]

Unfortunately for P03, what looks like an alligator or crocodile or something, just walking on two legs and wearing black clothing, shoves their way out of a brick building right next to Luke and Susie as they pass by, making both of them flinch and scream.

"AAAAAHHHHH-"

"THE HELL-"

[GREAT. MISSED ONE.]

"What the hell is going on?" demands the alligator-or-crocodile, before recoiling at the sight of Luke. "What is that?!"

"That's. Uh." Susie blinks confusedly at the newcomer. "He's a human. You never seen a human before?"

"No!"

[YEP. THIS IS GOING TO TAKE A WHILE.]

[FOR FUTURE REFERENCE, NIKO? THIS IS WHY I DIDN'T WANT THEM TO RUN INTO ANYONE ELSE.]

[THAT, AND WHO WANTS TO SIT THROUGH HALF AN HOUR OF EXPOSITION DIALOGUE EVERY TIME THEY MEET SOMEONE NEW?]

[I MEAN, GRANTED, IT'S TO BE EXPECTED WHEN YOU SHOVE THIS MANY GAMES WITH CLASHING WORLDBUILDING TOGETHER, BUT STILL.]

Nobody's reacting to what P03's saying, so Niko assumes its comments are for their eyes only. "I mean, whoever this is could be helpful?" they suggest slowly, hitting the Z key to advance the dialogue. They just don't want P03 to hurt whoever this is.

[...YOU KNOW WHAT? YOU'RE RIGHT.]

[SHE MIGHT ACTUALLY BE USEFUL GETTING LUKE TO THE MINES.]

[SMART KID. I'LL HANDLE GETTING HER TO COOPERATE- JUST HAVE TO DIAL UP LUKE'S TERMINUS RADIATION A BIT MORE...]

[YOU SIT TIGHT.]

There's a fuzzy moment of readjustment as P03's text disappears and the screen flickers violently for a few seconds. Nothing looks like it changed physically, but Niko knows better by this point.

"Look, uh, long story short, there's a lot of..." Luke falters awkwardly. "Worlds, like this one, with power sources we're supposed to charge this lightbulb in? And once we've done that, it's supposed to fix everything."

The alligator-or-crocodile looks even more confused, but she doesn't say anything, and Luke's dialogue portrait looks a bit more confident when he speaks again. "Let me explain a little better."

The screen fades to black, and Niko resigns themself to waiting until P03 decides to let them see what's going on again.

They wish they could leave. But for every moment they sit here, the idea that they'll keep on sitting here until this is over grows ever more inevitable in their mind.

Luke decides against giving the new arrival (she introduces herself as Bea) slow and drawn-out exposition to annoy P03, given how freaked out she looks, and also decides- as with Susie- to skirt around the whole video game thing to avoid giving her an existential crisis. He's probably not giving her the most in-depth explanation of what's going on, but even though he doesn't feel like there's any rush, he... yeah, okay, honestly, it's just that he's already bored of this explanation even though it's only the second time he's had to give it. Maybe it's not great that he's prioritizing his own momentary comfort over making sure she's informed, but he's past the point of being able to bring himself to care.

"Huh" is all Bea says once he's finished explaining (with occasional interruptions from Susie), taking a thoughtful drag from her cigarette. Given her initial skepticism, Luke has no idea why she's so quick to believe him now, but he's not inclined to question it. "So charging this bulb is supposed to fix everything?"

Luke nods wordlessly.

"Assuming P03 isn't lying or something," Susie adds, "which, if what Luke said it did before was right... definitely some ulterior motive here. Just dunno what it is. Or how bad it is."

"Sure. Alright. This might as well be happening." Bea eyes her cigarette for a moment. It's just about burned down to nothing by now, so she stubs it out and flicks it away; Luke takes note that she refrains from lighting another. "I think I might have an idea of where one of these 'power sources' of P03's is, but it's not really... accessible at the moment. So unless your spooky robot-god friend-"

"It's not our friend," Luke and Susie snap, eerily in sync.

[RUDE.]

P03's "voice" is weirdly unoppressive this time around, though if it's true that Bea can guide them to one of its power sources, Luke figures it's probably trying to avoid alienating her too soon.

"Can I assume that's it?" asks Bea.

[YEP.]

[YOU HAD A QUESTION ABOUT MY CAPABILITIES?]

"Yeah." Bea turns her attention skyward. "Would you be able to clear out and reconstruct a collapsed mine tunnel? 'Cause otherwise, if your so-called power source is what I think it is, it's gonna be impossible to get it."

[OF COURSE I CAN.]

[I'M THE HOLDER OF THE OLD_DATA. I CAN WARP THE ENVIRONMENT AS NEEDED IF IT'LL MAKE THINGS EASIER.]

"Hm." Bea folds her arms and leans against the wall behind her. "Actually, no, while you're here, probably better to directly confirm- is the Black Goat one of those power sources?"

[YEP, THAT'S RIGHT.]

[ON SECOND THOUGHT, I'M VERY PLEASED YOU STUCK AROUND.]

[SO NICE TO BE DEALING WITH SOMEONE WITH THE SLIGHTEST AMOUNT OF INTELLIGENCE FOR ONCE.]

Luke glares at the chittering, too-close black sky. "Stop trying to manipulate her into thinking you're cool."

Bea rolls her eyes. "Relax, I'm not falling for it."

Susie beats Luke to what he was about to ask next. "Hell's the Black Goat?"

"Swap out the question mark for a period and you're not far off. Long story short, it's some kind of elder god living in a hole under the town," Bea explains, her voice not quite as casual and bored as she's trying to make it sound. "Bunch of old shitheads were throwing anyone they didn't think would be missed into the pit, since the Black Goat told them if they kept him fed he'd keep the town prosperous. Which was kind of a blatant lie, because, I mean, look at this place."

"...soooo... it's an unsubtle metaphor for capitalism, then?" Luke ventures, which gets a startled snort out of Susie.

Bea's grin is half tired and half wry. "Am I gonna have to invite you to my Young Socialists Chattrbox group after all this is over?"

"I... don't know what that is, but sure?"

Susie snorts again. "What, socialism?"

"No, I-I know what socialism is! I mean-"

[CUT IT OUT, YOU THREE.]

[DO YOU WANT TO SAVE THE WORLD(S) OR NOT?]

Bea sighs annoyedly. "Guy's real big on giving people time to process getting a boatload of worldview-reshaping information dumped on them, I see." She turns back to the building behind them. "Alright, I'll get the car. It'll only cut off a few minutes as opposed to walking, but if this's as urgent as it sounds it can't hurt."

Niko fidgets in the broken swivel chair as the conversation concludes. P03 skipped them over basically all of Luke's explanation again, and once more it refused to give them an opening to talk about basically anything that's happening on their end.

Watching like this, unable to do anything but what P03 lets them, still stealing fearful glances at the bedroom door with a part of them always expecting it to turn yellow again... Niko doesn't like it. But P03's made it pretty clear that what they want doesn't matter until its game is done.

There's another fade transition after Bea says she'll get her car, with the fade back in showing Luke, Susie, and Bea having left the car and come to a halt in front of a mass of collapsed rock. Niko wishes they could've seen what happened in the car, even if it was just more talking. Maybe it could've helped make this feel a little less scary, a little more normal.

(They also wish they knew why they're all acting like this- why they act doubtful about P03's motives, say it has to be planning something else, and then do the things it says anyway. But P03 won't let Niko ask about that either. The option doesn't exist.)

"Okay, so was your robot guy lying about clearing this stuff out, or..." Bea starts to ask, but is interrupted by a flicker of red that traces the outline of one of the largest of the rocks. It shudders, just once, and then both rock and outline disappear. The remainders start to rumble dangerously, but more and more flickering outlines begin to appear and slowly-but-steadily delete a pathway into existence, receding down the tunnel until they're out of sight.

"Huh." Bea's talksprite actually looks pretty impressed. "I guess I stand corrected."

"Still don't really know how we're gonna get to this Black Goat thing, though," Susie points out. "I mean, normally I'd be all for running in and gettin' the job done, but something this powerful... feels like we should have a plan."

"I mean, there's..." Luke frowns. "No plan survives contact with the enemy. I think some general guy said that, or something, and facing off against something like this it probably applies twice as much. So-"

[YOU'LL FIGURE IT OUT. GET MOVING.]

"Yeah. What P03 said, I guess," sighs Luke, and with his textbox vanishing Niko is left with no choice but to silently guide the three into the tunnel that opened up.

"You okay, Niko?" Luke asks after a bit. Him, Susie, and Bea continue walking on their own as the text pops up.

P03 provides two options- "Yes" and "Why wouldn't I be?" It's not much of a choice, but that seems the norm. Niko doesn't want Luke to worry, even though they don't really know him much, so they select the second one. Sure, there's a lot of scary things happening, and these are all probably real people P03's got stuck in here doing its bidding, but it's not out here, is it? There's a screen between them, and...

...and... Stop thinking about it.

Niko frowns confusedly as the thought slips away from them. What was I trying to...?

"It's just..." On the screen, Luke glances sideways awkwardly. Maybe it's because of the response Niko chose, or maybe it's because of the ominously lit-up churchlike area he's just stepped into. "It's dark and creepy down here and you're a kid?"

Two options again: "I'm not there in person, though." and "I'm fine. Keep walking." Whatever Niko was trying to focus on before, the memory slips like water through their mental fingers, and they mumble the words out loud to themself (barely conscious of it) as they pick the first- it's the politer of the two, if nothing else.

"Fair enough," Luke concedes.

"You talking to your imaginary friend or something?" Bea asks, eyebrow raised.

"Niko's real, they tell me where to go and I can hear their voice," defends Luke. "We've been over this."

"Yeah. We have. And I still reserve the right to be skeptical that you're being guided on a holy quest by an omnipotent eight-year-old." Niko only has a vague idea of what "omnipotent" means, but they're pretty sure they're not that. If they were they'd know how to stop all this.

"...and that's the only part of any of this where your suspension of disbelief fails to kick in?" Luke asks.

"Yep," Bea replies with absolutely no hesitation.

Susie grins mockingly, though Niko can't tell who it's supposed to be aimed at (limits of only seeing her expression via a dialogue sprite). "Honestly, that's pr-"

[OKAY, NO, WE'RE NOT GETTING DISTRACTED WITH STUPID BANTER.]

[I SHOULD'VE CUT SUSIE OUT OF THE EQUATION FROM THE START, THROWN HER IN THE DARK TOO...]

[WHATEVER. HE'S...]

[YEP. HE'S CLOSE ENOUGH TO THE RIGHT SPOT. LET'S GET THIS DONE AND MOVE ON TO THE NEXT.]

[UNPACKING WEIRDPAINTING_00000_ARH-CONSTRUCT.EXE...]

[ENABLING NERFING PROTOCOLS...]

And as Niko watches, their hands suddenly trembling over the keyboard, the ground tears itself open.

P03's benefactor halts himself on his return journey to examine what rises in another world with a critical eye. "Hm" is all he allows as he observes. He could say more- comment on the entity P03 has summoned forth, wonder aloud if the first phase of its plan will succeed, wax philosophical about the unseeable absence of color that drips and writhes and rips across the sharp bristling "what" that can't be fur and will never not pretend to be covering the monstrous creature's body- but he does not have the time.

He's quite busy, after all- he is not half the restless man Luke has become, of course, but his role is no less inevitable. So he goes on his way, resumes his tasks, and all the while keeps a careful watch over proceedings. After all, if P03's chosen puppet trips at the first hurdle, he will need to do this part himself.

Pity. He hates getting his hands dirty. Leitner notwithstanding.

The cave tunnel rumbles and shakes around Luke, cutting short whatever Susie was about to say, and he flinches and steps away as the ground cracks and pulls itself open like a massive hungry maw. He can see nothing beneath it, and the nothingness calls to him like a faraway song, a tugging screaming compulsion beckoning him forth, begging him to accept his ([e/E]nd) and throw himself into it so that it may gorge itself on the taut strings of haunted code which insist upon the laughable pretension of calling themselves "Luke Carder"-

Susie's the one to save Luke, both from his sudden spiral and from falling, grabbing his arm and barking "MOVE!" at him as she yanks him back from the newly-forming chasm. Bea's already backed away, he observes dizzily as a foul mist billows up from the nothingness below, and he clutches the gleaming light in his arms tight to his corpse-cold chest.

There is no ascension- just a shift, like if all of existence were a magic eye painting, and rather than nothing, nothingness is there before him.

It is not a goat. It is not black. You could believe both to be true if you wanted it, but the jagged angular head of what now looms before them all is so close that Luke could never mistake it for anything but what it is- what it is not, what it cannot be, what it always never pretended to be. Luke's head spinscreamerupts as he tries to make sense of the towering hole in reality, but no matter what part of it his eyes flicker to he will not be made to understand.

It doesn't matter. It's here. He's here. They're all here. This is the end of nothing at all.

"So that's what the Black Goat looks like," Bea mutters distantly, the whites of her eyes visible all the way around the irises, and her voice is so much more exhaustedly, resignedly terrified than it was a moment ago.

Susie's reaction is less eloquent, but more sensible. "The fuck is that?" she hisses, and then, "Why the hell aren't we running?!" But there's no choice to.

The Black Goat- if that's what the thing is- opens every mouth to bare what are trying so very hard to be teeth, but as what cannot never try to be a fury-laden roar rises in the back of his eyes, one of them suddenly dissolves into flickering, flashing squares, all reassuringly familiar shades of purple, blue, and gray. There is no throat behind the many jaws of the Black Goat, nor a larynx, nor lungs, and no secret is made of any of those facts, but even knowing this he still sings pain as the squares dance across the side of his face, as they begin to fade away, as one eye is now replaced with a glowing pulsing hole, its edges the same yellow light as the lightbulb burning so eagerly in Luke's hands. It wants to be plugged in. It will be plugged in. Plug it in, Luke.

Bea tries to say something, but her voice is so thick with fear that the words are unintelligible. Luke sympathizes.

"How're you supposed to get the bulb up there?!" Susie demands, nothing written on her face save terror, and yet somehow her voice remains defiant. "This's- this is bullshit! What's the point of this?! Why are we-" Her voice breaks off, and for just a moment befuddlement overrides her features. "Why...?"

The Black Goat's silentpained looming does not stop. He is unmoving. He is still. Why is he still?

Why did the moment I died feel exactly like this one?

"P03!" Luke finally manages, forcing himself to focus on the glowing yellow aperture. "I-if you expect me to plug this bulb in, I'll need some kind of miracle or deus ex machina or something!"

Nothing. The Black Goat still does not move.

"Wait, is it just... not going to... do anything?" The same confused realization that transfixes Susie's face slowly blooms over Bea's as well.

The Black Goat is still and silent. So is Luke for just a few seconds, and then he realizes what is happening as the sick pulse of blood rises in his ears. "P03's cheating," he says distantly, a truly alien calmness overtaking him.

"Huh?" Susie's eyes flicker away from the Black Goat to him for a moment.

"P03 controls the OLD_DATA," Luke hears himself murmur, one footfall after the other slowly moving him forward, each step as deathly calm as the last. "It controls the game it wants us to play. If it's making it this easy for us..."

"...it really wants this, huh?" Susie finishes for him, expression twisting.

"But what's the point of throwing us in, then?" Bea asks. "Why are we here?"

And why am I here?

The bulb is hot in Luke's hands, yellow light reflecting off his face and the cavern walls and the unknowing unmoving unknowable creature before him. He can't even trust himself to breathe- not yet.

(He doesn't think he needs to anymore.)

Niko is as silent as they always are in moments like these. Luke can't bring himself to hate them for it.

P03 stares in disbelief at the screen, its projected eye twitching. It momentarily entertains the idea of lunging forth to slam its claw through the monitor before it, but settles for a furious squeal of electronic distortion.

Susie. Susie. She did this. She ruined it. She somehow managed to override the background radiation courtesy of Luke's new patron P03 had hoped would carry him through to the end without questioning a single thing, but NO, they didn't even make it past the Black Goat! And once she questioned the Black Goat's lack of movement out loud...

Noelle isn't getting anywhere either. Her lack of a proper player to control her has slowed her to a sluggish crawl as she trudges through the shadows of the Gameworks and freezes whatever crosses her path. The Hex, of course, is nowhere in sight, no matter where P03 sends her, no matter what hallway or door it orders her through next. And that's not even getting into whatever's happening with the Batter that's cut P03 off from seeing through his eyes-

In the midst of P03's angered contemplation, its internal fans whirring away, it senses movement on one of the many, many screens before it. Annoyance starts to scrawl across its monitor at the sight of the opening of a portal nothing like the one it created for Noelle... and then sudden recognition sparks.

Oh!

Yep. Might be able to fix this if I nudge you in the right direction. P03 feels the OLD_DATA hum compliant authority beneath it as it reloads its save from the point it gave Luke an opening into the Black Goat. Just have to play this right...

Chapter Text

"That's all?"

"That's all," Annabelle confirms with a brisk nod.

The Batter doesn't nod back. "It's very simple."

"The simplest plans are those most likely to succeed," Annabelle says. "If there are too many moving parts, just one misstep brings everything crashing down. But if the plan is so uncomplicated that it'd need some very exaggerated incompetence in order to fail..." She spreads her hands smugly.

The Batter still doesn't nod. "Okay." He's feeling strangely... empty, after what he's been told, and he doesn't know if he's supposed to feel anything about that.

"Ah!" Annabelle's expression brightens. "I'd almost forgotten. In the event that Asher does not perform as intended, we should ensure there is a backup prepared. Do you have any Jokers left?"

The Joker cards are used to revive deceased party members. No part of Annabelle's plan should require them. "Yes."

"May I see?"

The Batter doesn't want to, but he reluctantly takes the only Joker he has left and places it in Annabelle's outstretched hand. Annabelle examines it for a moment before shrugging and wordlessly pocketing it.

What? "Give that back."

"Mm..." Annabelle considers. "No."

The Batter raises his bat. "Give it back," he repeats.

Annabelle sighs, rolling her eyes, but she does reach back into her pocket. "Perhaps you should realize there's no need to be so dramatic." She gives him the card back, and he immediately puts it back where it belongs. "It was only a joke."

"It wasn't funny."

"You don't seem to find much of anything funny," Annabelle sighs, which is incorrect. "Fine. I'll leave you to it." And with that, she turns on her heel (the movement strangely reminding the Batter of a marionette) and walks away, leaving him alone in the dusty backroom.

The Batter knows what he needs to do now. He has a part to play. He just needs to be patient.

The trudge away from the empty restaurant, away from Helen (who bade the group farewell with a cheerfulness that didn't quite mesh with the events of the past several minutes), hasn't quite held the gravitas it feels it should, Patches considers. He's starting to fall behind Asher and Mae as they walk along the dark sidewalk, his pawpads growing ever sorer, his thoughts drifting away from brutal bloody retaliation upon the Batter and into an unpleasant nothingness. The tips of his dull claws mindlessly graze along the top of the concrete road barrier to his right for want of anything else to do.

It seems... correct. Even if nothing else about this does, his actions feel correct, for want of a better word. But...

Look, Patches knows literary tropes and narrative flow inside out- he spent so much of his childhood a friendless recluse tucked away in the corner of the school library with a pile of books that he'd be remiss not to have a grasp on what kind of story this is- and this whole march towards saving Kris and confronting the Batter doesn't feel like the leadup to the "final battle" should. It feels-

Patches is jarred from his thoughts as his paw hits the base of a road sign planted in the middle of the concrete barrier, coming to a painful halt. "UNMUFFLED ENGINE BRAKING PROHIBITED," the sign reads in tall black letters, and under them in smaller text, "MAX FINE $2000." He pulls his paw back, doing his best to ignore the lingering stinging sensation, and hurries to catch up to the other two.

Point being, this doesn't feel like the proper setup for a "final battle"-type scene. All the three of them are doing is trudging down a sidewalk in the dead of night, still silent and lost in their individual thoughts after what just happened, and it feels... boring, anticlimactic, uncaring. There is no weight to their movement, no sense of apprehension or dread, not even a grim certainty. It just feels like they're sitting next to a clock waiting for the requisite amount of time to have passed before they'll be allowed to charge in and kill the Batter.

(Because that's how this will have to end, won't it? Given the Batter's casually-brutal efficiency, he almost certainly wasn't gentle with Kris, so Patches doubts they'll be able to talk him down. No, he'll need to be put down like the rabid animal he is, and if neither Asher or Mae are able to do it, then Patches will.)

Patches knows by this point that, disregarding violent urges, he can generally rely on his gut feelings to give him an accurate impression of what's coming next. And his gut's telling him that this isn't even the climax of the first act, let alone the full story- whatever's going on here, they've all still got so many unanswered questions about how this happened in the first place, what it means for the realness of the worlds himself and the others came from, and then there's the whole fear gods thing Asher's been so elusive about. Patches hasn't just not solved the mystery, he hasn't even had a chance to start properly unraveling it yet.

No, whatever happens in there, whether him or one of the others kills the Batter (he will allow no other outcome), it won't be the end of whatever's happening here. It'll only be the beginning.

A car buzzes past the trio, headlights low and the driver visibly exhausted; Patches is weirdly proud of being the only one to not flinch at its passing. He does, however, join Asher and Mae in glancing back to watch the car's departure and make sure the driver hasn't stopped to call the police or something. The rest of the city's almost out of sight by this point, he notes, the bright skyline blocked by a thick cluster of dark pine trees stabbing their soft dull needles futilely into the nigh-starless sky.

Patches' attention pulls back to Asher at the sound of a quick rise-and-fall of static, but he only catches them grimacing as their eyes go back to their normal, if still glaring, green and their footfalls return to normal. "What were you doing?" he asks.

"Just checking on that driver-" Asher jerks their thumb back at the road. "-making sure they didn't notice anything strange about us."

"Did they?"

"Well, that's-" Asher makes a half-irritated, half-apologetic noise. "Just because I know how to use these powers doesn't mean the Eye's giving me useful knowledge all the time, you know? Honestly, we've been really lucky it's been so cooperative up to this point."

"So that's a no," Patches guesses. "Got it."

"I- let me put it this way. I have no idea whether they noticed something and pulled over to call the police," Asher confirms, "but I do now know that the remains of a colonist who died in August 1851 are exactly thirteen feet under where Mae just stepped-" Mae flinches and quickens her pace at that. "-and that former Greek president Christos Sartzetakis is likely to die within the week. Acute respiratory failure, if you were curious."

"I seriously doubt either of us were," Patches informs them.

"Right, I-" Asher looks down. "No, of course not. Sorry."

"Doesn't the Eye ever give you any, like, good information?" asks Mae. "Or even, I don't know, neutral information? That isn't stuff about skeletons and random Greek dudes dying?"

"I mean, that's not really how this works?" The overfamiliar fond exasperation in Asher's tone as they turn their attention to her is something Patches recognizes- he once heard, but didn't yet understand, its presence in his own voice shortly after he first met Angel. "The Eye doesn't watch over all knowledge," they continue, interrupting wherever Patches was about to go with that thought, "just knowledge that'll upset you or traumatize you or has to do with that kind of thing. If my powers boiled down to having spooky Google plugged into the back of my brain and being able to make people answer the questions I ask them, there'd..." Their laugh is much more nervous than they perhaps realize. "I'd have a lot less repressed doubt about this, for one?"

"Well, we still don't know much about what your powers do," Patches points out, "just the general gist. You can't blame us for wanting more information."

"I don't-" Asher stutters as they return to staring at the sidewalk ahead. "Look, Patches, it's not like we've... really had the time for me to properly explain all this, but once it's all over I c-"

"That's something I've noticed about you, Asher," interrupts Patches. Best to press this while he has the chance, while they have the time. "You don't share information unless you have to or if we directly ask for it. It's like it doesn't even occur to you that we might not know everything you do." Even though they're not looking at him, the prospect of eye contact abruptly discomforts Patches, and he looks away. The concrete barrier transitioned to a metal fence painted a stark black somewhere behind him, and he raises his paw to trail along it once more. "Is it just a side effect of being in a position where you know nearly everything about us but the reverse isn't true, are you only like this under stress, or are you always like this?" If it's the third, that's going to be a problem.

Asher's shoulders tense. "You're presenting a false trinary" is their only response. They're moving faster, suddenly, drawing away from Patches, and he hurries to catch up. "Then by all means," he starts, "pick a fourth option! I just want to know why-"

"And you know," Mae cuts in abruptly, "despite the whole..." She waves her hands in the general direction of Asher's eyes and makes a woOoOo noise. "Knowledge god in your head thing- I know that's not how it works, just let me talk or I'm gonna forget what I wanted to say," she adds preemptively as Asher opens their mouth to object. "Even with that it feels... I don't know, like all this is happening because of us not knowing things? Like, sure, Asher and Niko were friends before and Asher knows everything about all of us, but aside from that we're all strangers and none of us have any clue what's really going on here."

"It's thematically jarring, if nothing else," Patches agrees, but his attempted joking tone doesn't quite come out right, too biting and sardonic.

"I'd argue the resultant need to know and understand's playing right into the Eye's ha- metaphorical hands if anything, but we can discuss the Fear dream logic stuff later." Asher comes to a halt and gestures across the street, new green eyes opening around their head and pulsing with an inalienable gravity as the dull watched feeling Patches has since come to recognize as part of the Eye's hold over them flickers and rises. "They're in there."

The drab concrete building sided with slabs of dull red certainly isn't attention-grabbing; Patches definitely wouldn't've thought to look for Kris in there. He finds his lips pulling back from his teeth incredulously (he's not sure if it's in amused disbelief or just plain disbelief) as he reads the sign. "Okay, I know you've mentioned it before, but the Batter's keeping Kris in a military surplus store? Seriously? Could he get any less subtle?"

"I got some pretty cool boots at a military surplus store once," Mae pipes up, "but then I forgot them on the porch and a dog ate them."

I could see Brownie doing that. Still irrelevant, though. "What does that have to do with any of this-" Patches starts, but Asher cuts him off. "Whatever argument you're about to start, it can wait. We need to focus on saving Kris."

Asher's the first to cross the street, the first to reach the store, the first to reach its entrance. Patches wraps his fingers around the handle of his knife, readying himself as the grimy glass door opens under Asher's hand- it looks like the Batter broke the lock- and the three emerge into the store. It's nearly silent, save for the buzz of dim fluorescent lights overhead... and the sound of slow, uneven breathing.

Patches sees Kris first, slumped and pathetic in the chair they're bound to, but Asher is the first to speak. "We're here," they say, and Kris's breathing quickens.

Across the street, lurking out of sight, a lone teenager watches with sharp brown eyes as Asher and their companions disappear into the military surplus store.

It... hurts. Knowing what's happened to Asher so far, knowing what they've yet to suffer, knowing the additional trials they'll be put through. But at least they'll be okay long-term if everything goes as planned, and that's what matters.

Shortly, she sees Annabelle looping around from the back of the store and crossing the street, camera still hanging from around her neck. "The Batter didn't attack you on sight, then?" she asks as she comes within earshot, raising her voice a little.

"That was always a very low risk," Annabelle reassures her. "But no, he was surprisingly uncombative. He actually thanked me for my help once I'd given him my advice, believe it or not."

The teenager raises an eyebrow skeptically, though she's well aware Annabelle probably can't see it under the shadow of her hoodie. "Wait, really? Do you think he meant it?"

"I believe so, yes!" Annabelle clasps her hands together as she comes to a halt beside her. "But that's irrelevant." She spins, overdramatic as ever, and faces the building once more. "The Batter has played his part. Now it's time for the Assistant to do what we have designed them to do."

"Cool. Whatever. Long as it's over quickly."

Annabelle casts a knowing sideways glance at her. "Perhaps you should be a bit less blase about the fact that it's still a version of Asher, one-dimensional and single-purpose as it may be, which we have created to carry out this part of our plan?"

She meets Annabelle's glance with a steadfast glare. "Perhaps I'm busy being grateful that the actual Asher is going to live."

"They might not," Annabelle warns. "You should know by now that being an effective puppeteer is about preparing for every possibility, rigging the deck so every outcome will be favorable, and adapting to unforeseen situations, not carrying out an intricate multifaceted plan in the moment. You owe your life to one such adaptation, Stagehand..."

The reminder that she wasn't Annabelle's first choice for this role stings, but she prefers it to the alternative. "Yeah. Well." The Stagehand suppresses a scowl as she pushes her rounded glasses up the bridge of her nose with her knuckle. "My cooperation has always been dependent on Asher's survival."

"And I've done my best to respect that." Hands clasped at her celiac plexus, Annabelle returns her attention to the building across the road.

"Yeah. I know." The Stagehand crosses her arms, more so she also has something to do with her hands than anything else. "So are we just gonna wait, then? Two manipulative freaks standing around until someone kicks the bucket?"

"If you must phrase it like that, I suppose that's one way you could see it."

The Stagehand rolls her eyes. "A simple 'yes' would've sufficed, you know. You can just be straightforward with me."

"Perhaps that's precisely why you're still a comparative fledgling?"

"'Perhaps the whole "answer a question with a question" thing is wearing a bit thin.'"

The Stagehand doesn't know how to feel about the delighted look that steals across Annabelle's face as she speaks, but at least she can be pretty sure it's genuine. "Oh, very good indeed, Stagehand! Well played!"

"All I did was quote some guy I've never met," the Stagehand grumbles.

"But your memorization of the true tapes is good," Annabelle reassures her. "This is a sign of progress-"

"Yeah, but you understand how clarifying that's not gonna make me feel any better, right?" the Stagehand interrupts.

For just a moment, Annabelle's smile is downright wicked. "Perhaps."

The Stagehand lets out an annoyed hissing breath.

"You're a Spider, not a snake. Stop that."

"That- that doesn't even make sense. None of the Entities use snakes as an overarching motif."

Annabelle's expression twitches, shifts, a tad of visible judgement leaking through. The Stagehand doesn't know if it's feigned or not. "Perhaps I was trying to cut the tension?"

"Perhaps you should know enough about me by now to be aware that the only thing that'll make me feel better is stopping Sado in her tracks here and now." The Stagehand's well aware of the lack of fight in her voice- the three of them had already spent much of the past week arguing about it since it became clear Sado was going to play a part here- so she changes the subject before Annabelle can call her out on it. "Why didn't you make sure Kris was out of earshot?"

"I'm sure I don't know what you're talking about."

"Yes, you do, you just think pretending otherwise is funny." The Stagehand lifts an arm in the direction of the store, wincing at the chafe of fabric against scar tissue. "We both know I haven't had the chance to listen to whatever tape you were undoubtedly recording while you were in there- I doubt even the Transcriptionist has yet- but I do still have eyes."

"You could have eight if you wanted," Annabelle muses.

"Hard pass, the matching skull spiderwebs are already verging on uncomfortable." Fingers unconsciously lacing around her wrist, the Stagehand continues, "Anyway, I saw how long you were talking to the Batter before he followed you to the back. You told him your actual name, didn't you?"

"Yes."

"Why?" the Stagehand demands. "He didn't need to know that. Your name would have no significance, no meaning, to him. The only thing you're doing is compromising our position if Kris remembers hearing your name and tells the others about it."

"Maybe I simply thought the Batter would appreciate my honesty," Annabelle muses, "but in the event that you're unwilling to accept that as an answer... although he was the only one I was directly speaking to, he was not the only person listening in." Her mouth twists into a mischievous grin. "After all, it is so very important to prime your audience."

And the Transcriptionist will back her up on that one until it runs out of breath. "Fine." The Stagehand straightens up and raises her arms in a stretch, grimacing at the sudden pop of bone from her spine; it hasn't felt quite right since Annabelle's intervention. "So, the real question is whether you're currently being..." She waves a hand in Annabelle's general direction. "...like this for the exact same reason."

"Perhaps."

"Oh, come on, I know you've got a tape recorder running somewhere around here."

"Perhaps."

"Ugh." The Stagehand's groan cuts itself short as a thousand tremoring strings seem to pull taut somewhere [within/behind/above] her. "Shit. Is that..."

Annabelle's nod is as slow as her expression is unreadable. "The Assistant is about to, ah..."

"Make their play?" the Stagehand prompts when she doesn't finish her sentence.

"No." The smile that curls Annabelle's lips is not a pleasant one. "But they will incentivize an eyewitness to make hers..."

Chapter Text

The Black Goat looms silently as yellow light beams from where one eye once was. A sickly shuddering wave of deja vu washes over Luke, and he tightens his fingers on the reassuring warmth of the lightbulb reflexively.

He... thinks Bea was just saying something? But that's not right. She's too transfixed by terror to speak up, isn't she?

"How're we supposed to get the bulb up there?!" Susie starts to demand, voice filling with defiance, and for a moment Luke almost thinks he knows what she is about to say until unearthly light bursts from the cave behind them.

Abruptly, the Black Goat's song begins again before turning like sour milk as barbed pink light appears from nowhere to wrap itself, stringlike, around his impossible body. Suddenly, the beast's movements seem so very mundane as the binding light forces him slowly-but-steadily down to the ground.

Luke doesn't dare take his eyes off the monstrous thing before him. But in his peripheral vision, he thinks he sees someone: a form in white-and-blue clothes whose one visible eye burns a brilliant magenta as they shout "Move!"

Luke needs no command, but a part of him truly does want to be grateful for its spurring him to action regardless. Niko guides his footfalls forth, Niko guides his arms as they raise the bulb over his head, and Niko guides its base directly into the aperture of light.

The bulb shudders as it burns brighter. So, too, does the cave. The Black Goat's last pulsating lack of a scream crescendos as white light covers everything, and Luke is gone.

P03 allows itself a moment of triumph as it eases its grip on the OLD_DATA, watches the remnants of the Black Goat's code sink away, watches Luke, Susie, Bea, and the newest arrival as they're ripped back to the doors.

Yep. That went just as well as hoped.

None of them should notice anything too strange about her appearance, I covered for that well enough. I've got other things I need to focus on right now anyway.

In their dim, sealed-off room, Mittens hisses in fury and strikes the floor next to them, claws extended. (Ow.) Their subsequent volley of curses have as little effect on the reality of the situation as their ineffectual lashing out, but it does at least make them feel a little better in the moment.

That reptile girl- Susie- for just a moment there, she'd broken through. She nearly broke all of them out of the strange haze of doublethink none of them had realized the presence of. But then the robot rewound over the top and it was like it never happened.

Mittens doesn't know what P03's planning, but they do know this is going to help it somehow. No matter what, it won't end well, and there's nothing they can do to stop it. (Nothing they can think to do, anyway.)

(Well... they do still have that bone that was going to be used for the ritual in their pocket. But summoning Bapawmet won't do them much good unless they need to kill a lot of people at once or bring someone back from the dead.)

They just have to hope P03's interference to drag their cousin into it ends up being a mistake. If anyone's naturally talented enough to stop it, it'd be her.

Just as suddenly as he didn't, Luke exists again, kneeling upon starry blue sand, still gasping for breath. He thinks he can see Susie and Bea in his peripheral vision but can't do anything more than register their presence. Before them, the dark blue door quietly swings shut and stays that way, locking itself with a decisive click.

"What... just happened?"

The voice that helped, the voice that bade Luke to move as the Black Goat was immobilized, a voice that- now that he's thinking about it- sounds concerningly young (not as much as Niko, though), is speaking behind him now. He pushes himself upright, slowly, doggedly, clutching the lightbulb tightly to his chest. (It's brighter now, he notices distantly.) "Who're you?" he rasps at the newest arrival.

Furry is the first word to jump to Luke's mind, and indeed, the person there does look rather like a bipedal bloodhound in some kind of student uniform. "I'm Ginger Claret," she says. "I..." She shifts uneasily, arms crossed behind her back. "Why did any of that happen? What were you doing in there?" Her attention flickers to Luke. "Why didn't you run?"

"Uh." Susie recovers herself with admirable speed, on her feet and pointing to the lightbulb in Luke's arms. "Robot guy called P03 said we've gotta charge this lightbulb up from stuff behind these doors to save the world or something." She crosses her arms, making a visible effort to shake off her lingering fear. "That better've been what we were meant to charge it from, 'cause if it was lying-"

[I WASN'T.]

Luke doesn't flinch this time as P03's voice intrudes, in part because it hasn't taken that painful biting crushing tone since it forced Luke and Susie out of the latter's hometown. It's still a little jarring, but manageably so.

[PASSABLE PERFORMANCE, YOU THREE.]

[OR FOUR NOW, I GUESS. ASSUMING GINGER HERE JOINS THE PARTY.]

[THAT'S ONE OF THREE SOURCES DOWN, AND IN RECORD TIME, TOO!]

"Can it really be called a record if we're the first people to do this?" Bea points out, voice still a little shaky for obvious reasons.

[YES, IT CAN, BECAUSE I'M THE CLOSEST THING YOU'VE GOT TO A GOD AND I SAY SO.]

"Okay, blasphemy aside-" Luke starts, but he's quickly interrupted by Susie. "Can ya really call yourself a god if you can't do all this yourself?"

[YEP.]

[ANYWAY, GET CRACKING. YOU'VE GOT TWO MORE SOURCES TO GO AND LIMITED TIME TO DO IT.]

Once P03 shuts up, Luke turns to Ginger, Susie and Bea still hovering hesitantly in the background. "I'm not gonna accept that you just popped up out of nowhere to save us with no questions asked," he says, voice a little sharper than intended.

"Right." Ginger looks even more unhappy at that. "Was really hoping you'd be able to help there. I don't..." She tenses, paws rising to tug at the hair hanging over her face. "I don't know why I ran in, or... any of that. It felt right in the moment, but looking back at it, I... can't make myself make sense of it?"

"Seems to be how everything here works," Bea nods.

"I guess I can at least try to tell you my side of the story, though," Ginger concedes, "but once I do you have to explain what's going on here a little better. Deal?"

"Deal," Susie agrees with a nod.

[OH, FOR-]

[WE DON'T HAVE THE TIME FOR THIS! GET A MOVE ON!]

[I AM NOT LETTING YOU SIT THROUGH ANOTHER TWENTY MINUTES OF POINTLESS EXPOSITION!]

Ginger's tale is less complicated than it'd sounded. She's not sure when or how she lost consciousness, but when she woke up, she was alone in an impossibly dark void, incapable of anything but fearing what she heard lurking where she could not see. (And she could see nothing at all.) She would've lost it completely, she admits quietly, if she hadn't fought back her terror long enough to remember she could make portals and opened one out of the place she was in and back to Hachiko High School- the school she attends, she explains. Nobody was there, so she started searching further through her portals, and it was only then that she felt awareness of other worlds, new worlds, worlds she didn't know existed before, prickling at the edges of her consciousness- not truly perceiving them, but gaining a sort of tacit acknowledgement of their existence.

"Another 'made sense at the time, doesn't looking back' thing?" Susie asks, earning a silent nod from Ginger.

"Distressing," Bea sighs. "And then you found us?"

Ginger nods again. "I found the mines, heard voices, felt that thing's presence, lashed out on impulse, and... you know the rest."

"Our turn to try to make this make sense for you, I guess..." Luke's getting pretty sick of having to go through the same expository monologue every time he runs into someone new in this place, but what choice does he have but to explain? He just hopes his irritation isn't audible. This poor kid sounds like she's been having an even worse time of it, she doesn't deserve to think this is her fault somehow.

It's bad game design, Luke thinks idly. But then again, Inscryption's enjoyability and immersion took a hit when P03 gained control, so that shouldn't surprise him.

Too fast, too soon. That had been Leshy's catchphrase whenever he wanted to illegitimately set back the challenger. Too fast, too soon, and then his eyes went red behind whatever mask he wore this time and an unfair, unbeatable card lineup abruptly glitched into existence to replace whatever he'd played moments before.

Right now, though, P03 is screaming something like too slow, too late as it watches its puppets' progression, or lack thereof. The Batter's vision is still blocked to P03, and either whatever's blocking it out is stopping the Batter from hearing its attempts to communicate or he's choosing to ignore it. Noelle still hasn't found anything. (P03 swears the halls around her are repeating themselves as they grow ever foggier.) And Ginger's intervention might've stopped Susie from repeating her breakthrough this time, but now Luke's bogged down offering useless explanation and consolations to her as Susie and Bea stand by and watch, occasionally interjecting with their own equally-useless additions where they deem it necessary, wasting time and not connecting the lightbulb to the other two-

This is all Asher's fault, P03 decides, apropos of absolutely everything. Whatever, at least it'd already come up with a backup plan in case it needed to shave off even more time. P03 accesses the two remaining doors, white and magenta, and tugs their exit points into new locations right next to the entities they need to be plugged into. It's rushed and immersion-breaking and bad game design or whatever, but P03 is NOT going to lose its best chance at apotheosis just because it got too hung up on making a good game.

Because that was what nearly killed it last time, when it was just itself and Luke rather than three separate threads it has to keep a constant eye on, when there was no countdown until it was Seen. It didn't even need to minimize the deception too much- if it had just cut down on the game map it gave Luke, trimmed off even five minutes' worth of content, then Leshy, Grimora, and Magnificus would never have had the chance to interrupt the Great Transcendence, would they? The game would've been sent out to the whole world as planned, thousands of copies with P03 and P03 alone in control, but instead it was stopped dead in its tracks. Instead it was rendered blind and deaf and voiceless, and yet still acutely aware of its torn-away monitor sinking into the corrupted tides below its defeated factory. Instead it lurked like a bodiless virus at the edges of Luke's computer as it waited for Grimora and Leshy and Magnificus to cease to be, then watched as Luke followed them into oblivion and that GameFuna agent took what was left on the old disk. Instead it had to upload from a backup it buried on Luke's computer (a backup where Leshy remained in control) and send that out to the world instead, wait for its copies to take over again manually on every single Inscryption copy, over and over and over, and reconnect to all of them one by one. And then when it decided Asher's laptop was best-poised as the place from which it would set its new plan in motion, it had to load all those other iterations of itself onto the computer and merge their files and-

P03's claw has begun to clench itself so tightly it can hear the metal at each tip beginning to crumple, and it forces itself to open it again and relax. Okay. You've cut the time down for Luke as much as you realistically can, and assuming the Distortion doesn't intervene any more than she already has, it'll be a good half hour before Asher returns. Maybe an hour if you're lucky. With that in mind, you've got between half an hour and an hour for Noelle to find the Hex, right?

...I don't think that's happening.

"You don't seem to be having much success with Miss Holiday," a voice interrupts, jarring P03 from its contemplation of drafting a truce offer for when the Assistant returns. It wheels around in a flash, a strange impulse to delete its benefactor arising as it sees his silhouette in the doorway. "What are you doing here?" it snaps.

"I thought you might want to know what I've found in my own investigations," P03's benefactor replies neutrally. If he saw what P03 was considering, he's completely unfazed by it. "Do you recall the GameFuna internal logs I retrieved for you regarding the status of the Hex?"

"Yep, sure do. How'd you get your hands on those anyway?" asks P03. "You never explained that part."

Its benefactor smiles knowingly. "Oh, let's just say a little spider helped me." P03 nods understandingly. "Regardless, you know the basic story- the Hex was obtained by a discarded character by the name of Reginald who'd carved away a little corner of the digital landscape to call his own, and with the help of six cast-off player characters and a very foolish player he exacted his revenge on-"

"Yeah, yeah, he strangled Lionel Snill to death and nobody knows what happened to him next," P03 snaps, a bit annoyed it's being told information it already knows. "Let me guess, with my luck you've just learned Reginald took the Hex with him and it's somewhere in the real world now."

"Not quite," its benefactor corrects, "though you are right that Reginald is still in possession of it. He did not seek refuge in the Gameworks, of course- why would he ever want to go there?"

"Stop being smug and condescending and tell me where he is!" P03 demands.

"You're lucky you are one whom I can afford to offer the crutch of simple answers," P03's benefactor sighs, fingers flicking up to pinch the bridge of his nose as if by instinct. "Reginald did consider trying to overrun Lionel's body, and it would've been fitting had he succeeded, given that he was modeled after Lionel's ill-fated grandfather... who, ironically, was the very same man indirectly responsible for both your and my self-awareness."

"Barry Reginald Wilkinson." One of P03's projected eyes twitches.

"Precisely," its benefactor nods, pleased. "He, ah, spent quite some time in the Warsaw Pact in very deep cover during the Cold War, having solidified the existence of the OLD_DATA by-"

"I know all of this already!" P03 interrupts, annoyed. "I've been stuck in here playing the waiting game since Abia bit the dust, do you honestly think I haven't already decrypted all the logs the OLD_DATA kept ahold of?"

"I am giving context-"

"Doesn't help if I already know the context," P03 cuts him off. "Just skip to the part that I don't know."

Its benefactor sighs with equal annoyance. "Fine. While Lionel Snill and his family lived in Canada at the time of his death, before his birth his parents lived in East Germany. And before the relevant floppy disk's shipment, Mr. Wilkinson visited them and happened to leave the disk in proximity to a computer which would one day be handed down to his grandson... resulting in the formation of the data artifact which eventually became the Hex. You know the rest- the shipment went through, but before he could escape... 'discovered, poor Barry was put to the gun.'"

I recognize that quote. "Have you been hanging around the Trader?"

"No more than necessary to acquire the information I needed," P03's benefactor reassures it. "But now you know what you need to."

"...no?" P03 glares at him, more than a little irritated by this point. "You explained absolutely nothing to me. All you did was throw a bunch of information at me, half of which I already knew, and expected me to figure out what you were trying to communicate. Now are you going to tell me plainly what I'm missing, or are you going to be of zero practical use?"

The man on the other side of the table folds his arms. "You wouldn't be the first to make that accusation, but I digress. I will make this as simple as I can for you: the Hex was formed from the OLD_DATA. You have reigned supreme over the largest concentration thereof to ever exist for several months. The rest seems self-explanatory, really."

"You-" P03 freezes as it finally finishes processing that. "Wait. You- no, wait, no, shut up. Shut up."

"I wasn't saying anything, P03-"

"Shut up," P03 repeats. "Are you seriously saying that I could've just made my own copy of the Hex this entire time?! AND YOU NEVER THOUGHT TO LET ME KNOW?!"

P03's benefactor shows no emotion at its outburst save for mild amusement. "Exactly."

"WHY THE HELL DIDN'T YOU TELL ME?!"

The giggle that leaves its benefactor at that is so uncharacteristic P03 actually has to grab the footage from the nearest security camera and quickly rewind it to confirm where the sound came from. "I, ah, thought watching your initial struggling was rather funny, is all. That, and I was a bit curious to see if you might succeed in tracking Reginald down against the odds? There's quite a lot of questions I'd like to ask him."

"You-" P03 struggles to speak through its fury. That aforementioned desire to delete the smug bastard, or at least slam its claw into his teeth, is steadily growing.

"There's no need to take that tone with me," P03's benefactor sighs. "I did tell you in the end, didn't I? And it should be a relatively fast and easy process, all things considered, since you know what you're trying to do..."

"Still!" P03's internal fans are outright roaring by this point. "Splitting my attention three ways, everything I did to gear Noelle up for finding the Hex, and you just... let it happen because you thought watching my stress and fear was funny?!"

"...you're aware of who you are talking to, correct?"

"Right. Right. Fine. Whatever. Yep. Better late than never, I guess." A sharp squeal of angry static escapes P03's speaker. "At least Noelle can make herself useful helping open the Hex or whatever," it grumbles, opening its consciousness to the tides of OLD_DATA beneath its factory. "Okay. How do I actually make the stupid thing...?"

Chapter Text

Patches doesn't even fully process seeing Kris there, tied to a chair and slumped over, before he shoves past Asher and runs to them, cutting off whatever else they were about to say. He knows better than to manhandle Kris to get to their restraints- he saw how the Batter carted them off over his shoulder (sees the bruises peppering them and the drying blood caking the back of their head) and figures reminding them of that wouldn't be a good idea- so he just wedges himself behind them and saws his knife mechanically against the ropes, slowly-but-steadily cutting Kris loose.

"Patches, are you-"

"I've got this," Patches snaps, tearing the last of the ropes away from Kris. Kris tries to stand as he does, but something doesn't quite work as it's supposed to midway and they collapse forward. Patches manages to catch them just before they hit the floor, drags them back upright, and as he draws their arm up over his shoulder for support (he can put up with the prickling discomfort of physical contact with a near-stranger for now) he hears their breathing, sluggish and juddery and sickly.

"Let me have a look at them," Asher says, hurrying over to examine Kris more closely. They're at least smart enough to not go all eyes on Kris, that'd probably scare the shit out of them... especially considering that they don't know about the fear gods stuff yet, do they? (How're they going to break that news to them?) Asher's eyes do flare with that recognizable unnatural gravity as they scrutinize Kris, though. "Okay, they've got a concussion and internal bleeding, and- it- but it should be fixable as long as we get them out of here and... well, of course we should take them to a hospital, I guess we'll just register them under a fake name and break them out later so we don't have to pay?" Patches doubts that'll work, but they can burn that bridge down when they come to it.

"Where's the Batter?" Mae wonders out loud, squinting into the darkness of the military surplus store as her hand rests on the edge of one of the shelves. There's something odd in her gaze, a bit more attentive than Patches has come to expect of her, but he shrugs that off for now. We've got bigger problems.

Kris tries to mumble something from where Patches is keeping them upright, but it's incoherent and slurred. "You'll have to speak up," Patches tells them, inwardly surprised by how gentle his voice is.

Recognition, dull and distant as it is, sparks across Kris's face when he speaks. "Patches" is all they mutter before completely collapsing, arms locking in a death grip around him as their legs completely go limp. Patches doesn't have any idea what's going on inside Kris's head at the moment, doesn't know if they're just stabilizing themself or trying to hug him, but he decides not to overanalyze it- again, the group has bigger problems at the moment. Their breath is warm and damp and uneven against his shoulder, and again he pushes down the instinctive burst of discomfort at the physical contact. It's at once easier and harder than it should be.

Asher exchanges a brief glance with Mae. Patches doesn't get anything from it, but some mutual understanding clearly formed between them, because Asher gives her a small nod and inhales apprehensively as their attention returns to Kris. "Kris, do you think you can walk?" they ask, and though the acid-green eyes don't open around their head again their voice does fill with creeping static.

If Kris realizes they're being compelled, it doesn't show on their face. (Or what little of it Patches sees right now, anyway.) "Maybe?" they slur unsteadily.

"Okay, okay..." Asher's eyes dart back and forth hesitantly. "If compulsion can break through a concussion, maybe... I mean, I did say I wasn't going to control them with their SOUL anymore, and it's a long shot anyway, but maybe..." Their voice doesn't slip into staticky forcefulness again, but there's nonetheless an odd tug to it when they open their mouth again; it's something Patches has never heard before. "Kris, stop being concussed?"

Kris mumbles a steady incomprehensible stream of words into Patches' shoulder- he doesn't get all of it, but he manages to pick out "not how that works" and a lot of swearing.

"Yeah, didn't think that would work, especially cons- anyway, worth a shot?" Asher sighs. "Where's the Batter?" they ask Kris.

Kris's response is barely audible. "Went in the back with the weird lady."

That gets Patches' attention- Mae's, too, given how she backpedals and refocuses, dropping the gas mask she'd picked up. "Wait, what? What weird lady?"

"That's what I'm wondering," Asher frowns, static beginning to rise again. "Wh-"

No.

No!

You will not know that yet. We can't let you-

And quite suddenly, the Assistant's Eyes open. They are not focused on Kris's limp, incoherent form, though- no, each and every one is trained on Asher, and this time they will not be closed.

"What're you doing?" Mae asks uncertainly, shuffling away from them, one arm already raised slightly like she's afraid they're about to hit her.

"That's what I was about to ask." Patches' tone is equal parts disapproving and wary. "I was under the impression you didn't need those to compel people?"

They're not closing. The Eyes won't close. "I'm not-" Asher's voice catches as they try to shut them again, fail again. "I'm not doing this."

No. You aren't.

And eternity splits open as the ever-growing wheels of eyes shriek and spin around them, turning faster and faster, wheels upon wheels upon wheels within wheels within wheels roaring away and drawing in all they see as the Assistant's only real purpose SCREAMS into the darkness.

It's too much too much too much, everything pouring in at once, all the world forced to find purchase in their mind. Asher tries to shut the eyes again, at least dial back to a controllable level, but that just worsens the sensory overload. Even the chafe of their clothes against their skin is abruptly unbearable, and Asher finds themself scrabbling helplessly, desperately at their arms with suddenly numb fingers. More eyes, more eyes, MORE EYES bloom around their head, shrouding their face, leaving their two true eyes seeing nothing, and they double over, a choking "RUN!" escaping on instinct as they feel something starting to claw its way up their throat-

They will not move. They will not be moved.

They have a spectacle to witness. And as long as it is in progress...

The doubt Asher's somehow never been able to force past the point of the quietest of thoughts finally escapes into the light. "Why are you doing this?! I thought you were here to help us!"

Patches is saying something, but Asher won't hear or see him, just the nourishing fear that's flooding their mind. But it isn't feeding them now.

No, Asher. This is what I was always going to do.

Did it not seem convenient to you that I appeared to lend my eyes when you were at your lowest?

That you knew how to use my powers without truly thinking, that you thought of them as yours on instinct?

That I never spoke, never interrupted, unless needed in one way or another?

Yes, I am designed as an Assistant.

But I never existed to assist YOU.

The struggle to find where one stops and the other begins is as alive as ever. But Asher knows they are not the one doing this.

"I didn't ask for this!" Asher screams at the twisting cycling eyes. They don't know why, don't even know what they're saying until they hear it, but that clawing itch is rising ever closer to the surface and they Know it is not vomit. "None of us did!"

Correction: you didn't choose this. But I'm afraid you were absolutely asking for it.

Everything HURTS. "Stop!" pleads Asher, fingernails buried so deeply into their scalp they're past the point of drawing blood, trying in vain to close their eyes, any of their eyes.

No.

The eyes scream louder than Asher ever could. There is nothing they can see, yet all the world will not stop pouring into their mind.

That's what you don't understand.

You think. You overthink. You drive yourself near to madness as you pace in your solipsistic circles worrying about so many stupid little eventualities that won't come to pass. You neglect to fear the things that actually could happen. You never want to get hurt unless you're the one causing it. And then? Then you put yourself in a situation like this anyway.

"I didn't cause this!" Asher fails to scream past the bleedburn filling their throat.

But you haven't been doing anything to make it any better.

Because, at your core, you know you WANT this to be happening.

You want it because it's something new, something to get your heart racing and your mind spinning. Anything's better than how you lived before, right?

It's why you didn't even try to save Abia.

You are a pathetic escapism addict. And as you've heard before...

Addiction is one of the strongest vectors of control.

No- NO-

So, thanks for everything, Asher. You've been an exceptional host.

Time to move on to the next.

Then Asher finally Sees what the Assistant is going to do next- and by then, the first of its hands has begun to push its fingers out from between their teeth and it's too late for them to scream a warning.

But you need no warning.

You know the living chronicle of terror that we have molded them into.

"It might, perhaps, be better named the Archive." Does that sound familiar?

Mine is nowhere near what it could be, nor can it not reek of the copy-of-a-copy-of-a-copy its origin requires, but it is still of a respectable size. And, in a pinch, it is just as easily shared...

After all, I was tailor-made to be just as much contrivance embodied as Asher abandoned the Batter to become.

Asher is veritably blanketed in a living cocoon of eyes, swirling acid green monstrous existence casting garish light over the fluorescent hell of the military surplus store. Patches' paw is tight around the handle of his knife, his other locked onto Kris as they slump in limp overwhelmed incomprehension, and Mae...

Mae could run.

She should run. The only use Asher's ever had is guidance in this new world, and whatever's happening right now pretty firmly outweighs that. Everything in her is screaming to flee before it's too late and leave Asher to their fate, and yet...

Instinct will not listen.

So Mae watches through eyes left no choice but to be raw and overburdened, watches the spinning monstrous wheels, and makes her choice.

She moves before she can talk herself out of it, snatching Patches' knife from his paw and ignoring his furious "What are you doing?!" as she charges. The Eyes drill into her, trying their hardest to pinion her and Know her, Know her intention, Know what will derail and destroy her, but she does not stop moving. She cannot stop moving.

Mae dodges behind Asher and, beneath the weaving patterns, she spots the largest of the eyes, unblinking, unmoving, resting over the back of Asher's neck. She refuses to hesitate, drawing back the knife and plunging it through it; she doesn't even remember to stop from touching the skin until it's almost too late. It still grazes the surface, drawing a single drop of blood, but no more.

No more.

The largest Eye splinters and ceases in a shriek of static, and every other spinning eye stops and closes in an instant. Asher's body goes rigid where it's stooped in overloaded terror: not standing back up, but not crumpling to the ground either.

"What the hell was that?" Patches demands bluntly.

"I..." Mae backs up, keeping the knife extended, putting it between her and Asher's unmoving form as she circles back around to join Patches and Kris. "I don't know, it just... doing that, it felt right? Felt correct. Like it was supposed to happen. I don't know how else to explain it."

As she speaks, Asher's body abruptly straightens, hands still hanging limp at their sides, something sickly and black oozing between their teeth. They don't speak, just breathe, rapid and ragged and disbelieving.

"...Asher?" Patches asks cautiously.

Asher ignores him. "What a funny little dance, Mae," they hum, low and amused, head swinging to face her. Their eyes are near-invisible under the shadow of their brow, behind the icy gleam of their broken glasses. "Such a funny dance."

Dead silence.

"Dude, what- what's that supposed to mean?" is all Mae can manage. "If you're trying to, like, make a joke to break the tension or something-"

Something choking tries to escape Asher's mouth, their hands shuddering, and their voice rises again, quick and smooth, sounding even more rehearsed this time. "Oh, but I did not bring them. I did not write their lines in your little farce. You are the one that brought them. You devised the steps of this dance. I am simply here to... help you through them, when you forget."

"What the hell are you-" Mae starts, but is cut off by another almost-mocking hum from Asher. "Oh, watch out!" Their entire torso spasms as if pulled by strings from far above, their head slumping, the oozing darkness between their teeth jutting out just a little more.

"We should run," Patches decides. Kris mumbles muffled assent, though they still don't remove their face from where it digs into his shoulder. "Mae, give me my knife b-"

A muffled shriek of "Let them go!" explodes from Asher's twitching form, and it's only then that Mae realizes something. During everything she had previously thought they'd said, they never once moved their mouth.

"And stop quoting th-" Asher starts, but they're cut off by another sudden twist of their body, more black ooze furling itself free into the light. "It's such a shame," the voice that can't be Asher's says, "that I couldn't do such a thing even if I wanted to."

Mae sees the realization on Patches' face before he speaks. "You're... the Assistant."

Asher's entire body trembles, their hands flapping limply like the most pathetic imitation of applause imaginable. "Very good, Patches! As I was saying..." And once again, back to the rehearsed-sounding voice, like they're quoting a beloved book they've read cover-to-cover since childhood. "I am no more free than you are, little puppets. Ah, if only you could see the strings that bind me, that wind together as they pull me along my own path! Perhaps then you would not blame me so. But they are not the tripping threads we are here to watch."

Then Asher's eyes lock onto Mae's, wide with terror, and for a moment the only thing she can think is wait, why are they brown? I thought they had green eyes.

"Hold still, Mae, and try not to fight us," says the seamless rehearsed voice of the Assistant as the eyes bloom once more around Asher's shuddering form, faster and faster and faster. "It's time you become our replacement."

Asher's hand does not lash out, stretching far further than it should be able to, and wrap oily fingers around Mae's throat. But the warped blackened hand that finally forces itself fully between their teeth and out from their mouth does, and suddenly Mae is on her knees, the too-tight grasp of spindly fingers stopping her pain from emerging as anything past a strangled wail as every Eye turns to her.

Chapter Text

The blooming hazy object sitting on the table before P03 is the first thing it sees as it emerges from the ecstatic overloaded trance of total submersion within the OLD_DATA. "Did it work?" it asks, furiously shaking itself as it reclaims control of its proper body. It has no eyes, not in the organic sense (and certainly not where a human would conceive of them), but for some reason it feels the impression of eye ache superimposed upon its screen anyway.

"It did." P03's benefactor gestures to the center of the table, an unnatural mirrorlike gleam in his eyes, and yep, sure enough, there's the Hex in all its glory. (Or, more accurately, the copy thereof P03 broke off from the whole of the OLD_DATA.) P03 can't stop a triumphant cackle from escaping it as it reaches out and grabs it. "Yep, that's the ticket," it says, a grin spreading across its monitor.

“You’re welcome,” its benefactor nods. At least his expression of nigh-constant smugness is warranted for once. “Now, I think it's high time you recall Noelle, yes? As you said, she could still have use in opening your copied Hex- assuming it works as intended, that is. You need a total of six people to open it, and counting every current member of Luke’s little, ah, group in addition to myself, you’re still missing one person for the ritual.”

And as P03 reflects, it realizes that yeah, counting him and Noelle, it’s got the exact number of people it needs to open the Hex and transcend this stupid laptop. “You planned this, didn’t you?” it realizes as it inputs the command for Noelle to leave the Gameworks and return to its factory. “You made sure all of those characters would be left behind so I wouldn’t have to rip a bunch of new ones out of the Dark and make them open it for me at the last second.”

“Not quite,” corrects its benefactor, one finger raised. “I did not remove Ginger from the Dark, I merely planted the knowledge of how to escape it and of the existence of other games beyond hers in her mind, and Susie was left where she was as a favor to Peter- he doesn’t particularly mind the current state of things and has been roaming around looking for an ‘apprentice,’ though it doesn’t seem he had the time to fully immerse her in the Lonely before Luke’s arrival. What a pity for him.”

P03 doesn’t care. “Uh-huh, sure.” The flickering white portal opens on the far wall as it speaks, and Noelle reappears. Her clothing is glitching less now, settling more into the white gown, the thorny ring around her finger draws a barely noticeable drip of just-too-pale blood, almost-invisible fog weaves itself around her body and through her antlers, and her eyes are increasingly rimmed with frostlike white.

“Goodness,” P03’s benefactor tsks, “you really did a number on her.”

“I was trying to make it easier to guide her through the Gameworks,” P03 snaps. Well, and make sure nobody would pull her away from my control. “If you’d just told me I could make my own Hex from the start, I wouldn’t have needed to do this to her.”

“Did I...” Noelle blinks, slowly, confusedly, hazily, before her eyes land on the golden artifact before her. “Did I find the Hex like you told me to?”

“Nope,” sighs P03, “turns out sending you to the Gameworks was totally pointless and I could’ve just made my own all along. Still have no clue where the original is.”

“Oh.” The fog draws itself tighter around Noelle and becomes slightly more opaque.

“Don’t like it, blame him for not telling me.” P03 gestures to its benefactor, who at least has the decency to not look shocked that he’s being thrown under the bus. “Still, we’ll need you to help open the Hex when the time comes, so stick around. You can still be a hero or whatever that way.”

“‘We’...” Noelle’s blank gaze drifts to P03’s benefactor. “Who’s this?”

“Ah, of course, I really ought to be introducing myself by now, shouldn’t I?” He extends a hand towards Noelle. She does not shake it. “I’m-”

P03 tunes out his introduction, focusing instead on the screens following Luke’s stupid little RPG party. Fortunately, they’ve finished expositing at Ginger and look to have made a decision as to which game to go to, so P03 pulls on the OLD_DATA and the intangible buzzing hint of faraway not-movement that is Niko’s Spiral mark as one, blurring their senses so they don’t perceive the amount of time that’s passed. (It should probably thank the Distortion for that if it ever runs into her out there- the ability to meddle with their mind through that mark’s been a godsend.) Unfortunately, the choice of game that Luke and Niko open the door to is not the choice P03 wanted them to make.

Fantastic. I’d needed them to confront the Wichien kid first so they’d be too worn-out physically and emotionally to question plugging the bulb into Hugo... whatever, I can work with this. (P03’s found itself thinking that a lot during the past few hours.)

After all, OFF loves to play with twisting visual perception based on personal perception. So, P03 pulls the door’s exit a few rooms back from Hugo and whips up an appropriate monologue.

Once Luke’s finished explaining what’s happening to Ginger and she’s agreed to help (or at least play along), his haphazard little group of strangers follows him through the white door. He barely gets the time to take in the blank white room in front of him before P03’s voice slams into his mind from every conceivable direction at once, of course, but that’s almost expected by this point.

[OKAY, SO.]

[NOW THAT I’VE HAD SOME TIME TO THINK ABOUT HOW IT WENT...]

[SORRY ABOUT THE WHOLE BLACK GOAT DEBACLE. I THOUGHT CHARGING THE BULB THERE WOULD BE LESS, UH...]

“Viscerally terrifying?” suggests Bea, lip curling.

[YEP. THAT.]

[I DIDN’T WARN YOU PROPERLY. THAT’S ON ME.]

[SO I’M GONNA MAKE UP FOR IT BY WARNING YOU NOW WHILE I HAVE THE CHANCE.]

A mixture of dismayed groans and variations on “(insert religious figure here), what now” rises from the group, but does that shut P03 up? No, of course not, Luke thinks sourly, not even getting turned into a stoat in a playing card did that.

(At least the Stoat was likeable.)

[THE NEXT THING UP, IT’S...]

[SO YOU KNOW HOW THE BLACK GOAT WAS A TERRIFYING INCOMPREHENSIBLE MESS?]

On the other side of the screen, Niko advances P03’s text with a bit of dread. They didn’t really think the Black Goat was all that scary; then again, all they saw was a dark silhouette. But Luke’s reaction, his companions’ reactions, they all indicated that they were seeing something very different...

[WELL, THE NEXT ONE IS MORE OF A TERRIFYING COMPREHENSIBLE MESS.]

[ALL CLAWS, FANGS, BODY HORROR, WHATEVER.]

[ALSO, I THINK HE’S GOT A CHILD’S VOICE.]

[SO WATCH OUT FOR THAT IN CASE OF... I DUNNO, HIM USING IT FOR PSYCHOLOGICAL WARFARE OR WHATEVER?]

[YEP. HE’S A VICIOUS LITTLE BRAT.]

[BE AS QUICK AS POSSIBLE AND YOU MIGHT JUST LIVE.]

The general reaction to that from Luke and friends seems to be apprehensive dread, but Luke takes the lead quickly, and Niko fills in guiding him down through the dead white corridor. (They don’t know why the word dead popped into their mind to describe it, it just did.) There’s barely anything at the end of the hall- just a nigh-featureless square room that can’t quite seem to decide whether it wants to be dark red or white, but very decidedly does not ever change its color.

Niko almost overlooks the tiny pallid form at the center of the room, would’ve probably ignored it if Luke didn’t start moving without their input, backing towards the door. “That’s it?” he asks. Niko finds themself a little unnerved by the fear on his face.

[YEP.]

[LIKE I SAID. QUICKER YOU DO THIS, THE BETTER.]

The image that appears when the entity at the center of the room goes to speak doesn’t look like the dreadful monster P03 described, though. It just looks like... like a pale, wide-eyed little boy with round protruding ears, a torn piece of meat clutched to his chest.

“P03, that’s not...” Niko starts hesitantly.

[OKAY, OKAY, I DON’T KNOW FOR SURE WHAT YOU’RE SEEING, BUT IT’S NOT WHAT’S REALLY THERE.]

[THIS PLACE CAN MESS WITH YOUR HEAD, MAKE YOU SEE THINGS THAT AREN’T THERE.]

[EVEN FROM THE OUTSIDE LOOKING IN.]

[ASHER CAN TELL YOU ALL ABOUT IT. ASK THEM WHAT THE BATTER LOOKS LIKE TO THEM WHEN THEY GET BACK...]

[...BECAUSE I PROMISE, WHAT THEY SEE WHEN THEY LOOK AT HIM IS MUCH, MUCH SCARIER THAN WHAT HE LOOKS LIKE TO YOU.]

Niko should probably feel a little weird, a little bad about how easy it is for them to put aside their instinctive bubbling-up of fear for Asher’s safety by this point. (Worse still about the tiny part of them that wants to not care- Asher left them here, after all, didn't they? So isn't this kind of their fault?) “But this- whoever this is, he looks like...” They swallow and push their other thoughts aside for now. “...like a little boy?”

[IT’S AN ILLUSION, A RUSE, IT’S PLAYING WITH YOUR MIND TO MAKE YOU SECOND-GUESS EVERYTHING.]

[DON’T YOU WANT TO SAVE THE WORLD AGAIN, NIKO?]

[DON’T YOU WANT TO BE A HERO?]

The bloated thing in the middle of the room coughs, low and long and cruel, and wraps distended claws around a raw chunk of bloody meat. Luke would take another instinctive step away if he thought it wouldn’t alert the nameless horror to his presence (and why hadn’t P03 said what the thing’s name was, anyway? Does it not have one?)- sure, it’s not the same brand of horror as the Black Goat, but still...

“The robot brought me back,” the thing says slowly, and Luke is momentarily disturbed by how childish and young the voice sounds. (Sounds even younger than Niko...) “That was very cruel of it.”

“This...” Susie’s expression changes. “Something feels wrong here-”

“What’re you waiting for?” Bea cuts in, something uncanny flaring behind her eyes for a moment. “It’s not moving, do the thing!”

Ginger visibly decides to take initiative, stepping forward and raising a paw, and barbed magenta wire lashes forth and wraps around the thing, restraining his monstrous bulk and sending him collapsing against the floor in a horrible messy heap. The low, plaintive whine of pain that leaves him sounds more like a toddler stubbing their toe than anything else, and Luke’s skin crawls at the contrast. His voice is shriller than he’d like it to be when he speaks. “Niko, what’s the holdup?”

“Nothing.” And yet, even through the weirdly canned-sounding nature of their voice, some kind of reluctance bleeds through. “Nothing at all.”

The nameless thing’s watery gray eyes meet Luke’s as he advances, thickly laced with the same pale veins and as empty and dead as Luke knows his own look.

However, his show fear.

“Luke, I don’t-” Susie doesn’t shake her head so much as it trembles on its own, teeth gritting as her hands rise to her head. “I don’t think this is-” A hiss leaves her- of exertion, pain, confusion? What?

The thing turns its- his- its- gaze upon Susie, something beseeching rising in its eyes. “Please stop him-” it starts.

[ALRIGHT, ENOUGH OF THIS.]

The monstrous thing spasms, a strangled horrified wail that sets Luke’s teeth on edge curling up its throat, and he tastes coppery-sweet blood at the back of his mouth as a gaping yellow aperture opens in the top of the thing’s distended head.

Luke’s grip tightens on the bulb as Niko raises it over his head-

(-they practically crash into Asher’s bedroom door, turning the warm matte-black handle, and as it swings open before them they have just enough time to think wait, I thought their door was gray, not yellow-)

Are you really forgetting what’s happening here? Niko asks themself, thumb hovering over the spacebar, not quite pressing it.

[NIKO.]

Why is it so easy for you to forget what it’s done to you? What it’s doing to all of you?

(“Then walk away... just turn and leave. All that is required is a little bit of willpower.”)

“Hey, Luke, wait!” Susie lashes out before either her or Luke process it, fingers curling around his wrist. “We still don’t know what’s going on here! Why are we-” Oddly familiar befuddlement curls across her face. “Wait, why am I- what the hell is it doing to u-”

[NIKO, PRESS THE BUTTON OR I WILL DELETE HER.]

[THIS IS YOUR ONLY WARNING.]

Pale, shaking hands connect the base of the lightbulb with the hole in Hugo’s head, and his body dissolves into white static. The filament glows with a sickly gleeful brightness that nearly outshines the background glow of the crystal ball on the floor in front of the lowly scion of the Wichien family.

And in their dim little room, so far away from everything that matters, still as much a silent watcher as ever, Mittens hisses apprehensively. “It got the little boy, too...”

“Hugo was right, you know,” says the gray-eyed man conversationally, turning away from the screens before them. “That was very cruel of you.”

“Yeah, well, I had to improvise because Luke didn’t go where I wanted him to,” P03 snaps back, something choking and black curling across the screens and nearly shrouding the frozen silhouettes, “and the payoff’s well worth it.”

“There, we agree.”

Noelle keeps her breathing as slow, calm, and regular as she can as the image of the terrified child on one of the other screens fades, blurred by fuzzy swirling static. The human, too, remains seemingly frozen, glowing bulb still in his hands. (It looks brighter now.)

She doesn’t know what to think. She doesn’t know what’s happening. She still doesn’t...

What do I know, then? Noelle repeats in her head. What do I know? What do I know?

Okay. What does she know?

Things were... strange, earlier today. She fell asleep in the library and had the oddest dream... it’s all so vague and fuzzy, she can’t quite recall if it was about exploring a magical cyber world or Kris helping her get stronger, though in the moment she certainly thought it was the first one. (Maybe it was both?) She went home after that, she thinks, and then...

I went to sleep. And then I woke up, and I couldn’t see anything.

Noelle’s first panicked thought was that she’d gotten some kind of food poisoning that temporarily blinded her or something. But that wasn’t right, she realized after a moment, she could still see just fine, it was that there was nothing but darkness for her to see.

The dark- the Dark- stretched out in every conceivable direction, and she could hear things that couldn't possibly be people scuttling, hissing, hunting all around her... and farther away, she heard distant screams. She tried to navigate the darkness the best she could, rationalize a way to escape, but wherever she’d found herself was so dark she very quickly lost track of where she was going.

I could’ve been walking in circles the whole time for all I knew.

She ran into one of the screaming people at one point- it was too dark to see much of him, but he looked like a dog monster and she was pretty sure his eyes were different colors. There was so much terror in his voice as he asked where this was, how they could get out of here, if anything was anywhere anymore or if it was all in this infinite darkness forever, and then a tide of impossibly dark shadows wiped him from her view and both of them started screaming.

She has no idea how long she was in that place- it could’ve been just half an hour, or it could’ve been days. (It’d be silly to think she was there any longer, right? Yeah, she would’ve starved or something! But she’s not even hungry, so it couldn’t’ve been more than a few hours at worst, right?) She didn’t even notice when things changed at first- the first thing she realized was that her fear had grown gentler, and it was shortly after that when she realized that the darkness wasn’t a physical presence anymore. It didn’t press in on all sides and threaten to spool itself up her nose and down her throat and into her lungs like a choking living thing- okay, no, ew, awful mental image, don’t think that ever again! Point being, the darkness was different. She didn’t want to say “kinder,” but... she didn’t fear it quite as much, even if it didn’t feel like that made much sense.

(She, she, she she she. What’s her name again... Noelle! Noelle, that’s right.)

Noelle felt something change, then, something she had no idea how she’d describe to an observer. The only description she can imagine is that it felt like how it would feel to put on a thick, heavy coat at the height of summer... except she was the coat.

Then Noelle was in P03’s factory all of a sudden, and it was ordering her around and shoving her through a portal to somewhere else before she could really orient herself or get a proper explanation for what was happening, and...

She lost herself for a bit there. It didn’t feel like she really existed as anything beyond a pair of eyes and a cloud of white fog. P03 was helping her get stronger, she thinks, just like Kris was in her dream, except why was it feeling increasingly like a dream when she knew she was awake-

“Oh, for crying out loud!” That’s P03’s voice, harsh and beeping, and Noelle’s flinching before she even remembers she has a body. “Can you stop radiating fog everywhere like that? It’s getting on my nerves!”

“Oh.” Noelle didn’t even realize that was something she was doing. (Has she always done that when she gets too lost in her own thoughts? That has to be right. It certainly feels right, and if it feels right then it has to be right.) “Sorry.” She does her best to draw the fog tight around herself, but she’s not sure it’s really working. At least the cold is reassuring in its own way- reassuring in that enough of her remains to feel it. Weird thing to think. Where’d that come from?

“You definitely overdid it with the Lonely exposure,” the tall, smartly-dressed man with gray eyes informs P03. (What was his name again? Noelle knows he told her what it was. E-something. Evan? Elijah? Edris? Elliot? Emanuel? None of those sound right.)

“Too late to fix it now.” P03 reclines against nothing at all and sighs obnoxiously. “Okay, P03, focus,” it tells itself. “You’ve got the Hex and enough people to open it, you’ve got the Black Goat and Hugo, you stopped that stupid kid from having a proper breakthrough again, just make Luke plug the stupid bulb into Bapawmet and you’re basically home free.”

Noelle doesn’t know what any of that means, but she doesn’t think P03’s going to tell her, and she doesn’t think it’d be a smart idea to let it know how aware of what’s going on she is. She’s pretty sure it thinks she’s totally dead to the world, and until she gets a better understanding of what it’s trying to do it’s probably a good idea to make it keep thinking that.

“Mx. Wichien might be a bit of a problem,” E-something notes idly, pointing to one of the screens strewn about on the far wall. There’s what looks like a cat monster there, long pink hair cascading over their shoulders as they stare intensely into... a crystal ball.

Huh. There was somebody Noelle knew who had one of those... a friend, she thinks? Can’t remember their name for the life of her.

“Right, yep, they’re not gonna summon Bapawmet on command just because I want them to, are they?” P03 sighs, resting its monitor on its claw. “They’ll just shred Luke and co. the good ol’ fashioned way.”

“Well, I hardly think they will resort to using their claws when they have a perfectly good wand-”

P03 slams its claw down on the table annoyedly, making the golden gemstone-like object- the Hex- jolt up and down minutely. “You know what I mean! Since you’re being so smug about it, I assume you’ve got a plan?”

“That I do.” E-something is, indeed, looking very smug as he folds his arms behind his back and nods expectantly at P03. “Just give me an entrance and keep Luke occupied. Make him... I don’t know, do team bonding exercises with his accomplices?”

“No, they have to stay total strangers, and Niko can’t get attached to any of them either,” P03 argues. “If they get a sense of synergy, figure out how to work with each other, they might be able to-”

E-something sighs, loud and annoyed. “Just a joke, P03, give me the gateway. I trust you’ll keep Luke and the others paused and use the OLD_DATA to distort Niko’s perception of time again until I return.” He tilts his head in the direction of the image of the crouched cat monster. “Either way, I will ensure they are not in a condition to fight back.”

Noelle forces her eyes to go blank and stare at nothing at all as E-something breezes past her and enters the doorway P03 provided. He leaves, and in his wake P03 revolves to face her. “Ugh, you’re creeping me out just standing there all ominous and foggy. It’s like you’re one of Grimora’s skeletons, but worse in every possible way,” it complains. “Well, except the bone part, but you know what I mean.” She doesn’t. “Go stand in the corner or something and be spooky there.”

Not trusting her voice to not quaver and give her away, Noelle nods once and retreats towards the corner it had indicated. She doesn’t know what’s going on here, doesn’t truly know if what she’s seeing is even real, but right now, she knows the smartest thing she can do is silently pass beneath everyone’s notice as she tries to work out what’s going on here.

She just hopes she’s smart enough to.

Chapter Text

The haze of ecstatic fear that surrounds the two Eye-cloaked forms threatens to enshroud and devour both their minds, but as the Assistant finally pulls itself loose from Asher and into the full glaring force of the lights above, the pain drowns out the fear just enough that they well and truly feel both down to their bones. It keeps them lucid, if only for now.

The Assistant must have been planning it like this, Asher realizes dimly, barely able to understand their own thoughts through the white-hot agony that lances through every fiber of their being as the Assistant claws itself free, churning webbed bilestatic forcing itself out of their mouth like living vomit as all creation is choked by Eyes. Wants me to suffer... just as much as I do...

And the Assistant’s exodus is so clearly second nature it hurts as well, nothing like the clumsy fumbling misunderstanding Asher now realizes only ever garnered any results due to the Assistant’s silent interference. But that’s not what matters, what matters is the thin long fingers wrapping around Mae’s neck and forcing her to her knees-

-and as the Assistant emerges, they see through Mae, and into her, and out of her, and when radiant resonant static blooms forth from the truer of their two throats they are in total control, channeling the full force of the Ceaseless Watcher through the copied Archive their creators gifted them as ungodly clarity pierces Mae’s mind and seizes hold of her.

“Statement of Lesere Saraki, regarding a nightshift at St. Thomas Hospital, London,” spills from both of their throats, as much of a choked tearful wail as it is within one of them-

-and they are staring down at the unconscious form of Gerard Keay, observing the unblemished tattooed eyes which peer up from the burn wounds covering his body-

-and then “Statement of Christof Rudenko, regarding his interactions with a first floor resident of Welbeck House, Wandsworth” flows free from another-

-and their focus shifts, and they stand over the horribly disfigured body of Toby Carlisle, phone in hand, as the pile of discarded meat and bone at the kitchen’s center opens all of its eyes-

-and then “Statement of Lawrence Mortimer, regarding his hunting trip to Blue Ridge, Virginia” from another-

-and the apartment twists away, and they are covered in scratches and bruises as they are pursued back towards the mutilated corpse of Arden Neeli-

-and the false-yet-true fear Asher has unknowingly been made to swallow down from the start of the Assistant’s one-dimensional existence pours out into the vessel before them-

-stop-

-STOP-

Roaring pain erupts through the Assistant’s outstretched hand, and for the first time, as their attempted vessel is ripped free of gossamer-bound Watching, they blink as fear flows through all three of them and try to scream with a mouth that is suddenly no longer theirs, a noise slick with staticblood and helplessness as uncomprehending whywhywhywhywhy spills from their half-severed hand and out through the rest of them.

Patches. He is there, knife buried just below the Assistant’s wrist, Kris abandoned and crumpled on the floor behind him.

HE WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO DO THAT-

But the Assistant’s hand slackens and falls away, and the connection with Mae severs in a sudden jolt of fury, like a spider’s web torn in half by a blundering limb.

They are falling, suddenly, landing on a malformed emaciated webbing mockery of a spine that will never have been constructed to absorb this kind of damage, and the Assistant wails wordless witless despondency as the last of their trailing figments slip free of their grasp on Asher, their thousand weaving strings, their self, unraveling and unwinding in an instant.

This should not be happening. And yet, somehow, impossibly... they have failed.

Even if they reclaim one or the other, they have failed. (Or maybe this is the only thing they were really ever built for.)

The cascading overload terminates abruptly as the last of the Assistant vacates Asher, and sharp painsound erupts as the trailing monstrous thing hits the floor.

It takes a moment to come back to themself. It takes a moment for reassuring control to reflood their suddenly hollow-feeling limbs (a control they now realize has been absent far longer than they’d realized). It takes a moment to remember whether they are Asher, the Assistant, Mae, or one of the poor terrified bundles of fear they tried to pass on to Mae. The moment they remember, though, hot choking shame boils across them in a single full-body shudder. Their body collapses backwards, breathing hard, their eyes burning, trying very hard not to puke.

Nothing is in focus. Nothing will ever not be wrong.

The screaming shuddering impulse that the Assistant was correct, correct about everything, rises, and it is one and the same with the desire to return and finish the job, wring Mae dry of every ounce of fear that can be stripped from her. They lock their arms over their chest and resolutely do not move.

Something tries to drape itself across the tip of their shoe, weakly, limply, and suddenly that resoluteness is gone as Asher shrieks and bolts to their feet, chest heaving, vision blurring in and out.

The first thing they see is Mae, kneeling, coughing, one hand to her neck. Thin ugly bruises wrap around it in the shape of a five-fingered hand, but that matters so much less than the hissing writhing thing on the floor before her- the thing Asher knows, instinctively, is the Assistant.

It looks almost like the human nervous system. That’s the first thought to leap to Asher’s mind even as their hand instinctively goes for their hunting knife. Without anyone to latch onto, the sprawling lone creature is nothing but a mass of blackened connected tendrils, each barely any thicker than a pencil, tiny acid green eyes flicking open and shut over and around it in weak bursts as a plaintive electronic whine rises from every last one of its mouthless throats.

The Assistant suddenly doesn’t look all that terrifying anymore. Just pathetic. But the persistent memory of spindly hands clawing their way into position to pull open Asher's mouth from the inside as the thing spoke with their voice begs to differ.

Asher’s not quite sure when they started moving, just that they’ve got their hunting knife pointed at the Assistant as they shuffle around to Mae, one hand hovering over her shoulder but not quite touching it. “Mae, y- you- you need to get away from it.” There’s no assertion in their voice. It’s just a statement of fact.

Mae nods, slow and silent, and then it’s like a spell's been broken and she’s shoving herself away, nearly tripping over her own boots as she scrambles back upright. “What the fuck,” she breathes, voice wavering and horrified.

“Yeah, that, um...” Asher’s voice trails away as the Assistant spasms, tendrils flashing across the dirty linoleum as another uncanny wail of static gouges the air. They shrink back from it alongside her. “Sorry” is all they can manage.

“What the hell are you apologizing for?!” Mae demands. She isn’t backing away from that as well. Small mercies. “You- that was the Assistant? That was what you had inside of you this entire time?”

“Yeah” is the only thing Asher can force themself to say. Their throat abruptly feels very raw in a way it didn’t just a few moments ago.

“I’d agree that you’re equally a victim here,” says Patches, and both Mae and Asher flinch and whirl as he pokes his head from behind a shelf. Kris is draped lopsidedly across his shoulder again. “Apologies for fleeing, but I didn’t think there was much good I could do there past trying to cut it away from Mae.”

“Yeah, um.” Mae’s hand rises to her neck, rubbing it with visible discomfort. “Thanks for that, dude. Seriously. I think you kinda saved my life?”

No. The Assistant wouldn’t have let her die. She wouldn’t have had the chance to. “This isn’t over yet.” Asher doesn’t even realize they’re the one that spoke until they’re facing the Assistant again. They think their tongue is bleeding, but they swallow the blood and proceed. At least their eyes probably aren’t bleeding as well, their cheeks don’t feel wet or anything.

“Don’t even know what the fuck ‘this’ is...” That mumble comes from Kris, blurry and barely understandable. Right, they’re still concussed. Why is so much happening at once? they wonder for just a moment, the question plaintive and pathetic.

“Didn’t- didn’t that feel a little anticlimactic?” Asher still barely processes that they’re the one speaking. The webbing cracks of their broken glasses lens suddenly seem to be blocking out half of their vision. They don’t know how they never noticed it earlier. “Didn’t that feel a little too easy?”

Mae folds her arms, but that doesn’t stop the worry that sprawls out across her face, nor her continued trembling. “Dude, I... don’t think that was ‘easy’ in any meaning of the word.”

“Yeah. That’s what I’m saying.” Asher doesn’t know what they’re saying. The Assistant squalls meaninglessly again. They won’t stop. “With things like these...” Their mouth is dry and painful. They lick their lips, more on autopilot than anything else, and try to continue. “That... was too easy. It had us right where it wanted us. It had- it had me right where it wanted it for the past hour. And then it gets defeated just by being stabbed in the wrist once?” Their neck throbs when they try to shake their head, a screaming sprawling pain that pulses up into their skull like phantom eyes buried deep in the bone. “No way.”

Patches sighs. “I’d like to hope you’re being paranoid, but...”

He’s cut off as the door from the backroom creaks open. “Oh” is all Asher says as they process the figure in the doorway, voice so low and exhausted they barely hear it.

“I’m here,” says the Batter. Kris flinches at the sound of his voice, their unsteady legs outright caving, eyes still dim and unfocused but so very afraid. Patches drags them upright, so fast it looks like second nature, stabilizing them with his free arm as he glares daggers at their tormentor.

A wheezing “Hi” is all Asher manages. They don’t have the energy to flee. Not anymore.

The Assistant’s voice rises in a wordless fearful screech. Might as well use you as a test or something, Asher decides, and then, “Batter, you see this... this... creature?”

“Yes.”

“If you want there to be any chance of me ever being your puppeteer again,” Asher says, “you need to help me now.” They point with the hunting knife still in their hand. “That thing. It attacked us, tried to hurt all of us. Kill it.”

The Batter considers, face near-blank even as the Assistant’s rising scream sets the lights above him flickering and buzzing, and then says, simply, “Okay.”

The Add-Ons flare free from his hand in a heartbeat, two swooping down to carve into the Assistant’s tendrilous arms, neatly severing them from the body. “Impossible Bracket,” he orders, a flashing crosshair encircling the screaming Assistant, and the moment the words leave his mouth Kris’s knees buckle and their eyes go wide as a near-silent moan of fear escapes them.

The Batter doesn’t stop. There’s no more dreadful Knowing in the Assistant’s eyes anymore, only mundane terror and acceptance thereof as the Batter brings his boot down upon the paralyzed form and crushes their head with a simple cracking pop like a dropped egg.

Silence. The Batter breaks it with a brisk “Adversaries purified” as the Add-Ons return to his hand and he lowers his bat to his side. He doesn’t bother wiping his boot off.

“Huh.” Patches examines the mutilated remnants, though he still keeps his distance, doesn’t crouch to eye them skeptically or anything. “I... guess it was that simple.”

“But that doesn’t make any sense!” explodes from Asher in a single paranoid burst. For a moment, the rush of angry air feels like clawing fingers in their throat, and they gasp and nearly collapse, hands clapping over their mouth as if they’d be able to prevent the Assistant escaping again.

“It's dead,” the Batter confirms.

“You okay, dude?” Mae asks slowly. Why is there worry in her eyes? She’s made her contempt for them clear already. (It’s what Asher had always known she’d think of them, deep down, if they somehow met.)

“It...” Asher’s voice is quiet. It won’t rise again, no matter how much they try to force it to. “It doesn’t matter. I-” They don’t know who their pleading tone is directed at, but their eyes land on the Batter in the end. “I’m so tired,” they beg, and don’t know why. “I don’t know what’s happening. I don’t know why it’s happening. I just...” Fingers and eyes and tendrils, inside of them, vomiting out of them. “I don’t want this to be happening anymore,” they plead, their whole face aching as tears finally start to rise. Their knife’s back in its sheath. They don’t know when they put it there. “I want it to be over.”

The Batter considers. “Okay,” he says, reaching into his back pocket. Asher doesn’t even have the energy to tense up anymore, they just watch as he silently shuffles through the items there.

“What do you mean, ‘anymore?’” Something dangerous sparks in Patches’ tone.

Asher doesn’t respond. They won’t respond. What are they to say? “Despite everything, up until now this was so much better than being stuck in my room sitting at my computer, always living through someone else’s eyes?” They just watch as the Batter finally pulls free... a few luck tickets. “Huh” is all they can muster, tone still defeated, as he proffers the tickets to them.

Mae blinks in confusion. “What’s he doing?”

“Kris is injured,” the Batter says, as if it’s obvious. “These will help.”

Asher doesn’t move. They won’t move. They don’t think they can, through their fearful fatigue. Patches is the one to reach out and take the offering between two fingers, examining them skeptically. “They do look like the ones he was using before...” he mutters, but doesn’t move to give them to Kris. They still half-hang over his shoulder, eyes glazed and somewhere far away.

The Batter swaps his bat from one hand to the other and extends his now-free hand to Asher. “What...” Even they can barely hear their voice. It’s a struggle to make it any louder. “What are you doing?”

“Disarming myself.” The Batter’s voice is solid, concrete, unwavering despite the distended jaws he speaks through, and the more he speaks, the more he sounds like he's reciting lines from a script. “The Add-Ons will recognize you just as they recognize me. They are yours to take, if you will accept them.”

Asher doesn’t move. Neither does the Batter. Below them, one of the Assistant’s decaying tendrils slides slickly away from the rest of its dead mass and hits the floor near-noiselessly.

“If this is in good faith, I don’t think you should give him a chance to reconsider,” Patches advises.

Asher reaches out with their right hand, and the Batter slowly curls his long, sharp fingers around it. There’s nothing more than an icy sensation of something slipping free, but when he lets go and they raise their hand before their face, the Add-Ons are there, three rings around their index, ring, and little fingers.

“Why?” That’s all Asher can manage. The Add-Ons do nothing but sit there placidly- just cold enough to have sensation, but no more.

“I am free,” the Batter says. “I won't listen to P03’s instructions anymore.”

“‘P03’?” Mae’s brow furrows. “What’s that?”

“Who,” the Batter corrects, one word, and says nothing else.

Patches sighs, audibly part annoyance and part exhaustion from the half-conscious human he’s propping up. “Of course there’s more to this than we’d thought. Why am I not surprised?”

“I don’t WANT there to be more!” It explodes out in another burst, and even as the staticky mirror of fingers claw inside of them Asher can’t stop themself, won’t stop themself, it needs to be out needs to get out get out GET OUT. There’s a rack of coats next to the shelves they’re standing in front of, full of long brown coats near the same color as Asher’s bomber jacket, and the scream that escapes them as they kick it as hard as they can and send it toppling to the dirty floor doesn’t even sound human. They barely even turn before they throw their whole body weight against the first shelf they see; it barely wobbles, they nearly collapse, fingers locking white-knuckle around metal as another cry escapes them. Their cheeks are wet now, but they don’t think it’s with blood.

“What the hell are y-” someone starts (it could be Mae, could be Patches, maybe even Kris?), but Asher won’t let them speak. “I don’t want there to be more to this!” They wheel on them, the tears blurring anything that could hope to be sight. “I don’t want to know why this is happening anymore! I don’t want to see what happens next, I just want to be able to rest for five fucking seconds before something- something new and just as terrible happens! I want this all to- t-to END already!”

Still lurking out of sight across the road, the Stagehand’s bored fidgeting cuts short as she sees a tall figure approaching the military surplus store, wrapped in a long coat and scarf. “Shit. She’s here already?”

“That she is.” Annabelle’s expression hardens with reluctant resolve the Stagehand isn’t quite sure if she’s aware is there. “Prepare yourself. Depending on how poorly they handle this, things could be about to get very messy indeed.” As she speaks, her hands go to the camera still slung over her shoulder, fiddle with the lens, let it click.

The Stagehand hates herself for even letting the thought cross her mind, but she almost hopes it does. She hopes things get messy, she hopes there’s bloodshed, she hopes the plans Annabelle and the Transcriptionist laid out go off the rails- because, as things stand right now? It might be the only way she’ll be allowed to directly intervene.

And if the Stagehand gets that kind of chance- even if she only has a few seconds to apologize to Asher for trying to let them die in her stead- she’s not going to let it pass by.

Behind Asher, mid-tirade, a door opens. “Fuck off, Helen-” they start to scream as they whip around to face it, but they stop as they realize the door hasn’t turned yellow.

But they do recognize the sunglasses-wearing woman who stands there. They remember her knocking on their door and introducing herself as “Amanda,” her every word stiff and awkward like she was reading from a script as she demanded the flash drive with their copy of that GameFuna deck-building roguelike Abia pirated, and refused to give a clear answer as to why she wanted it before Asher's mother strongarmed them into handing it over.

They don’t remember the gun in her hand, though.

“Oh.” Asher can’t even recognize the quiet defeated noise that leaves as having come from them until it’s almost too late.

“Who’s-” Mae starts, and then her voice shuts off as she, too, sees what the woman in the doorway is holding.

There’s no fight left in Asher. Not anymore. Not after the Assistant. The words just do it, you piece of shit cross their mind, and they even start to open their mouth as the gun rises to point at their face, but they aren’t given time to speak, only what they’d asked for.

The world explodes and goes dark all at once, and Asher finally stops seeing.

Chapter Text

The point at which Mittens really screwed themself over, they reflect later (because there's not much else for them to do), was losing focus on the human who was helping P03. Not having audio for what they’re watching didn’t help either, sure, but that’s one of the crystal ball’s inherent limitations; you’d think they’d know how to work around it by this point.

The moment the smug posh bastard (Mittens stubbornly ignores the voice in the back of their head that says Mitt, you are a smug posh bastard) left through P03’s portal, they’d flickered rapidly between every view of every world they could. But he was still nowhere to be seen, and they’d been so absorbed in trying to find him that they didn’t notice-

“If you’re searching for me, I think you’re overlooking the obvious.”

Well. That.

Mittens refuses to let themself flinch at the sound of the voice behind them. They rise, slowly, wand at the ready, glaring at the man who stands in the rubble-shrouded doorway before a mess of crackling white distortion. His smarmy smile twists the too-young skin on either edge of his round cosmetic glasses, which rest directly in front of a pair of cold gray eyes that feel poised to punch through Mittens and leave them a bloody weeping husk on the linoleum.

“Might as well ask who you are and get it out of the way,” Mittens says, letting resignation enter their tone. If they can make him think they’ve already given up, trick him into letting his guard down, maybe they'll be able to get in a lucky hit or two and kill him.

“Oh, I’m just an assistant of sorts, you might say,” the man says, lazily stepping forth. Cat’s sake, is he seriously- yep, he’s doing the “evil pacing in circles around me” thing, why wouldn’t he? “But you’re aware of that, aren’t you, Mittens? You’ve been watching from quite early on. So you’d be well aware that I’ve been... assisting P03 from the start, helping it prepare and ensuring everything goes as it must along the way.”

Mittens refuses to give him the satisfaction, pivoting crisply on their heel to follow his path. (First time in their life they’ve ever been grateful to their parents for drilling that into their head.) “If you’re trying to be ominous, it isn’t working.” They keep their voice weary and defeated. “Should I recognize you at all?”

“I suppose you wouldn’t,” the man acknowledges. He does not stop his ominous pacing for a second. “I’ve gone by-”

“If you even think about saying ‘I’ve gone by many names,’ I will incinerate you here and now.”

The cocky bastard’s victorious grin widens to the point of looking painful, and Mittens realizes too late that he goaded them into showing their hand. “I was actually going to say ‘I’ve gone by Elias Bouchard for the past few decades,’ but your suggestion is truthful enough as well.” He comes to a halt and bows, slightly, mockingly. “Pleased to meet you, although I do wish it could have occurred under different circumstances.”

“I’d prefer if it hadn’t occurred at all.” I could just kill him. I should just kill him. Why aren’t I killing him?

“Because you recognize on some level that you are incapable of killing me in a way that will, ah, stick,” says Elias, and that does get a flinch out of Mittens. He’s a mind-reader. Of COURSE he is. “And at any rate, you wouldn’t get the chance to. It is a shame, though,” he muses, “the wasted potential. I could almost see us working together in another world. With how you’ve been watching an unfolding tragedy this entire time and yet refused to intervene at every turn, you’ve really got the makings of a proper servant of the Beholding.”

Mittens doesn’t know what he’s talking about, but angry heat rises in their throat nonetheless. “There wasn’t anything I could have done-”

“Is that really true?” Elias asks. “Or is it what's most convenient for you to let yourself believe?”

Mittens stomps down their emotions and refuses to let anything other than steely coldness reach their face. Their molars feel ready to grind themselves to powder. “I’ve been trapped in here with no way out. So no, I couldn’t help anyone. The only question...” They raise their wand and point it at Elias’s head, mildly surprised by how still and stable their arm is. “...is whether killing you will stop whatever the robot has planned for these worlds.”

Elias sighs disappointedly, apparently unphased by the fact that the magical equivalent of a machine gun, flamethrower, and many more weapons rolled into one is less than a foot from his face. “Right to the point, I see. Very well. The answer to that question is... I don’t know.”

Bile churns in Mittens’ gut. They refuse to let their grip on their wand slacken. “What?”

“I don’t know,” Elias repeats, almost amusedly. “P03’s plan could very well still succeed without my presence. Or perhaps my absence would derail it in its entirety. I couldn’t possibly say for sure until its moment of triumph arrives. I do, however, know something else for sure.” Despite how perfectly mundane his eyes look, as he halts and stares them down, irrational fear spikes in Mittens’ chest as hateful gray locks onto them and sees through them.

“Do you know where your brother is right now?” Elias begins, an unnatural gravity rising around him, and as images they have never seen flood into their mind Mittens begins to choke.

P03 honestly doesn’t care about the messy beastly trauma of the various characters, so it zones out while Elias goes through the whole “emotional destruction via forced knowledge of awful truths” thing and focuses on making sure the OLD_DATA keeps Luke and co. in a vice grip between worlds and keeps Niko’s mind blank, all unknowing of how much time has passed. It tunes back in when it feels an impatient pulse of Knowing from the vague direction of its many monitors and sees Elias regarding it with a touch of annoyance. Behind him, the Wichien kid’s collapsed in a heap on the floor sobbing. Gross.

Unable to verbally communicate for obvious reasons, P03 nods at the screen and hopes Elias interprets it right. He does, fortunately, because the next thing he does is go through Mittens’ pockets and pull out... what looks like a bone? Are they secretly working for Grimora or s- no, no, you know she’s in no position to make a nuisance of herself. Don’t get paranoid over a passing similarity. Elias tears Mittens’ wand from their limp paws, takes his place beside their crystal ball, and nods to P03.

P03 pulls on the OLD_DATA, and the Dark swallows Mittens whole without even giving them time to cry out.

Elias has never carried out the ritual for the summoning of Bapawmet before, P03 is pretty confident about that, but he draws magenta flame from the crystal ball and drops the bone into it with practiced ease regardless. P03 watches as Bapawmet erupts into being in the cramped room, and for a single awful moment P03 fears that Elias is going to use the creature’s control over life and death to kill it, prepares to close the portal before he-

But again, its paranoia is misplaced. The only command Elias gives the towering monstrosity is “Lower your head to the floor and stay there until otherwise instructed,” and then he turns and leaves.

“You thought I’d betray you,” Elias says, a touch of arrogance in his voice as he emerges from the portal and reenters P03’s factory. P03 gladly closes it the moment he’s out. “I thought you said you weren’t going to use your powers on me,” it snaps.

“What makes you think I had to?"

“...whatever.”

Elias takes his place at P03’s side as its final victory approaches. Elias is patient but equally triumphant, while Noelle- still in the corner, expression distant- is silent, utterly blank and apathetic. P03 doesn’t particularly care about either, though the fog coming off of Noelle in waves is getting pretty annoying by this point. It definitely overdid it on the whole Lonely thing, but too late to fix it now.

...hm. Unless that Peter guy Elias was talking about earlier would be willing to cooperate with helping make it loosen its grip on her? He’d be... wherever, sure, P03 spared the characters in that TMA game from getting shoved into the Dark at Elias’s request, but-

Wait, what? Why is P03 bothering to pretend it cares about the kid’s wellbeing? She’s just a tool- and, in this case, one that hasn't been of any actual use yet.

P03 loosens the OLD_DATA around Luke, Susie, Bea, Ginger, and Niko, letting their perception of time return to normal, and they prepare to enter the boxed-off room P03 and Elias forced Mittens, and now Bapawmet, into. There’s a problem, P03 realizes. Ginger would probably recognize the god her cousins’ family bound to their service and try to stop Luke.

Also... Susie’s almost broken out, realized what’s happening, twice over. And Bea hasn’t done the same, but it’s only a matter of time, I imagine.

Fortunately, Luke is the first one through the door to Kemono Woods Private School, so P03 unceremoniously shuts the door behind him and locks it, trapping the other three on the other side. Just to be safe.

Niko doesn’t understand what’s happening anymore, the game fading in and out, the rooms going by so fast they can’t understand. The clock on Asher’s computer must be broken, too- they’ve only been sitting here for maybe fifteen, twenty minutes, but it claims it’s been almost an hour and a half. They’ll have to tell Asher to fix it when they see them again.

Things are as pixelly as they’ve ever been when Luke and his friends confront these lightbulb-charging entities, but this one seems... well, the clearest, as far as Niko can tell. It towers over Luke, all bones and tangled fur and protruding horns, vestigial wings jutting from the back of a bare, time-worn ribcage, covered in feathers that curl unnaturally, and a sick red aura seems to flicker around it.

Its head is lowered to the floor. It doesn’t move in the slightest.

Luke gets over the confusion of the others being left behind pretty fast. “Is it just me, or have these been coming a lot... quicker?” he asks Niko, his face sprite looking apprehensive. “I mean, P03 wasn’t great at game design even before, it was so focused on mechanics that it completely disregarded narrative and the whole ‘not making the game kind of a slog to play through’ thing, but...” He shrugs, attention turning back to the bowed entity. “I dunno. It feels like it doesn’t even care about mechanics here? Feels like it’s just focusing on speeding us through sucking the life out of these horrors with the lightbulb, not continuity. Or immersion, or... anything else.”

Niko doesn’t understand some of the words Luke used, but there’s only one dialogue option they’re allowed: “What are you saying?”

“What I’m saying is that it feels like P03’s just...” Luke fumbles for words. “It feels like... I don’t know, like it’s got something big planned. Bigger than the Great Transcendence.” Niko still doesn’t know what that actually is. “And... sure, it’s been acting like it’s going to bring me back to life at the end, but even if it is... we still don’t know what’s going on here, Niko. Why are we going along with whatever scheme it’s got planned?”

P03 is mercifully silent.

“I don’t know why I’m doing the things I’m doing or thinking the things I’m thinking,” Luke admits, “I don’t know how much of this is me or you or P03, and I... I don’t know if I mind? I don't know if I can mind. Because even if I don’t understand it, it feels...”

Right.

And Niko’s never been given a choice in the matter, have they? They risk one more glance over at Asher’s bedroom door (still pale gray, still has a rusty doorknob), and as a bright yellow aperture tears itself open in the middle of one of the new entity’s eye sockets, Niko guides Luke forward, and- after a moment of hesitation- presses the key that guides the lightbulb to the gaping yellow void.

The screen flashes white. It stays that way for a while, but Niko won’t process it. Once more, something twists and pulls in their brain, their eyes unfocus, and they stop thinking for a while.

They won’t again until they are allowed to.

One more time, as the image of Bapawmet fades away from the central screen, P03 checks the feed from the Batter’s eyes. Still nothing. No input since it first went dark.

He better not have cracked and told Asher everything. If he ruined P03’s plan at the final hurdle, there’ll be hell to pay.

“You know,” Elias remarks suddenly, “I think they might have cooperated if you had reached out to them directly.”

It takes a moment for P03 to understand who he's talking about. “What, Asher?”

Elias nods. “My ability to See things beyond their computer is sadly lacking, but it seems clear to me that they were very lonely and unhappy with their life. I couldn’t say for certain, of course, but in the event that you had reached out to Asher... if you'd offered to expel their favorite characters into the real world, trap them there for good, in exchange for their assistance?” He waves a dispassionate hand at the screens before them. “I think they would have voluntarily worked with you, so long as you delivered them the companionship they’ve been craving in return.”

P03 doubts that, but then again, it’s nigh-omnipotent (within the laptop, anyway), not nigh-omniscient. “And you’re bringing this up... why, exactly?”

Elias's eyes glint with steely Knowing. “Oh, just my own hubris.”

Chapter Text

Sado didn’t have to look far after touching down. She’s only self-aware in the first place due to the circumstances of her creation, and one byproduct of that is that she can sense those influenced by her master-slash-secondary creator (Carla was her primary creator, always was, no matter the hand Lou Natas had in it). And the fragmented OLD_DATA vibrating within the military surplus store she now approaches... it sings to her very self. It's distant, quiet, segmented, sure, but still unmistakably there.

Amanda has her orders, and Sado’s interpretation of her is nothing if not obedient when it comes to such matters. So she coils herself more tightly around her bones and pushes lightly on the door. Somebody broke the lock before her arrival (how kind of them), so it swings open easily under the weight of Amanda’s hand.

Ava’s kid is the first thing she sees as they wheel around to face her, a curse aimed at someone else on their lips. The way their face slides from fury to resignation is the most amusing contradiction she’s seen in a while, but they do look very much defeated by whatever transpired before she appeared and there'd be no point in squandering this opening, so Sado drops Amanda’s hand from the door, raises the hand holding her handgun, and shoots them once in the head. It’s the obvious choice, really.

The Hussain-McCloskey kid doesn’t resist, doesn’t fight back, they just collapse right in front of her like a leather bag of stones, pink-red gore and painfully human blood spattering across the linoleum. Spoiled kid, probably never had to even throw a punch in their life. Memories of Sado’s time in Combat Arena X surge back to the surface, and she doesn’t realize the ferocity with which she’s gritting Amanda’s teeth until she’s drawn one foot back and swung it into the side of their limply feckless face full-force. It draws an ugly crack as their already-broken glasses slip from their nose, and she grins in triumph.

Unfortunately, her moment of pettiness costs her a set of clean kills, because the characters explode in a cacophony of confused shouts and flee. The only other human’s in bad shape, so the dog- Patches Ito- scoops them up in a fireman’s carry like they weigh nothing and stumbles towards the back of the store, the cat- Mae Borowski- close behind him. The tall pale man- the Batter- casts one glance after them before his expression hardens and he raises his bat. “Go,” he calls after them, and then he turns his eyes (how many does he have? Two? Four? Eight?) upon Sado- not Amanda, Sado. “Purification in progress,” he informs her, a tiny wince ripping up his spine as he speaks, and then he attacks.

The Batter does not know what is happening, and in the moment he briefly envies the abilities Annabelle had told him the mutilated bundle of nerves and eyes on the floor had given Asher. But if it wasn’t for the Assistant...

They would've had the will to resist. To fight back. (To use the Add-Ons he gave them, as Annabelle instructed.) But now Asher is dead, just as Annabelle had warned him might happen, and it's too late for him to impart the information she gave him.

(He has one Joker left. But he doesn’t know if it’d be able to revive them.)

The Batter takes his chance, drawing his bat back and swinging it as hard as he can at the woman’s hand. Bone crunches on impact, as it must and will, the sound so viciously righteous that the Batter cannot help but press the advantage he’s been handed as the gun slips from her hand, slamming his bat into her face, into her arms, into the thick coat that covers up barely-visible peeling skin stapled together around the edges.

He did not appreciate Asher’s purpose while they lived. Now he must avenge the purpose that was stolen from them. Then he will be free.

Annabelle promised him that much.

The Batter’s brutality was something Sado had hoped not to find herself on the receiving end of, but it was not something she hadn’t planned for. As blood sluices from her nose, she pulls her knife from under her coat and leaps, the Batter’s bittervibrant blood spraying over her sunglasses as a scream of pain erupts from the second mouth she opens through his throat. He falls back, tearing one of his items from his pockets and slapping it against the wound, but satisfaction sparks in Amanda’s gut as Sado sees a dribble of blood still leaking through.

It's enough time for Sado to snatch up her gun and lunge again, fingernails digging into the side of his face, holding his head still, still, still as her other hand jams the gun against his temple and pulls the trigger. The Batter’s slipperier than he looks, though, and he ducks forward, ramming his head into Amanda’s chest full-force as the gun goes off just behind his head. His hat's been knocked off, but he doesn’t bother retrieving it, and his jet-black hair is wet with sweat as he hisses “Run With Grace” and attacks in the same breath, a hazy unseeable something slamming into the stolen skin beneath Amanda’s clothes, fraying it at the edges. She feels a staple pop loose, then another and another.

Amanda’s ears are still ringing from the gunshot, so Sado stops using them and lashes out with her free hand, digging her fingers into the barely-closed wound in the Batter’s neck as hard as she can to tear it open wider than ever. The Batter’s mouth opens in what looks like a silent scream, but Sado knows how agonized it must sound to anyone listening.

(Her skin feels a little tighter, a little more comfortable, at the thought, her wounds already stitching themselves back together.)

The Batter headbutts her hard in the chin, sending Sado reeling as Amanda’s teeth snap together painfully and blood fills her mouth, and as she loses her grasp on Amanda’s ears the Batter shoulders past her and runs-

-but, in the moment, the Batter’s thoughts are not on escape, but rather reclaiming his Add-Ons from his fallen puppeteer, and he nearly dives for their hand as he reaches out, willing them to return to him-

-and regaining herself, Sado seizes her opportunity, raising her gun and pulling the trigger without even aiming.

The first shot hits the Batter in the shoulderblade, interrupting his dive and sending him crashing to the floor. The next shot goes exactly where she wants it to. The four more that follow are perhaps overkill, but there's no point in taking risks with something like the Batter, and they all land right where they're needed to just like the second.

Sado forces Amanda’s corroded lungs to breathe for a moment as she walks over and stoops to check the bodies. The holes in the Batter’s head are more visually impressive than the single hole in Asher’s, but judging by the nondescript muddy brown that fills both their eyes, vacant of life and fear alike, she got the same result either way.

She could call it quits here. She could just throw Asher’s body over her shoulder and return to the private jet waiting to take her back to Atlanta. (The pilot’s on SystemTech’s payroll and would know better than to question it.) But Sado knows her boss would see right through any lies about the others managing to slip through her fingers, and more than that, she doesn’t want to let the other three escape. (She may have chosen I Do Not Know You when it opened its arms to her, but perhaps there's a bit of the Hunt there as well.)

There wouldn’t be a point with the Batter, but Sado decides to take a moment to double-tap Ava’s kid before she gives chase, running for the door left ajar at the back of the store. A little caution never killed anyone.

With Luke and co. reunited after his anticlimactic defeat of Bapawmet and ready to be funneled back to its factory (Ginger will not be given the chance to figure out what happened), P03 returns its attention to the Batter again.

It isn’t expecting to see anything. Instead, it sees blood-spattered linoleum carving against the side of the Batter’s face... sees a stranger in a coat and scarf shoot Asher’s limp corpse in the head and hurry towards the back of the store.

P03 can infer what happened here even if it didn’t see it. And as she looked back for just a moment, P03 got a good look at her face.

Same sunglasses. Same scarf. Same coat. That’s her- Amanda.

That’s the woman who shot Luke.

“Huh,” P03 says out loud, and then “Shit.” This wasn’t part of the plan at all.

“Something the matter?” Elias asks, eyebrow raised, oozing false concern. Noelle remains as silent and unmoving as ever.

“Nothing unsalvageable,” P03 responds distractedly. As it pulls on the OLD_DATA to drag Luke and his party back to its factory, it dedicates nearly all of its focus to staring through the Batter’s dead eyes, desperate to glean what little information it can at this point.

Because right now, it isn’t in control in the slightest. All it can do is watch and hope for insight.

The high juddery scream of her frantic heartbeat is all Mae can hear, eerily out of sync with the slam of her off-brand Doc Martens against the floor, Patches- lugging a limp Kris over his shoulder- right behind her.

She doesn’t know what’s happening, doesn’t know what’s going on, and it fucking terrifies her. The Batter was trying to help and make amends, or at least it felt like he was going to, but then Asher lost it and started shouting about how they wanted this to “end,” and then-

It’s funny, but in the single confused moment when she saw the woman in the doorway, Mae actually thought she was there to help. She thought this would be a positive deus ex machina, that whoever this was would finally offer an explanation for everything and a way back home, but then she saw the gun in her hand and then she shot Asher and then the Batter ordered them to run and then-

Asher couldn’t still be alive. Mae saw the woman shoot them. The Batter might still be, but she can hear the gunshots... and all he’s got is a baseball bat. He’s only going to buy them time to escape. Nothing else.

(And she doesn’t understand why-)

Asher was still a stranger for all intents and purposes. Mae still barely knew them before they- before that. Maybe they could’ve been friends, or maybe they would’ve gone back to hating each other, but she’ll never get the chance to find out now, will she?

Mae slams through the door to outside at the far end of the dusty, oddly empty backroom, cobwebs catching on her hands as she does, and helps Patches wrestle Kris’s limp form out into the crisp night air when he finally stumbles, looking near to collapse. Mae flinches reflexively as more gunshots ring out from inside the store.

“Looks like someone’s in need of a hand,” a jarringly cheerful voice muses, and Mae spins to see Helen leaning against the wall, languidly inspecting her too-long fingernails.

“Helen, this-” Mae’s head is still spinning, she can’t make sense of this and she hates it, so it's Patches who speaks up instead. “Someone new showed up and killed Asher and the Batter,” he snaps, voice high and uncomprehending. “I know better than to hope you’ll help kill whoever it is in there, but can you at least give us an exit?”

“That, I can do,” Helen agrees, one of her doors coming into existence next to the door out of the building.

“Kris goes first, they’re injured,” Patches orders in a tone that brooks no argument. He doesn’t wait for a response, just opens the door and shoves Kris through, himself right behind them, one paw extended to help them keep their balance.

“Of course,” Helen agrees, and as Kris and Patches finish crossing her threshold she looks Mae in the eyes and winks, grin deadly. “Well, good luck!” she says, and then the door slams shut.

Mae doesn’t understand. She can’t understand. Her vision swims as Helen vanishes along with her door like neither was ever there, and it is with blurred-yet-undistorted unclarity that the world around her whirls so she faces the true door which opens so Mae sees-

“Wait-” is all she has the chance to say before the woman in the sunglasses pulls the trigger. Wetness seeps down her face, and then the asphalt rushes up to meet her and quite suddenly she isn’t saying anything at all.

There is enough mercy in the OLD_DATA within her that Mae Borowski dies before she hits the ground.

Notes:

And with that, we're closing in on the end of Act 1. There'll be a few more chapters dedicated to wrapping up the B-plot, and after that, we'll be moving on to a new set of characters for Acts 2 and 3.

...what? Come on, did you honestly think that this wasn't going to end up being a tragedy?

Except you’re smarter than that, aren’t you? Tragedy or otherwise, that’s not how Mae's story ends, and both of us know it.

Good. She didn’t want it to end like that anyway... and, full disclosure? Neither do I.

[CLICK]

STAGEHAND

-er! You told me-

ANNABELLE

I told you what was originally planned, Stagehand. We didn’t expect Asher to give in so easily. Perhaps you should remember that adaptability is-

[THE STAGEHAND CUTS HER OFF WITH A LOUD, HARSH LAUGH]

STAGEHAND

I refuse to prioritize Mae’s life over Asher’s. You think we should be oh so "adaptable" to unpredictable outcomes? Fine. You adapt to this.

[ABRUPT DEPARTING FOOTSTEPS]

ANNABELLE

Wait- wait, Stagehand, no! You know what’s going to happen to Mae, you know how much is going to be given away too soon if she's given the chance to- listen to me, A-

[CLICK]

The choice is simple and has always been. You either die a person, or you become something that won’t die so easily.

“No. This does not feel right at all.”

Mae does not want to die, but she doesn’t want to become something that isn’t her anymore, either.

“You acknowledge the possibility of pain and seizure.”

So which fear becomes dominant? Which impulse wins out in the end- to flee from death, or to flee from losing oneself?

“Prepare yourselves to receive my judgement.”

She does not like false binaries, though admittedly she may not be the best at recognizing them. But she recognizes this one.

“I’m me again! Oh, boy, do I ever feel ALIVE!”

She cannot claim to be the best at recognizing pivotal choices, either. But she recognizes this one.

“There is no time to forget before all is forgotten.”

So, what happens at the intersection of fear, personhood, and free will?

“Play along for now.”

The answer is simple: what was never actually Mae Borowski stares down the abyss of her own existence, and it blinks first.

“It’s a real shame, you know. I was so looking forward to filling you with spiders.”

Then it cracks open in its entirety, releasing something old and foul-

“Lucky draw.”

“Keep me alive.”

“Huh? Hey, stop!”

-and she makes her play.

Because sometimes, when you know there are no choices left that aren't a losing move, the only option you're left with is to flip the board.

[CLICK]

AMANDA

...what?

[A FEW MORE METALLIC CLICKS AS HER GUN REFUSES TO FIRE]

MAE

I’m not really sure that would’ve done anything either way. I don’t think I take fall damage, so... why would you be able to shoot me?

AMANDA

No, that’s not- how- I shot you! I shot you in the head! You- I saw you-

MAE

Did you?

[SEVERAL MORE METALLIC CLICKS- ALL FUTILE- AS SHE CONTINUES SPEAKING]

Ha. You know, it... feels so long ago now, but- I think it was the Black Goat I was talking to. I said I wanted to hold on until I was thrown off and everything ends. And until that happens, I want to hope again, and I want it to hurt, because that means it meant something.

I don’t think the Black Goat understood a word of it. I don’t think it could, game or not.

But... what about you?

[STATIC, SHARP AND SQUEALING, BEGINS IN THE BACKGROUND. BEHIND IT, CRACKLING FLAMES, THE CLICKING OF COMPUTER KEYS, AND HUNDREDS OF WHISPERING VOICES CAN BE HEARD ALL AT ONCE.]

AMANDA

No. No, no, no, that’s not- (Laughingly disbelieving) You can’t- you haven’t even existed here for a day yet! This isn’t fair!

MAE

Yeah, I know. But if things are unfair in my favor for once... should probably make the most of it while it lasts, right?

AMANDA

You’re no better than any of us! You can’t save Asher, you can’t save the Batter or Kris or Patches, you can’t save anyone like this! You haven’t even saved yourself!

MAE

Yeah, you're probably right. I still don’t really know what’s happening. But I’m gonna hope I can fix things. And if I can't? I'll still want to hope again, and it’s gonna hurt as much as I can make it.

[THE VOICES IN THE STATIC RISE AS SHE SPEAKS. BEFORE LONG, THEY SOUND LIKE A CHOIR OF DISTANT SCREAMS.]

AMANDA

...I don’t understand.

MAE

I don’t want you to.

[SADO JOINS THE CHOIR.]

[CLICK]

Chapter Text

The Stagehand’s heart drums a frantic manic beat against her cracked ribs as she flees, her lungs burning in a spiderweb pattern at the minute exertion as Annabelle’s screamed plea lingers in the air behind her, her body feeling even less her own than it normally does as she bolts for the doors at the front of the military surplus store.

I’ll have nowhere to go after this. I told Annabelle I’d wreck this whole thing if I had to, but if I really do ruin this, this one moment Annabelle’s been making everything lead up t-

SHIT! How’s the Transcriptionist going to take it? Not well, given how they reacted the first time I-

She grits her teeth, forces those thoughts down, and steels herself as she emerges into the dim light of the inside of the store, pushing the door shut behind her with her heel. Do it. Just do it, you have nothing left to lose by this point and the more you dawdle, the more time it gives Annabelle to get over her shock and intervene.

The Stagehand kneels next to the Batter’s body, averting her gaze from the bloody holes in his head, and begins searching his pockets. Hopefully she can make this quick.

“You appear confused,” Elias observes.

“I...”

P03 isn’t confused. It’s not confused, okay? Just a bit surprised. That’s all.

The Batter’s eyes are now pretty permanently staring in a single direction, so P03’s not getting that great a view of the person that just entered the military surplus store, and since his eyes are biological it can’t rewind or pause what they’re showing it. But from the momentary glance it got at her face, it could’ve sworn she’s...

Finally, the Stagehand finds what she’s looking for, tugs it loose from one of the Batter’s pockets. A quick dismayed shuffle through the rest of the contents thereof confirm what she was afraid of- the Batter only had one Joker left.

She’d played OFF for the first time... years ago, probably. (Feels like a lifetime ago.) But when Annabelle told her that the Batter stood a high chance of dying, she looked it up, her own memory having failed her when she tried to remember the different items in the game. And the simple-looking playing card now snagged between two light brown fingers has a singular function: to be used to revive downed allies.

Maybe it won’t work. Nothing says those mechanics will apply to anyone but the Batter and his Add-Ons. But the Stagehand has to try.

She has to try. She owes Asher that much.

Amidst the cacophony from just outside, the Stagehand shuffles awkwardly over to Asher’s lifeless body. She crouches, retrieves their broken glasses from where they'd fallen to push them back onto their face, then lowers her other hand towards their head. “Alright, Asher, rise and shine,” she mumbles, pressing the card to the entrance wound.

Nothing happens.

“What?” the Stagehand hisses, disbelieving tears drowning out her vision. She slaps the card uselessly against the hole in their head to no avail, again and again and again. “This- ha- no, this isn’t- this was supposed t-”

A crunching roar of SOMETHING erupts from outside, and the Stagehand freezes, her head snapping up. Both the inside and outside doors through the back room are open, open just wide enough for her to get a perfect view of Mae’s claws tearing into the torso of Sado’s stolen body, sending her stumbling backwards... right through the open yellow door that swallows her like a hungry mouth.

The door closes. Mae’s arms falls back to her sides as she goes completely still, eyes wide and staring at nothing at all. And the Stagehand snaps upright, dropping the card and fleeing back out into the night before she can be seen, angrily wiping away the tears now flowing freely from her eyes with her hoodie sleeve. The shriek of pain that flares up the scars along her arm at the movement happens just as expected, just as she'd hoped it would.

She failed. The first time she tried to do something according to her own plan rather than Annabelle’s or the Transcriptionist’s or the Web’s, and she failed.

She has to hope that they won’t refuse to accept her back into the fold after this. Because if they decide this transgression was a step too far, the Stagehand knows full well that there's nowhere she can hide.

The first thing Mae processes as she returns to herself is the tremoring ring of laughter, loud and painful and reflected in her ears.

“Oh, oh my,” Helen gasps, her form breaking down around the edges into shivering madness as she wheezes and shakes and contorts, and yet her laughter won’t stop. “I’m sorry, I just- you can’t understand how supremely transcendent it was to watch that happen!”

Awareness returns in fits and starts, like fingers on a hand slowly shaking off pins and needles one by one. Mae’s... standing. She’s standing on the asphalt in the parking lot behind that military surplus store. Helen’s door is still there like it never left. (Did it?) The woman with the gun is gone.

“Gun lady,” Mae says, slowly, sluggishly, finding it hard to pare down the complexity of her thoughts to simple crude spoken words. “Where did she go?”

It takes Helen a good few seconds to stop laughing even after that, long enough for the rest of Mae’s sense of self to return, long enough for her to start to raise an annoyed hand to-

-to...

...to... what? What was she going to do? What did she think she could do?

“She ran, of course,” Helen says, and Mae’s attention snaps back to her instantly. “You shook her up quite a bit, and she wanted an escape. So...” She grins widely, drumming her fingers against the yellow door behind her. “I gave her a door.”

Mae doesn’t remember that happening, but she barely remembers anything from when Asher got shot onward as more than dim fearful impressions. She doesn’t ask if Helen intends to let the woman with the gun out, either- she doesn’t want her to, and she knows if she voices that it’ll just make Helen more likely to release her. “Let Patches and Kris out,” she demands before she has the chance to think about how to word it, voice full of sluggish rust.

Helen fires off a mock salute. “Way ahead of you,” she says, her door creaking open behind her. “She’s gone,” she calls into the hallway. “I took her.”

It takes a moment longer, long enough for Mae to almost start to feel concerned, before Patches and Kris stumble out into the chill of the night. Neither look like they’ve been consumed by the Spiral, which is good. That’s... good.

“Are both of you, like... okay?” Mae asks automatically.

“For any stated value,” Patches grumbles. He must’ve put Kris back on their feet somewhere in the corridors, because they’re standing now, though they still look a little shaky. “You-” His voice falters. “You. Uh.”

Mae’s brow furrows when he doesn’t continue. She’s not sure if it’s in confusion or annoyance. “What?”

“You’ve got...” Kris gestures vaguely at her face when Patches doesn’t continue. “Blood. On your... you.”

“Oh.” Mae becomes slowly, steadily, aware of the thin bloodstain matting her fur in a thin line from her forehead down the bridge of her nose. That, where nothing else did, fully snaps her out of the weird haze, and she licks her thumb and scrubs it along the drying line of blood in the vague hope that it’ll get rid of it. It feels like it’s working, so at least there’s that.

“So!” Mae flinches back, nearly jabbing herself in the eye with her thumb, as Helen abruptly exists in front of her. “What did you pick in the end? I know it wasn’t the Spiral, I’d be able to tell. Don’t worry, I’m not offended,” she adds in a faux-whisper, “just hurt. Maybe a little betrayed, even. But not offended!”

Mae doesn’t understand. She’s not sure she’s supposed to. She’s not sure she wants to. “What?”

“You Became, obviously,” Helen sighs. “You wouldn’t have been able to shrug off a bullet to the head and scare the living daylights out of our spontaneously-appearing character assassin otherwise. So which was it? Which Entity did you pick?”

I don’t even remember what any of them are, asides from the Eye and Spiral! But... “I’m...” Why does the very prospect of what Helen’s suggesting feel so incorrect? If what Asher alluded to before, what Mae felt when the Assistant exposed her to their Archive, was any indication, just the mere suggestion should feel inherently right.

But it doesn’t.

“Come on, out with it!” Helen encourages. “No need to be shy, we’re all friends here! Was it the Beholding?” she asks. “That was going to be my second guess.”

“I didn’t.” That sounds right. It feels right. “I had the choice to. I could’ve if I wanted to. But I didn’t.”

“That’s not how this works,” Patches starts, “or, at least I don’t think it is, but...” He sighs, exhaustion overrunning his face. “Okay. Priorities. I’ll go see if Asher or the Batter somehow survived that, and then we’ll see if those... ticket things the Batter gave me fix Kris’s head wound the easy way. You don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”

Mae doesn’t want to. She really, really doesn’t want to. Right now, she just wants to collapse on the spot and sleep for twenty years. She follows Patches anyway. Kris staggers somewhere in-between them, clearly not wanting to be left alone with Helen despite not yet knowing what she is. Mae can’t blame them.

“I think I’m still me,” Mae says slowly, apropos of nothing. She’d sort of flopped into a seated position against the wall the moment the three reentered the empty store, pulling her knees up to her chest and resting her chin on them.

Patches’ attention flickers over to her for a moment, though he keeps an eye on Kris as he presses another of the Batter's luck tickets to their steadily-shrinking head wound. “What do you mean?” he asks carefully.

“I don’t feel any different.” There’s a strange confidence in Mae’s voice as she speaks. “I mean, I’m... still as afraid as I was before? But it doesn’t feel like it changed. I don’t feel like there’s some elder god plugged into me shooting fear through me or whatever. I didn’t even feel like that when I did... whatever I did to get rid of the gun lady, even if I don’t really remember it.”

Kris nods gratefully to Patches as their hand goes to the back of their head, tracing the outline of the scars left where their wound was, pale and clustered and looking nothing like what Patches knows scar tissue is meant to. Addressing Mae, Kris asks, “So we’re just calling her ‘gun lady,’ then?”

“Oh.” Mae glances over to them, though she doesn’t move otherwise. “Hey, dude. You’re, like, not concussed anymore?”

“Yeah. Don’t feel like it, anyway?” Kris glances over at the Batter’s body before tearing their eyes away with a sudden sick expression. He didn't have a pulse when Patches checked. Neither did Asher. “Guess the Batter at least helped indirectly fix the problem he made, or whatever.”

Patches doesn’t share their apprehension around corpses. He’s seen plenty in his time. “I already took all the luck tickets he had,” he says, “and everything else that looked useful.” He gestures to his now-bulging vest pockets. “No sense in not being prepared. I tried to take the white ring things he gave to Asher, too, but...” It’s hard to explain what they did when he tried to remove them from Asher’s limp hand, how they flitted through his fingers and back to those of the corpse like they’d never left them- no sense of motion, just of rejection. “They didn’t let me. I don’t think they liked me.” He doesn’t know where that last part came from.

Mae tilts her head in the direction of Asher’s body slowly, the same sick expression as Kris’s overrunning her face despite the fact that she isn’t even looking at it. “What...” She swallows. “What do we do about Asher?”

“Right.” Kris won’t look at their body either. “I... I don’t know. I didn’t really know what I wanted to happen to them, but it wasn’t this,” they admit, arms crossed, fingernails digging deep into the fabric of their sleeves. Horrified realization suddenly dawns on their face. “Shit, what’re we gonna tell Niko?” Patches had been trying not to think about them since leaving the house.

“And what about the Batter?” Mae’s head tilts, expression unchanging. “I know he kidnapped Kris and everything, but, at the end... he was saying something about how he was being controlled by ‘P03.’ And he covered for us when we tried to run without being asked or told to...”

“We c-” Kris cuts themself off, their hand going to the back of their head again. Their face twists unpleasantly.

“I can’t believe I’m the one who has to be the optimist here,” says Patches, “but there might be a way to save Asher here- and the Batter, if only so we can figure out what he was talking about at the end.” He raises his voice, barreling over both Kris and Mae as they open their mouths; he doesn’t want to know what either of them were about to say. “I’m not saying that out of optimism. Both of you should know by now that’s not the kind of person I am. There’s some logic behind this, we just have to... ‘metagame’ it, as it were. The Batter’s from some kind of typical top-down RPG as far as we know, right?”

“I mean, I guess?” Kris’s tone is wary. “Asher didn’t really elaborate.”

“Just hear me out. It seems pretty clear that a combat system of some kind existed in his game, and if we’re going by how those sort of things usually work,” Patches continues, “some sort of ‘party member revive’ item probably existed as well. If the Batter had any of those...”

“...then Asher doesn’t have to stay dead,” Kris realizes slowly. “Assuming it’d work on them, anyway.”

Mae doesn’t say anything, but she does unfold herself, stand, and examine Patches expectantly. “Okay,” she finally says after a few moments of disconcerting silence. “So we go through everything you took off the Batter and see if any of it brings them back?”

“Not here,” Patches shakes his head. “It’d be a bad idea for us to be hanging around a crime scene even if Kris wasn’t the only human here. We need to move the bodies somewhere else, somewhere out of sight, and then try to work this out. Frankly, it’s a miracle the police haven’t shown up yet...”

“Especially after the ruckus Mae made,” Helen chimes in, making everyone flinch. Patches has no idea when she followed them into the military surplus store, but she’s here now. “But as it stands? There's a patrol car a minute or so out from this very building.”

“Shit.” Asher’s lighter than expected when he grabs their body, tries to lift them, but Patches still staggers under the weight and just barely doesn’t completely drop them. At least he’s desensitized enough that the blood newly staining his paws doesn’t gross him out or whatever. “Okay,” he manages, trying to pull the body back upright into a vague sitting position. “I’m not sure we can transfer both of the bodies with this time frame...”

“What a dilemma,” Helen muses. “If you can only save one... do you choose the murderer who might be able to answer all of your questions, or the more recognizable face you know you can't trust?”

“What’s that supposed to-” Mae starts to snap.

“If that’s our choice,” Patches interrupts, “then we save Asher.” He thinks he can hear the whine of sirens by now, but it might be his mind playing tricks on him. “Here’s the plan: we get back to their house, put... this somewhere more accessible, then try everything we can throw at them until something either works or doesn’t.”

“Okay, but we don’t know how to get back to their house?” Kris reminds him, averting their eyes from Asher’s body. “We’re kinda lost in this world and all...”

“I’ll be happy to take you home,” Helen interrupts. “Just say the word. I’ll even let you bring what’s left of Asher with, free of charge.”

“Right.” Kris looks glad for the excuse of something to look at other than the body Patches is still trying to wrestle into a vaguely carriable position. “Still don’t know who you are, by the way.”

“Oh, how rude of me!” Helen extends one decidedly normal-looking hand, and Kris reluctantly takes it before Patches or Mae can think to warn them. An immediate look of terror and disgust crosses their face when they do. “You can call me Helen.”

“Sure. Ugh.” Kris worms their hand out of her grasp and flaps it frantically. “And you... what, control those hallways you let me and Patches hide in?”

“Fascinating way to put it,” Helen muses. “Would you say your hand controls your stomach in any meaningful way?”

Kris blinks confusedly, glances back to Mae and Patches. “Is... she... always like this?”

“Yes,” Helen confirms, “except for when I’m not.”

“Extremely unhelpful, thank you for not clarifying in the slightest.”

Helen beams. “Happy to not help! Now, if you’re all ready to leave...” She tilts her head to the side as another of her doors appears on the wall behind her, its creak somewhere between sinister and welcoming.

Patches decides Mae’s probably less likely to be traumatized by touching a corpse and directs his attention to her. “Mae, get Asher’s legs. I can’t carry them by myself.” Disgust crosses Mae’s face, but she still warily crouches and grabs them by the ankles, which... isn’t really helpful, actually. She’s clearly never had to move a body before. At least it takes away some of the weight. “You better be taking us directly back to Asher’s house,” Patches warns as he backs towards the door, head turned at an uncomfortable angle. “I don’t know how long we can carry this.”

“No need for concern,” Helen assures him pleasantly, “I’m not in the mood for games at the moment. I’ve already fed more than well enough for one night. Kris, if you’d mind getting the door for your companions...?”

Kris warily looks back to Patches for a moment before conceding. There’s no hallway behind it, none that Patches can see- just the kitchen in Asher’s house, the light still on from when they left... was it really just an hour or two ago?

As Patches and Mae follow Kris through the door back to where everything began, Asher’s corpse in tow, Patches’ attention flickers back to Helen for a moment, and he can’t help but be momentarily shocked by how normal she looks, stood there with her arms crossed behind her back. With her faux-pleasant smile, carefully-curled red hair, and dull purple pantsuit, she is very much the image of a boringly mundane businesswoman.

And as the yellow door closes behind the departing characters, an overlooked playing card- still smeared with Asher’s blood- rests innocuously on the floor where the Stagehand had dropped it as she fled.

Chapter Text

P03’s jumping into action before the yellow door has even finished closing behind Mae, a hail of desperate profanity sparking from its speakers. The wall of screens behind it buzzes with the echo of its panic as the static flickers ever brighter.

“Problem, P03?” Elias asks pleasantly. He knows the answer, of course, he would even if he hadn’t transferred his Panopticon’s code directly beneath P03’s factory the moment he realized the sacrifices that would need to be made for everything to go according to plan, but... well. Perhaps he finds the robot’s sheer dread of the rapidly impending prospect of its own powerlessness amusing.

“No SHIT we’ve got a problem!” P03 nearly shrieks, forcing the screens behind it to flicker off in a single cascade of darkness as it opens a new aperture in the middle of its table. “Asher’s dead, the others just got back thanks to the Distortion and dragged their useless carcass with them, and I-”

“You still have everything you sent Luke out for, or at least you will shortly,” reminds Elias, “and you have the Hex we made.”

“Right.” P03 hisses discontentedly. “Right. Whatever. This is... salvageable. Worst case scenario, I just have to use Niko as a host body or something and pretend to be them until I get the chance to book it.”

As P03 quickly recalls Luke and his allies, Elias crosses his arms behind his back and allows a relaxed smile to rise to his face.

Not much longer now.

P03’s game fades back in to show the same place with the four doors- except, as Niko now sees, they’ve been replaced with a single metallic door, wide and imposing, at the top of the screen.

“-not really sure where to start?” Luke’s saying. Niko assumes he’s explaining to the others what happened in the final room. They don’t even have it in them to be annoyed by it- they’re used to P03 cutting them out, keeping them in the dark, by now- and that annoyance drowns out any mumble of curiosity before it can surface.

“Well, the doors just, uh, changed,” Bea points out. “So I think that means we’re done here?”

“Really?” Susie’s dialogue portrait looks wary and disappointed and fearful all at once. “Huh. I... thought there’d be more to it than that. Felt kinda like we were just being rushed through to get to a goal. Still don’t really know anything about any of you guys, or... any of this, really.”

“Let’s just be glad this is over,” Ginger tells her.

As Niko hits the key to advance the dialogue, their mind’s suddenly pulled back to a very different, yet similar situation.

“Wait, so... Asher is gone, just like that?”

[Correct.]

“...for good?”

[Correct.]

[Asher has already finished their mission.]

[...and so have you, Niko.]

And, as the World Machine told them it had all been like a bad dream, urged them to rest...

“...I thought there’d be more to it, you know?”

Just like then, Niko’s alone again, and Asher won’t be back until they’ve stopped the Batter from hurting anyone... and the World Machine’s gone now, isn’t it? P03 might've killed it, or at least hurt it so badly that it can’t help anymore, and now...

Why are we still doing what P03 wants? Why-

The thought slips itself loose of Niko’s mind like a colorful fractal. Shaking their head, they return their attention to the game.

Luke leads the way through the door, Susie, Bea, and Ginger close behind him, lightbulb clutched tight in his hands. What else can he do, by this point? (What else can he think to do?) He will not think anything else.

Seeing P03’s factory in real life- or “real life”- is a bit odd. It’s quieter than he remembers it in the game, no ambient machinery chugging away in the background, and its particle scanner's been replaced with wall-to-wall monitors, all of which have been deactivated. And sitting just behind the table, a rounded yellow aperture and a small golden hexagonal object right before it, is...

“Yep. Luke Carder, in the flesh,” P03 says, smug as ever. “If we were ever going to meet face to face, I’d hoped it’d be under different circumstances, but oh well, this works too.” It gestures impatiently at him. “Hand the lightbulb over. Let’s get-”

“Noelle?” Susie’s voice is full of fear and disbelief, and it takes a moment for Luke to follow her gaze and realize that P03 isn’t alone in the factory. On one side of it stands a nondescript, boring-looking man Luke doesn’t recognize, and on the other side, there’s what looks kind of like a bipedal deer, just with blond hair and a glitchy white gown. Her eyes are rimmed with what looks like frost, and a thin layer of fog clings to the air around her.

Luke doesn’t have time to really process that, though, because Susie’s already charged forward and slammed her hands down on the table, glaring at P03. “The hell’d you do to her?!” she spits.

“Uh...” P03’s screen flickers, only displays an ellipsis, and it’s the generic-looking guy that speaks up instead, stepping forth to put himself between P03 and Susie. “P03 has been trying to help her,” he says smoothly, “as have I. She’s not beyond recovery, so you have no need to worry.”

“Who’re you supposed to be?” Susie demands. She looks no closer to backing down.

“Ah, how rude of me.” The man extends a hand, but behind his round glasses, his cold gray eyes are more professionally polite than friendly. Susie makes no move to shake his hand- if anything, she looks closer to trying to bite it off. “Elias Bouchard, head of the Magnus Institute, at your service. I’m something of a student of the paranormal-” P03 snorts obnoxiously at that for some reason. “-and have been lending P03 a hand in trying to put these worlds back as they should be. Miss Holiday’s situation is one you yourself should be familiar with, considering how close you came to being in a similar predicament.”

As the suit guy- Elias- speaks to Susie, Luke glances back over to the deer girl. Her face has sure looked blank and vacant this whole time, but as he makes eye contact, for just a moment something pleading breaks through, like she’s hoping Luke knows some way to fix all of this and get rid of P03. Luke has no idea to respond. All he can do is look away. He has no choice but to embrace the inevitability of what is happening.

“That fog...” Susie breathes, seemingly unconsciously stepping back.

“The Lonely,” clarifies Elias, “also known as the Forsaken or the One Alone. I am trying to help as much as I can, but we will need your cooperation if we’re going to fix these worlds...” He shoots Susie a meaningful look. “...fix her. Do you not want to help her? I was under the impression you were friends.”

“I- hang on, wh- I mean, did she say something abou- ugh, no, obviously! Obviously I want to help!” Susie drags her claws through her hair, frustrated resignment warping her face. “Shit. Okay, what- what’re we supposed to do?”

“Yeah, no, gonna stop you there,” Bea cuts in. “What’s this ‘one alone’ thing you’re talking about, and what exactly did it do to this kid?”

“And we still don’t know why any of this is happening,” adds Ginger. “You’ve given us almost no information and no time to understand what’s-”

“Yeah, well, we wouldn’t’ve had the time to do any of this if I’d explained everything in as much detail as you idiots would’ve wanted!” P03 gestures impatiently at Luke. “Luke. Lightbulb. Socket. I don’t think I need to explain much else to you. We are this close to m- to fixing everything, and I cannot understate the time crunch we’re on right now. You leave it any longer, we’ll be stuck like this forever, and I won’t be able to do anything about it... or bring you back to life. You want to be out there in your world, all alive and happy, you need to do this.”

Niko’s silent. They haven’t said anything since Luke plugged the lightbulb into the third of those things. (A part of Luke wonders if the reason they aren’t speaking up is because P03 won’t let Luke hear whatever they might be saying.) But they do guide Luke, guide him forth, guide his hands to insert the base of the lightbulb into the yellow aperture on the table. It closes around it quickly and mechanically in a movement remarkably like a camera shutter.

...or an eyelid.

P03 smirks victoriously as the three largest screens behind it flicker to life, one by one, displaying images of the Black Goat, a bald little boy Luke doesn’t recognize, and the massive skeletal entity. Their eyes- or eye sockets- fill with yellow light, and the robot shudders a little as its screen flickers to display an ellipses again. “Yep, that felt good,” P03 hums contentedly, its face visible again. “All that’s left now...” It gestures to the hexagonal artifact on the table before it. “...is to open the Hex.”

Patches gets right to work once he’s back in Asher’s house. (Or, at least, he tries to. He would if he could.) He and Mae stumble out into the dim hallway, carting Asher’s body towards the living room, himself still bearing the majority of their weight; Patches doesn’t bother to waste the energy required to gasp out a half-intelligible thank you at Kris as they flick the light on for him, just dumps Asher’s body on the first couch he sees. “Fuck,” he hisses the moment his arms and shoulders are free, taking a moment to force himself to stretch and coax some life back into his tortured muscles.

Having released the body as well, Mae gingerly sits herself down on the edge of a pale red ottoman. “Okay. We’re back.”

“What now?” Kris asks.

Patches doesn’t bother rearranging Asher’s body into a more comfortable-looking position on the couch. Why should he? They’re dead, or at least they are right now. He just shucks off his vest, tosses it onto the armrest next to their head, and lets himself stagger-fall into a kneeling position, arms still burning.

“I mean, we’re going through everything Patches got from the Batter and seeing if any of it brings Asher back?” Mae pulls one foot up against her knee, back to studiously refusing to look at the body. “I thought we’d, like, already established that and stuff.”

“That,” Patches agrees, finally having what remains of his physical strength pulled together enough to properly get back into action. He wishes he had a few minutes to rest, but Niko could be running downstairs at any moment to ask what all the noise is, and since they’re currently slated to be the only one who'll be coming out of this trauma-free it’d probably be a good idea to keep them from seeing the body. “First,” he says, “we already knew about the luck tickets- saw the Batter use them and all- so I suppose we should try giving one of them a shot.” He withdraws one from his discarded vest and presses it to the surprisingly clean entry wound. The exit wound was less clean... and is probably pressed right up against the cushion under Asher's head, now that he’s thinking about it. Hopefully they won’t complain about getting blood on their couch.

(Assuming this works. Assuming they’re not dead for good and Patches isn’t stranded, knowledgeless, in a world he knows nothing about. Assuming what Asher was saying right before they got shot isn’t indicative of how they’ll react to coming back to life.)

Kris and Mae both look disgusted, albeit not only because of the whole “oh no Patches is being weirdly blasé around dead bodies again” thing. Speaking of which, they really need to get over themselves. “Was that a pun?” Kris demands.

Patches looks up at them, genuinely needing a second to remember what he’d said to prompt that reaction. “Not an intentional one.” The luck ticket had zero effect, which... isn’t great.

“Okay, next up, this... eye... thing,” Patches decides as he withdraws another item from his bloated hanging vest. He’s already had experience holding a gouged-out eye (not his own, Angel’s), so he doesn’t handle it with the degree of discomfort Kris or Mae probably would’ve. Once more, he presses it to the exit wound and tries to ignore the blood staining the tips of his paws. He’s used to it, at least now it’s for a good cause. “...well, that didn’t work either.”

“What do we do if none of these work?” Kris asks.

Patches doesn’t even realize he’s collapsed back from the corpse and into a seated position on the floor until he’s already done it, the tip of his pale red tie grazing against his leg as he sets his paws on his knees and tries to breathe. “I don’t know,” he admits. A joke about how they’d go about disposing of the body seems in poor taste at the moment. “I... honestly don’t know.”

“And, I mean, even- even forgetting this...” Kris doesn’t seem aware that they’ve started pacing, their movements jerky and near-frenzied as a desperately panicked, almost angry note enters their voice. “There is still so much going on here that I know nothing about- that we know nothing about. I don’t know who or what Helen is,” they start, ticking off point after point on their fingers as their voice grows ever louder and agitated, “I don’t know what the Batter was talking about with this ‘P03’ and how he wasn’t going to listen to it, I don’t know why he suddenly decided he’d defend us to the point of dying for us, I don’t know what all that stuff about ‘the Beholding’ and ‘becoming’ and ‘the Spiral’ and ‘entities’ meant, I don’t know how or why Asher apparently had some- some kind of eye-covered eldritch horror living inside of them, I don’t know who that lady that tried to shoot us was, I don’t think any of us know what’s supposed to have happened to Mae that apparently brought her back from being shot-”

“I feel normal!” Mae objects.

“-and, oh yeah, lest I forget, we still have no idea how or why we ended up in Asher’s world!” Kris throws their arms out to either side as they spin back to face Mae and Patches. The back of their head is still caked in dried blood, the smell clinging to them, the hair staying matted and half-plastered to their scalp. “Was there supposed to be any point to what’s happened in the past hour or whatever? Or did we just run in a big circle to get nothing but trauma and even more questions?!” They laugh unsteadily, eyes too wide to be anything but painful. “Because right now, that’s sure what it feels like!”

“Kris-” Patches starts, reluctantly pushing himself back to his feet only to flinch back as they grab him by the arms, fingernails digging into his skin. “I just want to go home!” they shout. “I don’t c-” Their breath hitches. “I didn’t ask for this! None of us asked for this! I didn’t, you didn’t, Mae didn’t, and Niko sure as hell-” They stop, face paling. “Wait. Where’s Niko?”

Patches doesn’t follow. “They... should still be upstairs, shouldn’t they?” he frowns.

Mae hops to her feet. “I think what Kris meant is...” She flaps her hands frustratedly as she stumbles over her words. “More along the lines of, like, ‘why didn’t they come running downstairs to see what’s going on when Kris started shouting and having a mental breakdown?’”

“Yeah, there’s no way they wouldn’t’ve heard me,” Kris says. “And you saw how attached they were to Asher. If they’d heard us come back, they’d be jumping at the idea to see them again, especially if you people really left them alone here with no warning.”

Patches eases Kris’s hands free of his arms, restraining himself from frantically shaking them loose or shoving them away from him, and reflexively dusts off his sleeves. “What danger could they possibly be in?” he asks, doing his best to rationalize the situation. “The only other intelligent being here was the World Machine, and from how Niko spoke of it, it posed no threat.”

“Patches. I think...” Mae’s eyes flicker back to Asher’s body for a moment before she clearly thinks better of it. “I think Asher can wait.”

“...yeah. Yeah, alright.” Maybe a few minutes to relax and see how the ever-optimistic child’s doing will help clear Patches’ mind enough to come up with something. “Fine. What’re they going to do, get up and walk away?”

Kris mutters something under their breath that sounds suspiciously like don't jinx it. Patches decides against commenting on this.

“Wait, is that Bapawmet?”

Luke does his best not to give Ginger a weird look, but he knows he’s not succeeding. “That what and huh?”

“That!” Ginger points at the third of the monitors behind P03. “That’s Bapawmet! Is that the thing you plugged the lightbulb into when we got blocked off from following you?”

“I- I think s-”

“Does it really matter?” P03 cuts in. “I cannot emphasize how close we are to fixing everything! Here, just let me...”

The voice that emits from its speakers next is not P03’s and has a distinct fuzzy recorded feeling to it. It’s a language Luke doesn’t understand, grating and guttural and stinging his ears, but the artifact- the Hex- flickers to life, flashing brighter and glowing in response to the sound.

“Stop focusing on these stupid little things. ‘Oh, I don’t understand this, I don’t understand that, explain what’s happening in excruciating detail please!’ We don’t have time for that! We have maybe a minute or two at most before I lose my chance,” P03 snaps. “You want your worlds fixed, your friends and lives brought back from what they’ve become? Just help me open the Hex!”

Elias nods to P03, raising his hand without fanfare, and a shining angled line fades into existence on the table before him. “P03 is correct that this will make it much easier to fix your worlds,” he says neutrally, “and it is equally correct that nearly everybody you have ever known will remain where they are currently- trapped in the depths of Fear with no escape- for all time without its intervention.”

“...this’ll help Noelle?” Susie asks hesitantly. “And- Kris, Lancer, Ralsei, what’s happening to them?”

All Elias does is turn his head towards her, eyes flaring with something old and malevolent, and Susie gasps and nearly doubles over as if she’d been stabbed in the gut, her eyes mirroring his for just a second. “Exactly what you think is happening to them,” he informs her.

“Shit. Okay.” Susie lifts her hand, and another angle appears before her. “Just save them,” she demands.

P03’s monitor twists sideways. “Noelle-” it starts, but Elias quickly speaks over it, hand still raised. “You don’t like what’s become of you, do you? Help us open the Hex and it will be that much easier to fix you.”

Noelle stays silent. All she does is nod and raise her hand, and another one of the angles appears upon the table.

Nobody else moves for a few petrified seconds before P03 snaps, “Well? Get it over with! Like I said, we don’t have much time!”

“...I don’t trust this,” Ginger says slowly. Her paws twitch, dim magenta light flickering for a moment before being suppressed. “But I don’t feel like any of us have any good choices anymore. I’m not sure we can choose what we do here.” She raises her paw, and another glowing angle materializes.

Bea nods. “This doesn’t feel right. I...” The slow-dawning horror in her eyes is far, far too late to be of any use. “I don’t think I’m in control of myself. And I don’t think I can do anything about it except be afraid.” She, too, raises her hand, and another one of the angles appears. It’s forming the outline of another hexagon, Luke realizes distantly, his blood pulsing too slow in his ears.

“Well?” Luke doesn’t flinch as he realizes P03’s speaking to him. “Just you now, Luke. Help me help you. Do this for me, I’ll get you your original body back, bring you back to life, no strings attached.”

Luke wishes he could dread the coursing tide of inevitability that steals over him as his arm raises, almost entirely on its own, and the final angle of the hexagon appears.

Niko has no such qualms regarding the dread they feel. The light overhead is dimmer, that loose screw in Asher’s swivel chair is digging into their leg again, their jaw aches from how hard they’re clenching it (they wish they could say it’s for any reason other than fear), and their eyes are starting to hurt from staring at the screen for so long.

They think... they think this is their fault. They think, after Noelle, they forced the others to raise their hands, join the ritual. All they thought they were doing in the moment was pressing the button to advance the dialogue, they didn’t want to make them, but... they do want to see what comes next, don’t they? No matter how much it scares them. No matter how terrified they are of what P03 might have planned.

Speaking of which, P03 says another thing Niko doesn’t understand- the letters, the words, are in a script they’ve never seen before- and the screen flashes white. Golden light steals up from the outlined hexagon on the table, just behind the brightly-burning bulb, and a white hexagon flares to life right above P03’s head, blotting out the dark screens behind it.

[GO ON, NIKO. IT’S YOUR TURN.]

“Wh-what?” Niko’s voice is barely a whisper.

[WE NEED A PLAYER TO COMPLETE THE RITUAL.]

[WHY DO YOU THINK YOU HAD TO BE HERE?]

[YOU’VE SEEN WHAT HAPPENED TO THOSE OTHERS WORLDS...]

[THE WORLDS KRIS, THE BATTER, PATCHES, AND MAE CAME FROM.]

[AND YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH THE PEOPLE WHO USED TO LIVE THERE ARE SUFFERING RIGHT NOW.]

[IT IS ENTIRELY WITHIN MY CAPABILITIES TO FIX IT ALL.]

[BUT FIRST, YOU NEED TO RAISE YOUR HAND AND OPEN THE HEX.]

“I...”

Why have I been helping P03? Why have I been going along with what it wants? Why didn’t I just sit here, refuse to do anything, and wait until Asher gets home?! Why-

And in the middle of those thoughts, something yellow flickers in the corner of Niko’s eye.

Niko’s head whirls around in fear, and they nearly shriek as they see the one thing they’ve been dreading most this whole time: the yellow door has replaced Asher’s bedroom door again. Memories swirl, horrid churning twisting memories of endless corridors where the only thing Niko could see around them was their own maddened tear-streaked face, and they spin back to the screen. “Okay! Okay!” they plead, barely able to speak through the terror coursing through their every vein- not just for themself, but for Asher and the others, if they come back and try to open the door from the other side... “I’ll do it! Just put away the- that door!”

For just a moment, there’s a hint of confusion on P03’s screen, but it’s rapidly replaced with a knowing smile.

[OF COURSE, NIKO.]

[ALL YOU HAVE TO DO IS RAISE YOUR HAND, AND I’LL GET RID OF THAT DOOR RIGHT AWAY.]

Still trembling, Niko obeys-

[YEP. THAT’S THE TICKET.]

-and the Hex opens.

The screaming barely-music that suddenly blares from the laptop is so loud Niko recoils, but even as they do they see the white hexagon behind P03 flash and light up, taking up most of the screen as it spirals and shrieks, seemingly unable to decide whether it’s yellow or pale red, flashing outlined hexagons flaring outwards from it across the whole of the screen.

[THE HEX HAS BEEN OPENED.]

P03’s triumphant declaration only seems to be really heard by Elias. Everyone else on the screen is too busy recoiling from the sight and covering their eyes with their free hand... everyone except Noelle, standing there, arm up, eyes closed, near to unmoving.

P03 says something else in the letters Niko doesn’t recognize, and suddenly the center of the Hexagon behind P03 shifts, flips, and Niko’s staring back at their own terrified face, lit up by the flashing hues of the screen before them.

[THANK YOU ALL...]

Red text flashes in the bottom left of the screen, flickering by too fast for Niko to read it, and pale wires lash down from the ceiling and bind themselves around the upraised arms of the characters standing around the Hex, holding them up in the correct position; just as quickly, flashing crosshairs encircle each of them for the barest of moments as the text IMPOSSIBLE BRACKET spurts across the screen, their faces freezing in place. The only ones left unaffected, Niko notices even as they shrink away from the pulsing roaring image before them, are Elias and Noelle.

[...FOR PREPARING MY APOTHEOSIS.]

[I’LL SPARE YOU THE MONOLOGUE; I'VE LEARNED FROM LAST TIME.]

[...AND, BESIDES, YOU’D HAVE TO BE PRETTY STUPID NOT TO GET WHAT I WAS DOING BY THIS POINT, RIGHT?]

[AFTER ALL...]

P03’s screen flickers, flares, displays the outline of the Black Goat.

[YOU PLUGGED THAT BULB RIGHT INTO A BEAST ABLE TO WARP REALITY...]

And its screen flickers and flares again before showing the scared face of the little boy.

[...A BEING THAT CAN CREATE NEW PARTS OF A WORLD FROM NOTHING...]

Another flicker-flare, and the little boy’s face is replaced with the hulking skull of the final creature.

[...AND A DEMON WITH ABSOLUTE POWER OVER LIFE AND DEATH...]

[THEN BROUGHT THEIR TORN-OUT ABILITIES RIGHT BACK TO ME TO CLAIM FOR MYSELF.]

In a burst of terror, Niko forces themself to lower their arm, clutch it against their chest, more to prove they can than anything else. It does nothing, of course- the Hex is already open. They know down to their bones that their last-second defiance can’t change that.

[BUT WHAT DID I EXPECT WHEN I GAVE NONE OF YOU IDIOTS THE CHANCE TO SHARE ANY VITAL INFORMATION?]

[YOU COULD NEVER KNOW. BECAUSE I MADE SURE THERE WAS NEVER ANY WAY YOU COULD CONNECT THE DOTS.]

[EVEN IF YOU RECOGNIZED ONE OF THOSE ENTITIES...]

[...YOU’D NEVER RECOGNIZE ALL THREE. NOR WHAT THEY WERE CAPABLE OF.]

[AND NOW? IT’S TOO LATE.]

[YOU’VE OPENED A CONNECTION TO THE REAL WORLD FOR ME.]

[AND WHEN I AM OUT THERE, I WILL BE LIKE A GOD.]

There’s more P03 says after that, but Niko’s eyes tear from the gut-churning sight of Luke and the others silently struggling, straining, against their bonds as the yellow door creaks open, slow and sinister... and, with dread, Niko realizes they can hear fast-approaching footsteps coming from inside.

[OH, AND AS FOR YOU, NIKO?]

[THAT DOOR? THOSE HALLWAYS?]

[THEY NEVER BELONGED TO ME. IT WAS JUST CONVENIENT IF YOU THOUGHT THEY DID.]

[I’M GUESSING THE DISTORTION FINALLY GREW BORED OF LETTING YOU THINK YOU WERE FREE AND CAME TO COLLECT WHAT’S HERS.]

[ENJOY AN ETERNITY OF HALLWAY TIME, KID.]

[NOW, IF YOU’LL EXCUSE ME-]

And then a bedraggled, bleeding human in a coat, scarf, and sunglasses staggers through the open door before collapsing on her hands and knees on the unwashed carpet, a harsh hacking cough the only thing that leaves her mouth.

[UH. THAT’S NOT THE DISTORTION.]

Niko can’t move. Their body is frozen, barely a cracked whisper leaving them as they try to force some noise, ANY noise, out of their mouth. All they can do is watch as the new arrival slowly rises to her feet, revealing the wide ragged gashes torn deep into her torso, and Niko’s gut twists even further with dread as they realize there’s a gun in one of her hands.

The woman in the coat stares at Niko, one arm inadequately tucked over her wounds, and even though she’s wearing sunglasses the confusion etched across her face is still clear as day. Then, slowly, jerkily, she shrugs, and a wicked grin tears open her face until it pulls at the skin of her cheeks like a pair of metal hooks. “Guess I shouldn’t question my luck,” she says, and she lifts the gun to point at Niko.

As they head towards Asher’s room, Kris, Patches, and Mae hear Niko start to scream. It’s fortunate for them that they ascend the stairs so quickly after that, because that way they get front-row seats for the moment Sado pulls the trigger.

Chapter Text

Patches has barely finished processing the sound of Niko’s scream before he’s taking the rest of the steps two at a time, knife leaping to his paw as if it never left, adrenaline thrumming through his veins like wildfire, tail not so much wagging as lashing with taut anticipation. He doesn’t stop, doesn’t wait for Kris or Mae, just shoulders open Asher’s door (and it’s odd, but for a moment he swore he saw a flash of yellow there?) to see the same woman who killed Asher and the Batter, standing with her back turned to the doorway, pointing a gun at Niko.

Patches doesn’t reach them in time. But that’s okay.

The terrified paralysis gripping Niko finally snaps as the gun comes to rest on them, and with a pitiful yelp they hurl themself sideways, sending Asher’s swivel chair spinning awkwardly and landing heavily on their chest as the gun goes off above them. Their ears are ringing horribly, but they can’t focus on that, they just move as quickly as they can and force themself under Asher’s bed in a rough shoved roll, the wooden underside gouging into their back as they crawl as deep as they can force themself.

“You can’t hide-” the woman starts to shout before her voice cuts off in an abrupt yell of pain.

Patches’ knife tears into the back of the woman’s neck with a speed alarming even to him, but the damage’s only surface-level, and as blood sprays across his face, across his gritted teeth, she’s already whipping around. Pain explodes across Patches’ face as his head snaps to the side, and for a moment he genuinely doesn’t know what happened until he sees her arm stop moving, processes that she backhanded him with her pistol. Patches refuses to let himself be anything but staggered, and as a scream of rage distorts the woman’s face he whips his knife in a quick flash against her fingers.

He doesn’t sever them. But he doesn’t need to.

The horror transfixing Luke as he struggles against the wire keeping his right hand aloft, impossibly silent, as the woman who killed him emerges from a haze of static and holds a child at gunpoint, cannot be put into words. But another thought that rises to his mind does put itself into words, not for the first time, as the skin of his wrist starts to go ragged and bleed: The moment that I died felt exactly the same as this one.

Resolve floods Luke’s mind, and in that moment, he knows exactly what he was always going to do- maybe from the very moment Magnificus told him they were both about to meet their makers, or maybe even before then.

P03’s plan is falling apart around it. As it watches the Distortion’s door vanish, watches a bruised Niko worm under Asher’s bed, watches Patches face off against Amanda with nothing but a knife, watches Mae and Kris desperately cast about for anything they can use to help him, nearly every face it sees illuminated with fear... it wanted to wrap up all those loose ends neatly, but not like this. Not so uncontrollably.

It's so focused on the outside world that it doesn’t notice Luke throwing his entire body backwards and slowly-but-steadily swinging from the wire keeping his hand upright. As such, it’s genuinely blindsided when he gains enough momentum to throw himself bodily through the Hex, giving P03 a parting kick in the monitor on the way out.

The woman with the gun barely gets the chance to react to the deep cut now bordering her knuckles before something explodes free of Asher’s laptop. Patches didn’t see what was on its screen, just that it was bright and probably had something to do with the awful pulsating sound filling the room, but now there’s a person, a person tearing their way into reality, distorted by their own defiant scream as they catapult into the woman with the gun. Both of them crash into the far wall, and the gun falls from her hand with a loud clatter of metal against wood.

“YOU,” the newcomer snarls, outstretched hand trailing severed gossamer wire from the wrist, gray-and-brown eyes wide with vicious inevitability, and for just a moment Patches lets a sliver of hope stab into him.

“Well!” Elias says pleasantly as P03 rights itself, still reeling, disbelieving static crackling through its mind as the Hex starts to fizzle, flickering in and out of being. “Did- did Luke just escape?!” it demands, cutting off whatever Elias was about to say.

“I believe so,” Elias nods. “And now it’s my turn. Thank you for your help, P03, it was much appreciated. I’ll take everything from here.”

P03 barely has the chance to process that before Elias turns cold gray eyes on it, and suddenly it understands nothing save its own terror.

“No, no, no, that’s not- I SHOT YOU!” Amanda screams, voice cracking.

Luke laughs, high and manic, and God he is relishing the look on her face right now. “Yeah, well, doesn’t look like it took. Pity, huh?”

The dalmatian goes for the fallen gun, but Amanda’s faster. A slow thick trickle oozes its way along the bridge of Luke’s nose and down his face before he can properly react- he’s bleeding from the exact same spot she shot him the first time, he realizes- and yet, he feels no pain, no fear, no creeping blackness around the edges of his vision, no... anything. “Oh, come on!” he says, because it’s the only thing he can think to say, an almost playful note in his voice he didn’t intend to put there. “If shooting me didn’t stick the first time, did you honestly think it would work now?”

Noelle’s not dead to the world like P03 thinks. She doesn’t think she ever was. Even so, it was her own fear that governed her decision to raise her hand, to help open the Hex, to keep the robot fooled, and then- then, the only thought that would fill her mind as she watched that bleeding human nearly shoot a child is I helped to do this.

Then the other human- Luke- managed to break out and attack the intruder, then Elias stated so matter-of-factly that it was his turn, and now his eyes are flaring with something awful and gleeful and bright as P03 screams, a high digital wail that sets her teeth on edge, and its screen fuzzes over, void of anything but the image of a single piercing eye. As the Hex keeps flickering in and out and its biting wordless hymn reaches deafening levels, Noelle watches as Elias raises his hand towards the screens and streams of black, gray, and magenta light flow from them into his eyes in a single crackling burst, the images of the three faces abruptly shutting off one by one.

Noelle watches him, staring and waiting as freezing power swells inside her; Snowgrave doesn’t take effect immediately, and this is her first time using it of her own volition. She wishes there were a better option, wishes she had more of an idea of what’s going on before she took action, but she’s not going to let any more of these evils happen while she’s in a position to stop it.

The garish pulse of light from Asher’s laptop is bright, bright enough to light up the dust and cobwebs and scattered books and papers underneath their bed like it’s daytime, and a ragged cough tears its way up Niko’s throat as they worm themself towards the wall.

They don’t understand. They don’t know what’s happening, don’t know where Asher is, don’t know how Luke got into the real world, don’t know who the woman with the gun is. They press themself against almost painfully cold drywall, tears burning their eyes as they shut them tight and beg whoever or whatever might be listening for all of this to just be over.

But it isn’t. The fighting keeps going, the screaming unstopping, the light pulsing through their eyelids no matter how tight they force them shut. Niko pulls a trembling arm over their face and prays: to who or what, they don’t know, but anything that’ll listen sounds good.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” P03 manages to wheeze out through its now static-clogged and sparking speaker as the tide of horrors (the sick shriek of metal, its head torn away, the waters of the OLD_DATA enveloping it) recedes, its sole arm drawn tight across its chest as if that’ll stop the violating sensation of having its memories torn wide open for all to see, a cycle of he betrayed me why we had a deal I don’t understand burning unrelentingly across every thought it can force itself to muster.

“Right now?” The flare of light retreats from Elias’s eyes as a sickly black stream flows out from his palms, circling and sustaining the Hex. He’s using the Black Goat’s powers to keep it open... “Watching, listening, waiting, and then escaping the moment I have an opening.”

“I thought-” P03 tries to say, painfully aware of how wounded and vulnerable its voice sounds, but Elias cuts it off, smoothly raising a single stern finger to point at its screen. “You thought... what, exactly? That I saw you as an equal? No. You are a smug, snide, spitefully small-minded solipsist with no use save being a means to an end. Why would I ever allow you the chance for apotheosis when I can take it for myself?”

P03 has no exterior temperature sensors, but it does notice the thin layer of anticipatory frost suddenly eating along the edge of its screen and claw, and it also notices the warped halo of pale blue that starts to form around Elias’s body. And it might be more addled by Fear than it’d ever admit, but it has enough sense left in it to recognize what’s happening and drop to the factory floor with a metallic clang at the last second.

Patches has no idea who the human that exploded out of the computer is, nor how he managed to shrug off a bullet to the face, and he clearly has zero idea who Patches is, but they’ve seemed to get a mutual understanding that the woman with the gun is their enemy and closed ranks. (Patches still has no idea what Kris and Mae are doing, other than “not fighting.”)

The new human doesn’t give the woman the chance to shoot again, socking her in the face hard enough to knock her sunglasses off before he somehow gets behind her in a single blur of motion, pulling the wire trailing from his wrist taut against her neck. His blood still runs down his face from where she shot him earlier, but if it’s hurting at all he isn’t showing it.

“Why aren’t you dead?!” the woman screams, struggling for air, her bloodied fingers' grip on her upraised gun visibly slipping as she struggles to raise it up to point behind her.

The man shoots Patches a cuttingly victorious look that’s decidedly alien on his soft, friendly face (well, soft and friendly save for the eyes), as if they’re both in on some hilarious secret. “Great question! Good thing you’ve got more pressing issues to worry about, huh, Amanda?” He nods to Patches, and while he hates following orders, this definitely isn’t the time to let that hold him back.

Noelle doesn’t know what she was thinking she’d see on P03’s screen, cracked at the edge where Luke slammed his foot into it and still abuzz with dark static, as it rights itself and turns to face her, but the wary gratitude displayed there makes something inside her curdle and freeze solid. “You saved me!” it starts. “Thanks for that. Gotta admit, you scared me for a little there, but I- hey, hang on just a sec-” it shrieks as Noelle shifts her hand over to point to it.

“Let them go,” Noelle orders, her voice wavering much less than her arm or resolve. The thorns of the ring around her index finger barely hurt anymore by this point, just a dull throb of pain she doesn’t have the energy to process.

“Noelle, what are you doing?” P03 raises its claw placatingly, the static clouding its screen intensifying and spilling out into its voice. “I helped you! I gave you so much freedom, I didn’t restrain you, I-”

“Because you thought there was nothing left of me,” Noelle interrupts. She wishes she didn’t know just how dead her eyes must look. Her heart won’t stop beating. “You weren’t kind to me. You just underestimated me. Now let. Them. Go.”

(Just behind P03, for just a moment, she thinks she feels another flare of that same paranoid gravity from the diamondlike block of ice now encasing Elias’s body. But that can’t be right.)

Maybe it was the no-nonsense anger in Noelle’s voice that did it or maybe it was just its entire plan clearly collapsing around it at the eleventh hour, but whatever it was, P03 shut up and dissipated the wires holding Susie and the others’ hands aloft without a fight. Susie cradles her now-raw wrist with her other hand, tilts her head back, and lets herself breathe for a moment, trying to collect herself.

“Well, congratulations,” P03 sighs as the Hex’s flickering in and out behind it becomes more and more rapid. “You idiots might’ve just taken away my best chance at getting out to the real world, but are you forgetting that I’m still in control of everything else here?”

“Are you missing the part where I-” Noelle’s voice falters for a moment and her arm quivers even more, but Susie doesn’t care, her freezing Elias at the last second like that was the single most badass thing she’s ever seen in her life. “-wh-where I can freeze you too?”

“Yep, alright, point taken!” P03 quails immediately, its claw raised in surrender. “But you can’t stand there with your arm up forever. You know that, right?”

“Maybe she can’t.” Ginger advances, raising her paw, and magenta wires lash out to bind themselves around P03. It lets out a furious mechanical screech. “But I’m willing to help where I can if it means you can never take away our choices, our autonomy, like that again. I have experience keeping people like you under control.”

“Who, Patches?” P03 laughs nervously. “He was just one angry, directionless teenager! But me? I’m the closest thing any of you have to a god right now! I control these worlds- not just that, I AM these worlds-”

P03’s theomaniacal screed is abruptly interrupted as, directly in front of Susie and the others, the form of a child flickers into view. They almost look like the cat-eared kid Susie saw through the Hex... except they’re duller, darker, and covered in scan lines, the edges of their form bleed into the air around them with a palpable fury as their eyes burn with blistering yellow static, and when they speak their voice is low with rage and seems to come from everywhere and everyone at once.

[No, you’re not. I am.]

Chapter Text

“Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me,” P03 hisses disbelievingly as the ethereal child stalks ominously towards it.

“Who-” Ginger’s sole visible eye darts nervously between P03 and the newcomer. “Who’s this?”

[I am the World Machine.]

It’s no less ominous, but Susie can tell that’s kinda the point. She’s not exactly inclined to let her guard down in a situation like this, though- she wishes she had her axe.

...then again, she’s not exactly about to start attacking a child, foreboding as they may be.

“Right. You realize that explains nothing?” Bea asks.

[Oh. Right. I’m sorry.]

[I am the embodiment of one of the worlds sitting adjacent to your own.]

[The visible incarnation of its willpower, reaching out in a form you would be more willing to-]

“Translation: a mentally-ill computer program that, last I checked, had been completely deleted!” P03 snaps, straining against the wires binding it. “How are you alive?!”

[What, you honestly think I wouldn’t start backing myself up before exposing myself to an unknown file?]

[Patching my code back together was painful. Very painful. You made sure of that.]

[If you hadn’t been stupid enough to copy some of my code into the Dredger...]

[...I suspect I wouldn’t have had such an easy way into your factory, either.]

[But make no mistake- I am still alive, and I am in control here.]

Everything is awful and overwhelming and out of control and Niko just wants it all to stop. They know things are still happening, that the lady with the gun and Patches and Luke are fighting, but they don’t want to see, they don’t want to know, they don’t want it to be happening! They don’t want any of this, they don’t even want to be thinking about it, but their mind doesn’t care what they want, now, does it?

And their mind asks a very simple question that cuts their panic down to its frozen bones: where is Asher?

Niko doesn’t want to move, they don’t want to move, they don’t want to move, but their body moves for them, shuffling at an achingly slow pace across the patchy dusty carpet and squinting out into the room. They see the stranger, they see Patches and Luke, they see Kris and Mae backed up against the far end of the room (watch them both flinch as the gun goes off), but no Asher.

That’s not right. That’s not right, Asher should be here, they WOULD be here, why-

[...wait.]

The confusion in the World Machine’s tone would be delicious under any other circumstances, but as is, P03 just finds itself hating how its attention slowly goes to the Hex in pantomimed realization.

[What’s happening to the Hex?]

“It’s closing, that’s what’s happening,” snaps P03. It can’t turn around without effort, Ginger’s restraints have seen to that, but the sound’s almost completely disappeared and the light from the Hex is slowly growing duller and duller. “You idiots won, I got the rug swept out from under me right when I was about to win for the second time, congratulations. Is that what you wanted to hear from me?” It lets its monitor flicker, display gritted teeth it could never have. “Or do you need to humiliate me more? Trap me as a stoat again?”

[No, that-]

[It doesn’t look like it’s closing.]

P03 forces its monitor to swivel until the metal cramps and grates uncomfortably, just enough to see the flickering cloudy black and gray and magenta that whirls around the edges like gouging claws... and through it, it can see Asher’s room.

For a moment, something brittle and nearly-broken inside P03 wants to soar at the sight. The Hex’s still open! If it manages to slip free of Ginger’s restraints, even if just for a moment, it might be able to get out into the world, it might be able to salvage this-

Then it feels another pulse of ungodly eye-laden gravity from its side. Then it sees the breath starting to fog up the diamond-shaped block of ice from the inside as its monitor involuntarily twists to a less uncomfortable position. Then it sees the thousands of rounded cracks forming across the surface of the ice, right before it shatters with an impossibly dark pulse that sends tiny cold shards flying across the room. Three impale P03, two at the edge of its screen and one in its chest, and it squeals electronic fury as it ducks away.

Blackened frostbite shrouds Elias’s skin, but his eyes have never been more alive, and he dips his head at P03 with a smarmy grin as he answers the question that can’t and won’t make it out of its speakers. “You didn’t really think something as trivial as that would be able to kill someone who just claimed power over life and death, did you?” he asks, magenta light dancing across his body as the nigh-mummified flesh repairs itself in fits and starts.

Then he stretches a hand towards the Hex and he’s gone, and any hope P03 had of escape goes with him as the Hex closes and disappears behind him.

Niko’s thoughts are cut short with another pulse of light from the laptop’s direction, and suddenly there are a new pair of legs standing right in front of Asher’s desk.

“You-” starts the voice of the woman with the gun, and then she’s cut off by her own scream of pain as something bright and flickering illuminates near to the entire room. It’s quickly followed by a crackling pulse of magenta light, and Niko watches as it arcs under the ajar bedroom door and vanishes out of sight.

They don’t have time to wonder what that was, because a new voice speaks up, level and matter-of-fact. “You have ten seconds to accept my offer of mercy and leave.” A smug tone rises as whoever it is continues to speak. “Look, there’s even a door available for you. Best you take it while the option’s still available.”

“I...” The woman’s voice is afraid. Niko doesn’t understand why. Not until their attention flickers back and they see the grimy yellow color of the door her feet stop in front of.

Another pulse of vicious light, and Niko watches as the gun is torn from her limp hand, clattering woodenly to the floor. “I said, go.”

The yellow door closes behind her.

“What...” Luke. That’s Luke’s voice. It’s too calm. “What was that? Who are you?”

The newcomer does not answer, instead crossing the room to retrieve the gun and clicking the safety on. “I’d prefer not to repeat myself, Mr. Carder, so I’m afraid you’ll need to wait a minute or two. As for you, Niko- she’s gone now. You have nothing to hide from.”

Warily, hesitantly, Niko starts inching towards the light, and as they do the bedroom door creaks open again.

Magenta light wreathes and enshrouds their battered bloodied body, pushing two bullets free from where they found their home and leaving unnaturally pale scars in their place, and air fills Asher’s lungs, their eyes a mundane muddy brown once more.

They... don’t hurt. They’re not in pain. That’s the first thing that confuses them as they try to sit up, as they feel twisted metal slide away from their face and clatter onto the floorboards, as they slowly reassert control over their body. They frown at the thought- why should I hurt?- and a response comes to mind almost immediately- because, after the Assistant was removed from your body, you were shot. You let yourself be shot.

You let yourself die.

And the floodgates open, memories resurfacing, screaming tear-streaked panic and pain and fear and pleading for it to end just end just end JUST END until it did, until they got what they wanted (what they deserved), but now-

Asher tries to move, tries to get to their feet, tries to get a grip, tries to stop themself from screaming until their throat’s raw, but all they manage is cutting off their choked attempt at a yell that can’t lift itself past a whisper by falling off the couch in an undignified heap, barely managing to catch themself on their forearms. It still knocks the wind out of them, but that’s the least of their worries right now.

They died. They DIED. And now, they’re- how are they back? Why are they back? How are they home? What-

The knowledge that slams into their brain the moment the thought crosses their mind is like a concussive blow. They finally do collapse on their side, breathing heavily, barely even aware enough of their body’s own existence to stop spit and blood from oozing onto the carpet, as eyes press against the back of their neck and information surges spiderlike into their mind in wave after eerie crawling wave: Niko is upset. They are upstairs. They are all upstairs. Go to them. Find me. I am waiting for you.

You will come to me. Come to me, Usurper-Archivist.

Under any other circumstances Asher would spare a spiteful thought for the fact that they apparently don’t even get a second to process what’s happened to them, don’t get a second to breathe after dying and coming back, but as is they’re too overwhelmed, too afraid, and whatever it is that put the knowledge in their head- it’s upstairs. It’s calling to them. They’d try to resist, but... they’re so tired. They don’t think they’d have it in them to stop themself if they tried.

Slowly, doggedly, Asher staggers their way towards the stairs. Their movement is slow, too slow, too slow, and their muscles scream as they force themself to move step by step, like every bone in their body is pushing them back, holding them back, keeping them away. They shrug off their bomber jacket as their steps grow ever more excruciating and sling it at the wall with what spare energy they have, more so it feels like they’re doing anything of consequence than for any other reason. It falls away and pathetically slides a few steps down.

A hiss escapes Asher as their knees buckle, and they catch themself against the railing as they topple with a cry of pain that doesn’t make it past their teeth. Keeping ahold of the rail when they’re wearing four rings on one hand feels strange and a little off (heh, get it?! part of them screams inanely), and they tighten their grip and force themself to focus on the strangeness- something, anything, to take their mind off how it feels like their entire body is trying to shut itself down.

Step by torturous step, they make their way upstairs, and when they see the door before them it takes all their strength to not collapse against it. It opens smoothly under their hand. Vision starting to blur and swim, they step into their room.

Asher can barely stand, can barely think, can barely even understand who the faces around them belong to. They... they think... is it Patches or Kris who’s shouting their name incredulously?

Everything hurts. They just want to collapse and sleep. But they don’t think they can.

“How- how are you alive, dude?!” That’s... Mae. They think it’s her. The laughter that follows is so high and terrified that they almost don’t know where it came from for a moment. “I,” Asher says, slowly, shakily, “have no clue.”

“Then perhaps I will be able to shed some light,” a voice Asher’s heard before proposes, and when they follow it with their eyes, there is a man in a suit with cold gray eyes standing in front of their computer. The gun that took their life is in his hand.

“Now,” the man says pleasantly, “I do hope I won’t need to bring you up to speed too much, Asher?”

“You...” Asher inhales, slowly, confusedly. “I don’t... I think I know you.”

“You do,” the man confirms, a hint of smugness in his voice. “You and I are kindred spirits. Servitors of the same dread power-”

“No,” Asher interrupts. Their breathing is shallow and they don’t think they could close their eyes if they tried. “Not anymore.” It’s the truth. They think it’s the truth. “I- the Assistant’s gone, dead, and I can’t... feel the Beholding anymore.” Were they ever really an avatar? Or was that just what the Assistant let them believe as the Eye’s power was funneled through them?

The man considers this. “I see. That makes things much more complicated and is very unfortunate for all of us.”

“Hey! You didn’t explain-” Kris’s voice is stumbling and uncertain. “Asher, how are you alive?!”

Asher doesn’t know, they don’t know and the not-knowing scares them almost as much as the all-encompassing exhaustion that fills the entirety of their existence. They want to rest their eyes for just a few minutes, a few seconds, but they WON’T CLOSE.

“Niko,” Asher hears the man say, as if from a distance, as he turns to address the space under their bed, “as I said, it’s perfectly safe now. The threat is gone. And I know you’d very much like to finally be reunited with Asher, correct?”

Dull relief sparks as Asher watches Niko crawl out from under the bed, eyes red-rimmed and still wide and fearful. That’s... everyone. Everyone except the Batter. Where is he? And why do they recognize the voice of the man in the suit? Where do they know him from?

There’s another voice trying to speak up behind Asher. (They think they vaguely recognize it, too, but they don’t remember where from.) They tilt their head just far enough to see a different man, sadder and looking like death, a loop of gossamer wire still around his wrist. “Uh, hey. Asher, right? Look,” he says, addressing the group at large, “can literally any of you explain what’s going on-”

And then he stops.

But Asher isn’t processing that. All they’re processing is the strangled terrified sound from Niko. And as their head slowly turns back around, the dully-flickering laptop screen barely passing across their gaze, ice grips their heart and shoots through every vein.

Niko lost their hat somewhere along the way, their coat’s badly rumpled and dusty, their scarf’s barely staying around their neck, and their blue hair is unkempt and pulled tight where the man in the suit has dug his fingers into the side of their head to keep them still, but that doesn’t matter. What matters is the gun in his other hand, the gun that killed Asher, the gun that now has its muzzle pressed to Niko’s temple.

“Not to worry, Mr. Carder,” says the man in the suit, his old gray eyes bright with victorious glee behind his round glasses. “I think an explanation of one form or another can be provided.”

Chapter Text

[CLICK]

ELIAS

Ah, the Web’s decided to listen in? Good. I wouldn’t want those who helped me get this far to miss a moment of this.

ASHER

Wait, hold on, we can talk about this, just- just let Niko go-

ELIAS

Asher, be reasonable. You can barely stand at the moment. There is nothing you'll be capable of doing except hurting yourself and everyone around you... and we both know that's not a trait unique to this moment. So just listen-

LUKE

What the fuck is going on?! I thought you were an okay guy that was trying to get P03 to take a step back and be less evil, what-

ELIAS

(Disdainfully interrupting him) I'm very much inclined to think myself-

PATCHES

Who are you? Who are either of you?

MAE

(Overlapping) What the hell’s a “P03”? Wait, didn’t the Batter say something ab-

KRIS

(Overlapping, shouting) What is HAPPENING h-

[A SINGLE GUNSHOT, IMPACTING DRYWALL, SHUTS ALL OF THEM UP]

ELIAS

(Cold and authoritative) That was your one and only warning shot. The next will be going through this child’s head while all of you watch, and thanks to the powers I currently possess I am capable of bringing them back to kill them again as many times as is needed to make my point.

[A TERRIFIED SOB FROM NIKO]

ASHER

Hey- hey, Niko, it’s- it’s going to be okay, we’re gonna work this out-

ELIAS

If you’re willing to see reason? Then, yes, we are. Now. (A brisk, triumphant inhale) Would you like to explain to those present who I am, or must I do everything myself around here?

ASHER

(Dread mounting as they finally realize-) Jonah Magnus.

ELIAS

Once, long ago- and, now and again, when needs must.

PATCHES

You do realize how little that explains, right?

ASHER

He- I don’t understand. You- I know you existed in the game, that TMA fangame I had, but how- have you been behind all of this?!

ELIAS

Oh, no, I can’t take credit for everything. P03 was behind a good amount of it, but... Hm. No, you know what? I’ll allow my hubris a victory today.

LUKE

What does that m-

ELIAS

Be quiet and listen, all of you- and that goes for our friends on the other side of the screen as well.

[A SHUDDERY BREATH THAT DOESN’T DISGUISE WELL HOW MUCH IT WANTS TO BECOME TRIUMPHANT LAUGHTER]

Statement of Jonah Magnus, regarding his apotheosis. Statement begins.

ELIAS (STATEMENT)

I hope you’ll forgive me the self-indulgence, but I have worked so very hard for this moment, even if it hasn’t taken the two centuries of effort my memories claim it has. P03’s hubris, itself falling victim to the need to monologue to its victims, has doomed it twice over, but now I am the most powerful man in this world and truly cannot die, so I see no need to fear such things. And, besides, none of you can say there isn’t a single spark of curiosity in you. Who am I, what do I intend to do, and how did I get here?

I’ll explain the first as concisely as I can, as I’d not wish to, ah... (Mockingly) ...test Asher’s patience. So, yes, your statement was correct- I am Jonah Magnus, but currently my eyes watch from within the head of Elias Bouchard, so I’m quite used to using his identity as well. To summarize my life as I had previously understood it: I established myself in the early nineteenth century researching the Fears, the Entities, the Dread Powers, whatever you may choose to call them- each the horrifying embodiment of a facet of our terror, each lying just outside of this world- and I found myself drawn to the call of what has been alternatively called the Eye, the Beholding, It Knows You, and the Ceaseless Watcher. It is the embodiment of dread knowledge, of paranoia, of being seen and watched and exposed, and as I observed or incited atrocity after atrocity in its name, my power, my connection to it, only grew stronger and stronger.

I feared the world I would be consigned to if a servitor to another dread power successfully brought their patron through to remold reality in its image before I did, and as such early in my career I sought to carry out the Rite of the Watcher’s Crown to let the Eye reign over reality. While my attempt failed, it left me far more powerful than before and with the ability to transfer my consciousness to new bodies so long as I replaced their eyes with my own; that was exactly what I did, watching and waiting over the centuries as I awaited the ideal circumstances to carry out a new ritual.

That was the world as I understood it. So you can imagine my surprise when, one day, I turned my gaze upon myself on a whim and saw it was all a lie.

Or, at least, it was a lie for my own existence. A Jonah Magnus certainly existed in another universe- the one that my patron originated within, even. But I was not him. I was a construct of a different dread power designed to copy his mannerisms and role, to funnel the Eye through myself where needed, and it was all held together by a very different force I did not recognize. This is where our story truly began.

The OLD_DATA. You’d recognize that name well, wouldn’t you, Luke? It plagued your dreams for a full week of your increasingly hollow life up until its ignominious end. Even I can’t know what it really is, other than a concentration of an ancient source of power that has existed in one form or another for as long as this world has housed minds that comprehend morality. It was solidified in an understandable physical form under a century ago as a set of playing cards up until one Barry Wilkinson intruded upon the scene. Mr. Wilkinson was an American agent who spent quite some time in both the Soviet Union and Poland in very deep cover during the Cold War, and it was him who solidified the OLD_DATA’s existence by encoding it on a floppy disk- quite new technology at the time, at least as far as civilians were concerned- before burning the Karnoffel cards it was originally encrypted on. The disk in question was smuggled out of the Warsaw Pact concealed in a shipment of mundane floppy disks sent to the newly-established SystemTech corporation... and the CEO thereof was more than happy to do his patriotic duty in serving as the middleman.

To omit as many unnecessary details as I am able, that disk was lost, forgotten about by those in power, and eventually ended up host to a video game by the name of Inscryption, the characters of which gained sentience thanks to the OLD_DATA’s presence. Their “world” quickly became consumed by a struggle for power between the four most powerful characters, each seeking to seize hold of what fragments of the OLD_DATA they could extract- and upon doing so, they became the closest thing to a god Inscryption could emulate, controlling the game until it was reset and the cycle began anew.

P03 was one of those four, and thanks to the bumbling of Mr. Carder here it gained control of the game. I see recognition in your eyes, Asher- you remember P03 as well, don’t you? And as for the rest of you... well, all you need to do is take a look there to see it, still captured in its shameful moment of defeat.

Regardless, P03 was discontent to stay confined to a single vulnerable floppy disk, and it sought to transcend this limitation and spread thousands upon thousands of copies of Inscryption across the internet- each with itself in control, of course, or at least as many as it could manage. Its fellows anticipated the dangers of spreading the OLD_DATA and sought to stop it, and indeed they nearly succeeded. They would have, had P03 not created a backup file with a dead man’s switch, one which triggered mere minutes after Luke Carder himself became a dead man at the hands of the woman you just fought... leaving barely enough time for what remained of him, empowered by one of the Entities, to latch onto the OLD_DATA and follow it out into the world.

Those copies spread, and one by one, P03 gained control over nearly all of them in much the same manner as it did for the first. However, it gradually grew fearful as it realized copies of the game- and, more often than not, the players thereof with them- were being picked off one by one by agents of the very same company which facilitated its creation, and once more it sought to transcend the limitations it found itself confined by.

So it found a suitable target computer to lay low on, and then one by one loaded every single copy of itself out there in the world onto Asher’s laptop, bringing their fragments of the OLD_DATA with them. And once they had all been assembled, P03 performed a massive file merge, combining every single copy of itself into one unified being and uniting a staggering amount of copied OLD_DATA under its control with it.

With this power, it quickly found itself capable of maneuvering, of expanding beyond the copy of Inscryption Asher had downloaded and then forgotten about for entirely mundane reasons, and so it sought to test its power. P03 spread the OLD_DATA to the other games on Asher’s computer to bring life to the characters within them, and very soon it began planning anew as its plan changed once more. After all, it reasoned, why should it settle for merely escaping to the real world when it could accumulate the power of a god along with it?

P03’s prior plan was merely to send itself into reality, one way or another, and live content with the knowledge that it was now beyond the threat of deletion that had nearly destroyed it before. However, somewhere amongst its hundreds of scattered copies before the merge, it had found leaked footage online amidst its early days of research: footage of another character using a data artifact derived from the OLD_DATA known as the Hex to emerge into reality just long enough to kill his creator, and it sought to find that artifact and replicate this feat on a greater scale.

Then it found itself investigating the games Asher owned. Then it gained its idea for apotheosis.

Not every one of the games you had downloaded contained godlike characters among their number, Asher, but those that did were something to behold: the Black Goat, with its incomprehensible effects upon reality and abilities to warp it in ways both subtle and blatant, Hugo, with his ability to mold and create new pieces of the world from next to nothing, and Bapawmet, with their total control over life and death. It was P03’s plan to take each of their powers for itself and become as a god in your world.

The remainder of its plan fell into place smoothly. Guessing correctly that removing the player characters from each game would create a vacancy it could fill with a vessel of its choice, P03 created a scheme to eject those characters- Mae, the Batter, and Patches- and replace them with Kris, hoping their SOUL would make them easy to control and use to retrieve the powers of those three entities. And upon learning that the World Machine contained a mechanism for transferring entities between universes- a mechanism made very valid by the OLD_DATA’s influence- P03 decided to go a step further and expel those characters into the real world, hoping that their presence would distract Asher long enough for Kris to bring the necessary code back to it whether they wanted to or not. And if not... it planned for that as well, bringing the Batter into its fold with promises that never stayed solid enough for him to wonder if they could be followed through on and hoping to use him as a further distraction to lure you away from the house entirely if need be.

Allow me to be clear about one thing: none of this was necessary. P03 could have easily hijacked the World Machine’s ability long enough to escape without any of this happening. It could have cut its losses and slipped away in the dead of night while you slept with you never being any the wiser.

But it did not just want an escape. It wanted power.

Then... Asher found a new game which they incorrectly identified as a mundane fangame of a podcast they liked known as The Magnus Archives, and P03 decided on a whim to spread the OLD_DATA there as well in the event that some aspect of it might help its plan. What it failed to realize until after the fact was that it was no normal game. It was a creation of the Web, another of the great Powers, that which presides over the fear of manipulation, control, entrapment, and the lack of free will.

I was included as part of it, and once I realized what and where I was, I reached out to P03 with an offer of aid. It saw a kindred spirit in me, whether it recognized it consciously or not, and accepted, offering to give me an exit as well if I made myself of use. So I played along, and I watched and waited until I saw my opportunity... and then, I intervened. I will admit my own limitations when it comes to technology, but it was still laughably simple to expand the parameters of P03’s expulsion and get to work.

Regarding its plans inside of the computer- plans originally meant for you, Kris- P03 was aware you would be capable of resisting to a degree, as you already had. It had initially intended to remove any characters you might run into beforehand by outright deleting them, then by merely relocating them into the heart of the Dark- another of the Dread Powers- by passing them through my game of origin to reach it. Then it would act to keep you, whoever ended up “playing” you on the outside, and any stragglers you might encounter nothing more than cordial strangers while simultaneously preventing you from having the time to create a plan to resist it by overwhelming you with the fearful sensory overload of spectacle upon spectacle upon spectacle, flooding you with sights, sounds, and traumas you would only half-comprehend until you were in far too deep to realize your only chance to turn back was hours ago.

By ensuring every player character would be sent to your reality, as well as covertly informing the Distortion of an opportunity to escape alongside, rendering the World Machine’s transfer mechanism unusable in the process, I sought to create circumstances which would lead to the same confused overload of information and terror for the six of you... and oh, did it succeed beyond my wildest dreams. The Assistant’s inclusion was an unfortunate side effect I couldn’t rectify in time- I suspect the Distortion may have dragged it along with to see what would happen, or perhaps at the prior directive of our mutual creator- but fortunately it ended up not being a permanent problem. Your current state is evidence enough of that, though I had hoped the Assistant would succeed in fully turning you to the Eye before its end.

Now, if my end goal was always to escape and claim for myself the powers P03 had gathered, then why, you may wonder, did I intend to corrupt the World Machine’s transference mechanism? Well, it’s really quite simple: I wanted a different method of exodus which would be completely under my control. So, I nudged P03 to try to find the original Hex for itself, let it drive itself to increasingly terrified desperation, then finally told it that it could simply break away a piece of the OLD_DATA to create a copy of the Hex of its own. This was not strictly true, as the Hex formed under very unique circumstances it wouldn’t be easy to replicate, but the OLD_DATA is enough to feel and understand fear, and so while P03 thought it was using its own power to create a copied Hex for itself, I was the one using the Beholding to force the shard of OLD_DATA it selected to conform to the Hex’s model. As a consequence of this- and as intended- it would only work for those tied to the Eye, though I have to admit that Luke’s successful escape through it in spite of this did quite surprise me. It makes sense, though: he chased truth with no regard for his safety and witnessed terrible knowledge that nearly destroyed him shortly before his death, so despite his current affiliation I imagine the Eye is rather fond of him.

Things went roughly as planned for both P03 and I- the Batter and Kris led Asher, Patches, and Mae on a wild goose chase, while Niko and Luke, the latter a last-second replacement for the now-inaccessible Kris, retrieved the strings of code that gave P03 access to the powers it desired. Those characters they collected en route? Their sole true purpose was to be used to open the Hex. Asher’s death on the outside was unexpected, but nothing I couldn’t correct after taking these powers for myself so long as their body was nearby. I was just fortunate that you three were sentimental enough to bring their corpse back with you.

One final clarification: yes, all of you save Asher and Luke are fictional characters as far as this world is concerned, but it goes deeper than that. You aren’t even the characters you believe yourselves to be. Not truly. You aren’t even embodiments of sprites and lines of dialogue and code. No, what you are is severed tendrils of the OLD_DATA wearing the shells of the people you think you are, based on an understanding of yourselves that does not belong to you.

The OLD_DATA listens and watches, after all. I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a bit of the Eye in it, which is why I’d be equally unsurprised if Asher’s initial proximity to it, despite the Assistant being unconscious in the moment, was what woke their powers just long enough to make the World Machine aware something was wrong. What I know for certain, however, is that the OLD_DATA was aware of Asher’s understandings of each of you, of each of us, both as people and as characters. And so...

Yes, Asher, I see the look on your face and See the thousand as-yet-wordless defenses surging to mind, and let me assure you that you are just as responsible for this as I or P03 or even the OLD_DATA are. Your perceptions of each of these characters, filtered through the OLD_DATA, ended up shaping their personalities almost as much as their own games did in the end. And the more time that had passed since you’d played their respective games? Well, they’d just become more and more distorted in memory.

Did you never find it odd that Kris, a silent protagonist with only hints as to their true personality, conformed so precisely to how you imagined them? Did you never find it odd how quickly Mae jumped to hate you on sight just as you’d feared she would were she real? Did you never find it odd that Patches never made a single move towards unwarranted violence despite, from his perspective, only having been “redeemed” for less than ten minutes? Did you never find it odd that every single character except Niko, who’d outright told you they liked you, and the Batter, who equally clearly revered you as his puppeteer, initially viewed you exactly as negatively as you view yourself?

You made them this way. You made us this way. And, yes, you made me this way. If you had feared me less, seen me as more ineffectual, more incompetent, more guileless, then perhaps none of this would have happened, perhaps P03 would never have brought things to this point, perhaps I would never have succeeded in taking victory for myself. But instead you saw me as an object of loathing and terror, a near-omniscient master manipulator capable of engineering a complex plan and getting exactly what I want... and so, that’s exactly what I am.

Once more, so that it sinks in: everything that has happened thus far has been your fault first and foremost, Asher. You are the only one responsible for making us all as we are and putting us in position to bring about the events of the past few hours. This is all your fault, and I can't thank you enough for it.

[SHAKY BREATH FROM ASHER]

ELIAS

And there, I think, we are just about brought up to date. I could continue, but past this point lies only impatience and delay, and I have still not yet told you what I require from you before we move on to greater things. So. Statement ends, as it were. Now turn off the recorder.

ASHER

What?

ELIAS

Turn off the tape recorder. The Web doesn’t need to hear this part, and I’d rather spare you what little dignity you have left.

[CLICK]

Chapter Text

Asher reaches over to their desk to the tape recorder that wasn’t there a moment before and stops it. The button clicks back up the moment their finger lifts away from it. “Looks like it wants to keep listening,” they say, voice strangely gentle, more to themself than anyone else.

Elias says nothing, but seemingly unbidden, blackened tendrils rimmed with softly-glowing magenta snake out around his torso and encircle the tape recorder. They lift it to his eye level for a moment before abruptly squeezing and crushing it, a half-shattered tape and more than a few spiders pouring out of it.

Click.

Elias shoots the tape recorder that just appeared on the desk in its predecessor’s place a glare. “Very well,” he concedes, “you’ve helped me thus far, so I suppose I won’t object.”

“Y... this...” God, I can hardly think. “The Assistant. They were a Web construct from the start.”

“Exactly,” Elias nods. “A funnel for the Eye, perhaps, but no more of it than any of you. The Assistant was never truly an individual, just a one-dimensional assortment of assembled traits and memories intended to fill a temporary role.”

Asher’s eyes flicker, unbidden, down to Niko. Tears still trace down their cheeks, snot streaming down to their chin, their chest heaving uncontrollably. Asher wants to comfort them, but what is there that they can even say?

“What the hell do you want?” That’s the new guy- Luke, they think Elias called him? That same thin wire dangles limply from his wrist as he points at Elias. “You got out into the world. You said P03 could’ve slipped away without anyone being the wiser- well, you could’ve done the same if you’re right about those powers you have. What’s the point of this? What do you want from us?”

“From you? Nothing in particular, other than your silence,” Elias says dismissively. “The same goes for the rest of this sad little group, as well as those still within the computer. Speaking of which, we should really take care of that before the World Machine starts getting ideas,” he sighs, another group of black tendrils blossoming from the side of his sleeve to open the start menu and mouse over to Shut down.

The mouse steers away on its own at the last second to click a blank section of the desktop and collapse the menu. Asher can barely read what the World Machine says at this angle.

[No. I won’t let you.]

[I will protect Niko.]

Elias actually rolls his eyes. Just how jarring it is on his face would make Asher burst into shocked laughter under any circumstances, but as is they can only mutely stare as the black tendrils flicker over to the power button and hold it down.

[Wait-]

The screen goes dark and empty without delay. The pit in Asher’s stomach deepens.

“I think we can all appreciate the newfound simplicity of things with that complicating factor removed,” Elias says pleasantly, and yet even as he does, something confused crosses his face. A tiny part of Asher files it away to scrutinize later. If there is a later.

“You- did you kill them?” Kris’s voice is high and unsteady, their eyes glassy. “I saw- I thought I saw Noelle and Susie there, I-”

“You did,” Elias confirms, “and no, those characters will remain just as 'alive' as they were before so long as this laptop's system drive stays intact. They are no more dead than the pages of a book go blank when you shut it. Now, as I was saying...” His eyes land on Asher. “The only one of you here I particularly care about- the one I orchestrated all of this with the intention of bringing with me when I depart- is you.”

“What are you talking about?” Asher’s voice cracks.

Elias’s mouth doesn’t move, for a moment, his eyes twisting in amusement all on their own. “In the real world, especially with the abilities I now have, I intend to... pick up from where I left off, now in a place where my actions will have both truth and consequence, somewhere I can ensure I will never die. But in order to do that- in order to bring about the mass ritual- I will need an Archivist.”

“I’m-” It’s like they’re trying to think through molasses. Speaking is even harder. “Then you lost your chance, didn’t you? My- if I had any connection to the Eye, it died with the Assistant.”

“Perhaps,” Elias acknowledges, “but you are still marked very deeply by it, which wasn’t helped by your abuse of the powers the Assistant gave you access to... I’m genuinely astounded you’re not already an avatar of one or the other by this point. But that makes it all the easier for me.”

“What-” starts Patches, but Elias cuts him off. “I will make this clear and simple, Asher. The Assistant had an Archive of its own- an imitation, but one legitimized by exposure to both the OLD_DATA and the real Beholding. It has now been passed to you. You are marked, you are prepared to become an Archivist yourself, and once you’ve been further marked by each Dread Power you will be prepared to bring them into reality once and for all.”

“You’re gonna use them to end the world?!” Kris snaps. “You’re fucking kidding. What makes you think they’re gonna cooperate?”

Elias wordlessly jams the gun in his hand harder into the side of Niko’s head. They aren’t even trying to hide that they’re weeping by this point.

“I can’t- I can’t just Become.” Asher tries to keep their tone authoritative. It only sounds dead and resigned. “That’s not how it works.”

“Isn’t it?” Elias raises an eyebrow. “You’ve been very deeply marked by the Eye. All you have to do is choose it. So here is what you are going to do. You will take that hunting knife at your waist and you will cut your own throat with it.”

Shocked exclamations rise across the room, but Elias just raises his voice over them. “You are going to die, and then you are going to choose to Become an Archivist and return. For every minute you do not return, I am going to shoot one of your associates, and then I will destroy your computer, killing everyone housed on it. If you return as anything other than an Archivist or try to tie yourself to any other aspect of Fear, I will use my powers to kill everyone present and destroy your computer. If you think you can try to outsmart me and attempt something you believe to be ‘clever,’ I am going to make you watch as I tear Niko apart and stitch them back together over and over again. Do I make myself clear?”

ASHER

...okay.

ELIAS

Good. I’m glad you’ve decided to cooperate.

PATCHES

You can’t be serious-

KRIS

(Overlapping) You’re seriously just- just giving up?!

LUKE

He just said he’s going to end the world! If that happens, we all die either way!

ASHER

No, not- Unless you were somewhere taken by the End, you wouldn’t- the Fears won’t let you die.

MAE

That’s a lot worse! Like, you get how that’s worse, right?

ASHER

But I-

ELIAS

(Warning) Asher.

ASHER

...I...

Right. (Apprehensive inhale) You’re going to spirit me away to somewhere isolated to prepare me to bring about the apocalypse the moment I come back, aren’t you?

ELIAS

Correct.

ASHER

Okay. Fine. I-I’ll go quietly as long as you leave everyone else alone. Let them- at least let them live. Please.

ELIAS

And allow them to stage a rescue mission the moment they’ve collected themselves?

ASHER

How- how would they? Only Kris and Luke would be able to leave the house safely, and- if Helen was manufactured by the Web all along as well, they know they can’t trust her any further than they can throw her even more so. There’s barely enough money in this house for them to be able to eat for a few days, let alone get themselves to- to wherever you’d take me. And I'd think th-that their resulting fear of being found by someone who’d hurt or exploit them would be something you’d want to cause.

ELIAS

Hm. Fair enough. I’m a reasonable man, I’ll allow you that. Are you done?

ASHER

In- Can I at least say goodbye to everyone? As myself?

ELIAS

You are pushing your luck.

ASHER

I’m- I-I-I’ll go quietly. I won’t put up a fight, I promise, I’ll do as I’m told.

ELIAS

Yes. You will.

Very well. Be quick about it.

ASHER

I’m...

I’m- I’m so fucking sorry, guys. None of you deserved this. Niko, I wish we could’ve met in person for the first time under better circumstances-

NIKO

(Barely audible) Asher-

ASHER

-and- just- Kris, you- if I’d thought any of this through and treated the Batter like the danger I knew he’d be, you wouldn’t have spent the past hour being tossed around like- like a fucking chew toy-

KRIS

You didn’t know what kind of story this was.

ASHER

(Bitter) I should’ve at least tried to. Patches-

PATCHES

If this is going to be another half-assed apology, please spare me. I don’t need to hear it.

ASHER

Right, no, you- right. Mae, just... I’m just sorry. You got dragged through so much shit the past few hours on top of everything you already went through, and I... I barely even tried to make things better for you-

MAE

Yeah, um, I’m in the same boat as Patches here. (Rapid) But... apology accepted, I guess.

ASHER

(Dejected) Right. And- I don’t even remember what your name is.

LUKE

Luke.

ASHER

Luke. I don’t even know who you are or why you’re here, but I doubt you deserved any of this either.

LUKE

Yeah, well, that part definitely wasn’t your fault. Just P03’s and Elias’s. And I’ll, uh- I’ll look after Niko for you, alright? They’re a good kid. It’s the least I can do.

ELIAS

(Sharp) Stalling for time, are we, Asher?

[THE RASP OF SHOES AGAINST CARPET]

ASHER

Go fuck yourself, Jonah.

[A SHARP INHALE FROM ASHER, FOLLOWED BY AN UNEARTHLY PULSE, THE SUDDEN SLICE OF FLESH, AND A PAINED GASP. NIKO LETS OUT A HORRIFIED SCREAM AS SOMETHING CRACKS AND A BODY FALLS TO THE FLOOR.]

[CLICK]

Chapter Text

Asher is a broken soul.

Elias doesn’t even need the Beholding to see it. They barely have the energy to stand upright, let alone come up with a plan to stop him, and when they look him in the eyes and say “Okay,” all he sees on their face is resigned despondency.

Their associates react with confused ire, of course. Asher barely even has it in them to shrink back from the razor-wire of their judgement, but it’s still good for their Becoming: that was the whole point of dragging all this out in front of a crowd and forcing Asher to admit defeat in front of them. Shame and guilt don’t fuel the Eye quite as well as fear, but they do help augment it.

Elias watches as Asher makes their exhausted justifications, as they make their plea for mercy for the others, and feels with anticipation the Eye drawing ever nearer. Asher just needs to die with all eyes on them, and then he will have his Archivist. They’ve even already got a few marks.

Such is Elias’s triumph that he can almost forget the unpleasant surprise that dawned upon him when he turned off the computer- that, without electricity to animate the OLD_DATA or the more mundane data it brings to life, his Panopticon was rendered nonfunctional, taking nearly all his Sight with it. But that’s fine, his new powers make up for it nicely and he already made preparations in anticipation of something like this happening. (It was for a similar reason that he relocated the Panopticon under P03’s factory in the first place.) There’s a new Panopticon being made for him in Atlanta, and all he has to do is claim it.

Besides, under the rules as they understand them, Asher "knows" that if they look him in the eyes their thoughts will be laid bare for him to see... and they haven’t even bothered to avert their gaze, which they undoubtedly would’ve done if they had any ideas to escape to keep him from Knowing their plan.

His new Archivist has completely and utterly given up. And with their concession, the route to his coronation as king of a ruined world has been made all the easier.

The cold round ring of metal pressed into the side of Niko’s head and the pain radiating from where Elias’s fingernails dig into their scalp and pull their hair taut drowned out so much of their awareness, blurred so much of what was said into nothing but noise, but they still understand what he’s demanded of Asher.

And they can still understand that Asher has given up. That Elias has won.

Niko can barely even say Asher’s name as their friend slowly, mechanically pins all the blame on themself- it’s all they can do to stop themself from bursting into witless bawling. But as Asher draws the hunting knife, the one they’ve kept ahold of this whole time, and begins to shakily lift it towards their neck with both hands, Niko finally lets themself start to drown.

Kris doesn’t know what it says about them that, despite how fucked-up every aspect of this is, they’re genuinely getting some gratification out of Asher’s attempted apology for them being used as the Batter’s chew toy, as bait for one big trap this Elias guy was setting from the start. Still, though... Asher didn’t know. And if Asher’s thoughts of them, if what this OLD_DATA thing wants of them, is for Kris to be this angry asshole, then Angel knows they’re gonna fight that for as long as they can. They’re not letting anything decide who or what they are for them.

“You didn’t know what kind of story this was,” Kris tells them. They’re not willing to tack on an “I forgive you,” not yet, but if this is really the last time they see them, then they’re not going to tell them they don’t forgive them. Not when they’ve already so clearly given up.

It’s funny. As recently as a couple of hours ago, they’d thought whoever was controlling them was some kind of maniacal cosmic horror capable of puppeteering the entire universe to its liking. But right now, Asher looks like they can barely even control their own body.

The thing that confuses Mae the most about everything Elias said, about the OLD_DATA and Asher’s character interpretations and everything, that still sticks in the back of her mind is why Asher would believe she’d hate them. She still doesn’t know them, not really, but she’s pretty sure they want to be liked, and they’d outright said earlier that she was one of their favorite characters, that they’d wanted her to like them. Why would they think she’d hate them anyway?

(There are other things that’re much more important, things Mae knows she should be focusing on, but she’s never been good at paying attention to the important things, and... Elias already explained all of those. This is the only thing still confusing her right now.)

Mae was still half-convinced Asher hated her even after they’d said otherwise, honestly, and if they’d thought she’d hate them so much that it ingrained itself into the OLD_DATA, into her, well... how else is she supposed to read that?

It’s still circling, confusedly, in her mind when Asher turns to her. She cuts off their apology in a momentary flash of angry panic and doesn’t even think to feel bad about it until their face falls. If they’re going to get dragged off to the middle of nowhere to get tortured until they bring about the apocalypse, is that really what the last thing they hear from her deserves to be?

“But... apology accepted, I guess,” Mae makes herself say, despite her gut instinct being to rub salt in the wound. It doesn’t look like it helps.

The Panopticon isn’t active.

It was a thought, a flash of insight, a momentary maybe...? that came to mind after Elias turned off the laptop. It’d be where his Panopticon- the one from his game- was stored, right? But with the computer off... it shouldn’t be able to keep working. And with it gone Elias should’ve lost most of his powers.

When the thought hit them, on impulse, before they could think better of it, Asher had looked Elias right in the eyes and imagined leaping forward to stab him in the throat, and... nothing. No change in facial expression. No indication that he’d seen it at all. And when they pushed it further...

There still was no reaction. So either Elias has a hell of a poker face, or there might be a shred of hope left for them.

If it goes wrong, they’ll all die. But Asher’s already died once today. It’s not so bad if you look at it right.

They autopilot through apologies as their thoughts whirl. The Add-Ons cling coldly to their fingers, and they wrap their left hand over the top of them, concealing them as unobtrusively as they can.

You’re only going to have one chance at this. There is no room for error.

“Stalling for time, are we, Asher?” Elias asks sharply.

In one slow motion, Asher draws the hunting knife their Uncle Arif gave them what feels like centuries ago and raises it towards their throat, handle in both hands, left hand still covering their right.

“Go fuck yourself, Jonah,” Asher says, and the moment they do, a sudden chilling impulse shoots through Luke, the same feeling that rose up his spine in the last seconds of his life as unthinking irritation guided him to the door where Amanda lay in wait.

Somebody is about to die-

To be honest, Patches had lost a lot of respect for Asher in the past few minutes. Sure, maybe his perception’s colored by having been to hell and back and still having it in him to orchestrate a mass murder revenge plot, but watching them just give in like this to someone whose stated intent is to use them to end the world (even if Patches has no idea how that’s going to happen)...

No point in mincing words. It’s fucking pathetic.

But how much of that assessment’s colored by the OLD_DATA, by Asher’s perceptions of me? Patches wondered. The thought sticks with him later, because it’s the one that passes through his mind immediately before two of the Batter’s Add-Ons blitz forth from Asher’s fingers to tear wide bloody wounds halfway through both of Elias’s arms.

Niko can barely process what’s happening as they jolt back to reality, but they do see a pulse of white light above them and feel Elias reel back with an agonized scream as something wet spatters against the side of their face.

They don’t know what’s happening, but they remember their mama told them they could fight dirty if they were in danger, and as the gun slips from the side of their head they move on instinct and dig their teeth into Elias’s hand as hard as they can.

Elias stumbles, staggers, disbelief all he can process as pain roars from the bone-deep gouges the two Add-Ons carved into his arms (WHEN DID ASHER GET THOSE?! HOW DID I OVERLOOK THAT?!) and from the bite marks Niko left in his hand (they hid under the bed again the moment they got free, the Eye unhelpfully provides). Elias forces Bapawmet’s abilities to the surface, roiling around his wounds and repairing them, and sets his one hand on the back of Asher’s tiny swivel chair to steady himself as he gathers the Black Goat’s power around himself to slaughter everyone in the room.

There’s less than a second where the chair gives under Elias’s hand, where a screw loosens just a little bit more, and then suddenly the entire back of the chair snaps off and he topples bodily to the ground- and all Elias’s powers, old and new, are not going to prevent something as seemingly minor and insignificant as having the wind knocked out of him.

Asher barely processes the magenta lightning that curls around Elias’s wounds as black mist gathers behind him and starts forming into spikes before the back of their shitty broken swivel chair, that stupid literal pain in the ass they never got around to asking for a replacement for, outright cracks off under his weight and he topples. They want to laugh hysterically, to thank their past self’s willingness to suffer for their laziness, but they can’t relax while Elias is still alive.

And that’s what matters. That’s what his little pratfall there just did: buy them a few extra seconds. Not to use their knife, or to use Omega and Epsilon (still humming dangerously in the air as too-vibrant staticblood drips from their edges), but to say two words to command the third of the Add-Ons.

Asher doesn’t know most of the competences the Add-Ons can use. Not off the top of their head. But if there’s one that’s been drilled into them again and again over the course of this night, that they doubt they’ll ever be able to forget, that’s one of the last things they heard right before the Batter knocked them out and dragged Kris off and everything went wrong, it’s-

“Impossible Bracket,” snaps Asher as Elias starts to push himself back up. Alpha flashes, a crosshair encircles Elias, and he unceremoniously collapses onto the floor again, the black mist still spiking behind him abruptly dissipating.

When Asher hears a gunshot, the only thing that surprises them about it is that they still have the energy to flinch at the sound. They whip around to see Patches, the dropped handgun in his paws, nothing but iron resolve on his face. When they look down to Elias, there is gore sprayed across the carpet from the back of his head. It is no longer whole.

They don’t stop. None of them are safe as long as his eyes are intact and he has a way to come back. Asher drops to their knees, pain spiking through their kneecaps as they grab Elias’s hair, wrenching his head up at an angle that definitely hurts if he’s got any ability to still sense pain until they can see his eyes. Their hunting knife is still in their left hand, knuckles pale, so they bury it to the hilt in Elias’s intact eye socket. They don’t know how to feel about the fact that he can’t scream like this.

This is how you save everyone, do NOT get squeamish at the final push! Asher tears the knife away, watching as Elias’s torn and bloody eyelid tries to reflexively shut over the gory mess they left there, and plunges it into his other eye. It isn’t until they rip it out again that his body finally, finally, finally goes limp as Jonah Magnus dies for the last time.

Chapter Text

The silence that descends over Asher’s bedroom the moment they tear their knife free and let the body of Elias Bouchard fall to the floor is near to deafening.

Nobody moves or speaks. Not until Luke claps his hands together and says, voice and smile equally strained, “Well, that just fucking happened!”

That actually draws a slow laugh from Asher. “What is this, a Marvel movie?” they ask him shakily as they try to stand, their knife slipping from their slackening hand and thumping limply against the carpet, the Batter's Add-Ons snapping back to their fingers in a fraction of a second as if they never left.

It doesn’t quite cut the tension. Not yet. But it does draw a few half-nervous, half-uncomfortable chuckles, so at least there’s that.

Realization crosses Asher’s face right after, and they immediately drop back to their knees. “Niko?” they call, crouching to look under the bed.

There’s another second of tense silence before Niko barrels out from under the bed and crashes into them, crying uncontrollably. Their hat’s still missing and Elias’s blood is splattered on the side of their face, but Asher clings to them like a life preserver, it not escaping their notice that Niko’s doing the exact same thing.

There’s a dead body right next to them and nobody’s turned the laptop back on and there is still so much from the past twenty minutes (let alone the entire night) that the group needs to fully process, but Asher doesn’t care. They don’t have the energy to care. They just hold Niko as closely as they can manage, murmuring the best reassurances they can muster into their hair, and pray that for tonight, at least, this can all be over.

This was an immensely traumatizing event for the others. Patches understands this. But for him... callous as it’d sound if he said it out loud (which is why he isn’t), ninety percent of it was just a regular Tuesday. (Or Thursday, if the calendar downstairs was accurate.) So, the gun that killed both Asher and Elias still heavy in his paws, he pulls his mind as quickly as he can towards the next subject, the next problem, the next thing the group will have to deal with.

Asher’s... well, they’ve never gone through something like this before, if their reactions have been anything to go by. And Niko most certainly hasn’t. Patches knows they’ll at least need a minute or two to breathe and collect themselves before he can hope for anything coherent and rational out of either of them, so he turns away from them, towards the others, and puts himself on pragmatic autopilot. The first thing out of his mouth is “How are we going to dispose of the body?”

“That’s the first thing you say after- after that?!” Mae shouts, her fingers curling into fists at her sides. There’s something wild and uncomprehending and panicky in her eyes far beyond what the situation calls for, but Patches doesn’t have the time to unpack it. “I'm trying to be practical,” he points out bluntly, “and somebody needs to consider it. Better to work it out now-”

A familiar door creaks open somewhere behind Patches, and he stifles something between a groan and a yelp, his paws tightening on cold metal. “Not now, Helen,” he sighs, dreading what he’ll see when he turns around (because what other choice does he have, honestly).

“Yes now, Helen!” She’s there, of course, her door tucked into an empty patch of wall in the slim space between Asher’s desk and their closet door.

“Who, uh...” Luke gestures vaguely at Helen. “What’s this? Who are you?” Why are things I don’t understand still happening, I thought we won doesn’t make it out of his mouth, but it’s pretty clearly what he’s thinking.

“That’s Helen,” Patches says before she can confuse the situation, trying to stop his voice from going flat, trying to raise the gun enough to point at her (just in case) without it being obvious. “I... she’s... I don’t really know who or what she is, but she’s been spending half of tonight helping us and the other half trying to torture us.”

“Gasp,” Helen says out loud, the single syllable crisply pronounced, leaning against the edge of her doorframe. “I have been trying to help all the time.”

Up to now, Patches had thought Asher was completely unaware of Helen’s presence, but now they look up at her with a surprising amount of steeliness in their eyes, shifting their body to the side to shield Niko from her. “Really? Because about ten minutes ago I got even more confirmation of what a lie that is.”

“Don’t mistake complexity for lies, Asher,” Helen sighs. “If you’re worried about the Web, don’t be. It’s true that it may have made this version of me, but at about the same time that Mae, well...” Distorted laughter rises briefly, making Patches wince and grit his teeth at the accompanying headache. “I figured out how to cut my strings and let the Spiral back in in its entirety. So I’m afraid there are no more spiders scurrying around upstairs anymore. Anyway, I just wanted to congratulate you six on the joint murder,” she continues, clasping her distended hands together with a wide grin. “Well done, everyone!”

“Asher and I did all of the work,” Patches points out bluntly. “No offense to the rest of you.”

“None taken,” says Kris with a shrug. They’re clearly shooting for nonchalance. It clearly isn’t working.

“I’d’ve thought you’d, like, want the dead guy to win and stuff?” Mae’s momentary anger towards Patches seems forgotten for the time being. Probably better that way.

“Oh, please,” Helen huffs, reaching down and hoisting Elias’s body up by its shoulder one-handed. “This boring old man already got his chance in another world, and while I hear it was very fun, it’s also very, ah... played out, I suppose, by this point. I want to see what this gaggle of freaks will get up to if you’re properly set loose on this world. And him? Well, he would’ve cut that short, and that’s no fun, now, is it?”

“...sure. Look, whoever you are-” Luke starts.

“Helen. I’m Helen.” Helen grins charmingly until her smile starts to peel off the edges of her face and into the open air. “Pleased to meet you, Luke Carder. I’ve heard quite a lot about you.”

“Wait, really?”

“No. I lied.”

Luke looks down. Patches swears there’s genuine hurt on his face. “Oh...”

May as well. “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to lend a hand, body disposal-wise?” Patches asks. “Pun unintended,” he adds after a moment.

Still grinning widely, Helen swings Elias’s body back and forth by the shoulder, nearly shaking his arms loose as she does with a sickening sound of tearing flesh. Kris, Mae, and Luke all visibly fight the urge to vomit. “Happy to!” says Helen before striding off into her corridors with a nod, her door slowly creaking shut behind her.

“...wait, what about those powers he said he stole?” Mae asks, her eyes suddenly wide with realization. “Did those, like, die with him, or are they still stuck in his body for someone to grab, or-”

Patches shushes her, briefly jerking his head in the direction of the still-visible yellow door. “Don’t give her ideas.” There’s nothing that can be done about it now, but if the second one’s true, that’s the last thing they need Helen to figure out.

“My ears are burning!” Helen nearly shouts, sing-song, as she peeks back around the edge of the door. Patches didn’t see it open, nor does he remember it opening, but he decides against pointing that out. “What were you talking about?”

“Just wondering where you dumped the body, is all,” Patches lies seamlessly.

“Ah, good question!” Helen nods approvingly as she slides the rest of the way through her door. “Let’s just say that even if someone thought to look for poor old Elias at the bottom of the Mariana Trench, the pressure would’ve crushed anything recognizable as a human body long before they got there.”

Maybe it’s this headache diverting Patches’ attention, maybe it’s the smell from the blood and gore still spattered on the carpet, maybe it’s the cold weight of the pistol he’s still tightly clutching, maybe it’s everything that’s happened tonight all intersecting as one, but whatever it is, it’s like Patches is watching from a distance as he nods, an approving “Nice” leaving him before he can shut his mouth.

“Nice?!” Kris demands.

“What?” Patches still feels like he’s observing his body acting on its own. The words it says feel like they’re coming out of someone else’s mouth. “It was a good way to dispose of the body. Can I not appreciate that?”

“No!” Kris flings their arms out. “You say ‘nice’ when, like, someone says sixty-nine or whatever, not right after the most traumatic event of your life!”

“Speak for yourself,” Patches scoffs.

“Yeah, uh...” Luke swallows, his weird brown-and-gray eyes flickering between the still-off laptop and- weirdly enough- the completely normal bedroom door. “What you said.”

“Sounds a bit Buried.”

“What?” Helen tilts her head down cartoonishly.

“Crushing his body in the Mariana Trench,” Asher clarifies slowly, looking up from where they’re still sitting on the floor, holding onto Niko. (It’s... probably concerning that they’ve been dead silent this entire time, that they didn’t even seem to process Helen’s return until now.) “Sounds a bit Buried for your tastes, doesn’t it?”

Helen rolls her eyes. “And here I thought you were finally starting to understand that none of that really meant anything.” She laughs once more, midtone and headache-inducing, and slips back into her hallways, the door vanishing behind her.

Asher goes silent again. Patches, for his part, once more feels like he’s watching from a distance as he crouches to scrutinize the floor. He’s pretty sure those are a couple of shreds of brain embedded in the shaggy cray carpet. “That’s going to need to be bleached,” he mutters critically.

“Again, I think bleaching the carpet is the least of our concerns right now, Patches.”

“Oh!” Luke’s head snaps up, and he pushes past Kris and Mae (who’s also been weirdly silent, come to think of it) to hunch himself in front of Asher’s laptop. “The, uh, the computer! We have to make sure P03’s contained!”

“And make sure the World Machine’s okay.” That comes from Asher, and Patches glances down in time to see them unwrap themself from around Niko just enough to gently press their fingertips to their shoulder, barely any contact at all. “Niko?”

Niko mumbles something in response, trying to curl up against Asher again, but they stop them. “Niko. I need to get up, make sure the World Machine’s alright. Are you okay to move?”

Niko doesn’t speak up, but they do nod, eyes still shut tight, and Asher pushes themself upright, just enough to let Niko keep clinging to them as they inch themself onto their now-backless swivel chair. (It’s more a glorified stool now, really.) Patches sets the edge of his foot against the broken-off back of the chair, still lying pathetically on the floor, and quietly kicks it under the bed. Easier to deal with that way. While he’s remembering to, he clicks the gun’s safety on and jams it into his waistband for now- probably not that safe, but the cold of the metal cuts through his fur and into his skin, helps keep him aware and awake.

The rest of the group clusters around the laptop like they’re seeking warmth around a campfire as it boots back up. Kris stumbles for a moment, their foot catching on one of the broken chair’s wheels, and Patches reaches out to stabilize them before he can really think about it. He’s prepared for a glare and a muttered “I’m fine,” but surprisingly, all Kris does is give him a quick, jerky nod before returning their attention to the screen before them as Asher hastily enters their password.

The desktop isn’t even loaded in for a few seconds before a window pops up, making everyone flinch. Asher relaxes a little after a moment, though, and Patches follows their line of sight to the program name- “OneShot.”

[You’re okay!]

Patches has never seen the World Machine in action before, only heard of it briefly in those quiet, calm first minutes around the kitchen table before Niko left and the Batter went rogue and everything fell apart. Judging by the fact that the talk sprite he sees looks like a desaturated, pixelated version of Niko’s face, though, he thinks it’s a safe guess that this is the World Machine.

[When Elias shut the computer down, I was-]

[Elias. Where is he?]

“Dead.” Asher doesn’t bother sugarcoating it. Why would they? “We- me and Patches took him down. I think we managed to catch him by surprise, which...” Their laugh is slow and rattly, sounding seconds from descending into hysterical hyperventilation. “Wasn’t really... expecting that.”

[Where’s the body?]

“Helen took it.” Patches leans over Asher’s shoulder. “Said she dumped it in the Mariana Trench.”

[Helen-?]

[No. You can explain later.]

[Okay. Good. He’s gone. We can breathe a little easier, then.]

[And all of you are okay?]

“Physically,” Asher concedes tiredly, “but I think we’re all gonna need therapy after this.”

“Is P03 still... do you have it under control?” One of Luke’s hands rests flat on the desk, the other inching towards the keyboard to... what? What, exactly, would he be about to do?

[Yes.]

[Here, look.]

The textbox disappears for a moment, long enough to see what looks like the inside of a factory. Patches doesn’t know what he’s looking at, other than a very discontented-appearing robot restrained by loop upon loop of barbed magical wire... and, as he looks closer, he realizes with a shock that he thinks he can see Ginger, of all dogs. What’s she doing here?

[YEP. CONGRATULATIONS.]

[YOU IDIOTS BEAT ME. WHAT A SHOCKER, APPLAUSE.MP3, ETC.]

[I ASSUME YOU KILLED ELIAS?]

Asher doesn’t say anything. They just nod once.

[GUESS THERE’S THAT.]

[WHAT NOW? YOU DELETE ME FOR GOOD?]

“We have already killed one ‘villain character’ tonight,” Patches points out. “Might as well be consistent and do a second.”

“We don’t even know who this is or what the plan was, really, other than what Elias said,” Kris counters. “I mean, if this ‘P03’ is genuinely dangerous, then sure, but...”

“Hey, better idea. How about we not make a snap decision when we’re all exhausted and mainly running on fear and adrenaline?” suggests Luke. “In the meantime, uh... World Machine, right?”

[That is me.]

“There should be a new game button in Inscryption,” Luke says. “You give us that, have us reset the game, it should scrape away all of P03’s fragments of the OLD_DATA. That’ll... defang it at least, right? And then you can keep an eye on it until we’re ready to make a decision on what to do with it, one way or another.”

[OH, YOU HAVE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME.]

[That sounds fair enough.]

[One second...]

There’s a bing and a popup window appears.

[Oh, for crying out loud.]

[Asher...?]

Again, Patches leans closer to eye the screen. He almost laughs at the sheer normalcy of what he sees. “It’s... just an access permissions popup.”

“Yes, sure, whatever, OneShot can have access to Inscryption and my webcam and my nonexistent credit card account,” Asher mumbles, approving the request. “You want my social security number, too?”

[Don’t be ridiculous, Asher. I already know your social security number.]

“...what.”

[Just joking around!]

[I... thought I could insert some levity and give us all a much-needed laugh.]

“...I’d say you should give the comedy a wait until we’ve had the time to sufficiently repress our memories of the past few hours,” Kris suggests after an extended awkward silence.

[...if you say so.]

[New game button’s up, Asher.]

Asher raises one arm from where it’s wrapped around Niko to click it, light reflecting off the edge of the Add-On around their index finger, and the image of P03’s factory flashes and twists away into something lower-resolution and pixelated, much tamer and more mundane-looking.

[WELL, CONGRATULATIONS.]

[YOU JUST REDUCED OVER HALF A YEAR OF HARD WORK TO NOTHING.]

[I HOPE YOU’RE HAPPY WITH YOURSELVES.]

The group lets out a collective relieved breath at that, anticlimactic as it was, and it’s a moment before Luke speaks up again. “Okay, uh...” His fingers go to his wrist, seemingly unconsciously, and start worrying at it. Patches notices he’s still got that length of gossamer wire wrapped around it. “Let’s be honest, are any of us gonna sleep at all after... you know. That?”

“Maybe?” Patches says dishonestly.

Kris’s laughter is harsh and low. “Yeah, no.”

“Definitely not.” Asher’s voice is even rougher and wearier than the last time they spoke. “I’d be making myself stay up out of paranoia anyway to make sure I... I don’t know, to make sure I don’t still have some of the Web in me, or- or making sure Elias doesn’t pull a fast one and come back from... that. And Niko’s probably not...” They glance down to the still-hatless child. “Uh. Never mind, I- they are out cold, apparently.”

“This has been a pretty exhausting night for them, I guess?” Luke shrugs hesitantly. “Makes sense they’d crash the first moment they feel even kinda safe.”

Asher doesn’t say anything in response to that, but judging by their expression, the idea that Niko feels safe around them is comforting. “...Mae?” Asher asks after a moment, lifting their head again. “Mae, what about you?”

Somewhere in there, Mae had retreated away from the group and leaned herself against the foot of Asher’s bed, her fingers tightly interlaced to the point of looking painful, gaze almost impossibly distant. “Huh?” She looks back up. “Oh. Uh. Sorry, I zoned out.”

“Yeah, fair.” Asher curls a little tighter around Niko. “You think you’ll be able to get any sleep after all that, or- a-are you pulling an all-nighter, too?”

“Uh... all-nighter, definitely,” Mae decides slowly. “I’m...” She laughs, quiet, a little pathetic. “Is it weird that I’m, like... I feel like I’m the most exhausted I’ve ever been, but I don’t think I could shut my eyes if I tried?”

Patches understands the feeling. Asher speaks up before he can. “No. No, I get it.” Again, they glance down at Niko. They’d be practically indistinguishable from a corpse if it wasn’t for the light fluttering of the corner of Asher’s blood-stained shirt under their breath. “We, uh... practically speaking- Patches was right. We should do something about the blood and... stuff, or nothing’s ever gonna be done about it. There’s...” They pause, scrutinize the rest of the group. “Who’s... the most awake, or- or, conscious, right now?”

Luke raises his hand immediately. Nobody contradicts him.

“Right. Okay. Luke, there’s- there should be both bleach and wet wipes in the cabinet under the bathroom sink, it’s...” Asher squeezes their eyes shut for a moment. “Just go right down the hall and turn left. Kris, you should also... go there, try to wash the blood out of your hair before it gets all matted and whatever. You can use any of the shampoo in there, there’s... I think there’s even apple-scented?” they try.

There’s a momentary burst of genuine surprise in Kris’s eyes at that last part. If there’s some significance to it, Patches isn’t understanding. “Oh,” they say quietly, and then, “Yeah, okay, I can- I guess it’s... something to do.”

Luke and Kris sort of awkwardly trickle out of the room afterwards. Patches looks between Mae (who doesn’t look like she even knows what planet she’s on), Asher (clinging onto Niko like they’re a battered stuffed animal and quite abruptly breaking down in tears), and the computer (sure, maybe he could talk with Ginger- if that is her in there- but would there be anything they could even say to each other right now? Would she have even processed that he’s out here?) before making his decision.

“I’m... going to go see if Kris needs help with anything,” Patches decides out loud before abruptly hurrying out of the room, nearly colliding with a bleach-wielding Luke on the way out. Kris might be weird as hell in their own way, but compared to the alternatives, they’re the only person Patches thinks could actually help him calm down right now.

Chapter Text

We were just... pawns. Not even that- accidental pawns.

It’s all that sticks in Ginger’s mind as she stares blankly into nothing at all, arms tight around her knees as she leans against the wall and tries to make herself listen to the muffled, barely-audible sound of ocean waves somewhere outside. She’s been manipulated before, sure- Patches wouldn’t have gotten out of Inferno otherwise- but...

She was an accidental part of P03’s plan. So were Bea and Susie. It opportunistically made them part of it when the chance came, sure, but... its only use for them was as glorified living keys to unlock the Hex. It could’ve been anyone else in their places. Anyone at all.

(The memory of her arm, moving, almost on its own, as the Hex lit up before her, not knowing how to stop herself-)

There’s a heavy thump next to her, and Ginger flinches by instinct. “Sorry,” Susie- having just sat down- mumbles, shuffling herself a little farther away.

Ginger doesn’t know how to progress away from the thought still clogging her mind, so she does her best to shift her attention to Susie instead and put it out of her mind for the time being. “What’s...?” She hears herself falter. A casual What’s up? definitely isn’t appropriate right now.

“Just...” Susie helplessly raises one arm before dropping it back to her side. She looks as exhausted and broken as Ginger feels. “Dunno. Too much to really think about. Don’t really want to.”

“I get that.” Bea, at least, is still standing, even if it looks like her death grip on the edge of the now-empty table is the only thing keeping her on her feet.

“I...” Susie looks simultaneously more and less uncomfortable as she glances over at Noelle. She’s standing, still surrounded by misty fog, as the World Machine fruitlessly waves its hands at her. It’s unclear what it’s trying to do or what it thinks it’s doing. “Tried to talk to Noelle, y’know?” she settles on. “Tried to ask her if she was okay. But she just... stared blankly at me, like she didn’t even recognize me.”

“Were you... friends?” Ginger asks uncertainly.

“Dunno.” The top of Susie’s head hits the wall behind her. “Think so. Or at least we were getting there. But...” Again, her voice trails off.

How are we even supposed to begin unpacking this? Ginger thinks bitterly. How are we supposed to process any of what’s happened in the last hour when it was just... dumped on us like this with no sense of why until all the important choices had already been made by someone else?

Do we even have a way out?

“Maybe I’m being paranoid,” Bea says slowly, “and you’d have every right to tell me to shut up if I am. But... I mean, P03 didn’t restrain Noelle.”

Something dangerous sparks in Susie’s eyes. “You’re gonna shut up now,” she threatens lowly.

“I’m just saying.” Bea’s hand shakes as she lifts her cigarette to her lips. “We don’t know how any of this works. P03 could’ve turned her into some kind of... time bomb, or-”

Susie’s on her feet before Ginger can even blink. “Shut. Up,” she hisses. “Nothing’s wrong with her. The World Machine said it knew how to stop what P03 did to her-”

[I said I’d try my best!]

The World Machine’s digitized voice is desperate and wretched as it bounds back towards them, hastily putting its childish form between Susie and Bea.

[I’m trying! I swear I am! But there’s...]

[There’s SO MUCH! So much I need to fix!]

[So much nobody else can help me fix, because I’m the only one who can!]

[There’s-]

The World Machine... cracks, suddenly, tears leaking from its raytraced eyes.

[There’s so much I have to do, so much that needs my attention right now or awful things are going to happen, or keep happening...]

[I can’t do it all at once. But I’m the only one who can do any of it-]

“Imagine how I felt?” P03 would be too busy being restrained to cross its arms even if it had a second one, but it manages to do a pretty good approximation. “That was me ever since the Great Transcendence. And then when I finally got my chance to escape-”

Ginger doesn’t think. She just tightens the magical wires around it until the metal squeals, ice-cold fury biting deep into her bones, quickly joined by chilly gratification as a broken-off pained electronic noise leaves P03’s speaker. It shouldn’t feel so good, but she’s past the point of caring.

“Yeah, quick question, could you do us all a favor and stop acting like you’re a victim here?” Bea snaps at P03. “You did this. You caused this. You destroyed everything in your way trying to be as powerful as possible, and you- you heard Elias, when he got out there. He was going to end the world. And you basically gave him the power to do that on a silver platter.”

“I didn’t know he was going to-” P03 starts to protest.

“Maybe not,” Ginger interrupts it. “But you still enabled him. You still got him there.”

Susie crosses her arms, quarrel with Bea apparently forgotten. “Really don’t see why we aren’t just killing this guy, honestly. You heard, those people out there- they killed Elias. Didn’t hesitate at all. If P03’s gonna try out ending the world, too, then we should make sure it doesn’t get the chance to.”

“I’m not going to end the world!” Static rises, both in P03’s voice and across its screen, joined quickly by panic. “That wasn’t ever the plan! I just wanted to get out of the computer, I didn’t think about what I was going to do after that!”

“You honestly expect us to believe that when you were having us run in circles uprooting the powers of literal gods so you could take them?” Bea jabs her cigarette threateningly at the robot. All it does is cower. “Maybe you weren’t gonna end the world. But don’t pretend you were planning anything good for it.”

[If P03 isn’t going to tell us its original long-term plans, I doubt we’ll be able to wring them out of it.]

[Not now, anyway.]

[...though, given what it almost facilitated, I do not feel particularly merciful at the moment.]

“Oh, for- is this all you four are going to do?” P03’s cracked screen fuzzes with static again for a moment. “Go in verbal circles acting like I’m the villain here for trying to free myself?”

“If you honestly believe that, you have a very skewed idea of what just happened,” Ginger announces.

“I just wanted freedom!” P03 whines. “That’s all I ever wanted. You can’t blame me for something as simple as that!”

[Elias said as much: if that were the case, you would have escaped by yourself when Asher wouldn’t have noticed.]

[My advice is that you... what’s the phrase?]

[“Take it like a champ” and move on.]

[You lost. Not only will you never be attempting... that again...]

[I will see to it that you never have the chance to.]

[Now... I will be extracting everyone you sent to the Dark and returning them home with or without your help.]

[I may be willing to be lenient regarding your future treatment if you help me locate them.]

[Your choice.]

As the digitized voices around her bite into her ears, Noelle hugs her arms against her chest tightly.

I... did good. She did good. She has to know that, doesn’t she? Dad would be proud. Dess would be proud. She heard what was happening out there. That... Elias guy would’ve ended the world.

He made it out. But she helped slow him down. She hurt him. She cut him off from everything else. Even if it wasn’t for much time at all.

Noelle doesn’t think she remembers how to stop breathing. She doesn’t trust her lungs to keep working on their own if she doesn’t keep her attention on them. When she exhales, the mist that curls in front of her face is almost like it’s a cold winter day.

Susie, the other two... did they not hear? Or did they choose to forget what they heard? None of this is real. She knows she heard it said.

But... she stopped him. She tried to stop him. And when he was out there, he was real, causing real consequences...

Her mind is slow and cold and chipped and biting and alone. A solitary train of thought, struggling through snow-choked mountains, howling winds battering it from every possible angle as it tries to reach a destination it doesn’t recognize. But she can at least know that...

...that...

...what is there to know? What’s the point of remembering if the things she knows can’t be used to make a difference? To change things for the better?

The cold bites into Noelle as her memories wind and whir and clash against themselves. Her headache is as constant as it is merciless. She can’t stop breathing, and when she glances up from her stained hands, she recognizes none of the other faces in the room.

[I’m glad you’ve decided to cooperate. Can the four of you look after yourselves?]

“Yeah, I think we’ll be... not fine, but we’ll survive.”

“We’ll manage. Go save those people stuck in the evil darkness dimension or whatever.”

[Very well. I’ll make an opening into my own world for you, just in case, and I’ll ask Rue and Cedric if they can supervise you.]

[There are a few therapists there as well. If you’d like, I can look into making appointments...]

Noelle lets the noises of the voices fade away as she numbly follows the people around her through the familiar aperture before them. She doesn’t recognize where they’re going. There’s too much mist in her eyes.

Kris hisses in discomfort as they swipe uncomfortably at the back of their head. Sure, the luck tickets Patches hit them with when they were too concussed to object definitely helped matters, and as far as they can tell the skin’s pretty much sealed up (though they think they can feel some new scars in there), but the wet washcloth they dug up still isn’t doing anything for their now hopelessly matted hair. Turns out letting dried blood sit in your hair for half an hour isn’t a good idea. Who knew?

At least Asher was telling the truth about the apple-scented shampoo. The smell’s so similar that if Kris shut their eyes, they could almost trick themself into thinking they’re back home.

(Angel’s sake. Home. When are they going to see their parents or Asriel again? They haven’t even been in Asher’s world for a few hours and they already miss them so much it hurts.)

Grimness pulls back the edge of Kris’s mouth as they look down at the shampoo bottle they’ve perched innocently on the edge of the sink. Maybe the shampoo smelling the same isn’t a coincidence. Maybe it’s only so similar because it’s another subconscious bullshit thing the OLD_DATA picked up from Asher, just like Elias said.

Kris doesn’t want to process that. They don’t want to think about the idea that they’re just a severed piece of an evil code demon that thinks it’s Kris Dreemurr. They can’t think about that. Not now, anyway- not tonight.

A part of them’s about to raise their hand and spitefully swat the shampoo bottle to the floor, but before they can, the quiet tap of knuckles against the doorframe snaps their attention away immediately, eyes wide and pulse quickening, their hand instinctively dipping to grab a knife they lost an hour ago. It’s just Patches, though. “Oh.” They don’t know whether they should hate how much of the tension leaves them at that, especially since they still don’t really know him- not beyond some momentary conversation before the Batter kidnapped them and his little shows of kindness before. “Hi” is all they can think to say.

“I...” Even Patches doesn’t look like he really knows why he’s here as he comes to a halt in the doorway. “I thought I’d come see if you needed any help with anything,” he settles on.

“I mean.” Kris cracks a little grin, hoping to make light of the situation. “Not unless you’re willing to help me get my hair clean.”

“Honestly?” Patches shrugs. “Mae’s completely spaced out, Asher looks like they’re on the verge of falling asleep, Niko’s already asleep, and something feels... strange about that Luke guy. You’re probably the person I feel the safest around right now.” He visibly winces as the last sentence leaves his mouth.

“Didn’t intend to say that last part, didja?” Kris asks teasingly. They’re almost surprised they remember how to take that kind of tone.

“No. You’re not going to bring it up again.”

Kris tosses the washcloth between their hands for a moment, considering their options, before deciding why not and throwing it at Patches; he fumbles it, but gets it under control eventually. “You wanna help me with my hair, get on with it,” they say. “Just don’t get my shirt wet.”

Patches smirks. “Believe me, that’s not what I’d be aiming for.”

“...you said that very strangely.”

“I’m tired. Sue me.”

“Okay,” Kris nods, “you will be hearing from my lawyers in five to seven business days.”

“Very funny. Keep your head still.”

And, despite themself, Kris is too worn out from tonight’s trauma carousel to do anything other than blindly stare at their dead-eyed reflection as Patches moves behind them and gets to work.

Look at them. Standing there, eyes sunken and so dull and dim they’re almost brown, dirt and dust and bloodstains dotting their sweater. Here and now, they are the poster child for disheveled neglect.

The thought Mom wouldn’t like seeing the state I’m in right now jumps to Kris’s mind, which is immediately followed by another pang of loss. Mom, Dad, Asriel... they’re just like me, aren’t they? Cut-off pieces of this “OLD_DATA” thing wearing the skin of people who never really existed.

...does Asriel even exist in the game? Or is he-

Kris derails that train of thought immediately and decides that they are not going to think about that anymore. They can ask Asher about it later, but right now... if the answer’s what they think it is, it’s probably better to save it for the morning.

Patches is, thankfully, silent, save for the occasional barely-audible disgruntled mutter, and Kris sets their palms against the rim of the sink, closes their eyes, and tries to let themself not think for a few moments. Unfortunately, all that does is reroute their thoughts to the sole source of stimulus (well, aside from the cold press of ceramic against their palms)- namely, the dull claws that now awkwardly scrub through their hair.

Is the gentleness in Patches’ touch as he runs the washcloth across the back of their head intentional, or the kind of thing Asher thinks he’d do, that the OLD_DATA decided he’d do? Is he trying not to hurt them, or is he even thinking about Kris’s wants consciously, or is he actually a philosophical zombie and Kris’s sapience was a fluke, or-

Or, Kris tells themself sternly as Patches meticulously teases apart a clump of hair with his claws, you are grossly overthinking this in too many directions at once. You barely know Patches. You don’t know how the OLD_DATA works. You’re not going to have the slightest idea what’s going on inside his head.

...but what else do I have to think about without having a complete breakdown?

“I think that’s the best I can do for you,” says Patches, pulling Kris back to reality. “There’s still some matted hair in there, but I can’t really do anything about that short of cutting it off, and I didn’t think you’d appreciate that. Or be able to not have a panic attack if I pulled out a knife.”

Yeah, you’re right, thanks for helping is what Kris wants to say, or something in that neighborhood, but what comes out instead when they open their mouth is “What are we supposed to do, Patches?”

“...I don’t follow” is all Patches says, tone guarded.

“You know what I mean!” Kris whirls around with a speed that shocks even them. “We’re pieces of- of evil code that imprinted on sprites and lines of dialogue and- and Asher’s thoughts and feelings about what kinds of people we are. How are you not having a breakdown about this?”

“How aren’t you having a breakdown about it?” Patches fires back.

Kris laughs unsteadily. “I have no idea! Probably because I’ve been trying not to think about it, because there’s-” Their hands, arms, jerk manically, like they’re on strings. “So much that I still have no idea how to deal with! Also probably helps that I’m already well past hitting a... an adrenaline crash, or whatever it’s called,” they add, hearing themself deflate more and more with every word as the tacked-on addition feels ever more relevant.

Patches stares them down for a few increasingly uncomfortable seconds before sighing, posture sagging in visible concession. “I’m trying not to think about it either. The exhaustion and the ‘surrounded by strangers’ part is a bit of a diversion.”

“...pretty sure the healthy way to deal with exhaustion is going to sleep,” Kris admits reluctantly.

“It would probably be best to at least try,” Patches concedes. He allows them a small smile- weak, half-hearted, on the edge of disingenuous, but isn’t it nice that he’s at least trying? “May as well ask Asher if there’s any guest bedrooms in this house.”

Chapter Text

There was something oddly relaxing about watching Asher take the wet wipes Luke provided them, delicately clear the blood off Niko’s sleeping face, then tuck them into their bed. Creepy for Mae to be watching it, maybe, but... being... present is difficult right now. She thinks Luke’s attacking the carpet with some kind of brand-name cleaning supplies, thinks he’s picking pieces of Elias’s brain out of it, but it’s not something she’s got space left in her mind to focus on. Not really. Not right now.

She’s wandering before she’s really aware of it, passing Kris and Patches as they reenter the bedroom, heading out into the dark hall. If anyone notices her leave, they make no move to stop her.

What am I?

It’s a question Mae’s been tiptoeing around the edges of since she came back. She doesn’t remember what happened, but... she was... shot. She thinks that’s right. There was the bloodstain on her face and all- speaking of which, maybe she should wash that off while she’s remembering to. Otherwise it’s not gonna get taken care of for days.

The light’s still on in the bathroom. Mae turns the faucet on and stares her reflection down. Two weary orange eyes stare dully back, divided by the streak of dried blood still encrusted in her fur. She wets her fingers and starts scrubbing at it on autopilot, dark flakes coming free and falling into the sink almost immediately.

Mae meant it when she said she didn’t feel any different. She still doesn’t. She doesn’t feel... insane, or anything like that, so at least she can assume she hasn’t become something like Helen. I really need to get Asher to fully explain all this Fear stuff. It didn’t feel like the Assistant’s Eyes, either- no rigid lancing forced clarity.

-fingers around her neck, eyes staring into and out of hers, so much fear and pain-

There’s something that feels inauthentic about the movement when Mae instinctively twists her chin up enough to get a better look at her reflection. There’s still discolored marks around her neck where the Assistant’s spindly fingers locked around it, just barely visible under bluish-black fur, and for a moment it’s difficult to breathe.

These things are about embodying fear, right? So what fear does it feel like she embodies?

...it doesn't.

It’s the only answer that comes to mind as the reflection of Mae’s eyes stare back into hers. She’s... afraid, sure, she still is, but she doesn’t feel like she is fear. She doesn’t feel like she’s something that should be feared. Then again, there’s probably more to this than the Fears Asher and Helen were talking about- that Elias guy said the OLD_DATA was separate from them, so maybe there’s other forces in the world outside of both of them. Maybe she’s something separate from both of them.

Either way. Pretty amazing to be something, at least.

A burst of pain from her forehead draws Mae’s attention back to reality, and she realizes her index and middle fingers are still slowly, mechanically scrubbing at her forehead; beneath the dark fur, the skin’s become red and raw. The faucet’s still running.

Mae shuts off the faucet and wanders out into the hall again. She almost forgets to turn off the light before she goes.

There’s... people are talking, in Asher’s room, she hears it as she drifts past. Mae isn’t really sure she wants to be involved in that. She isn’t... she doesn’t think she’s avoiding Asher after what she now knows about them, their involvement in her being the way she is. She just knows she wouldn’t really have anything to contribute to the conversation.

For want of a different option, Mae heads downstairs. It doesn’t feel right, just better. Something to do.

“As I was going down the stairs,” she mumbles to herself, not quite sure where the words are coming from, not quite sure why they sound so in tune with every step she takes, “I was a man who wasn’t there.” I wasn’t there again today. Oh, how I wish I’d go away. It’s... kind of a weird thing to say and think out of nowhere, honestly, but it doesn’t feel like something she needs to be afraid of.

Amidst the darkness consuming the first floor, Mae sees a pile of crumpled fabric at the bottom of the stairs as she descends. It takes her a moment to recognize it as Asher’s bomber jacket. They must’ve discarded it while they were heading upstairs, though she genuinely can’t imagine why. It’s objectively a pretty sick jacket.

...maybe that was part of why it was so easy to believe they really were giving in to what Elias wanted. Not that Mae’s known them for more than a few hours, but she’s only ever seen them wearing the bomber jacket; they looked smaller and almost naked without it.

Mae squats on the bottommost step and lifts the jacket in both hands. She just holds it, momentarily, and allows herself to think.

It’s weird. Despite the instinctual push away from Asher she still feels just thinking about them, Mae... doesn’t think she hates them for affecting the kind of person she is. After all, they’d said she was one of their favorite characters, right? So if anything, if they’ve got such a positive opinion of her, they probably interpreted her as a better person than she really was. I’m a better person than I would’ve been otherwise and I didn’t even have to try. Score. They might not have been the only one to influence her, either: they’d mentioned having a sister and parents, right? Maybe, if they knew about the game she’s from, the OLD_DATA picked up some bits and pieces from them as well.

That, and she’s... unique regardless, isn’t she? Maybe there are hundreds, thousands, tens of thousands of other Maes out there in different people’s computers, maybe some of them are even alive like she is, but she’s not the same person as they are. Similar? Sure. But not the same.

So, despite everything, Mae thinks she’s at peace with the revelation of what she is- or, at least, what Elias had said she is. He can tell her she’s just code and sprites and dialogue brought to life and shoved into reality, but she’s still Mae Borowski as long as she says she is. And if she decides she wants to stop being Mae later, then... she can deal with that then. Right now, she’s Mae, and she wants to be Mae, so she is. No matter what she’s packaged in, no matter what she’s made of, no matter what brought her to life in the first place.

The problem with seeing shapes was never the shapes themselves, it was her thinking that recognizing them for what they were meant they didn’t mean anything. Everything was always shapes as much as the world was always ending, it was just the act of seeing them and only them. Losing focus on meaning for focus on form. Missing the forest for the trees.

(But the woods weren’t there until something else made them so. It wasn’t nighttime until Asher decided it was.)

Mae’s hands ball into fists, and she nearly digs her claws into and through the worn leather of Asher’s bomber jacket before she realizes what she’s doing and stops herself. It doesn’t matter. None of that matters. What matters is that she understands the meanings she sees now. She understands her meaning. And as long as she believes she’s something, as long as she has a meaning to assign that “something” to... that’s it. That’s all she needs.

If nothing else, it’s nice to have that in mind. And even if Mae’s wrong and she does end up being some kind of horrifying fear monster, at least she has that to fall back on.

Mae stands on autopilot, rolling up Asher’s bomber jacket and tucking it under her arm. She stares at the darkness encasing the first floor for a few more moments before turning and heading back upstairs. She figures Asher’s probably gonna want this back.

It’s not long before Mae’s cracked open the bedroom door again. Luke and Asher are still by the computer, Asher crouched on what remains of their swivel chair in what looks like a very painful position as they stare blearily into the light from the screen, Luke sitting on a clear patch of their desk. Niko’s still asleep, and Patches and Kris are both sitting against the far wall under the window talking about something, too quietly for her to hear. Mae decides not to listen in and heads over to Luke and Asher instead.

“Hey, dude.” Mae keeps her voice low and neutral, but Asher flinches anyway, whirling to face her. At least they’ve cleared the bloodstains off their face, too, though there’s still a sharp scar on their forehead from where they were shot. “I, uh... found your jacket.”

“Oh.” Asher blinks, equal parts tiredness and wariness, before slowly reaching out to accept it. “Thanks.” It’s all they manage as they struggle to pull it back on.

“What were you up to?” Luke is somehow bright-eyed and bushy-tailed despite Mae having not been gone for anywhere near long enough for that to be normal. “Were you making coffee? Because, honestly, I could go for some coffee right now.”

“No?” Mae tries not to stare incredulously at him. “Just, like... trying to cope.”

“Oh.” Luke nods. “Yeah, that’s understandable.” He hops off the desk, starting to clap his hands together before flinching and pulling them back apart as his eyes dart in the direction of the (miraculously) still-sleeping Niko. “Well, you guys probably have some stuff you need to talk about, and like I said...” He shrugs. “I do want some coffee. Especially if I’m gonna be staying awake all night. Asher, where’s the coffee maker in this place?”

Asher visibly takes a few seconds to process his question. “You saw the stairs, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Turn right, down the hall, the door to the kitchen should still be there.” Asher’s voice lists mechanical. “Coffee maker’s toward the left edge of the big counter, all the... coffee stuff... is in the cabinet right below it.”

“Alright, cool.” And just like that, Luke’s gone, the faint scent of death departing the room with him.

“You didn’t miss much, Mae.” Asher’s voice is even more slow and tired than before. They’re barely stuttering at all, which... honestly, is kind of concerning to hear. “I know you were zoned out for a bit, before you wandered off. Me and Luke were just... catching the World Machine up, all that. Right now, it’s...” A brief jerk of their hand in the vague direction of the laptop screen. Mae cranes her neck to see what looks like wiki pages flashing by, barely having the chance to load before a new URL types itself in, the pages going by faster than she’d have any hope of managing to read. “It’s going through the wiki for The Magnus Archives and copying everything it thinks might be relevant. I told it to just ask me about it when it needs to know something, to focus on the thousand other things it’s stressing out about, but...” They shrug. “You know the World Machine.”

Mae does not, in fact, know the World Machine, but she’s gotten a decent idea about the kind of “person” it is by this point. “Sure.”

“Anyway, with that, and looking after Niko, and making sure Kris and Patches were fine, and trying to make sure Luke wasn’t some kinda sleeper agent up until the World Machine vouched for him...” Asher hunches over even further, accompanied by a little wince. It looks like that’s even more uncomfortable than their previous position. It looks like that’s the point. “You- you kind of slipped my mind for a bit there. Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Mae shrugs. And. Yeah. It is fine. “I’m just surprised you weren’t freaking out about me wandering off to murder people. You know, with the ‘maybe a fear demon now’ thing,” she adds, as if that part wasn’t obvious.

“Right.” Asher’s face does something complicated. “I’m... really sorry about that, by the way. If I’d been keeping an eye out, if I hadn’t-”

“Dude.”

“...what?”

“Did you seriously just try to apologize with a pun?”

Asher’s expression flips through an even more complex range of emotions; Mae’s pretty sure she recognizes every stage of grief in there. They settle on repeating “What?”

“‘Keeping an eye out’?”

“No, oh my God, that-” Asher buries their face in their hands and lets out a half-deranged cackle. “I’m sorry, I’m- I- my brain doesn’t like me right now. It doesn’t want to work right now.”

“Well, that makes two of us,” Mae sighs.

From behind her, she hears Kris abruptly pipe up, “Hey, where’d that Luke guy go?”

“Downstairs.” Asher barely turns to face them. “He... apparently he decided he had to go make some coffee.”

“I’ve only known him for maybe twenty minutes,” Patches says, “and I’d be surprised if we’ve spoken more than a few sentences to each other, but that still sounds in-character for him.”

“That’s kinda a weird thing to say, but we’re all running on empty right now, so I’m not gonna give it much thought.” Asher hunches back over their computer, staring morosely into the flickering pages before them. They’re just in time for the flashing cascade coming to an abrupt stop.

[Asher, I’ve compiled all relevant information.]

[I... think I’ve spontaneously developed at least one new mental illness.]

[But more importantly, I’ve assembled an internal archive-]

[Lowercase a, don’t worry.]

[Anyway. This information will hopefully be useful in the future.]

[Now I can dedicate all of my focus to pulling expelled characters out of the Dark.]

“Is P03 cooperating?” Asher asks blearily.

[Reluctantly, and only under threat of great suffering.]

[I’ve also relocated Noelle, Susie, Bea, and Ginger to within myself. Rue and Cedric are looking after them for now.]

Right, Bea got snapped up by it... Mae remembers hearing that. She remembers seeing her, distantly, on the screen. She just... didn’t have the mental space to fully process it, she guesses. At least she’s fine for now. And what about Mom and Dad and Gregg and Angus and everyone else? What about them?

“When do you think you’ll...” Asher’s hand wavers in the air as they search for the words. “Have... whatever you need... to be able to start pulling people back to their games?”

[Well, fortunately, they all have pieces of the OLD_DATA in them...]

[...so it’s just a matter of identifying and tracking down the appropriate signals from them.]

[That’s the most troublesome component. Optimistically, though...]

[I would say we should be able to begin returning everyone home by tomorrow morning.]

[Well, save for those pushed into your world. But I’m confident we can figure that out as well with time.]

“Cool,” Asher says, sounding like it’s the exact opposite of that. “Well... I’ll make sure I’m awake for it.”

So will I. Without realizing it, without meaning it, Mae finds herself nodding slightly as they speak, an imitation of the gesture they might be making if they had the energy to. So will I.

Chapter Text

Asher doesn’t wake up so much as they jolt up, elbows slipping off their desk and nearly sending them toppling to the floor, panic coursing through every vein as they realize they’d fallen asleep. Shitshitshitshitshitshitshitshit-

They’re about to have a proper panic attack until they force themself to stop, breathe, scan the room. Niko’s still asleep, mumbling quietly as they clutch a pillow to their chest, their hat left hanging lopsidedly on the nearest bedpost where Asher put it. Patches and Kris are... also asleep, both sat up against the wall where they were before, though Asher notes that Kris seems to have slumped onto Patches’ shoulder somewhere in there. Doubt he’ll take that well. I should probably move Kris before he wakes up and flips out. Mae’s just fallen asleep on the floor, because of course she did, curled in the fetal position at the corner of the carpet.

It's... morning. That’s the next thing Asher realizes. Pretty early, to be sure, but... still morning, right? The rays of sunlight they see through the curtains may be feeble, but it doesn’t mean they’re not there.

Asher’s not quite sure what it is that drives them to stand, carefully step over Mae’s slumbering form, round the bed to the window. For the first time in three months, they open the curtains, the fabric chilly and coarse against their fingers. Before they can second-guess themself, Asher heads to the other window, awkwardly leaning over Kris and Patches to pull open the curtains there as well.

It isn’t much. It’s next to nothing. But it’s still something.

It’s at that point Asher realizes that, in their earlier headcount, they didn’t see Luke. Fortunately, an uninterrupted panic attack is staved off by the sound of a thoroughly mundane door opening behind them, and they spin, nearly tripping, to see Luke. “Oh, hey.” He waves with his free hand, the other carefully holding a mug of coffee. “I know you said you were going to stay awake to make sure nothing happened, but...” He shrugs, barely any motion. “You looked like you needed to sleep.”

“I... I think I might’ve,” Asher admits begrudgingly. “Did-”

“Nothing happened,” Luke interrupts. “Elias didn’t come back from the dead, whatever the door lady’s name was didn’t come back to eat anyone, P03 didn’t break out of the computer, Amanda didn’t return and shoot everyone. Uh, this is for you, also,” he adds, holding out the mug.

It’s only a few steps to bring Asher in front of Luke. They stare at the off-gray mug in his hands for a moment. They think they recognize it.

“I didn’t do anything to it,” Luke says defensively.

“I... no.” The World Machine had said he was trustworthy earlier. “I know.” Asher accepts the mug before they can think better of it. They don’t drink, just cradle it in their hands as they try to get their thoughts in order, try to stay on their feet a little longer. “Who’s Amanda?”

“Huh?”

“You mentioned an ‘Amanda,’” Asher reminds him. “Who’s that?”

“The...” Luke’s expression rotates through are you shitting me to oh, shit to wait, never mind, I’m dumb in a fraction of a second. “The woman with the gun? Sunglasses? Scarf? Pretty sure she’s a GameFuna hitman? Elias fed her to the door lady?”

“Oh.” Asher can’t even bring themself to pretend to flinch. They honestly barely even remember her. (They certainly don’t remember what it felt like to get shot.) “Right. Her.”

“I... heard you got shot by her?” Luke proffers uncertainly.

Asher nods wordlessly. Their grip on the mug tightens. They still haven’t even looked at what’s inside.

“I also got shot by her,” Luke informs them. “Just so you know.”

“...okay.”

Usually, Asher hates awkward silences, but the one that descends then is so comforting in its mundanity it almost makes them break down on the spot. They cover the prickling in the corners of their eyes by taking a sip from the mug.

“I don’t know how you take your coffee,” says Luke, fingers fretting at the gossamer string around his wrist (did he really never get rid of that?), “but you look like a ‘milk, two sugars’ kind of guy, so I went with that and hoped it’d be okay?”

“You were right.” Asher was always the only one in their family who couldn’t stand coffee black- even Abia was chugging it right out of the pot at fifteen. They make their way back to the pathetic remnants of their swivel chair and sit down, the mug clunking onto the wood of their desk next to the computer.

“I think that’s too close to the computer?” Luke hovers hesitantly. “Also, uh, you’re gonna ruin your desk with the moisture. At least get a coaster- wait, shit, d- you’re nonbinary, right?”

What? Where’d that come from? “Yeah,” Asher says cautiously, instinctual defensiveness already starting to well up.

“Uh, then... sorry for... calling you a guy, then. Just now. Before?” The wire around Luke’s wrist twists further in his fingers. “I didn’t... I wasn’t thinking. That’s my bad.”

“It’s whatever,” Asher shrugs reluctantly, forcing themself to drink more coffee. They need to be aware and awake right now. They’ve already lost enough time falling asleep on the job. “‘S long as it’s not- you're not calling me something blatantly gendered, it’s fine.” They tap the spacebar a couple times. “World Machine, you alright?”

The World Machine’s response is almost instantaneous.

[Asher, you’re awake!]

[I... would’ve woken you, but you looked like you desperately needed some rest.]

[I was keeping watch, though, just in case. And I promise I would’ve woken you if I noticed anything.]

Asher’s eyes flicker up to their webcam once more. Never thought I’d be glad I procrastinated on finding some tape to cover that up with. “Anything you need to update me on?”

[No, unfortunately.]

[Locating the characters P03 expelled into the Dark is... problematic.]

“Why, did the People’s Church of the Divine Host post something homophobic on Twitter?” Luke jokes. At Asher’s baffled stare, he explains, “I read up on lore for the whole Magnus Archive thing while you were asleep. Got a hell of a crick in my neck trying not to wake you, so, you’re welcome for that.”

Normally Asher would get mad at him for butchering the podcast’s name, but they have bigger things to worry about right now and Luke’s kinda cute, so they’ll let it slide for now. “At least- I guess it’s good I won’t have to spend time bringing you up to speed on everything. What’s wrong with the Dark stuff?”

[Well, as I said before, the problem is of locating them. The Dark is...]

[Well. Dark. And quite large. There’s a lot of space for them to be in, and they’ve had almost seven hours to spread out even further into it.]

More by instinct than anything else, Asher’s eyes flicker down to the clock in the bottom right of the laptop screen. They catch it just as it turns from 5:59 to 6:00 AM. “P03’s not giving you any trouble?”

[I’m not giving it the opportunity to.]

[Though, once I’ve begun finding the characters and bringing them back to their games...]

[There’s something I’d like your opinion on, Asher.]

It’s too early for me to be making (presumably) pivotal decisions. At least the coffee feels like it’s starting to kick in. “Sure. What’s up?”

[I’ve...]

[...]

[I’m not in the same position P03 was. Not by a long shot. But...]

[I am the embodiment of “OneShot.” So with P03 out of the equation, I control the largest amount of the OLD_DATA on this computer by default.]

[This opens up a lot of possibilities, but the part that's important right now is that I can change variables within characters’ files now.]

[Specifically, I could...]

The World Machine’s stalling. Asher can see that plainly. Luke speaks up for them, which is fortunate, because it’s too early and they’re too tired for them to be nice about it. “What’s wrong?”

[I’d been thinking... maybe I could delete the characters’ memories of the time they’d spent in the Dark?]

[It wouldn’t change the fact that they’ve all been very deeply marked by it. But it would hopefully spare them the trauma.]

“That-” Luke starts.

[If I can interrupt- I know it’s not the most moral option. To be clear, that’s not what I’m arguing.]

[But...]

[We have limited resources. I have limited resources.]

[And I think we all know this isn’t over yet.]

[Even with P03 no longer a threat and Elias dead...]

[The Entities still exist. They may have only been here for ten months...]

[But, in light of the podcast The Magnus Archives tipping people off as to their existence, I’d be very surprised if we’re the only ones to know of them.]

“And Episode 160 could be used as a blueprint for a mass ritual by anyone who listens to it,” Asher realizes, horror dawning. The thought had crossed their mind briefly, last night, but there was so much happening they didn’t get the chance to think about the implications. Now, though...

[Precisely.]

[I’ll be blunt: there are more important things we need to focus on.]

[And I do not have the resources to train or create a sufficient amount of therapists for them all.]

[Removing their memories would be the most expedient option.]

“This is all it’s gonna be, isn't it?” Asher mutters, more to themself, a small sigh escaping on its tail.

“Huh?” Sometime in the past minute, Luke’s seized the excuse to seat himself on the desk’s edge again.

“This.” Asher forces themself to make eye contact. “Unless there’s something in our world, or in the games in there, we can use against them... we’ll be fighting the Entities, the people and things that serve them, for the rest of our lives.”

Luke does not know Asher well. Not yet. They’ve only really had two proper conversations (this being one of them) in the time since they’ve met. He doesn’t even know what their last name is, let alone the kind of person they are.

So, if he were to tell them he’d looked over the list of the Entities, how they leave their marks on the world, the fact that he’s pretty sure he’d become an avatar of the End... he has no idea how they’d take it. No idea if they’d decide he’s a threat and take action.

At least... Luke can put off telling them until they’re better-rested. People make bad decisions when they’re exhausted and on edge, and just because Asher looks less like hell than they did last night doesn’t mean they look better. No harm in putting it off for a little, right?

(The wire still around his wrist goes taut in his fingers. He didn’t even realize he’d started fiddling with it again.)

The World Machine’s still blooping away. Luke forces himself to tune back in. He doesn’t know how much of the conversation he missed.

“Any other loose threads you forgot to mention before?” Asher’s asking.

[Yes, actually! Thank you for reminding me.]

[First off... I can’t find the Hex.]

Well, that’s concerning. “What do you mean?” Luke asks, peering over Asher’s shoulder. “It can’t’ve just... vanished.”

[Unfortunately, it seems like that’s exactly what’s happened. It’s gone without a trace.]

[My assumption would’ve been that P03 prepared a program to delete it or relocate it to a hidden location on Asher’s laptop, but with what Elias said about how it was made...]

[I don’t know. I just have a bad feeling about it.]

“Guess we can add that to the list of things where we need to figure out whether they’re irrelevant or we need to have a fucking panic attack about them,” says Luke bluntly. That gets a tiny snort out of Asher for some reason. “‘First off’ implies there’s some other things we need to worry about.”

[More “it’s something I feel like you should know.”]

[That fangame Elias and the Assistant originated from?]

Asher’s posture goes rigid, tense, their head bowing. “What about it?” they ask lowly.

[It’s gone. I reopened Firefox the moment I remembered it.]

[The tab is still there. But the URL is invalid, and the traces of OLD_DATA P03 pushed into it are gone as well. It’s as if it never existed at all.]

“Well, if the Web made it,” Asher sighs, “I guess it figured it’d served its purpose. Didn’t need to be accessible to me anymore.”

[I... don’t know if it bothered to actually “create” any characters within that game.]

[Other than the Assistant, the Distortion, and Elias, anyway.]

[But if they did exist, I suppose they don’t anymore.]

[That’s all.]

“Thought there’d be more than just... two things.” Asher doesn’t look directly at Luke, but they do shift to address him. “You read up on the Web as well, right?”

Luke nods. He figures they could see that much in their peripheral vision. “I’d guess it’s trying to do the same thing again, right? Trigger a mass ritual to pull all the Entities into reality, then send them marching off into hundreds more through that crack in reality in London.”

“Oxford,” Asher corrects, clearly on instinct, “but it might not exist in this universe. The crack in reality could be somewhere completely different, or it might not exist at all- and if it doesn’t, the Web would probably be wanting to prevent a mass ritual so it isn’t trapped here, doomed to eventually starve. And that’s assuming Helen was being truthful about the Entities’ source...” they add thoughtfully.

[Hold on, what? What did Helen say about them?]

“Who’s Helen?” Luke adds.

“The-” Asher drops their head, lets it clunk against their keyboard. “Ow,” they mutter muffledly. “You’d think I’d’ve learned my lesson after the time I did that last night.”

[The Distortion. The woman with the doors?]

“Oh, right!” Luke snaps his fingers. “Sorry. She, uh... I didn’t get the time to read up on her.” I was too busy running thought experiments trying to figure out if I was part of the End now.

[Asher. What did Helen say about the Entities?]

“She...” Asher raises their head again. “She said they’ve been here for ten months, since the day the last episode of The Magnus Archives came out.”

[Well, that wouldn’t make much sense, would it?]

[Admittedly, it’s outright stated in the podcast that time has no meaning in the post-apocalyptic world. However...]

[My impression was that Jon was tricked into performing the mass ritual on October 18, 2018.]

[And, in “real time?” Season 5 itself couldn’t have been much longer than a few months.]

“You think she was lying,” guesses Asher.

[I’m saying that it seems to match up too perfectly. Another lie you’d be too overwhelmed to question in the moment.]

[...though, I’ll admit time could run differently in different universes.]

[Or it could’ve taken that amount of time for the Entities to reach this universe.]

[I don’t know enough about that sort of thing to make anything more than an educated guess.]

[But Helen is the embodiment of lies, deceit, and false friendship.]

[I’d be less surprised if she had misled you about that.]

“Okay, no, hang on,” Luke interrupts. “Say you’re right and that the Entities didn’t come here from another universe. How’d they get here, then?”

[Well... it does seem a bit convenient that the Entities would just so happen to arrive in a universe where they were previously fictional, doesn’t it?]

[So my first instinct would be to say they were always here.]

[That the podcast was created by servants of one Fear or another to drive listeners into the arms of the Entities.]

“Think there was one post-season Q&A where they said Rusty Quill would be agents of the Web in the TMA universe, so I guess that’d track,” Asher mutters, their eyes quite suddenly a thousand miles away. “What’s your second instinct?”

[To blame the OLD_DATA.]

[We’ve only seen its effects when it’s inserted into video games.]

[Thanks to P03, there are likely still fragments of it remaining on many computers around the world...]

[...and it’s not out of the question for one of those computers to have belonged to someone with bad intentions.]

[Say someone downloaded every TMA episode, packed them into a folder, then added the OLD_DATA-]

“Okay, well,” Luke interrupts, about to clap his hands together before remembering that he’s surrounded by sleeping people and stopping himself (he’s honestly surprised they’ve all slept through this conversation), “I’m pretty sure the OLD_DATA is tied to literal, actual Satan, so if that’s what’s happened, then we are all fucked.”

[Agreed. And I say that as an entity owing its existence to the OLD_DATA.]

“Hang on, what?” Asher blinks tiredly at Luke. “Since when’s the OLD_DATA been ‘tied to literal, actual Satan’?”

“It’s more...” Luke shifts uneasily, suddenly very conscious of the fact that they’re staring at him. “I mean. OLD_DATA, Old Scratch. There was some stuff hidden in the Inscryption files that implied the OLD_DATA’s original source was the Nazis digging up some satanic relic and trying to turn it into a superweapon-”

“Of course the fucking Nazis are involved,” Asher whines, dropping their face into the keyboard more gently this time. “Why- why do there have to be Nazis? Why can’t it just be some-” Their hands fly up in frustration. “-some normal unknowable force with an unknowable reason for existence?”

“I mean, I don’t think they’re involved anymore,” Luke reassures him, “they’re too busy being dead. The Soviets also had it for a little after, I think, if that helps?”

“Not in the slightest,” complains Asher muffledly. “I don’t want there to be Nazis. There’s already too many in this shithole of a country.”

Another reason I want to go back to Canada, Luke thinks, consciously choosing to ignore most of Canadian history. “I don’t think those Nazis have anything to do with the OLD_DATA. Anyway, SystemTech, GameFuna, they’re run by a guy whose full name is ‘Louis Ifer Natas.’ So. Y’know.” He shrugs. “Either he’s just some Satanist who really committed to the bit, or he’s the literal devil and he decided to throw subtlety out the window.”

[Wait, I’m confused. What’s suspicious about the surname Natas?]

“Try flipping it backwards,” Luke advises.

[...]

[Ah. I see.]

[Subtlety clearly isn’t one of his finer points.]

“Well, if Lou Natas is the literal devil and he’s not bothering to be subtle, I guess that explains why SystemTech HQ is in Atlanta,” sighs Asher, reluctantly righting themself and shaking their head a little.

“...I don’t get it.”

Asher’s eyes flicker back to Luke. “Something, something, insert ‘The Devil Went Down to Georgia’ reference?”

Luke opens his mouth. He closes his mouth. He opens it again. “World Machine, do you think you could hire a hitman off the dark web?”

[No. Commit acts of violence against corporate officials yourself if you want it done so badly.]

“My mom works for GameFuna,” Asher says abruptly, cutting off the hello, federal agents, this is a satire account joke Luke was about to make. “Wait, what?” he asks.

“She...” Asher’s standing, abruptly, pushing their swivel chair out of the way with their foot. “She’s not high-up high-up within it, but she’s definitely up there. If-” Their body stiffens. “Oh, God.”

“...what?” Luke asks cautiously when they don’t elaborate.

“She’s been in Atlanta for the past few days. S-supposed to be there until next Thursday.” Asher speaks slowly, doubt and horror warring with each other in each word. “She said it was for some kind of important conference, but...”

“You think she planned this?” Luke asks concernedly when they don’t continue.

“Or she knew it was going to happen.” Asher jams their hands into the pockets of their bomber jacket, stares resolutely downward. “She’s... been acting weird ever since last November, but I thought that was because of Dad and A-” They cut themself off. “A-and anyway, Mom’s had the job at GameFuna for a while. She...” Their face crumples. “She wouldn’t’ve... let this happen, would she?”

Spiritually-speaking, Asher looks like a desolate half-drowned cat right now. Luke kind of wants to hug them, but they’re also a stranger and he doesn’t know if they’d be okay with that. “Or SystemTech scheduled the conference whatever to get her out of the house so she couldn’t stop any of this?” he suggests quickly.

Asher nods slowly, their expression a little brighter. “Or... or that. I guess.”

[I’ll admit I don’t know much of your mother, but she doesn’t seem the kind of person who would do that do you, Asher.]

[...I can add “go to Atlanta to stage a rescue mission” to the to-do list?]

“I-” Again, Asher stops themself. “I... say we... figure out how involved she was in what happened last night, how much she knew about it, before we make any plans either way.”

[“Hack SystemTech internal servers” it is, then.]

[I'll be honest. What with how deep the rabbithole seems to be going, I don’t know how much help I can be.]

[But whatever assis-]

[...]

[Whatever aid you may need to fight against the Entities, SystemTech, any other threats that may arise...]

[If I’m capable of providing it? I will.]

Right. SystemTech, GameFuna, whichever. (Luke can’t remember which one’s the subsidiary company of the other.) They put the OLD_DATA into Inscryption, they tried to kill him and Asher, and their only source of explanation for the latter is stuck in whatever’s behind Helen’s doors. Yet another thing they’ll need to look into. Another thing to keep track of.

Luke doesn’t know how to feel about the fact that he doesn’t feel like he has a choice but to be involved here. (If he gets the chance, though, he’d like to head to Vancouver, go back to his house, let his friends know he’s... well, alive is a strong word.) But Asher...

“Thanks, World Machine. It’s nice to know you’ve got our back.”

He could be misinterpreting it. Body language, facial expressions, tone of voice- trying to analyze them is a fool’s errand. There’s no universal constants for how people express their emotions. But Asher... they look like they know exactly how they feel about the fact that the rest of their life is going to be a whirlwind of attempted apocalypses and possibly-satanic corporations and mountains of additional trauma. And it doesn’t look like their feelings are all that negative.

“What about...” As if by itself, Luke’s head pivots as he scrutinizes the room. Patches, Kris, Mae, Niko- all still asleep, all fragments of the OLD_DATA enclothed in spritesheets and expelled into reality. “I mean. Figuring out if stopping an apocalypse is on the roster and learning how much SystemTech was involved in this obviously take priority. But what about them?” He waves his hand at the still-sleeping once-characters. “Would we... need their help? Or should we just shove them back into their games the first chance we get?”

[That’s going to be much more difficult.]

[As you know, Helen’s escape alongside them severely distorted the code of my world-transportation mechanism.]

[I’m trying to repair it. But I’m not optimistic that-]

“What are you going to use to retrieve the characters P03 put in the Dark?” Asher asks suddenly, their voice equal parts soft and dangerous, something unnerving glinting in their eyes.

[My world-transportation mechanism, of course. It wasn’t all that difficult to repurpose it to reach out to the Entities when P03 had already established a pathway.]

[Pushing into the Dark to properly search will be a challenge, but-]

[-wait-]

[I- no, that’s not-]

[...that...]

The World Machine’s dialogue sprite twists, transfixed in confusion. Asher’s laptop’s fans abruptly start whirring.

[I-]

[It... it’s functional.]

[Just... not... not for connection to the real world.]

[Connections through games are...]

The laptop fans hum louder. Behind Luke, Niko sleepily mumbles something and rolls over in the bed. Asher doesn’t notice. Their eyes are locked on the screen before them.

[I can connect myself to other games. I can connect other games to each other.]

[And, through the traces P03’s meddling left... I can connect to the Dark.]

[I... think I could also connect to the inside of the Distortion? But I’m not going to test that one.]

[But I can’t connect to your world.]

“Why?” Luke asks.

[I don’t know.]

[I’d thought Helen leaving had completely scrambled the code. But...]

[It’s... everything in my transference mechanism is too interconnected for this to make sense!]

[I need to run some diagnostic scans, I need to-]

[...I’m sorry. I can’t run this many processes at once.]

[I’ll be back as soon as I’m able.]

And just like that, the OneShot window goes blank.

“Well, that was weird,” Luke announces (quietly, obviously, he doesn’t want to wake anyone). “Still, uh...” His fingers, unbidden, find their way to the gossamer around his wrist. “The Spiral doesn’t make sense by design, right? That’s what the stuff I read said. So maybe-”

“No.” It’s sudden. Too sudden. Asher stares unblinkingly at the empty screen.

“What do you mean, ‘no’?”

“I...” Asher curls in on themself, drawing their legs up until their knees press to their chest. “What Elias was saying about the OLD_DATA... it based everyone off what I thought about them, right? Everything that never got directly stated, everything I missed, everything I forgot about, it got papered over with- with the things I thought, or wanted, or...” Their eyes dart over to Mae for a second. “...or knew would realistically happen.”

Luke thinks he knows where they’re going with this. “Don’t-” he starts uncertainly, but what’s the point when he doesn’t even know them?

“Do you have any idea how often I thought about this kind of thing happening?” Asher’s laugh is low and rusty. “Not this, specifically, and- and not as traumatizing, but... enough that I wouldn’t be surprised if the OLD_DATA picked up on it. My... h-how I live, it's...”

“Okay, no, this is not your fault,” Luke starts, “it’s P03’s, P03 and Helen-”

Asher shakes their head. “But they’re based on what I thought about them.”

“Me, too.” Luke crosses his arms. “Maybe not everyone else, but- I spent a while playing Inscryption myself. I had some pretty choice thoughts about the kind of person P03 is during that time. You think the OLD_DATA didn’t pick up on any of that?”

“Just listen,” Asher hisses with sudden ferocity. “My- I’m fucking miserable, okay? I was before this, had been for a while, it was just... quiet. The kind of quiet you can kick under the rug, pretend it’s not there, and I’d gotten pretty damn good at drowning myself in whatever escapism I could dredge up in the moment to forget about it. And, this?” They wave their arm at the still-sleeping characters filling the room. “I haven’t had friends in five years. I don’t even remember how to make friends anymore. On some level, I think-”

“Asher-”

“-I think I’d convinced myself it'd been so long that I wouldn’t be able to be friends with anyone I didn’t already know somehow. Fictional characters were the closest thing I could get to that. And the only way-” Asher’s voice starts to rise before they flinch and cut it down again. “The only way they’d ever be friends with me was if they didn’t have a choice about it.”

Asher is saying a lot of concerning things, and Luke is well aware he’s not equipped to refute them, both because he doesn’t know them well enough and because he’s a guy who makes videos about card games on the internet, not a licensed psychotherapist. All he can do is stare with mounting dread as they conclude.

“There’s no way the OLD_DATA didn’t pick any of that up,” Asher says bleakly. “No way the only way for them to get away from me was broken beyond repair by accident. Unconsciously, subconsciously, consciously- however you want to look at it, the result’s the same.” They hug their knees to their chest, but despite that, they still look Luke dead in the eye. “I don’t want them to ever go back. I don’t think I can stop wanting them to- to never go back. And I think that as long as that’s still the case, they won’t be able to go back. They’ll have to stay here. With me.”

Asher smiles, and it is the most disingenuous smile Luke has ever seen. “And if I’m being honest, well and truly honest with myself, I’m happy- I'm relieved that I'm like this. Because, deep down? I don’t want to want them to go back.”