Chapter Text
It all starts with a long silence. Then-
"Well I definitely can't kill Trant, he's a father."
"It's true!"
Trant Heidelstam, civilian advisor to the RCM, widens his ever-present Trant Smile and begins unfurling his painfully beige leather wallet, no doubt to unveil the dreaded 'Child Photo Accordion'.
One of the glasses makes a heroic nose-dive towards him. Its sacrifice is not in vain, as the Child Photo Accordion instantly disappears back into its pocket lair for safe keeping. At the same time, four pairs of legs scramble away from the flood. It's just tonic water with a sad slice of lime. Friday night after work, but no one's drinking.
Legs slowly return to the now slightly tacky aftermath under the table. The three pairs not yet accounted for belong to 41st finest, Lieutenant Kim Kitsuragi, Satellite Officer Jean-Heron Vicquemare and Detective Harrier Du Bois.
Location is one of Jamrock's less seedy bars.
A game has just been proposed. A challenge from Jean to Harry.
It's a stupid fucking game and it's also dead serious.
When amateurs play it, the focus is always on the first two options. The "Fuck" and his less vulgar sister "Marry". Something to giggle and smirk about. In reality, they barely count. Worst case scenario they give birth to some benign office joke. It's only the third one that actually matters, their estranged uncle "Kill".
Who's the odd one out? Who's the most replaceable?
Jean-Heron Vicquemare, ex-satellite officer to 41th's resident superstar black hole, is a professional.
"Just admit you'd kill me, you son of a bitch."
Harry looks at him, brows knitted in frustration. "I would never kill you, Jean, you're still my partner where it matters." He taps his chest where he clearly assumes the heart is.
"In your fucking *liver*? Yeah that seems about right. With all the drunken asshole shit you dragged us both through, it's a miracle you still have either of us."
"No, not the liver, y'know the-"
There's a pause, as if a shouting match is happening inside his head. He taps his chest again, much closer to his goal.
"In here, Jean."
Jean snorts, humorlessly. "And here I thought Kim was your cool new partner. How quickly the tide turns, eh Kitsuragi?"
Kim doesn't react, just sips his tonic water. He's clearly above caring about something so inane, that bastard. Cool as icebergs up in Yekokataa, twice as remote.
"Jean, Jean, Jean, I'll have you know my heart has-"
There's another pause as Harry's mind whirls through its cryptic process like a frayed tape recorder. Nobody interrupts it, they learned not to.
"-three little blood room thingies, space for everyone!"
"Four, actually! The human heart consists of 2 atriums and 2 ventricles, a pair on each side." Trant, of course.
"Hot damn, room to spare!"
Harry starts looking around, presumably for a waiter to replace his spilled tonic, possibly for his 4th victim of affection.
"I probably won't marry you though, since you keep yelling at me." He murmurs, under his breath.
"Oh no, you're really breaking my heart here, shitkid, whatever *shall* I do."
"I am?" Harry has the gall to look genuinely shocked. "Well, you are pretty cool aside from that, maybe we could make it work somehow."
"It was an obvious joke, dolores-fucking-dei. I guess that means you're killing Lieutenant Kitsuragi then?"
You already know it doesn't mean that.
The full body shudder that passes through Harry is intense enough that Jean can hear his teeth clatter when it finally reaches his head. He clearly didn't even consider it as a possibility.
It's very obvious Kim has moved into Harry's three room fixer-upper of a heart and will be using the newly discovered fourth room as a Kineema garage.
'Last resident was a bit of a loser, couldn't keep up with the maintenance, but we threw all his shit out while he was away. It's all blank walls now, all it needs is some new moulding and a splash of paint, a nice spring project.'
He'll learn soon enough, mold always grows through paint.
No, you read the reports, it's because less than a month ago, Kim almost got shot right in front of him.
Never mind that, the conversation has stalled dangerously. It's almost at the point when someone might feel comfortable changing the topic. Don't let them.
"So you *will* kill Trant then?"
"No."
"No? You've got amnesia again? You're out of options, shitkid."
"No. I simply chose not to kill anyone." He leans back, infuriatingly self satisfied.
"That's not how it works, it doesn't mean anything if you don't kill anyone. You.have.to.chose."
Harry holds Jean's gaze for a couple of moments, like he always does when he's not quite sure where the context is hiding.
Reading you like a cheap detective novel. Good thing he forgot most of it, it'd be very predictable otherwise.
"Hmhhh..."
He's stroking his stupid walrus moustache, really thinking hard about it now. It's a case. Probably already has some bullshit name like THE FUCK MARRY KILL CASE. Pryce will be furious if he accidentally files it later.
"Alright!"
Harry seems to have reached a decision, palms landing flat on the table as he gives Jean one of his signature Expressions.
"I'm taking the case, brief me on the details."
"There's no details, there's no case. It's a stupid fucking game, just chose."
"No, no I agree with the detective, what's this situation like, how did this happen, why can't he just refuse." Kim fucking Kitsuragi, finally joining the conversation. The bastard is smiling slightly. Iceberg bobbing in the pale sea, brief flash of white before it gets you.
"Fine, we all got kidnapped by some gang and they're making shitkid play fuck marry kill with real life consequences. Why are they doing this? No fucking clue, they didn't tell us."
"Kidnapping four high ranking RCM officers seems super messy, I'll just stall until they find us." Harry.
"We're in abandoned warehouses by the west Jamrock docks, no-one for miles."
"How exactly are they enforcing these strange demands again?" Kim again.
They're cross-examining you, the nerve.
"I don't fucking know! They gave him three contracts or something, it can be the goddamn pervert lawyers gang for all I care."
Harry chuckles, he likes the idea of the pervert lawyers gang.
"So if he signs my name on the death one and I refuse to die, can they sue the precinct for breach of contract?" Kim asks, lightly. "I'm just worried what the paperwork load will be here."
Jean has a sneaking suspicion he's enjoying himself.
"No, it's magic or some shit, it just happens immediately."
Harry's eyes widen and he turns to Jean, hand on chest.
"I don't think I like the idea of a magical fuck contract then, as a feminist."
"As a what! We're all men here, you-" Jean lets out a long breath. They've only been here for 20 minutes, he needs to pace himself.
"Jean, despite the name, Feminism fights for safety and equality of all genders and that includes minimizing the harmful rethoric of-"
"-fine, the magical fuck contract has a consent section. You both have to sign it."
Harry opens his mouth, but Jean cuts him off before he can once again advance the field of women's rights at breakneck speeds.
"Yes, yes, so does the marriage one, fucking hell. Three magical contracts, shitkid, sign or we all die, that's all the stalling you're gonna get."
"Actually, I believe what you described is just a regular marriage certificate." Interjects Trant, helpful as always.
"Wow, marriage truly is magical." Whispers Harry. "And terrifying."
"Two magical contracts and one regular marriage certificate." Jean amends, then catches a glimpse of Harry's hand moving up and has a brief premonition of the future, like a prophet that only specializes in divining from one extremely predictable madman. "One of the kidnappers is an ordained dolorian priest."
Harry lowers his hand again.
"Wait, so if he signs the-" Lieutenant grimaces for a second, the side of him that's having fun, fighting the side of him that refuses to say 'fuck contract' . He sighs, pained, but not pained enough to spare Jean. "-if he signs the 'fuck contract' and it immidiately triggers, how is he going to sign the rest?"
"Kim's right, I fuck like a wild sea monster caught in a crabbing net, it's not pretty, Jean, it's intense, it's chaotic, there's sailors everwhere."
"GOD FUCKING DAMMIT HARRY, Not sailors, sea-men!, There's sea-men everywhere!"
Harry gasps, mock-offended.
"Jean! This is a family establishment. "
" You fucking piece of -Not every bar with a soft drinks menu is a daycare. You're supposed to say there's sea-men everywhere, not sailors, that godawful joke doesn't even make sense if you don't."
Kim raises an eyebrow at his outburst. "If we can agree to put your semen aside for a moment, satellite-officer Vicquemare, detective Du Bois' strange, erratic 'fuck movements' would likely tear the very next contract he's given, killing us all."
"I'm not putting semen anywhere, it's not my fucking semen! And the contracts all trigger at the exact same time, after you sign the last one."
A clap reverberates through the bar, attracting the attention of even the far-off tables that have so far been doing an enviable job of ignoring them.
Jean rolls his eyes so hard they threaten to leave their orbit in search of better, less embarrassing star systems. He knows the Clap. The Clap means superstar detective Harrier du Bois has reached some sort of an Epiphany and wants an Audience.
"Alright, I have enough data. Get ready, I'm gonna ace the “FUCK MARRY KILL” case, I'm gonna blow that shit wide open, they'll be finding little bits of it behind the curtains for years."
" Unbelievable ... The semen talk was the last missing clue for Dick fucking Mullen?"
Harry looks at him as if Jean just interrupted the moralintern congress on little war orphans with a well placed fart.
"Jean, please, this is a serious matter."
"Yeah, stop talking about your cum, cum-man, we all wanna hear this." Shouts someone from the back of the bar.
Harry flails his arms with panache.
Like the world's saddest circus clown about to make a balloon noose.
"Alright, here we go." He holds up three fingers.
First!" He curls up one finger. "The Marriage Contract That's Actually Just a Regular Marriage Certificate!"
In a movement that surprises no one, he turns to Lieutenant Kitsuragi.
"Kim, will you marry me?"
There's jeers of course, it's a jeer-y kind of question.
Kim raises an eyebrow, but accepts the invisible contract from Harry.
Fucking iceberg.
"This is all so sudden, detective." He says in a voice of someone being handed the weekly traffic report.
"It's a life and death situation, Kim."
"Khm" He says, looking down. "I suppose it is."
He signs the imaginary contract with one of his non-imaginary pens, then hands it back, cool as a deep sea cucumber that has never experienced a single sunray of insecurity in its entire cool little life.
A second finger curls.
"Next comes the FUCK CONTRACT ."
More jeers, a few hollers, quite some groans. The phrase 'fuck contract' will never catch on.
Harry's eyes meet Jean's for a moment, withstand the barrage of eye-daggers for another one, then hurriedly slide off before they can be hit by the eye-artillery.
"Trant, I know you're a family man, but do you think your wife might learn to understand the sheer fucked up reality of this situation we're in right now?"
"I'm sure she won't mind, we're very much divorced."
This actually breaks Harry's stride for a split second. He looks genuinely horrified.
"Shit, man, I'm so sorry."
"Oh, no need, It's very amicable, we play Un-Deux-Trivia on thursdays."
"Wow."
The sheer concept of two adults working things out in a healthy manner seems to shock him into another one of his strange pauses. He snaps out of it, when Trant hands him back his own invisible contract.
Finally, a single fist raises high in the air, zero fingers remain.
"And lastly, the death contract..."
The bar is dead silent now, save from a soft curse from the bartender who just noticed he'd started cleaning the inside of a full beer glass.
Say what you will, he knows how to work a crowd.
“On the death contract…!”
He has their full attention. He has *your* full attention too.
Not yet, he's going to repeat it again. It's like there's a little voice in his head that always overestimates how effective that is.
"Onnn the deathhh contract- !"
Shuffling, groans, but they're too hooked to turn around now.
Here it comes. It doesn't matter that you basically forced this call. You just need to hear him admit it so you can wallow more efficiently. You *need* to hear this.
"...I sign my very own name."
The bar erupts with glee.
It's dramatic, it's satisfying, it's poetic, it's tragic, but in an undeniably cool way. It's the perfect end twist.
It makes no goddamn sense.
Jean is furious.
"MOTHERFUCKER ! -THAT WAS YOUR GENIUS SOLUTION ALL THIS TIME ? - KILLING YOURSELF ?"
A broken ceiling fan in a trashed hotel room, one of the wings bent lifelessly towards the floor, as if strangled by a sudden weight.
Harry's eyes are wide as saucers, he clearly didn't expect this response.
A hand settles on his shoulder. Kitsuragi's.
"Jean, it's just a game."
You're ruining it for everyone, is what he meant to say. Lighten up, asshole.
"Yeah, it's just a game right? It's always some fucking game with him."
"Jean, shit, I'm sorry." Harry has unfrozen and is now pawing at his shoulders like an insecure seal. "I'm not- I'm not killing myself. I swear."
"Lay off, I'm fine."
Bit of a mood killer, you screaming like that, but everyone's willing to just drop it now. It was a bad idea to do it in the first place, you can simply stop.
You're not going to do that, make him finish the goddamn game. Drowning cost fallacy, baby!
"So what's your *real* plan then? Crying onto the contract until the text is too smudged to be legally binding?"
You can almost feel the atmosphere reboot.
Harry beams. "That's an amazing idea, but the truth is actually much more elegant and less demoralizing, my dear partner in crime." Ace detective act is back in full swing.
"Partner in crime...I'm not even your partner in law."
Next to him, Trant seems to reach an unknown epiphany.
"Ah! Of course…"
Harry turns to Trant with a wide smile.
"Hell yea Trant, tell them, karate chop them with your sick all-knowing advisor facts."
"I honestly can't believe it took me so long to remember! Marrying a corpse has been strictly illegal in the entirety of the Occident since the United Mundi congress in '32 FN." Says Trant, cheerfully.
"Exactly! You see, when I-"
Harry's attempt at further dramatics is ran over by the Trant Train.
"It was of course generally frowned upon long before that, but no one thought there needed to be a rule about it until that messy inheritance feud for South Köningstein. It's actually a very fascinating insight into early-franconigerian law, if you'll allow me to-"
The second martyr-glass misses splashing into Trant's lap and shatters on the floor instead. It will be remembered as a hero, just as you'll be remembered as the 'somehow got trash-the-place-drunk on tonic water alone' table.
As Kim apologises to the waiter and orders himself a new glass, Harry continues, slightly faster than before.
"As I was saying. When I planted the idea of changing one of the *magic* contracts into a mere marriage certificate in Trant's mind, I also planted the seed of destruction into your whole little magic world-THE SEED OF LAW."
"Bullshit, you didn't make Trant do shit, you just lucked out, like you always do."
"THE SEED OF LAW-" Continues Harry "-which grows into THE TREE OF JUSTICE, WHOSE ROOTS OF LEGALITY PIERCE THE FOUNDATIONS OF THIS EVIL SCHEME. AND SINCE THE THREE CONTRACTS ARE LINKED TO ONE ANOTHER WITH AN UNBREAKABLE MAGIC BOND, THE SHEER PARADOX OF INSTANT ILLEGAL CORPSE MARRIAGE TEARS THEM ALL TO SHREDS IN A SUPER COOL MAGIC PAPER EXPLOSION.
He tears up his napkin for effect, letting it confetti through the air.
"Ta-dah!
Victory, only slightly saggy from spilled tonic water.
There's polite applause from the restaurant patrons. The grand finale has already happened. Most people enjoy the intricacies of corpse law less than grand gestures of self sacrifice. A few réal roll into Harry's fallen hat, their owners clearly assuming they were enjoying some sort of an experimental indoor street theatre.
Harry's beaming at him with that stupid grin of his. So fucking self-satisfied. Ace-goddamn-detective.
"Great job, shitkid, the only thing you forgot was the armed kidnappers holding us hostage, they just killed us all."
“Nuh-huh, the sheer shock of my brilliant stunt was just enough for us to slip out unharmed."
"What is this Du Bois? Fucking kindergarten logic? 'You can't beat me, I have my invincibility shields on' kinda deal? They have guns and we're in the middle of nowhere port."
Another one of those smiles. He knows you're playing along now.
"That's why we run out of the werehouse straight to their parked carriages. And what's that? It's a conveniently unlocked Couopris Kin-"
"It's a LUM Vent, model C." Lieutenant Kitsuragi sounds very sure of it.
"Kim, you dog, your Kineema is parked right outside the bar."
"The walls are thick, detective." He says, with a distant smile.
"Anyway, Kim floors it, blasting us into the sunset at insane speeds."
"I keep to the speed limit." He corrects, automatically. "Wait, you said this is Jamrock West, warehouse district?"
"Empty as the pale, baby!"
The corners of Kim's mouth inch up. "Alright, I floor it."
"Rims spinning!"
Lieutenant cocks an eyebrow. "I see the kidnappers visited that one particular pawn shop in Martinese?"
Harry nods solemnly. "They've been following us for a while. In fact, they're following us right now! Five carriages gaining on us fast, six o' clock!"
"That's quite alright. I suggest you all hold on to something, I'm about to truly floor it."
He's sitting perfectly still, taking occasional sips of his tonic with every drop of his usual nonchalance, while Harry flails and acts out actions with wild abbadon. But somehow it works.
"Trant, you heard the man, are you holding on?"
"I'm in the back, making sure Mikael doesn't get carsick."
Harry gasps. "Shit, you brought him with you?"
"Well, you said it was sunset, so I must've been picking him up from his violin lesson when they got me."
"Kim bring your coolness levels down, we have a baby on board."
Kim grimaces regretfully.
"No can do detective, coolness levels are stuck, I just popped a truly sick wheelie to avoid incoming fire."
"Shit, they're shooting at us too?"
"I'm afraid so."
"Shit. Shit! Jean?"
Harry's looking at him expectantly.
"What?"
"We need some firepower!" He's flexing his arms, because of course he is.
"I'm not in your fucking made up car chase."
"Hell yea you are, Jean, we pulled you into the car for sure."
"No, I definitely stayed behind to beg the ' fuck contract' gang to kill me anyway."
Harry's puppy dog eyes last about three seconds against Jean's death glare before giving up.
Back to the show. He's not as springy as he was before, but you'd need to have known him for years to notice.
Why the fuck is he so bothered by this.
"Kim, how are we doing?"
"Not fantastic, detective. It's only a matter of time before they hit us or we crash."
"Trant-" His voice veers off, staring at the sofa where the civilian advisor has twisted himself into some kind of a knot over his briefcase.
"It's the Brönner-Schmidt protective maneuver, detective. Did you know the human body is one of nature's best shock absorbers due to its varied fluid filled tissue composition? It might even match an airbag when deployed properly."
"Good thinking Trant, at least Mikael will survive!"
"Well I wouldn't say it's a given! There's a reason we don't put bones in airbags. For example, due to age-retraction of marrow and general mineral loss, the average adult femur is laterally brittle enough to snap right through-"
Goddamit, they're really laying it on thick, putting imaginary kids in imaginary danger like that. The imaginary ethics committee will have something to say about this.
Jean sighs.
"Fine, I lean out of the window and shoot their fucking tires out, happy?"
The smile Harry sends him confirms that yes, he is, very much so. "You hit them, it looks super cool, but as soon as the normal, boring cars spin away, BAM! IT'S THE FRANCONIGERIAN ARTILLERY CARRIAGES , BIG SOLID ARMORED WHEELS, THEY'RE GAINING ON US!"
Jean's jaw drops. "What the hell, whose side are you on, you fucking maniac?"
Beside him, Trant is muttering to himself. "Sunset, sunset… Ah! Detective, did you know there's a time right before sunset where all the west Jamrock drawbridges go up for an hour, so the evening inter-insulindian tanker convoy can return to port all in one go?"
Harry's grin is so wide it threatens to split his face.
"Franconigerian artillery carriages, they can't float!"
"Neither can we, idiot, what are you going to do, jump a bridge- oh my god you're going to jump a bride."
"Kim, can you make it so we hit the ramp just before it lifts completely and it launches us into air over the canal while the artillery carriages swerve and crash into the bridge and then one of them that had too much running speed can't quite stop in time and falls into the water?"
Kitsuragi considers it for a split moment, no doubt making sure all the specificities of the request are accounted for, then a corner of his lips curls up.
"Yeah, I can make that." He reaches for the imaginary stick shift with such precision the air around his fingers makes a clicking sound just to appease him. "Watch out, sharp left."
"Fuck!"
Jean grabs the arm rest, to avoid careening into Trant. The engine whines and sputters as you're thrown back into the carriage seats, dark under the shadow of the lifting bridge wing.
A few tense moments of rattling and burnt rubber, then suddenly, all the force is gone and the last rays of sun bathe the cabin in gold. You've got air.
Reality pops softly, like a soap bubble.
The jump is glorious.
Kim's lips are now fully curled into an adrenaline grin. One hand still on the stick shift, the other with its full forearm stretched across the steering wheel, illegal racing ring style. The sun strobes off his lenses and the half opened window glass to your right.
The flow of time has thinned down to a trickle. Honey in ice water.
Beside you, Trant is holding Mikael up so he can see through the window, presumably explaining the physics of the colorful splat you'll make when you hit the ground on the other side. Harry in the passenger seat, his fist pumping up, immeasurably slow.
All around the carriage, things are taking flight. Harry's tie rising from his throat like a languid wave. Trant's immaculately folded lapel unfolds at glacier speed and slides from his pocket. One of Kim's pencils floats by you, spinning lazily around its orbit.
Pieces of broken glass, slowly undulating spheres of tonic water, six slices of lime.
Wait?
Things are floating?
Actually, it makes perfect sense that things are floating right now. Things always float for a moment or two at the very peak of a jump.
That's not the weird part.
The bar has frayed to its very edges, as if reflected in a scratched up rear-view mirror. You can tell it's still there, conceptually, but it's always just outside your vision. A mere mirage in this new reality.
That's absolutely the weird part.
YOU - What the actual hell...
YOU - Huh?
YOU - Why am I... a 'YOU' all of a sudden?
The rest of them are all there beside you, but not exactly with you. Not frozen, but moving infinitely slow. Slower and slower with each barely passing second.
Harry's fist finally reaches its upper apex. Despite it all, his eyes manage to slowly slide to yours.
You're not sure how yet, but this is absolutely all his fault.
JEAN 2 - His smile is wild and happy in a way that makes you nostalgic. He's glad, he's so incredibly glad you're here with him, in his 'fucking made up car chase' . He knows it's salvageable now.
YOU - Who the *fuck* are you?
JEAN 2 - I'm your inner voice.
YOU - My inner-Oh my god I finally lost it, Shitkid has finally scrambled my brain like a cheap slushie...
YOU - Wait-,
YOU - 'JEAN 2' ?
YOU - What kind of a lame inner voice name is that?
JEAN 2 - I just assumed you'd hate the pretentiousness of something like FRATERNITÉ.
YOU - You know what, you're right JEAN 2, I * would* hate it if my sudden onset audio-hallucinations waxed poetic about my shitty ex-partner *and* then also had a stupid name, it *would* be the absolute worst part of it, thank fucking god you spared me.
JEAN 2 - (there's no response, but you can feel FRATERNITÉ is happy you agree)
YOU - So what is this? I didn't have a life reel worth playing so I'm stuck in a B movie car chase making smalltalk with myself while we wait for the aneurysm to finish?
JEAN 2 - You're not dying and this is not a dream. It's… well, I think it might be some sort of a supra-natural pale-induced phenomena thingy? You know how Harry does his Harry thing when he stares at nothing for a few minutes and then says something absolutely unhinged he had no real way of knowing? It's like that, but you're in it too now. Or something. I'm sorry, this is really not my forte.
YOU - So, shitkid's spreading Pale like it's the fucking pox? Why am I not surprised.
JEAN 2 - Not spreading, imprinting. A 24 karat crystal latice, difracting and refracting alongside its own axis, a fractured, fractal gemstone of self, projecting its structure onto amorphous window glass of minds around it, until they too, bend fragments of pale light right back at it.
YOU - What the absolute fuck.
JEAN 2 - Uh… I'm not entirely sure where that just came from either.
JEAN 2.1 - Heyy, that actually wasn't JEAN 2 at all, it was me, JEAN 2.1. I didn't want to alarm you, so I pretended to be the same voice for a second there. I see it had the opposite effect, so I've taken the liberty to number myself in accordance with the already established voice naming format. I suggest we start referring to JEAN 2 as JEAN 2.0, for consistency's sake.
YOU - Never talk to me again.
The air around you continues to sparkle and shift as the Kineema continues it's molasses-slow arc across the river. Sunshine and tonic water, with a hint of lime.
YOU - So when does this shit end? Do I have to kick his imaginary mind-ass or something? Is there an emergency button?
JEAN 2 - Again, I'm-
YOU - -not sure, yea, got it. Shut up.
You climb over to the front of the car, snapping your fingers in front of Harry's face.
YOU - "I know you're doing this, asshole, let me out."
JEAN 2.1 - He doesn't react, eyes still on the spot you were a moment ago. Mere picoseconds have passed in his world, his neurons will never even know you were here. Same space, different speeds, it's all very quantuum.
You've never been as alone as you are right now.
YOU - "Goddammit Shitkid, first you forget I exist and now you're erasing me from what, your entire plane of existence? You could've just requested a fucking transfer."
JEAN 2 - You wish, desperately, to just forgive and fall into the easy lul of camradery he's offering, it's eating you up inside. But it wouldn't be fair, you like things to be fair, obsessively so. Sometimes you wish you'd forgotten as well.
YOU - Oh fucking *great*, it's *that* kind of a vision. Fine, just give me the stupid moral, so I can leave.
HINDSIGHT - You could end it at any time, this stand-off that nobody but you knows even exists.
YOU - Oh wow, I get another one? Lucky me, brain-hosting a proper shithead convention.
HINDSIGHT - I’m the voice of things you knew you’d regret, of preventable actions that’ll grow to haunt you, of words you’ll wish you could take back, but say anyway. You don’t listen to me a lot.
YOU - Wish I could listen to you less.
YOU - Wait, 'HINDSIGHT' ? What happened to the 'no pretentious names' deal?
HINDSIGHT - I just thought you’d appreciate some clarity, looking back-
YOU - Shut up, you're 'JEAN 3' now.
JEAN 3 - Are you sure? It might get a bit confusing.
JEAN 4 - Only if by confusing, you mean funny as hell!
JEAN 5 - Nice fucking mess He's gotten you into this time. Nothing really changes, huh? Use this, Vic, it's high time you got to be the crazy piece of shit.
JEAN 2 - I'm sorry, this is my fault, I didn't know there were more coming.
JEAN 2.1 - Heyyyy, no big deal, but it looks like you followed a different naming convention than the one I suggested just a minute ago. Could we maybe just bump everyone up a number, starting from JEAN 2, since that's where the error occurred. Alternatively, we could also follow mine, since I really do think it's superior all around.
JEAN 6 - Somewhere in the alley behind the bar, a rat gnaws on a piece of cold flesh. It doesn't particularly care that it's a finger and it cares even less about the thin gold band adorning it, so much unlike the people that dumped it there.
YOU - (Scream and Snap out of it)
To be continued..