I (Don't) Remember

[Lord_Shadow]

((AnArchy was always here. Or maybe she continued from Listening to Ghosts. Did she?))

The casino was exactly as she remembered it. Everything in its proper place. Everyone doing what they were last left doing. A dead, desolate, empty wasteland. Filled with nothing but regret and sorrow.

And there were still all these damn people here. Fuckers wouldn't go away. She vaguely recalled something about the vast majority of these people not being real. The fact that her senses told her in very clear terms that the people were here detracted from that idea.

She sat at the nearest table for blackjack. "Deal me in." The dealer obliged. Crap cards. Crap players. Crap fantasy. "Fuck it. Forget it. I fold." She got up from the table and moved on to a nearby slot machine.

How much longer are you going to resist? You can't do this forever.

"I don't care what's real and what isn't. Haven't I understood that yet? Bring on the perceptual dissonance I say!" She took out her blade and stabbed herself in the chest.

Stop that. It's not funny.

"It's fucking hilarious. I'm well and truly insane now. Talking to myself for real. Seeing things that aren't there but believing they are. Hell, I'm not fully convinced I'm real at this point. Was my life just a dream up till now? Who the fuck knows or cares. Let me just keep denying the opportunity for my morality to reassert itself and just have fun till I keel over. I'll be dead soon anyway. Maybe I already am."

Who am I even talking to? Goddamn it is there any coherent sequence of thoughts or actions left in me? Just give in you stupid animal ego bitch!

"Whee!" She twirled around with her sword outstretched. "No responsibility! No obligation to entertain anyone anymore! If none of it is real then why even bother pretending to give a fuck anymore? Yay!"

Sooner or later. Sooner or later this too will end. Rationality and morality will take control once more. I'll be sane again. I'll be good again. I'll be ME again.

[Lord_Shadow]

"Why don't they talk?" AnArchy asked, poking the apparition of her sister. "It's boring that they don't talk." She stared into those unflinching eyes. The hallucination followed her gaze.

"Because my voice isn't theirs." Ana replied curtly. "And I can't speak for them."

She crossed her arms and glared at her crazier self.

"Okay, idea. Maybe I mediate this metaphorical/literal identity crisis. Help a girl pull herself together. Maybe not add fuel to the fires of insanity. Maybe have some shred of dignity left." Stasia said, sitting in between the two rivals.

They temporarily turned their attention to her.

"Maybe you butt out and leave this to me, don't wanna see you get hurt." Ana said.

"Stay out of this and let the extremes settle this, middler." AnArchy cheered.

"Okay. Still gonna be crazy I see. Still sticking to Freudian archetypes despite the fact no respectable psychologist considers them useful as anything more than an intro to the history of the field."

She fell backward into her beanbag chair. AnArchy stepped up to sit on her throne. Ana kept still sitting at her desk.

This was getting nowhere. What was going on in reality? Or, what might or might not be reality. Right now two thirds of her imaginary mental composite didn't believe anything was real anymore. Indulging this pseudofantastical  labyrinth of distorted perception was an exercise in proving the limits of her patience.

And it was wearing thin.

---

She stayed beside Shawn's corpse. The blood was long since dried and useless to her. She didn't bother to try it. The smell of death was great but she ignored it. She just sat and stared at the body. He used to mean something to her. He still did. He now didn't. Both and none at the same time.

None of it could be true. Everything was true. It never happened. It always has been.

She looked at a nearby camera. Did anyone understand what was going on with her anymore? Was anyone even watching? Or was anyone even watching in the first place. She sat in silence. Not doing anything. Letting her mind do the actions her body was having an increasingly difficult time doing.

She was already dead.

And yet still alive.

Schrödinger's Anastasia.

[Lord_Shadow]

"The first day. A new way. A new day. The second day. We all say. We all bray. The third day. The same grey. The same ray. The fourth day. Our death may. Our death, nay. The fifth day. Blood, okay. Blood, I pay. The sixth day. Silence lay. Silence yay. The seventh day. Repeat." She rocked back and forth against the wall. She stared at the camera in front of her. It seemed so far away. Just beyond reach. And yet, she knew if she drew her blade she could cut down the device easily. It would no longer stare into her soul.

"How long has it been? Doesn't matter. Is anyone even out there? Doesn't matter. Was there ever a point? Doesn't matter. The game is over. Or rather, it never began. It's hard to explain. But really there was never any rhyme or reason to this. Because this didn't happen. I'm not here. No one is." She blinked and pressed her back against the wall.

"And I don't mean in the game. I don't mean in life. Because there is no life. No mortality, no afterlife. No spirit, no mind, no body. No illusion. What is... isn't. Reality is not a lie because there was never a truth to lie about. My words now are not being spoken. Not being thought. No one hears them and no one listens for them because no one is."

She slumped down to the ground, sliding slowly. "But all of it is real. This did happen. It is happening. And I'm caught in it until I break free. Until I no longer exist because I never existed. I'm not even some figment of imagination. I'm a real flesh and blood girl who happens to be the very antithesis to her awareness of the true nature of nothing. Existing is keeping me from not being. From being not. From not. Not."

She drew the sword. "If I kill myself, I die and we repeat this cycle. If I live it perpetuates indefinitely. I must find a way to undo the is. Become the is not without becoming anything. We can't really comprehend that as extants ourselves. Since we are we cannot know what it is to not. But I fully believe that's the only escape. Whether in this game or out of it, I will pursue that. To be no longer. To not. Not. It doesn't make sense but it makes perfect sense."

She turned the blade against her useless arm. She applied some pressure and slowly cut herself. Intense pain flooded her being and she cried and whimpered in pain. "This. This is what I mean. This is the curse. Being able to feel at all, having awareness. Existing. Because our true state is nothing. Because we aren't anything. We exist as a mistake. Truth isn't. Is not. Not."

She let go of the blade and put pressure on her wound. It still hurt like crazy. "I ramble to people who aren't there. No one is listening. Because I'm not talking. I'm not thinking. Is this real? Doesn't matter. Is this my dream? Doesn't matter. Is this just all in my head. Doesn't matter. Does not. Not. No."

[Lord_Shadow]

Bodies strewn all over the place. Weapons, armor, vehicles all scattered and broken. The battlefield was saturated with death and destruction. The goddess-empress observed the carnage with glee.  Blood was everywhere, painting the landscape.

"Still wanna fight? All of this death is starting to get out of hand. Gotta be weighing heavily on you, little miss perfect."

The chairwoman glared at her.

"All the necessary sacrifices will be made. Anything it takes to push you out for good. A million, even a billion dead. Whatever I must lose to win, I shall."

Watching from a nearby hill, the jester sat idly. She had seen the entire battle unfold. She had simply observed the pointless struggle. It wasn't real so there wasn't a need to care. But it still pissed her off.

She scowled. It wasn't like this mental tug-of-war was helping. And the real situation was even less helpful. Somehow she knew it was pointless to even try to get better. But even if it was, she had to try and get better.

"Idiot. I'm wasting time with all this pointless struggle. I need to get along with this already."

[Lord_Shadow]

Enough. Enough. ENOUGH! It was time to put an end to all this insanity. The extremes were called together. The mediator took her place.

"Before we begin, allow us to say state that our conclusion is the same. This much at least is not real. The world of woes, perhaps or perhaps not. We cannot ascertain that yet. But this much is false. Now then, we know why we are gathered. Present our views."

"Order. Justice. Rationality. All things we have lost. Things we must reclaim if we are to survive."

"Chaos. Joy. Savagery. Things that have allowed us up till now to ignore the horrors that have befallen us. Why return to a state where despair can reach us? I detest that line of thinking."

"The fault lies in both. One runs from pain, masked with craziness. The other thinks the pain is irrelevant. That we can deal with it completely and be fine. Forgetting, of course, that we ran away from it precisely because we cannot deal with it. And so it lands on the jester to fix it. The mediator, the baseline, upon which all other traits are extended." She sighed.

"I really am beyond saving at this point. Fine. Enough of both of you. I'll be the persona. I'll hide behind this now. Until I'm ready to embrace all of me, to stop hiding behind false beings. To stop using lies to obscure the truth. Might as well be the funny bitch. We already went through the hardass and the crazy lady."

---

She awoke after an indeterminate time. She had simply drifted off after a long period of nothing. But when she awoke she had a new role to play at. Coward. Why was she still hiding behind a mask?

"Knock knock. Who's there? Fuck. Fuck who? Fuck you, open the door!" She smirked. She got up using a chair for support. "Well, existential crisis aside, I'm doing pretty well. Time for me to take center stage again. This time I'm not playing crazy. I'm not playing the ruler either. I'm still not being true to myself bit then again this may not be real so why should it matter?"

She looked over at the hallucinations. They were still sitting idly. Good to see she had company. "Hey, what did one ghost say to another ghost? Boo the fuck are you?" She laughed.

"Man is this boring. And here I am passing time with terrible non-jokes." She was pretty sure that this wasn't actually happening. And then the announcement happened. She didn't bother to react to the names. She just waited for the dangerzones. The casino was fine. Okay. Good.

"Will real fake people come visit me now? It'd be nice to talk to someone psuedo-real."

[KamiKaze]

(Bella Bianchi continued from The Cold Never Bothered Me Anyway))

A long time ago, Bella figured out that one of her worst fears was being alone.

“Alone” could mean a lot of things. Sometimes Bella would get a chill when it was only her in the house, or walking down a quiet path. A sense of paranoia? Perhaps. But what truly scared her was the idea of being completely and utterly alone in every sense of the word. Maybe it was the idea of the world ending and her being the only human being on Earth. Or maybe it was the idea of having everyone you know and love hate you. Whenever she heard about such things, or read them, or watched them, it horrified her.

Maybe it was because of how she grew up. There were plenty of friends and people her age to talk to. There was the drama club, various people at school, people she talked to online. But it never felt like she had enough time in the world to just be with them. She was always too busy, with rehearsals or acting classes or auditions or performances.

After they left the Ice Palace, it felt like her and Yagmur were among the few people left in the world. Of course, that wasn’t true. There were definitely people tuning in to watch. Mother was, in all likelyhood. She didn’t know what to think about that idea. There were a few other people left in the resort, too. Zoe, the girl at the Ice Palace, hadn’t tagged along, but she was alive. Cathryn had been on the announcements, but as the killer. She probably didn’t want anything to do with her, after she broke her promise to come back after killing Gene. Nor would Tucker, not after she murdered his sister. There were a few others still around, both from her school and Yagmur’s.

The snow crunched louder and louder under her feet as they approached the casino. It was colder than ever, now. Too cold.

She’d messed up. Many times. Leaving the condos with Eden and losing her. Not fighting back against Gene when he was hurting Will. Not going back to the aquarium as soon as possible, leaving Aidan to die. Getting Regina killed. Maybe Paisley and Gene weren’t that huge mistakes. She did what she could do.

When it came to Shadi, she especially messed up.

Bella had known, right from the beginning, that she was here. During the opening briefing, she had seen her in the crowd. She hadn’t managed to figure out who else was there, but Shadi was definitely there. And yet, even though she wanted to, she barely looked for her. Didn’t find her. Never even went to the nature walk to see her one last time. She still couldn’t believe Shadi did the things the announcements said she did. That wasn’t the Shadi she knew.

The Shadi she knew was kinder, much kinder, and it was hard to picture her doing those things on purpose. Even now, some part of her wanted to give her the benefit of a doubt. Maybe she was defending herself and two people died when she did so. Or maybe that was the second time.

She remembered how one time, she and Shadi went out for pizza together when Mother was out of town for the weekend. Just them, and the Old Town. Mother never liked her too much, but since she was away it meant they could be together. They went back to her house afterwards, and Shadi had brought cake mix. She knew that she wasn’t allowed to have sugar, so she sometimes went out of her way to bring something sweet with her. Bella never asked, but she did. She made sure to clean up thoroughly enough so Mother wouldn’t find out, either.

It was heartbreaking to know that she wouldn’t experience anything like that again. Not with Shadi.

They were up to the casino doors, now. Bella had managed to retrieve the pogo stick. It was slightly warped and the horse’s head was still stained, but she felt it wasn’t completely in disrepair. Right now she loosely drug it behind her, making tapping noises as she walked through the snow, head lowered.

She looked up to see the large cowboy tipping his hat, then diverted her eyes to the nearest door. It seemed warm. Bella placed her hand on the handle, before turning to Yagmur. Once again, she was at a loss for words. For a few seconds, she looked at him, mouth open, but nothing was coming out. Instead, she just opened the door.

At first it seemed pleasant. It was brightly lit, and it smelled vaguely nice, too. Like peanuts and whiskey. She imagined they pumped the smell through the building somehow. It must have been a decent place, even to gamble all your money away. For whatever reason, it had a Western theme. She guessed they couldn’t figure out a way to keep with the tropical theme. They even played saloon music.

She took a few more steps in, and a new, just as powerful smell reached her nose. This one was familiar by this point. Deep breath. She didn’t see anyone on the ground right now, but that smell was never a good thing.

Based off the loud ramblings, there was someone here. Bella turned her head to see someone wearing a dress that was somehow frillier and more girlish than the one she was wearing. Bella looked at her, making a face. That reddish brown on her dress definitely wasn’t a pattern of some kind.

Bella knew the girl, but she didn’t seem like good news. There was something… off about her. Not in the same way as Paisley or Gene, or even Vahka, but something definitely wasn’t right.

She looked back to Yagmur, and raised a hand.

“Stay back. I’ll deal with it”, she whispered.

For a brief second, she was worried about losing Yagmur too. If the girl was nuts, she’d go for her first. Yagmur had the gun, so if she moved closer he could shoot her away.

Bella stepped closer, raising the pogo stick. Another deep breath.

“Ana, is that you?”

She wasn’t sure if it was a good idea to call out to her.

[Lord_Shadow]

"Was that my name? Did I call it out? Or was it someone else?" She turned to face the source of the voice.

An unfamiliar person greeted her gaze. Someone she was sure she had seen before, or had never seen ever, yet was unknown to her. Holding a goofy weapon.

"Hold your horse there! Let's be neighborly here. You can talk so I assume you are not a phantom manifestation from my mind. But," she smiled. "the question here is, are you real? Or have I just imagined you?"

She gripped her blade. Maybe she should test her new friend's tangibility.

She decided against it.

Letting go of the blade at her side, she renewed her smile. "Well, real or not, welcome. Make yourself at home."

[General Goose]

((Yagmur Tekindor continued from The Cold Never Bothered Me Anyway))

Zoe had decided to leave them.

That was fine. He had nothing much to say to her. A few days ago, sure, they probably would have had far more in common, far more shared interests and points of conversational reference, than Yagmur would with someone like Bella. Indeed, from what little he knew of Bella's pre-SOTF life, they wouldn't have seen eye to eye on much.

Now she was probably the only person that he could trust.

Sure, there were family and friends back home, but he'd probably never see them again, their trust and support completely meaningless in his final moments, and even if they were here...well, he no longer knew their world, and they no longer knew his world.

So it was just Bella. And though it was largely unspoken, though they'd had few heart-to-heart moments or friendly conversations, he could tell they had a lot in common. Not on things that mattered back in normal existence, but on things that mattered right now.

Which is why he wasn't exactly happy with her walking forward, into a potential death trap, but he knew that hanging back while he went forward could have been just as dangerous for her as well.

So, with a nod and a grunt, he obeyed, and focused on making sure no-one hostile came through the door.

And the girl that greeted Bella was...weird as fuck. Even from his position hanging back, slightly out of her field of vision, he could hear the girl's ramblings. Yagmur was normally in no position to judge other people as weird or unusual, and certainly he expected everyone still alive at this point to be carrying some severe mental baggage, but...

What the fuck was this stupid Shakespearean existential bullshit?

Yagmur raised an eyebrow, his expression stoic and unmoved for the first time in days.

[KamiKaze]

Bella was never too close with Anastasia Arcadia. They shared a few classes, definitely. It was just that they usually weren’t in the same circle. But she remembered Ana. Ana was, in a lot of ways, like Lisa. Very energetic, very cheerful. In a way, Bella envied people like them. She had always been a little self-conscious. But people like Lisa and Ana, they were exuberant. Bella remembered that she hosted a party recently, that she received an invite for. She wasn’t able to go, though. There was an audition that night.

In any case, Bella knew she was always a little on the quirky side. However, this wasn’t quirk. Ana did a lot of things back home, but not… whatever this was. Dressing up in a princess gown, the insane rambling?

Bella tensed up when she noticed that Ana had a sword. If she tried to go for a kill, that would be how she’d do it. Just a quick stab or slice, and that would be the end of Yagmur or her. If she did, there were two of them, and Yagmur had the gun. But, she didn’t want to risk it.

She shot a glance at Yagmur. He had stayed a bit behind, like she’d asked. His face was unemotional. Then back at Ana.

Bella lowered the pogo stick, though not by much. Ana was definitely out of it. She had no idea how her dress got that filthy, but the mental image that came up was Ana, hacking away at a screaming kid on the ground with a big grin on her face. She didn’t remember if Ana had been on the announcements, but for all she knew something like that happened. Just the thought gave her a shudder.

As much as she didn’t want to, she was willing to fight back if Ana tried something.

“We’re real”, she said. “I remember you from Davison”.

If Ana had to be reminded of what was real and what wasn’t, it wasn’t a good sign. Along with the stench of dead bodies somewhere, the things coming out of her mouth in general, and the stained dress, it could mean nothing good.

She had to ask.

“Ana… what happened?”

She didn’t dare get any closer.

[General Goose]

The peaceful approach. Bella was trying to talk with her, in a friendly empathetic way. Maybe this weirdo was important to Bella back home.

Maybe not.

Still, Yagmur could respect that, and gave Bella a quick warm smile, before forcing the warmth and friendliness off his face.

The peaceful approach was probably the best: this Ana girl appeared to be the quirky, eccentric, harmless kind of delusional wingbat. Yagmur appreciated that, respected that in some weird kind of individualistic, it's-a-free-country sort of way. Certainly more unsavoury and less effective coping mechanisms available than losing your shit like this girl had done.

Still, that didn't mean he had to trust her yet, and had no interest in getting to know her unless Bella wanted him to.

So, he flicked the safety of the gun off, flinching when he accidentally rubbed against his hand wound a bit too roughly.

[Lord_Shadow]

Her smile fell. She turned to look back towards the bodies. She sighed heavily. "A lot of things. I don't wanna talk about it."

Her smile returned. "Let's talk about the present. What brings you here my non-imaginary possibly unreal friend? Me, I'm cycling through multiple personae. Trying to find what works. I assume the same for you."

She laughed and hopped over to an overturned card table. "Cause you Shirley ain't here to gamble. It ain't in the cards. It's a travesty really. What if I had wanted to play?"

She laughed again.

Talking was fun. Especially when it accomplished nothing and got no one further to their goals.

[KamiKaze]

The question seemed to bring out some lucidity in Ana. For a moment, she looked sad. Bella noticed that she briefly looked towards the ground, as if there was something there. Her gaze followed, and she noticed that there were a few shapes lying about. Almost as if there were piles of clothing, or-

That’s where the smell was coming from.

From here she couldn’t tell who they were, or if any of them were from Davison. The realization, though, sent another shudder in her. How long had Ana been here, muttering to herself among corpses? She had no idea if Ana just gotten here herself, but it didn’t seem like it. At least, it wasn’t her impression.

Ana had deflected the question, instead focusing on a new topic. The way she asked hers, it seemed almost normal, casual even, if it weren’t for the parts about shifting personae and imaginary friends. She wasn’t sure how to respond to that. Some part of her hoped that Ana was just being philosophical, but the fact that she was looking the way she was right now made that less likely in her mind.

She wasn't even sure if Shirley was a nickname or if she got her name wrong.

"Uh..."

Another knot in her stomach had formed. Bella had no idea if she was violent or not. Again, she didn't remember if her name was on the announcements, so she didn't know if she ever killed anyone. The stains didn't look too fresh, but the very fact she hadn't changed out after the dress got stained meant something. Bella couldn't tell who the bodies were, but if they were friends of Ana's...

Bella decided to answer Ana's question truthfully.

"Yagmur and I... we were at the Ice Palace. Some stuff... something came up, and then we had to leave."

Her voice came out a little nervous. She didn't really want to talk about what happened since they arrived there. Not too much. The sight of what was left of Regina stuck with her.

Bella's hands hurt a bit. While the one that got hurt was disinfected and bandaged as best as possible, both of them did. She guessed it was because of the weather. It was snowing, and the wind had been blowing. She hoped it wasn't a storm coming.

"It's cold, too. Outside, I mean. Snow's been falling heavily, and... this seemed better."

Bella took a step closer. Her shoes slightly squeaked from the frost. But Ana's behavior prevented her from coming any more closer. The pogo stick still remained in her hands.

[Serpico]

((Corin Albanesi from – and the wind died, too))

He only focused on getting out of the bad weather for a moment; he walked on ahead, trudging through until he could see the casino ahead. His digits felt stiff and painful, his nose was aching from bearing the brunt of the wind.  He pulled the neckline of his sweater to his face, thinking at the least he could protect it. He imagined that Anzu must have felt the same, that the cold was painful.

He chose not to enter the front of the building, when it looked like there were multiple entrances anyway. He really hoped at the time that no one else was thinking to use the same door or waiting for them there. He looked back for a moment to check if Anzu was still following him alright, before finding a back entrance and cautiously stepping in. At the very least, the shelter from the cold was a welcome relief; he audibly exhaled at the comfort felt from the warmth.

It wasn’t as though he was going to be able to rest long though, he was already moving up a set of stairs as soon as he saw them, he moved automatically, trying not to think hard about the day and just plough through. He told himself that it was for security, rather than to quiet the buzzing of his mind, he quietly looked over the second floor and the lines of poker machines, listening intently for noise. It wasn’t difficult for him to pick up the sound of Anarchy laughing, and it caused him to pause a moment before deciding to draw closer out of curiousity without consulting Anzu.

[delicateMachine]

((Anzu Sakamoto - and the wind died, too))

It had been quiet for a long while, Corin still in mourning, Anzu still unwilling to disturb him. In any case, the cold continued to be the most pressing concern on both their minds as they both trudged through the storm. The cold had been harsh before, but at least it had still been possible to see more than five feet ahead of you at a time.

After much too long, they came across the casino. It had been several days since Anzu had first entered through the doors and been reunited with Caroline. The joy she had felt then now seemed strange, alien to her. Now, all the building had to offer was shelter from the cold, which she supposed was more than enough.

Not wanting to risk the front, they looped around the back and cautiously made their way up the stairs. Before either was able to fully scope out the place, manic laughter echoed throughout the casino. Anzu simply sighed exhaustedly as Corin went to take a closer look.

[Lord_Shadow]

"It is cold outside. It's colder here though. The wind can chill your body, but loss can chill your soul." She mused. She glanced again at darling's body. Somehow it still gnawed at her that he was gone. For some reason she just couldn't let go.

"But enough about that. I have another question to ask." She smiled again. "Who do you suppose will win this farce? What murderer among those left will win the right to go home, won with the blood of the others? This bloody ordeal can only end with more bloody spilling of blood. Bloodletting and blood spewing and blood, blood, blood, and bloody blood! There's a joke in there somewhere. There has to be." She giggled.

"Hey, what did the crazy girl say to the possibly imaginary not crazy girl?"