When People Don't {Guilty Gear Paracelsus TFTG SL}

This was a mistake. This was a massive mistake. And whoever started this bet is going to get punched.

Yawning, Pierce rubbed her eyes and cracked her neck. It may be the dead of night when she should be sleeping, but doing this now is better than risking the chance of somebody else seeing… whatever she is supposed to be doing. One short straw pulled and she was stuck giving some stranger a… warm welcome.

She scowled at the reminder in her mind. Nonsense. Absolute nonsense. This is ridiculous. All of this hullabaloo for a strange green-haired woman that nobody knows a thing about. And she was tasked with asking this stranger out on a date. This whole plan, from the intensity of the focus on this strange girl, to the fact that Pierce was chosen as a candidate for it at all, befuddled her as she chewed on the side of her left hand. Why could they ever think that a hermit like herself would be good at taking someone out on a date? How does a “date” even work?

At least, coming out in the deepest part of the night, nobody should be out here to see her doing this.

She craned back in a long stretch before leaning on a street lamp, bag-cradled eyes fluttering in-and-out of nodding off. Her eyes scanned the darkness even as the flickering street lamps strained them. They said that the girl liked skulking around here the most. Skulking… what a particular word choice. Not normally one used to describe a person. Just what is it about this girl that makes her so interesting?

All she knows is that she cannot stay outside forever. Especially in the horrid heat. If this weird girl does not come by within the next five minutes, then she is going home and crashing, lest she pass out right here on the sidewalk…

Her hair stood on-end, dark eyes snapping open. Something was different. She did not see anything, yet she could feel a presence, a set of eyes burning into her from somewhere unseen and with intent that she’s couldn’t discern. Even through the sound of plants rustling in the burning breeze, something coarse and grating that made her teeth buzz. Not a rickety car, nor a bike, nor someone dragging their feet in hard-soled shoes, not even some punk kid dragging a baseball bat against the concrete like they were the most intimidating person in the world. It was heavy and unrefined, raw metal being dragged against the concrete.

Yet she could not tell from where. The sound was distorted and resounded strangely, as if it was somehow coming from everywhere. Even as she spun her gaze around during a long stretch to get a look at her surroundings, she could not pinpoint whatever the source of the sound was. Outside of the street lamps, the darkness was deep and stark, and the light spots were seemingly growing smaller and smaller, as if the already-limited light was being eaten to further obscure whatever was making the sound.

If she did not know any better, she could have sworn that she could feel breathing against her back. Her heart rate picked up and she grit her teeth as she held a hand to her chest. She is supposed to know better. They are all just messing with her, that weird girl that they are supposedly so interested in is not real. She let out a rattly, sharp sigh and looked down at the dimming light around her feet. It is just her lack of sleep getting to her, yes. This is just her senses pulling tricks on her.

Right?

Then why does everything feel wrong?

Her chain of thought was shattered by a sudden surging pain in her back and the sound of ripping fabric as something slammed into her back with enough force to send her multiple feet away and tumbling into the darkness between the lights. Vision spinning and her already-messy hair pulled out of its hair tie, she remained stunned in silence even as she attempted to scramble to her feet and the whole world seemed to shake with the screeching of metal and shattering of glass, a long rod wrapped in white bandages like a spool of thread flying past her head and striking the ground with such force as to crack the concrete of the road into rubble. She shut her eyes tight as to avoid getting glass in them as she clumsily reeled back and tripped over herself in an attempt to get a safer distance away from whoever was attacking her. Time felt much slower through her messy pale blond bangs and the rapidly flickering harsh lights as she got a better look at her assailant.

The person was not the first thing that caught her eye, but instead their weapon, now not entirely wrapped in white bandages: A street lamp. An entire street lamp, uprooted from the ground with its wires severed, its body dented in such a way that it almost resembled an accordion, and its glass bulb shattered, light flickering randomly with an intense, painful-to-look-at glow that she could hear the buzzing of in her ears. Standing hunched-over next to it was the seeming-lunatic, with long green hair that was somehow still neater than her own. This was not someone she recognized…

Neither did she recognize that look in her green eyes: A wide-eyed, pinpoint-pupilled gaze. Her stance was almost animalistic, she could hear her panting, and the flashing lights casting such dark shadows obscured most of her facial expression, but those eyes… Are they are full of…?

So this must be the woman that they were all talking about. And she has violent tendencies. She let out a sharp huff from her burning throat. Splendid.

Another strike racing towards her severed her thoughts. A wide, wild swing that could easily have disemboweled her if she hadn’t stepped back out of its range.

“I am not…” she stated, holding her hands outward, “...I am not an enemy of yours. Please calm down-”

The woman seemingly ignored her attempt to de-escalate the situation as she swung yet again, a feint before she sped forward and struck Pierce low at her shins, causing her to topple to the ground. Pierce gagged and coughed as she hit the ground again. She could feel blood dribbling from her nose and hear the strange woman growl as they stared each other down.

“...Are you processing what I’m saying?”

No response. The only action that got a response from her was an abrupt kick to the leg that caused her to yelp and stagger back, letting Pierce escape once more. Even when she was closer to the light of the other street lamps, the emotion on her face remained ambiguous. But now, during a life-threatening situation, was not the time to analyze that.

The green-haired girl snarled as she swung her makeshift weapon and slammed it into the ground. Sparks of friction flew, and were only kicked up more as the weapon was dragged against the concrete, the compressed shaft being extended as she dashed towards Pierce. Pierce could only do one thing.

Run.

And run she did. Watching as the woman hauled her weapon on, she tumbled to the side a hair’s breadth away from it coming down upon her skull in a savage downward slam. Rubble and a cascade of friction and electric sparks sprayed out as the stolen street lamp’s metal shaft snapped in half. The strange woman grit her teeth as she pulled back on what remained of her makeshift weapon, the wires resisting being pulled past their maximum tolerance of tautness for a few moments before all snapping and spewing electricity.

Her voice was rough, now, a ragged panting and heaving as she lazily held the top half of her weapon, busted bulb dragging on the ground. An unnatural, unfocused stance. Her hands are shaking. She is getting tired. That makes both of them…

Pierce panted as she slowly and awkwardly stood back up yet again. The sheer harshness of their breathing between the both of them was tied, as were their unstable, exhausted postures. Her left eye twitched and she held one hand to her chest, holding the other one out towards the girl.

“Please… calm down… I am not...”

Black soles hit the ground with a loud clack in a breakneck sprint. It appears that her words were ignored yet again…

She crossed both of her arms in front of her and shrunk away out of instinct as she watched the woman lunge towards her, barely watching the sparks from the flickering bulb scatter and stunned as the woman’s incoherent yelling ringing in her ears. An inevitable death blow… that never came. Instead of a hunk of glass and metal destroying her skull, she heard the woman’s screaming cut short with the sound of whatever metal and plastic bits she was wearing scraping across the road’s concrete.

With her heart in her throat slowing its beat, Pierce slowly uncurled her limbs and craned her head around to get a look at the current scene. Pure silence, at least compared to the mayhem that had transpired mere moments before, hung in the air. Her eyes quickly found and focused on whatever became of the violent woman: Fell chin-first, knocked unconscious, mouth and nose leaking blood that was oddly tinged purple. That must have hurt.

Thoughts buzzed in her mind as she slowly knelt down closer to the girl and moved a hand to the side of the girl’s neck. She still has a pulse. Good. So she can thankfully not be associated with someone’s death.

That just leaves the question as to what to do with her. They said that she just wandered into town one day. If the girl had a house, then everyone would have known about it, but all that she was told was that she hung around the place’s dark recesses without talking to anybody. A vagrant.

Pierce sighed as she awkwardly shuffled her arms underneath the woman’s torso and shakily lifted her up, standing up. It wouldn’t be good to leave her here. Maybe if she brings her into an actual house, then she would not be so… murderous.

At least the woman is light. Almost like holding a handful of rocks.

Dark. Everything is dark. Dark, rough, uncomfortable, heavy, hard to breathe.

A.B.A strained out a small stretch before feeling for her face, finding that there is something on it. Something big and heavy. The horrible rough feeling on her face didn’t stop even as she heaved the large object, a massive book, off of her face, before absent-mindedly letting it fall to the floor. A multitude of loud, strong sneezes sent black powder flying all around, and her eyes watered while she ripped off a small section of her own bandages in an attempt to clean a horrible synthetic taste out of her mouth. Graphite was caked all over her face and hands, a horrid gritty sensation that she furiously attempted to wipe off of them. What fool would even think to put so much graphite on something? And why on her?

And why on this… odd book?

She looked back down at the book she threw to the floor beside the couch she had woken up on, awkwardly bending to pick it back up. She was used to lifting heavy things, but this book’s heft still caught her off-guard, though she thankfully didn’t pull anything pulling it up into her lap. It was by far the largest, thickest, heaviest book she had ever seen, let alone handled, even compared to all of the books in what she was able to access of Frasco’s archives. No text on the front or back of its purple covers and spine, though the edges of the book’s covers were lined with strange red-and-blue filigree that she didn’t recognize the style of, and decorating the front cover was a large bright blue heart that was outlined with a bright red.

She closed her eyes for a moment and furrowed her brow. That blue… It was familiar. A deep cerulean, ever-so-slightly tinged green, dark and yet clear. A blue so clear...

“You’re awake?”

A.B.A jumped and looked around. Who was that? And why do they sound kind of like her when she was younger? A distinct deepness and awkwardness, a creakiness like they were not used to speaking.

Pierce placed an elbow on the end of the couch where A.B.A was resting her head, leaning over while attempting to keep her long, messy hair out of her face. She couldn’t be bothered to put her hair back up after bringing A.B.A to her house. She should be asleep by now, but she also needs to make sure she would not try to kill her in her sleep…

Both of them locked eyes for a moment, A.B.A curling up nervously before looking away. Pierce’s eyes look… odd. Yet she could not pinpoint exactly why...

The strange book accidentally slipped open, scattering an unreal amount of black graphite, A.B.A noticing Pierce’s gaze repeatedly switch between her and the book.

“You can keep it.”

A.B.A raised an eyebrow, shifting her fingers with the uncomfortable graphite on them.

“Keep—“

“That book,” Pierce stated, pointing a bony finger at the mess of paper and smudged black dust in A.B.A’s hands.

A.B.A’s expression did not change as she turned back to look into the book. She did not even bring the book up. Just what could be so interesting about it? Outside of how… illegible it is, at least. The sheer amount of graphite on each page wasn’t doing it any favors, nor was the state of the handwriting, but what frustrated her most of all was the strangeness of the writing itself. Odd spellings that almost resembled words she knew, normal letters adorned with dots, entire symbols she had never seen in what she used to read. A realization hit her: This is not English.

“What is it supposed to be about?”

Pierce was quiet for a long moment. She shut her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose in an agitated sigh.

“I don’t know.”

A.B.A slowly closed the book with a hiss. Of course she did not… Humans always have something that they do not understand...

“We should both go to sleep. You won’t kill me in my sleep, right?”

A.B.A tilted her head and scrunched her nose with a raised eyebrow.

“I’ll take that as a ‘yes’. I feel like I’m going to pass out…”

Pierce yawned as she trudged through the room, turning off the lights as she made her way through. She leaned her head on the wall as she held her hand near the last light in the room.

“Night.”

A.B.A didn’t even get time to respond before the last light was shut off.

Her eyes watered and she grit her teeth as a burning agitated her eyes. She groaned and stretched… before awkwardly tumbling out of the couch.

Pain pulsed throughout her head, as she had accidentally caught the key in her head on the side of a nearby table on the way down. She stumbled to her feet and leaned on the table for support. Outside of the limited light streaming through the window blinders, the room was dark, nearly pitch black. She tread as carefully as her generally-unstable gait would allow in order to find the walls and the switches that controlled the room’s lights. How a person’s house could be darker than the darkest recesses of Frasco was bewildering… Though she eventually turned on all of the lights in the room even as they momentarily burned her eyes.

After her eyes adjusted, she saw that the room she was in was quite large, if a bit dull. There was not much in the room outside of the couch she slept on, the table she accidentally caught her head-key on, and a few black cabinets and drawers pushed up against the walls. One of the idiosyncrasies of the woman who brought her here was apparent: A bright, eye-searing yellow, combined with any manner of black details, was everywhere. This was not something she expected from somebody so… lethargic.

She wandered through the house, turning on the lights as she went. Everywhere she went, she found that every room she came across was colored those shades of black and eye-burning yellow in some form. If it was only one room, it would have been tolerable, but it goes on and on… Humans have such strange tastes, such strange habits.

At least the kitchen is not bright yellow. Thankfully.

It was black and white. Less obnoxious, thought only marginally. Better than the alternative.

Even with the lights on, the kitchen was not as bright as any of the other rooms she had encountered. Even the white managed to not burn into her eyes, and the various fixtures of metal and other shiny materials lacked the clear, bright sheen she expected them to have. The place was definitely thoroughly used.

Her eyes were drawn to the fridge, marginally less dull than the other fixtures of the kitchen, particularly the bright yellow sticky note stuck to the right door. She walked closer to get a better look at the note, though the handwriting of it was almost entirely illegible, especially with how small and squished it was to fit the amount of it on such a small note. Almost.

So this woman was deliberately sent after her? She did not think she was being that bothersome… At least the woman does not seem to understand why, either. She could barely understand her handwriting…

But it reminded her of something.

Her whole body perked up before she ran back into the room she woke up in, darting around and seizing the strange heart-decorated book, before running back in front of the fridge. Graphite scattered almost akin to a plume of smoke as she clumsily opened it and began flipping through it to find a more comprehensible, less-messy page to compare its writing to the one on the sticky note. The material’s gritty textures made her shudder as it coated her hands. It made it difficult for her to focus. The grittiness was already unpleasant enough, but now it felt different: Somehow both dry and wet, even thicker than before, as if it was written in some kind of thick paint.

She only gave a quick glance to the book’s pages before she abruptly dropped it and looked back at the sticky note. It was obvious that the handwriting is the same between the two, though the book’s writing seemed to be much more rushed. They both have a very particular messiness. And now she’s going to need to wash her…

She looked down at her hands with a scowl that quickly vanished as she saw that they were somehow entirely clean, like the strange sludge was never on them in the first place.

...Never mind, then.

The book was still open as it sat on the ground. Her vision focused past her hands to it, the scowl of disgust returning with a vengeance. The blackness, the writing material reminiscent more of tar than of pencil lead, almost seemed to be moving. Writhing, squirming, undulating… Disgusting.

“Are you throwing things?”

A.B.A jumped, startled, frantically looking around as she heard a small laugh.

“Early riser?”

The voice… Just the weird lady that brought her here. This must be “Pierce”.

“...No.”

Pierce leaned over one of the counters and pulled a toaster into view. A.B.A tilted her head, noticing that she was holding a bagged cut loaf of bread in her other hand.

“Do you like jelly toast?”

A.B.A looked down at the book for a moment, mumbling to herself as she closed it and picked it back up. She let out a sigh and turned to face Pierce, her breath stopping as she locked eyes with her. Many oddities about them were now visible in the much clearer light.

They didn’t look like those of any human A.B.A had ever met, even compared to that “Potemkin” she met ever so long ago. Her right eye looked human, a dark brown, though it was darker than anyone else’s she had ever seen, but it had a strange crack of blue going through the iris. It was her left eye that felt particularly alien: Only a pupil with no iris around it. She had seen people with no pupils and irises, but a pupil without an iris was something she had never seen in humans. The shade of blue, the glass-like crack in her right eye, was once again familiar.

A sudden loud click caused A.B.A to jump, snapping from her focus and looking around. Right, toast… which would mean a toaster... Though she was now able to look at the rest of Pierce, confirming her suspicion: Pierce looked odd in general.

Her thin, bony face was made up of pallid, grey-tinged complexion, her eyes sunken deep with large, dark bags, and her nose was equally angular. A prominent widow’s peak made up her hairline, an absolute mess even compared to her own hair, long and dyed a near-black dark blue, save for the pale blond roots lining her hairline edge and the two strange long, thin, stringy bangs than hung down past the length of her face from the middle of her peak. The strange pale blond color, so pale as to look nearly indistinguishable from her skin tone, also made up her eyebrows and eyelashes. It must be her normal hair color. Unhealthily pale all around.

And still wearing more black and bright yellow. It was only when pulling her gaze away from her face that she realized that Pierce was taller than she had realized. Though she was tall, the sweater she was wearing was somehow still too long in the torso. The phrase “Magnum Opus” was written on the front in a stylized black font, and the hems and its turtleneck were also the same shade of black.

Pierce turned around and leaned down as to grab some utensils from a drawer, and A.B.A’s eyes caught a detail as she scanned her back. The back of the sweater’s torso was black and decorated with a strange, angular yellow symbol, but what caught her eye most of all was a large tear across it, revealing some messy, blood-stained bandages wrapped around her skinny body underneath it. It looks like she did not even bother to change her clothes when she went to bed last night.

“What do you want on your toast?”

Another breaking of her focus. Ah.

“I don’t know.”

Pierce rolled her eyes and twirled the butter knife in her hand before dipping it into a jar of bright red jelly, spreading it over multiple pieces of toast.

“Then I’ll give you what I’m having.”

A hand with painted nails slowly reached over to grab a piece of jellied toast, A.B.A anxiously sticking it in her mouth. It was tastier than she was expecting.

“...Thank you, human.”

“Human?” Pierce asked with an eyebrow raise.

“You’re human, right?”

“Yes,” stated Pierce, applying jelly to the last few pieces of toast she wanted to apply jelly to, tilting her head, “and you aren’t?”

“Only humans get so… obfuscatory…”

Pierce did not respond. There was silence for a moment before A.B.A shot Pierce a glare, tapping on the front of the book with a finger.

“This is yours. This is your handwriting,” she growled as she clumsily opened the book while pointing to the sticky note on the fridge. “You made this.”

Pierce still did not respond, at least not for a long, awkward moment. Her whole body was still, though the stillness was soon broken by her turning to A.B.A, her eyes shut as she let out a nervous sigh.

“Yes. I did.”

“And you seem to hate it.” said A.B.A, quickly closing the book. “I don’t blame you, but… Why don’t you just get rid of it, then?”

The tall woman leaned over the sink with her hands rubbing her eyes.

“I’ve tried.”

“Burning?”

“Yes.”

“Throwing it into the sea?”

“Mmmmm-hm.”

“...Feeding it to an animal?”

“...Now, no, I do not tolerate animal cruelty.”

“...What do you mean that none of those have worked?”

A sharp sigh exited Pierce’s mouth.

“It always comes back.”

A.B.A looked over the book’s cover again. A cold blue heart…

“What could this thing have against you?”

Pierce did not respond. Her hands dangled over the sink, and A.B.A leaned over to find that her expression was dull, eyes empty. Poking her shoulder did nothing to relieve from the long, awkward silence that had yet again overtaken the conversation. She could barely even tell that Pierce had eventually responded in a barely-coherent mumble.

“What is it?”

Her face met her hands again.

“...I made it…”

It took A.B.A a few moments to figure out a response.

“So do you know what this reads?”

“No.” Pierce said as she shook her head. “I don’t speak or understand German.”

A.B.A paused as she processed the though before furrowing her brow in confusion.

“Then how could you have made it if it’s in a language you don’t—”

“I don’t know!” Pierce snapped, standing more upright.

“I don’t remember writing it! I just… know that I did, but…” she waved her hands with only the smallest amount of self-restraint, “...but I don’t know how, I don’t know why, every time I try to remember writing it it feels like my brain is being... cooked… burned… fried by the summer sun, like I was sitting outside in the heat while I was doing it. I remember the feeling, but I don’t remember-”

“...Anything specific from then?”

Pierce paused.

“That’s the closest to what I was looking for.”

Both of them paused, Pierce looking to her side.

“...Thanks.”

Before A.B.A could respond, Pierce stood up and forced a stretch with a hard-to-read expression on her face.

“That… thing,” she stated, pointing to the book A.B.A held in her arms, “it’s like it’s… alive. I don’t know why I wrote it, I don’t know what it... wants with me, I… I don’t want to know what it would do if somebody else tried to steal it.”

“...Then why did you offer for me to have it?”

Pierce paused, frozen mid-movement.

“I haven’t had any good sleep in a month. I wasn’t…” Pierce rubbed her eyes. “...thinking straight.”

A.B.A tilted her head.

“...Are you sure that you’re thinking straight now?”

“No,” sighed Pierce, “I…don’t know. I don’t know if I’ve been thinking straight for a long time.”

A hand with painted nails tugged on the sticky note as A.B.A pulled it off to look it over. A… “date”, they are calling it?

“Do you have any ideas?”

Pierce paused and tilted her head, furrowing her brow. A.B.A shifted the book in her arms and tapped on the corner of the sticky note. Pierce’s gaze drifted to the side as her mouth pulled itself into an expression of thought, though it was clear in her eyes that she was drawing blanks.

“I don’t understand ‘dating’…” Pierce sighed while pinching the bridge of her nose, looking down to meet A.B.A’s face.

An aggravated expression, with a scrunched brow, washed across A.B.A’s face.

“Why are you looking at me like that, like I’d know?”

Before Pierce could properly respond, A.B.A shook her head.

“You’re the one that’s from here, you should know some… some…”

Her speech petered out, quickly followed by frustrated grumbling and her rubbing her face. Pierce returned to her wondering, though it didn’t last long.

“Do you like food?”

The green-haired woman’s grumbling stopped as she looked up at Pierce and raised an eyebrow.

“...Yes?” she stated as she removed her hand from her face. “Who doesn’t?”

“Just making sure!” Pierce yelped as she held her hands up in front of her, wide-eyed.

“...Humans continue to prove themselves to be strange…”

“...I’m not going to ask.”

A.B.A was snapped out of her focus, gaze pulled to Pierce looking down at her with a perplexed expression across her face as she tilted her head. The expression quickly shifted after a momentary side-eye and stretch.

Well, it won’t be fancy…”

“’Fan’…” A.B.A tilted her head, “...’cy’?”

“Not that, yes.”

Pierce looked to the side and momentarily checked her phone. A.B.A craned her neck awkwardly in an attempt to look at what Pierce was doing, but both her phone screen and thoughtful expression remained obscured from her view. Whatever she was typing, she was typing it vigorously, and… agitatedly?

Her hair reached to the middle of her back, and her constantly having to move her hair out of her face definitely looked like she wasn’t used to having it down. After placing the heavy, lead-stained book on the nearest flat surface with enough space for it and wiping her hands off on her clothes and bandages, A.B.A slowly crept up behind her and took her hair, causing Pierce to momentarily freeze. A.B.A’s gaze was aimless and looked more through Pierce’s hair than actually looking at it. She... did not have anything to put up Pierce’s hair with…

“I…” Pierce’s voice trailed off as she pulled the phone closer to her, “...I forgot about that. I’ll take care of it.”

She left quickly after placing her phone beside the sink, leaving A.B.A alone. Alone with the book.

The black material that overflowed from between its pages collected on the countertop. Somehow, it did not leak over the countertop’s edge or into the sink, the edges of the material trembling with tension as if it was being held back with purpose. Pierce was right, it did seem alive.

And familiar. Eerily familiar…

Pierce’s phone buzzed with a notification. A.B.A pushed her thoughts on the book away as she wandered over to take a peek at the screen. Whatever Pierce as typing, she still had not finished it or sent it, and it was...a lot of words just to say that she had A.B.A and was asking them why they think she’s perfect for it. She seems to have a clear verbosity problem when writing.

A.B.A rolled her eyes at what she could see of the chat. Stupid digital names, dumb icons, incoherent text, all tied up in an unproductive conversation. Deliberately obfuscatory at best, and outright dismissive at worst. It was like everyone else was brushing off Pierce’s words like they didn’t mean anything. What disgraceful behavior.

A hand touching her shoulder caused her to jump. Pierce quickly snatched her phone away and began tapping away at it again, now with both of her hands. A.B.A’s shoulders slumped, repeatedly switching her gaze between the book and Pierce, and even without seeing her face she could tell that she was… aggravated. Very, very aggravated.

“Do you actually like any of these people?”

Pierce didn’t respond for a moment, momentarily pausing her texting with an annoyed sigh.

“Used to.”

Pierce’s eyes fluttered and squinted with strain at the phone screen.

“Used to…”

A.B.A’s attempt at keeping the conversation up petered out into an awkward silence, her eyes wandering down to the massive tear she had made in Pierce’s clothing the night before. The bandages visible were even more red, the shade even seeping through into her clothing and slowly overtaking the black and yellow that dominated them. She pinched the now-damp material between her fingers.

“Do you have anything else to wear for tonight?”

Pierce looked to the side and furrowed her brow. She cocked her head oddly in an attempt to completely hide her face from A.B.A’s view, though it proved ineffective as A.B.A scowled.

“...No…”

A.B.A’s expression did not soften despite the embarrassment hanging heavily in Pierce’s voice. She never had much for clothing until recently, watching humanity from the outside, but this person… Humans supposed to be better than this, right?

Leaning awkwardly and tugging at her bandages, she tore off a long strip and twisted it tightly, pulling open cupboards in search for something, something... sharp, and soon enough she found it: A knife. Small holes were cut around the tear opening with deftness unexpected of the lack of poise she had shown prior, pulling the twisted bandage through them and over itself in multiple X-shapes while tugging on it to close the tear to her satisfaction, before tying them in an awkward knot.

“Good enough.” she grumbled as she pulled herself up.

“Good enough?” Pierce mumbled awkwardly with her tongue sticking out of the disgusted look on her face, as if she had tasted something bad.

And with the blood leaking out of her thumb’s cracked nail…

The red glinted in both girls’ eyes as they looked between each other, before Pierce put her phone down again and began to quickly walk out of the room.

“I’ll... do it myself!” she stammered with a wave of her hands.

Her awkward voice grew quiet as she vanished past the doorway. A.B.A glanced at the knife she held in her hand before slowly placing it in the sink. Thoughts buzzed in her mind as she looked at the phone’s screen again: This person, this “Pierce”, is an absolute mess, but the people that she used to like are raging fools at best and purposefully tormenting her at worst. Even now, the others just kept replying to each other, leaving Pierce’s questions in their dust of sheer inanity. Just how is this considered acceptable?

“Back.”

A.B.A noticed her voice, but didn’t respond verbally. Wandering up behind her, Pierce looked over her shoulder and followed her gaze to see her look at her phone screen. Still talking at her instead of with or to her.

“...Are these really human standards?”

Pierce’s expression was dull even as she let out a small chuckle.

“Worse, they’re mine.”

Everything was quiet. It appears that her attempt to bring humor into it did not lighten the mood…

“…Not like I have a choice…”

They both momentarily locked eyes. Pierce’s expression looked… empty, and the blue crack in her right eye was thinner than it was before. A.B.A forced her gaze to look anywhere else to try and pull her mind away from it. It appears that Pierce had bandaged her left thumb.

Now, to end this horrid awkward silence…

“What’s the place you were talking about? ‘Won’t Be Fancy’?”

Light returned to Pierce’s eyes, crack in her right eye returning to its previous size, as she heard a small chuckle at the end of A.B.A’s question. So she is messing with her… Hah.

“No, it’s...”

The crackling hum of the flickering sign still rang in A.B.A’s ears, its brightly-colored lights still slightly seared into her vision. She attempted to push those agitating sensations out of her mind as she moved to sit at a table that Pierce, who was the one going to order for both of them, had pointed her to. So this is a “hot dog” place… What exactly is a “hot dog”? What do dogs have to do with any of this?

It did not take long for Pierce to meet her at the table, handing her a plain hot dog while holding her own, which was covered in ketchup. Things were surprisingly quiet despite all of the people here. There was not even that feeling of eyes burning into her with scorn that she was so used to feeling in public. It was almost like it was just her and Pierce… Almost.

“….Got anything to talk about?” Pierce asked as she gulped down a bite of meat.

A.B.A took a small bite of her hot dog. It… was not half bad. Her gaze was aimed at the table in thought. Outside of her husband, who she had learned many times before that nobody else knew about, she had no idea what she could talk about. It is not like Pierce seems to like talking about herself, anyway. She leaned on her free hand and took another bite of her hot dog.

“...I miss my husband…”

Pierce did not respond at first. It seemed to take a moment before she properly processed what A.B.A had said before she perked up.

“...You had a husband?”

A.B.A slowly nodded.

“Paracelsus.”

Pierce’s eyes widened while she took a small bite of her hot dog. What an odd name. Yet it somehow feels… No, that would not make any sense to say.

“...Doesn’t ring a bell.”

“Doesn’t seem to ring any bells for anyone else, either…” A.B.A sighed in between bites of food. “We were inseparable. Ever since we found each other, we were never apart…”

A.B.A looked up, and both of the girls’ eyes met. Pierce had leaned forward in intense interest, taking small bites of her hot dog while resting her head in her left hand, both of her eyes firmly glued to A.B.A in anticipation of what she could say next. A.B.A could only mumble as she looked into Pierce’s right eye. The strange blue crack, it was… bigger? Well, if it could become smaller…

“But then I woke up one day, and he was… gone...”

A.B.A was met with a head-tilt from Pierce.

“Gone?” stated Pierce, before she awkwardly blew her bangs.

For her, those stupid things that dangled in front of her face were starting to get annoying.

“Without a trace. Like he never existed in the first place.”

“...I’m sorry, let me just get this.” Pierce grumbled as she shook her head in an attempt to get her stringy bangs out of her face, before caving and brushing them to the sides of her face with her left hand.

She failed to notice A.B.A’s eyes widening. At least, until A.B.A gripped her chin, causing her to yelp, and turned her whole face to face her.

“...You look like him when you do that. That style… thing… with your hair.”

Pierce looked to the side for a second before looking back to A.B.A. Her pupils were small, especially noticeable with her right eye, tightened enough to fit within the blue crack without touching its edges. She stuck her tongue out for a moment before responding.

“Like Paracelsus?”

A.B.A nodded, though that did not come with her letting go. All the two of them could do was look at each other… At least, until Pierce maneuvered her left arm to her right, locking a few of her fingers in the holes of the skull-shaped bow of A.B.A’s head-key. The buzz of a silent stare-down crackled between them, overshadowed by the bustle of the public space. Neither of them were willing to give up so easily.

The green-haired woman’s stare had turned into a glare.

“Let go.”

All she got in response was Pierce sticking her tongue out again.

“You first.”

It took a few moments of her grumbling and huffing before she decided to let go, Pierce quickly following suit with a snicker. The bandage wrapped around Pierce’s left thumb had slipped off, exposing an irritated red crack, though it was no longer bleeding.

“Told you.”

A.B.A sighed and rubbed the side of her head with the skull-shaped bow of the key sticking out of it. Ow…

“...Sorry about that.” Pierce stated as she took another bite of her hot dog and stared at the table, furrowing her brow.

There was no response from A.B.A. Their attempt at conversation had petered out yet again, leaving only the sounds of the two women eating and everyone else in the cheap place conversing. They did not have anything else to talk about…

Neither of them spoke even as A.B.A finished. Pierce should know common human etiquette for eating in public, right? She’ll tell her herself when it would be good to leave… right?

She finally looked up. Pierce, unlike A.B.A, still had not finished her hot dog, and her gaze was aimed… nowhere in particular. The hot dog was not even in her hand. She was not looking at anything specific, and her gaze was wide-eyed and vacant. That blue crack, it was bigger, even bigger than before.

Before she could bring any of her odd behavior up, Pierce was gone, only the sound of quick, pounding footsteps behind her wake. The ring of the doors’ bells hung in the back of her slowly-processing thoughts. Her eyes widened when the thought finally clicked.

That is not right.

She nearly leapt out of her seat. Her chair toppled over as she rocketed to her feet and she slammed her hands onto the table and frantically looked around, before quickly rummaging through her pockets, finally pulling out a few speckled dollar bills and slamming them onto the table before bolting through the door. As bloodstained as they were, they should be acceptable.

Pierce...

“Pierce!”

Outside of shouting questions in the faint hope that Pierce would respond, her name was all A.B.A could think to shout. Pierce could not have gone too far away… but where could she be? She did not know much about her outside of what they had talked about, so outside of the color yellow, what could she be drawn to?

The sound of shoes dragging across the concrete caught her attention. Even unseen in the darkness and physically obfuscated by the various alleys, she could feel that it was Pierce. Repeatedly crashing into walls with her clumsy speed, not quite used to being so fast without Paracelsus giving her strength, all she did was follow the sound of Pierce’s ragged breathing. All the while, she was shouting Pierce’s name.

The bright yellow of Pierce’s shirt, even in the deep dark that was only barely properly illuminated by busted lights, immediately caught her eye as it came into her sight. A.B.A almost toppled as she came to a literal skidding halt.

“Pierce!”

A wet squelch sounded through the alleyway a the hunched-over Pierce turned her head around to face her. Both of Pierce’s eyes were wide, almost unnaturally so, though her right eye continued to be stranger than her iris-less left, its iris an ever-shifting marble of bright blue and dark brown, as if the two colors were battling for dominance. A.B.A’s scanning gaze slowly moved down, caught by a deep, dripping red…

Pierce’s left hand cannot catch a break. First, anxiously gnawing on it the original night that A.B.A had attacked her; next, biting her thumb hard enough to crack the nail; now, tearing a large portion of skin from the back of it with her mouth. The exposed red flesh seemed to glow in A.B.A’s vision despite the murky darkness, as did the blood dripping from Pierce’s mouth. A.B.A was already standing as still as she could, not wishing to set off the currently-high-strung Pierce… though she faltered for a moment as she watched Pierce swallow the flesh she had bitten off. It does not seem like she even thought to spit it out.

As slowly and delicately as she could, A.B.A stepped forward. It only took one step, a single click of her thick-soled shoes, for Pierce to jump to her feet with a yelp.

“No! Leave!” Pierce yelled, back against the alley wall. “Away! Get! Get!”

More clicking, clattering footsteps returned from A.B.A as she stumbled backwards, turning clumsy as the back of her heels bumbled into something unseen and toppling over with a yelp. Cursing took the place of the yelp as she quickly pushed herself to her feet, questions flooding her mind. Good that she was still conscious compared to her last trip incident, but these alleyways are extremely narrow, if there was something already in her path then she would have tripped over it when she skid in. So…

It took a surprising amount of effort for her to stay upright. Both of her feet were planted on the ground, yet they kept slipping and wobbling with squeaks and wet sounds.

Wet sounds. Slippery.

As she looked down, the bright blue heart caught her eye immediately, in all of its lead-oozing glory. Its cover was somehow pristine even now.

That accursed doorstopper.

That… goddamn book.

A large scowl grew across her face, furrowing brow shrouding her face in even more darkness, letting out a furious roar as she hoisted the massive book and hurled it into the deep darkness that surrounded them. The darkness consumed it… for only a moment. A.B.A quickly turned her head to a new sound as she heard the loud slam of the book colliding with the alleyway wall, coinciding with Pierce shrieking.

She was right. It really does not stay gone.

Both of them fiercely eyed the book. A.B.A slowly and cautiously stepped forward, gaze repeatedly switching between Pierce and the book. She needs to get this thing away from her. This accursed thing, endlessly driving the woman to madness… Why?

Pierce seized the book before A.B.A could get anywhere near it. Nearly blinding speed, lifting the massive book in her torn hand with surprising ease, a downright bizarre sight from someone so… bedraggled. She had turned away from A.B.A, using her free hand to leaf through the gunk-covered pages. Her breathing was ragged, laden with gurgles, speech sounding like little more than incoherent gibbering if one was not listening closely. And A.B.A was listening very closely.

“...Me…”

A.B.A took a slow step towards her, attempting to be as quiet as she could as she listened in.

“...Why… Why… Me…”

A.B.A remained quiet, eyes wide.

“Why… Why won’t you…” Pierce slurred, hand smearing the book’s black deluge across its pages, “…leave… leave me…”

Her right hand continued to leaf through the book’s incomprehensible pages. Her speech was stifled for a moment, interrupted by nauseated gurgles before blood spilled from her nose and mouth, mottled red mixing with the glittering black sludge. A guttural wheeze exited her throat, her whole body trembling and eyes slightly crossed. All the while, A.B.A’s eyes remained wide.

If anything, they were even wider. Her mouth was slightly agape. The intense stench of iron.

Pierce’s eyes focused and she grit her teeth.

“You… haunt… me…”

She mumbled to herself for a moment.

“Hunt… me…”

The black sludge stretched in webs between her fingers. Her growling was impossible to miss.

“...Tell me. Come on. Come on…”

She gripped a few pages that were stuck together with gunk between her fingers and folded a triangular corner. The book seemed to shudder as she gave a rough tug to the glued-together pages.

“...Tell me.”

She tugged the pages again, lead tingling her fingers.

“I know you can manipulate this…” she rubbed the material between her fingers, “…stuff. If I’m so important to you, why don’t you tell me why?”

A.B.A held her hand out for a moment, but pulled it back as Pierce continued. It was only growing more clear by the second: She has entirely lost her mind.

“What? Do you need me to scare it out of you? Is that it? Throw you into the flames again and again, or just tearing your pages out one-by-one?”

Her grip on the pages was already tight, but A.B.A could easily see it growing tighter even from behind, right arm shaking from how much Pierce was straining herself. Pierce let the book fall to the ground to free up her left arm as she hunched over further.

“The latter, then?”

No.

This has to stop.

“Pierce.”

A.B.A’s voice was firm. Pierce paused for a moment, though quickly returned to gripping the pages, now even more tightly. The green-haired homunculus let out a tired sigh.

“Pierce.”

There was no response this time from Pierce as she held down one side of the book with one hand and attempted to grab more and more pages with her right, growling all the while. A.B.A stepped closer and held out her hand.

“Pierce. This… isn’t right. Whatever this curse is, there should be another way. You need to st—”

An enraged shriek pierced the air and rattled the contents of the alley as Pierce yanked her right hand skyward.

“A.B.A! Stay out of this!” Pierce heaved, her whole body shaking, “This isn’t about you!”

Silence. This was not the mere awkward silence of two people that had run out of things to talk about over a meal. This was something more, mired in confusion. Pierce panted, body trembling, and A.B.A was left dumbfounded. Both of the girls simply looked at each other. Millions of different thoughts rushed through her mind, yet all were joined by one throughline.

A.B.A shook her head and gulped, holding her hand out towards Pierce.

“How did you learn my name?”

Pierce did not respond. Her head pounded with pain that surged through her shut left eye, causing her to hiss and grab her head with both of her hands.

“I…” she winced, attempt at responding interrupted by pained grumbles.

The right side of her face felt wet… and she could not stand it, quickly pulling her hands back despite what little comfort holding her head gave her. She did not manage to pull out any of the book’s pages, and her attempt to do so instead let the paper split the palm of her right hand clean open, which only left her with her own question.

“I…” her eyes were wide, which did not help as a buzzing sensation welled up in her now-watering right eye, as if it was going to pop.

A.B.A lunged towards Pierce, seizing her by her sweater’s turtleneck. Her patience had long since worn thin. This needs to end.

“Look at me! Are you listening—”

Silence. Her chastising was quickly cut short as she looked into Pierce’s right eye, which leaked black fluid. Her right eye was open, and looked… different. A.B.A had noticed it immediately, the deep brown seemingly melting away from her iris, leaving only the bright, clear blue that was originally just a thin crack. That blue…

“...So clear...”

The book’s contents bubbled, the popping of its bubbles being the only sound within the silence. Pierce’s visible torn flesh, originally a deep red, was dyed a familiar deep black, and oozed slowly with much higher viscosity. Her chest was tight, yet it also felt like a weight was lifted from her shoulders.

All of this familiarity…

If she knew this woman’s name, then what could this woman know about her?

“...You can peer into its depths.”

The words were tinged with the same sense of familiarity as the exited her lips. Because A.B.A loved the color blue, that particular shade of blue, like that of the deep ocean. But just how did she know that?

Her body shook, hands trembling as she held one out towards A.B.A, the other girl watching wide-eyed as the blue color drained from Pierce’s right eye, the limbal ring that originally separated the sclera and iris following suit to leave it looking identically to her left. What was originally red that leaked from her nose and mouth had become the same black as the book’s tar. The black sludge that had replaced her blood bubbled up from underneath her skin and her skin began to sag and hang limply from her bones, as if sloughing away, yet it still managed to cling to her form as she held her left hand out towards the homunculus.

A.B.A took her bubbling hand in her own, though it did not last long as the hand’s limp skin blackened and the entire limb melted through her fingers. The sleeve of her sweater fell to her side, leaking black sludge that twitched and began to slide closer to Pierce, climbing over her shoes to reunite with her body, though her clothes sagging made it obvious that her torso was beginning to melt, too. Skin, muscle, bone, organs, all uniformly dissolved into black tar that slipped out through the various holes in her clothing. Both of her arms had melted away, and her legs and feet merged together as she entirely left her clothes behind.

A.B.A only watched as the blackness overtook the strange woman. This is like… like...

The dissolving quickly spread upward through Pierce’s neck and to her head. Her hair, flesh, and bone, the materials that made up her head, melted into gooey blackness, her nose and ears smoothing away into complete flatness. Yet, somehow, her eyes and most of her teeth remained even as her whole head reshaped into thick-yet-flat circular disk shape, at least as much as the melting flesh could manage. Even without gums to hold them, her misaligned teeth stood out of the dripping sludge. The sides of her rounded head slightly split and dangled to the sides, almost resembling floppy animal ears.

“...A.B.A…?”

A.B.A jumped at Pierce’s wavering, distorted voice. The melting being’s body continued to morph, her shoulders, hips, waist, and neck all becoming the same uniform width, and a mound of black tar grew outward from the bottom of her long body, from her right side. The mound took a rectangular shape, at least to what extent the amorphous substance would allow.

“...You know who I am, don’t you?”

The homunculus’s eyes only grew wider as she attempted to hold Pierce’s melting rod-shaped body. Her speech was incoherent stammering, the name was on the tip of her tongue…

The black material gripped at Pierce’s original clothing and ate away at patches of the fabric. She shut her eyes as it began to pull itself away from her, material stretching to open holes that revealed bright golden metal, riddled with nicks and scratches of various sizes. Her head continued to morph as the blackness fell away, shape properly becoming round and flat and the ear-like flaps curling to cling nearly flush to the sides of her head. Her teeth were pulled inside her face before the blackness receded to reveal that her simple mouth now reached nearly to the sides of her head, with three weaves of white X-shaped stitching across it. A pair of small nostrils was quickly revealed afterwards, as were her massive, bag-cradled, completely-circular eyes that lacked irises similar to how her left eye was before.

“P-P-Pa—“ A.B.A continued to stammer. That is his face, so why can she not say it?

The tar continued to slough off of her artificial body, revealing more worn golden metal along the entire length of what originally made up her neck, torso, hips, and legs. What was once merely a strange mound that had grown from the right side at her bottom was revealed to be a massive rectangular slab with its rightmost edge tapering into being thinner: A massive blade. The blade had a large cross shape cut out of it, with the cross’s horizontal bar connecting to the blade’s sharp edge.

He mumbled to himself as the surface of his metal body warped with a shifting marbling made up of his original gold and a bright blue, his eyes crossed. This familiarity… it was starting to make sense. All of it was starting to make sense. But still… Who is he?

He… He? He…

No, that sounds right. But it still feels weird to be using that again after so long…

The green-haired homunculus strained to hold him due to his immense weight. Much heavier than the street lamp, it had been very long since she had last held him and part of her limited strength had faded in that time.

Pierce’s original clothing, mired in the black gunk that had fallen away from him, began to bubble and twitch. It was entirely immersed and merged with the sludge, which twitched and bubbled before lunging to and wrapping around the middle of his body, and remained black even as it solidified and changed texture to resemble leather. A thick band wrapped around where his neck used to be, almost resembling a collar, though nothing was connected to it. Much of the remaining material shaped itself into a long sheath with a seam down the front where it opened, with the bottom ending above where the axe blade began with a clasp lined with round silver studs.

The remaining material almost seemed to reach upwards in strands that converged together and solidified. Though they were thwarted by gravity, they still grew together into a long length of black fabric that dangled to the ground, wrapping around under the bottom edge of the thick collar and above the top edge of the studded clasp, held together with belt looping and silver buckles. The dangling material gained color as a small part of the middle portion layered upon itself to gain extra pierces of bright yellow-orange fabric on both sides, held together by more silver studs and with bold black text in an angular font reading “Hohenheim” on both sides in all capital letters.

They both locked eyes, A.B.A keeping her eyes on him as she grabbed the strap and pulled it over her shoulder. It felt much easier to carry his weight when it was spread across her shoulders instead of just clinging heaving him for dear life with only her arms. Pierce let out a squeak as A.B.A swiftly pulled him into a hug.

“Paracelsus.”

He blinked as something clicked in his mind, curving his body in an attempt to mirror hugging her back, though it was difficult without any actual limbs. That was it.

“A.B.A…” he whispered, body’s colors still shifting in bands, the stitches not inhibiting his ability to speak, voice ever so slightly more nasally and noticeably squeakier and higher in general than before. “I… missed you.”

A.B.A twirled him in her hug. It seemed like her strength was returning and held him like he was almost weightless, before slowing down to speak again.

“You… How were you human?”

Paracelsus bent his body to the side and looked upwards in thought, one of the flaps clinging to the side of his head dangling for a moment.

“If I knew, I’d be telling you.”

“You… don’t know?”

“Not a thing.” he said with a shake of his head, his colors settling uniformly into his original gold.

She slung him over her shoulder to carry him on her back as if she were carrying a guitar bag while Paracelsus grumbled.

“All I know is that I miss being… ambulatory.”

What had previously led to an awkward silence now was quickly quelled by barely-restrained snickers and giggles from both of them. That is a very fair thing to miss.

Outside of the sound of popping bubbles… Right, that book. That book that haunted Paracelsus when he was bound in a human form without his memories. That tormented him… Where was it? Was it…

The green-haired woman raised one leg and spun on her heel to take a long step in whatever direction she settled on, her eyes shooting to the ground before her. The book, still leaking tar, was by her feet, and she had successfully not tripped over it.

“HAH!” she let out a forced, if still triumphant, laugh as she pointed at the strange tome. “HAAAAAAAAH!”

Paracelsus, still hanging from her back, caught the book in his gaze, sticking his tongue out and blowing a raspberry at it.

“We’ve got you now, you stupid book!” he laughed. “We’ve figured out your little tr—“

A single blink, and it was gone from their sight. A.B.A felt a weight on the shoulder that Paracelsus’s holster-strap was not slung over…

Wriggling in his sheath, the golden axe attempted to get a view of whatever was connected to the new strap that had slung itself over the homunculus’s other shoulder. A.B.A’s eyes followed it downward to a robust black satchel decorated in bright blue heart symbols, the bag itself feeling… squishy to the touch.

“—ick…”

A.B.A grimaced, and her revulsion only grew as she pried it open to reveal a familiar bubbling blackness, though it thankfully did not spill out and the bag’s contents were somehow much lighter than it was before. Still unpleasant. Paracelsus scowled and stuck his tongue out at the bag.

“Really? Really? This is stupid.” he swung himself closer to the bag while blowing a raspberry at it. “You’re stupid.”

A.B.A rolled her eyes and looked around, though Paracelsus shaking himself again caught her attention.

“...A.B.A, did you pay for the hot dogs?” the axe asked, voice slightly tinged with panic.

“...Do the dollars I had in my back pocket count?”

Paracelsus looked to the side for a moment before letting out a small chuckle.

“...Good enough.”

Outside of the bubbling within the bag, the night was silent. The two of them could stay longer, though it would not be a very bright idea. They did not want to be caught in the middle of people looking for the now-missing “Pierce”: A.B.A, a complete outsider to the town, was the last person to be seen with her, and then “Pierce” went missing… Suspicious, too suspicious, much too suspicious.

They need to get out of here. Leaving on foot would simply be too slow. Yet, now that she has Paracelsus again… A.B.A let out a sigh and shut her eyes. It has been such a long time since she had summoned it, she was bound to grow rusty... focus was going to be needed this time.

It felt much longer for her, but it only took a few seconds before a shock wave rattled the entire alley. In front of her opening eyes was a set of massive doors made of green stone, carved with unreadable runes and a series of interlocking circles, triangles, and lines that all connected to a singular engraved weeping eye in the center.

“...Been a while, huh?” Paracelsus chuckled as he gazed at the strange gate, watching it open with the sound of grinding stone to reveal a star-speckled void, like looking into the clearest night sky.

A.B.A simply nodded as she slowly stepped through, turning back to watch it close behind both of them. It has been so long since she had been able to summon it, let alone use it, so…