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Frustration. That was the emotion of the day as Al was starting to see it. Twitter got him nowhere fast, people were so set in being heartless bastards they couldn't pull their heads out of their own arses long enough to... deep breaths. But Al was not a quitter. He asked everyone that crossed his path until eventually he got the tip that would change everything.



The soft hum of the machine compelled him closer. It seemed so cold and sterile and brought forth memories of his own shock at being dumped in this horror. The thing was though, he was not dead. So then why was Rep?...

WHAT THE ******** ******** made the horrific mistake of rounding the pod to view the contents within. It was most certainly Rep. He could not deny that. Nor could he deny the fact that the look frozen on his face gave away what his eyes tried very hard not to wander to... and yet did.

Rep. Just. <******** chest was wide open, ribs splintered and peeled back like they were absolutely nothing. Meaningless. He could swear he could see the yellowish red matter that was his heart, covered thinly in a red liquid veil. That red covered a lot. A lot. A ******** LOT. There was just so much of...

THUNK.


His eyes rolled back and he hit the floor. It was a few long moments before he finally pulled his thoughts back together and his eyes fluttered open again. It wasn't like he never saw blood and guts before. It was just... context was everything. Unfortunately, this time it meant someone he actually gave two ******** about was dead.

He writhed and slowly eased himself back to his feet, he wasn't allowed to just lay down and die. Rep would have been pissed. So pissed. But still.

"Rep. ********. I-" he dragged his worthless body back to the pod. This time managing to avoid looking at the injury or even directly at the man's face. He fixed his gaze on his forehead. A trick his father once taught him.

"Why? Why did you have to-?" his voice crackled and his lip trembled uncontrollably into a deep frown. "You were supposed to be stronger."

He closed his eyes, choking on his breaths and shuddering when he'd released them. "If this could happen to someone as powerful as you, what hope does someone like me ever have?"

He tilted his head to the side and his expression darkened as he realized just how selfish that might have come across. Maybe he was mostly selfish. Maybe. But who wasn't? Losing someone you care about is like losing a part of yourself too. You mourn the loss of both, right? He shook his head slowly and then pressed a cheek to the glass.

"I should have been there to help you," he muttered against it, causing the glass to fog with his breath before hauling himself back.

"I don't think I would have made any difference though," he admitted as he re-opened his now reddened eyes. "I know real men don't cry. But I think there's a special clause for when it matters."


Al crossed his arms and buried his face into them, his entire weight propped against the pod as he began to shudder in muted pain.

There he sobbed for far longer than he would ever admit to anyone. Eventually stopping when he was all out of tears to give. His mouth was left so dry his tongue stuck to his lips when he'd attempted to moisten them. He swallowed hard, voice dry and raspy, "You can't just die this way."

He was trying to convince himself more than anyone else.

He rubbed his eyes and face dry and attempted to smooth out his appearance until all of it was buried beneath a smile. Both false and forced. His eyes gave away too much right now and so he lingered until they cleared. The smile unchanging the entire time.

When he was certain he looked normal, he turned on his heel and left. Surely those vultures would rejoice at the news confirmed. Shame none of them would hear it from him.

In a lot of ways, Deus Ex Machina was like high school, Molly noted. People gossiped. They gossiped a lot, and Molly always just happened to catch a lot of it while she was quietly working in the background, unnoticed. There was a lot going on about Rep, and the more Molly heard, the more she knew she...well…she needed to see him. Or what was left of him? She didn’t know…some of those rumors going around about what happened to him were more frightening and scary than what was said he had done.

Eventually she found her way to the pod room, and her entire being felt burdened down with apprehension, nervousness, and anxiety. There were too many words swirling around the circumstances leading up to this, and honestly Molly wasn’t sure she wanted to see what awaited her once she stopped.

She rounded the corner, found Rep’s pod, and gasped loudly. Curls bounced as she rapidly turned her head away and covered her mouth with both hands, and her eyes pinched shut. The trainee took a few moments to collect herself, but luckily, she did not faint. Molly took those few moments to also muster up her courage to look upon him again, and as she opened her eyes a freckled hand reached out, and she place it on the glass. She did this for two reasons. One, it was the closet she could get as a gesture of ‘comfort’, and second, well, it obscured her vision of his chest.

Even if he couldn’t see her or hear her…well, it didn’t matter. What mattered, she thought, was that she was trying to reach out.

“Hi, Rep…” She started, her voice coming out meekly. Molly sighed, and then cleared her throat softly, and her voice came out clearer, but still soft, as if she didn’t want to disturb the sleep of the others in pods around them. “Hello.” She started, and paused once more, staring up at his face. “It’s been a while since we spoke face to face…I’m really sorry! I guess everyone just gets so busy, huh?” Molly paused again, and her brows furrowed. “There’s…a lot of things being said and both around Deus and on the Twitters…and…I’m not sure what happened exactly and…I don’t want to know what really happened. I really don’t. I don’t need to either…and…I’m sorry for what I’m about to say…no, wait, I’m not because I mean it…I’m sorry…ah…” She grimaced, took a breath, and then tried again. “I’m not really good at saying what I think and feel, and that’s one of the things I admire about you…that you’re very honest about how you think and feel, even if it’s not always…well…even if it’s not always nice.”

Molly fell silent again and stood there for a long while, trying to piece together her thoughts and voice. Even if he was podded, even if he couldn’t talk back, and even if he couldn’t hear her…it was still hard to get her thoughts and feelings across, but the urge and the desire to try was there. She wanted to reach out. Because as stupid as it sounded to anyone else, Molly believed in thought that there was a bit of good in Rep. Even if it was rarely seen, even if it you needed a microscope to see it, it was there, and Molly felt everyone deserved another chance. Even Rep.

She wanted to try, for his sake.

“I’m sorry I have to say this…that I’m in a position where I need to. Rep, I’m so disappointed in you.” Getting out that initial statement seemed to help her, and her fingers flexed against the glass of the pod. “There’s absolutely no justifiable reason for you to be in there!” She cried. “There’s no reason for what you did to that other young man! Oh…this is why I stay off the Twitters…nothing good ever comes from it…and…that all this happened because of that…I just…no. There’s no excuse. No reason.”

Molly paused again, and took another breath. Her other hand came up to wipe her eyes, which had started to tear up. “This is a consequence of your actions, but this isn’t the only consequence, Rep. You’ve hurt a lot of people. You’ve hurt…those that care for you…doesn’t that mean anything? Don’t they?” At some point, Molly couldn’t look at Rep’s face anymore, and instead stared down at his boots, with her hand still pressed against the glass.

“You’re throwing so much away…and…why? I really want to know. I can’t grasp it. What’s worth throwing away those who care about you? Your life? Your chance? I wish…you could answer me right now. I can’t understand it…I couldn’t imagine doing anything that would hurt those I care about, and that would ruin this second chance I was given at Deus that I’m so grateful and appreciate for…because it allowed me to meet so many wonderful people and for me to live…and I count you among those wonderful people…because I…I think that deep down…well…really, really, really deep down, that there’s some good, even if you’re also really um…really, really, really rough around the edges…I’ve seen it. I know it’s there and I cherish it.”

She paused and took another breath, and her eyes shifted back up to his face. “Maybe there’s such a thing as going ‘too far’…and saying ‘sorry’ won’t make what happened right…but I think…” Her brows furrowed. “This is just what I think…but if I was you, and I was given another chance, because I believe in second chances…er…well…third…uh…fourth…eh…fifth, sixth, seventh…ah…I believe in another chance, but if I was given another chance…I’d try to do everything in my power to live my life as right as I could, and spend the rest of it trying to make amends, because as important as end results are…I think trying is even more important…I think no one can fault you for trying…and…you’re not a quitter so…I think…I think you could do it, if you really tried. I believe you could do it, if you tried. I think you’re worth another chance, and if…you do get another chance, Rep…please know I’ll be there to help you...if you wanted it…I promise.”

Molly released a loud breath, and looked at the back of her hand for a moment before looking back up.

“I…I’ll come back tomorrow and visit…alright? I’ll…bring the sweater I’ve been working on knitting too…! I…I wish I could get your opinion on it…but…that’s okay.” Finally, she cracked a very tentative smile. “I’m sorry. I don’t know what the right thing to say is right now…sleep well doesn’t seem right…” Her hand slid away from the glass and Molly swiftly turned to the side so that she didn’t see what lay beneath, and instead looked down the rows and rows of sleeper pods. “So…I’ll see you soon…alright?” Molly lingered for a moment longer, before she finally took the first step away from the pod, and then down the aisle, wiping her eyes again as she left.

It had been mentioned quickly on twitter, and he mistook it as a joke, as most jokes went on the social media site. However, as he practically lived in the Life division, he inquired, and the more he heard, the more he grew pale. It had never really seemed like a real possibility that someone’s morality, at least someone close to him, could be tested, or taken. That he could loose someone so important to him without even being there or noticing. To hear it from word of mouth seemed cruel, and a hard slap to his pride as a friend.

It took questioning and frantic pleading to find the location, and Melvin felt that was only because he had done a lot of menial labor for the Life techs to even beg them that far, but he threw pride aside as he ran to the pods. When the door open, he was welcomed with the same eerie quiet he was used to in the pod rooms. They had always been a sanctuary for him. Quiet, private, and one of the few places to really be alone yet not alone. He could spend all day cleaning these rooms and no one would judge him, and he felt better in some way for helping the many sleeping occupants by cleaning up the room they lived in. He liked taking care of them, because they never demanded he shut up, to stop asking questions, to stop acting in a certain way. They were quiet, and resting, and despite knowing that some might be going through mental testing, to him they were at peace and happy to take a breather.

Not now. Now it had that solemn truth that some people in the pods were sent there as punishment, as prisoners in a jail cell that no one could break them out of, and the peace they felt was ultimately a unsure hold without probation. No bail. No pleading. It had a uncertain finality to it, of one of release or deteriorating to nothing.

Breathing deep, he let the door shut behind him, locking him in the room of melancholy blues and the pale faces behind frosted glass. He moved down the rows, looking for a familiar face among the strangers. How long had these people been here? How long would they remain.

He stopped, turning his head when he noticed the face in the crowd, and felt his heart harden, drop like a anchor, and hold him in place for just a moment – frozen. “Dear god no.”

He moved over, eyes welling up despite his resolve not to break, but with leaving the cursed classroom to this news, there was no reason not to. Who was he saving face for at this point? No one cared if he shouted or cried or threw himself off those accursed cliffs that Rep ran off too. He had pride only for those he valued, and one of the few he had was here. What use did he have for his image when no one cared a lick for what he was? He was disposable. A liability. A debt that needed to be paid. A slave. A pawn.
He touched the glass, letting the heavy tears fall, and found the will to take in a breath only to feel it shatter like glass in little weak huff, painful and sharp. “No….No-no-no.NO!” He touched the glass, and looked at the frozen face. It was Rep, as unmistakable in a crowd as he was here, but he lacked the smile, the cocky turn of his head that said he gave no ******** while hiding great concern over others. It was stripped, leaving something peculiar in its raw nature. A twisting grimace? A shout? A silent plea of something that Melvin could never understand.

He held to the glass, fingertips touching cold, and looked through the glass to the torn body, confusion and worry as his head turned down to a massive gaping wound that lead right to his core. An open biology lesson to human anatomy grossly rushed. “What happened?” He covered his mouth as he looked back up to Rep, as if the ex-Sun could answer him, and then felt his insides crushed when at the ridiculous that even now he asked questions, and this time Rep would not openly, freely, honestly answer with all the qualities that made Melvin need him.

His hand swept across the glass, over the open wound splayed out for all to see that he was alive or not, one couldn’t be sure, and wished he could will some power to close it. To fix it. To fix everything.

“I should have been here. Whatever happened, I should have been here.” He turned his hand, wiping his wrist and length of his arm over his face and up against his glasses. What did he pay for a stupid wish to escape for a vacation, only to be tricked and used in some illusion’s game, by people who cared nothing for him? Now one of the few people he cared for, one of the top, the one who actually gave a damn, had suffered in his absence. He had neglected him in some time of need, and as worthless as he was, he hadn’t even been there for those who even cared he was around.

Something happened, and the story was lost to him. All he knew was that Rep was here, frozen, either was a warning to others or something else. Dead? With that wound possibly, but if he was really dead, why was he not buried unmarked with the rest of the hunters? He had seen bodies in the Infirmary before. Why wasn’t Rep there if he was truly dead?

His hand curled into a fist as he pressed his forehead to the glass, staring up at the eyes behind the barrier. Despite being frozen, they still seemed so alive. “I’m so sorry.” He croaked, his voice breaking with every wet breath. “I should have been here. I should have been here to help …to help whatever ******** happened. I’m so sorry. I’m such a s**t friend. All I did was wanted to get off his damn island, and then I just got used up by people who don’t give a damn and I can’t trust, and like…the only person who does, who even gives a ******** if I’m around, who I can even give a damn about, is here.” He looked up, his vision so blurred that Rep turned into a distorted shape muddled by tears. “I’m so ******** sorry. You kept giving so much and all I even ******** do is run or take or ******** up. I’m such a s**t person. No wonder people don’t care if they slit my throat.” He was the first to go. He was so low on the totem pole, had such little value here. No wonder he had a worm. He was a worm. Lower than dirt.

He felt Saliva stir, but she held her voice. It wasn’t the time, and she had nothing to offer. No comfort that could heal all the wounds.

“What am I going to do now without you here?” He asked, sliding down his brow against the glass until he turned and fell to the ground, sitting as he hung his head, wrung his fingers through his mushed hair, and cried outright. “What do I do now?” He managed, before he broke down. It was a long time before Melvin rose up, eyed dried up and throat raw, before he touched the glass once more, turned, and left – without answers.

By the time Melvin came around, Rep was already beginning to feel like he was imagining things, the locked point of view was tapping into very primal instincts in him, that sensation that something was lurking at the edge of his vision that he would see if he could only turn his head. If his heart had been beating, it would have kicked up his pulse, instead there was only a very solitary kind of fear, a reminder that he had undervalued having a body that could react, that could express anything of the seething emotions that were the entity that called himself Rep.

Melvin wasn't a hallucination however, and his arrival for that time being dispelled the creeping edge of fear and uncertainty that was filling up the lonely minutes. Once again there was that familiar freeze, the look of horror at him trapped there, no doubt a mask of mortal terror. He'd been looking death in the face, all that had changed was that he got a much longer look at it than he'd ever wanted to, until the shock faded and all there was was captivity.

Seeing Melvin shatter the way he did made him wish again that he could cry, that he could do something other than look out, feeling the ache of sorrow and regret build up in him like a dam with no release. The other man didn't break easily, forever maintaining his front of normalcy and clipped control. He wanted to tell him what had happened was deserved, it was his own fault - it was always his own fault.

It's not your fault. You shouldn't have been here. People shouldn't always feel like they have to mind me like a child. I should be able to be alone without being a ******** burden. he thought helplessly, but knew as much as he wished it to be true, it wasn't. He couldn't be left alone, he was a liability and though it might hurt now, surely it was better this way?

He wanted to shake Melvin by the shoulders for calling himself a s**t friend for simply wishing to get some time to himself. He was anything but that and Rep would have reminded him of such, he was a good friend who had never expected anything from him but for him to stop acting like a baby. And in that they'd been in agreement, there was no part of himself Rep loathed more than the part of him that was the child, the weak, the petty and the vindictive.

What am I going to do now without you here? the words made him cringe internally. Move on. Fight, go out onto the battle fields with everyone else. Be out of his reach to protect. Just like Al, just like everyone who had counted on him. And that, he realised was the worst part, it wasn't the boredom, it wasn't the restraint from all the good things in his life, it was that he couldn't be there to protect the things he cared about.

He had always hoped if he lost his life, it would be doing something heroic, something good.

Instead his own selfish choices meant that there was a Melvin wandering around out there without a Rep to give him a kick up the bum when he got too internally focused.

It just wouldn't do.

As soon as he could break away from the herd, Al found his way back into the labs. This time going over and looking directly at Rep with a calm expression. He did not seem to see the injury anymore, or that horror frozen eternally on Rep's face. No. It was even questionable if he saw the pod itself.
He shot Rep a quick wave.

"Hey man, me again," he approached with his head held high.
"I brought you something," he carefully placed a very small dog carved from a bit of soap on the narrow metal lip of Rep's pod. Just barely within his field of view as the distinguishable shape rested against the glass.

"It's supposed to be like. Nuru. He can like. Bite the assholes who try to be dicks to you," he laughed at his own 'joke', awkward and uncertain. Nervous.

He stopped and stared at Rep in complete silence. For a while. Just, stared him in the face as his thoughts wandered and then abruptly came back to earth with a blink of his eyes. "Anyway man, see you later." He waved again and left.

The red ruin of Rep's chest stirred a coil of nausea in Jordan's stomach. He looked, briefly, just long enough to know what was there, and then up to Rep's face instead, studying the troubled expression there, pain and surprise and something that Jordan couldn't identify. "Why?" he asked quietly, and laid a hand on the pod.

He stood there silently for a while, just breathing in a slow, controlled rhythm, before he leaned his forehead against the curved glass, his shoulders drooping into a tired slump and his mouth twisting into an unguarded curve of unhappiness. "I can't lose you too," he whispered. "Why do you keep doing this? I should've been there." A breath. "Maybe that wouldn't have helped either. Maybe I've lost you already. s**t, Rep, why?"

He shook his head, a tiny motion. "I wish I could know what you were thinking. What you do think. I can't -- I guess I don't know you as well as I thought I did." The hand on the window curled slowly into a fist, and his voice dropped to a low, ragged register. "The waiting's always the worst part. I should be grateful for that. That there's still a chance that you'll, that you'll come home. But not knowing is tearing me up. I don't think anyone's noticed. I hope nobody's noticed. Getting the looks is shitty enough without everyone knowing how much this hurts."

He took a deep breath and looked into Rep's frozen blue gaze. "You didn't mean to kill him. I believe that. I have to believe that." A small and bitter smile crossed his face. "Maybe I'm wrong." The set of his expression and his posture altered subtly as he thought about the Blue Queen, who would have meant it without doubt or shame. "But that's not you. Not quite," he said, and sighed. "I miss you. I hope you're sleeping peacefully in there. Is it even possible to have nightmares while you're podded? I hope not."

He pushed himself away from the pod and wiped the heel of his hand across his eyes before he straightened up, deliberately returning to the straight-backed, confident posture he generally kept to. His eyes held Rep's a moment longer, and then he turned to leave.

Jordan stopped short, caught off guard, dismay replacing exhausted unhappiness on his face for an instant before he hauled himself firmly under control and the neutral social mask dropped into place. How much had Taym heard and seen? When had he gotten there?

The question made his lips flatten into a thin line. Assessment of psychopathy. Right. "Yes," he said, and left it at that.