[Can’t Opt Out]

“At what point do we panic?”

“Were… were we not supposed to already be panicking? It feels like we should be panicking?”

“Emilia will manage to get out of there!”

“Will she though? It’s been… what? Like ten minutes of her stuck there? What happens when someone comes along and attack us? We’ll be dead, and she’ll be trapped over there.”

“No one is yet coming.”

“You can’t know that.”

“I do… but I’m also lying.”

“Oh, just great. Now even our soothsayer doesn’t know the future. So, enlighten us, oh great one! Who is coming?”

“Many people.”

“Care to tell us who these many people are?”

“Some belong to Fräthk… others belong to Emilia… yet more do not yet belong to anyone, although they will soon.”

“Great—just great.”

“I mean, we already knew a bunch of Emilia’s friends were coming, from their messages.”

“Sure, but they’re not actually supposed to be coming down here, right? Emilia told them not to enter the building—which, weird, right?”

“Why doesn’t she want them in the building, anyways?”

“This place is not meant for people to tread within. There are those amongst their numbers who would be safe, but not many. It is best not to risk it. They will risk it, of course—no one who loves so deeply could not risk it. Yet, they will never reach us; instead, we will already be headed towards the sky by the time they dare step foot within this building.”

“So.. assuming we believe you, we’ll come across them on our way out of here?”

“Yes.”

“I suppose if we do come across them, that’ll be a sign that the will of the aether is real?”

“Or that she’s really good at reading people—it’s not like we haven’t heard about how much Emilia loves her friends. It would make sense for them to love her back just as much—and seriously? Could you see her not coming down here for them, even if she believed this wasn’t a place people were meant to set foot—or whatever it was Rayleen said.”

“No. I think she’d jump into a volcano, intent to save someone she barely knew.”

“Exactly.”

“Which of Fräthk’s people are coming?”

“Oh, come on! You don’t seriously believe her!?”

“I dunno—I mean, I’ve seen her tell Fräthk about some weirdly specific things over the years? And it’s not like we’ve seen her check her xphern or anything to get information on who’s where at the moment.”

“I do not have my xphern with me.”

“I was just thinking it was odd that you weren’t giving us information on what was happening in that chat we can’t read on Clemence’s xphern. Why’d you leave it behind?”

“I did not leave it behind. A silverstrain child bumped into me earlier. I believe they stole it.”

“A silverstrain child? Were they…”

“I believe they were as we have already discussed.”

“Seriously? That’s weird, right? Two people…”

“Three, I believe.”

“What?”

“I suspect the same happened to the Baalphorian man.”

“You cannot be guessing that based on nothing.”

“Nothing, and everything. Many things come in threes—such is the way of the universe. We are three, as ever. Heart, soul, shame.”

“What.”

“It's from an old story! Fräthk used to read it to me, a long time ago, before… well…”

“Have you always called Fräthk… Fräthk?”

“No… I used to call them Momosha? But then, after Paparish changed…”

“Changed?”

“Fräthk was involved with one of their loyal. Qoréa was once known as Qorant. She transitioned shortly after Clemence was born, her relationship with Fräthk falling apart as a result. It was something of a touchy subject for Qoréa, as Fräthk never held a preference for their partner’s gender identity, yet, they rejected Qoréa. It was a source of constant gossip, as Qoréa often stayed in the upper levels of this building. Terrible woman—no offence, Clemence.”

“None taken. It’s not like she ever really wanted to be a mother or father to me—Fräthk, either? I think Fräthk liked the idea of a proper family: a man, a woman, and a child.”

“I thought Fräthk was a ‘strangavi?”

“Another source of gossip. Some people argue they are, and that ‘losing’ Qorant was the catalyst to finding their own identity. Other people say the stress of their ongoing mental health crisis has caused them to identify as ‘strangavi, but that if they managed to chill, they’d go back to identifying as a woman.”

“Mental health crisis?”

“This place is corrupting, and those who would have it continue to exist have lead Fräthk into the darkness.”

“I heard these dungeons have existed for a long time, though?”

“Yes, but corruption is a slow thing.”

“I heard Fräthk’s mental health took a huge dive after Qoréa transitioned?”

“Yes. I believe the stress and grief—and perhaps regret, for having fallen for someone who would not fit their idea of a ‘normal’ family—allowed corruption to rise within them. These last sixteen years have been… a decline, and their mind has become a splintered thing, ready to crack and shatter with the smallest of pushes.”

“So… Clemence is probably better off having spent little time around them?”

“I don’t even need Rayleen to answer that to know that yes, yes I am. Fräthk isn’t a nice person.”

“You say that as though Jerrial wasn’t literally kidnapped and held hostage by them.”

“You know what I mean.”

“Do I?”

“Yeah, you do! I know you like acting like you’re a little slow, but you’re also a little shit you likes poking at things!”

“Why do you say it like that?”

“Like what?”

“Like it’s a bad thing?”

“Uh… because it is? Duh?”

“Well… then why are you obsessing about Emilia? That girl is also a little shit, if you didn’t notice.”

“Sure, but she’s nice about!”

“Is she?”

“Yes! She is!”

“You’re just saying that cause she’s pretty.”

“Part of it is also her black knot—once it locked onto Emilia, I believe it became something even Clemence’s common sense could not undo.”

“Wait… you knew about that? About my black knot? Does… does Emilia?”

“Uh… yeah? I think everyone knows? And yeah, we talked about it when you first joined us?”

“I… I…”

“Oh shit, is she gonna cry?”

“Do black knots cry!? Since when do they cry!? Fuck, fuck, fuck! I hate it when people cry! Make her stop! Jerrial! Rayleen? Seriously! Clemence! Please don’t cry! I—”

“SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP! FUCK! YOU ALL ARE SO FUCKING LOUD AND ANNOYING AND SHUT. UP!” Emilia shifted, pressing her foot onto the still-open wall panel—it had refused to shut, although she’d attempted to force the creepy doll back into the wall—and stepping on to it. From her slightly higher vantage point, she could see all of her companions a little better, her glower biting into them. “As interesting as some of her chit-chat and gossiping is, I have to agree! This might actually be the time to panic and your bickering ISN’T HELPING! SO SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP PLEASE FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THE AETHER! SHUT. UP!”

Screaming at her friends—plus Rayleen—did at least help her release some of the stress that had been building within her for the last ten or so minutes. For the barest of breaths, Emilia felt calm. Everything was good. Everything would be fine.

Then, Clemence burst into tears. The girl’s legs gave out, and the next thing Emilia knew, she was vanishing from sight, only her sobs remaining. The only good thing was she was graced with Vern’s horrified experience as Jerrial vanished to kneel beside the sobbing teenager—the man clearly didn’t do crying.

“Now look what you’ve done!” he hissed, edging closer to her, as though intent to get as far from the crying as possible.

“Dude, why are you afraid of the crying teenager?” she asked, planting a hand on her hip as she glared him down… for about two seconds. Then, she turned about, using her new position to examine the area from a new perspective. While she had little confidence that she would find anything new, it was worth checking.

“It’s just… a lot,” Vern lied, like the lying liar she was. One sharp glance later, and he was explaining that he was the oldest of several siblings, Clemence’s sobs turning to sniffles as she quieted in an attempt to listen to the man’s story.

The short version: his parents really fucking sucked. It really was quite amazing how universally terrible the majority of parents were. Emilia’s adoptive parents? Great. Loren? Byron? Awesome guardians for their respective pods—as well were a number of other clones. The Laprise moms? Acceptable enough. The Baxter fathers? Could be better, could definitely be worse. Mikhail’s mom? At least she tried and knew her inability to connect with her son was an issue. The majority of her other friends’ parents? Terrible. Some were far worse than others, of course—they would all agree Simeon and Coral’s parents were by far the worst, but almost everyone else’s parents had honourable mentions on the Terrible Parents List.

As for the Free Coloniers she knew? Most of them were equally terrible. Wander was pretty good, although the fact that Cameron was a bitch could be due to his generally busy schedule, and therefore, lack of regular connection with his kid. Most of the other people who popped into her mind, though—Yujao, Hurinren, Averie, the Yu siblings, Meridian—all had terrible to mediocre parents.

The long version of Vern’s story was that his parents had been idiots and had way too many kids, resulting in Vern, as the oldest, being left to parent many of them. His parents hadn’t liked crying—like, really hadn’t liked it; like, they’d scream at him if even the current baby of their family started crying for food.

“Best thing that ever happened to me was going away for school,” he said, eyes skipping towards Jerrial’s presumed location on the floor, next to Clemence. “I specifically chose a school far from my family, so I couldn’t be dragged home on weekends. They weren’t happy.”

“I’m sorry,” Emilia said, smiling sadly at her friend. “I know what it's like to be responsible for kids who are the same age or barely younger than you are. My siblings and I are all adopted, but when we were in the orphanage? Well, I was always the one protecting and parenting them. I didn’t have to, like you did, but even that little bit, before our parents brought us home and took over being the responsible adult, weighs on me sometimes? I can’t imagine what sort of damage having that responsibility forced on you by your parents—the people who are supposed to protect you—must have done to you. So, I’m sorry.”

The man shrugged—muttered that it wasn’t something she should be apologizing for. Cultural difference—that brushing off of her expression of sadness for what he’d been for—she supposed… at first, before running back her words and realizing the form of sorry she’d used had placed herself far too close to the words than she’d meant to. Vern was correct: she had chosen a form of sorry that implied she had directly caused him harm, and he had probably assumed that given her Lüshanian was a little rusty at times, she either didn’t know the million different ways to say sorry in Lüshanian or had simply messed it up.

“I’m sorry,” she repeated, placing herself further from the words—positioning herself as an observer who was sorry such a terrible thing had happened to him and hoped that he would find peace with it and figure out how to move on in his life.

“Thanks,” he muttered in return, his gaze still positioned away from Clemence’s sniffling. It wasn’t exactly helpful when, a moment later, the teenager was popping up beside the man, her watery eyes peering over at Emilia.

“I’m sorry I wasn’t honest with you,” the teenager said, her lips wobbling severely enough that Emilia was worried the girl would start sobbing again—something that was liable to cause the fleeing Vern to pass out, given how pale he’d suddenly become.

Poor guy.

“Honest?” Emilia asked, turning her attention more fully onto the teenager. “About?”

“About her black knot, I assume?” Jerrial offered. He had also popped back up and was gently patting Vern on the head; for the life of her, Emilia couldn’t figure out if Vern was enjoying the treatment or not, although he showed no sign of attempting to flee further from Clemence.

Shifting her gaze back to the girl in question, Emilia smiled at the kid. “It’s not something you have to tell me? It’s not like I was out here laying my own, less obvious genetics on you all? Sure, my silverstrain is pretty obvious; other things, not so much.”

“But…”

“Clemence,” Emilia laughed, “don’t take this the wrong way, but Jerrial telling me you have a black knot or not, I would have known.”

The girl blinked her big eyes at her. “What? How?”

“I know a lot? Like, the stupid group of friends who are apparently going to try coming down here despite one of my last messages to them being that they were absolutely not allowed to do so includes three Hyrat clones. A couple more of the people with us are black knots as well—and seriously, if you run into any of the clones, I already sent them all of your photos, so they’ll keep you safe for me?”

Shrugging, Emilia resumed her searching for any way out of this place—seriously, there had to be some way through!?

“So you… don’t care?”

“As long as you don’t hurt me or anyone I care about in any substantial way: no, I don’t. I love a lot of black knots, and I don’t see why I can’t make room in my heart for one more friend with a black knot.” Had she thrown in that friend bit, simply so Clemence would remember that all she was currently consenting to was friendship? Yes, yes she had.

The bing of her xphern going off tugged Emilia’s attention back to the teenager, still watching her. Their eyes met for the barest moment before the girl was shaking herself and tugging Emilia’s xphern from her waist band and frowning down at the message.

“It says the person who tipped The Black Knot off about some sort of situation brewing in the city connected with them? Apparently, they want to meet up and help, in exchange for aid in getting… at least two, but probably four—assuming one of those people isn’t a depressed baby?—out of the city?” Clemence glanced up at her, frowning because that message was a little odd—did it really say a depressed baby? What a way to put it; also, why would being depressed keep someone from—

Emilia may have screamed when, suddenly, energy split through the playground, everything beginning to shift and fucking fucks did she soooo not want to be reduced to Emilia mush!