and every broken heart will mend

[scourgingstars]

[Not too long after the trial, a note found its way under everyone's doors, all of them written in the same neat handwriting that had been asking after a ring not that long ago.]

If any of you would prefer not to be left alone after all of that, I propose we meet in the dining hall. Nari has taken up cooking at the moment, and should anyone wish to talk I will be present regardless of whether or not the group at large should choose to join us.

-Ardyn

[True to his word, Ardyn was at a smaller table in the dining hall with an untouched cup of coffee in front of him; lost in thought leaning his head on one hand as the other turned a silver coin over between his fingers.]

[King in an empty hall, and savior of nothing. All that effort to prevent bloodshed, and it had come down to a situation designed to force their hand from the beginning.]

Comments

[motherfucking_ghost]

[His hands slide away, that was really starting to get awkward anyway and the last thing he needs to start doing is shaking people for ANSWERS and such.] Yeah? Yeah, sure, what is it?

[theundertaker]

Follow me.

[She turns and walks back into the guest house, making her way down the short hallway to the locked double doors from earlier in the week.]

[motherfucking_ghost]

[Ohhhhh the mystery doors. He is all about that. He's about those doors. Show him the mystery, Cece. He's a little apprehensive, but honestly, after today, who could blame him?]

[theundertaker]

[Cece lays both hands on the door handles and pauses, mentally preparing herself. After a long moment she turns the handles and pushes open the double doors to reveal what the other half of the guest house has become.

It's a very nice half-circle of a room, decorated similarly to the rest of the mansion save for the lack of normal furniture. In fact it's almost completely empty save for two pale pink pods, side-by-side on one end of the room. They’re shaped like large rosebuds, graceful arcs of metal marking the aperture at the top where they must open. Through the partially-transparent surface, Mikaela and Mai’s faces are visible. The blood has been washed out of their clothes, and both girls have their hands folded over their chests, tucked over a glass rose.]

This is where he told me to put them, with their roses. [She turns to look at him.] Church, this room was empty a week ago.

[Welcome to the morgue.]

[motherfucking_ghost]

[The more she hesitates, the more he kind of doesn't want to go, but of course he goes, and of course he has immediate regrets about it once...it's clear what it is.

For once, there's a large swath of silence from him, trying to even comprehend this. The pods are unlike anything he's seen, even from relatively futuristic tech. He reaches out to Mai's pod and gently pokes the surface, then flattens his hand against hit, not terribly unlike the glass separating him and Junpei from the execution room. She almost looks peaceful like this, like she hadn't been savagely torn apart by, quite literally, her own demons. And Mikaela--

He does want to talk things out in the guest house, away from PAL and away from cameras, but while this has the most space (the most space, he's starting to realize with dawning horror, for most if not all of them), they can't meet here.

Clarith can't see this.]

The roses...from the vase, in the foyer. The Rose Ceremony. [He's laughing but it's not a ha-ha funny laugh, the sickness and incredulity jolting out of him.] Like they were chosen.

He put them here. He put them here because he knew. But he's just an AI, he didn't just--didn't make them out of thin air; they were already here, just...stored somewhere, behind--behind a wall, or up in the ceiling, or shunted up from the floor or--

This was set up specifically. This was planned. This was...always going to happen.

[theundertaker]

[She doesn't follow him into the morgue. For her having to come in here twice, both times carrying the too light bodies of these girls she wishes she'd gotten to know better. She'd had to shower three times before she'd felt clean enough to change her clothes after cleaning up they'd left behind but even now, while she hugs herself from the doorway, her hands still somehow feel sticky.

Cece is listening to what he's saying and, while it churns her stomach that there's a very high chance the network planned all this from the start, there's something else that jumps to the forefront of her mind.]

...Don't let Clarith come in here.

[motherfucking_ghost]

I know. I--I know that. Son of a bitch this is fucked up.

[He pulls himself away because this is Bad and Wrong and Cece could use some comfort. Which, y'know, he's bad at, but at least he'll come back to the doorway.]

Do you think you'll...get a punishment of some kind, if you don't do what he says?

[theundertaker]

That's the impression I've been getting. And I... [She peers around him at the bud pods before leaning in and just resting her forehead against his arm.]

I don't know what he'd do to them if I didn't take care of them.

[motherfucking_ghost]

[Have a headpat, Ceec. Do as much leaning and resting as you want.] Maybe he'd find another way to clean them up. God, making you a fucking mortician is...fucked up. I'm sorry. That you have to see it, much less do it.

We get out of here, you're gonna sue for so much money.

[theundertaker]

It almost makes sense in a sick way but there's no way he'd know... [She's more muttering to herself than to Church but her arms are going around his waist to hug him. It's hug time, boyo.]

I'm taking them for all they're worth and starting my own network that is never touching AI or reality TV. Period.

[motherfucking_ghost]

[Hugs are fine. Please hugs. He'll take that as permission to also hug.]

Cooking show. Those are always in fashion. What doesn't he know? [You think he's not gonna prod at that mutter haha think again.]