Sunshine (Pomni x Ragatha) Chapter 1 - Put On a Happy Face
[Click here to read from the beginning on AO3!]
Cover art by @blukiar
“You’re supposed to $%#&ing smile, Pomni!” Zooble's hoarse scream reverberated throughout the big top. “Are you stupid?! We can’t finish the new intro if you aren’t @#$%ing smiling!”
“Leave. Me. Alone!” Pomni, denied the catharsis of slinging her sailor’s mouth, expressed her disdain with her middle fingers instead. She only ended up seething harder, however, when a pair of other-dimensional censor bars appeared to obscure the rude gestures.
“Oh! So that’s how you want to play it, Puffball?” Zooble narrowed her eyes, limping toward the jester with as much aggression as their awkwardly-constructed body would allow — which, for the record, wasn’t very much.
Ragatha had seen enough. “Relax!” She raised her voice, swooping vigilantly between the bickering belligerents. “Both of you!”
Gangle, moping off to the side, sniveled pitifully. In all the commotion, her comedy mask had been shattered. For the second time. This morning. “Guys…! Please, just stop fighting…”
Jax crossed his legs, reclining smartly against Kinger’s impenetrable pillow fort. “Can it, crybaby. This is the best entertainment we’ve had in years!” He flicked a piece of popcorn into the air and caught it in his mouth. Meanwhile, a vibrating Kinger poked his eyes out from between two pillows, saying nothing and everything at the same time.
Ragatha’s good-natured attempts to keep the peace were all for naught. She flinched out of the way of Zooble’s punch — but before the strike could connect, a floating boxing bell materialized out of nowhere, piercing the air with a shrill shriek.
“Now, now! There’s no need for that!” Caine’s wagging finger appeared beside the bell, followed shortly after by the rest of the entity. He lifted his tophat, and a cheesing Bubble gingerly drifted out.
“Naughty, naughty~” Bubble chomped his teeth.
Caine snapped his fingers, and an unseen force pushed Pomni and Zooble apart. “The Amazing Digital Circus — copyright 1996 C&A Incorporated, all rights reserved — is a magical, marvelous CD-Romp for all ages! Zany shenanigans and cartoon mischief I can abide, but outright violence? Strictly out of the question!”
With a grunt, Zooble spiked their arm against the floor. “What are we supposed to do, then!? We’re on take fifty-seven of your dumb@%$ theme song because poor little Pomni thinks she’s the main character of the universe!”
Pomni responded to that, but whatever she said, it was profane enough to be scrubbed out entirely.
“Yes, well…” Caine crossed his arms, steeped in careful thought. The last hour-and-a-half of unusable footage played back through his mismatched eyeballs in a matter of seconds. “It’s nothing we can’t fix in post.”
Zooble swiped their discarded arm off the ground and crammed it back into its empty socket. “Great. Then you can edit me in, too.” They stormed off, reciprocating Pomni’s earlier gesture. “Eat $@#%, sad sack.”
Jax sighed. “Aw, shucks. Right when things were getting good…”
“Uh…!” Caine skipped a beat. He swiveled toward the five circus members still gathered beneath the big top. “Well, then!” he elbowed his soap bubble companion, “Looks like we’ve got our work cut out for us, Bubble! As for the rest of you, consider yourselves off the hook for the rest of the day — my treat! Take some personal time, get some sleep, and try your darndest not to dwell on the soul-crushing scale of eternity!”
“I have no soul!” Bubble turned upside-down. “So I don’t mind it one bit!”
“You and me both, old pal!” Caine’s laugh sounded forced and unnatural.
There was a pause. Gangle glanced around, then meekly raised her ribbony hand. “But what about—”
“Go on, now! I won’t take no for an answer!” the ringmaster stabbed the air with his cane, “I want you all in tip-top condition for tomorrow’s wacky adventure!”
🎪 🎪 🎪
It wasn’t long before everyone had gone their separate ways. Jax had slinked off to the digital carnival to terrorize the NPCs, Gangle had left a trail of teardrops all the way to the digital lake, and Kinger, as per usual, had just disappeared without anyone really noticing.
At last, Pomni was alone again. She curled her tear-stained face inward and filled her chest with three shaky breaths. She couldn’t hold it in anymore. Hands tightened into trembling fists, she threw her head toward the sky and let loose a long, ear-shattering shriek.
Why was this happening to her? What did she ever do to deserve this!? She was a person — a human being, for God’s sake — not some stupid, one-dimensional children’s character. How dare anyone expect her to just grin and bear it? She didn’t owe anything to anyone — not even one second of feigned emotion. As far as she was concerned, the moment she forced that goofy smile onto her face would be the moment she surrendered, and she would never, ever, in a million years—
“I’m always here if you need to talk. You haven’t forgotten, have you?”
Pomni flinched, wrenching away from the sudden voice. After the emotional hell she’d gone through during her first day, unexpected noises didn’t exactly put her at ease — nor did anything else in this deranged digital purgatory, for that matter.
“Ah! Sorry!” Ragatha covered her mouth. “I didn’t spook you too bad, did I?”
“You did, actually! Wh-What’s wrong with you?” Pomni gathered herself quickly. She didn’t dare to even look in the direction of the person who had just watched her childish tantrum. The moment she found her footing again, she stormed off like her very life depended on it. “Don’t just sneak up on people like that!”
Silently relenting, Ragatha stepped aside to let Pomni pass. She watched the pouting jester jingle and jangle with every step, stomping with boundless confidence in the completely wrong direction.
“Uh…” Ragatha tilted her head. “Pomni? Do you remember the way to your room?”
“Ugh! What do you care?” Pomni doubled her pace. “Mind your own business!”
Ragatha smirked. “Alright, I guess I’ll just head back to my room, then. Which, for the record…” She pointed behind herself, “…is that way.”
Pomni stared vacantly as Ragatha sauntered off. The doll had read her like a book. Locking herself in her room for days on end meant she still had no clue how to get around the tent — if she wanted to get back to her regularly-scheduled self-pity anytime soon, she would have to swallow whatever was left of her pride.
Pomni grumbled under her breath, fast-walking to catch up. “Hey! W-Wait!”
🎪 🎪 🎪
There was no ambient noise to dampen the tension; the dormitory hall’s plush carpet absorbed the sound of Pomni and Ragatha’s footsteps. Ragatha led, hands tucked politely below her waist, while Pomni trailed behind.
The complete, unbroken silence wasn’t exactly the most comfortable thing in the world, but it was preferable to whatever inane smalltalk would have filled it. That’s how Pomni saw things, at least.
In the time it had taken to walk here, she had managed to cool off a bit — and the unwavering quiet gave her plenty of mental space to reflect on the last few minutes.
She wasn’t sorry. Pomni didn’t care if Zooble hated her — she could hate them right back. Breaking bread with Jax was pointless; that creep preferred to provoke. Gangle was friendly, but to interact with her was to walk on eggshells, and Pomni lacked the patience. And Kinger? Was Kinger.
Arms crossed, Pomni looked up from her big, dumb clown shoes. Her gaze settled on the doll in front of her. Pomni despised everything about this place — but now that she was going through her laundry list of grievances, she had to admit: she had nothing on the redhead.
…What was her name? Ragatha…? She was by far the most mature of the circus’s captives. She was kind. Predictable. An island of calm in a stormy sea.
Pomni’s harsh features softened. Ragatha was the only character who had shown her the slightest shred of compassion since she’d arrived here. The realization weighed down her stomach with more than a few pangs of guilt. Ragatha, of all people, certainly wasn’t a deserving outlet for her angst.
Oh, no — nice going, you idiot. Ragatha was the one thing about this place keeping you anywhere close to sanity, and you’ve already repelled her by acting like a petulant child. She probably hates you now. You know that, right? Actually, it’s not ‘probably’. It’s ‘definitely’. That’s why she isn’t talking. That’s why this is so awkward. That’s why —
“So…what’s under your cap?”
Pomni stumbled. Had the wall not been there to grab onto, she absolutely would have fallen flat on her face.
Stabilizing herself, Pomni gawked up at Ragatha as if the doll had just beamed down from another planet. What’s under her cap? Did she hear that right? It was such an odd, out-of-the-blue question — but at least it had yanked her out of her head.
“I’m sorry?”
Ragatha bent down to Pomni’s eye level. “Your cap.” She said gently, resisting the urge to prod one of the little bells dangling from either end. “It comes off, doesn’t it?”
Pomni blinked. She hadn’t really given it any thought. In fact, until Ragatha had brought it up, she had forgotten that her ridiculous new form came with a hat at all. Doing nothing but hiding under the covers and sobbing for days on end had that effect.
With much bigger problems weighing on her mind, Pomni didn’t really care to check — but something about Ragatha’s expectant gaze possessed her anyway. Very carefully, she hooked her fingers beneath the golden rim. She felt a small amount of resistance as she pushed up, almost as if the headpiece were attached to her body through some kind of magnetic force.
With a just a little effort, though, it popped right off.
“…Huh.” Pomni held the striped cap in her hands. “Look at that.”
“Oh, goodness!” Ragatha tried and failed to suppress a squeal. She paid no mind to her question’s answer, too distracted by the worst hat hair anyone had ever seen. It was certainly a look; a chaotic mess of tangles, knots, and flyaways did as it pleased atop the jester’s capless crown.
“Hey! What gives?!” Pomni ducked her cap back onto her head. A few extra clumps of hair stuck out from underneath. “Why are you laughing?”
“I’m so sorry! Your hair is just…” Ragatha giggled. “Well, it’s a bit messy at the moment. But I like it!”
Pomni leered. “…Liar.”
“I’m not making fun of you! Honest!” Ragatha crossed her hands over her heart. “I love your hair, Pomni. It’s…”
“It’s what?!”
“It’s so cute!”
Pomni’s eyes grew two sizes. That was…not the answer she expected to hear. She didn’t know what to say — just that her face felt a lot warmer than before.
“Obviously, you could use a comb…or three. But who cares about that?” Ragatha’s hand drifted through her own thick, yarn-like locks. “You really lucked out, you know. I’d trade your hair for mine in a heartbeat.”
Despite everything, the smallest of half-smiles lit Pomni’s face.
“I, um…” Pomni took a deep breath. And then two more. Her whole body slumped closer to the floor. Try as she might to keep her personal pity party alive, Ragatha’s radiant energy made her forget her troubles, if only for a moment.
“…Why are you being so nice? And to me, of all people?”
Ragatha just shrugged. “Do I have a reason not to be?”
Pomni gripped her other arm, gaze flicking down the corridor. Her smile faded in the silence.
“Well, um, anyway…” Ragatha glanced at the door behind her — Pomni’s awkwardness was infectious. “You have your room key, right?”
Pomni’s heart skipped at the thought of having lost it, but eased at the feeling of cold metal in her pocket. She nodded.
Gently, Ragatha took the cartoonish key from Pomni’s hand. With a turn and a click, the way to the jester’s room was open.
Ragatha held the door, smiling warmly. “You look like you could use some space. Go enjoy some quality alone time, okay, new stuff?”
“O-Okay.” Pomni didn’t hesitate to do just that — until she did. “Um…” She peeked behind a door half-open. After the longest pause, a simple, stammered “thanks” was all she could manage to get out.
I LOVE YOUR FF SO MUCHHH!!! IT’S SO PERFECT AND CUTE!!! I WAS GIGGLING AND KICKING MY FEET WHILST READING ITTT!!! YOU DESERVE SO MUCH MORE RECOGNITION AND ALL THE LOVE!! <3333
AHHHH THANK YOU SO MUCH YOU'RE SO SWEET AND I PROMISE I'M GOING TO KEEP WRITING IT I'M JUST REALLY BUSY WITH LIFE RIGHT NOW
Yo, I just read all Sunshine's chapters and it's soooo goood 💕 it's funny cause you reblogged my stupid thing recently too lol, but yeah, can't wait for next chapter!
Aww thank you so much!! It makes me so happy to get messages like this! 🥹
Grad school is sucking up a lot of my time but I’m working on Chapter 9!! Stay tuned!
Starts rapidly gnawing on everything within a 10 mile radius WE ARE SO BACK BABY IVE ALREADY REREAD THE FIRST 7 CHAPTERS JUST WAITING FOR CHAPTER 8 LIKE 4 TIMES I’ve genuinely never been this excited for a fanfic to update but your writing is fire🔥🔥🔥🔥
Thank you!!! Chapter 8 of Sunshine is out now! Go check it out!
Sunshine (Pomni x Ragatha) Chapter 8 - Take the Plunge
[Click here to read from the beginning on AO3!]
Cover art by @blukiar
Pomni.
Pomni.
Pomni.
A bead of sweat traced a numbing line across her face.
Pomni. Pomni. Pomni. Over and over again, the familiar sound pummeled her ears, yet she was powerless to hear it.
Pomni. Pomni. Trapped in the endless corridor, she stood before the centipede’s wretched shadow, stomach seizing, pupils shrinking, acrid bile smoldering in the deepest depths of her throat. Dread — profound and overwhelming — gurgled like poison through her veins.
This couldn’t be real, she told herself, watching through shimmering eyes as one-hundred chitin-glazed legs chattered toward her. This had to be a nightmare, she insisted, flinching at the shadows in her periphery, feeling every shiver and quake of Ragatha’s form in her clammy palms.
Pomni. Pomni. Pomni.
Pomni. Pomni—
“Pomni!” Ragatha screamed; at long last, her voice had pierced through the veil. The ragdoll snatched the scruff of Pomni’s tunic, shaking the jester as hard as her weakened body could. “What are you doing?! Why are you just standing there!?”
With a jolt, Pomni came to, gawking at Ragatha as if she’d forgotten the cotton-stuffed damsel was even there. “Huh…?” she shook her head, “Wh-What?”
“Don’t look at me like that! Do something!”
Pomni pitched an anxious glance down the hall. A discordant ensemble of prickling steps played a persistent crescendo, growing ever louder as the beastly centipede closed the distance. “B-But I…! But I don’t—” she warbled, gasping through tears, “I don’t know what to—”
“Run!” Ragatha shoved Pomni closer.
“Run where?!”
“AWAY!”
The little jester dipped forward with a frustrated grunt. She couldn’t argue with that. “O-Okay!” she finally forced out, holding Ragatha tight and barreling forward with no thought, no direction, and no plan. “Okay!” she huffed, “Okay!” she croaked, “Okay!” she sobbed.
Tears shimmered behind Pomni’s eyes as she sprinted for life and limb, shivering soles pummeling the endless ribbon of carpet underneath. Her destination was but an afterthought; all she could do was run, as fast and as far away as her body could carry her.
There was just one small wrinkle in the plan, however: Pomni could run fast, but so could the centipede. And the centipede was faster. By a longshot.
No matter how far the elastic corridor stretched, or how many corners the little jester swerved around, the beast’s omnipresent shadow — spread across all four walls by flickering chandelier lights — stalked her all the same.
The shape, spelled in darkness, was a thing of nightmares. A despicable, wriggling horde of insect parts, growing and bending and stretching in the wavering light. Clicking legs. Undulating antennae. Crunching pincers, primed to devour the beast’s next meal. Pomni swore she could feel their venomous touch as the wriggling silhouette reached for her ankles.
Every pixel of the young woman’s digital form begged her to toss a glance behind herself — but her twisted guts were wiser than that. Under no circumstances could she look back. She couldn’t look back. She couldn’t even think about it. Couldn’t look back. Couldn’t look back. Couldn’t—
Look back. Just for a moment.
Couldn’t look back—
The shadow is stretching. It’s right behind you.
Couldn’t look back—
It’s getting closer. Closer. Closer. Closer—
Pomni grunted, succumbing to temptation just as she knew she would, but her meek, over-the-shoulder glance failed to do her any good. All it did was reinforce just how quickly the centipede was gaining on her — and distract her from a pesky fold in the carpet that she really would have been better off having seen.
She tripped.
“@#$&! Nononono—” Pomni gasped, squeezing Ragatha tighter as she stumbled forward. Had she full control over her arms, she may have been able to right her sudden spill — but given her ragdoll cargo, there was simply nowhere to go but down.
Pomni clenched her teeth, skidding roughly across the scratchy carpet. Ragatha tumbled helplessly out of her arms, and just like that, the chase was over.
The writhing shadow that had ruthlessly pursued Pomni turned manifest in a matter of seconds. Pomni felt her stomach convulse in disgust as the centipede — and all one-hundred of its prickling legs — scuttled across her back in pursuit of its ragdoll prey.
“No…!” Ragatha gasped, eyes sinking, mouth twisting before the living nightmare crawling toward her, “D-Don’t come any closer! Get away! Stop!”
Pomni struggled to stand — hell, she struggled to speak — as an endless parade of insectine legs crushed her underfoot. She was pinned; for every step the beast laid down upon her, it felt as if a spear were being driven straight through her backside.
The centipede’s foul head, meanwhile, loomed over the cowering dolly, noxious drool flowing like water from its quivering maw. Ragatha shrieked bloody murder as its pincers pierced the fabric flesh of her arm. A garden of hairline cracks, winding like wild vines, was etched across the windows.
Its prey all but secured, the centipede stood up straight, dragging Ragatha off of the ground with trivial effort. Ragathas dangled helplessly from the beast’s maw, screaming in horror, spangling the floor with tears as her captor scurried off to God-knows-where.
Pomni didn’t wait. She growled like a wild animal, scrambling to her feet despite the burning pain carved across her back. With a running start, she dove forward with gusto, tackling the pair of long horns that served as the centipede’s tail.
The little jester held on with all of her might, letting herself be dragged until she finally managed to hoist herself up onto the centipede’s trunk. The moment she’d mounted the beast, she began to slowly crawl up the length of its body — and it wasn’t long before she found herself at the centipede’s midsection.
“Let! Her! Go!” Once, twice, thrice, she pounded her knuckles into the beast’s hard exterior, and with each successive hit, her face coiled further in pain. Trying to crack the centipede’s exoskeleton with her bare fists was akin to trading blows with a brick wall — and felt just about as torturously painful.
Pomni winched, grimacing at her throbbing hand. “Just…! Just…!” she gasped, “Come on!”. She shoved her whole weight behind a fourth hit, a fifth hit, a sixth, and a seventh — but the arthropod’s outer armor proved itself utterly impenetrable.
Pomni cursed under her breath, glancing at the empty hilt hitched to her belt. How was she supposed to do any damage when her sword was stuck in a petrified tree miles away?! Her pupils flinched around the whites of her eyes, combing the infinite corridor for something, anything, that could possibly serve as a substitute weapon.
The pickings were perilously slim. Lion-pawed sofas and empty shelves lined the hall aplenty, but anything resembling practical weaponry was nowhere to be found. There were no swords mounted to the walls, no halberds clutched by empty suits of armor, no antique rifles displayed proudly behind shatterproof glass.
The only objects that could do any damage were the assorted busts of Margarethe MacGuffin scattered through the hall — but one-hundred-plus pounds of solid marble was too heavy for Pomni to wield. It was almost like they were placed in the hall just to mock her — to make her the punchline of some sick cosmic joke.
Pomni felt her stomach churning, her skin itching, her forehead being tickled by warm beads of sweat. What now?
The centipede picked up its speed, barreling down the hall with its loudly-sobbing prey in tow. Pomni tightened her grip around the beast’s trunk as the mansion trembled once again. Dirt, drywall, and a smothering tide of what-ifs swarmed into the jester’s lungs with every shuddering breath.
What was she supposed to do?
The world spun around her. Sparks of crippling pain stunned her body. A raging wildfire of panic blackened her lungs, roasting them from the inside-out, and—
— Wait a minute. Was that a…?
Pomni exhaled, eyes bulging as the darkness that drowned the end of the hallway gave way to feeble rays of light. The infinite hallway, as it turned out, wasn’t quite so infinite after all — and Pomni gawked at the sight waiting for her as the tail-end came into view:
There was an elevator.
A single, old-fashioned elevator, stationed at the very end of the corridor.
Oh, no.
Even from a distance, it was evident — the mansion’s rapid deterioration had already done its part in reducing the antiquated contraption into a surefire death trap. The rusted doors were bent completely out of shape. Half of the sconces were now just a nasty carpet of broken glass. One of the elevator’s overhead cables had already snapped in twain, causing the entire car to slant to one side.
Pomni didn’t need to be an obsessive worrier to picture what might happen the moment she dared to step inside.
The young woman blinked with morbid fascination as the beat-up elevator car swung left and right like an oversized pendulum. A certain idea took root in Pomni’s head — an idea so horrendous, so atrocious, so stomach-churningly awful that she could barely stand to even entertain it. But, as awful as it was, it was something. And ‘something’ at this point, no matter how terrible, was leagues better than the ‘nothing’ she’d been working with up to now.
There was no time to come up with anything better, no time to doubt herself, no time to catastrophize over the thousands of little things that might go awry, no matter how desperately the aching knot in her heart obliged her.
She had to make a choice — it was now or never.
God help her.
“Ragatha!” Pomni yelled, glaring up at the centipede’s head — her destination. “Hang in there — I have an idea!”
Slowly and deliberately, Pomni inched up the rest of the creature’s worm-like body, fighting tooth and nail to hold it together against the dissonant orchestra of sensations that plagued her senses.
The constant motion, blurring her vision? Stomach-churningly awful. She pushed forward anyway.
Spindly, cracking legs constantly brushing against her arms? Revolting. She didn’t even think of quitting.
The odor of rotting bark emanating from the slick surface of the centipede itself? It took everything Pomni had to not puke — but she persisted, climbing higher until, at last, she’d crested the centipede’s head.
Pomni steeled herself. Here goes nothing.
“Let her go!” she demanded, plunging her fingers straight into the beast’s drooling maw. She pulled up with all of her might. The hundred-legged creature bucked like a temperamental steed, fighting with everything it had to toss the saboteur off its head — but the jester refused to be cast off so easily.
“Come on!” Pomni grunted, flexing her drool-covered fingers to adjust her grip. She yanked her trembling arms at every possible angle, yet the creature’s powerful jaws simply refused to yield. “Let…her…go!”
The centipede grunted. It bucked again, nearly striking one of the gargantuan chandeliers hanging from the ceiling. Pomni wasn’t so lucky, nearly losing her grip as she was struck in the face by the large glass fixture.
“Son of a #@$!%…” she growled, bitterly pounding her heel into the centipede’s head. Again, she tried to pry the creature’s mouth open, but even she knew her efforts were doomed to fail.
“Ragatha! I’m trying, but I can’t get its mouth open!” said Pomni, wilting forward in defeat, “Wh-What am I supposed to do? I can’t—”
More agitated than ever, and far from giving up, the centipede bucked for a third time, catching an exhausted Pomni completely off-guard. The jester barely had time to notice what had happened before she was sent sliding off the monster’s head.
“What?! No! Nonono—” Pomni groped around in blind panic, searching for something to grab hold of. Fortunately, she would easily find it. Unfortunately, that ‘it’ was none other than Ragatha herself.
A harrowing scream — and the sound of tearing fabric — filled the corridor as
Pomni’s fingers skidded down the length of Ragatha’s legs, stopping just above the heels. Pomni’s face flinched upward, shock and horror spelled in bold across her face.
The stress of Pomni’s weight had ripped open the sensitive seams connecting Ragatha’s arm to the rest of her body. Black sludge, infested with peering, neon-colored eyes, dripped like blood from the open wound. The foul abstraction wasted no time slithering across the exterior of Ragatha’s body, closely hugging her frame.
Ragatha whimpered in pain, tear-soaked face turned away from the gory sight.
“Ah! I-I’m sorry!” Pomni gasped, plate-sized pupils watching lumps of cotton and toxic tar tumble out from between stretching seams, “Your arm! It’s—’”
The grunting, fuming beast cared about only one thing, and that was dinner. Determined to have its meal, it whipped its head left and right, leveraging its massive strength to dislodge the pesky clown hanging off its prey.
The seam between the ragdoll’s arm and body felt the stress, and one-by-one, the remaining stitches popped loose. Then, with one final, miserable tear, Ragatha’s arm was fully severed from her body. Both girls — too stunned to move, and too breathless to scream — hit the floor like two sacks of heavy stones.
The centipede hissed, scopious trunk worming about in frantic search of its lost prey. Its head squirmed left and right, low and high, violently thrashing into anything and everything that dared to stand in its way.
The giant arthropod smashed into one wall, and then the other. Deep fissures, branching like lightning bolts, flashed across both surfaces. The corridor’s oddly-placed furniture was the next to meet its match, reduced to jagged shards of shattered wood with only a handful of rage-fueled strikes. Nothing seemed able to stop the rampage — until, of course, the centipede decided that one of the hallway’s extravagant chandeliers would be its next target.
Bad move.
The fixture swung in broad, hastened strokes. A sizzling hiss broadcasted the beast’s pain as plumes of molten wax, splattered from hundreds of burning candles, seared the centipede’s tough outer armor. Then, with a violent snap, the feeble chain that held the chandelier forgot its tenuous grip on the ceiling. Thousands of pounds worth of beads, branches, and bobèches collapsed onto the beast, pelting its exoskeleton with relentless persistence.
The centipede twitched, buried beneath a mountain of twisted metal and broken glass.
In the stunning silence that ensued, a honeyed voice, soured by despair, struggled to make itself heard. “Pomni…” it said, barely louder than Pomni’s gasping breaths. “I’m…I think I’m…”
“Ragatha…?” Pomni blinked, pushing her battered body off the floor. “R-Ragatha!” she yelped, scrambling to her feet and rushing to Ragatha’s side — but her panicked stride skidded to a halt mere seconds later.
Pomni smothered her mouth with her tremlbing palm. Her feet retreated by a single step.
Ragatha was fading. Fast.
Pitch black abstraction, infested with a rash of vibrant, restless eyes, flowed from the open wound left behind by the ragdoll’s missing arm. The blight clung like molten tar to the curves of her body, and seared her skin just the same.
Ragatha gasped dollish features twisting in terror and confusion as they watched the toxin spread. “What? No no no—” Her heart pounded in her chest; with every pump, the midnight curse stuttered up her quaking shoulder, across her sunken chest, around her shuddering waist. “Please! Help me!” she pleaded, “This isn’t happening…this isn’t happening!”
“I-It’s gonna be okay! D-D-Don’t worry!” Pomni swallowed, reaching—
But Ragatha flinched away like a frightened animal. “No! Get away from me! You can’t—” she gasped through tears. A cluster of blinking eyes sprouted on her neck. On her hip. Her back. “If you touch me, you’ll—”
“I don’t care!”
“What?!”
“I. Don’t. Care!” Pomni said. She hoisted Ragatha off the floor, pinning the wriggling dolly against her side. The moment her digital avatar made contact with Ragatha’s, a treacherously-uncomfortable sensation — like pins and needles charged with static electricity — sizzled up from her wrist to her shoulder.
In less than a half-second, Pomni’s arm was in total disarray. The complex network of functions, formulas, and floating points that defined the scrawny digital limb rebelled against themselves, ensnared in a never ending, cannibalistic battle for control over their own existence. One moment, her arm was twice as long. The other, thrice as wide. One moment, her hand had five fingers, the other, negative three. Polygons flickered and twisted, stretched and compressed, bent and broke with only one rule to follow: that there were no rules.
Grimacing, Pomni leaned into a sprint toward the elevator, staving off the urge to gawk as the unfolding chaos spread to the side of her torso. It didn’t make sense to look, after all: she already knew, whether she wanted to or not, the crippling consequences of touching an abstracting player.
“P-Pomni…” Ragatha whimpered, struggling to meet the jester’s gaze. The sweet and caring ragdoll was in miserable, miserable shape. The shape of her body began to warp as the infection progressed; sharp corners jutted out as her digital model simplified into an abstract, low-poly lump of nothing.
The grisly sight plunged Pomni’s little heart into depths unseen. “Hey, hey! Don’t worry!” she assured, cradling the weakened dolly tighter, “Everything’s gonna be just fine — I promise!”
Faintly, Ragatha lifted her head. The will to fight faded in her eyes, as though she knew that the frigid despair pumping from her ruptured heart was unstoppable; only a scant few places — the bottoms of her flat Mary Janes, the stitched tips of her simplified hands, and half of her cherubic face — remained un-abstracted.
Still, she spoke. “I…love you so much, my Sunshine,” she croaked, leaning her head against Pomni’s chest. The weakened grimace upon her face shied away from two tearful eyes. “I’m sorry our story had to end this way…”
“Come on! Don’t talk like that!” Pomni scolded between haggard breaths, “It’s not over yet!”
“Maybe,” Ragatha said. “Whatever happens, Pomni, I want you to know — you are everything. My whole wide world. And you always will be.” Pearly tears glistened down the soft curves of her cheeks, “I just wish I could have learned your real name. Or brushed my thumbs across your real cheeks, or rested my head on your real shoulders…”
“You will! I promise you will!” Pomni’s fierce gaze, wet with tears, fixed on the crooked elevator doors down the hall. She was nearly there. A stone’s throw away. Nearly to the end of this horrendous nightmare. “We’re going to get out of this stupid game together, no matter how long it takes us! We’ll find each other in the real world, no matter how far we have to travel, because…” Pomni shakily swallowed, “Because I love you, Ragatha, more than anything else in this stupid world!”
Ragatha smiled, despite her demise. “Sunshine…?” she breathed. The creaking of floorboards beneath Pomni’s feet — and a distant, monstrous groan down the hall — filled the pregnant pause before the dolly found the strength to speak again, “Humor me for a moment?”
Pomni’s brows squinched together. Humor her? What was Ragatha talking about? “H-Huh?”
“Do you…do you still remember the color of your eyes…?”
Pomni flinched. Ragatha’s question wasn’t unusual — but decidedly out-of-the-blue. Her eyes. What color were her eyes? The gut response of ‘I don’t know’ or ‘why do you ask’ waited impatiently on the tip of her tongue, and yet, Pomni knew in her heart that that wouldn’t do.
“I, um—” Pomni hemmed and hawed. Ragatha stared back with a patient, yet expectant look. “Well…”
It had been ages since Pomni had given herself more than a passing glance in the mirror, let alone looked at herself long enough to notice such a trivial detail. She could barely even recall the last time anyone had brought it up.
She chewed on the thought a little while longer before finally spitting it out: “J-Just brown. I think,” she mumbled, squinting at her destination. She was close enough now to make out the distinct “C&A” etched in cursive script above the elevator door, “Nothing too special.”
“Brown? No kidding?” Ragatha swooned, fading eyes flashing brighter “That’s just what I hoped you’d say…”
“Really…?”
“Brown is such a charming color. Copper pans, autumn leaves, coffee beans…” Ragatha cooed, donning a peaceful smile even as strands of black death stretched across her mouth, “...I can almost see your brown eyes now — and goodness gracious, they’re just so beautiful…”
“R-Ragatha?” Pomni gasped, looking on in horror as Ragatha’s face was buried beneath a toxic expanse of black and neon. “Ragatha! Don’t go, please — we’re here! Look! We made it!”
Skidding to a halt before the elevator, Pomni rammed her heel into the ‘open door’ button more times than she cared to count. A metallic shriek answered her call as the smashed-up doors creaked open a moment later.
As soon as there was enough space to squeeze through — and not a moment sooner — Pomni charged inside, spun on a dime, and bolted to the control panel.
Pomni slammed her foot into the first button unlucky enough to catch her eye. She held back a sigh of relief as the button, marked with the number ‘3’, yielded to the pressure of her aching sole. She didn’t care where the old contraption took her, as long as it was far, far away from here.
Whirring gears and rusted cables belted an ominous tune as the crooked doors limped back toward one another. Through the slowly-shrinking space in between, Pomni could see into the dark corridor, where the silhouette of her hundred-legged pursuer stirred to life, casting off the last remnants of the fallen chandelier.
Sluggishly, the centipede rose to its feet. Then, the floor rumbled beneath a hundred insectine legs as the beast charged ahead like a raging bull, Ragatha’s lost arm still clutched firmly in its mouth.
Pomni swallowed hard, staring daggers. A blizzard of anxiety speared through her chest, but a mindful breath reminded her that there was absolutely nothing to worry about. She’d already won. Any second now, the doors would meet in the middle, the car would descend, and—
With an ear-shattering pop, the elevator jolted to one side, sending Pomni and her ragdoll cargo tumbling into the corner between the wall and the floor.
“$#@%!” Pomni cursed, first checking on Ragatha, then righting herself. Heaving and huffing with one hand on her thumping heart, she rolled the dolly onto her back before flinging her gaze back toward the car’s double-doors.
She exhaled, her pupils doubling in size. The doors had stopped mid-closure, leaving a gaping, monster-sized space in between.
The distinct flavor of vomit pestered Pomni’s tongue as she scrambled to the control panel, fingering the ‘close door’ button again and again and againandagainandagainand—
“No…! No! COME ON!” Pomni screamed, dragging her un-corrupted hand down each column of worn, gold-trimmed buttons. The brittle plastic lit up with an off-yellow glow, flickering like dying Christmas tree lights…but looking pretty was all the old buttons were good for.
“No! NO! YOU PIECE OF #@$%!” Pomni shrieked with rage, punching the panel until her knuckles couldn’t take any more. A handful of pointed pops sounded from up above; golden sparks showered down from the ceiling.
Pomni’s wailing gaze wandered toward Ragatha, and at long last, the nervous little jester broke down; her shoulders curled over her chest, and shimmering tears carved parallel streams across her face.
She looked up. Up at the centipede. The passage of time seemed to lag as the horrid beast grew larger in her vision, as the oily musk of its greasy exoskeleton became ever more pungent, as the sound of insect legs scuttling against the ground grew like wild weeds in her ears.
A vise of terror, unyielding, chained her feet to the floor. Her body joined her mind’s rebellion — nothing would cooperate, nothing would move. Not in any way that mattered.
Shrinking pupils shivered in a swelling field of white. One million pestering voices hissed and cawed and whined and sniped, each with something new to say, but none of them truly heard.
Ragatha — abstracting. Centipede — getting closer. Her body — half corrupted, shrieking in pain. What to do? Should she even try? Her heart beat faster.
Ragatha — abstracting. Centipede — getting closer. Her body — half corrupted, shrieking in pain. What to do? Should she even try? Her heart was pounding.
Ragatha — abstracting. Centipede — getting closer. Her body — half corrupted, shrieking in pain. What to do?
What to do? What to do? What to do? Needles pierced her heart as the organ hammered faster, faster, faster than it ever had before, until the tension was just too much, and the organ felt ready to explode in a gory burst of cherry blood and burgundy flesh and—
— Thud.
The elevator lurched downward. With a gasp, Pomni caught herself. What just happened? What the hell was that!?
Pomni stared at the elevator doors, mouth ajar. Her eyes flicked down. A small ledge, about the height of a staircase step, now existed between the floor of the car and the hallway carpet. It looked like something she wasn’t meant to see. The golden trim and glossy wood paneling that dressed the elevator stopped exactly where the ledge began, giving way to gritty concrete overgrown with loose bundles of fraying wires.
It didn’t take long before what she was looking at clicked in her head.
The elevator shaft.
Tremulous breaths struggled out of Pomni’s chest as the jester stared wide-eyed at the approaching danger, then back down to that curious ledge. Up. Down. Up. Down. At that moment, she realized. She’d have to decide, right here and now, how this nightmare would end — with the bad ending, or the worse ending.
And so, she jumped.
She jumped, as hard as she possibly could.
Body trembling with terror, Pomni slammed her full weight into the elevator floor, pummeling the surface with every scrap of force her tiny little frame could muster. The antique car swung to and fro, rust-rashed hinges squeaking and groaning and squealing and whining away.
Something fizzled. Something popped. Sunset-colored sparks puffed out from the sconces, and all at once, the lights petered out. Darkness smothered the car, but the hallway was bright as day; Pomni could still see the century of chattering legs barreling toward her.
The beast was getting close. Close enough for Pomni to see the stitching on the severed arm in its mouth. Close enough to smell its earthy aroma fouling the air. Close enough to have already won. Time was running out. Time. Running out. Running out. Running out…!
Pomni grunted, bracing herself against the shockwaves rumbling beneath her aching feet. She jumped, ignoring the burning pain that climbed up her trembling legs, the vise of anxiety that pressed down, down, down, making every struggling breath shorter than the last, the pool of dread that formed in her stomach as she watched the centipede’s head slither through the elevator doors—
A punchy, resonant sound exploded above her. Pomni barely had enough time to toss an upward glance before everything within the car — the beast’s head included — plunged through the drooling maw of the elevator shaft.
A slimy crack could just barely be heard over Pomni’s screams as the centipede’s lifeless head, cleanly severed, hovered in zero gravity.
A murky cloud of debris spewed forth from the slain creature’s remains as it returned to the dust from whence it came. The powdery debris swirled around in the air, crystalizing into a new, more compressed shape: one half of a bronze brooch, set with a large, glittering emerald.
Pomni, of course, was none the wiser. Drowning in the darkness, she kicked her legs, but couldn’t feel the floor beneath her. Blood rushed into her head, and white dots twinkled across her vision.
“R-Ragatha…!” she struggled to say, reaching for the rash of twitching eyes curled in the corner of the car. A hesitant smile, dampened by dread, found its way to her face. “We did it, Ragatha…! We’re…”
Faintly, Ragatha lifted her head. The will to fight faded in her eyes, as though she knew that the frigid despair pumping from her ruptured heart was unstoppable; only a scant few places — the bottoms of her flat Mary Janes, the stitched tips of her simplified hands, and half of her cherubic face — remained un-abstracted.
Still, she spoke through the pain. “I…love you so much, my Sunshine,” she croaked, leaning her head against Pomni’s chest. The weakened grimace upon her face shied away from two tearful eyes. “I’m so, so sorry our story had to end this way…”
“H-Hey! Don’t talk like that!” scolded Pomni between haggard breaths, “It’s not over yet! Everything’s gonna be okay!”
“Maybe,” Ragatha choked out, her worn-out voice shattered to pieces. “Whatever happens, Pomni, I want you to know — you are everything. Just everything. My whole wide world. And you always will be,” she said. Pearly tears glistened down the soft curves of her cheeks. “No matter what comes next, I’ll never forget the time we spent together. I just wish I could have learned your real name. Or brushed my thumbs across your real cheeks, or rested my head on your real shoulders…”
“You will! I promise you will!” Pomni said, a frog in her throat. Her fierce gaze, wet with tears, fixed on the crooked elevator doors down the hall. She was nearly there. A stone’s throw away. Nearly to the end of this horrendous nightmare. “We’re going to get out of this stupid game together, no matter how long it takes us! We’ll find each other in the real world, no matter how far we have to travel, because…” Pomni shakily swallowed, “Because I love you! I love you, Ragatha, more than anything else in this stupid world!”
Ragatha smiled, despite everything. “Sunshine…?” she breathed. The creaking of floorboards beneath Pomni’s feet — and a distant, monstrous groan down the hall — filled in the pregnant pause before the dolly found the strength to speak again, “Humor me?”
Pomni’s brows squinched together. Humor her? What was Ragatha talking about? “H-Huh?”
“Do you…do you still remember the color of your eyes…?”
“Uh—” Pomni’s head flinched slightly. Ragatha’s question wasn’t unusual — but decidedly out-of-the-blue. Her eyes. What color were her eyes? The gut response of ‘ I don’t know’ or ‘why do you ask’ waited impatiently on the tip of her tongue, and yet, Pomni knew in her heart that that wouldn’t do.
“I, um—” Pomni glanced down. Ragatha stared back, black abstraction spreading across a patient, yet expectant look. “That’s a good question…”
It had been ages since Pomni had given herself more than a passing glance in her toothpaste-flecked bathroom mirror, let alone looked away from her big, ugly blemishes long enough to notice such a trivial detail. She could barely even recall the last time anyone had brought up the color of her eyes. Sometime back in the ‘00s, she figured — when life was simple, and she was old enough to count her age on just two hands.
In truth, she was only half-sure, but she couldn’t leave Ragatha hanging. Pomni chewed on the answer a little while longer before finally spitting it out: “Uh. J-Just brown. I think,” she huffed, squinting at her destination. She was close enough now to make out the distinct “C&A” etched above the elevator door, “Nothing too special.”
“Brown…” Ragatha swooned, “...such a charming color. Copper pans, Autumn leaves, fancy leather couches…” she cooed, wearing a peaceful smile even as strands of abstraction stretched across her mouth, “...I can almost see them now. Goodness gracious, how beautiful they are…”
