𝕋𝕙𝕖 ℙ𝕒𝕣𝕒𝕕𝕠𝕩 - Introduction
Meet "Verith" Aerugo Daun, Dearest.
One of the best lawyers in the city, working in and helping run a firm both affordable and effective to all, specialising in contract law, corporate law and criminal law.
A life of high rise buildings seems to be what they live in, of expensive meals and expensive lawsuits, well known in the business sphere for effective legal litigation in so many spheres.
Despite this though, they seem so... grounded. Like they walk among the layman rather than striding above, finalising where the gold in the banks is pushed around in some lawsuits that should've been far more intense than they were.
"And with that... The first step is complete."
They were there regarding something about the business' next step forward. Projects are all about that at the end of the day, trading papers and gold bars in banks until the factories can start churning or the builders start breaking backs, and the trucks roll out like emigrating birds.
You were called in for how the changes would affect you, a new contract printed out with far greater benefits, a place that would be worth staying at for more than short-term.
Seemed too good to be true, But no matter how you read through it, it seemed all so... liberal, as the company took strides with a business you hadn't exactly heard of before, but seemed well off if it could offer so much for someone like you.
'The contractor and contractee will meet every 3 months to ensure mutual satisfaction of the contract, and amend said where needed to satisfaction."
the cost of the breach struck you as odd though, no reparation of damages whatsoever, but a call to specific performance to fix the mistakes instead, closer supervision.
teaching you how to fix your own mistakes, was how your boss put it, but the lawyer only smiled, keeping their boss' will hidden behind their pleasantries.
As the emissary, the hunting dog of such a private CEO, they were bound to return with that ever present smile of theirs,no matter rain or shine. through pleasantries or their displeasure their mouth was curved upwards; whether it be thinly pressed lips when gazing down at your boss, or with simple curiosity, a smaller thing in your presence as you sat on opposite ends of a table in a meeting room.
Honestly, do their cheeks not ache?
"Stare too long and you'll be seeing the shoddy seams of this costume I wear, Dearest. Please, focus on the whole like I do."
You wouldn't expect a hotshot lawyer who's the emissary of some capitalist overlord to appear in some community theatre project, but that's where you meet them next, during some citywide event they're up there on stage, performing for free.
Frankly, you didn't recognise them at first; thank the wig and makeup for that, walking less like the bringer of god's words, burdened with a heavy fate, and instead prancing like a deer getting ready for summer.
Only bumping into them post performance, do they speak with a more recognisable voice.
You could say a friendship was struck that day.
"Ach, You work so hard, My dear. We'll be lucky to have you on our payroll from hereon."
They started showing up more frequently, after awhile; 'seeing how the workplace functions on the regular' was the justification, given how they lingered and chatted so often, paying your boss trying to suck up no mind, for idle, if not beneficial chatter with you.
They spoke of their life, of raising their siblings alone, of how they came to work at one of the top law firms in the company, as you spoke of your life, your effort to go forward, hopes and dreams, the whys and hows of your motion.
Their smile has turned gentle in your presence, if authoritative when you ask for advice from someone who really seems like the best step up in the corporate ladder, no matter the field you wish to go into from here.
As nice as the benefits of working here are as the workload seems to get easier and the day more tedious, you have your own plans and dreams. greener pastures, brighter and more engaging fields; this isn't the sort of work you can see yourself doing for over twenty years, with a boss with a strange look in his eyes that only gets stranger when Verith is around.
Expressing this offhandedly strains that smile on their face.
"It's an awful, awful world out there, Dearest."
Your new neighbour is... odd.
Henry's lovely, yes, not your type, but friendly enough. a smile on his face that draws away from the callouses on his hands and the stray tattoo peeking out under his clothing.
just... something's off about him. like you're seeing one of those animals that have grotesque behaviours underneath their popular visage on the internet.
Hippos, seen as adorable, who kill more people each year than sharks have ever. Dolphins, who kill their young, and isolate the women. Other people keep their distance, despite how friendly - docile - he seems when approached - he's offered you help numerous times, and numerous times, you've turned him down for how overwhelmingly eager he looks, too friendly for his visage.
Like one wrong move and there's no escape, and given that he's always leaving his place and arriving back at nearly the exact same time on the dot, you can't help but feel disquieted.
doesn't help he smells weird too. not bad, just... a weird cologne or deodorant that you can't place that he only wears half the time.
You overhear him on the phone sometimes, speaking some European language - German, you think, given how you can almost recognise some words.
He's efficient, in those moments. A well oiled machine,printing out his responses cold as steel, warming up just as he notices you approaching.
The man who says 'auf weidersehen' is a very different one who bumbled over his words when you snorted at how he said 'tschussi' when you first met.
It hits you then that, he's never told you what he works as.
the day you walk home rushing late from a traffic jam, cutting corners from the bus stop to your home, he's here, just a few seconds after you reach the door.
that same cold, hard look, and a no matter how clean his hands appear, under the stark overhead light you can't help but notice a darker patch on his dark dress shirt,
and the absence of the smell of something metallic when you go to shower.
"Dearest? Oh, you seem so tired, that's no good, whatever's the matter - is it your boss?"
They speak so knowingly, and it's so welcoming. that you can just spill it out. A lawyer's job is to be trustworthy towards their clientele, after all, they've said time and again.
Verith very well may be your closest confidant at this point, between their dramaticism and professionalism, they've helped you and you've helped them (even if it's in just a rudimentary thing as giving feedback for their performances).
Hence, you tell them about that disquieting night, about the neighbour who acts and does right, but everything rubs you the wrong way of them, how he's the epitome of the uncanny valley.
Their eyes narrow at that, and supposedly, they have to go and make a call.
The man moves out a week later, not even stopping by to say goodbye, like he does - like he should.
The lady who moves in next hasn't got that glint in her eye. No tattoos, no callouses, no scent of metal that lingers in the space separating the two of you. She passes by your workplace a lot, though. Apparently it's en-route to her gym when you ask her
There's better gyms closer to where the two of you live. She has that look in her eye; Half stone cold and dead, half terrified out of her life.
You don't say anything. She slipped up.
Once is happenstance, twice is coincidence, three times is conspiracy.
You leave it be, poisoned sugar water for the fleas. At this point your world has teetered into a sense of unease, and you need a reason to act on it. 'Fuck around and find out' maybe, but the pay as your work gets merged is too good to give up on a whim, those meetings with a friend being part of work too good to leave.
You overhear her call, ear to your walls the one night that it isn't quiet as a mouse and rather as loud as a fox.
Unease has become an unwelcome roommate and coworker in your life, as your boss seems to get more and more nervous by the day, and the urge for some relief, even at the cost of intruding on privacy, takes over. A world that's miles at you as it loosely veils blood curdling actions is what you feel you're living in, and you need to open Schrodinger's so cruel a box to make sure that rotting stench isn't the fault of your overactive mind.
She's speaking English when you stick your ear to the wall. the person behind the call has their voice altered. She sounds like she's balancing on a piano wire already cutting her feet. "I don't get it. What's the point in doing this- Yes, it's in my contract to be able to question, I read through it-"
a forceful, harsh tone, that anyone should tremble under.
instead, that modulated voice tears through the lightning of your neighbour's voice, drains all the energy, leaves her just trembling.
"Doch - Ach, Geehrt, lies Abschnitt zehn noch einmal. Weißt du, was mit Henry passiert ist, ja?"
"...I see. I'm sorry it has come to this, Dearest."
You're not daft. You're getting the hell out of dodge. Your two weeks notice is given and your free time's not filled with performances but the pressure to find somewhere good to live with somewhere good to work.
But nowhere's as good as here for a future, but you can't stand this place, trembling at the dark that trembles at whatever's behind you.
it's her, that lady, your neighbour - your contracted stalker. You're sure of it. She's better at covering it up, but when you've dropped by with extras when you've baked, you've caught that metallic twinge in the air of her living room - strike three, but you pretend that you're on one. She's been better at managing the calls though, to your chagrin, but as employment ends and moving out begins, whatever.
You'll be better out from hereon.
Two months into your new apartment - your less personalised, less comfortable but less unnerving apartment - it happens. They arrive.
Verith appears, and you wish you didn't have ideas as to how as they look upon you without any affection a friend should have. they look disappointed that you'd - what? - skip town after it appeared the people involved around you wereinvolved in the criminal?
How asinine, yet they stare at you like a petulant child who knows nothing of business or employment; Frankly, it's like they're wearing a new mask unlike that of the stage or workplace.
Maybe it's not even a mask. Maybe this is their true face, and you don't want to entertain that thought any more, so you stare at any other detail upon them.
Makeup that makes their visage hard to make out, jewelry that seems equal parts extravagant and practical, loose thin and volumeless hair free, looking like sharp piano wires.
They walk in, and place a sheet of paper down, your contract, details already underlined.
'The contractor and contractee will meet every 3 months to ensure mutual satisfaction of the contract, and amend said where needed to satisfaction."
the date of expiry was underlined too.
"You have failed to meet for re-negotiations, and thus are at penalty for breach of contract." They say, unblinking.
You can argue that you're no longer employed all you want, but a layman versus a lawyer, who holds more control, more power?
Still, you can try. You have to try. You must. Going down without a fight is just... pathetic.
"My two weeks was given to my boss-"
"To your supervisor. No message was relayed."
"We never amend the contract, we were fine-"
"Your satisfaction is not mutual satisfaction. I, am not satisfied by this outcome-"
"-You're not the boss!" You can yell. "You're just extending his will You can't do this-" You can try to say, to get this done with. A foolish endeavor that barks a laugh at your desperation, fox playing with prey.
"-Don't use the wrong pronouns for me, most dearest. You can't turn a blind eye now of all times."
they slide a card forward as they cut through your words, over the paper, their visage clear as day, even if the name has been scrubbed clean. legal advisor to Daun and co, CEO of.... the business your old workplace was merging with.
a second piece of paper is brought out. a news article - by no means a major one - stained in blood, but still legible.
"CITY CRIME LEVELS STILL THE SAME AFTER HISTORIC MASS ARREST OF GANG MEMBERS - IS A NEW SYNDICATE AT LARGE?"
Your heart is stuck in your throat, pumping dread down to your stomach. If you look up, you're gazing into the answer.
The answer that nothing - no one, no force, no institute, no effort - can help you.
Penalty, punishment, the people behind Verith stare down at you. Even now, sitting on opposite ends of the table, they're looking down at you - they chose to be equal, to be the carrot.
"…I have two options, don't I." You say, as a pen is slid forward next, a guillotine raised to be readied, a commander offering a traitor a game of russian roulette. "Legal punishment or Illegal force. You're not letting me go." You speak it because it's an attempt of retaining control, not because you want to acknowledge it. You say it so that just maybe, you can think of an out from this room these people, this time and space.
Verith - or the monster that has always been wearing Verith's skin - is laughing, smiling, a razor sharp smile, too bright, so delighted at a fate they had sealed, clapping their hands like they're celebrating your misery, this sadist.
"Correct, my dear. So very correct. So don't keep me waiting."
Your voice is caught. You're caught. And you need time, you need a villains monologue, an explanation like fiction despite the truth of the matter. Putting this together has been hell, an unease that has draped over you, a curtain that has never fallen on your stage, and now the performance is faltering; you seek an out.
And seeking it is thoroughly punished, your curiosity got the better of you months ago, it's time to kill the cat.
Your throat is caught in a vice grip, your ears deafened by hissing, eyes clouded by the guns raised to your head.
"Invidis, Most Dearest. Now choose, before I choose for you."
"Ach, What can I say? I felt I was getting to disillusioned with my efforts. It was nice to see some... innocence and passion, for once."
The nice part about being with they who run the criminal underworld is the luxury, you suppose. It's something, at least.
the worst parts are hearing every other person you've met and how they've been bound by the law into puppets for the sake of a "greater good" that makes you writhe inside,
You don't even have a place in their game for the greatest safety, Invidis said one night over dinner.
You're just the epitome of their end goals, a way to keep their eyes on the good they seek from doing the bad.
You think they're too far gone from that point. A lawyer that's a mob boss can't be anything but corrupt, but awful, a living paradox that wants to be both evil and good is impossible.
But what can you do? Every amendment of your contract just prevents you from acting out more and more, the gloved, bloodstained hand that cradles your cheek also binds your wrists and sews your mouth shut whenever they speak to you in tender words of a still bloody carcass.
"You must understand; I want the world to only consist of people like you, most dearest. And I want to be the only threat to people like you."
