Author's Rating: NC-17 [violence, gore, torture]
Author's Note: Again, with very special thanks to Sincos and Erquin. Here in particular, when Agony finally became curious enough to start asking Deliria questions, his dialogue in this piece is preserved as the player wrote it to me. I've thoroughly enjoyed this piece as it is the most I've ever developed any thoughts on what it can be like as an Ebb-user.

Deliria and Agony

Attica City. 654SD. High rise hotel.

Part 5: Vacation

…perhhhaps we got offf…on the wronng ffoot…?

I hated that the Gore Cannon could do that. It couldn’t speak, but it could borrow another mind’s voice. Briefly. Though the focus was drawn thin… wavering enough to be able to tell—even to me—that it wasn’t my own thought. It was only a weapon. It didn’t have a soul.

“You deserved what you got. Get out.”

Get out of my head.

Syn hissed like steam out of a burst pipe, but settled down in my lap, growling contentedly as it started gnawing on my bicep like some teething toddler. I could hardly feel it, so I let it. I was weary of cutting my hands every time I tried to push it away, of wasting my flux healing or ‘porting from it when there had been nowhere to run on the ship. And nowhere to run in this sun-scorched “Attaca City.” I risked more and more being seen, and getting far too hungry when I ran. I had given up. While it chewed…it fed me some of its flux, staving off some of the need for blood. I hadn’t asked it to do that. But I accepted it.

Why should I deserve this?

…it’s odd that I am even asking myself the question. So many years, I can’t be sure for how much of it I felt…. Awake.

The Cannon wanted to huddle in my lap often now. I could taste the anxiety like a bitter nectar. Away from its Mistress and perhaps the first time away from Mort at all? I didn’t know, but Syn did not sit easy with Jorn’s decision to attach it to Agony and I for this…”vacation.”

I hadn’t seen the twitching, lashing tail and pacing along the ceiling until we left Mort’s orbit. Seeing that…it made me happy. For a moment. Until it started following me, trying to climb my legs or drop down onto my shoulders from above. Until it chased me.

So furious. And so afraid of more pain from the Cannon…though with time, it became…interesting. That Syn had been so gleeful tearing into me as Jorn watched, approving and encouraging. Now? It mostly grabbed only my dead armor, seemed to attempt to avoid the thinnest parts of my skin, and didn’t dig in as far as it had in Agony’s kitchen. It drew far less blood than I knew it was capable with its appetites, and tempted me, encouraged me not to fight with small bursts of flux that I could eat all my own.

I came to understand Syn wasn’t eager to torture me further. I was….familiar to it on the foldship, and in this city. It wanted to be near. It clung to me for hours as I only sat and drifted in a dark room inside the Brain Waster’s suite. I wished I could get it to cling to Agony instead. Little parasite.

I barked a harsh laugh then. Yes. I would know parasites.

The first time the Brain Waster slept in the new luxury hotel…that was a clusterfuck. Literally. As the vassal got into bed, Syn was pouting and sitting like some scintillating tarantula on Agony’s suitcases. I joined the live one only after his dose of Drum was taking effect. Agony loathed sleeping with me next to him, only tolerated it…barely. Because he wanted to prove something to Jorn, or his lust for power kept him willing. I didn’t care why. It was his ascension.

The vassal was still resistant to the idea that his dreams were opening more paths for him to approach the White. While that resistance was up, the tears in his veil would be slowed. It occurred to me…and I’d giggled…that if the veil tore completely and the path came to meet him before he was ready…

Well. It depended on if he submitted. If he accepted.

This time he was too tense to be able to sleep without the Drum. He’d had a break from me. I could not feed on dreams on that foldship, I feared the navigator. Now there was the prospect of me touching him in his sleep again—and I would, though he’d drink no blood, I had none to spare—plus the Gore Cannon “staring” at him without eyes yet radiating high degree of…envy. Jealousy. Possibly malice. Agony had interacted with the Cannon in the past, his dreams told me…it had helped fight a Shard Angel and, of course, even helped Jorn to fuck him. Syn had tripped him and held his wrists. Possibly, Syn had wanted to join in the play. But that was before it remembered the taste of my own agony, before it had bonded with me again. The Gore Cannon definitely had a preference between us. It wanted me.

I’d learned one thing about Syn: Sentient. But not independent.

Should I wonder if Jorn did it on purpose? Of course she did.

“Sit,” I hissed. This was my time. My dreams. My pleasure touching Agony’s Deathsuit. Mine.

Syn murmured in a guttural grumble, the barbed end of his tail flicking briefly. It sat.

Agony was already asleep.

Hi, sweetling…you remember me, don’t you?

It did. Agony’s Deathsuit knew I meant no harm. So soothing, peaceful, though like its wearer, still reluctant to reach out to me. I embraced Agony and the seeping salve coated me, draw a distinct cry of relief and ecstasy from my pale lips. I heard a light snarling, squeal from the corner, but paid it less attention than I should have.

The dreams were just beginning when Syn must have left his perch and slid beneath the blankets at the base of the bed. A hard metallic coil wrapped around my ankle and pulled. I held on to Agony, refusing to let go. I was no longer on the surface. I wasn’t awake. It slid up my leg to my thigh and yanked again, this time with barbs embedded in my armor. My grip nearly loosened and I screeched, growling as I scrambled to seize hold of Agony’s shoulders. I climbed on top of him, as I had when I first fed him my blood in that dark place, before taking him home to heal. I couldn’t let go…it would hurt too much.

Syn climbed onto my back. It dug in again.

Not again.

My screaming woke Agony, in spite of the Drum. It was as if he’d shaken the drug off like rain drops. If I’d been more coherent, not being ripped violently from Agony’s dreams and lanced open by Syn, I’d have seen that it was a step closer for him. His body was changing.

I didn’t realize any such thing. All I had in that moment was the Deathsuit to anchor me. I couldn’t let go to bond fully with Syn. Or I’d go…utterly… completely… mad…

Again.

What would a Brain Waster do, waking up to such noise, to shrieking and squealing and happy, piggy grunts… to the scent of unnatural blood in his nose…to the weight on his chest?

What would he do when he realized I was conducting my rage and fear and anguish into his Deathsuit, asking it for help…?

He surprised me…

He helped me. He attacked Syn…

Fuck youfuck youfuck you…! At last the pain lessened. Not the rage. But I got the reprieve I needed to ‘port away from Syn. Agony could watch the repulsive beast. It’s his turn.

I am on the roof of the hotel. It was not slick or wet as I’m used to; the material hadn’t been worn smooth by erosion. It was dry and rough, new and sharp. I was already spilling blood onto it anyway that wouldn’t wash away in the rain, but again I would leave footprints to mark my passing.

I blinked when I felt no acidic rain on my hands or feet and looked up into the dark sky. Except it wasn’t so dark. There were a thousand pinpoints of light, and two small satellites, one glowing more bluish to the other’s white. Stars. And…moons.

I’d only seen those once before. In the White. I should be afraid, then. Was it so close again? Was I following Agony into it? I can’t go back…

No. This was Attaca City. There was no rain here. That’s all.

No rain now, anyway.

I sniffed the wind; I could smell salt and sand and…greenery. I took a painful step to turn around and looked out, trying to understand what I was seeing. The moon’s light was reflecting, glittering across a wide expanse of….liquid. I sniffed again. Water. Of course it would be water. An enormous body leading up in waves to lap gently at the sand, and on that sand, I believed I saw two figures lying together. My over-sensitive hands could feel the cool, wet breeze flowing off the water’s surface over the land. It felt…smelled…tasted…clean.

At least until the sky seemed to churn with red clouds, and the water boiled like blood.

“Ohh…”

The scent of my own blood added to that one surreal moment, but the pain in my feet finally brought me back to the star-filled sky over the hotel’s new rooftop. I needed to feed to heal. There was no more putting off the hunt. Even if Syn had delayed it in giving me flux, it had undone any progress by lacerating me so badly.

It took me longer to find an Ebon here than I was used to. Everyone, everything was so beautiful here. I couldn’t hide among the trash. Lights were bright, and parties were frequent, people celebrating with each other. Dangerous for me. I could not be seen.

In the end, I ‘ported to the beach, and took the couple who were sharing a blanket on the sand that I’d seen from the rooftop. One had been Ebon. And they would live…they would just not remember. Not like the last beautiful one I’d taken.

Whom I’d nearly drained in order to see the Sleeper in the Sector…

I gasp just after ‘porting some place dark where I can huddle and heal, nearly floored by the rushing recollection. My nothing-lover. The Sleeper was still on Mort. I remember now. That had to be why Jorn had arrived with Syn to punish me.

I’d rebelled.

Again.

I started to wonder where I’d be after Agony entered the White. Still caught in the same cycle of pain and nothingness, probably. What would it take, I wonder…?

Won’t she, someday…at last…won’t she destroy me?