Episode_TheMindAquatic

08/02/2016
Blackthorne Plateau

The snowman melts into the ground, leaving nothing between Tizona and Zeke. He rests his sword against his shoulder and gives her a half-assed wave.

ZEKE
Hey. Are you hurt?

TIZONA
No! I could’ve handled that myself, you know.

ZEKE
Famous last words. I’m sure that thing thought something similar...

Zeke points to the melted snowman with the tip of his blade.

ZEKE
...the same way my parents did.

TIZONA
I appreciare the gesture, but I don’t plan on becoming like that thing...now or ever. I know what I’m doing, I come here all the time.

ZEKE
You freeze your ass off for fun?

TIZONA
No. I get to start fires for fun. See that little cave over there?

ZEKE
Mhm?

TIZONA
That’s my hollow. It’s where I set up my fire and watch the birds.

ZEKE
Wait what’s wrong with the birds?

TIZONA
??

ZEKE
Why do they have to be watched? Do they attack people now or something?

TIZONA
...no? You just...observe them.

ZEKE
Oh. Phew. So you just watch them for fun? From up here?

TIZONA
That’s what I do, yes.

ZEKE
You can see that far?

TIZONA
Usually I bring binoculars-- shoot.

ZEKE
What?

TIZONA
I may have forgotten them at home. Well, there goes my plan for the evening.

Tizona walks past Zeke and into the Hollow.

ZEKE
So what now?

TIZONA
I’ll make do. Can’t waste a perfectly good opportunity to light a fire still, you know?

Tizona gathers some sticks and twigs from her stockpile within the Hollow. Kneeling down over her pile, she holds a twig with both hands and ignites it in one swift, vague motion.

TIZONA
Ahhh...sweet warmth. Maybe forgetting the binoculars was a good thing...I don't need them to have a nice evening.

ZEKE
This feels like a lot of work for stuff you could do just fine somewhere else. Then there's no risk of snowmen, catching a cold, you know. All the crazy shit going on here.

TIZONA
I disagree. This is my spot, and I love it enough to look past its flaws.

ZEKE
I-- Look, if you really know what you're doing, then...

TIZONA
Yes?

ZEKE
...then it's your funeral. I just really don't want anything to happen to you, especially with the world as cruel and fucked up as it is.

TIZONA
Mmh...I'm not your parents and you're not mine, okay?

ZEKE
Right. That'll be all from me, then, I'm sorry.

TIZONA
Thank you. Now I'll tell you what: I'm going to make myself some tea and catch up on a book I brought. If you want to stay in my spot, you've got until the kettle's boiling to tell me who you are and what YOU are doing up here.

ZEKE
Eh, you know what?
I got nowhere else to be...

PLAGUE (Shown as "??????")
I was starting to think we lost you.

Unknown Time
Red Aquarium

Zeke fades into consciousness in a dimly lit operating room. The walls are cracked and covered with strange residue. Dust pollutes the air, along with the faint smell of cigarettes. Its source -- Plague -- stands against the wall. Tristan sits on the floor across from him, struggling to stay awake. When Plague notices Zeke's eyes opening, he walks over to examine him once again.

PLAGUE
You have a great deal of explaining yourself to do before we leave.
Do you remember your name and what day it is?

ZEKE
...yeah, Zeke...

PLAGUE
And what's today?

ZEKE
Is it still the 21st?

PLAGUE
Close enough. Midnight passed sometime before I got you here.
Which, we'll get to now...can you tell me what happened?

ZEKE
Everything was a blur after Abel punched me, but...
I was on the ground, and it hurt so badly that I couldn't move.
I just laid there trying not to fall asleep.
After a while, it didn't hurt anymore.
It just got cold. Cold to the point where I felt nothing.
Just...nothing. At all.
And then I was back on the mountain again. Tizona was right there in front of me.
I heard her voice. We talked.
I could feel the campfire keeping us warm...
Everything I've been looking for since the day she disappeared.

TRISTAN
...

ZEKE
Do the rest of Blackthorne a favor and leave me here.

Tristan covers her mouth and starts to cry.

PLAGUE
I’m not going to do that. You were unconscious, yes, but you were not dead. What happens if there’s no mountain when you die?

ZEKE
...

PLAGUE
You never found anything that suggests Tizona died, correct?

ZEKE
Haven’t found a single lead suggesting anything.

PLAGUE
The world’s not as big as you might think it is. If you haven’t found anything, then it’s more likely her circumstances simply changed.
Do you think it’s possible she’d want to find you alive, if she comes looking for you?

ZEKE
...

PLAGUE
I can’t stop you from grieving, nor self-destructing if that’s what you’re set on...
But if your feelings are as sincere as they sound, then live to tell the tale.

ZEKE
Huh?

PLAGUE
You owe her that much.
Can you get up okay? How does everything feel?

Zeke hops off the operating table, doing a few slow stretches to assess his condition.

ZEKE
...seems fine. I would say lighter, even?
Plague, what the hell did you do? I thought you weren’t a doctor.

PLAGUE
I’m not. What medical knowledge I’ve taken in is more a result of alchemy, than anything.

ZEKE
Alchemy? Don’t you go straight to hell for that?

PLAGUE
You’re probably thinking about material alchemy...the kind that promises gold and produces rotten odors, fires, and chemical hazards. At least in the hands desperate or stupid enough to try it.
I studied a different kind of alchemy.

ZEKE
What was it?

PLAGUE
The only option I had, given the situation.
Unless you feel or see something that I don’t, the only unintended result seems to be something with your eyes.

ZEKE
My eyes?

PLAGUE
Look at your reflection in the window.

Zeke turns his head towards the wide glass pane dividing their room and another one. Barely able to make out his reflection, he suddenly notices his faintly-glowing pupils and black, empty eyes.

ZEKE
Woah.

PLAGUE
I’ve never seen such a thing before...but you’re able to see fine, then for now it’s not a priority.

ZEKE
I could live with this...Tristan, what do you think?

TRISTAN
...

PLAGUE
Don’t antagonize her, Zeke. Tonight’s been hard enough already.

ZEKE
Alright, yeah...so are we moving?

PLAGUE
Yes. Do not leave my sight.

Red Aquarium - Burial Tank Hallway

Zeke suddenly stops and turns to look at his reflection in the glass.

PLAGUE
Zeke?

ZEKE
@,@

PLAGUE
What’s wrong?

ZEKE
^,^?#
%

BLANE (Shown as ?????)
Worried I wouldn’t show? I’ve had a front row seat just as long as you.
That’s the difference between us. You’re too...vast. You could be so much more with a little concentration.
A victim of magic...is that all you want to be?
The truth is, I’m not sorry for what I’m about to do.
I’m really, really, really not fucking sorry.
A nightmare like you?
You’re lucky I’m only taking half.

*Zeke stumbles against the glass, using a hand to support himself. Plague tries to approach him before noticing a card under Zeke’s hand.

PLAGUE
Zeke!

In that instant, a hand made of ectosnow reaches out of the glass and wraps around Zeke’s throat. Blane -- a snowman with white hair and roughly the same height/ build as Zeke -- pulls the rest of himself out of the mirror.

PLAGUE
Tristan, get behind me.

Complying with no objections, Tristan backs up against the wall as Blane shambles past her and Plague unceramoniously -- no acknowledgement at all.

BLANE
Pi...geon...
Tiz...ona...
Tris...t--

The sound of Tristan’s hand cannon rings out in the hallway from behind Plague. He looks behind at her, gun raised and set on Blane. Even with a bullet lodged in the side of his translucent face, he continues on his way and eventually fades into the darkness.

ZEKE
I don’t...I don’t know what that was.

PLAGUE
We don’t need to figure it out right now.
Are you okay?

ZEKE
I-I couldn’t say anything, and then it felt like...I don’t know, I don’t know...

Plague helps Zeke get up.

PLAGUE
As I said, we have other concerns. Can you move?

ZEKE
I’ll...yeah. I’ll be fine. Let’s just get Tristan out of here.

A chilling voice echoes through the hallway, causing the trio to stop.

ZEKE
What is that?

PLAGUE
We’ll deal with it if it finds us. Just keep moving.

Turning a narrow corner leads the trio directly into an encounter.

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
I don’t believe it...it’s you, Simon.
After all these years.

PLAGUE
What...what the fuck?

Above their heads, an Anima snowman tethered to the ceiling looks down on the three. While snowmen rarely ever retain traces of their former humanity, seeing Plague shaken to his core was enough for Zeke and Tristan to instinctively step behind him.

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
I’ve been waiting a long time.

PLAGUE
What are you doing here, Harry?

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
Waiting for you, Simon.
Days, turned to years, felt like centuries.
Wondering -- needing to know if you heard it too.
If you heard it, all these years in between.

PLAGUE
Heard what, exactly?

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
The distant song of hell when everything is quiet.
Bugs on your skin that you can’t ever seem to catch.
A void in the mirror where your face used to be.

PLAGUE
...yes. I heard it too, Harry. I felt it, and I saw it.
But it faded into the background with time. Time, and...people.

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
Not for me. The others just made it louder.
It was supposed to be easier to breathe when we made it to the surface...
But I suffocated without you.
Did you even try to look for me?

PLAGUE
No. I didn’t.
It was safer that way. It’s what we agreed on.

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
It’s what killed me...but I don’t have to wait in agony any longer.
There is nothing left of me to melt.
There hasn’t been for some time now.

Harry holds out his melting hand. Around him, anima tethers mimic the motion, aimed at Plague.

HARRY (Shown as ?????)
Don’t make this harder than it has to be...you and I were always meant to die here.

Alongside a couple of average snowmen, a deformed snowman made of blue-tinted ectosnow drags itself around the room. Tristan points her hand cannon at it, switching her aim between its several heads before Plague swats her weapon away.

PLAGUE
DON’T SHOOT!

ZEKE
What the fuck else are we supposed to do?!

PLAGUE
It’s blue. It has an Aqua catalyst.

ZEKE
So you kill it then.

PLAGUE
I...can’t.

ZEKE
Then give me the gun and I’ll make myself useful!

PLAGUE
No. I can’t do that either...I think you do have a catalyst, Zeke.

ZEKE
I’m pretty certain I don’t.

PLAGUE
This is not the time to find out.
Catalyst or not, I’m warning you both: DO. NOT. KILL. IT.

ZEKE
...understood.

They made it out. Zeke and Tristan practically collapse on top of each other from exhaustion, cutting their return to Blackthorne short in favor of much-needed sleep. Plague doesn’t argue -- he just removes his coat and folds it for them to use as a pillow. When he’s certain they’re out cold, he finds the fallen trunk of a neighboring tree and sits down to have a cigarette.

PLAGUE (Thinking)
I’m certain it’s an Aqua catalyst. Its capabilities, as abstract as they seem...
...suggest something that operates on variables, not constants...
...but there’s no signature. There’s no anchor, nor symbol--

Plague drops his cigarette.

PLAGUE
The card.
The inability to speak.
The snowman.

Plague looks at Zeke, fast asleep. A revelation hits him in such a way that he can’t help but laugh to himself.

PLAGUE
He’s a mimic.
As if cheating death wasn’t enough in the way of luck...
Under the right circumstances, his catalyst can just...
Do whatever it wants.
Whatever it needs.

Plague holds his head in his hands.

PLAGUE
Fuck my life.

08/02/2016
Blackthorne Hollow

Zeke sits down across from Tizona as she empties water bottles into a little teapot and holds it carefully over the fire.

ZEKE
Name's Zeke. Around a month ago I ran away from home and ended up in Blackthorne.

TIZONA
Why'd you run away from home? Don't you have a family?

ZEKE
No, actually. Not anymore. And honestly...it was the best thing that ever happened to me. I’m free now.

TIZONA
How, could that possibly be a good thing?

ZEKE
Look past the trees.

Zeke points at the distant walls of Astra Dominus’ border.

ZEKE
Those walls in the distance, have you ever been inside there?

TIZONA
Is that...Astra?

ZEKE
Yes. Astra Dominus.
It’s hell. Success is all that matters, even if it means shaving off parts of who you are in the process. My parents were reducing me to nothing for the sake of a salary.

TIZONA
...that’s awful.

ZEKE
Now that I’m free from the pressure...the expectations...I’m not so scared of losing who I am anymore. What good’s crawling out of hell if you never learn to walk...you know?

TIZONA
Success doesn't have to be such a rigid thing, either. Sometimes just getting out of bed is a success.

ZEKE
What about making it up mountains?

TIZONA
Seeing a mountain at all sounds like a pretty big success to me.

ZEKE
The same day I ran away from home, I saw a flamingo here. It was watching me from right there, like...

TIZONA
Oh! Oh! I wonder...

Tizona ruffles through her satchel and whips out a notebook looking as though it's on death's door, decorated in stickers and the residue of stickers no longer in tact.

ZEKE
What the stars is that? It's falling apart.

TIZONA
It's just a little old, it used to be my brother's. Whenever I see a new bird, I read about them and write a few pages in here. Let's see, flamingo...

08/14/2016
Blackthorne Plateau

It’s just Zeke. Tears freezing down his face, he lies on his side, with the same thousand-yard look, holding onto the same flickering memory.

End of Chapter 1: Losing Virtues