abyssianmelody | [Chapter 03 -- Scene] In This World.

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[Chapter 03 -- Scene] In This World.

Who: Emil Castagnier and Rita Mordio
Where: Belkend
When: Two weeks or so after the collapse of Azkeriuth.
Warnings: There's a lot of death, destruction and mayhem in here following a certain replica's breakout...

Madness.

It was the only way to describe the situation in Belkend right now. Much of the city was gutted and smoldering, people were either dead or dying all over the place. Researchers were scrambling for their notes and experiments, while the other inhabitants were doing all they could to flee for their lives. It truly was chaotic, seeing such a respectful city brought to its knees like this.

Among the rubble and the chaos, a young, blond-haired man wandered out of the city entrance, eyes empty and his hands clutching a journal and a small bag as he meandered out into the field, seemingly ignoring the plight of the town's citizens. Two dead guards lay behind him, blood trailing from his boots as he shuddered. There was so much of it...

He just wanted out of this city, now.

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Rita could not believe this was happening... Her home had been partially destroyed! What were those idiots thinking, trying to replicate someone?! The brunette clenched a fist. She didn't know who it was they had replicated, as she had been locked up in her little "hole,"--as some of the researchers jokingly called her home--for days. She didn't really care, either, who it was. It was stupid! Why did this have to happen? Just as she was about to leave to search for Estellise, too...

In the destruction, her parents had died. The fonist wondered how the girl would take the news... She didn't believe that her perhaps-friend would very well. Estellise had loved her parents...

Well, she would find her for them. Their last wish... Rita snapped her mind out of dark thoughts, and instead turned them onto the replica. She had joined the search to find and subdue it, but she never came upon it. The researcher had heard that they had caught him, but not anything else. The girl sighed. How could one simple replica cause this much destruction and havoc? Perhaps they had replicated something dangerous...or just powerful.

Meanwhile, the replica in question? It was still standing dumbly outside the city, shivering in the wind despite the flames covering the city. Finally, after what seemed to take forever, the replica uttered something under his breath.

"... Home... need... home..."

Rita sighed, again. She needed to clear her mind...and think on the matter of tomorrow. Where she would go, how she would get there...things like that. A walk would do her nicely...

The brunette began walking towards Belkend's exit. If there were any monsters outside that attacked her, she could just blast them to bits with a fonic arte. Yet, what she came upon--even before leaving--shocked her, she had to admit. Two dead guards...and a distance away, with his back to them, stood a familiar-looking young man. The lab coat, the blond hair styled int hat particular way...

"Aster...?" Why was he here, what was he doing...and why were those guards dead? Aster was not a fighter, there's no way eh could have done it...

Emil visibly jumped -- who was that? He turned around to look at the young researcher, sneezing a bit as he pulled the coat tighter around himself. He looked up at her... and recognized her from some of the various pictures and talk of the researchers in Belkend.

"A-ah... R-Rita, right...?" Emil stammered in fear. "W-what... w-what re... you doing out here? I-it's... d-dangerous." Yeah, dangerous was the word he was looking for, right?

She raised an eyebrow. What was Aster so...nervous about? The two of them were friends, were they not?

"What are you talking about? What, did you hit your head more than a little on your trip to Akzeriuth? Of course it's me, and it doesn't matter if there are monsters about. My fonic artes are more than a match for them, Aster!" Her fellow researcher could be such an idiot sometimes.

Forgive him, he's not the Aster you're looking for, Rita. That man is dead. Either way, Emil flails, whimpering and raising his hands in defense.

"I-I'm sorry...!" he responded, whimpering in fear again. "I... I got caught up in the destruction and everything, and..." He trailed off, sighing as he clutched at his head -- his unknown other self was trying to talk to him again, and it hurt.

Pft, like Rita knew that. She's the most antisocial of all the researchers. She did not even know about Akzeriuth's destruction...

"Well, I guess you're right. It is still pretty chaotic around here. Apparently, whatever replica the other researchers had made went crazy. I wonder why..." The fonist's eyes caught the motion with his hand and his head. "Hey, Aster, are you all right?"

Emil winced, managing a shrug as he looked at her. "M-maybe they did something wrong with it...?"

"Head. Hurts... ow..." was all Emil was able to say as he clutched at his head again, trying in vain to keep his other self from doing something drastic.

"Hmm, I suppose that's possible. Fomicry isn't an exact art or technology yet, from what I know...not to mention it's supposed to be forbidden, so no one knows as much about it as we could if it were not." Rita replied. She then stepped closer to the figure she believed to be her friend.

"Been thinking too hard again?" The brunette taunted lightly, dismissing his odd behavior for now. It was a rather peculiar time, so Aster was allowed to be odd. For now.

"I... I don't know." Emil responded, wincing in pain. "I-it feels like I'm... I'm supposed to remember something, but... I-I can't."

Lorelei, his head hurt. Even with a vigorous headshake, it still remained.

...Did Aster actually hit his head? Perhaps her joking really was true... Was her friend developing a partial amnesia?

"Aster...are you all right? You never forget things..." Ugh, why was everyone rubbing off on her? Okay, so she was worried.

"Ugh..." Emil groaned, coughing as he shook his head. "I-I'm sorry, Rita... a-all I know is that... I-I'm here... t-that, a-and you name, too..."

In short, yes, Rita should be worried.

And dangit, she was worried. Very worried--she pretended to herself that she was less, of course.

"Wh-what are you talking about? What do you mean 'all you know?'"

"I... I think... I-I might... I might've lost my memory..."

And thus the bombshell was dropped. Oh, poor Emil. Who was he -- Aster, or Emil?

"L-lost your memory? H-how does that work out?" Okay, yeah. Her mind sorta esploded from that bombshell. Good job, Emil.

It would explain things...but what would cause him to lose his memory...? A strange, but plausible idea came to her. Could the scientists have tried replicating Aster? She did not know why they might do that, but...could the replication process have somehow wiped his memory away?

Ah, Rita... So close, yet so far...

"I-I don't know!" Emil yelped, clutching at his brain again. Oh, why did it have to be now that he had to suffer headaches again?! It was enough to amost drive him insane. Again.

"I-I was hoping... y-you'd tell me."

Aster was freaking out as well... Well. More that she was, of course! That probably explained his different behavior...

"How the hell would I know?! I've been working on a project for the past week or so! All I can guess is something to do with the possibility of them making a replica out of you. All I've heard at all recently about anything is that a replica was made of someone, and went crazy." Rita retorted.

"E-EH?!"

Emil couldn't believe his ears. Well, actually, he could, but he'd been blocking out the possibility. Still, the fact hit him in the face, hard. And... he didn't like it at all.

Still... was he the original or the replica?

"W-wait... i-if that's true... t-then who's the replica?"

What is it that Rita had just said? Yeah, he might be freaking out right now, but that did not excuse him from listening!

"What did I just tell you? How would I know when I wasn't there?! I didn't even see the replica! But if it is true, then it'd be some guy running around who would look just like you. I'd heard the other researchers had subdued it up, though." The genius fonist stiffened. "Ooh, those idiots! doing something they probably didn't understand! If they hadn't created that replica, it wouldn't have destroyed half of the city and killed Estellise's parents!" Yes, she was rather angry with it and her dear, fellow researchers.

Oh, geez. Emil's just... so confused now. Either way, he manages to stand up straight and wince -- the pain in his head is starting to subside, for now.

"S-sorry..." he sheepishly apologized. "B-but... th-that's still very irresponsible of them, d-doing something like that..."

Never mind the fact that selective amnesia and the now-unknown Rem's interference prevented him from finding out that he was the replica.

"..." This all just really sucked. Rita was glad she was going away in the morning; she could get away from all of the death and destruction. She would miss her ostensible now-amnesiac friend, but... It was important that she find Estellise, too.

...She scrutinized him and narrowed her eyes. Wait, with the light from the faint flicker of the flames...were his eyes green? Weren't Aster's gray? ...She had to be seeing things. It was just a trick of the light. No one could see well at this time of night, anyway.

"Aster...do you remember anything?" She had to know the extent of his current knowledge... Then, perhaps, she could for a hypothesis as to how and why he had lost his memories.

"A-ah..." Emil faltered, trying to remember what he knew, except... he hadn't read that far into the journal yet.

Her mentioning of Azkeriuth did give him a clue, though. So, with some hesitation and doubt, he answered thus:

"T-trying to keep everyone from... from going to Azkeriuth, I think..."

He remembered something? Rita was filled with relief. That was a good sign. Perhaps it was only a temporary thing, his amnesia. Despite the doubting tone in his voice, there had to be a hint of something if he at least mentioned that. After all, Aster did go to Akzeriuth.

"What about anything else? Can you remember if there were any of the others experimenting on you or some weird thing? They might just be jealous because you're smarter than they are, if they did that."

Once again, Emil was at a loss for words. What was he suposed to tell her now?

...of course, he didn't even have time to think before he found himself... blacking out? Disappearing? Being shuffled to the back? He didn't know what to think, but he vaguely heard his other self telling him to sleep for now...

This time, the sentience within Emil responded thus:

"There was a lot of chaos then, too, because from what I recall Azkeriuth fell and sank into the Qliploth."

"..You remember?!" Rita was surprised at the sudden change in demeanor. A lot more confidence, a lack of hesitance...more certainty, she supposed. Perhaps the shock of the night's events had finally left him...

But even more surprising... "Akzeriuth...fell?" The brunette thought she may have heard of a mention of the Qliphoth before, but she could not remember where. "How is that possible?"

Too bad Rita doesn't realize she's talking to a fonic sentience just yet. Oh, well...

"Someone blew up the passage rings." Rem replied simply. "Needless to say, it didn't take too long for it to collapse."

Yeah, because then she could go all blastiamode--in this case, coolfononstuffmode--over him. But, then again, she might be only a little sad that her friend is, uh...hm. Dead?

"Passage Ring?" Rita was curious and a little puzzled. She had not heard of anything like that before... "What is that? ...And how did you all get out of there in time?" Not like the fonist was not grateful, but if it did not take long, then...they must have been very lucky.

"There's been research on them for a while... they basaically hold up the Outer Lands and keep them from falling into the Qliploth." Rem stated simply.

The fonic sentience thought a little more before he responded. "We'd... only escaped because we weren't that far into Azkeriuth yet." Like hell Rem was gonna tell her than her Belkend bestie was dead, after all.

"The Outer Lands..." Ah, that's where Rita had heard that from. She had read over some of the research at one point that mentioned the Qliphoth below their world, the Outer Lands.

Not far into it, hm? "So, you all were lucky, then?" The brunette supposed it was unfortunate that no studies could have been conducted, but it was the others' loss, not hers.

"...yeah. The Outer Lands." Rem was in no mood to repeat himself at this point. Either way, he nodded again in confirmation. "Everyone got back safely, though at this point? I'm not even sure if they're still safe." He gestured back towards Belkend as if to prove his point.

That was the easy part, telling her all of that... now all he needed to do was to think of a way to get out of here and not arouse Rita's suspicions.

Too bad, she was a bit suspicious already. Aster had been acting timid, and now he was acting more aloof and serious than before... Not to mention Aster was always more optimistic and cheerful. He did have a point, however...

"But haven't most of them already left until it stops? You'd think they'd stay to try and put out the fires... Well, I guess not all of them are fonists."

Blame both Emil and Rem for failing their impersonation classes, then. Either way, Rem couldn't exactly do much but shrug.

"Most of them stuck around to try and save their research. Dunno about the rest, though it'd be good to get out while we can. Like... now, perhaps."

And thus, Rem turned to attempt a quick exit. "If you have anything more to ask, do it now -- I'd rather not stick around if I have to."

This was not like him! She swore that before, Aster would stick around to help others than just quickly try to flee, himself. What was up with him?!

"Yeah, I do. What's with you?!" Rita snapped. "I'm sure you would be there, helping them, but you're instead running away!"

Oh, Rita, you still haven't figured it out? Rem let out a hmph in reply, turning around yet again as if dismissing her to whatever she was doing before.

"I have no need to explain myself to you. Now leave."

"Excuse me?! Who do you think you are, ordering me around, Aster?! I don't know what got to you when you hit your head, but I'm not liking it!" By now, Rita would have begun casting the easiest, simplest, and her favorite arte, but...this was Aster, her friend...or so she had thought. Grr, he was really frustrating!

"You're going to start explaining yourself to me right now!" The fonist snapped.

"Are you some kind of idiot?!" Rem all but snapped as he whirled around, shoved Rita into the wall and held her wrists down wih one hand, the other keeping a grip on her neck in case she tried to scream for help. Despite the rather lewd position he held her in, Rem found himself being far more gentle towards her than he would've the other researchers.

He snarled, forcing her to look into his blood-red eyes. "I'm not the Aster you know. Not anymore, anyway."

...She should have realized it. Rita just didn't want to believe it... But this had to be the replica. His eyes... The fonist forced herself to not shiver. She could beat this idiot! Yet, still...she didn't want to hurt him. He still looked like her friend... Stupid sentiments!

"Let...go of me." The brunette growled. "Or...I'll make you regret it, replica."

"You'll make me regret it?" Rem snarled at Rita as he continued to glare at her and hold her down. "Please, you don't even know what I'm capable of, dear Rita."

Still, he was more displeased at himself for not being rougher to Rita than he was now. This body he inhabited... a replica of Aster, right? He'd have to look deeper into this problem...

Either way, his thoughts were interrupted by shouting -- the soldiers were coming, and that wasn't a good sign. He let out a hmph, setting Rita gently on the ground before whirling around.

"You're better off forgetting about him, Rita. The Aster you know is gone."

And with that, the replica turned around and fled as fast as his legs could take him...

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[Chapter 03 -- Scene] In This World.

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