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Season 7, Day 32
Darkness has fallen on Sunken Halifax, though hours still remain before night will do the same. The sun is only a faint echo above the stadium, casting nothing but the memory of light on the teams below. Kiki’s watched games under shadowed skies like this before, knows the feeling of waiting on the edge of her seat with concern for the players, but this is the first time she'd seen an incineration.
She's not sure she'll ever stop seeing it, now, the image of Moody Cookbook’s pages going up in flame, bright enough to illuminate the anguished faces of the Tigers. Kiki shudders at the memory and wraps her arms tighter around Quack, grateful for the comfort of his presence -- and offering what comfort she can, too. Even her familiar, normally so restless during games, is sitting solemn and subdued as the fans around them.
But the game must go on, and so it does, despite the ashes still drifting in the dim light. Down on the field, Elijah Bates steps up to the plate -- or most of him does, anyway; his form has been wavering ominously ever since Cookbook’s incineration.
“BATES CAN BAT!” the screens proclaim in large bright letters, their relentless optimism a stark contrast to the mood of the crowd. The message is accurate, at least; Bates has somehow managed a hit in every appearance so far this game, even after becoming unstable.
Ziwa Mueller leads off as far past third as they dare, ready to run, trusting Elijah to bring them home. He hits the ball high in the air, sending it spinning towards an outfielder, and Ziwa takes off.
Bates doesn't. He takes one step, but he's flickering wildly now, and then --
And then another surge of flames, and he's gone just as Ziwa slides into home.
Kiki bounces up onto her feet instinctively, Quack fluttering away in shock. Two incinerations in one game? That just doesn't happen. The crowd, already still, now seems to have frozen entirely. Ziwa’s staring at the pile of ash where their teammate used to be, as though they could reconstruct him with their eyes if they only just stood there long enough. Failing that, they turn to scream something at what remains of the sun until Workman Gloom comes up, gently urging them back to the dugout.
Bates will never bat again.
Kiki feels a sudden rush of clarity amidst the shock. She can't just sit back and watch this happen, especially now that the Moist Talkers need a player. She's always wanted to play in the major leagues, though not like this -- who would ever want to step onto this battlefield of flame and ash? -- but if she doesn't, who will? She can't stand to see someone else burn up in her place, not if she can help it. With magic and Quack on her side, it might be harder for them to incinerate her.
(It probably won't be, of course, and she knows it, and her heart pounds with fear and her hands tremble when she looks at the umpires, but she has to believe that it will be, believe in herself and the team and step up anyway. This is her moment, and she wishes it was a better one, but she’s going to save the day or die trying.)
She takes a step away from her seat, and then Quack is in front of her, wings spread wide to block her path.
“I'm sorry, Quack, but I have to go,” she signs, hands slick with sweat, already a true Moist Talker. “They need me.”
He frowns, spreading his wings wider.
“I know, you need me too.” She crouches down to affectionately ruffle the feathers on his head, then steps back again. “And I need you. Lend me your power, so I can make it back safely.”
He hesitates. She feels his fear mingling with her own, knows that he knows it isn't so simple, but she pushes on.
“Please? I can’t do this without you. You just have to trust that I'll be okay.”
Quack bows his head, finally accepting it, if only because he knows she'll run out there with or without his help. She crouches down again and he wraps his wings around her, their foreheads touching. Kiki closes her eyes as her familiar’s power flows into her, enhancing her own magic. Be safe, he's telling her.
“I'll be back, I promise,” she says when they pull away.
He just stares at her with sad eyes as she turns to go.
Kiki steps forward. No one protests her walking onto the field and into the Moist Talkers’ dugout, because someone has to, and that someone is her.
The team doesn't notice her immediately, their eyes all on the ground, the field, the sky, or still searching for someone they'll never see again. It's PolkaDot who spots her first, of course, ever observant, and with just one word, all those faces turn towards her.
“...Hi,” she says. Her hands stop there. She doesn't know what to say to them. They don't know what to say to her. I'm sorry seems empty. They're sorry for her, too, sorry that she's been drawn into this. Sorry that she's here, for one reason or another.
Ziwa looks up at her through moist eyes, forcing themself to take charge, to make her feel welcome by signing as they talk. “You know how to play?”
Kiki nods. “I've spent years in the Underleagues.”
“Okay.” They look down at the bat resting in their lap. “You can... you can. Uh. You can use this.”
Bates’ bat is still warm and smells faintly of smoke. Kiki takes it from the reluctant Ziwa, wrapping her hands around the scorch marks. It feels comfortable, but... well, it doesn't feel like hers, and it shouldn't.
Ziwa blinks at her and says nothing more.
Gloom steps up to help again, ever professional. “We'll have to find you a uniform.”
“No need.” Kiki closes her eyes and reaches for her magic, for Quack’s, for the energy still glowing in the bat, and lets all it swirl around her, remaking herself in the right image. Not too plain, but not too extravagant either; she doesn't want to make a scene.
Blue spreads like waves until her outfit is mostly engulfed by it, leaving some white and red accents. The team logo embroiders itself on her hat, her shoes turn to cleats, most of the ruffles and bows disappear.
They stare at her anyway. Suddenly self-conscious, she turns to sit down, but they’re all getting up, being called back onto the field. She puts the bat down, her hands already feeling unsteady without it.
Bates’ glove is too big for her.
Kiki takes it off and puts it aside guiltily, feeling as if every last part of him is being left behind. She hasn't brought her own glove, of course, but she draws on the magic again and summons it to her, lets the comfortable shape fit itself around her hand.
It feels cold.
Kiki stands in the outfield, the darkness seeming to wrap around her from all sides. She tries to look past it, to watch everything at once -- the batter, Jenkins on the mound, the rest of her team, the Tigers’ dugout, the umpires, the empty outline of the sun, Quack in the faraway stands. It's probably for the best that nobody’s hit anything towards her yet.
Her gaze shifts to Mclaughlin Scorpler, who's on deck. She can feel the world shift, too, now that she’s closer to it all; it’s slight and almost unnoticeable, but it is, and her whiskers quiver, because she knows what it means, and she’s not close enough to do anything about it.
She's not the only one looking over there.
Eyes glow, and Scorpler goes up in flames, their headphones tumbling to the ground, the strange aura that once surrounded them now reaching out all the way to the Talkers’ dugout to ensnare Antonio Wallace. Kiki sees Fish twitch out of the corner of her eye, thinks for a moment that they might scream or rip something apart, but they just seem to... crumple, as if the world has finally become too heavy to bear. She realizes that Fish and Richmond have both lost three teammates today, have more to lose than anyone else here, and the game is still far from over.
Three incinerations is… beyond wrong. This is no coincidence. It's a payment, a consequence. What if nobody survives this game? How can she do this?
She can. She will. She won't let it become four, or more.
(And how is she going to do that? What use is her magic against an umpire, against the gods, against a debt that cannot go unpaid? How could she dare to think that she could make a difference?)
She finds no answer on her way back to the dugout, no answer in the ash-clogged air, no answer in the numb expressions on her teammates’ faces.
Bates’ bat seems to glow in her hands when she finally steps up to the plate, the warmth lingering stubbornly as the outline of the sun.
Hiroto’s determined to not look back, though there’s fire reflected in her eyes as she stares Kiki down from the mound. The first pitch lands right in the middle of the strike zone and Kiki doesn't even swing, hands frozen around the last traces of flame.
(What was that, Familia? You didn't pick up this bat just to hold it. Bates deserves better. Swing.)
She doesn't swing, though, next time, because she can see the ball veering off course. One and one. Not too bad of a start.
Kiki lets her instincts take over on the third pitch. Bates’ bat finally slices through the air again, sending the ball spiralling high as if it too wants to eclipse the sun.
Instead, it comes to rest in the far less lofty location of Peanutiel’s glove.
Three outs. Inning over.
Okay. That's okay. It's not bad. It's good. She didn't die. No one else died, not yet. This isn't a game to win, it's a game to survive.
She walks back to the dugout, unburnt, chin high. She doesn't talk to her new teammates, not wanting them to see how badly her hands are shaking. She has to be strong for them, because it's not her friends who are dying. Not yet.
They don't talk to her, either, but not out of rudeness. They’re looking past her again. If they see anything at all, it's the blinding echo of flames.
The game goes on. Kiki keeps looking up at the scoreboard, because surely it should have ended by now, but no. It goes on. The Tigers break the tie. The Talkers tie it up again. They can't leave. They can't give up. They have to play blaseball until they die.
It's the tenth inning by the time she’s up to bat again. It is about winning, now, too. No one will be safe until either team wins. She's got to do this.
Feet planted. Eyes up. Hands steady. Hiroto looks at her. Don't look back.
Swing.
She does, swings Bates’ bat with all her strength, feels the crack as it connects with the ball. Kiki takes off running, almost flying, as if Quack’s wings are spread out behind her, pushing her on. Home is right around the corner, but she doesn't want to risk it, and just barely slides into third. Safe.
(She doesn't feel safe.)
Kiki leads off as far past the base as she dares, watching Gloom step up to the plate. The image of Ziwa and Bates burns painfully in her mind.
She trusts Gloom to bring her home. To save them all. Gloom looks at her, and knows this, and nods.
And swings.
Kiki runs, soars, eyes fixed on that fourth base -- and then she's past it. Home. Safe. She looks to first and finds Gloom there. Safe.
(Nothing about this is safe.)
It should end there, but it doesn't. There are still two outs to get, and the time ticks on, and Antonio is up there, but he's only partly there, and all the fire the sun left behind is in her eyes and her mind and --
And it ends, finally.
There's no celebration. No shaking the other team’s hands. What is there to be said to each other? They just stand together, and grieve, and watch as the sun finally dares to show its face again.
Interlude
Kiki's broom sweeps through the air far above Sunken Halifax, Quack’s wings beating steadily at her side. The sky that surrounds them today is not dark, not light, nothing but a steady dull gray, solemn and unchanging. A purgatory to wait in until the flames of hell return.
No games today. Whether it’s out of confusion, necessity, some attempt at kindness, she doesn't know. It's a delay of the inevitable.
She’s on her way to practice, to practice with every moment she can have because it just might make a difference, because she needs to do something. Not at the stadium, though, because the thought of walking in there after yesterday, walking in there when she doesn't have to, is just too hard to bear.
Instead, she heads for an old field, where she remembers playing casual games with her friends many years ago. She'll pitch to herself with magic, or try and get Quack to do it, even if the resources back at the arena would make things easier.
Kiki spots them from the air. The team. The entire team. What are they doing here? She hops off her broom and signs a greeting, Quack fluttering to the ground next to her.
They're all looking at her. Or looking past her, eyes still instinctively scanning for someone who they'll never see again.
“Hey,” Ziwa says, taking charge of the welcoming again. “We all decided to meet up for a practice, because we had to do something, but -- well, you're here instead of there, so I guess you understand why we’re here too. Would have texted you to let you know, but no one has your number. Sorry, I know we didn't exactly get off to a great start yesterday, and you deserved better from us, and --”
Kiki shakes her head. “Let's not apologize to each other. We all know how awful things were yesterday. There's nothing else I would have expected you to do.”
Yesterday was hard for her, of course, but for the others... it was more than just losing their friends. It was knowing that they dared to defy the gods and all it brought them was more pain, pain that shows no sign of stopping anytime soon, and as much as they try to blame the gods and the umpires and Jaylen, they can't stop blaming themselves. How could they possibly have focused on someone new in the middle of all that, someone who’s only there because Bates died?
Kiki says none of this, of course. Nobody wants to talk about it. They want to try and pretend, just for a day, that things are okay, though it couldn't be further from the truth.
And so phone numbers are exchanged, Quack is introduced, and Kiki is officially welcomed by everyone as a new member of the team. She wasn't expecting their kindness to hurt, wasn't expecting to feel as though her heart might crack in half every time they talk to her because they're trying, they're trying so hard to make her feel welcome despite everything, signing while they speak and asking her questions about her life, about Quack, about whether she has any suggestions for this practice. The Talkers are her team, and they want her to feel like it’s true.
For the first time, she does.
This field has seen better days. It's muddy, most of left field is underwater, and someone appears to have literally stolen second base.
Somehow, it feels perfect.
It's not a very organized practice, although everyone is there -- even the pitchers who won't be pitching tomorrow, even PolkaDot, who never needs to practice. But what matters is that they're all together while they still can be, even if it's a solitary sort of togetherness, everyone slipping back into a subdued silence now that they’re spread out and alone with their thoughts again.
Ortiz Morse is pitching. He's pitching tomorrow. He's pitching now, throwing everywhere but the strike zone no matter how hard he tries, the dots and dashes repeating SOS with every ball until he just... stops, sinking to the ground.
“How am I going to keep you all safe?” he despairs as everyone gathers around. “I'm the worst person to have on the mound tomorrow, you know how long my games can get --”
The protests start up at once.
“Hey, no, don't talk like that.”
“It's not your responsibility to keep everyone safe.”
“We'll all be right there to back you up.”
“Nothing you do will make a difference.” Everyone turns to glare at PolkaDot, who quickly elaborates. “That is to say, if the gods wish for any of us to die, we’ll die regardless of how long the game goes, or who pitches. We can’t change what will happen, and we’ll only be punished further if we try to defy them again. Please don’t put such a heavy burden on yourself, Morse. If anything happens tomorrow, it won't be your fault.”
“Not sure if “we have no control over our fate” is very reassuring,” Ziwa mutters.
“No, that does help, in a way. Even if I'm not sure I can believe it.” Morse takes a deep breath, and some of the SOSes disperse. “Gives me something different to worry about, at least. It's just that I… I can't bear to lose any more of you. I don't know if I could ever forgive myself.”
Jenkins crosses their arms, eye glowing. “Are you saying you blame me and Hiroto for what happened yesterday?”
“No, of course not --”
“Then don't blame yourself tomorrow. No matter what happens.”
“...Right. Okay. I'll try.”
He's looking everywhere except at the wavering form of Antonio, and the rest of the team is doing the same. This does not go unnoticed.
“Could you all stop acting as if I'm already dead?” Antonio snaps. Kiki can barely understand him; his hands phase in and out of existence over the course of the sentence.
An awkward silence descends.
Finally, Greer looks at him. “I hate to break it to you, Tony, but... you’re a skeleton.”
No one's sure whether to laugh or cry, so they settle for both.
Now that the tension’s been eased a little, the practice properly gets going. Even Quack joins in, chasing foul balls whenever he's not following Kiki. The Talkers slide in the mud and splash through the water and argue about how much of the empty spot counts as second base, and it's as close to fun as it can possibly be.
Kiki hits one of Dot’s fastballs and watches it sail all the way into the woods. She jumps up and down with excitement, because if she can hit a home run off of PolkaDot freaking Patterson, she can --
She comes back down to earth as she remembers that tomorrow's game is not about hitting home runs. It's about surviving, again.
All she wanted was to play blaseball.
“You're allowed to be happy,” Dot tells her. As always, it’s hard to read their expression, but she thinks they look… impressed? Proud, maybe? But not happy.
Kiki thinks about what they said earlier. Is it better to believe that she can make a difference one way or the other, or that things will just be the way they will be? She doesn't know the answer. She doesn't know what to believe anymore.
But she knows she wants to be happy. She's going to be happy, even if it can only be for brief fleeting moments before darkness falls again. And so Kiki finds herself celebrating even harder when it's Morse’s turn to pitch again and he strikes her out.
(She reassures him that yes, she was trying her hardest, and yes, all those pitches were in the strike zone, even the ones she swung at. The others vouch for this, and for a moment, he's happy too.)
(But will it matter?)
Nobody wants this practice, this day, to end, but the sky is already darkening in a natural way, and they can't stay out here forever. They still linger, though, not saying much but not wanting to give up this safe togetherness.
“Thank you,” Kiki says once it's clear they really can't stay any longer. “Thank you for making me feel like part of the team already. I know it hasn't been easy for you. I wish we could have met under better circumstances, but... I'm glad I met you all, despite everything.” She wants to say more, but she's not sure what. It will come in time, she thinks.
“I don't think anyone meets under good circumstances anymore.” Ziwa’s smiling, but their eyes aren't. “But if we had to meet someone, we’re glad it's you.”
The others chime in their agreement, and for a moment, Kiki struggles under the weight of their grief and kindness and expectations. But she shoulders it all and stands high, thanking them again. She's as glad as she can be to be here.
Morse says it best when they all finally turn to go, no longer feeling quite so hopeless.
“Whatever happens tomorrow, we’ll face it together.”
Season 7, Day 33
It's time.
Her first full game in the major leagues. This would have been something to celebrate, but no one feels like celebrating today.
On her way to the field, Kiki looks to the dugout, where Quack stares back in concern. He'd refused to stay in the stands, wanting to be as close to her as possible. Normally she’d be worried about him getting into mischief, but he's much too tense for that today. The other four pitchers are there to watch him, and all he's doing is watching her.
I'll be back, I promise, she repeats to him. She kept that promise last time, and she intends to do it again.
The sky fades back into shadows, the sun hiding away again as if ashamed, afraid.
Kiki won't be afraid. She'll get through this. She's not unstable. They just need to protect Tony, and it will be okay.
(It won't ever be okay again, not really, no matter what happens today. Not after what they've all been through. But they have to keep playing, and so she has to believe it will be okay.)
She's so busy thinking and trying not to think that she almost misses the ball, but at the last second she leaps, invisible wings lifting her up, and it thumps into her glove. Okay. Good. One out. Only fifty-three more until this is over, and only twenty-six of those are resting on Morse's shoulders. She waves the ball at him and manages to grin. Nothing to worry about.
The dots and dashes spell out thank you.
Morse strikes out the next batter, and Kiki's grin widens. Only fifty-two more. They can do this. They have to do this. He's looking more confident.
And then he's not, he's looking behind him, and Kiki follows his gaze, her entire body prickling with sudden unease...
The nearby face turns towards her, an inescapable, terrifying glow behind that mask. Kiki closes her eyes, remembering all too well what the fire looks like.
Please, don't take any more of them. They've suffered too much. Let it be me.
She wonders if her words make a difference, and then she can't wonder anything anymore.
Quack feels everything. The fire, the pain, the hopelessness, the terror.
And then, nothing. A horrible blank lonely emptiness, the complete absence of his person like a sudden hollow pit in his chest. He tumbles into it as if his wings can no longer hold him up, the world now stumblingly dark and blindingly bright all at once, and Kiki, his Kiki, is no longer in any part of it.
He sees her there on the field, the absence of her, the pile of ash, and spreads his wings to go out there, but she's not really there, but he has to go, she --
Strong arms wrap around him before he can take off. Wrong arms, belonging to the wrong person. He struggles and flaps and shrieks, but they hold firm.
“I'm sorry, Quack,” Jenkins says, pulling him back to the dugout. “She's gone. There's -- there’s nothing we can do. It's not safe for you out there.”
It wasn't safe for her and she went anyway! Quack screams. But none of them understand the words. None of them are her.
He scrambles over to the corner and picks up the still-warm bat, feeling the faint tingle of her magic. She held this for such a short time, but it has not forgotten. Quack swings it around and stares down the pitchers, daring them to stop him.
“You don't have to do this, Quack,” Jenkins shakes their head. “We’ll find someone else, someone with experience, who --”
Quack flutters his wings in frustration. How can someone else do this? No one else is going to replace his Kiki. He won't let this last part of her go, no matter what.
Greer raises an eyebrow. “A duck playing blaseball? I mean, I've seen weirder. I think we should let him go, if he wants. Someone has to.” She looks regretful.
“There’s nothing in the rulebook to suggest that a duck can't play blaseball,” Mooney agrees.
“This isn’t a choice to make lightly, Quack.” PolkaDot’s expression is unreadable as always. “You can never go back if you choose to step out on that field.”
I don't care I don't care I DON'T CARE! I can never go back anyway! She's gone and she'll always be gone and nothing can change that, we can't bring her back because now we know the consequences, she's gone and I'm here and I need to do this for her because there's nothing else I can do!
The rest of the team is back now, everyone but her, stumbling one by one into the dugout.
“Goddammit!” Ziwa yells, punching the wall. “This is all wrong, it shouldn't have happened, it wasn't even part of the debt! She stepped up for us and died for nothing ! She didn't even get one full game!”
Morse has slipped back into an anguished swirl of dots and dashes, barely understandable. Words jump out here and there: Kiki. already. sorry. innings. slow. can't. SOS.
“You have to,” Antonio tells him, various bones phasing in and out of existence. “It's just eight more innings. I survived the last game, and I plan on surviving this one, too. You're doing fine. We just need to hold on.”
Everyone had been so focused on worrying about Tony that they hadn't stopped to consider the possibility of a regular incineration. That if he was okay, they'd all be okay.
(No one is okay.)
But they have to keep playing. Morse sits down, tries to pull himself together. Quack holds tightly to the bat, though no one tries to take it now.
Haley strikes out, hands shaking. Ziwa strikes out, not even moving, as if they've forgotten how to hit the ball.
Quack has never learned how to hit the ball, but he’s seen Kiki do it many times and he’ll never see her do it again and he's going to try anyway, for her.
Dunlap doesn't offer him a moment to prepare, to grieve, knowing that the kindest thing, the most important thing, is to just finish this game as soon as possible. They throw the ball with a fierceness that Quack tries to match, but the bat just wiggles wildy before the ball thumps into the catcher's glove.
The umpire calls it strike one, and Quack wants to rip that metal cage off their face, see if he finds fire or just surprise beneath, wants to scream and wail and tear them to pieces until someone else is hurting more than him.
He misses the next pitch, flames raging through his mind.
Swing, come on, swing, you only have a beak and the memory of her but that has to be good enough. Swing.
He does, hitting the ball, almost taking off before he remembers what the lines on the ground mean.
Foul.
Come on come on we don't have time for this she wouldn't want anyone else to die just hit the ball better come ON
Quack remembers watching Kiki stand here that day, seeing her hit that ball towards the remnants of the sun. He swings and watches this ball do the same, arc high in the air and plummet into a glove.
Three outs. Inning over.
It's good, he knows, good to move the game along, it doesn't matter who wins. But he wants to do more than that for her, prove that she deserved to be there, that he deserves to be there, that...
But it doesn't matter. None of this matters, without her.
He takes the field without being asked. Without a glove. He has wings and a beak, and that's enough, and he proves it when he catches the third out.
(It's not enough.)
(It'll never be enough.)
They're all watching Tony when he's up to bat. They all see it happen. He's there, and then he's flames, and then he's gone. Didn't even make it three whole innings.
This death is not a surprise. It still hurts. Even Quack, who barely knew him, who didn't think there was room for any more pain.
Everyone hovers around Mooney, who's caught the instability, but she waves them off, as if she hasn't just been marked for death. “I think it's unlikely to affect me if I'm not pitching. Yazmin's been fine so far.”
“Oh, like Tony was fine, until he wasn't?” Ziwa adds a second dent to the wall.
No one is fine, unstable or not. Kiki's death proved that.
The game goes on. Quack strikes out again and again, the flames dancing behind his eyes with every swing. The Tigers rack up runs. Morse walks the bases loaded and blinks a nonstop SOS SOS SOS.
It ends, eventually. 16-2. A pointless game. Not worth dying for. No game is worth dying for, but she died anyway. Quack will probably die for a game someday too, now that he's caught up in this, now that there's no going back.
He can't bring himself to care.
It's the same as before. No celebration. No shaking of hands. The Tigers haven't lost anyone today, but they know how this feels. Quack stands alone, still clutching the bat, watching the Talkers comfort each other. What's the point in going over there? They were Kiki’s team, she should be the one there with them, bonding over this loss, she…
She's gone. She's not coming back. The Talkers are his team now, even if he dies tomorrow.
Quack flaps his wings, drifting over to join them. He owes it to her to try.