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If you were to ask Khun Aguero Agnis to describe the person in front of him, not a single word uttered would be positive. He despised every part of the person in front of him. It wasn’t that he didn’t try to understand Rachel, he really did try to look for some redeeming quality in her. But if it was there he couldn’t find it. He desperately wanted to believe everything Bam told him, he wanted to believe that Bam the most didn’t just enter the tower chasing a lie. He so desperately wanted to believe that Bam didn’t almost throw away his life over and over again for someone who would throw him at the drop of a hat. In the years he spent taking care of her he sincerely looked for some redeeming quality about her, something to help him understand why Bam cherished her so much, why he clung to her so desperately. But there was nothing. Not a single redeeming quality; when she smiled her face would scrunch up in this way that made him want to punch her. When she laughed it was a weird giggle dipped in sarcasm that made him want to punch her. When she spoke her breath reeked in a way that made him want to punch her. When he saw her eyes, all he could think about was how this was the person who tried to kill Bam. Her personality was also unbearable, Khun couldn’t tell what he hated more; Rachel when she was acting pitiful and crippled, or when she was herself, a vile wretched person. He hated the way she always thought she was smarter than everyone else when he could see through almost everything she did. Including this very, very predictable ambush. Despite being able to predict this ambush he wasn’t sure if they would be able to win this fight. One thing that Rachel always seemed to have were strong teammates. If they fought here the only recourse would have been for them to escape with the sweetfish at the cost of another Dallar, which wouldn’t have been a bad tradeoff, but even so Khun wanted to goad Rachel. Perhaps it was an act of mercy, perhaps it was a gut feeling, but Khun knew this was something he had to do.
“...So why don’t we have a match to see who gets the remaining dallas from both teams?... a match between the two of us.”
For Khun this invitation wasn’t directed at Rachel, but at fate itself.
“To be honest, I kind of just want to prove you wrong, too. Hurry up and toss it.” Rachel said with what could only be described as a smile in the loosest of terms.
“Let’s ask god how this will turn out.” Khun responded as he tossed the coin in the air with an easy flick of his thumb. The coin rose into the air with a quiet ping, and it fell on the lighthouse between them.
Heads.
Just as planned.
And as predicted she lashed out.
“That wasn’t a proper showdown! It doesn’t count!”
“It doesn’t count? What do you mean? We said we wouldn’t complain about the results. You can’t complain about it now…” Khun responded to her cooly.
And then she did something he didn’t predict. Amongst her blathering and complaining she baited Khun with the one thing he could be baited with. Bam. Khun expected more dallas or a bonus for the next test, but this was...unexpected.
“I’ll tell you everything that you want to know. About Bam and my past...Everything.”
Reason told him to turn around, to not take her up on this bet but Khun was consumed by curiosity. Where Bam came from… what his true identity is… this was an offer hard for Khun to turn down. Whenever the topic of Bam’s time outside the tower came up Bam always redirected the conversation or only told him the surface details— it was clear to Khun that conversations about Bam’s life before the tower were a touchy subject for Bam, and so he also refrained from prying. And now the information was being offered to him. Chances were she would lie about everything but there was still the possibility that she might tell him the truth. Bam’s past was the one thing she held over him. If he was actually going to gamble with fate this would be a good place to start, this was a risk he was willing to take, besides, this was between him and fate.
“Alright. I’ll let you try again. But this time, if you lose, that’s it.”
Rachel tossed the coin and it landed on tails. Which wasn’t a surprise (if she didn’t rig the toss then she was far more stupid than he thought), what almost did make him laugh out loud was that Rachel also genuinely seemed excited that it landed on tails. Seeing her so happy made him irrationally upset.
“Ahh… well that’s not good. I can’t believe you won, but this only proves that the game was fair. Let’s play one more round. Best of three— whoever wins twice is the final winner.”
“Fine.”
“Let’s see whom god loves more.”
He might have been the one who said those words but he already knew the answer. God loved him more. There was no way the universe loved someone as wretched as Rachel, god would never love someone like her. Not someone as disgusting as her. Khun was going to win.
It wasn’t just a matter of probability, if it landed on tails once, it would probably land on heads the next time. But he knew probability wouldn’t save him here. It wasn’t because Khun did the math that he knew she was going to lose. It was because he knew the world simply would not, and could not love someone as ugly as she is. And if the world did truly love someone as ugly as her then this world was not worth living in either.
All eyes in the area were trained on Rak. With a quiet ping the coin turned in the air and landed with a quiet clink on the lighthouse between Rachel and Khun.
And just as he predicted, god loved him more.