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She had gone by Noise from the time she was old enough to care what she was called. She hadn’t known why—hadn’t been able to locate a reason from the cacophony of nightmares out of which she’d drawn her nickname—but she’d thrown a tantrum and refused to respond to any other name even so, and so by the time she was sixteen she was known as Noise almost exclusively.
This was a good thing, because when Noise was sixteen the cacophony in her dreams resolved itself into crystal-clear memories of another life—another life in which she was mad, and a Baskerville, and there were other girls in her head—Echo upon Echo upon lonely, lonely Echo, sweet Echo, poor mistreated Echo—oh God—raped and beaten and desecrated Echo, Echo who had one friend, a friend whom Noise had done her very best to isolate her from, Echo who had guarded Noise’s soul and said she would guide her into the next life—into this life—regardless—where was that Echo?
The first thing Noise did upon hitting that particular question was snatch the scissors from her desk drawer and rush to her bathroom mirror and cut her bangs into a shoddy impersonation of the haircut she and Echo had worn in her last life. The second thing she did was squeeze her eyes shut and search deep down inside her and search for any sign of Echo—of Duldum—of any Duldee, and come up blank. It was only her inside her head—only her, a feeling so novel and so lonely that Noise wanted to scream, but she gritted her teeth, did her best not to think about it, and went about evening out her new haircut as best she could, staring at her reflection as though she might find poor Echo somewhere behind the mirror. The third thing she did was to try and seek out Echo on social media. She went to the Baskervilles’ official page—their latest post was about four years old, an In Memory Of for a Vincent Nightray, and Noise felt something inside of her squeeze in grief before she forced herself to think, he had a happy life, he lived in love, it’s okay, he’ll move on to his next life just like I did, and continued scrolling through the page. There was no sign of Echo there, though, and so she swiped out of it, took a selfie, and entered it into a reverse Google images search, but she only came up with her own pictures. Then, and only then, did she wonder if she might have been the only one reincarnated. Had Echo had her own soul, really? Had any of the Echos had one?
Noise should have known this. Echo—every Echo had been the product of her Chain. Each one had been of her own creation, somewhat, and they had held her memories close and based themselves off of her. She was the Noise and they the Echos—and had they been allowed their own lives in the cycle of reincarnation? Or—or did they truly vanish, gone and dead forever in the manner typically reserved only for Children of Ill Omen?
Noise cursed, using language she had never heard even once in this life, and threw her phone across the room, glaring at her reflection in the mirror. Her bangs were uneven and messier than they had been, back then, and if she tied her hair in her own old hairstyle that would have been fine, but leaving it loose in Echo’s it just looked wrong. Shabby, messy, a poor reflection—
But which one of them had been the reflection, really? Noise had existed first, back then and now, and if she wanted to wear Echo’s hairstyle badly that was her right. Echo was her reverberation, and now Echo was gone.
Noise kicked the wall and cursed again.
The next morning for school, she kept her hair in Echo’s style and threw her arms into a red hoodie before stomping down to her bus stop, still silently fuming over Vincent’s death and Echo’s lack of existence. It wasn’t fair. It wasn’t fair. Noise had—had—at the time of her death—and Echo had forgiven her, which burned more than anything else, really, and maybe if Echo had been the one to go on to the next life and Noise was the one to die, that forgiveness would have been okay, but Noise was here and Echo was not, and so the forgiveness was bullshit and unfair and Noise was furious with it, just furious. She didn’t want forgiveness. She didn’t want peace or healing or any of that crap. She wanted Echo back, and she wanted Echo to be able to live a happy life with Oz Vessalius (even if Noise thought that the girl could do better, really), and she wanted Vincent to be fucking alive, and—and—damn. Damn!
Noise continued her sulk at the bus stop, where her two classmates who lived on her street—Oscar and Bridget—stared at her in shock and then both looked away quickly and did not meet her eyes. Bridget and Noise shared a birthday, and Oscar was born three days before them, and they’d spent most of their childhoods playing together in the streets. It had been Noise and Bridget who were the first to learn that Oscar was in fact a boy instead of a girl, and though he’d begun to avoid them slightly after he revealed this fact, and his name, spoken like an accusation, they had remained, to some extent or the other, friends.
“...Interesting haircut, Noise,” said Oscar after a few moments.
“It sucks actually,” said Noise. “I’m shitty at cutting hair. Plus it’s an ugly haircut and it’s even uglier when it’s all done up. So.”
“So why did you cut it, then?” said Oscar. He seemed now strangely on edge, his fingers brushing just slightly against the box cutter hanging from the side of his backpack, a gift from his boyfriend Kevin who was currently in disciplinary school for trying to kill a kid who called the long-dead Lady Sharon Rainsworth a traitorous slut.
“I needed this style for a reverse Google Images search,” said Noise, “but it failed so fuck that, I guess.”
“You gave yourself a bad haircut for a reverse Google Images search?” said Bridget, who had in fact sported this very haircut from first grade to fifth. “Why? What is it that you were looking for?”
“Echo,” Noise muttered, looking away.
“Yes?” said Bridget.
“Oh, shit,” said Oscar, and he took out his box cutter and held it in a defensive position.
“What the fuck are you doing,” said Noise. “Are you high? Has your freak of a boyfriend broken out of jail? What the fuck?”
“Kevin isn’t in jail, he’s in juvie, there’s a difference,” said Oscar defensively. “Also—I would rather you not kill me again, Noise.”
“Kill you agai—”
Blond hair. Green eyes. Chosen name Oscar.
“Oh, fuck fucking shit, you’re Oscar Vessalius?!”
“Was that not obvious, Noise?” said Bridget.
“Give me a break, I just remembered everything last night!” Noise shrieked.
“Last night!? You’ve been going by ‘Noise’ since we were in kindergarten!”
“I had vibes, but I didn’t know what they meant,” Noise groused. “—Wait, are you from—that life—as well?”
Bridget rolled her eyes. “Take a wild guess,” she said.
“Well—you know Oscar Vessalius—” Noise realized, belatedly, that she didn’t actually know the names of most of the people with whom she had associated in her past life. “You’re not Gilbert, are you?”
“Sweet Core from which all things flow,” said Bridget, which was a Baskerville curse, but this was about when the school bus arrived, and the other girl practically fled inside, leaving Noise with Oscar, still clutching his box cutter with a vehemence, on the curb.
“Might want to put that thing away before you get arrested,” said Noise, following their neighbor onto the bus, and Oscar gritted his teeth on the pavement for a moment more before clipping it back onto his backpack and sitting as far away from Noise as he could manage, which she told herself she wasn’t upset about, because why would Noise Baskerville want to associate with Oscar Vessalius anyway. She’d pretended to be Echo and then stabbed him in the gut in front of his kids. Why would he even pretend to be friends with her?
She was gratified, though, to see that he didn’t sit with Bridget, who was watching Noise with an intensity she usually only reserved for substitute teachers she planned to torment into oblivion or one of the new Baskerville teenagers, whom she’d seen once at a conference she’d attended and had been making eyes at and flirting with over text messaging ever since. Bridget and Noise had been best friends since they were very young, though, like Oscar, Bridget had gone a little odd a few summers ago. She had become a bit quieter, a bit sadder, and had grown her massive crush on that Baskerville kid. That was another bit of evidence towards her being secretly Gilbert, maybe, though Noise kind of suspected that Bridget would have stuck a lot closer to Oscar and wouldn’t still be going by Bridget if that were the case.
After one of the longest and most awkward bus rides of Noise’s life, the high schoolers all filed out of the bus and onto the campus. Noise, who had spent the bus ride reflecting and desperately hoping that her childhood best friend wasn’t Gilbert Nightray, darted after Oscar and grabbed his arm.
“I’m sorry for stabbing you in front of your kids,” she said. “I won’t attempt to murder you again.”
“—Thanks,” said Oscar. “I’m going to find them again. Oz—Gilbert—and Ada. I fully intend to do things right this time around. And I won’t let anyone hurt them.”
“Geez, okay, I got it,” Noise muttered, letting go of his arm and rolling her eyes. “I won’t bother you anymore. Sorry.”
A divot entered Oscar’s brow. “Noise—I—look, we didn’t know each other in our past life, and honestly I’m glad for it. But I am glad I got to know you in this one. As long as you don’t hurt any of my family, I don’t mind remaining friends with you.”
“Oh,” said Noise, surprised, something warm unfurling in her chest and blooming out into a smile. “That’s—thanks. I don’t plan on trying serial murder this lifetime, anyway. I got enough of it last time.”
“That’s good to hear,” said Oscar.
“You should try to track down and kill your bitch-ass older brother, though,” said Noise. “You know, the one who shot you in the head? He died like the same day I did. A Chain got him. It would have been more tragic except the fight with that Chain and everything stopped me killing your kids, so it’s whatever, I guess.”
“Just because Xai died at the same time as you doesn’t mean he—”
“It does,” said Noise. “One hundred years after the day you died, you get born again. No way around it unless you turn into a Chain or you’re sacrificed to the Abyss, since Chains can’t die and sacrifices can’t reincarnate.”
Oscar’s eyes widened. “So—Oz is still alive,” he said.
“What?” said Noise. “No way. He wasn’t a Baskerville, so he couldn’t have lived the past hundred and sixteen years. He probably died of old age, or somethi—”
“No, Lord Oz was a Chain, like I was,” said Bridget from directly behind Noise, who yelped and jumped nearly half a foot in the air.
“You were—a Chain?!” Noise said. “Who in the fuck were you? How did you reincarnate?”
“That’s none of my business,” said Bridget. “But Lord Oz was a Chain, the Bloodstained Black Rabbit. He ended up taking control of Jack Vessalius’s body after losing his memories, once Jack’s soul had shattered enough to vacate it. And he has been reincarnated. He’s a Baskerville now. I got his number a few years ago, and we’ve been texting.”
“What, your Baskerville sweetheart?” said Noise, torn between delight and shock. “How’d you get that information?”
Bridget blushed. “He’s—not my sweetheart,” she said. “We’re friends. Shared experiences and et cetera. And I asked him about it, that’s how I learned who he was and that he remembered. Communication is important, Noise.”
“You can shove communication up my ass,” said Noise. “Communication can suck my big fat dick. Which is coincidentally what I texted your Baskerville sweetheart from your Instagram account three days ago, Bridget, so if he says anything about it—”
“He knew it was you,” said Bridget. “Also, don’t call me Bridget.”
“Well, what should I call you, then?” said Noise. “Gilbert?”
“Absolutely not. He‘s still actually alive, too, you,” said Bridget. “Oz’s guardian, actually, and that girl Alice’s too. You can guess who I am.”
Noise rolled her eyes. “Well,” she said, “I knew like seven people back then, so I’ve got a real fucking limited pool to draw from.”
“I’m sure you’ll think of me eventually,” said Bridget as the bell rang. “Don’t worry about it.”
“Alright, geez,” muttered Noise, heading off to class. “See you two chucklefucks later.”
“Right back at you!” Oscar called over his shoulder, heading to his own class. Bridget, for her part, accompanied Noise to her classroom, nodded a goodbye, and then went off to her own class. It was an old habit, one that Bridget claimed to have started to make sure that Noise didn’t skip class, but as Noise headed inside to her desk, she wondered for the first time why the other girl would do such a thing. Noise had not thought that any person she’d known in her past life would ever voluntarily help her with anything, not even Vincent—and anyway, Vincent wouldn’t be reincarnated for another ninety-six years. Oscar Vessalius’s kindness had been a shock—a welcome one, but a shock nonetheless. Kindness such as that had not existed in Noise’s world, not in that life, not for far too long—so who was Bridget, and why was she insisting on being Noise’s friend? Habit? They had known each other since they were infants—
—so adorable, Bridget’s practically her echo—
—What is it that you were looking for? —Echo. —Yes?
—Holy fuck. Holy fuck. What were the fucking chances? Was that even possible?
Noise pulled her phone out of her pocket and opened her texting app, thumbing over to Bridget’s contact.
noisemaker
ARE YOU FUCKING ECHOjyanta-kun
I’m not fucking anyone.
But yes, I am Echo.
Congratulations on figuring it out.noisemaker
you could have told me :/jyanta-kun
I think it was kind of obvious, actually.noisemaker
well maybe i’m not that smartjyanta-kun
You know that isn’t true, Noise.
Also please don’t text in class.noisemaker
:/
Noise tucked away her phone, though, somewhat shocked and off-balanced by the revelation. She hadn’t thought Echo would be so close—or that the forgiveness would persist—and yet—and yet—
Class was starting, which was annoying, but Noise didn’t really pay much attention to it, her mind whirring over her new memories, her new knowledge about her friends. Had Echo and Oscar talked about the fact that Echo was flirting with the reincarnation of Oscar’s kid, who was their age now? Why had Echo forgiven Noise? Why did she still care about her? And how had this Echo, out of all the Echos there ever were, gotten enough of her own soul to reincarnate?
All these questions and more bounced around Noise’s head as school for the day started, and she made a mental note to try and get answers out of the Baskervilles later. After all, they would probably be very interested in the fact that three people had been reincarnated with their memories intact and, at the very least, she might get one or two answers herself.
But for now, she was in class, and so she opened her notebook and started doodling random things. After all, she had a reputation to upkeep and friends to disappoint, and a whole host of new memories to sort through.