Chapter Text
-1-
Hello?
The sky spirals like a vortex. It's the slow spin of cirrus clouds above the water's edge like the stirring of cream into a near-sickly aqua sky. Even the skies in Naples aren't this blue. There are birds overhead, though his eyes aren't quite good enough to tell what they might be, simply categorized as small blurs of white and black specks amidst the thin clouding. The next thing that hits his senses is the salt in the air, causing the bridge of his freckle-spat nose to curl in. Small tones of a more aquatic -- if not fishy -- odor weigh down the air in a magnitude only Doppio can pick up on. His sense of smell was always particularly keen.
The water sets in soon after. As his magenta turtleneck quickly laps up the water, Doppio can only now become hyper-aware of the thick sheet of water stretching and touching even the furthest edges of the horizon. He quickly scrambles, stirring to stand himself up to only realize the uncomfortable, heavy pull the water's gained on his clothing and the embarrassing realization that he'd just been marinating in seawater for god knows how long. The absence of wrinkles on his fingertips and palms seem to have kept that knowledge in sworn secrecy. It seems the birds do too.
Doppio can only keep his eyes trained on the birds -- for so long until gravity seems to have it's fun, grabbing him by the back of the neck and harshly laying him back down into the shallow deep with a loud splash muffled as seawater paths into his ears. It seems to muffle the irritating speak of his avian spectators at the very least.
But his body aches, made painfully apparent by his first dose of a soaking. Each joint feels rusted to his confusion, like a machine left ungreased. The boss certainly wouldn't be happy nor approving of his laziness, and the thought near-instantly springs him back onto his feet despite his protesting joints. He is far too young to feel this old.
Swaying, Doppio manages to keep himself upright as his feet plant on unsteady sand. It takes a sharp breath and a firm furrow of his brows until he feels right enough to think, that of which he admittedly has not done much of ever since he'd woken. Once he opens his eyes, there comes a light realization. There isn't much to see.
If not for his wobbled reflection in the inflicted ripple of water and the trill echoing down from the sky, there isn't another soul in sight. There's simply nothing.
Not that there only isn't anything to see, but that there isn't life elsewhere. The air is still, and despite his watered skin and the soak of his clothes, it isn't cold. It's empty weight. How peculiar, truly. No stand that he knows could behave like this, but Doppio doesn't rule the idea out. Who knows.
His hands soon navigate to his pockets, palming the hind of his pants and circling to the fronts in the case he has a device. His search yields nothing, and there's both relief in knowing he hadn't destroyed a valuable electronic, and something near fear knowing that he hasn't the privilege to contact anyone to ask where the hell he might even be. The idea of escaping catches his exhale into a nervous and shaking breath.
But first, he knows not enough. The boss had always called him a little naive, that Doppio had known as long as he'd been in Passione, and listed it as a top-priority trait for him to shake. That wouldn't make a good member out of him, now would it?
Doppio takes a quick glance around as if there had been something left unseen until now, keeping himself anything but disappointed at the results. As nothing seems to pique his interest, he might as well continue straight forwards. Perhaps there was a reason why he might've been oriented in this direction.
As his leather oxfords wade him through the ankle-level water, it gives him time to trace through his memories.
"It's so lonely..."
The words leave bloodied chapped lips drier despite the cold rain. His heart races, and the sound of his own words dies amidst the loud impact of the rain on brick. The stench of blood comes in waves as precipitation makes a poor attempt to wash it away. Something burns, the hot feeling sitting in the pit of his abdomen where a hand's been left clutched. It seems like he's been here for some time, left to die without another soul in sight.
This is it. He knows it. This is the part where he dies.
It's familiar, and Doppio has been here before. He recognizes the arching brick buildings towering over him like titans, quiet and enduring to the weather. He knows this endless grey of sky, and the idea of a nonexistent god existing in his dying hour comes like an idea he's had before.
Reflexively, his hazel eyes flinch and shut to the unrelenting rain hitting him no different than the cold ground he lays on. But he can't, he doesn't want to close his eyes just yet. Once he does, all this will disappear, and it will all be over. So his eyes force open even to the criticizing rain, even if this is the last thing he'll ever see. He forces his mind to something better, something he would had rather seen in his dying breaths. And it all comes back to his boss. The words come out as fast as the life drains from his body.
"Could you call me again... like you always have..?"
A phone rings, and Doppio has just the energy to flinch.
This isn't how he remembered it.
His strained eyes quickly dart upwards, and his neck cranes back far enough to find a red cellphone sitting half a metre away from his hand, fingers uncurled with a palm open as if he'd dropped it this way. It rings again, demanding an audience. He doesn't need to guess who it might be, knowing the lecture he might receive if even one call goes unheard. Doppio's fingertips twitch, and his throat tightens in a grunt as he attempts to stretch his arm out enough to grab it. It feels like his joints are dislocating themselves, his arm undoing itself just far enough to grab the little red cellphone.
Doppio has it, and he curls a finger in to pry the phone closer. His fingertip only ends up scratching the hard shell.
Time's up.
The light comes bright on his eyes as soon as he's woken back up. He squints, his lips perking into a frown to focus on what's circling in the sky. They're seagulls.
His pleasant discovery can only distract him for so long until Doppio comes to realize that he's been floating, kept in a stasis above the water. It's not terrifyingly deep at this point, but the sand he'd been laying on prior is only a quarter metre deeper now. That, or the water had risen just as much. It takes a slightly more awkward scramble to propel himself onto his feet than the last time, and it's now he measures the water to be around his knee.
But hadn't he been wandering just moments ago? Hadn't the water been lower? He could have sworn...
And he could have sworn that the black rotary dial telephone hadn't been there before, sitting neatly on a black carved wooden table with a rather pleasant yet old-fashioned lace mat underneath just metres away. He awkwardly scrambles, wading through knee-deep waters to grab onto the telephone. He owes someone a call.
Doppio's slightly wrinkled fingers meet the dial, fitting into slots as he dials the only number he knows at the top of his head. Heart swelling in anticipation, he can only chew on his lower lip to wait. Now feels like forever, and he can't even measure the amount of time he's stood himself here without a shed of shame listening to the dead dial of a telephone.
The tone pops, and the bland buzzing soon replaces itself with a strange fizz of static. A voice calls itself through.
"Hello?"