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Near Darkness.
That’s what first came to the jester’s mind when she awoke within an endless black void.
Everything around her was shrouded in near darkness—it almost reminded Pomni of the time she ended up trapped in Hell with Kinger at the Mildenhall Manor, except now she was all alone.
Pomni tried to scan her surroundings, but the insufficient lighting didn't work in her favor.
“H-Hell-Hello?” the jester called out, her speech cracking like a rickety floorboard under pressure.
There was no response—not even the faintest trace of an echo.
Anxiously turning her feet inward with her back hunched, Pomni fiddled at her mismatched red and blue gloved hands before pulling at the yellow cuffs. “...I-is anybody out there?" she asked meekly—hoping someone would respond this time, but sadly the results again proved fruitless.
As she turned her head side to side, the two tails of her belled red and blue striped jester hat flopped lazily with each soft head turn, while the two bells themselves produced a faint jingle.
“Mmph," Pomni shyly hummed out through a brief press of her thin lips. The uneasiness she felt made her feet feel as though they weighed hundreds of pounds—leaving her mobility impaired.
Without warning, beams of white light sprouted down throughout certain areas of this unknown black void, causing Pomni to stiffen up in fear while expressing bafflement over the abrupt turn of events, but was at the very least relieved that light was now shining within her vast confinement.
“W-w-wha—” Pomni then felt something sprint past her from behind, resulting in her turning around frantically; her beautiful blue and red pinwheel pupils were now animated scribbles.
“Who’s there?!" the jester asked apprehensively, her eyes darting around erratically.
An agonized groan was produced in Pomni's front direction, making said jester's adrenaline accumulate as her breathing steadily became rapid and erratic. “H-hello?!" she fearfully cried.
What followed mere seconds later was an anguish ridden reply. “...S-st-ay..b-ba-ack…”
Pomni blinked; her scribbled pupils reverted back to their blue and red pinwheel appearance.
The prickling fear that resonated within Pomni’s psyche instantly vanished when she recognized that voice, but was now concerned over the state she had heard it in. Without hesitation, Pomni ran towards where the voice was; the feeling of her feet weighing hundreds of pounds vanished.
“A-are y—” Just as she reached a hand out, Pomni was violently shoved away by a lanky arm.
“ARGH–OW!” When Pomni's tiny, computer-generated body collided with the cold, hard ground below her, white-hot pain shot through every artificial nerve the jester had within her digital form, causing her pupils to briefly turn into a white circle with a black outline to showcase her distress.
After tumbling for a bit from the push, the little jester found herself under a wide light beam.
Ignoring the pain as best as she could, Pomni clumsily sat up to gaze in full bewilderment at the perpetrator that pushed her away without a second thought—something the jester had become all too familiar with him doing, and learned to subtly tolerate it during her time within the Circus.
“Seriously! Are you ever not—” Pomni stopped—her cartoony body froze in horror at what stood beyond the illuminated space—the pupils to her large eyes once again changed in appearance, this time Pomni's pupils shrunk so much it nearly made her eyes appear to be nothing but white.
Limping inside the light despite his warning to stay away was none other than one of Pomni’s fellow captives of the digital realm, Jax, only now the lagomorph's rubber hose appearance was nearly unrecognizable; grotesquely transforming into a form the jester was unfortunately all too familiar with, and understood that once the process had begun there was no way to reverse it.
Jax is abstracting.
The rabbit’s entire right side was morphing into sharp jagged black edges that glitched, and pulsed with every passing second as large colorful blinking eyes scattered the infected areas.
“P-P-om…niiii…” Jax wheezed out.
If it wasn't for the fact that Pomni's milky white skin, and pink blush were already pre-rendered when she was forced to take on this artificial body of hers, her entire pigment would've been instantly drained of any color right then and there due to the horror she saw before her eyes.
“J-J-Ja-Ja-JAX?!" Pomni exclaimed in frantic, stuttering turmoil.
The tall periwinkle lagomorph let out an agonized groan before falling to his hands and knees, his body violently contorting as his abstracted right side began to menacingly spread towards his left.
Despite herself, Pomni gently scooted closer towards her abstracting companion; the short cast member abandoned a circus mate twice already out of her own safety and benefit, she wasn't about to repeat the same act again no matter how dire the situation could turn out in the end.
“..I-I.." Pomni whimpered before coming to a stop. “what should I do?”
Jax avoided eye contact while drawing in a shaky breath. “W-why…do y-you…c-care?”
The jester blinked her eyes in puzzlement. “Wh—Why wouldn't I—”
“W-we're NOT fr-friends, re-rem-remember?!” Jax snapped, venom laced despite his stutter.
Pomni fell silent—unable to formulate a reply.
The rabbit couldn't say anything more in turn when he felt the contortion of his body worsening, making Pomni weakly back away at this as her own digital form began to tremble—only in the jester’s case it wasn't from abstracting herself, but from the fear her artificial heart was feeling.
Even though Pomni told herself earlier that she wasn't going to abandon Jax despite it threatening her very own safety, she was regrettably starting to have second thoughts.
Pomni's brief change of heart from feeling overwhelmed made her ponder in spite of herself.
What's the point in trying to reach out to Jax when he constantly chooses to push her away, no matter how hard she tries to look past his faults? If Jax doesn't want anyone to reach him then—
The jester squeezed her charcoal eyelids shut as she shook her head, now's not the time to be questioning her true opinion on the rabbit, in the end Jax was still one of her fellow circus mates.
Once she opened her eyes, Pomni nervously blinked twice before slowly inching her hands forward, grabbing onto one of the only parts of Jax’s body that hadn't yet fully abstracted.
His gloved left hand—yellow in color, just like the sclera of his only non-abstracted eye.
When Jax felt the gentle touch of Pomni's hands grasping his own he inhaled sharply through whatever remained of his yellow teeth, his body then steadily ceased its violent contorting—as if the jester's delicate touch was an inhibitor—though the prickling pain from abstracting remained.
Jax groaned faintly, his reply a quivering mess. “D-do-don't t-t-touch—”
“I-I'M NOT LEAVING YOU ALONE!" Pomni shouted as assertively as she possibly could.
The rabbit fell silent—whatever remained of his long ears drooped in the process—before tiredly scoffing at his cast mate with a frown. “I-Is...t-that so, k-kid?” Jax asked with rhetorical snideness.
Resisting the urge to clapback at the age-inaccurate nickname, Pomni pressed her lips together momentarily while faintly nodding her head in confirmation towards the question. “Yeah, that's—”
The lagomorph yanked his hand out of the jester's own two without any sort of struggle—not even a faint tug—giving Jax the opportunity to further emotionally detach himself from Pomni.
“S-some g-grip y-ya have th-there.” he scoffed bitterly while refraining from meeting Pomni's confused yet tender gaze. “I-it’s s-straight up n-non-ex-existent, j-just l-like o-our f-friendship.”
Pomni tried to reach for Jax's hand again even though she was a touch averse person. “Jax, I—”
“Stop looking already!” Jax snapped; the feebleness in his voice dissipated without warning.
The jester instantaneously ceased reaching out with fearful surprise etched into her captivating eyes, but didn't get the chance to process the drastic change in her cast mate’s tone of speech.
Something grasped tightly around Pomni's neck, making her pupils turn into animated scribbles once again as she desperately tried to pry off whatever was depriving her body of oxygen; even though you couldn't permanently die within this digital purgatory, any inflicted pain still lingered.
Pomni weakly gazed down at the cause of her suffering when she felt its grip around her neck loosen slightly before retightening. What the jester saw shouldn't have surprised her at all, but it still did regardless. Jax was strangling her with the very hand she had tried to show kindness to.
“JAAA—?!” Pomni coughed feebly. “AAAX…?!” she painfully rasped out.
Jax ignored Pomni's distress, choosing to instead meet her gaze after all this time. Unlike the jester’s, which was full of hurt, agonized confusion, the rabbit's gaze was unreadable—ice cold.
“Just who do ya think you are, Doll Face 2.0?” Jax asked with contempt.
Ignoring the rhetorical question, Pomni persisted in trying to free her air-deprived neck from the brutal grasp of her abstracting cast member, but ceased when she realized each of her attempts proved fruitless; relenting in her failure, the jester perched her hands faintly onto Jax's slim wrist.
“Why’re you so adamant on sticking by me, PomPom? Nothing will change at all. Period.” As if on cue, the rabbit’s abstraction gradually worsened, like it was slowly being turned by a dial.
“I-I-I-” The jester stuttered out faintly. "J-ju-just thought-" she wheezed. “Yo-you n-needed me. E-even though…y-you're pushing me away, I-I…d-don't want you…t-to ever feel u-unwanted.”
Jax widened his non-abstracted eye. “...Needed ya?" Pomni felt the tight grip around her neck loosen slightly, giving her the chance to breathe in whatever air she could with spewed coughs.
Jax then slowly pulled the jester closer to him by a few inches—his abstracting body gradually worsened. “You're sticking around even after everything because it looks like I need you?”
Pomni weakly swallowed, trying to stop her coughing fit as it began to burn her throat. “...Y-yes.”
Jax let out a meek chuckle that gradually grew into a soft laugh before morphing into sheer, deranged laughter. Whatever was left of the rabbit's mouth—dissipating from his impending abstraction—split wide open, revealing his jagged razor-sharp yellow teeth and pink tongue.
“T-th-tha-that’s rich!” Jax continued to laugh profusely—his mouth was no longer split open as he spoke between his mocking laughs. “Th-that big head of yours mu-must be thick as well!”
Pomni cringed at Jax's shrill cackling—when will this nightmare of hers come to an end?
“Y-you truly are lame!” Jax abruptly released his grip on Pomni's bruised neck—letting her draw the deepest gasp of air she could—and then grasped her chin with a merciless, painful squeeze.
“J-just accept that you're n-nothing more than a-a sucker to me, already!” Jax narrowed his gaze that was filled with mockery and detest. “A-a-a toy for me to torture whenever I please!”
Not wanting to see the rabbit's sanity dwindle any further, Pomni resorted to shutting her eyes tight for as long as she could; her charcoal eyelids stood out in stark contrast to her milky white skin, and permanently pink rendered blush, making the jester’s appearance even more alluring.
After some time, Jax's pathological laughter began to falter—like a flame dying out—until it finally ceased, leaving the surrounding area in a deafening silence, much to Pomni's minuscule relief.
The tension-riddled silence lingered for what felt like an eternity until something broke it.
Not believing what her non-existing ears were hearing, Pomni opted to cautiously open her eyes to see for herself. At this point the jester's pupils were back to being blue and red pinwheels, but what the short circus member saw before her caused those pupils of hers to enlarge from shock.
Jax, the impulsive jerkwad Pomni's come to know and loosely tolerate, was now feebly sobbing before her with a broken grin plastered on his virtually abstracted face while tears leaked down.
“S-So, I-I don't…n-need…” Jax's voice quivered in spite of himself. “Y-you coddling me like s-some kitten...” the rabbit tried to act disgruntled, but realized it was too late to save face now.
Jax squeezed his one good eye shut, hoping that would stop his tears from coming, but it failed, making him scoff bitterly as his forced grin turned into a turmoiled scowl. “
!" he cursed.
Despite everything, Pomni tried to reach a hand toward what was left of Jax's dampened face.
“H-Hey—" As the tips of Pomni's fingers brushed against Jax's tear-streaked cheek, the surface warped into sharp, abstracted ridges, causing the jester's hand to glitch out. “AGH!” cried Pomni.
The lagomorph's grasp on the jester came to an end at last when he absentmindedly clutched the side of his head with an agonized scream, curling himself into a fetal position on the cold ground.
Pomni tried to hightail it out of there, but her knees buckled and she collapsed to the ground with a thump. The jester's hands splayed at her sides as she stared at her abstracting cast member.
Jax snapped open his unabstracted eye, his square pupil twitching sporadically as the left side of his body finally began to abstract. Pulsing, black edges grotesquely crept up from his bare foot.
Pomni raised the backs of her hands to shield her face as Jax neared complete abstraction, but when faint glitches tickled her vision, she lowered her defenses to examine her jumbling hand in deep thought. Her mind went to Ragatha—how she had chosen to fully disregard the ragdoll if it meant her safety was guaranteed. Regret had lingered ever since, as it should. It wasn't worth it.
Meanwhile, Jax failed to subdue another pained scream just as more large, colorful, blinking eyes sprouted menacingly across his deforming body. ‘Just get this hell over with already!’ he thought.
‘It hurts!’
‘It hurts!’
‘IT HURTS!’
‘̷̝͠ͅǏ̴̞̹T̴̞̕ ̷̗̽H̶̪̞̑̐Û̷̳̃Ṛ̷͙͂̉T̸̪̙̔S̴͓̣̀́!̴̩͝ͅ’̴͕̏͆
Amid his distress, Jax felt something gently wrap around his left arm. Despite himself, the gentle warmth of the hold soothed the rabbit's nerves enough to make his abstraction come to a crawl.
“̷̔͜P̶̞͠ő̴͜m̵̢͆ñ̶̤i̸̲̓,̵̠̒”̸̯͠ the rabbit snarled, his voice crackling with static. "Lay off m̶͎͔͆͝e̸͉͐͆,̸̖̉͘ will ya?!”
Pomni shook her head firmly as she looked at her cast mate, the two tails of her jester hat swaying gently. "N-no,” she said defiantly. "I-I said that I wasn’t leaving you, and I meant it!”
Jax couldn't help but chortle at that in disdain. “Ha! T-that's ẹ̷̗͝v̸̡̈́ę̸͇̍̇n̷̞̒ ̵̮̫̃m̷̢̲͝o̶̧͙͋͒r̶̳̼̈́̇ĕ̷͔̾ rich of ya to say-!”
“I'm serious!” Pomni exclaimed; her gaze was now filled with determination and confidence.
Tears flowed from Jax’s nearly abstracted eye once more, prompting a wavering, forced grin. “I̴̜̔-̵̯͛Ḭ̷͆.̷̳͠.̷͇͛.̶̰̀d̷̪̊-̸̜̔don't ya get it? Y̸͇̯͂͋̕-̷̤͕̈͑͝you gain nothing a̶̬̭͂t̴̝̽̚ ̶̪͛͠a̶͉͋͛l̶̤̇͜l̴̢̋̓ from waiting around ‘til I f̴͉̆i̵̛͇n̶͈͌͗â̴̟l̵̦̓͒l̷̰̃͛y̵̻͇̏̀ abstract-”
“You're my friend!" Pomni proclaimed wholeheartedly. "You can be a jerk, and I don't like how you act sometimes, but despite that, deep down you can surprisingly be a decent and pretty fun guy!”
Jax tried to free himself from the jester's hold, letting out a growl of contempt. “L̸̞̼̟̍̈́-̸̬̮͌͘let go-!”
Pomni didn't back down; she gripped Jax's arm tighter despite the abstracting essence nearing her. “You’ve managed to make me laugh even though you treated me like crap half the time!”
Jax's abstraction reached Pomni, but the little jester refused to relent her hold on him; her arms were now jumbling in and out of place. “You've changed the way I think about you, believe me!”
Jax huffed faintly. “...S̴̨̛̰̥-̷̛̱̩̙̔̂s̸͍͕̬̏t̷̘̭̏i̸̮̼̓̊͜ĺ̶̤̗ļ̶̫̯̀̇͘ changes n̸̩̳̈́-̴̼̓͝nothing…s̴̰̲͂̃-̴̦̈̂s̶͈̋o̴͍̥̓…b̷͇̉̆-̷̪̲̆̑beat it already-”
“I SAID NO!" Pomni shouted, her throat still burning after her coughing fit from a few minutes ago, and constantly raising her voice certainly wasn’t going to help soothe it. "END OF STORY, JAX!”
Realizing that Pomni wasn't going to relent, no matter what he did or said, he shook his head with an amused, glitched-out chuckle as tears streamed down. “Y̴̳͑͠-̴̞̞̑you’re ŝ̶͇̋ȯ̷͇̜͛ lame, you know that?”
Pomni couldn’t help but make a faint chuckle of her own, her smile twisted with sadness while huge, digital tears fell out of her own large eyes. “...S-so are you…for trying to push me away.”
Jax couldn't hold back the emotional pain he tried to bury for so long anymore, for the first time in who knows how long, the lagomorph released the loudest sob Pomni had ever heard. “I̵̪̓'̸͕͝m̴̺̒ sorry!"
Pomni just cried with him, her saddened smile never wavering.