Archive of Our Own

It had been three days since the disastrous "escape the circus" adventure. Three days since that flicker of hope, kindled by the promise of freedom that had been extended to them in this bleak digital hellscape disguised under a brightly-colored circus tent, had been ignited within everyone's hearts…only to be swiftly and cruelly snuffed out when the glorified warden they called a ringmaster had revealed it was all just a facade, another one of his twisted little games they were forced to play for his sick amusement.

Three days since Pomni's world had been completely, utterly shattered, for the second time.

Ever since then, time felt like it had crawled to a standstill. It had already lost all meaning in this world anyway, with no set schedules to dictate what she did when and no clocks or calendars to mark the passage of hours and days and weeks. Years? Had it been years since she'd put on that cursed headset and accidentally condemned herself to a life in this cartoonish purgatory, trapped in the body of a cutesy rosy-cheeked jester? It might as well have been at this point. She couldn't even be sure that it had only been three days since that terrible adventure, since the only thing she could base it on was the haphazard day-and-night cycles Caine had implemented to give them a so-called sense of "normalcy" and the adventures that occurred at seemingly twenty-four hour intervals.

Not that it mattered. What did matter was the way time now slogged by at such a slow, agonizing pace that it made her want to tear her own hair out. She wandered aimlessly through her days, weighed down by her own constantly-churning thoughts, melancholy and anxiety and a sharp, burning fury in equal measure roiling within her. She went on the adventures only to placate Caine, but she didn't register anything they did. She walked around the circus tent just to keep herself moving, but she wasn't tempted to poke her head into any rooms or seek out anything interesting the way she had once she'd started warming up to her new home and wanted to explore the oddities that lay beyond the deceptively plain doors lining the halls. She stayed in her room and slept a lot despite not needing to, just to have a merciful reprieve from the perpetual hurricane roaring within her mind, until nightmares ripped her out of her slumber kicking and screaming.

And the cycle repeated itself. Again and again. Day after day after day. No end in sight, no point, no purpose. Nothing mattered anymore.

It was hard to convince herself anything had ever mattered before then in this world. But she had tried—god, how she had tried—to forge a sense of meaning in the senseless chaos around her, to find a purpose and a reason to keep going. She'd developed routines, paltry as they had been, simple things like establishing morning and bedtime rituals and eating at regular mealtimes to maintain a sense of being human. She'd connected with the people around her, forming more meaningful friendships than just about any she'd ever had in her old life. She'd found things she enjoyed here, pockets of interesting curiosities in the tent and on the grounds that satisfied her urbex cravings now that one of her favorite hobbies was no longer an option to her here. Life was far, far from perfect, but at least it had stopped feeling so terribly, achingly pointless now that she had a few precious things to cling to that kept her fraying sanity intact.

But now…after learning there truly was no way home, after being deceived into believing for even a minute that she would get to go back to her old life, after the massive bombshell that might not even be fully in control of her own mind…it felt like none of it meant anything anymore. And what did that leave her with now?

Pomni knew this didn't change the fact that she still had friends here. She knew that she wasn't truly alone, that they had endured just as much betrayal and pain as she had, even more so since they had all been here much longer than her. Now more than ever was when they needed to band together, form a united front against Caine, be there to offer each other comfort and support in the midst of their grief.

But instead, things had been…strained between everyone. Even though Caine was the one they were all rightfully furious with, somehow it had become hard to communicate with each other in the wake of that infamous adventure. At least, Pomni had no clue how to reconnect with everyone. Zooble and Gangle were together almost all the time these days, though it was hard to tell whether they were finding much solace in each other or if they just didn't want to interact with the others. Pomni suspected with a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach that Zooble might resent her a little now, because she had hesitated in the moment of truth rather than pressed the button that had seemingly promised to send them all back home. It didn't matter that it had all been fake—in Zooble's mind, Pomni guessed, there would always be that lingering doubt that maybe it had been real, but now they would never know if they would have gotten to go back to their old lives or if they would have just been sent to Shrimp Town because Pomni had blown it. And that acknowledgement, that one little mistake could possibly turn a friend against her, made Pomni's throat swell shut and her heart plummet. Gangle didn't seem upset with her, as far as Pomni could tell, but she was also a very dedicated friend to Zooble…and if Zooble was mad and not speaking to Pomni, Gangle was likely to keep her distance too, out of solidarity.

Pomni knew she still had Kinger and Ragatha to turn to, but…she could only count on Kinger being lucid enough to even remember what had happened when shrouded in the darkness of his pillow fort (unless Caine had snapped his fingers and permanently modified that part of the poor chess piece's brain), and Ragatha seemed like she was stuck in a perpetual dissociative episode ever since they returned from the "adventure." She looked every bit as lost as Pomni felt. Pomni felt terrible that she hadn't truly attempted to reach out to the doll yet, but…what could she do to comfort Ragatha when the words completely evaded her, when there was no reassurances left to provide? Ragatha hadn't even tried to talk to her yet either, hadn't tried to soothe her woes or assuage her anxiety with empty promises that everything would be fine and that they just had to look on the bright side, which Pomni took as a sure sign that there was truly nothing that could be said to inspire hope or mend their broken hearts. If even Ragatha had given up this time, what could anyone else say and do to try and lift the spirits of the circus's downcast denizens?

And Jax…where to even begin there? A confusing mix of emotions swirled within Pomni's heart whenever she thought of him, equal parts sadness and anger with the conflicting addition of sympathy. She had been hurt by him, but it was clear that he was hurting badly too, from things she wasn't fully aware of yet. She wanted to be there for him, to help him, to actually be his friend if only he would stop stubbornly pushing her away. She understood he was only trying to preserve his own heart, despite everything he had spewed at her in the heat of the moment, and in truth it was hard to blame him for that when they were all susceptible to the unbearable weight of grief in this cruel world where any one of them could abstract after one too many bad days eventually culminated in the downward spiral that would be their demise. But her empathy could only stretch so far, and right now the deep wounds left by his betrayal—the fact that, had he been wrong, he would have ended up sealing their fates in one selfish move and condemning them to a life of digital imprisonment when freedom had been close enough to taste—were still too fresh and sore, straining her capacity for forgiveness. Deep down in her bruised heart, she knew he had been desperate, that he'd been trying to save himself from something he refused to talk about…but that didn't change the fact that he'd been willing to drag everyone else down with him. She knew he still needed help, needed someone who cared to stay with him, but she was simply too mentally fatigued to do more than check on him every morning to ensure he hadn't abstracted and then leave him to hole up in his room the rest of the time, the way he seemed to want.

She told herself she would make a sincere effort to talk to him about it. Someday. When she felt like she could do it without crying or screaming or wringing his neck out of sheer frustration.

But Pomni wasn't thinking about that right now. Her mind reeled, a dozen fragmented thoughts spinning and tumbling around in her head, but one presented itself clearly and prominently as the rest of her worries droned dully in the background.

Is this real?

Is any of this real…?

Pomni lay on the floor in the main room of the tent, her legs propped up against one of the empty couches in the seating area. There wasn't any reason she couldn't just sit on the couch, but somehow she felt better on the floor—something about the cold black-and-white tiles pressing against her bare, milk-white arms, the mildly uncomfortable pressure against her spine, was oddly grounding to her. Not that it helped all that much, not when her mind was currently trekking into dangerous, unchartered territory. And once her thoughts started carrying her away like this, there was nothing she could do but submit to the spiral that would shortly ensue.

I mean, how can it be? Look at where we are…stuck in this stupid digital world, trapped in weird cartoony bodies that aren't our own, being forced to go on these traumatizing adventures just to entertain our captor and appease some imaginary audience. That's all it is, one big endless performance, and we're all just puppets on a string as far as Caine is concerned. Literally…because who knows what he's actually doing to us? Who knows just how much access he has to our minds? What can he make us do, if he so chooses? Is he the one forcing us to abstract? And why? Why would he possibly want to make anyone suffer so much and leave the rest of us here to grieve? What does he gain? And…and if he can do all that, if he can manipulate our minds and make us go crazy enough to abstract as he gleefully strips away the last shreds of our sanity…does that mean we aren't any better than NPCs? Caine can make them disappear in a burst of confetti at the drop of a hat, and isn't that the same thing he's doing when he drops a new victim into the cellar forever?

If he can do all of that to us…what does that make us, exactly? Are we really human anymore, or are we just lines of code that Caine can shape and morph into whatever he wants us to be? Does that mean we aren't people now, that we aren't real?

Does…does that mean I am not real…?

A sharp, nauseating chill seized Pomni as the realization dawned within her, penetrating the layers of muscle and seeping deep into her bones. Did she even have bones, here? She raised one arm, pinching the rubbery, strangely malleable flesh of her forearm between two fingers and stretching it out like a chewed-up piece of gum until it reached a disturbing length—and even then, she knew it could go farther. Her stomach flipped again, and she quickly let go of her flesh, watching it snap back into place with alarming elasticity. She dropped both arms to her sides again, and closed her eyes as she forced herself to draw in a deep breath, her chest already tightening as she felt a panic attack creeping up.

Of course my stupid new body doesn't have any bones! Of course I can stretch myself like a rubber band and never reach a breaking point! And of course I have a big round head and big weird eyes and this ridiculous costume I can never take off! Because I am not a person anymore, I am just a bunch of ones and zeroes in the shape of a silly little jester that no one can ever take seriously! I'm designed to match this goofy circus aesthetic, I'm programmed to entertain! I don't even know which of my own thoughts I have control over anymore, for all I know Caine is reading my mind right now and will try to fast-track my abstraction because I'm just a broken little puppet who doesn't want to play his games anymore. And what's stopping him from throwing me in the cellar anyway? I'm worthless, I'm just as disposable as all of the NPCs he's heartlessly deleted, I'm not real, I'm not real, I'm not real…!

"…Pomni…?"

Pomni's eyes snapped open, jolted out of her rapid spiral by a soft, hesitant voice beckoning to her through the cacophony of her own swarming thoughts. She tipped her head to the side to find Ragatha standing next to her, wringing her hands nervously, worry stitched across her features.

"Oh…h-hey." Pomni's voice snagged in her dry throat, hoarse with disuse. She realized she hadn't spoken out loud all day, until now. She swallowed and cleared her throat, trying again. "Hi, Ragatha."

Ragatha kept fidgeting anxiously with her hands, seeming unsure what to say now that she had approached Pomni. She finally exhaled a shaky sigh.

"I…I was looking for you," she admitted slowly, her gaze cast shyly to the side. "I didn't see where you went after the adventure, and I was worried about you…I wasn't sure if you'd want me to track you down, but I really felt like I should check in. I just…I'm really sorry I didn't try to talk to you sooner, after, well, everything. I should have been there for you, I should have been there for everyone, but it's…I, I don't…"

Pomni's heart ached as she listened to Ragatha rambling, her voice trembling with choked-back tears. The jester sat up, cringing inwardly as the bells dangling from the tips of her hat jingled merrily with the movement, a striking contrast to the melancholic mood permeating the air. She tried to ignore how stupid it made her feel as she leveled her tired gaze with Ragatha's equally weary-looking eye.

"Hey, you don't need to apologize, it's okay…honestly, I should be saying sorry for not going to you sooner," Pomni confided quietly. "The last few days have been…a lot. I guess it's understandable we're all a little too drained to get out of our own heads right now."

Ragatha nodded blankly, lost in her own thoughts. "Can I sit with you?" she asked, after a beat. "I-it's okay if you don't want to, I understand if you'd rather be alone right now…"

In response, Pomni patted the floor beside her. "You're good. Actually, I think we could both really use the company."

Ragatha hedged for just a second, as if convincing herself that Pomni actually meant it and wasn't just appeasing her, a tendency Pomni had noticed a lot and that made her wonder with a flare of bitter anger just what the doll's mother had done to her to make her believe every request for companionship was a burden. But Ragatha must have accepted Pomni's invitation as genuine, and finally sank to the floor next to her, daintily smoothing the patchwork-adorned skirt of her dress over her lap.

In the span of silence it took for Ragatha to adjust herself, Pomni couldn't help discreetly examining the doll's features out of the corner of her eye—a gleaming blue button where an eye should be, bouncy yarn hair that bore more than a passing resemblance to red licorice, a pretty bow that matched her dress topping it all off. Her avatar was adorable, there was no denying that…but Pomni couldn't keep herself from wondering if Ragatha was overcome by the same sense of stomach-sinking dread that she was whenever catching a glimpse of herself in the mirror, her fabric skin crawling with a disconcerting itch any time she tried recalling what it was like to have two eyes and flesh that leaked blood instead of cotton when sliced. Pomni raked her fingers absently against her own arm, momentarily frustrated that the gloves permanently affixed to her hands prevented her nails from meeting her flesh, and decided that now wasn't the right time to ask.

"Do you…um." Pomni scratched uselessly at her arm again, feeling nothing. "Do you want to talk about, you know…it?"

"…I don't even know where to begin," Ragatha confessed, wrapping her arms around herself in what Pomni recognized as a self-comforting gesture. "I mean, how do you even know where to start after something like this…?"

Despite her own reservations about physical affection, Pomni scooted closer and rested a hand on Ragatha's shoulder, offering what could only be loosely defined as a smile in an attempt to reassure her when the doll glanced up in surprise at the touch.

"Why don't we start with a simple question?" Pomni ventured, once she'd gathered her thoughts. "How do you feel right now? It's okay if you don't really know or if it's messy, it's a lot to process at once. But we should probably at least try to make sense of it."

"I…I f-feel…" Ragatha faltered, sniffling, then started over. "…I feel hopeless, completely and one hundred percent defeated. I feel manipulated and cheated…which, you'd think I'd be used to be now, but it sneaks up on you like a stab in the back every time." She gripped the skirt of her dress, bunching it tightly in clenched fists. "I always try to look on the bright side, to find some kind of meaning in the utter nonsense of this world, because who else is going to do it? How can you get by when everything feels so absolutely pointless? But this time…this time, I only feel broken. I know my friends need me, I know they probably expect me to keep my chin up and tell everyone else to see the silver lining too…but there's no silver lining, it's just clouds through and through. And I feel horrible that I haven't been reaching out to anyone, haven't been trying to help, because I just can't. And what good am I if I can't be counted on to be there?"

Tears glistened in Ragatha's non-button eye as she spoke, her hands shaking as she twisted them up in her ever-wrinkling skirt. Pomni's throat closed, tears pooling in her own eyes and blurring her vision as she listened, every one of Ragatha's words heavy with the weight of devastating loss underscored by the fear of disappointing others. Pomni related to those feelings only all too well—everyone in the circus probably could, but there was something uniquely torturous about struggling to process your own trauma while simultaneously berating yourself for everything you weren't able to do for others on top of it.

Pomni reached into the "invisible" pocket on the side of her costume, producing a handkerchief out of what she could only guess was hammerspace that she presumed was meant to be used in some kind of circus act, and offered it to Ragatha. The doll accepted it wordlessly, blotting at her eye and sniffling feebly.

"Ragatha…" Pomni's voice trailed off, her lips pursing as she tried to formulate the right words for what she wanted to express, the fog in her own head so dense that thinking through it was a greater feat than it needed to be. At last, she pressed on, "…You know that nobody is expecting you to be this bright ray of sunshine that everyone can lean on at any moment, right? You're so kind, and it's not that wanting to help people is a bad thing, but it just always seems like you're on the verge of burning yourself out when you constantly put everyone else before yourself. You always sacrifice so much of yourself because you think it'll make others happy, but we want you to take care of yourself and put yourself first too. And after everything, no one is upset with you for not being able to put on a smile and pretend like everything is fine, or have something positive and encouraging to say. I honestly don't think there are any words that are going to help any of us feel any better. We're all going through the same thing, but the way do it is different. No one blames you for needing a little more space or a little more silence right now, it seems like all of us have needed some privacy to just…try and think clearly, for the last few days."

"I know…trust me, I'm doing everything I can to believe you when you say that. I feel a little pathetic needing to have it drilled into me over and over like I'm a child." Ragatha gave a hollow, rueful laugh, void of any mirth, casting her gaze downward as she wrung the handkerchief between her hands. "But old habits die hard, I guess. I know nobody expects me to step into that role…maybe they're happier when I don't, at that. I've been told before I can be a little, well, overbearing. But I still can't shake that feeling that I'm not doing enough, and I hate feeling like I'm failing anyone by not trying hard enough, that I'm…useless. But what can I do when I suddenly feel like none of it has any point, that it probably never did?"

…That was a little harder to answer. Pomni exhaled slowly, her shoulders slumping. She was acutely aware of every movement of her body, every breath and gesture, all so subconscious and human. She watched Ragatha twist the damp handkerchief between her fingers, a nervous tic that came about so naturally, copy-pasted from a past life. Pomni did everything she could to absorb these small details that reminded her they were still people, had been people, but her turbulent thoughts didn't want to cooperate with reason. Still, she had to try.

"I don't think it means there was never a point to it, that you were wasting your time trying to help others and spread whatever positivity you could," Pomni began softly. "To be honest, I think that's admirable of you. You might take it too far sometimes, but it's not like you ever meant any harm in doing that, you know? You just always wanted others to be happy, or at least not miserable, much as that's possible here." She shifted positions, sitting cross-legged next to the doll, drumming her fingers thoughtfully against her shin. "You know…when I first got here, you were the first person who even attempted to make me feel at home. You were the first one to really reach out to me, to assure me everything would be okay, you'd check in on me just to see how I was doing. No one else really did that for me. And I know I thanked you for it, but I don't know if that was enough to express my gratitude for everything you did for me. For everyone."

"Oh, ah…really?" Ragatha cleared her throat. "I kind of thought that I…upset you back then, more than helped you."

Pomni bit her lip guiltily, scratching at the back of her neck, fingertips grazing her flesh yet leaving no marks. "It didn't upset me, exactly…but sometimes it did make me feel a little too babied," she admitted. "I felt like I was being pacified when what I needed most was someone who would just listen to me and hear how I was feeling. I didn't want you to see me as some helpless child who needed to have my hand held or everything sugarcoated for me, I've gotten that enough in my old life. But…I realize now that's not what you were trying to do, that it wasn't because you thought I was incapable and would break the second something went wrong. You were just trying to take care of me and make sure I didn't feel alone here in the only way you knew how…and, sure, maybe it didn't always help me, but that was on me for not communicating that. You were always trying for me, and I appreciate that. I…wish I had let you know that, the way you should have heard it. I wish I'd made sure you felt seen the way you tried to make sure I was, and I wish I hadn't left you behind on my first day here and ever made you feel like I didn't care. I'm…I'm sorry if I didn't do enough, on my part."

Ragatha was quiet for a moment, though Pomni didn't register it as a bad sign. She and Ragatha had talked since that infamous first day, a deep heart-to-heart where they'd earnestly discussed their feelings and resolved to be more honest with each other, forging a bond that Pomni had been grateful for ever since. Even so, flashes of guilt still pierced her heart here and there, remembering their initial rocky start and Ragatha's broken, glitched-out body crawling helplessly toward Pomni seconds before she'd panicked and run away instead. Even if it was water under the bridge now, she still regretted some of the things she'd said and done, and wanted Ragatha to know beyond any doubt she would never abandon her again.

"…I guess we both have a few things we're still hung up on," Ragatha observed at last, sounding lost in thought. "I wish we hadn't gotten off on the wrong foot right away, I guess we both could have done things differently so there wasn't all this tension between us. It's always easiest to see that once it's too late. But since we can't change the past, we should just focus on the present. We've both owned up to what we did and wished we hadn't, we've both forgiven each other and moved past it. Right now, I just want to appreciate our friendship." She brushed a lock of hair away from her face, a fond smile curling up the corner of her mouth ever so slightly. "I hope it's not weird to say this, but…I wanted to be your friend from day one, in spite of everything. But when I thought I'd screwed everything up with you, I convinced myself it would never happen and that I didn't deserve your friendship, anyway. Sometimes I still don't think I do. But I'm still so grateful to have it."

"Hey…you do deserve it. You deserve to have friends who care about you and will be your support system when you need it, Ragatha," Pomni asserted, albeit kindly. "I may have messed up at the start, and if anything, I feel like I didn't deserve your grace when you gave it to me. But you are my friend now…a better friend to me than just about any of the people in my old life who claimed to have my back but then turned on me the second things got too rough, the second they decided I wasn't worth staying for. I…I've had that happen a lot before, and it feels horrible. It makes you feel like everyone will desert you, that there's something wrong with you that just turns people away after you let them see you break down one too many times. But you…you didn't give up on me. you've seen me at my worst and you still stuck with me, still tried to reach out to me even when I made it, uh, hard. And I really want to thank you too, Rags…for not leaving me, for thinking I was worth the effort. For just…being you."

Ragatha finally met Pomni's gaze, her smile a little wobbly but genuine. It spread an unexpected warmth through Pomni's chest, despite the bitter chill that still resided deep within her core, permanent and haunting. She tried to cling to this precious little flame glowing in her heart, comforting and tender in comparison.

The tranquil moment between them, sweet as it was, wasn't fated to last long. After a moment had passed in silence, Ragatha's smile wavered, and her shoulders slumped as she sighed tiredly.

"Do you ever wonder…?" she began, but her voice trailed off hesitantly, as though uncertain she should give a voice to her current thoughts.

"Wonder what?" Pomni prompted gently, tilting her head curiously to the side. "Please, you can tell me."

"W-well…" Ragatha's voice trembled, but she collected herself with a deep breath before asking, her tone somber, "Do you ever wonder…what it would have been like if we had met outside of the circus? Would we have gotten along, would we have become friends if it wasn't for the forced proximity? And what could have been, if it had been on our own terms, if we weren't restricted by the circus's limitations…? Maybe none of it really matters as long as we're stuck here, but do you ever just…ask yourself these things?"

It was Pomni's turn to sigh then, her own shoulders falling in their comically puffy sleeves, the bells on her hat tinkling faintly with the movement as if to emphasize the sheer ridiculousness of her current plight. In this world, she was nothing more than a joke, and everything was a stupid punchline.

"…Yeah," she confided at last, and she was sure the ache in her voice was palpable. "Yeah, I do. A lot, actually. I have things here that are important to me, people who really matter to me and who actually care about me too. It's more than I can say I ever had for most of my life, sad as that is. But sometimes I lie in bed and just think about it…if I had known you back in my real life, if I had known any of my friends from here…how much better would my life have been? Maybe I would've actually felt fulfilled for once, because I wouldn't have been alone anymore. Maybe I wouldn't have had to chase down mild thrills just to fill some gaping void in me, always seeking excitement where I lacked it but craved it so desperately." She curled in on herself then, hugging her knees tightly to her chest. "Maybe then, I never would have ended up…here. Maybe we all could have been spared."

"Who knows…maybe we would've, or maybe we were cursed to wind up here one way or another." Ragatha leaned back against the couch behind them. "It might have just been some twisted sort of destiny, that we were all meant to meet at some point, but only here. We all have some reason we ended up here, it seems, so…maybe it was inescapable."

Pomni made a noise in the back of her throat, one even she couldn't discern the meaning of. Her thoughts were starting to blend and whirl together again, an overwhelming current of regret and melancholy and harrowing existentialism threatening to pull her under and drown her. She breathed in, fighting to stave off the mounting panic, loosen the tightly-coiled knot constricting her chest…but to no avail.

"Pomni…?" Ragatha asked softly, when Pomni couldn't bring herself to speak. "Are you okay?"

"I…j-just…" Pomni's throat stung as she swallowed hard against the lump suddenly blocking it, choking off her words.

"Hey…take your time, give yourself a second to catch your breath," Ragatha advised patiently. "You listened to me, and I want to give you that same space as well. Not because I feel like I need to…because I want to. Because I care, an awful lot, about you."

That was almost enough to make Pomni completely break down into sobs. Ragatha had proven to be such a sweet and thoughtful friend, genuine in her concern and affection once she let her walls down, and Pomni sincerely regretted that she hadn't reciprocated sooner. Not to mention…guilt gnawed at the edges of her heart over the feelings she harbored deep within her, unwarranted though it likely was. How could she reveal to her friend, one of few people she felt ever really gave a damn about her, that she was questioning the very nature of their existence here…questioning whether they even counted as real people anymore?

But…Ragatha had confided her true feelings, and Pomni was honestly proud of how far she had come since they first met, how hard she tried now to speak her mind even when it hurt and to understand she wasn't expected to be happy all the time. It was because they had talked things out that Ragatha had taken even small strides toward improving herself and accepting care from others as equally as she tried to dispense it, and if Pomni wanted to maintain this openness and honesty between them, she would need to practice what she preached. And…well, maybe she did want to talk about it, hard as she knew it would be to put it into words.

She followed Ragatha's suggestion, inhaling as deeply as her digital lungs would permit and exhaling slowly, before finally finding her voice again.

"I just…I don't know how to put this, not without making it sound horrible…" she began tentatively. "But…ever since, you know, the adventure, I've been feeling things that I thought I had gotten over, things that kept me awake at night in my first days in the circus but that consumed me less the more acclimated I got here. And maybe I never really got over it, but instead it just got easier to stash away in the back of my mind and not dwell on every waking moment the way I used to."

Pomni caught Ragatha's eye, and Ragatha nodded silently, urging her to continue.

Pomni curled in tighter on herself, huddled in a ball with her shoulders hunched. "But…ever since that last adventure, the stupid escape-the-circus one, I've felt like I'm not…real. Like I'm no longer a person, like I'm not remotely human. Like none of us are. I mean, I have a body, I can still feel my heart beat and my chest get tight whenever anxiety makes it hard to breathe, but it all feels…fake, just a manufactured response meant to replicate the sensations I felt outside of the circus. It's not like my heart is pumping real blood through my body, it's not like I can die from oxygen deprivation. And I'm aware of my thoughts, I know the person that I am and I have the fractured memories of who I used to be, but it all feels so detached from myself. Especially since finding out Caine has more control over our minds than I thought…so whose to say my thoughts really are my own anymore? What am I really thinking and feeling versus what he's making me think and feel? Can he control everything? Kinger made it sound like he might even have some power over who abstracts and who doesn't, so whose to say he can't just snap his fingers and make one of us lose our minds? Does he do it to keep us in line, if someone starts thinking and behaving in a way he doesn't like? Would he be that cruel? And if that's the case, if he can manipulate our minds and do away with us that easily…does that mean we're no more significant than NPCs? Are we just glorified NPCs at this point, do we…do we even have souls?"

Nervous energy hummed through Pomni's body, her nerves practically vibrating as anxiety collided with anger that had been simmering for days just below the surface of her skin but had now reached the point of boiling over. She couldn't stand it, she needed to get up, needed to move so she wouldn't explode. She bolted abruptly to her feet, pacing around the area, her fingers twitching at her sides. The bells on her hat jingled, further stoking her ire.

"I'm just…so…mad!" Pomni fumed, the words spilling out faster now, part furious and part frantic. She suddenly felt like she had no control over herself, so charged by adrenaline that her mind had forfeited all rational thought in favor of pure impulse. Without thinking she yanked a pillow off of a nearby couch and hurled it to the floor. "I'm so mad that Caine would play with our emotions and trick us so cruelly, all for a stupid game!" She flung another pillow to the floor. "I'm mad that I no longer know if my mind is really my own, if Caine is just constantly reading my thoughts and altering them as he sees fit, just to keep me under his control like some perfect little puppet!" She stomped across the floor and kicked a pile of blocks, knocking them to the floor with a noisy clatter that could've drawn the attention of someone all the way on the other side of the tent. "And I am so, so mad that I have to keep being a pawn in his game, stuck in this stupid toy-like body that doesn't feel like my own, asking myself day after day if it's even worth it to get out of bed and keep living through this farce of a life like I haven't had everything that was ever important to me torn to shreds the second I wound up here, as if I'm not wondering every minute if I truly stopped being a human at any point! But if I don't keep going through the motions I might get sentenced to the cellar and be as good as dead! How can I do it? How can I keep making myself act like it's all okay when it will never be?"

Pomni's rant finally shuttered to a halt, only because she could no longer catch her breath, her chest heaving with ragged pants as tears streamed down her face. She hadn't even noticed she'd started crying at some point during her rampage. And now that the initial adrenaline was gradually ebbing away, abject mortification rushed in like a tidal wave. One minute she'd been having a genuine conversation with Ragatha, and then all of a sudden she lost her cool and basically had a temper tantrum, throwing things around and shrieking the whole time? Who was she anymore? She'd been hanging on by an even thinner thread than she had even realized, fragile and swiftly unraveling.

Silence descended upon the room in the wake of her explosion, during which Pomni couldn't bring herself to meet Ragatha's gaze. She sniffled and scrubbed furiously at her watery eyes, mopping the tear stains off her cheeks with the backs of her gloves, waiting…for what, she wasn't yet sure.

At last, Ragatha cleared her throat, breaking up the tense silence smothering them like an itchy blanket.

"Wow…it uh, seems like you've been holding in a lot lately," she commented carefully, and Pomni's whole body went rigid, suspecting she'd scared the doll off. But instead, Ragatha continued, her voice as kind as ever, "Pomni, this might seem off-topic, but there's something I wanted to ask you…something about the escape-the-circus adventure. Is that okay?"

Pomni only nodded, suddenly feeling worn-out and timid. She sucked in another shuddering breath, feeling it rattle harshly in her lungs, and let it go in one long gust as she braced herself for whatever was coming next.

"Well…" Ragatha stretched the word out, clearly hedging, before ultimately deciding to come out with it. "When we reached the control room, and you were standing in front of the console, in front of the red and blue buttons…why did you hesitate? You had seemed so sure of yourself beforehand, and like you wanted to leave this place just as much as the rest of us, until you just froze up at the last minute. I didn't want to put you on the spot or anything, and in the end it didn't really matter because it wasn't even real, but it's been eating me up a little inside wondering what happened back there. Did you just…change your mind, all of a sudden? Did you start thinking that you wanted to stay in the circus after all?"

"What?! I…no! That's not it at all!" Pomni shook her head adamantly. "I wanted more than anything to get out of here, you have to believe me! But after you'd all been launched into Caine's office, and it was only me and Abel left…he said something to me, and the way he said it didn't sit quite right. He told me to make the right choice. Which sounds like nothing, but…when we were actually faced with the moment of truth, it sank in with me that maybe this was too good to be true, that maybe it was some kind of trap. That's why I paused and tried to get Kinger's input before making a decision, because…he's a completely different person in the dark. He's very wise and patient, and it seems like he knows a lot about the circus and how it runs. I trusted that he would be able to tell us what he thought, if we were about to make a mistake. But then the darkness didn't work on him then, he was just as scattered and confused as he is in the light…I wonder if Caine put some kind of modifier on his mind then, to prevent him from telling us the truth. I don't know, I don't know. Everyone probably hates me now for holding back, because what if it was a real exit and it's all my fault we're still stuck here because I didn't act quickly enough, but I swear to you, Ragatha—it's not because I wanted to stay. It just suddenly seemed fishy, and in the end it was…but I wish it hadn't been. I wish that more than anything."

Pomni felt like she was rambling, but Ragatha listened patiently, remaining thoughtfully silent for several seconds once the jester had finished. After a beat, she spoke again.

"I don't think anybody hates you, Pomni…quite frankly, I think it'd be impossible to hate you. I think everyone might have been a little confused, like me…and, well, Zooble might be irritated, but if you explained it to them I'm sure they'd understand, too. You're always well-intentioned, I don't think anyone could blame you for having second thoughts in that moment." Ragatha shook her head slightly. "That's not really my point, though. I just wanted to say this: If Caine was using mind modifiers on you or manipulating your thoughts, don't you think he would have tried to sway you into wanting to stay or pressing the button he wanted us to pick, the second he realized you were skeptical of the whole thing? Or even now…look how angry you are, how sad you feel. How all of us feel. Don't you think that, if Caine had significant control over our minds, he'd just always make us happy and agreeable? I'm pretty sure if he could, he would've manipulated Zooble into thinking they liked his adventures so they would go on them more often. I can't say for sure, but I think he has less power over our minds than we think."

Pomni rubbed her arm, considering this. Ragatha had a point—if Caine did have complete access to their minds, he would've surely used it to his full advantage by now, be it to persuade the most stubborn of cast mates into joining in on the adventures or to compel them into expressing their love and appreciation for him that he clearly sought so desperately. If he could convince them to love him, he never would have had to concoct that stupid escape adventure designed with the ill-guided intent of "giving them what they wanted" in the first place. But while that realization provided some solace, there were other things that still weren't sitting right with her.

"That makes sense…and you're probably right that he doesn't have full control of our minds," Pomni replied. "But…what about what Kinger said, about the first abstraction? It sounded like Caine was behind it somehow. Kinger has been here long enough to have witnessed that, so maybe he knows a secret or two that Caine is purposely keeping under lock and key. And Kinger himself…maybe he is the way he is because of Caine, maybe he's got a permanent modifier on his mind to make him forget things, and somehow it doesn't affect him in the dark? Ragatha…you've been here the second longest out of all of us, you've known Kinger a lot longer than any of us. Do you remember if he's always been like…this?"

A look that Pomni couldn't quite identify flickered in Ragatha's eye, as though she had just recollected something.

"He was…different, from the way he is now," Ragatha confirmed, her voice softening into an almost nostalgic tone. "He was always eccentric, I can say that much, but not quite the same as he is now. He was a little more subdued, not quite as forgetful, but you could still never have much of a conversation with him without him trailing off and then losing his train of thought, or starting to ramble about bugs instead. And…he was always kind to me, he was kind to everyone, like he truly wanted people to have a good time here. Not the same way Caine does, in Kinger's case it was genuine. But…over time the forgetting spells got worse, where he'd forget where he was when we were on an adventure or need to be reminded of his own name. He started spending a lot more time in the pillow fort, distancing himself from the rest of us. Now that you told me the reason why he spends so much time in his fort, I realize he wasn't purposely pushing anyone away, that he was just trying to cling to his own sanity. But I didn't know that then, and thought maybe he just wanted to be away from the rest of us…I wish I had known then that there was more to it than that. But that was about the point it became apparent that something was getting worse with him, that he wasn't himself, the way I'd known him up to that point at least. Does that help?"

Pomni mulled this new information over, and nodded slowly. "Yeah…it gives me a better picture, at least. So he's always been a little unstable, then. Maybe it has nothing to do with Caine and everything to do with the nature of the circus, for all I know. He's been here forever, that's bound to take a major toll on your mind after probably a couple of decades. And he watched his own wife abstract…I don't think I could ever recover from that, had it been me."

"…I wouldn't, either," Ragatha responded, almost wistfully, her voice just above a whisper.

Pomni sank to the floor across from Ragatha, her posture slouched, her previous burst of angry energy having seeped out of her entirely and leaving her too exhausted to combat her own feelings anymore.

"So…what do we do now?" she asked forlornly. "Are we expected to just carry on like normal? Can we even do that at this point, when it was never normal to begin with? And what do we do with this…this new information about Caine? It's not like we can just ask him questions and expect him to answer truthfully, or that he won't try to brainwash us in some way to get us to stop prying. He's already lied once, probably countless times. How do we just keep living here with that knowledge?"

Ragatha tugged hard on a strand of her hair. "…I don't know," she admitted somberly. "I don't think it's possible to just…just keep going, like it never happened. Like we didn't just have our worst fear confirmed, that there really isn't a way out, and that we all ended up played for fools. And I don't know what we can do about Caine, either…he'll never tell us what we really want to know, not to mention I don't want to risk angering him if we get too accusatory. Even if he didn't try to do anything to our minds, the outcome would still be, uh, not good to put it simply. He doesn't have the greatest track record when it comes to being confronted, on the rare occasion someone is brave enough to do so."

A shiver snaked along Pomni's spine as she nodded. As much as she had already witnessed, she did not want to learn the results of Caine being provoked past his limit.

"But it's…it's still not fair, having to live in the dark like this and doing nothing about it." Pomni gripped the ends of her hat and pulled in frustration. "I've tried so hard to accept that this is our fate, that we're just doomed to stay here for eternity, and just when I think I've adjusted this happens. I don't think I can take much more…I can't take not knowing what to expect, what Caine is going to trick us with next time."

"I know…I wish I could tell you it'll all be okay, that we'll all get through it somehow, but I know empty promises aren't what you want to hear right now. But…I still want to say something." Ragatha extended her hands toward Pomni then, palms up. "Can I hold your hands, just for a minute?"

Pomni glanced up at Ragatha, meeting her solemn gaze, before gingerly placing her hands in the doll's. Ragatha squeezed her hands gently, and a warm current pulsed through Pomni's body at the contact, a surprisingly human touch she hadn't realized she'd needed so badly until now.

"Whatever happens next, whatever Caine does to torment us…remember that it's not just you who is going through it," Ragatha told her, voice soft and consoling. "All of us are on the same boat here, navigating this awful twist to our already unfortunate reality, and we shouldn't have to feel like we're going it alone. Maybe I'm the last person who should be telling you this, but it's true. And as divided as we all are right now, more than ever I think we need to try and find a way to overcome it and stick together. That…might be harder with some people more than others, but we still need to try. We can't just give up. And, you know…I've always thought you were very strong, Pomni. You're smart and kind and brave in a lot of ways you may not realize. I think if anyone can pull through this, if anyone can persevere and inspire the rest of us to do the same, it's you. That's, ah, obviously not to put any pressure on you…but just, to remind you that you're resilient, and that I think you can make it. I feel like something changed when you got here. Before, I don't think I would have been able to survive even a day after what Caine put us through with the escape adventure, but now, seeing how much you've adapted to this world after such a rough start and been there for others who needed it even when you were struggling too…you've made me feel like I can endure more than I think too. And I'm so very grateful to have you on my side, something I'm sure everyone else here would agree with."

At that, Pomni's eyes once again welled with tears, and she felt the first weak but tangible glimmer of something positive emerging from the wreckage of despair within her heart. Ragatha's words didn't erase all of her problems or ease all of her pain, and plenty of doubt still stirred within her. She still feared that Zooble and Gangle were angry with her, that she'd broken her trust. She still worried about Jax and wished they hadn't fought, that he wouldn't keep pushing her away. So much hurt and uncertainty accumulated within such a short amount of time couldn't be so easily overcome. But knowing she had at least one solid, dependable friend in this messed-up world—one who had so much faith in her, one whose trust in her hadn't wavered, one who had remained so steadfastly by her side even in times when she felt she hadn't deserved it—proved to be a more powerful salve to her wounds than she would have anticipated. And she wanted to give Ragatha back the same that she had just been given, the assurance that her efforts had been seen and the strength to keep going. She wanted to give all of her friends here the same, no matter what it took…no matter how hard it may be to convince some of them to accept it.

"Thank you, Ragatha," she murmured softly, her voice husky, blinking back her tears and trying to remember any other time when her emotions had ridden on such a wild roller coaster. "I…I think I really needed to hear that. I don't know the last time I ever really felt strong, but…I don't want to give up, either. I want to be strong, for you and for everyone else here. There's too much at stake to just quit now. And if I have you with me, facing it together…I think we can make it." She sniffled, then choked out a laugh, a squeaky snort of a sound she hadn't realized she was capable of making. "Hey, when did you get so good at the whole advice thing?"

Ragatha laughed too, just as teary-eyed as Pomni by now. "Oh, I don't know…I think I may have just learned a thing or two from some people who are very important to me," she responded, squeezing Pomni's hands again, a tender gesture that made Pomni's heart flutter—a pleasant thrum that tickled against her ribcage, compared to the erratic drumbeat it had been earlier. "So, let's try this one more time. What do you think we should do next, Pomni? Not about Caine, but about us—you, me, the rest of the circus?"

Pomni drew in one last deep breath, then let it go, contemplating her response. At last, she said, "…What I want to do next is talk to Zooble and Gangle, just to explain why I did what I did and clear the air. I can't do much about it if they still hold grudge against me, but at least they'll know I never meant to hurt them. And then I think we should try talking to Jax, again…he probably won't hear me out, not when he's been so disconnected from me for so long, but I need to at least try and remind him that he doesn't have to be alone if he just lets people in again. I'll leave it up to him to take it or not, but even he doesn't deserve to go through this with nobody supporting him."

Ragatha nodded. If mentioning Jax in any empathetic capacity had soured something within her, she didn't express it. "I think that's a good starting point," she affirmed instead.

"Okay…I'm glad you think so, too." Pomni sniffled again, reluctantly withdrawing one hand from Ragatha's grasp to wipe her eye. "Can I…can I ask you a favor? You don't have to, if you'd rather not, but…will you come with me when I talk to everyone? It's not that I can't handle it on my own, and you don't have to say anything to anyone since these are my messes to clean up, but I feel a little all over the place right now where I think the moral support would help."

"…Oh!" Ragatha seemed surprised by the request, but she didn't falter as she quickly nodded. "Of course, Pomni, I absolutely will. I know I already said this before, but…I meant it when I said you can come to me if you need anything. I'll always do my best to be here for you, always."

Pomni smiled gratefully at the doll. She knew how hard that must have been, for Ragatha to agree to be around Jax for a moment that was sure to be rough for all parties involved, but her willingness to join only proved further to Pomni just how dedicated of a friend she was and how much she wanted to support her. That little flutter flapped away in her chest again, batting gently against her ribcage, appreciation warming her like a welcoming sip of hot tea chasing away the cold…although she couldn't help but wonder, as her face warmed up too, if maybe there was something more mingled in with her gratitude. But that was yet another thing to file away and process another time.

"Thanks, Ragatha…you don't know how much it means to me that you would do that for me, not a lot of people would." Pomni lightly traced her thumb over Ragatha's knuckles, or at least where her knuckles would be had she still possessed bones. Pomni tried not to think about that, though—besides, it still felt right somehow, in a way she couldn't describe. "And, after that…I think I just want to do something to distract myself, just try not to think about this whole awful mess at least for the rest of the day. Do you…would you want to join me? Maybe we could go back to the Digital Lake, or the carnival…or even just go to my room and talk. I'd love to hear more about the farm and your horses. But if you'd rather have alone time, I understand, too."

Ragatha's eye lit up as if Pomni had offered her something more valuable than gold. "I'd love to, Pomni…honestly, I've had enough alone time in the last few days to last me awhile." She chuckled slightly. "You might not want to get me started on my horses though, I'm warning you now that I could go on all day about them."

"Maybe that's what I want, though," Pomni countered without thinking, realizing it was true. Maybe all she wanted was to listen to a dear friend go on and on for hours about something that brought her joy, something that separated her from the NPCs programmed to mindlessly obey commands and respond to prompts with pre- determined dialogue until witnessing their won reality get shattered before their eyes advanced their sentience…something that made her human. Pomni would wholeheartedly embrace it every single day, if that's what it meant.

She stood up then, helping Ragatha back to her feet as well. "Why don't we start now? Zooble and Gangle are probably in one of their rooms together, so we can go track them down first."

"That sounds good to me…oh, and Pomni," Ragatha started, and Pomni paused, wondering what else might be on the doll's mind. "I just wanted to say…for all it's worth, I hope you know that you will always be real to me. Believe me, I know it's a struggle to feel like an actual person in this world, especially when something like this happens to rock your whole perception of reality just when you thought you were used to it. But you're not an NPC, no matter what you look like, what you feel, what Caine can and can't do to your brain. You're still you, you're still real, this world can strip away everything else from us but it can't change the fact that we are still people. And whenever that feeling rears its ugly head, you can talk to me about it, and I'll do my best to remind you of all the wonderful reasons you are still undeniably, genuinely human. Okay?"

Pomni let Ragatha's words sink in, and tried to capture them permanently within her heart. She knew she would still struggle to believe it, to stay in touch with the part of her that was still human as she continued to grapple with the surreal universe she had been thrust into and every shred of her humanity that had been unceremoniously torn away from her in the process. But she also knew, had always known, that she wasn't the only one who felt this way in her new home. No one shouldered each other's burdens here, they commiserated with them, and did their best to alleviate each other's pain in the only ways they knew how. And, as grim as it sounded, Pomni was at least thankful that she wasn't alone in this, that there was still hope for her to regain those precious pieces of herself in the company of those who would be there for her when she fell apart. In this world, that mattered more than she could have ever possibly expressed.

"I will," she said at last, and silently vowed that she would keep this promise to herself. Not only for her sake, but Ragatha's too, and anyone else who might need her. For all her friends she cherished, and didn't want to let down.

With that, Pomni and Ragatha began to walk toward the hallway that housed their rooms, seeking Zooble and Gangle. At that point, neither woman had noticed that they were still holding hands, but neither of them would have cared even if they had.

There was no telling what the next day would hold, what terrible new truth about their doomed existence may be revealed to them next. Pomni couldn't claim that she'd suddenly adopted a positive outlook toward any of it, that she was no longer scared out of her mind or found any real contentment with this digital form that more often than not left her feeling imprisoned within her own body. For all she knew, her crumbling psyche might finally collapse entirely under the weight of her unyielding dread and condemn her to a life sentence in the cellar, becoming yet another crossed-out face on an abandoned bedroom door. But today, Ragatha had cast Pomni a lifeline, and she may never know just how close to the edge of her own sanity Pomni had been teetering when she'd reached out and caught it, determined to never let it go.

Right now, she was still here. She was still human. She was real. And she never wanted to give anyone the power to take that away from her again.