Chapter Text
Out of all the people that would’ve lasted in this digital hellhole, Zooble wouldn’t have put themselves at the forefront. They had never really put much faith into their own survival, always having a more passive attitude towards the thought of abstraction. It was going to happen to them at some point. There was no denying that. Maybe soon or maybe later, but it would happen and they wouldn’t fight it. Though, they usually put the thought of abstraction way into the back of their mind, for their own comfort and sanity. It never did them well to ponder their own abstraction, let alone the others’.
It was … hard. Seeing them all go. Kaufmo, Jax, Ragatha, Pomni, and even Kinger. Though they weren’t the closest to some of them, the mismatched assortment of parts felt a deep pang every time their broken mind lingered at the thought of any of their passings.
The hardest was Gangle’s.
When it was just the two of them left, Zooble had a surprising amount of optimism, a starch contrast from their usual pessimistic and overall “done with this sh!+” attitude.
Was it foolish to dare to hope in the face of permanent suffering?
Was it not just an attempt to ignore the inevitable?
To lose themselves to delusion rather than abstraction, if only for a brief moment?
Yes, but for a time they were able to believe it. That as long as they had Gangle and she had them, they could stick it out together for a little while longer.
The soft and delicate feelings of her ribbons wrapping around their body, holding them together as the two clung tightly to each other in their bed. The feeling of safety and comfort they felt with her, through the forced adventures to the serene moments of reprieve they had when they were alone (when they could ignore and forget that they were always watched by two heterochromatic eyes), only reinforced their faith that both of them could survive this digital hellscape.
But even the digital circus, for all its proclaimed defiance of the concept, could not escape reality.
And on a day, or what constituted as a day in the circus, that felt like it would end in a routine that ended like any other (enduring Caine’s annoying and almost mocking enthusiasm as he forced the two remaining members on a violent adventure that Zooble would’ve preferred to hide away from were it not for the desire to stay by Gangle’s side no matter what, to finally being able to retreat to their room to rest up, holding each other until blissful sleep took them, only to do it all over again). A routine that Zooble was, dare they say, almost content with, as long as they had Gangle by their side.
When Zooble turned over, their misshapped eyes widened as they found not Gangle on her side of the bed, but a mass of black static and shapes and polygons created jagged edges that looked like they were trying to breakout all at once, adorned with hundreds of multi-colored eyes huddled in the corner of the room like a frightened animal. A brief bout of fear overtook them at the all too familiar horror before them. But that fear had morphed quickly into despair as they realized what … who this abstraction really was.
The being that had once been their only source of companionship left in this eternal nightmare (how they wished this was all a nightmare) was no more. The one being who kept them sane throughout it all, that gave them some inkling of hope that everything was going to be okay.
Their last friend, now a monster that would lunge on them at any moment, all sense of what they were lost forever.
Though, strangely, it - she didn’t attack them. Merely stared at them with their dozens of eyes. Not in fear, nor anger, nor confusion or interest. Just blank stares as though she couldn’t really see what was in front of her.
Zooble couldn’t say or do anything, only stare as they stood frozen in place. They wanted to cry out for their friend. Wanted to scream at them in rage and betrayal, for leaving them without even saying good bye. They wanted to beg for her to come back, in that deluded hope that they could somehow fix this. They wanted to run up and hold the abstraction, the effects of touching her be d@#med, just as long as they could hold her.
But they didn’t do any of that, merely staring frozen in place at the abstraction before them.
The two beings stayed like that for a time, the world fading away as nothing else mattered to Zooble. In a way, Zooble wished that they could stay like that forever. To ignore what they knew was going to happen, to just stay like this with it, with her. Too stay in their delusions of a better tomorrow for just a little longer.
Until Caine had popped into the room to probably announce a new adventure. His joyful demeanor pausing mid shout as he caught sight of the abstraction. For a few seconds, all he did was stare, just as frozen as Zooble. But that quickly changed, his cheerful persona now replaced with something cold as he levitated the abstraction off the floor and started dragging it to the centerstage of the circus.
Immediately, Zooble snapped out of their stupor and ran after Caine, ignoring the off balance of their legs and how they almost tripped as something desperate, something primal took over them. Just as Caine had opened up the cellar and was about to throw the abstract– GANGLE! It
“GANGLE!’ They screeched, the hoarse and animalistic noise that came out of their voice grabbed Caine’s attention. And in a moment of pure panic, pure delusion and desperation, Zooble did something that they would never thought they would ever do in this eternal hellscape they were forced to call home.
“CAINE, PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE DON’T DO THIS, PLEASE!”
They begged.
For the first time in their existence here, they pleaded with the Ai ringmaster. Their voice of desperation slowly morphing into a strained whisper as they repeated their plea over and over again.
“Please, Caine. Please. Please don’t take her from me,” Zooble was on the ground now, having tripped over on themselves in their hurry, a hand stretching as far as it could, reaching out for the abstraction that was once their Gangle, “She’s all I have left.”
At their plea, the Ai had paused for a second, for a brief second. His back was turned to them so they couldn’t see his expression, but they had thought for a moment, for just a foolish moment, that he would listen. That their plea made him listen to them for once. That they wouldn’t lose the last person they cared about in this d@%m circus.
That hope was shattered immediately as Caine suddenly motioned his hand downwards, dropping the abstraction, dropping Gangle in with the rest that had passed on.
The dead silence that followed contrasted with the loud colors that made up the circus grounds.
Zooble didn’t even scream when it happened. They just stood frozen in place, unable to do anything but stare down at the circus floor that had once been the opening to the cellar. The door to hell to where their friends, where Gangle would spend the rest of their distorted existences in utter darkness, their minds reduced to nothing more than feral animals as they float into the black void for eternity.
They didn’t notice Caine had come beside them, still floating above them like he was lording over them like the uncaring god they always knew he was, until he brought a gloved hand to their mismatched shoulder.
“ZOOBLE, MY FRIEND, ARE YOU ALR–”
With a shrill scream akin to a rabid animal echoing throughout the circus, the abstract character lunged at the Ai, bringing him to the ground as they wailed squeezed fists that would’ve bled if they could into his stupid little avatar over and over and over again. Though the rational part of their mind knew that it didn’t bring him any pain, that part of them was drowned out by their all consuming rage as they continued in their assault.
How they screamed every obscenities, every swear they could think of to the machine, to their keeper, to their tormentor, the scene almost being comical with how each one was censored, yet that didn’t fail to convey the utter contempt, the disgust, they held to the one they hated the most.
How they cursed at him, at his very existence. All the hatred that they had for the Ai, saying everything that they could think of in their frenzy that could hurt him. How they hated the adventures. How they hated him. How they didn’t see him as anything more than a broken machine that couldn’t do the one thing he was “good” at. How he failed as a ringmaster, who couldn’t keep his “performers” happy and avoid abstracting. How they would gladly leave him to rot if they ever got to escape this circus. Every jab they could think of, every thing that they had said to him before out of exasperation and hadn’t said to him out of caution. All laid forth for him to hear.
They could see how it hurt him. The way his teeth lowered in an angle similar to a distressed frown, his eyes welling up like he could actually cry.
And a small, horrible part of them reveled in it. Delighted that, if nothing else, they could hurt him like this. Make him feel worthless, make him feel an inkling of guilt for what he had done. Their voice a low growl, their verbal assault laced with malice and hatred as they continued.
“I wish I never put on that stupid headset. I wish I never met you. If … If I had the chance, I would’ve smashed that stupid computer to pieces and never looked back,” they could see how his eyes were glitching as he stared at her, one engulfed in blue and the other red. His body becoming more akin to static and polygons disrupting his form like an abstraction. And though they were too focused on the Ai to see it, they could hear the glitches of the circus around them, just like in that god forsaken therapy session so long ago.
He was glitching. Not just him, the circus was glitching. If they kept going, they realized, Caine … the circus would break in its entirety.
What would that mean for them?
Would that somehow free them, spit them out of this digital hell?
Or would they still be stuck here, perhaps to suffer a fate even worse than the circus?
They didn’t know.
And frankly … they didn’t care, as they were face to face with the Ai ringmaster, their hateful eyes staring right into the glitching ringmaster’s very “soul”.
“WE!”
“ARE!”
“NOT!”
“FRIENDS!”
All that mattered to them right now was hurting Caine. To make him feel just as pathetic, just as horrible about themselves himself. Consequences be dam#$#.
“We never were. And we never will be. I HATE YOU. I FU$%$KING HATE YOU, CAINE!”
And with that, they were far too exhausted to continue, rolling off the still glitching Ai as they laid beside him, looking up at the bright colors and poor graphics of the circus tent. They always despised how bright the circus was, a constant pain that they could never get rid of lest they leave without their eyes. A constant, mocking reminder of the prison they would never escape from. But now, they couldn’t give a single f89k about it.
“Zooble, I …” And to their annoyance, Caine just had to speak, never giving them a moment of reprieve from him. His voice was still glitching, his usual bravado was absent in his near quiet, almost hesitant voice, “I’m sor-”
“Shut up, Caine,” he looked surprised, shocked even. Not at the all to normal response from them, but just at how … empty they had spoken it, none of the usual snark nor disdain that came with it. How tired they sounded, as though struggling to even get it out as they refused to look at him. A quiet plea, one that they had no hope nor delusions would be heeded, “just … shut up.”
Surprisingly, for once in the Ai’s existence, he didn’t argue nor speak up again after that. Zooble could've made a scathing remark on that, another way to hurt him. But they didn’t, nor did they care to.
Both the last two members of the circus didn’t speak, only looking up at the circus tent, lost in their own thoughts. They didn’t know how long they stayed like that, but it didn’t really matter to them. Time was made irrelevant to them the moment they entered this digital hell.
And for the first time in the history of The Amazing Digital Circus, all was quiet.