Chapter Text
“Are you.. sure?”
“Proceed with the examination. Even if it tries, it couldn’t kill you with your armour on.”
Two figures stand behind a clear glass pane, staring at the subject behind it.
“That wasn’t the case last time! Do you understand the amount of resources this takes? Even if your vision is a success, we won’t get what we were hoping for in the first place.” The one in the lab coat stresses.
The light flickers. The subject does too.
“Oh, please. Could it really do any harm after being injected? Ever since we got that new assistant, it’s been much more docile.”
“He. He’s still a human, after all.”
“I’ll be looking forward to the results.”
Ash had woken up wrong that morning.
His room, as white and shiny as ever, welcomed him when he opened his eyes wearily. He felt the comforting warmth of his pillow and bedsheets underneath him, as usual. The sun was just beginning to rise and he could make out the loud argument of Haiper and Spider outside, which was expected.
Thank goodness they weren’t very close. His morning headaches could only get so bad.
He paused under the covers to think for a moment. Did he really have to get out of bed? He could just sleep the day away. No petty drama, his lovely spacious room, no disturbances, it all sounded pretty great to him.
Of course you have to get up, dumbass. Tubbo would scream at you if you didn’t go and make sure that everything in the Regime was in tip-top shape. He thought fondly, shrugging the heavy blanket off his body.
It wasn’t until he prepared to open his mouth to make way for a big yawn that he noticed the wrong that festered within him. My mouth? He sat up almost immediately, eyes squinting from the sudden headache. Maybe I have a cold, he mused. I don't usually get colds.
Ash drowsily raised his hands to rub his eye before he felt something strange. The supreme leader of the Regime paused momentarily, his heartbeat slowing as he felt his chin, to his cheek, to his-
His mouth.
It started as a nervous chuckle- well, attempt to chuckle, as he carefully ripped off the glitchy particles surrounding the entirety of his lower face, as if they were paper. It was similar to washing your face when you woke up to get rid of that crusty feeling, but after two minutes of nonstop peeling, Ash realised that the wrongness remained.
See, Ash had an extensive morning routine that consisted of trying to maintain some sort of a human face. It wouldn’t work sometimes—in which cases he would just avoid people (which never worked)—but sometimes, it did. And he would be able to speak, look at others, the usual basic human things he wanted the privilege of having. If he didn’t, he’d just feel ill for the rest of the day and also look like a complete weird creature thing. Didn’t help with the Regime’s image, he knew. He was lucky it mostly kept to his head and took time to regenerate in most circumstances.
With a muffled groan, he slipped off the bed and took notice of the specks of purple that floated around him as he moved. More than usual. Huh.
Really, things have not been going well for me at all lately. The regime leader rummaged in the cabinet until he found YD’s mirror, a heartfelt gift from her before she went travelling. Now, let’s see what’s wrong…
He blinked. He blinked again. His hand rose instinctively to try and rip it off his face, but he wasn’t even sure if he wanted to touch it, and it was on his mouth—hell, it was everywhere!
Glitchy particles, much like the small section that mostly festered on his right eye, were all. Over. His face. His body. The only reason he hadn’t noticed it was because they had left his other eye alone, and even then, it was crawling down his body, multiplying and moving like a living, breathing creature, shifting colours from a dark angry purple to a light pink to even pure black, like some sort of storm forming on top of his skin. What?
He looked at the mirror again (just in case it was a really bad dream) with shaking hands.
He looked crazy, to say the least. Like some sort of rabid monster. His skin, which was warping from its usual brown hue to a dark pinkish colour, was the first thing he noticed under the glitchy mob swarming his head. He could see his hair, at least, but what?
What the hell? What the hell? What the hell- The mirror fell from his hands at last, shattering on the floor, but it was the least of his worries at the moment.
Is it in my throat? Can I breathe it in? He was painfully aware of the argument outside coming to a halt, probably from the dropped mirror, and also the fact he was breathing heavily from his nose because everywhere leading to his mouth was sealed shut.
And at that moment, Ash knew at least one thing he wanted. I can’t let Haiper see me like this.
Ash stared down at his hands which were also starting to turn into that purplish colour his face had, and small particles appearing on top of them. Oh, it’s spreading faster. Great. Did this ever happen to him before? No. Not that he remembered. He could feel the colour draining from his face with every passing moment, not that it mattered since it was fucking purple!
...
“Ash?”
Oh, just great. Haiper’s voice rang from down in the pantheon. He turned to call back, but he forgot his mouth was quite literally gone, so he just shook his head frantically while looking for escape routes despite nobody being there to see it.
“You always make such a big deal out of nothing, bro. You just want to change the topic because you’re losing the argument.”
“Shut up, Spider.. Ash? Did something happen?” Haiper’s voice, which sounded more curious than concerned—which wasn’t rare nowadays, considering how he had changed recently—rang in Ash’s ears like ominous bells.
I’m so fucked.
He started by getting away from the door, for one, because he didn’t want them to see him like this. Hell, he didn’t want anyone to see him like this. How would they react, even? With the little sense he had left, he pulled out his pickaxe with shaking hands and mined his way out of the pantheon, making a small promise that he’d fix it later—if he could fix himself first, of course.
Haiper wouldn’t follow him. Not this Haiper, at least. And Spider would stay with that fox for the sake of winning a stupid argument.
It was getting harder to breathe.
He could feel it slowing him down. Usually, he just felt this dull ache on the side of his face, but it had spread. Why would it spread to the rest of his body? Was it like an illness of some sort? Who could help him?
The feds? No fucking way.
He knew that he was headed somewhere, but the edges of his vision were slowly fading and fragments of purple were falling off of his face as if he was rotting somehow, as if his body had started to deteriorate. But how?
Stop asking questions. Find someone to help.
Maxo? I’m sure Maxo can. He’s…
Where is he?
Back to fucking square one. Great job. It’s not as if you’re probably dying right now, Ash. He breathed in sharply through his nose and realised he had reached spawn from the solid feeling under his shoes. Right, so there was a chance anyone could see him if they went there, another amazing choice by him, of course.
Could he be any more pathetic right now? Probably, depending on the person who found him.
With a huff, he leaned against one of the walls of spawn, trying to keep an eye on the waypoint despite his fading consciousness. Breathe in, breathe out. God, this hurts.
You’re the leader of the regime, barely keeping yourself together because your body is failing itself. What a wonderful morning! He would’ve laughed if it didn’t feel like it’d kill him. Ewron was right. Ewron was right. He was right, wasn’t he?
Maybe dying isn’t that bad of an ending. I’ll come back anyway.
Actually, why hadn’t he thought of that before? He would come back. Why the hell are you panicking?
He understood not wanting to show himself in front of Haiper, obviously, because that fox wasn't the person he once knew. He could boil it down to paranoia, but his gut feeling never lied to him. Ash couldn’t let Haiper know.
Even so, he had this sinking feeling, the terror that enveloped him right now was familiar. It was familiar, but how?
The sunny sky above seemed to be getting cloudier by the second.
Just as Ash felt himself letting go of the threads of consciousness he had left, he heard a familiar, grating voice.
“Well well well!” Ewron’s image came into his already limited view, accompanied by the familiar sound of the waypoint being used, and he would’ve rolled his eyes if they weren’t burning with white-hot pain at the moment.
“Hey, Ash?” Again. “Ash? Supreme leader? You people and your attention spans..”
A hand pressed to his forehead. He flinched, attempting to get away, but another hand held him in place, as if expecting it.
Maybe I would have been better off letting Haiper find me after all.
Ash couldn’t really speak, or look at Ewron, or move. But he did feel the weight underneath him shifting, Ewron’s annoyed grumbles, and his body slowly being lifted into the air. And he panicked.
“Hey—hey! Fuck, can you stay still for one moment?!” Ewron screeched. “Still as a fucking ragdoll for one second and thrashing around the next! I’m taking you to the church, alright?” A few more curses in Polish, and Ash finally paused.
He tensed a little, but the regime leader complied. He always did when it came to this idiot. And anything to get him out of plain sight, right?
He did notice that the glitch didn’t affect Ewron. Whenever Ash touched someone, it’d usually react, and quite violently at that. It was why he had tried to get away a moment ago. However, as he lay limp on Ewron’s shoulders, the mob remained silent, timid. Even with it eating away at his own body.
Bitterness clawed at whatever he had left inside of him, but he didn’t bother his blade further out of spite. Not right now.
Even so, Ewron had gone quiet. That was louder than any unnerving thoughts tugging at Ash’s mind, so he let it wander for a little as the waypoint’s glow invaded the little vision he had left.
‘We’re here.”
A few more steps and he could feel himself slump against one of the church seats.
“Well!” Ewron sat down in front of him, the assassin getting closer until Ash’s eye was directly staring at his face, his tail waving curiously.
“You look worse than usual, you know? What, is this because YD went on that long trip? No cosmetic surgery to fix your face?”
“...” He took the insult with grace, if nothing else.
“Do you need to.. wash it off…. or..”
Ash would raise an eyebrow if he could.
“Ash, I have no idea how to help you. Like—like, imagine, I come to spawn to find Katie, and you’re lying down on one heart with your fucking body covered in more purple shit than usual. It scared me a little!” A short laugh ensued. “So, I need you to tell me how to fix it.”
One heart? Ash looked past Ewron’s annoying face as he fell into thought. Why am I not dead now? Did it stop when I saw Ewron?
Speaking of the assassin, Ewron had moved again. He was scampering off, announcing that he was going to fetch a towel from the cave, and something about not missing him in the meantime like the little prick he was.
And just like that, Ash realised how fast his heart was beating as soon as the sound of the waypoint echoed in his ears.
I don’t think I’ve ever felt this alone before, one thought became comprehensible in thousands of muddled thoughts, and he would’ve laughed to himself—but of course, he was dying again, and so Ash just wheezed, letting his body hit the ground, trying to soak in the warmth of the nearest candle.
Some Regime leader I am. He was at least glad he was dying slowly, because he didn’t want to die when Ewron was trying to take care of him.
What? It was a rare treat.
It seemed dying made your inner wants rise and bubble at the surface, unfortunately.
The time seemed to go slower, which didn’t help the pain at all. He could feel the glitch had decided to start spreading to the furniture surrounding him, gnawing hungrily at the carpet and the chairs, and he bitterly hoped that it would go and bother someone else. Which was, well, impossible. It was too merciful of an entity to torment anyone but Ash.
Why me? Why can I never recall the reason why you’re bound to me in the first place? Static. Could you tell me why? Are you a person? What if you used to be a person as well?
It didn’t reply. It couldn’t. He imagined that it waved at him condescendingly through his continuously warping vision.
If you were a person, it’d be easier to like you. I’m good at making friends. I had two daughters, you know. One of them is alive and she doesnt really like me right now, but we'll fix that.
Ewron would come back soon.
And he did. Ash noticed even with his vision eventually blurring out completely, and he quickly dissolved the relief flooding through his veins, trying to lean weakly towards the assassin’s direction as if it would speed up the time it took to enter the church.
“Dying in a church,” Ewron’s muffled voice broke through, “does that mean you’ll go to heaven, Ash? Well, it’s your lucky day!”
Funny.
A few more precious seconds of silence, and Ash noticed briefly that the glitch had stopped attacking him, as if waiting for Ewron to speak again. It retreated from the area around him. Even his hands. A long sigh escaped from Ash, and the cloud of purple pulled away from his eyes so he could see Ewron clearer than before.
As Ewron sat down, Ash kept his eye on the damp towel in his hand.
“...I broke YD’s mirror.” He croaked out.
“She can get you another one, no?” Ewron reached closer, the towel connecting gently with Ash’s forehead, his forehead which was now actually viewable. “And you decide to speak now, hm.”
No answer.
“..So.. tell me what happened?”
“Later.”
Ewron seemed satisfied with that. The towel wasn’t stained. Ash realised then that everything had gone completely back to how it was, or how he preferred it—the glitch surrounding the side of his face once again.
“I feel hot.”
“Yes, well—you have a fever of some sort.” Ewron grumbled, waving the towel around in front of Ash’s face. “So, Mr Supreme Leader, I have to be your nurse now, too. Being your loyal fucking blade wasn’t enough, hm?”
“You always find me at the right times. How is that, Ewron?”
“Hmmm.. maybe it’s fate!” Ewron’s tone had shifted to that familiar message of ‘stop asking questions’. Ash obliged—regrettably, but he made sure to kick Ewron’s ankle sharply in silent rebellion, to which he relished the hiss in return.
Even with the kick, Ash felt oddly compliant.
He watched carefully, Ewron’s quiet, focused face allowed the towel dabbing on Ash’s head to come closer than he’d let most people.
Familiar. Why? Why was it familiar? It was similar to the way his shoulders trembled when he was greeted with his white, silent empty room. It was a good shudder. He liked it. He liked right now, too—even if the unease was more than it usually was.
I forgive him. He simply thought. It’s Ewron, so I can forgive him for this weird feeling. So I’ll just bury it deep, deep down.
“I’m done!” Ewron exclaimed. He backed away, inspecting the towel. “Hm. It’s not purple now.”
“Now? I don’t think it ever got stained.”
“Ah.” The towel was put away. “I think it was, actually.”
Ash forced himself to get up as well, ignoring the sharp stabbing pain in his head from the agile movement. That was enough vulnerability.
Ewron had noticed the brief stagger, his ears flattening. “I’ll go now, okay Ash? Uhm, Katie’s calling me.” That toothy smile had returned to his face.
“Go, whatever man.”
And just like that, Ash was alone. He was standing in this church, holding onto that brief nostalgic feeling that made him feel so wonderfully ill, the feeling of a towel, the glitch devouring him and almost killing him, stopping when Ewron helped, and hunched over, retching.
It did not have the human colour he hoped to see. Purple spit dripped from his mouth.
Oh. I’ll have to clean that up. I don’t want him to find something else to annoy me about.