Work Text:
Jungle Pocket woke up like any other morning.
She was fired up.
She woke up early that morning, a smile on her face. To a normal person, a bed would be comparable to a magnet in the morning. To Jungle Pocket, it was a spring. She hopped out of bed and loudly stretched with zero remorse for her roommate's sleep quality. Narita Top Road opened her eyes groggily, blinking at the disturbance that was Jungle Pocket. Despite being suddenly woken up, she could only hope to cheer her friend on.
"Up and early, hm..." A yawn. "You'll never stop improving at this point.."
Jungle Pocket was now grinning wildly, her hands on her hips, as if a superhero, as she proclaimed:
"I don't just want to improve, I want to surpass the best! And after that.. be the person everyone can take inspiration from, so they'll improve, too!"
Narita Top Road was already asleep by the time she finished talking. Jungle Pocket changed into her school-supplied tracksuit and stepped into the open world.
The open world was the hallway outside of her dorm. She was working towards that part.
As if she forgot the time, which she did, Jungle Pocket pulled out her phone and texted Fuji Kiseki.
[GOATKKE]
im pumped today! could you help e train today please
There was no response. It was 4 am. She entered the stairwell and had an idea. She jogged down the stairwell once, then twice, then three times. Every time she closed her eyes, she imagined the roar of the crowd around her as she passed the finish line. The roar of the crowd as she bested T.M. Opera O. A triumphant huff escaped her as she was engrossed deeper inside her own mind. The crowd chanting her name, the confetti, and Fuji Kiseki's approval. She beat the overlord; what did that make her?
A moment was all it took for her to fall too deep into her own head. She imagined the cheers of the crowd. She imagined the confetti. The way the sun was shining that day. How she entered the gate so ready to win, ready for anything. But the cheers weren't for her. The confetti wasn't for her. It was for Agnes Tachyon. She didn't even place behind her; she placed third. How could she be the best? How could she feel good about beating Opera O, when she would never be able to prove herself against her biggest rival? She could never win, there would never be a retry, and she would never be satis-
Caught up in her own head, Jungle Pocket tripped. She felt the tears before she felt the pain. She was already tearing up before she fell. Her foot slipped off of the concrete stairwell. Her hands flew in front of her by instinct, taking the brunt of the impact. Her forearms hit the concrete hard, and she went sliding down. She didn't have to fall far, not that far up the flight. Her self-esteem was in free fall. It had phased through the concrete and evaporated into the core of the earth.
She lay at the bottom of that flight of stairs, sobbing. She looked ugly, snot bubbling from her nose as her tears dropped sideways onto the floor. She looked pathetic. She felt pathetic. In a flash of anger, she balled her fist and slammed it against the concrete floor, groaning from the pain. Her physical pain couldn't compare to the pain of not knowing. The pain of comparison. The pain of not feeling like enough. How had she let one race, one person affect her so deeply??
How had she fallen so far?
Agnes Tachyon woke up differently that morning.
She woke up to her favourite scent in the world.
It was her favourite scent in the world. The smell of alcohol and bleach, and whatever she had cooked up that following week.
Now, she could only smell herself. She smelled disgusting. She hadn't showered in days, and hadn't left her lab in two. Manhattan Cafe stopped hanging around. She stopped hanging around a long time ago, more-so visiting. And eventually, she stopped visiting, and started checking in. Now, Agnes Tachyon doesn't see Cafe at all. She predicted as much. As her body began to wake slowly, the throbbing pain in her leg returned.
She bent over, her head feeling heavy as she looked down. A small but noticeable trail of dried blood dripped from the back of her leg. The source was a cauterized wound she inflicted on herself. In a crazed attempt at an experiment, she cut open her own leg and inserted a rod of titanium into the area above her heel to 'accelerate' the healing process.
She drugged herself heavily, leaving her so intoxicated and impaired that she couldn't finish the job. Before she could bleed out on the floor, she sprinkled iron oxide onto her leg and layered it with aluminium powder. The result was a cauterized wound and severe burns around the area.
All she could do was tilt her head back and laugh at herself. How badly she wanted to run again, and how badly she ruined that chance once more.