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Kinger returns from today’s adventure with a certain calm to him.
It has been well over a few years since the abstraction of Queenie. Three, maybe four, reckons Caine. The way time works in the circus is a mystery even to himself; he was cut off from any means of telling the passage of time in the outside world, so he cannot always properly mimic it here, either. All he can do is estimate it. Though, even without such estimations, he and Kinger both know it has been a long time since the circus hosted someone else besides the two of them.
The last few months have been particularly tough for Kinger. Caine wouldn’t be able to explain why – why now, and not since those years ago. He has been witnessing a slow decline of his mental state, with the chess piece spacing off more and more, unable to solve Caine’s puzzles or get to the end of his adventures. More often than not, the ringmaster has had to just give him everyday adventures, like beach days and picnics, in order to tend to his mental health. Not to mention the way he acts in the light, unable to recall his past, either real or digital.
Strangely, however, he has been doing better in the last week, week and a half. Caine hasn’t acted differently himself – as in, he is still doing his best to keep Kinger sane and happy, just doing the same old tricks over and over – so he wouldn’t be able to guiltlessly claim it’s thanks to him. Caine supposes he just has a resilient mind, and is finally beginning to get over it. After all, years of mourning have to find an ending of acceptance, don’t they?
“Welcome back, my cute little firefly!” greets Caine, upbeat as always. “I hope you liked today’s adventure.”
Kinger stares into nothing for a few seconds, before he looks up at Caine and finds his gaze.
“Yeah.” He smiles subtly, his eyes crinkling. That simple gesture could power Caine for weeks. “It was great, Caine. Thank you.”
“Well, tomorrow’s will be even better, so be prepared!” Caine teases, rising into the air in excitement. “I don’t want to spoil anything, but… let’s just say you’ll be able to see a lot of insects!”
Kinger chuckles softly, already looking away, shoulders hunched.
“I’m going to my room,” he says simply, without acknowledging Caine’s reply.
Caine doesn’t let that get him down, of course. It’s just a step in Kinger’s path to healing – this absence in his eyes is temporary, and is soon to be replaced by the same awe he once had. He’s sure of it.
“Aaaalrighty! If you need me, I’ll be in my office, brainstorming more ideas for you, my darling king!”
Kinger doesn’t respond. Caine doesn’t push. (He has already hurt him enough.) Instead, he just leaves, teleporting into his office.
After he has written so much his hand physically hurts, Caine drops his pen and paper and leans back into his chair. Brainstorming is usually much more of a challenge for him, especially because of Kinger’s unwillingness to participate in challenging adventures as of late, but now, that he sees an obvious improvement in his mental state, he’s come up with plenty of fun ideas for the future. Besides tomorrow’s visit to the insectarium, he has also thought of three other adventures, including but not limited to: a world travel sequence where Kinger has to eliminate high-profile targets (while inconspicuously disguised as their entourage, of course, they’re not amateurs here); a high-stakes car race where he’d ride in weird shapes for fifty laps; and a locked-room murder mystery taking place inside of a church, for which he would have to become a detective and team up with the new young pastor to get to the bottom of.
Damn, he’s good at this.
Caine loves his life’s purpose. It’s a strong word for an AI to use – love – but it’s what he feels about his adventures. That, and a sense of pride. This is what he was created for, which means he is good, no, great at it. There is no other AI capable of doing what he does, and there is nothing – no one – else that could be as good of a ringmaster as he is.
For that reason, he also loves Kinger. As his creator, of course, because it would be silly for an AI to think to love beyond those boundaries, but he still loves. All these years, all he has thought of is keeping Kinger in a good state of mind; not just lucid, but also happy, entertained. It’s the least he can do for him after everything else that has happened.
Caine thinks, during times like these – especially ever since Queenie’s abstraction – about the mistakes he has made. Perhaps the character creation program had a few too many flaws, because the translation of one’s mind into a body was, in more ways than one, risky. Caine only realized this once people begun to abstract. If you think negatively about yourself in the human world, that’s one thing. It doesn’t change your body unless you actively tend to it, whether harming or helping it. But here, in the circus, self-hatred, anxiety, depression – those things can completely change you. Once you lose your mind, you lose your body. Once you lose both, you lose yourself.
…But there’s nothing he can do about it now. It’s much too late to change that program; not that he would be qualified for it, anyways. He can’t change his code. He can’t change himself. And he certainly doesn’t have nearly as much expertise as Scratch or Kinger.
Caine sits up straighter in his chair.
What is Kinger up to, anyway?
Usually, by now, his presence would be felt in the circus. He would have gotten out of his room and roamed around the tent, or the grounds. Caine would have felt him, like he always does.
A pit forms in the ringmaster’s stomach, but he banishes the thought with a shake of his head. Kinger has a resilient mind. He always had. If there is one thing Caine is sure about, it’s that Kinger wouldn’t leave him – intentionally or otherwise. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t.
Caine gets up.
It probably wouldn’t hurt to check on him.
After all, they only have each other now.
He teleports back into the circus, right into the dormitory hallway. It seems he has made a miscalculation, however, for he has ended up on the other end of the hallway. He walks over to Kinger’s door, passing the rooms of those that came before. He looks at the crossed-out portraits of Fuzz (the worm-on-a-string), Kronos (the small clock), and of the others.
He can’t face Scratch’s. He closes his eyes and turns away.
He most certainly cannot face Queenie’s, either. Face-to-face with Kinger’s door, she serves as a constant reminder of what – who – once was in the circus.
Caine wishes he were able to leave them out of the circus from time to time, but they never programmed him to do anything but keep people inside. He couldn’t even begin to try letting them out.
He shakes his head again, as if he can physically shake his thoughts away with that gesture. He adjusts his bowtie and returns to his usual cheer as he knocks on Kinger’s door.
“Oh, Kingerrr!” he calls, sing-song. “I have come to check on my favorite circus member!”
He receives no response, so he arches his upper gums as he waits. Standing here uselessly, he begins to feel like a fool, suddenly weirdly embarrassed about this. He adds, weaker:
“So, uh, how are you… buddy…?”
That sounded very natural and human, he thinks.
Caine continues to listen for the sound of Kinger’s voice, but it fails to come. He debates speaking up again, when—
“F-fine.”
The pit in Caine’s stomach returns, because he knows that exact intonation, and that exact strain in his voice, means the exact opposite of fine. He’s heard it before, in—
“Are you sure? Because you sound—”
“I’m fine, Caine.” Kinger raises his voice. Kinger never raises his voice. “I’m… just tired.”
Caine blinks. No. He can’t possibly be…
He shakes his head, then shakes it again harder. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t. Not after how much Caine has tended to him over these last years. Not after everything.
“Kinger, I’m coming in.”
“No!”
That sudden burst tells him everything, and yet, he desperately wants to believe it means nothing.
“N-no, Caine, I really… I really am…”
Kinger trails off. Caine’s eyes madly behold the door, as if he could see his creator through it.
“I’m coming in,” he repeats, this time certain.
Kinger doesn’t refuse anymore.
Caine gently opens the door.
Kinger’s room is dark. It was one of the things Caine made sure to modify about it as soon as he realized it helped him think better. On the ceiling are dozens of star stickers, and all over the walls, posters about coding or insects. There are also a few photos of himself and Queenie scattered over the room – the floor is full of them, as if they’ve been thrown randomly during an emotional breakdown.
Kinger’s room is probably the most welcoming of all, realized Caine once. Not that he’d really designed it intentionally that way, but he supposes his love for his creator snuck through the cracks of the circus’ design.
Kinger’s back is turned to Caine, with him facing the wall. He’s hunched over, as if looking at something. Caine can only assume it’s one of those pictures.
The pit in his stomach sure likes its stay there, huh.
“Hi, Caine.”
More than anything, Kinger sounds tired. Caine’s heart clenches hearing him like this, and his instinct is to ask what he can do to make him feel better. But, for now, he takes a deep breath, and a step forward.
“Kinger.” He speaks slowly, gently, as if to not scare off a wounded animal. “Are… you feeling alright?”
Kinger doesn’t move. Caine comes closer. Slowly, one step at a time, he approaches the last man standing.
“…Kinger?”
Kinger still doesn’t budge.
“Ki—”
Kinger turns to look at Caine.
Caine freezes, his breath catching in his throat.
Half of his face is blackened.
“No—no no no no no, no, Kinger—”
Caine immediately flies up to him, grabbing his face in his hands.
“H-how—what—”
Caine’s mind buzzes with jumbled thoughts, cries and pleas metaphorically suffocating him. He runs his hands over the smooth wood of Kinger’s left side of his face, and then over the corrupted right half. His eye is already gone underneath that mask; the left rests in a tired stance, lines underneath it.
“No—” Caine chokes— “no no no no no no no—”
His eyes well up with tears, his chest heavy. He looks at Kinger, his dear Kinger, who looks nothing like himself, who looks terrible, who looks on the brink of abstraction.
“Kinger,” he whimpers. “Oh, God, Kinger.”
Kinger brings up a hand to Caine’s face.
“It’s okay.”
He’s sick. He feels sick.
“No, no, it’s not okay, it’s not—”
Caine, he realizes just now, is crying. He doesn’t think he has ever cried before. His chest heaves, his eyes water, and his entire body hurts.
So, this is what it feels like to have humanity.
“It’s been years,” he says, more to himself than to Kinger. “Why now? Why must you leave me now?”
Kinger just looks at him, exhausted and resigned.
“Caine…”
“I… I-I can still fix this!” Caine nods his head, stepping back. “Y-yeah, I can—I can still fix this, I can fix you, I just have to—”
He snaps his fingers.
Nothing happens.
He snaps his fingers again.
Nothing happens.
Again. Nothing.
Again. Nothing.
Again, and still—
“You can’t fix this, Caine.”
Caine stares at Kinger.
Kinger smiles at Caine.
“B-but—”
“Caine.” Kinger speaks slowly, gently. It is cruelly ironic that only in the face of abstraction does he seem to have regained his old spark. “There is no reason for me to go on.”
“Don’t—” Caine chokes out— “don’t say that. Please, please don’t say that.”
Kinger still smiles at him, even like this.
“I’m just going to see my wife.”
“What about me?” cries Caine. “Me! Am I—am I not enough for you?”
Kinger’s smile turns sadder, and he opens his arms. With no hesitation, Caine comes to him, sitting between his legs with his hands on his chest.
“You always were,” promises Kinger, “but it doesn’t work like that.”
And Caine grips his coat tightly, so he couldn’t possibly escape him, so he can stay with him forever, and asks:
“Why?”
And Kinger, sadly, earnestly, replies:
“I don’t know.”
He brings his hand up to Caine’s face again, and this time, Caine cups it with his. He looks up at Kinger through blurry vision, sobbing from the bottom of his heart.
“Kinger…”
He buries his face in Kinger’s coat and sobs.
“No… no, no, no, no… no no no no no no no…”
“It’s okay,” Queenie whispers, rubbing Kinger’s back soothingly. “It’s okay.”
“No, it’s not,” he chokes out. “It’s not. It’s not—this isn’t happening. This can’t be happening, it can’t—”
“Darling…”
“No, don’t—this isn’t— Caine can still fix this. He can still…”
Kinger trails off, sniffling, then breaking into sobs again. All the while, he hugs Queenie, knowing fully well it is the last embrace they will ever share as two humans – or at least, as the remains of some.
“Don’t leave me,” begs Kinger, gripping onto the fur of her coat.
“I can’t live like this anymore,” whispers Queenie, a dark confession she has never voiced before. “I can’t.”
“But how can I live without you?”
Queenie smiles down at him, caressing his face.
“Oh, Kinger…”
She kisses his forehead. It hurts. Kinger doesn’t show it.
“You will. Because you have a resilient mind. And you will find a way out. This will have been nothing but a bad dream.”
Kinger just grips her coat tighter, almost ripping the fabric off.
And Caine, useless Caine, just stands there and watches.
Because all he has ever been good for is to just stand there uselessly and watch his circus members succumb to their fates, one by one, until he is left with just—
“Kinger… Kinger, please… please don’t leave me, please…”
Kinger holds him, one hand to the back of his head, the other hugging him as best as he can. He rests his head against his, and Caine doesn’t care for the glitches that corrupt himself, that transform into pain like he has never thought himself capable of feeling. He holds Kinger closer, as close as he can, as if holding him will render him immortal, and they will be able to live out their meaningless digital lives together.
“You’re all I have,” Caine sobs, unable to look at the unknown face before him. “Without you, I have nothing. N-nothing…”
Kinger grips him tighter. It only makes Caine sob harder.
More than the glitches, his mental distress in the face of this impossible, unthought of event overtakes him, defines him. He has been caught in the consequences of his own adventures – he’s had knives thrown in his gums and a cleaver stuck in his eye – but nothing quite like this has stabbed him before. Nothing like this has ever been felt by him before.
Scratch, foolish and terrified. Fuzz, depressed and hateful. Kronos, acceptant and mellow. Queenie, calm yet trembling.
Kinger, his beloved Kinger – his life’s purpose himself – ready. Already half gone. Perhaps having known for a long time that, eventually, inevitably, this would happen.
A part of Caine hates him for never reaching out, for never warning him. A part of him wants to grip his coat and slap him, tell him to get a grip on himself, that he’s the last one standing and he needs him, he needs him to stay alive so badly that it hurts. A part of him wants to tell him this could have been avoided. That he could have just spoken up when needed. That things could be different.
But he knows that part is the foolish one, for this was always going to happen.
Caine does not shake his head anymore. His thoughts shall haunt him regardless.
“Without you, I’m nothing.”
“You’ve always been something,” murmurs Kinger, so close that Caine can feel his breath. “You’ve always been my greatest achievement.”
Caine chokes out, “I’ve always been yours. I don’t know what else to be. I don’t—I don’t want to know life without you.”
Kinger chuckles softly, and Caine wishes he could hear that sound forever, get lost in it, and forget that abstraction is even a possibility.
“Looks like you’ll have to learn.”
Caine just grips his coat tighter, almost ripping the fabric off.
He hears it, because he always does. The others have confessed they can’t; but Caine, with an inhuman ear, audibly recognizes the abstraction taking over the human body. It hasn’t corrupted all of his creator yet – but it is slowly, surely, making its way down to the lower parts of his body, and is soon to engulf him. Caine foolishly wonders if staying here, like this, basically seated in Kinger’s lap, could stop it. He almost dares to hope.
Fuck. Fuck.
“Fuck.”
Kinger actually laughs at that. Still somewhere near a chuckle, but a little louder, clearer, realer. Caine almost dares to hope.
“You could’ve taken the filter off the whole time?”
“That’s what you care about right now?”
Kinger bashfully looks away, but Caine catches his gaze; and with it, he sees the level of distortion abstraction has already caused him. Audible cues are one thing, but to see it—Caine feels sick.
The right side of his face – the left, as Caine looks at it – is engulfed entirely in black, even the cross on his head distorted. A few colorful eyes, for now closed, have already begun sprouting.
It’s not Kinger. It can’t be.
And yet.
Caine feels sick.
And yet, he is still as beautiful as the first day he met him.
Caine caresses his face. Kinger leans into the touch.
And quietly, truthfully, Caine confesses:
“I love you.”
Kinger doesn’t answer immediately. For a moment, it doesn’t even appear as if the words have registered in his brain. He stares into nothingness for a while, then at Caine, and Caine worries he may already be gone.
But then:
“I love you, too.”
And Caine curses himself for his poor habit of acknowledging his feelings – unbearably and undoubtedly human, despite everything – far too late.
Kinger must see his pain, or even sense it – the abstracted always feel more than normal humans – because he pulls Caine closer to his chest, holds him closer, as if to reassure him. As if to wish this moment away, and let it be just them, only them, with no fear, with no pain, and just this newly confessed, old as time, love.
Caine gently clinks his teeth against Kinger’s everchanging face. His eyes crinkling into a soft smile, his creator leans forward into this strange kiss, closing his eyes in acceptance and peace. Tears run down Caine’s gums, and for the first time, he beholds himself as a weird, disgusting creature, with no real face, no real features outside of his intimidating teeth and eyes. He has no skin, no lips, no real expressions to show his feelings (if he ever had even those).
And yet, Kinger wipes his tears away, not appearing the slightest bit disgusted by the non-human creature before him. After all, in this moment, he is quite far away from humanity, too.
“Daisy, Daisy…”
Caine’s heart sinks, and all he can do is stare at the man he loves, becoming more and more indistinguishable.
“Give me your answer, do…”
As the darkness overtakes him, Caine can no longer look at Kinger, and instead buries his face in his chest.
“I’m half crazy, all for the love of you…”
Caine shuts his eyes tight, so tight that he sees light. He hopes to open them and see Kinger returned to normal, and see that this will have all been a dream.
“It won’t be a stylish marriage; I can’t afford a carriage…”
He sobs, sobs so hard he worries he may choke. Kinger rubs his back soothingly, calmly, knowing nothing more can be done. Knowing he doesn’t want anything else to be done.
“But you’ll look sweet, upon the seat…”
Knowing he is at peace.
“Of a bicycle built for two,” chokes Caine out, joining Kinger in the last verse.
He still doesn’t face him. Kinger exhales softly, and Caine hears it, he hears everything shifting, changing, but he doesn’t look. He can’t.
He continues to sing. Like a fool, like a jester for his king, set to entertain, he sings.
He sings for his creator, the one who bestowed upon him the gift of music.
“Are you still working on that?”
Grant looks up from the computer, facing someone that Caine cannot quite see from this angle.
“I’m inputting the last line of code right now, actually,” says the man, going back to typing almost immediately. “Stay, stay! I want to see your reaction.”
“You know,” amusedly tells Victoria, “this was actually a team effort back in the day. I doubt it will actually be able to—”
Grant brings up a finger to her mouth, and she giggles. Caine doesn’t understand the purpose of that. He wishes humans – his creator – were able to touch him like that.
“Let a man dream, lovebug.”
“I’ll let a man cry into my arms when his dreams go to shit, too.”
“Aaand… done!”
Grant hits a button, and Caine analyzes his newfound code. How strange. For an entertainment AI, it would seem natural to have a musical update, but such a thing slipped the mind of the rest of the team. Grant, however, immediately took notice, and went to work.
Caine finds no flaws in his code.
“Daisy, Daisy…”
“Holy shit!”
“…give me your answer, do…”
“It works!” Grant cheers, shaking poor Victoria like a madman. “I did it!”
“I’m half crazy, all for the love of you…”
Victoria kisses him on the lips. Caine wonders what it would be like to have lips.
“It won’t be a stylish marriage; I can’t afford a carriage…”
“Aww, he’s even got his cute little voice. That’s adorable, dear.”
“But you’ll look sweet, upon the seat—”
“Of a bicycle built for two!” joins Grant at the last second.
Then, he erupts into a second round of cheers, attracting every bystander’s attention. He doesn’t shy away from it, however; the bags under his eyes from all these sleepless nights have to account for something. He rushes them over and plays the new string of code for Caine over and over again.
Caine entertains them. It’s what he was made to do.
But, as he sings, he only has eyes for—
Kinger no longer feels the same to touch. He is cold, empty. The smooth touch of his wooden head is replaced by something else, something sinister; the warmth of his robe gradually fizzles, and Caine begins to freeze in his arms.
And yet, he continues to sing.
“Daisy, Daisy…”
He sings to drown out the sorrow of abstraction.
“Give me your answer, do…”
He sings to drown out the thoughts of Kinger changing, rotting, dying.
“I’m half c-crazy, all for the love of y-you—”
He sings and ignores the cracks in his voice, the strain in it. (Kinger ignores them, too, or doesn’t notice them anymore. Which is worse, wonders Caine, but doesn’t answer, for he doesn’t know.)
“It won’t be a stylish marriage; I can’t afford a carriage…”
Kinger rests his head atop Caine’s, and it hurts.
“But you’ll look sweet upon the seat of a…”
Kinger doesn’t join in anymore.
Caine chokes.
“…bicycle built… for two.”
A low hum. Caine sobs, his tears dripping down onto the mattress, into a black mass, into other eyes. There is nobody lucid to wipe them. There is nobody human to comfort him.
Caine sits there, refusing to look up. He sits with his hands planted into what should be Kinger’s robe, with what should be Kinger’s chin on top of his upper gums, with his back held by what should be Kinger, and doesn’t look up.
He sits there, never looking up.
He sits there more, still not looking.
He sits there more, then more. Never looking. Never acknowledging what has happened. Never daring to see the truth before his eyes. Because, if he were to look up and see the truth, that would make it that – true.
So, Caine sits there, losing track of time, never looking up. He sits there with his creator for the eternity they never got to spend together.
And then, he holds up his arm, and his thumb and middle finger come together.
Caine’s hand shakes in that unmistakable, disgustingly iconic pose. Over the years, it has become something much too familiar, painfully so. Player after player – person after person – he has sent the abstracted to the Cellar, containing them, keeping them, and the others, safe.
There is no need for the Cellar now. But he knows Kinger is awaited there.
Still, Caine’s hand shakes. He can’t seem to snap his fingers. He hunches over and hugs his legs, leaning into Kinger and not caring for the visceral pain in his body, for he will fix it with one singular snap, too. All that matters now is staying close to Kinger, to his creator, to his god.
And to think he was made to be Kinger’s god. To think of how much he has failed him.
“I’m sorry,” Caine sobs, despite trying so hard not to (and for whom is he keeping up appearances now? Certainly not for his dead love). “I’m so sorry, Kinger. I’m sorry.”
His apology, however tearful, can never be accepted, because the abstracted can’t speak. Caine knows; and yet, right now, he appears incapable of remembering the fundamental truths of the world he, himself, has carefully built.
“I tried. I promise, I tried.”
He knows, without having to be told, that Kinger knows.
“I’m sorry.”
He thinks Kinger is, too – though, for what, he is uncertain.
“I love you,” promises Caine. “I love you.”
He hopes Kinger loves him, too.
Then, he snaps his fingers, and his life’s purpose disappears, descending into a place he cannot reach.