pipers_son | 020 // Video

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020 // Video

[For once, there's not a smile on Joker's face. It's a rather... disconcerting effect, considering how he usually is.]

So, for folks that don't already know- our lad Wrath is missin'. He's one a the younger folks around here, with messy black hair that goes 'bout his waist and purple eyes. Teeth like a beartrap.

If ya find 'im, or 'ave an idea of where he is, or saw anythin' suspicious, lemme know. There's a reward of 4200P for anybody who can get 'im back ta us safe and sound. And so help me, if anyone did anythin' ta that boy...

[There's a moment where he seems to struggle with himself before he lets out a breath, letting his expression go down a tone to "not very happy" instead of "I will definitely break someone's legs".]

So! There's that. This is also a reminder that Halloween is next month, and Eve's Garden Circus is always lookin' for workers especially now that we'll have a haunted house that needs ta be manned. If yer not afraid of crowds, then we could always use more performers. Contact me if ya think ya 'ave any special talents or want ta learn any, and we'll talk.

We 'ave plenty a jobs for others, such as sellin' tickets, takin' care a the lights and such, anyone who can path folks up, and mannin' stalls. If ya 'ave a business of yer own, we can set ya up on the grounds.

The haunted house itself needs people ta take care a things up front, makeup and costumes, and, a course, anyone who's interested in givin' folks a good scare inside.

This ain't just for people, too. Pokemon are free ta work with us as well. If ya need help gettin' ta Goldenrod, let me know, and I'll help ya get here.

[Joker taps his fingers on his hip for a moment before taking in a deep breath, his shoulders slumping.]

And seriously... Let us know if ya see Wrath.

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[Well, Lust had told Ralph about what was going on and if that guy hadn't immediately come over to break the door down...he's pretty sure he can explain this to Joker.]

[Envy doesn't really care about most of the people worrying over Wrath--he hadn't thought there would be THIS many--but he does feel bad about how upset Joker's gotten over it.]

Hey, Joker? I've...got something to tell you, about Wrath.

He's fine. He's with us, me and the other homunculi, we're trying to help him. He needs it, and we're the only ones who CAN.

[It's a good thing this is audio, because Joker needs a moment to just breathe. This is good news. Wrath is fine, and he's with people Joker knows. Hell, people who work for him. That's good.]

...So long as he's not hurt, that's good.

Would I get the whole story if I asked for it?

[Envy lets out a held breath. That could have gone much worse.]

He's not hurt. [It bears repeating.] And it's working.

[There's a pause on his end, as he hesitates. Envy's a secretive liar to the core, and that's hard to let go of, even for important things like this. But he's going to have to, isn't he? Lust had told Ralph, and honestly...he suspects that Joker would get this more than most. Envy's still not telling anyone that they've got Wrath locked in the BASEMENT if he can help it, but there's other things he can say.]

What's mine to tell, if you ask. Do you really want the whole story?

[It's more warning than evasion. This isn't a pretty story, none of it is anything that someone who cares about a person would enjoy hearing.]

[The sound of fingers tapping goes for a moment over the Gears before Joker sighs.]

Can't be worse than anythin' else I've seen or heard. I'd rather know as much as I can, so I ain't entirely useless.

Okay.

[Now where the hell does he start?]

You remember, when I told you what a homunculus is? And how we have all these powers, but we're not supposed to be people?

It makes us pretty useful servants. We had a master, back in our world, who would collect us whenever we were born. She took the new ones in and promised them humanity, promised that they'd feel complete when they had that, if they just did as she said. She didn't mean it, she'd lose her servants if she turned them all into humans, and we weren't worth wasting the power it would take. I don't think it was ever possible anyway. But she was a good liar, it was easy for her to get the new ones wrapped around her finger.

[Here he grits his teeth. Here's the part he doesn't want to talk about, and he'll gloss over it if he can get away with it.]

And if one of us screwed up a mission or disobeyed or turned traitor...it was bad.

Wrath's still loyal to her. Completely. And he won't be able to get out of it on his own. I didn't want anything to do with him when he got here...a lot of shit happened back in Amestris, and I was pissed about it.

But I can't...I'm the oldest homunculus. And you said it yourself, didn't you? The oldest is supposed to watch out for the younger ones.

[He lets out a humorless laugh.]

I did a pretty shit job of that before.

[There's a very long period of silence as Envy finishes up that story. However, if he checks, the line is still connected.]

[Joker... just really needs to think about this.]

I. Ah.

[This is difficult to spit out. He's spent a good solid year in Johto- more than that now- steadfastly bottling everything inside. No one's ever needed to know, as far as he's been concerned.]

I think I know a bit more than ya might think about... the kinda thing. 'Tho I never did deal with that sorta... supernatural business, I suppose.

...Think there's any chance a me seein' 'im sometime soon?

[Envy waits quietly while Joker processes, but it'd be a lie to say he wasn't all but wringing his hands on the other side of the line.]

[Joker's his friend, a GOOD friend. He doesn't want to lose that because of all this.]

[When Joker finally answers, Envy doesn't let out the breath he was holding until he finishes talking.]

I...guessed, sort of. After those dreams. That's why I thought I could tell you now and you'd get it. We couldn't risk anyone breaking down the door to come to the "rescue".

...I don't know when you can. Right now, it's still--it's tricky. He doesn't trust us yet, if you come he'll either think you've betrayed him too or he'll latch on and won't listen to us anymore.

If we don't get through to him now, I don't know if we ever could again. And even if you understand, he wouldn't listen to you about it. It's too easy for him to ignore coming from anybody who wasn't there.

[Envy knows. It was the same for him, and it took him years to even BEGIN to think about not being loyal to Dante anymore.]

[He's not particularly surprised by the answer, but it still makes him give a frustrated sigh over the Gear.]

...Yeah, I got it, I understand.

So. Wotcha say I do about this, then? I outta tell Ralph, too, he's been worried somethin' awful.

Ah...Lust actually told Ralph already a few days ago. She didn't know about it until she got back from her trip, and she insisted.

And he didn't come smash us all into a pulp, so I thought I could tell you.

...not sure how many other people I'd trust to keep it a secret. Or to just not get it.

Ya don't have ta tell 'em the details.

[Casual lying solves everything, right?]

People are worried, and they're lookin'. All that's needed is a "yeah, he's found, and he's in rough shape so we're helpin' 'im out."

...Ain't even technically a lie, that.

I'll think about it. And I'd have to ask the others.

[He's still sounding pretty unsure of that idea. PEOPLE DO STUPID THINGS, HE DOESN'T TRUST THEM.]

...he'll need you, though, when we've done what we can.

[When they let him out of the basement anyway.]

Especially if you get it.

I wanna be there for 'im.

[A sigh whistles out between his teeth.]

Was hopin' ta show him Halloween and all that thing. Let 'im be a kid and enjoy it all.

If things keep going like they have, he should be ready to go back out by Halloween.

[At least, Envy's really hoping so.]

He'd like it, it's just his kind of holiday.

[He lets out a sigh, dragging a hand back through his hair. It's a minute before he speaks again, more cautiously. But there's an edge of curiosity in his voice, too, the kind that's less an outsider gawking at someone's sad story and more like someone who gets it reaching carefully for understanding.]

You...had something like a master, then? Before?

[A guess, gathered from that dream he saw combined with what he's heard just now.]

I bet it is...

[Free candy and ridiculous costumes and all sorts of things.]

[His voice stops at that question. Joker's already given hints, he knows, but there's something that still tries to bind his mouth shut tight. Old habits and older threats that shouldn't have any weight but do still.]

[He clears his throat and forces his voice to work.]

Back in England, me and a buncha other kids- s'close ta a family I've ever known- lived in the streets. Some a us were missin' limbs, our Doll got burned somethin' awful, Peter and Wendy never seemed ta grow past 10, and most folks put Jumbo down as some sorta monster instead a how young he really was.

[The ratta-tat-tat-tat of his fingers interrupts his words.]

Most folks treated us like trash, just waitin' for us ta die and get taken away.

So one day, us starvin' and soaked and practically dead in the gutters, old fella grinnin' like Ol' Saint Nick himself comes and takes us away in this posh carriage. End up in one a those homes- y'know, orphanage. Out in the country side, even, away from the bleedin' city.

Back then, we all thought we'd got real lucky, findin' someone who didn't mind us bein' broken and willin' ta take us in like his own children.

[As he talks, the tapping's rhythm becomes more erratic and violent.]

...Guess we shoulda known generosity like that don't come for free.

[Oh, that does sound familiar. Not as supernatural as his own story, true, but familiar all the same. Unwanted castouts who'd die on their own, a generous, powerful figure come to collect them...Envy's own hands tighten into to uneasy fists as he listens.]

It never does.

[His teeth grind before he's able to continue.]

There's always something they want. And the more desperate the target is, the easier it gets to make them agree.

[Envy knows. He knows because he was always the best recruiter, the one sent out to actually lure the new ones in and then help convince them to stay, and it makes him sick to think of now.]

Don't help that he gave us new limbs- those fancy replacement ones. [Remembering just what those 'fancy replacements' were made of forces Joker to stop, just to stifle the nausea rising in his gust.] Me, Beast, Dagger- those two couldn't even walk before.

Gave us everythin'. [Joker wipes at his mouth and chin a bit.] Didn't, uh. Didn't let me forget that.

[The pauses keep getting longer as he struggles with the words. He's never spoken about this kind of thing, not even with the rest of his family back home. It'd been a shared experience, a thing they thought they didn't need to talk about, and he in particular had been eager to try and pretend he could get away with not thinking about it.]

Thought I could pay it off, bein' his butler- Father was an old type, he needed all that help, especially with all these surgeries he was demandin' for himself. The others helped too, y'know, but butler- that's the top dog, all the responsibility, I was fine with it.

But...

[He runs his hand through his hair, and his foot is starting to tap nervously. He has to keep doing something, or else he's sure he'll just stop. Completely.]

...They got that occult business, where yer from? Like, not this alchemy I've heard about, but demons, spirits, all that sorta thing.

[Envy stays quiet, even through the pauses, until he's asked the question. He thinks it over a long moment...he's got a lot of memory to think back on.]

It used to be a big thing. It was even pretty closely tied in with alchemy a few centuries ago. But it faded out over the years and now you only find it in little out of the way pockets. There's a few backwater cults here and there, but they don't get big. Science really took over, there's barely even religion at all.

[He gives Joker a questioning look. He's assuming that this master of his was involved.]

Ha, ya don't say... [A whistle of air between his teeth as he exhales.] Different back in the London I know.

Religion, that's always been the big thing, but the occult stuff is really popular with, y'know, the well off. Father... No exception, but I didn't think much on it. Thought it harmless at first...

[Now this is the really hard part. Joker knows how people generally are. Anyone can feel bad for an orphan. Yet when you get to actions... Some folks wouldn't even feel bad if you had to steal an apple to save your life.]

...He knew folks. Group of 'em were gonna get together, do a- a ceremony kinda thing. [The taps get harder before Joker abruptly curls his fingers into a loose fist.] Sacrifice someone. A kid.

Now, him, he wanted ta go, but he'd just had another of them surgeries, he couldn't. I put my foot down on that.

Maybe I- nah. [He cuts himself off.] Nah.

[But he still can't help wonder what would have changed if he'd let the Baron go. Had give in. Maybe it would have cut off everything that happened afterwards. Or maybe...]

None a the folks he knew from that thing ever came by again. I'd kinda hoped that'd be it, but... He got obsessed with it. It'd been one thing before, not bein' happy with how old and, y'know, not particularly fair he was, and gettin' worse as life does ta folks, but after that...

[His nails start to dig into his palm.]

He wanted ta recreate it. But he couldn't go out and do a single thing in his condition, stuck in a wheelchair as he was...

[Envy had expected that with all of this, and with that kind of lead-in, it wouldn't be anything good. Hell, he'd sort of suspected that Joker wasn't the most moral of individuals before. People like them can always sort of pick each other out.]

[He can't say he's surprised or shocked at what this occult group did, or that this Father wanted in on it. He's spent a long, long time dealing with a lot of the worst humanity has to offer. All those alchemists that would be willing to make a Philosopher's Stone or be easily pushed to it, all the corruption of the State. The homunculi and their master themselves, for that matter.]

So he sent you to do his dirty work for him.

[He doesn't sound judging or horrified with Joker. Just resigned.]

[Somehow, that resignation seems to bounce right back into him, sinks into his bones. If he's not reacting after that, there's half the tension gone. It echoes in Joker's own voice.]

Noah's Ark Circus. It... was the one we all worked for back home. S'a good cover, a circus. Ya can wander around all over, move on before folks notice what's gone on...

[A dead, humorless laugh.]

And they liked me. Kids. Half the time, don't think I even needed the powder Father liked ta have me use.

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020 // Video

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