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The face under the paper bag doesn’t reflect his clear heart. It’s scarred, nearly etched, just like the fizzing lines of tv static across his face. Each time she lets him fall feels amazing – he’s handsome, and she’s in love.
Then she betrays him, and turns to leave.
x
Every loop is the same, until it isn’t. She’s bent over the Nome and its blood tastes stale. Then she understands, that she’s been here before.
She kills the beautiful lady and even her flawless visage feels like a poor imitation. The power in her veins still leaves her empty, and the sun beyond the Maw is cold. The world fizzles like the sea is carbonated.
The ocean is boundless, and it feels like home. There was a boat, a poor excuse of a boat, just something that floated out of Physics' mercy. She was not alone, but she can’t remember his name.
(It was a broken-down door, so light they pushed it with ease into the cold sea. Their destination was cold and grey. A step away, he was so warm, breathing heavily into the fog.)
x
She never relies on him – until she has to. He thrusts himself in screens every cycle, and his instincts fail to warn him away from the shut door. She pulls him out each time and he leaps back in.
He’s a fool that never realizes how time and space are twisting them into a rotten end every loop.
Yet each time, he’s the fool that braves an army of clay dolls to free her. He’s the one waiting as blood drains from her head back to her aching ankles, before leading her off by a hand.
It’s always his back to hers, headlong into an incinerator, trusting her to shut the door behind the mad doctor. It’s his skin that’s warmer than the fire as he lets her rest by the burning corpse. Never disgust in the way he waits for her, never anger in his strong, firm grip.
That loop, right after they escape the hospital, she asks him for his name.
The handsome boy she drops into the abyss, the Thin Man of Pale City; His name is Mono.
x
Cycles pass, and the only way Six knows is by the way cruelty becomes so much easier – she’s not afraid to jump, not afraid to die. Fate does not allow it, regardless. She just wakes, her broken bones reset, a distance where she previously met her demise.
She likes breaking the Bullies and kicking their shards about. She likes smashing Geisha dolls just the same. When Mono is off unlocking doors in the emergency ward, she likes bending mannequin hands backwards.
Only once did hesitation possess her – when a bottle with a message floats near the shore they land at. She holds it in her hand, unable to dash it upon a rock. Mono sees her staring at the curled-up secret in the dirty bottle, gently takes it from her, and hurls it out to the sea where it is safe from her forever.
He later tells her he can’t read.
“I couldn’t have done any good,” he mumbles, bashful under his paper bag, “best to send it out again.”. The rainwater rolls off his mask's waxy coating.
Six holds his hand, feeling irrational cruelty recede like waves away from her heart. She holds his hand firmly, and he holds it back.
(The only thing he breaks is her music box - it takes less effort to break his heart. The world resets.)
x
“How do I look?” Mono asks, adjusting the smart Agency hat on his head. He straightens and beams, somehow looking smart in rags. It's silly, too big on him and it droops to a side. If he were a little taller it would...
Six turns to leave.
x
“We match!” Mono beams, showing off a bright yellow rain-cap he finds in a pile of debris.
In the shadows, she sees his crooked smile, his lower teeth squeezed like a traffic pile-up. She imagines his scarred face beaming at her, warm in the light of the hypothetical sun.
Something dark and cruel curls up and dies in her. Six turns to leave.
x
“Look what I found!” Mono says in the dusty attic, a white dunce cap on his head.
She snatches and rips it to pieces, blood turning into salty tears in her trembling body.
Guilt, after all this time?
When he holds her hand again, she turns and his paper bag is replaced over his face.
(“I’m sorry for scaring you,” he says much later, when they’re about to say goodbye in the Pale City. He's got a hand under his mask, no doubt feeling the ridges of his skin.
Six lifts his paper bag to his nose, and kisses him on his cold lips. When she pulls away to leave, he holds her.)
x
This time he’s late to get her.
She counts the days in the dark room, turning the handle on the small music box.
Three days later, the Hunter swings the door open, and slams the hatchet into her small body.
x
He’s late again.
She doesn’t wait, on the second day she chances it, twisting her way painfully out the boarded-up door that kept her prisoner. The hunter tracks her to the old shed, where she slams the door behind her. Her shoulder is dislocated, and it hurts to even look at the heavy shotgun hung up behind her.
It’s already on the floor.
The Hunter smashes through the door, and she lifts the heavy weapon to aim, and behind her, someone pulls the trigger.
This time, they talk.
Mono apologizes when Six never did, not even once. He says he'd walked right into a trap the last time, and didn't quite make it to her. Then he tells her about the signal tower and how it calls to him in every waking moment. It calls to him like family. Six tells him she’s killed him every time, that she hears a music box when she escapes the maw, before the world sways and folds.
They talk about everything except the kiss.
They run, they fight together, and then before them is the room with the television again.
“Don’t let me go,” Mono says, “I’ll try one more time, to destroy him. To save him.”
So Six pulls him up, and the hunger overtakes her right as they tumble out the screen, Mono smiling triumphantly beside her. Her teeth dig into his neck, her tears salting his flesh as she eats. All the while, his gentle hand is tugging off her raincoat hood, threading in her hair, stroking her head softly. He tastes awful, but she’s so full, and she’s so warm. There's a violent, zipping noise -
She wakes up in the Maw crying.
x
Mono slams the heavy hatchet into the door, ready to say Hello again.
She’s right behind the flimsy wood. Split open.
His emotion electrifies the air, and the world changes channel.
x
“I see you,” Mono whispers, “don’t make me do that again.”
Six stays silent, leaning on the door. Mono sneaks a cold finger in and pokes her.
“I’m not mad that you ate me.” Mono says.
Six turns and bites his finger viciously.
(“I have a plan,” he whispers, over and over until they’re in the Pale city again, “You have to trust me.”
So she does, and this time, he runs ahead, and catches her.
“Trust me,” he says, pulling her so close.
Then he drops her into the cold and dark. She’s so hungry, she’s so hungry, she’ssohungry shessohungry--)
x
She wakes and the sun is warm. She’s full for now, and her pillow is warm and breathing beneath her. Her instincts kick her up, and she jolts, waking Mono from under her.
Her panic is faster than her brain, and her hands are around his neck in a second, fury in each finger – then he’s gone.
Not dead and cold in her hands – he’s gone. Behind her, a buzzing - then footfall on wood. Six spins in shock.
He’s beaming at her, toothy grin in the sun. Behind him is a television screen set to channel static. She and her animal heart lunge for him, and-
He’s gone again.
Another zipping, buzzing sound of transmission. She turns and he’s behind her again, still smiling. Now he’s where she woke up, and Six realizes that below Mono-the-mattress was another television, screen-up as a bedframe.
She turns to run, the only thing she knows to do when there’s an adversity she can’t kill – out the window where it’s burning bright. The skyline has straightened, and the signal tower is nowhere in sight. Her desperate grip on the windowsill is warm, and she can't bring herself to run, or cry, or turn to face him. The day is quiet without the high-pitched buzz of electric rain.
“You ate it,” Mono says, “you ate the Signal tower,”
The memory of flesh and gore flashes to mind. She turns in outrage and he’s grinning. He walks closer, and closer still, backing her up to the window. He’s so near it’s a safety hazard – for who, Six can’t decide.
He lowers her hood like a wedding veil, and kisses her softly. All thoughts turn to sensation – all his tender warmth heightens her awareness that she’s got lips of a corpse.
But Mono pulls back and he’s smiling again, and Six is in love. No sequels or remakes this time – just them and the ending credits.
Then he betrays her, and tells her she needs a breath mint.