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No. 69 doesn’t cry.
He never does.
Not when he lies awake at night and feels so, so alone, not when they strap him down, slice at him, gouge and push and pull or inject him with whatever, not when he’s scared he might die, not even when he thinks he might just prefer death by now.
Why should he? It wouldn’t be of any use, it wouldn’t change anything.
He watches No. 65, 66, 67 and 68 that were all here before him and No. 70 that came shortly after him resist and complain and break and fade away until they don’t fit their names anymore and become nothing but the numbers they’ve been assigned. He watches them scream and wail and cry and die.
So no, crying doesn’t change anything.
Though that’s not the real reason why he doesn’t.
He had a name once. A name and a life. But that life is blurry in his mind, so much so that it seems like decades ago instead of the few years that it’s been. And that name is nothing but a distant memory now, long since been discarded somewhere between scalpels and syringes, flown out of him together with his blood.
He was human once, a person. But that’s over. He’s a guinea pig, a number.
No. 69 does not cry because numbers don’t cry.
-
He sometimes wonders if, should he run, his replacement would get whatever numbers would be next by that point or if they’d become the new No. 69.
And if it were the latter what would that make him?
-
No. 69 never cries and Dr. Moreau loves him for it.
Meaning he gets rewarded with more pain.
Dr. Moreau is the name of their tormentor but to No. 69 and the others (or at least he assumes so) it’s not a name but a word.
A word that when uttered out loud makes fear just as much as rage settle in his bones.
Fear because how could he not be scared of a man who wants to become a vampire, a monster, but already now seems like the worst monster of them all.
Rage because there’s still that small part of him that screams How dare he? inside his head. The voice keeps on steadily decreasing in volume but the rage grows anyways.
Dr. Moreau is insane and delusional.
He’s merciless and cruel and narcissistic.
And he never gets any results.
That doesn’t deter him though.
He simply uses them until he can’t “get any intel out of them anymore” but in reality it’s just until they break and he continues even after that. And when a test subject dies he gets a new one and starts the whole cycle all over again.
No. 69 begins to think the doctor doesn’t even want to get results and it’s all just entertainment for him. He wouldn’t put it past him.
He remembers having been interested in the meanings of names.
No. 69 doesn’t know the meaning of the name Moreau but the word to him means insanity and cruelty and pain.
-
Dr. Moreau drops off a little boy who looks like a girl in No. 69’s room and tells him to take care of No. 71.
No. 71 tells him his name is Mikhail but he should call him Misha.
No. 69 tells the other that that’s not his name anymore so he’s warned but the white-haired doesn’t listen to him.
-
Misha calls him “big brother”.
He could get used to that.
-
No. 69 offers to take Misha’s place in experiments.
He sweet-talks Dr. Moreau into thinking he wants to help him achieve his dream and the monster man looks at him with so much awe No. 69 wants to throw up.
He doesn’t but Moreau has upped the dose of whatever it is he is injecting them and No. 69 screams until his voice gives out.
Later when he’s returned to their shared room Misha smiles at him, his eyes shining, and cuddles up to him because of the cold.
That’s how it goes from then on. No. 69 cooperates with each and every experiment so Misha only has to when Moreau isn’t in the right mood to be persuaded. And in return Misha shines.
Mikhail is a version of an archangel’s name. It doesn’t fit all that well in his opinion.
Misha though, that means light to him.
-
Dr. Moreau tries to bind them to the Books of Vanitas to make them nothing but switches for the world formula.
No. 69 wants to kill him and then himself maybe because he can’t take it anymore and he couldn’t even protect Misha and he shouldn’t have had to in the first place, he’s still a child himself after all and…
The laboratory gets destroyed and a beautiful, strange person takes them with them.
-
The Vampire of the Blue Moon doesn’t have a name.
People call them Vanitas but they say that’s simply a word, not their name.
They seem to be sad about it.
Misha smiles and tells them they’ll give them a new name someday.
They smile back.
-
Misha starts calling them “father”.
It’s like they’re a family.
-
It’s night and they’re sitting in a field of flowers, looking up at the moon.
It’s the Blue Moon and it’s as uncanny as it’s beautiful. He’s not scared though. It has actually been a while since he has last been scared.
He looks away from the moon and to Misha and their “father”. A warmth spreads inside him despite the cold of the night.
Misha is smiling, like he is most of the time, and the white-haired vampire is looking at the two of them with a gaze so gentle he can barely take it and the moon reflects perfectly in their eyes and-
And he has a sudden epiphany.
“Luna!” he announces. “Your name should be Luna.”
Luna looks happier than he’s ever seen anyone be and he feels that strange warmth again.
He knows then that Luna means warmth.
-
Something or someone steals Luna’s true name and he has to kill them.
Misha dies as well.
He’s dead too, dead and empty.
-
He takes on Luna’s given name, Vanitas, as well as their mark and book.
Luna was right though because Vanitas is not a name at all but a word in Latin. It means emptiness or nothingness.
He thinks it fits him really well, after all as he’s staring in the mirror what he finds in his eyes, in his soul is just that. Vanitas.
So alone with a book and a name that’s fitting but doesn’t feel like one he makes it his mission to cure curse-bearing vampires who had their true names stolen and find the one that stole Luna’s to get his vengeance.
He also calls himself human again, even though it’s not quite true anymore. But it doesn’t matter because he hates humans and vampires and everything in between all the same.
-
He finds a greedy dham as a paid informant.
Dante calls him “quack” and he pretends to be mad about it but in the end it’s just a word like all the others.
-
On an airship he meets a vampire of the Archiviste Family who wants to “assess” the Book of Vanitas.
-
“I find you intriguing.” Noé tells him and he could say the same but he doesn’t because he has appearances to keep up.
The name Noé means “giving comfort” which is a good meaning.
He does not yet know what Noé actually means but he’d like to find out.
He has a hunch it might still be something good.
-
There’s a certain sound to the way Noé says “Vanitas”. A soft lilt at the start, a gentleness to his tone, the syllables drawn out just the tiniest bit as if he liked the way it felt on his tongue…
Every time he hears it, he has this strange fluttery feeling in his chest or goosebumps spread over his skin or he gets the inexplicable urge to tell him to say it again.
He can’t explain it even though he prides himself in his eloquence.
-
He gets Jeanne to call him Vanitas in exchange for keeping her secret.
He wanted to see if it’s different from when Noé does it.
He thought since he’s “in love” with her it should make him feel more or at least the same.
He pretends that’s true because he just cannot think about the implications of that feeling being caused exclusively by Noé.
-
While dancing Noé asks him what love is.
He can’t give a proper answer because he doesn’t know.
Love is simply a word.
-
The name Jeanne means “God has mercy”.
It’s ironic, really.
He can’t find a fitting meaning.
-
They’re on the search for the missing vampires and he has a terrible feeling.
He’s right because after Noé’s grandiose plan actually worked (he can’t believe it), he finds himself face to face with Dr. Moreau, with Noé and the creepy paladin behind him and the fact that he’s a former lab rat out in the open.
He does what he always did. He sweet talks him, pretends to admire him, to want to cooperate and dies a million little deaths inside.
Moreau, of course, welcomes him back, tells him he’s not mad (like he’d have any right to be), tells him what an amazing test subject he was and he can feel the others’ horrified gazes in his back.
He doesn’t want pity.
It’s not like he’ll break down crying or something. After all…
“No. 69!”
Right. Numbers do not cry.
Apparently Dr. Moreau noticed his change in eye colour because he starts rambling about the Vampire of the Blue Moon (who he knows nothing about) and-
Suddenly he reaches for his face.
“Let me gouge one out!”
He freezes up.
“I need but one! You don’t mind, do you?”
He can’t move.
“No. 69!”
He wants to scream, make known the boiling rage and ice-cold fear inside him, wants to do something but he can’t-
Just before the hand can touch him another, gloved, strong and reliable hand grabs it in what looks like a death grip.
Upon looking up he’s met with Noé’s face, usually full of awe for everything, filled with so much rage it’s palpable.
“Stop referring to people as numbers!”
-
Dr. Moreau escapes with someone out of Charlatan’s Parade.
They jump into the mouth of a fully-manifested curse-bearer and somehow manage to not only survive but also cure the vampire.
There’s a whole flood of emotions roaring inside him but he can’t deal with that right now so he laughs.
He laughs because they shouldn’t have been able to survive this, any of this, but they did, it’s all so ridiculous and he’s alive, for the first time in he doesn’t know how long.
Noé laughs too and they both laugh and laugh until they can’t laugh any more and they realise they really need to get out of here.
The vampire smiles and helps him up and Vanitas isn’t quite sure yet but he thinks Noé might just mean safe.
-
They get caught in a time loop, Noé fights another chasseur and makes new friends, they save said friends and find out Naenia is the Vampire Queen.
It turns out Jeanne means fragile.
It explains why he felt connected to her, it’s something they have in common.
-
Misha is alive. He also took Dominique de Sade hostage to make Noé drink Vanitas’s blood.
When he arrives at the empty amusement park his partner is already lying on the floor, overwhelmed by the weight of Mikhail’s memories. It’s where things start to blur.
He tells the vampire he doesn’t care about him. “I’ll leave as soon as you stop being useful.” he says while a treacherous voice in his head is begging Noé not to believe him, not to leave him.
No! He doesn’t need Noé. Being alone is better anyway because that way you can’t get hurt, you can be free and-
The other comes closer and his self- hypnosis sets in.
He doesn’t need Noé, he needs to kill him. He needs to kill that vampire.
-
“My name is Noé, not ‘that vampire’!”
Safe.
But he doesn’t need to be safe.
He needs to kill the vampire trying to look at his memories. That’s what he needs to do.
“Listen to me, Vanitas!”
He needs to kill him.
“I’m never going to do the one thing you want me to.”
He needs to kill Noé.
“I am never going to set you free!”
The blade of Vanitas’s dagger stops mere centimetres away from Noé’s throat.
He can’t.
Why can’t he?
He feels tears build in his eyes and drip down onto Noé’s face.
No. No, he shouldn’t and why does Noé look like he wants to apologise when Vanitas is the one who should be apologising?
“Forgive me, Vanitas…”
He sobs in Noé’s arms.
No. 69 never cried because numbers don’t cry. But he’s no longer No. 69.
He’s Vanitas.
And Noé does mean safe.
-
Misha gets taken away by the man Noé calls Teacher.
When he shows up again Vanitas declines his offer of killing him.
He wants to live now. He wants to be alive. And when he’ll inevitably die he wants it to be by the hands of the one who showed him how to be alive in the first place.
-
Vanitas apologises by baking Tarte Tatin.
Noé looks at him like he gave him the world when in reality it’s the other way around and he gets rewarded by him saying his name in that special gentle Noé way.
He hates sweets but Vanitas thinks this might be love.
-
“Vanitas.”
He looks back from where he’s standing on the windowsill, ready to escape into the cold of the night.
“Hm?”
“Stay inside. You’ll catch a cold.” Noé looks up at him with pleading eyes and there’s nothing Vanitas could do to resist.
Besides he doesn’t need to escape anyway, he doesn’t need to run, not as long as the other is with him.
So he lets Noé pull him towards his bed (“Fine. But only because I’m indeed cold.”) and he lets Noé wrap his arms around him (“I can warm you if you’re cold!”) to cuddle.
He’s found out by now that the vampire is the best cure for his insomnia and soon enough his eyes start drifting shut.
“Sleep well, Vanitas.”
He blames it on his tiredness and the coziness of the bed (and Noé) that he slips up just this once.
“Say it again.” he asks of him.
“Sleep well?”
“No. My name.”
His name. He has a name again.
It doesn’t fit him any longer as he’s not all that empty anymore but he’s starting to like it.
A soft laugh sounds behind him.
“Vanitas. You’re Vanitas. I’ll say it as many times as you need me to.”
I am never going to set you free!
Noé makes a lot of promises, it seems. And if he’ll keep them, well then…
“Vanitas.”
Noé means safe and as long as he’s by his side Vanitas can mean together forever.
(“Are you crying?”
“Of course not, you are! Now go to sleep, you overgrown puppy.”
“Puppy?”
“Yes because you’re clingy like one.” And loyal.)