Chapter Text
Six swipes a sleeve at her mouth, grimacing at the bitter taste of blood still on her tongue.
“Pah!”
Monsters don’t ever taste good, but the Tall Man tastes the worst of all.
Really bitter, really sour. Two tastes that shouldn’t go together and are leaving her fighting the urge to puke. Ugh.
Trying not to puke while running isn’t great. But she can’t stop. Not with the Tall Man on her tail. Waiting for her to slip up, to recapture her.
She pants. She runs. Through halls of endless gray, lit up by strange purple and red lighting. There are doors, but not many, easy for her to push through. There are stairs, all leading up, but she tries to avoid those because what if there’s no way down.
Nowhere to hide. Six isn’t sure that hiding would work on the monster chasing her either.
Because...
The scary thing about the Tall Man is that he’s clever. Smart in a way other monsters aren’t.
Normal monsters go after whoever ran last, if they see kids running to hide. They’re also really loud about when they find a hidden kid. Not that it really saves many kids, that loudness. But it gives everyone else time to get away, if that caught kid isn’t alone.
Monsters aren’t the best at looking into things either. Or under. Comes with being big instead of small like real people are.
If it followed normal monster rules, then Mono would have been dead.
Instead the Tall Man had looked around. Looked at her. Looked and reached, and pulled her out. Leaving the other kid alone completely, even though they all saw him see Mono run and hide. Barely skidding to safety under his spot under the bed.
Instead she was yanked away. Dragged into the TV screen screaming, taken apart piece by piece and refitted back together with a roar of static.
He seemed to pick her out specifically and she has no idea why. And not knowing is terrifying.
(Not knowing is death.)
Six hates to admit it, but there’s a lot of luck to her escape.
Like how extreme the Tall Man’s reaction was to her biting him, pretty much tossing her across the room instead of tightening his grip. Like how she managed to land on her legs and elbows, taking the hard impact somewhere that wouldn’t break anything serious. Skinning her knees is a small price to pay.
Hurt a lot? Yes. But she wouldn’t have survived as long as she has if she let hurt stop her from getting back onto her feet to run.
Run where, Six has no idea. Only that she has to get away. Away from the thumping and hissing that announces the Tall Man’s presence. A steady throb that follows her, no matter how many turns and twists she takes.
Another problem: she can’t run forever. Not like how the Tall Man can apparently walk forever after her.
What does she do?
First, find a way out. A door that leads outside, any kind of window, a vent maybe... anything. Not that her surroundings have been helpful in that, with how similar everything looks.
If Six didn’t know better, she would say this place is laughing at her. Going along with the weird purple light that makes her eyes go all funny when there’s too much of it.
There have been TVs, in her path, as she runs. Most of them are out of reach, crackling down at her.
Here, now, she slows. Next to a TV that’s been tucked away in the corner, a little bit off the main path. She eyes it carefully. Blinks back the gray fuzziness that always tries to take over her head when staring at a TV for too long.
Slowly, Six reaches out. Presses her hand against it. Both hands. Warm to touch.
Mono could do something with the TVs, and would fall into them if she weren’t there to pull him out.
(She almost didn’t get to him in time, the last time. When the Tall Man appeared.)
What if...she could reach back somehow?
“Mono,” she whispers to the screen, the first and only time she’s used his name out loud. “ Mono. ”
Impossibly the TV almost seems to croon the name back. Whispering almost familiar words as she presses herself closer against the fizzing gray. Some faint part of her mind wonders if this is what Viewers feel, watching their screens.
Most of her is too intent on finding him to think about that. C’mon, Mono, she’s here. Right here!
Focus.
“Mono, I’m here.”
...Will he even care to look for her? It’s safer for him to run, get away from the endless TVs and Viewers of the city where the Tall Man hunts. She would probably run, in his place. She would have to run, because she can’t do the thing with TVs Mono can.
But Mono...
(She doesn’t want to leave him behind. Or have him leave her behind.)
She bites her lip. Squishes her face closer and closer, hands pressed flat. The TV is going to burn her, if she doesn’t back away.
She stays.
Stays, almost curled up against the burning of the screen, until something forms in the shadows in between the white fuzzies.
She almost flinches back, but it’s not her enemy. It’s...
A familiar paper masked form.
Six breathes out a shuddering breath, her entire body shaking.
Mono.
He’s here.
Here and his hands are reaching for hers, in that impossible way of his, through the screen. Cool to the touch, comforting after nearly frying herself on the TV for so long.
For a moment, Six dares to let herself hope: they’ll get out of this.
Forgetting, in that same moment, exactly why she hasn’t stopped running for so long. The footsteps that have been steadily getting closer, finally caught up.
A large hand wraps around her waist. Like before. And pulls. Like before.
She doesn’t look back, she can’t, she’s holding onto Mono.
Six squirms and kicks, but the grip only tightens. Biting her way free might be the only way out, like she did before, but with her body mostly pointed towards Mono and the TV screen, she can’t twist around to actually do said biting.
Leaving the Tall Man freedom to drag her away, buzzing away at her raincoat and skin with his fuzzy touch. A touch that is a lot like the burning of the screen. Completely opposite to the chill Mono tries to pass onto her.
Her hands are tight around Mono’s. Mono, who sees the threat and cries out. Pulling harder to get her free, but of course not as strong as the force keeping her from getting through in the first place.
No child is strong as an adult. No one.
If Six continues to hold on, then Mono will be pulled in too. Trapped by the thin monstrous man yanking at her.
She should let go.
Six screams. Her fingers, her nails, dig into the boy’s wrists. Enough to draw blood, underneath his coat sleeves.
“No!”
Is the word coming from her or Mono? Six has no idea, not with the blood pumping in her ears. Drowning even the static out in her terror.
But.
She doesn’t let go.
~
He doesn’t let go.
The adult known as the Thin Man cannot afford to let go.
An awareness just as violent as the energies in his veins assures of this, though he knows not the reason.
Only that the girl in this yellow coat must not escape.
He pulls her back, away from an escape route limited to only those of the transmission. A route he had been unaware that he needed to guard from this girl in turn, even with her lacking that transmission. Foolish, but who would have supposed that the boy would have been able to reach her from so far?
The man will simply have to make sure no other TVs are in reach, in the future. Simple enough.
As he pulls the girl out, she screams and struggles. Useless, of course. There is more resistance than expected as his hand moves back. Slightly more. Not enough to stop the man.
Enough to pull something else through the screen.
His form flickers, at the sudden brightness of transmission. The boy. She’s pulled in the boy in after her, tumbling onto the floor.
Within his reach.
The girl has only pulled the boy in due to her own selfishness, he knows. Yet her same selfishness has made the entire situation much easier to handle.
Having the boy in the Tower is a very different situation from hunting him through the streets, the end-goal of getting the boy to the Tower in the first place already carried out.
Of course, that still leaves him with a screaming girl in hand. One that’s attempting to bite into his hand like before. The wound from that still itches mentally, though long healed in actuality.
Almost absent minded in the action, he readjusts his grip. Pinches around the shoulders and neck of the jacket, directed away from anywhere that gnashing teeth may try to tear into.
Allowing him to look downwards, in his squat.
The man is far more interested in the very still form of the boy on the ground, than whatever attack this feral child may try to pull.
The buzzing of the boy’s transmission abilities have almost died down to nothing, despite the fear of the situation that should be bringing them singing to a new height of power. Very light breathing. No response to him nudging the boy with a shoe.
Hm.
It seems that the sudden shock of transferring straight away to the Tower may have knocked out his newest guest. Another unasked for boon, in giving him much needed time for preparation in order to host that same guest.
It’s not every day that they receive an individual that has such a strong presence of transmission, after all.
Most are far weaker and in response to their weakness the man has to had to do some...unfortunate things.
There’s a bitter gratitude, though he hesitates to name the emotion such, that today he might not have to do the same to this boy. And maybe the girl, even though it’s clear she lacks any transmission abilities.
The weight hanging from his pinched fingers suddenly lessens.
His eyes flick over to catch the girl slipping out of her coat sleeves. Leaving the slick yellow fabric behind in her escape from his grasp. Racing to grab at the boy’s arms, his shoulders. Tugging him after her, the best she can.
He’s not sure why that is so utterly shocking to him, the girl abandoning her coat to flee. Why wouldn’t she do whatever she can to escape? She did drag in the boy, in her attempt.
But to run straight to the boy, to attempt taking that deadweight with her...something is wrong with that. A disconnect.
He rises to his full height. Lets static buzz throughout his form, his words.
“Stop that.”
To the girl’s credit, she doesn’t let go of the boy’s shoulders. Though it’s clear that she wants to, in order to cover her ears from the sound of his voice.
Just continues to drag him away, as quickly as she can manage.
...Surprisingly quickly, considering the lack of size difference and the girl’s limited upper body strength.
They’re halfway down the hall before the man considers doing anything about it.
Not like they can truly escape this place.
Not with the Tower’s Eyes on the two, intent on finding out more. Always more, never any privacy from those eyes.
“Girl. There is no running here.”
Another headshake, and the girl keeps moving away with her burden.
The man contemplates catching up to her, grabbing both children here and now. But he doesn’t need to. He will not tire and there is nowhere for the pair to hide.
Simply waiting for the girl to exhaust herself will minimize her continued attempts to bite him. And waiting for the boy to wake up in turn will give him time to prepare the proper rooms.
Still.
How truly irritating.
He heaves out a breath he doesn’t need, a buzz in the air.
Why won’t this stupid girl stop running?!
~
Why won’t this stupid monster leave them alone?!
Other monsters always tire out eventually, but this tall one doesn’t. More following like before. And she even had to leave her coat behind to get away, too. But this time is even more difficult.
Because this time, Mono’s with her. Hurt and unable to run. Leaving her to do all the work of getting away, a burden.
She needs to leave him behind.
(He reached through the screen for her.)
Six grits her teeth. Pulls. Not letting Mono go.
Thankfully she’s not stuck with his dead weight for much longer. His body moves under her touch, the paper bag head twitching.
She lets go and he slumps onto his back. But slowly, slowly, begins to sit from that position. Alive.
“Mono!”
He stares at her, the best she can tell with the paper bag on his face.
“You said my name!”
Right, she hasn’t done that before in person. Doesn’t matter because-
“We need to run!” she hisses. “Up up!”
Mono gets up onto his feet. Gets up and...staggers. Nearly runs into the wall before he puts a hand out to catch himself on that same wall.
“I’m okay,” he whispers loudly in her direction. His bag rustles. “Where’s your coat?”
Her coat. She hides her eyes behind her bangs, rather than answer.
He doesn’t push, but she can see him swallow back his words. His apologies. Because they both know apologies are useless, in this world where anything and everything could be gone forever without warning.
Besides, there are other things that are more important. Like how Mono can’t seem to stand on his own, that’s bad.
She might have to leave him behind.
But Mono does move away from the wall. Wobbly, but stable enough.
She doesn’t breathe in relief, because it’s only expected, right? Of course Mono is strong enough to make it, they’ve made it through so much before.
They can get through this too.
“We need to find another TV, to get out,” Six decides out loud.
“Yeah, good idea,” Mono agrees. “Have you seen any others?”
She nibbles on her cheek in thought, careful not to draw blood. Looking Mono over just in case he falls over from being so wobbly.
Her eyes catch on the holes on his wrists, from when she refused to let go. Still bleeding lightly. Making her viciously aware of the blood under her fingernails.
She scowls, reaching up to rub her nails on her tattered sleeves. Wipe the blood out the best she can.
It’s not her fault, it’s not. Sometimes stuff like this happens. Sometimes another kid gets hurt by accident. That’s all this is, an accident.
It has to be.
Movement. In the corner of her eye. Not from Mono, the other way.
She checks. You always have to check, when a monster could come and eat you at any moment.
(That’s how the Hunter got her, not being careful enough.)
Nothing.
There’s nothing. Same old gray walls, not an escape route in sight.
Her body shivers anyway.
~
There is the usual shiver in his flesh, the itch of the Tower watching him. Watching him and the newcomers to its territory.
The children are steady in their fleeing.
Their pace will not last for long, of course. Fear can push young bodies beyond their normal limits, but even that cannot keep them running forever.
All the man has to do is wait. Follow behind until their legs can run no more.
But how long it is taking for that running to end...is longer than the man expected. They are clever, finding shadows and corners to hide behind in corridors that otherwise offer no clear hiding places. Giving them moments to catch their breath, to draw out their ability to run.
If not for the boy’s steadily rising transmission to track by and the keen eyes of the Tower, the smallest of possibilities remains that the man would have lost them entirely.
Small, but still a chance.
Again, the man can wait. Follow and wait.
Yet...he adjusts his hat, considering. He has spent a very large portion of his existence waiting. Waiting for something just beyond his reach, a hole inside that hummed once he laid eyes on the girl in the yellow coat.
Something about those children calls to him, more than any other he’s retrieved for himself and the Tower.
Familiar, even with the girl lacking transmission entirely. Unlike the boy, who has more than the man has ever seen in a child before.
He wants answers and answers are usually easy for him to find, with his connection to the Broadcast. This lack of information is new to him. Digging away at the patience he would otherwise have in this situation.
So the man considers what other options he has, pausing in his walk. Turns over what information he knows over in his mind.
The children that wander the streets of the Pale City are starving little beasts. Properly paranoid in a world that would not, and does not, hesitate to devour them when given the slightest chance. Food is hard to find and shelter even more so.
Providing a proper hiding place would be taken advantage of right away, especially after running for so long without that possibility. Proper precautions, thrown to the side, in the light of an unexpected windfall.
Why wouldn’t they believe in that? Especially after the disaster that nearly lead to the girl escaping through the TV, a windfall in entirely different fashion.
Also...he tugs out the yellow coat of the girl from his pocket. Turns it over between his fingers, feeling the rain resistant material.
The girl will want this back, will she not?
It will serve as decent bait. And the boy will not let her go for it alone. They will be caught together, in the trap.
Perfect.
All he’ll need is more doors down these halls...