Chapter Text
Jax has seen Ragatha die before. Hell, most of the time he's the one killing her. He's memorized the way the digital fabric of her face folds in from a gunshot, the exasperated expression that will hold for just a moment before she vanishes, the cold shoulder she gives him when they both reappear in the lobby. It's routine, almost familiar.
But this time feels different.
The abstractions are bearing down, while they look helplessly out at a sea of code. Kinger's at the front of the group, doing...something. None of them are entirely certain, but they're all putting their faith in him, as his disconnected hands tug at strings of numbers almost too fast for Jax to see. But not fast enough, because the creatures behind them are catching up, and no matter how quiet they are, they'll be found out soon.
He almost doesn't notice it happen, so intent on his own imminent death --- and maybe a part of him still expecting this to be one of Caine's adventures. Ragatha squares her shoulders, presses her hand against Pomni's shoulder, says "Be happy, okay?" and ducks out of their hiding spot. Pomni cries out, and lunges forward, at the same time that Zooble pulls her back, the two of them sprawling onto the floor.
The abstractions don't notice their movement, because Ragatha is in front of them, waving her hands and hollering for all she's worth. "Hey!" she shouts, "hey, down here!" As the behemoths of corrupted code and consciousness turn their attention to her. Jax is struck by the absurdity of it all, a rag doll flailing around in the the fucking backrooms of a video game, and he opens his mouth to say something about it---and then they're eating her.
Well. Not eating. Absorbing, maybe? The corrupted darkness and eyes and pixels are surrounding Ragatha and she's making these awful choking noises, and she doesn't look exasperated, she looks terrified. Gangle is sobbing, curling in on herself, and Kinger says "Got it!"
And everything goes white.
He wonders sometimes, if he hadn't been so shocked, if he hadn't thought on some level that this was all still a game, would he have stopped Ragatha?
The question circles in his head when he wakes up --- everything is still white, white sheets, white walls, white uniforms, and the doctors put a saline drip in his arm and tell him that he's at Massachusetts General. They give him sunglasses and tell him he's lucky to be alive. Someone has to spoon feed him for the first week, it's humiliating and weird and he keeps waiting to wake up in the lobby.
Would he have stopped her? He thinks about it, while the doctors help him sit up, and the PT person gives him a walker, and everything is still too-bright-too-much, but at least he's out of the room. He asks about Ragatha, about Pomni and Kinger, and all he gets are puzzled expressions. They tell him that he's one of several survivors. They tell him that patient information is confidential. They tell him he's lucky to be alive.
He's able to go to the bathroom on his own, shuffling on unsteady legs like a baby deer. He almost has a heart attack, when he realizes someone else is in the little room with him. Gaunt and staring at him with a single-minded focus. Except, and he realizes this when both he and the stranger flinch at the same time, it's his own reflection.
It's the first time he's seen his own face, he realizes, in years. It's weird, weird like seeing yourself through a fun house mirror is weird. Yeah, on some level he knew he wasn't a cartoon rabbit anymore. It's different to have the confirmation. He has his nose back, which he's happy about, at least. Pointy, sort of crooked, but he always thought it was one of his best features. He covers the mirror with a bedsheet.
He wonders if he would've stopped Ragatha. He comes to the conclusion one night, staring at the ceiling (still white, though he's noticed some stains in the corner. Sort of brownish. Detailed, in a way that Caine never managed.) Of course he wouldn't have. Of course not. And to suggest anything else is just deluding himself. And Jax has never been very goof at that anyway.
Physical therapy, a doctor had suggested, when he complains about the weakness in his arms. He thinks her name might have been Sharon. Or Karen. He doesn't really pay attention to the endless parade of white-coated strangers who attend to him. They all sort of look the same anyway, with their weird fleshy faces and pinkish-brownish skin. Physical therapy, the doctor decides, group physical therapy, which should help with his general apathy and miserable personality.
He nearly manages the trek to the elevator without the walker. Granted, it's three doors down, and he has an orderly supporting his left side the whole time, but still. Small victories.
It's the most of the hospital he's ever seen, and it all sort of looks the same. Gleaming white surfaces, too-straight hallways bustling with people getting on with their lives and their days.
The orderly comes to a stop outside of another identical room, ushering him inside. Various machines, probably intended for exercise, line the walls. They’ve made the effort to paint the walls yellow here, a sort of awful neon hue that gives a sickly sheen to the whole place. Jax feels right at home.
A woman approaches him, a land yard designating her as ‘Dr. Bethany Jones, PT.’
“Felix, right?” She says, extending her hand. She’s waiting for a response, her expression open and friendly, but Jax’s attention is immediately pulled away from her. They aren’t alone in the room—there’s another set of patient-and-doctor, a short woman in sweatpants is trying to do some sort of modified sit-up and failing miserably. Her short, dark hair is plastered to her forehead with sweat and her face is a grimace of concentration. The doctor crouched over her is murmuring reassurances, helping her reposition her arm, or something.
Jax’s feet are moving towards her, brushing past Dr. Bethany-PT, before he gets the chance to really think, or interrogate the action, or wonder if he’s wrong— “Pomni,” he blurts out.
Her gaze locks on him immediately, eyes widening, as she scrambles to her knees, to her feet. “Oh my god,” she says, beaming. “Oh my god.”
Suddenly, her arms are around his waist, squeezing tighter than he would have thought her capable. "Are you crying?'" he asks after a moment. Pomni sniffs, pulling away somewhat. Her eyes are huge and watery, and there's snot dripping from her nose.
"No," she sniffles, wiping furiously at her face. She takes a deep, shuddering breath and shakes her head. "Sorry, I just, you were the last to wake up. Um," she pats self-consciously at her hair. "
"That’s a lost cause, kid," Jax says helpfully.
"Shut up," she says, still grinning. “I’m older than you. God. Look at you, you’re a baby.” Jax raises an eyebrow, making a show of craning his neck to meet her eyes. "Shut up," she snickers. "You know what I mean." She sobers slightly, looking him up and down. "So it's...Felix, right?" Jax feels his mouth go dry. She must have heard the doctor. He realizes he and Pomni have been left in the room alone, presumably for privacy. He'd appreciate it if he wasn't halfway to a panic attack.
"Yeah," he says. Pomni offers her hand.
"Christine," she says lightly. Like it's a normal thing to say. Like his world isn't sliding off its axis. Jax blinks down at her slowly, and awkwardly shakes her hand.
"Christine," he repeats numbly. A concerned crease forms between Pomni Christine's brows at his silence. He forces himself to grin. "That's a dumb name," he says. "Anyway, who else made it, huh? Don't tell me we're the only intrepid survivors."
"Oh, no." Pomni Christine says. "So, Kinger--Abel was first actually. 'Bout a month ago, now. So he's back home already. Zooble and Gangle have the time slot before my therapy, so we usually grab coffee after. And uh, Ragatha..." Her voice trails off, expression darkening. "She's uh. She..." And she's saying...something.
Something that Jax can't hear, because his ears are ringing, and his vision is blurring, but he can guess: She's dead. She's dead, and she died screaming, and her heart stopped before they even pulled her off the ventilator, aren't you glad? Didn't you hate her so much?
And he's stumbling away, distantly he can hear Pomni yelling after him, can see Doctor-Bethany-PT reaching out with a worried expression, can sort of gather that he's stumbling down a hallway unsteadily, leaning on the wall, but it all seems too far away to be worth paying attention to.
He knows he's breathing too fast, because his vision goes sort of dark and spotty, and when he can see again, he's balled himself up in a corner. He's in some sort of janitor's closet, he realizes. Sitting on the floor, in his hospital gown. His stomach is still lurching, clenching around the dinner he didn't eat. Fuck. Fuck.
He knew she was dead. He'd already known that, he'd seen it happen. Why is he still hyperventilating? Why can't he breathe? (Because some part of him still, still hoped he'd open his eyes and be back in the lobby. With Pomni and Kinger and Ragatha---except now it's Abel, and it's Christine, and Ragatha is dead, and even if he never liked her anyway, god, what a horrible way to go.)
He loses track of time, in the closet, trying to steady his breathing. For the most part, he fails. He guesstimates that it's only been about fifteen minutes though, when someone knocks on the door. Because no one can ever just fuck off and leave him alone.
"Go away," he snaps, The janitor's closet, unfortunately, does not lock from the inside. The door swings inward, slowly, revealing the woman behind it. It's not Pomni, she's too tall for that, but he can't really make out her features against the halo of light behind her. He thinks, inanely, of the church his mother used to take him to. Of all those saints, and the massive disks behind their heads. He realizes, belatedly, that this is the first time he's thought of his mother since he woke up.
"Uh, I will," the woman says, stepping forward, out of the light. "It's just that Christine came to get me, she thought maybe..." her voice trails off, and she lifts a shoulder.
Everything about her is achingly familiar. The cloud of red hair around her face, how she rubs awkwardly at her forearm, she's even wearing blue plaid, for fucks sake.
“She thought you might want to see me,” Ragatha finishes.