Lacrima: Chapter Nineteen

Down and Up

Bae’s body locked up. Each individual strand of muscle on her forearms revealed themselves. She looked up. Her thoughts didn’t always escape her skull, as they so readily chimed down below. Still, a few wayward inner speech became outer speech.

Almost there…

She reached an exhalation of exhaust, running ragged and unceasing. The hyper heated metal around the port forced her hand to grab a handhold further away. Bae scuttled until she found an area less hot before advancing. This comprised the tempo of her climb. If she later charted her movements, she knew it would turn out to be this inefficient jumble. But instead of chastising herself, she kept climbing. There was no other way.

Don’t look down…

As the climb worked into her muscles, Bae mused on how irregular the tower was. Seemingly more organic than a human-made construct could be. The exhaust ports especially came at strange intervals. Some were joined together to produce compound blasts of air. Others shot out thin blades of sweltering gales. It reminded her of an actual mountain, built from the dual forces of tectonic plates and time-burdened erosion. This obelisk didn’t have a design or, if it did, Bae thought it had to be made by committee. The natural world had a logic to it with predictable patterns, but nothing like the slavish laws of humanity. Bae climbed a metalscape which had the aesthetics of these human laws, but really much believed in the ethos of the natural world.

Anxiety came to a fever pitch. Bae, more than anything, wanted a way out.

Finally, her hand pawed the top of the tower. For a terrifying second, sweat-slicked, her fingers slipped. But, she managed to plant her palms down and snatch enough friction. She arched, lurched, and mustered herself to her feet. Hunched, she took gasps of breath until she came together. Bae glanced up and could see the individual planks in the ceiling. Poised on her toes, her fingernails just barely scratched them.

She was this close.

What next?

The hairs on the back of her neck stood up. Pricks jabbed the surface of her skin. A distinct burning smell came to her nose, making her put a hand to her nostrils. Static rose up to a deafening quake.

Then, she saw Service. The silhouette once contained to the reflections in the mansion now stood on the opposite side of the tower. No more than a few meters from Bae. She began stepping back, remembered the edge, and then froze with her knees bent. Her heartbeat pumped at an alien rhythm.

The apparition could be seen marginally more clearly - standing there. It wasn’t much taller than Bae with shoulders slumped. The vague outline of clothes hung to it, but nothing that could be deciphered as any particular garment. Jittering and twitching, the ghost leaned slightly forward. Service’s inscrutable face shifted. It wasn’t blank. Shapes and vectors glided along the surface to form a fractal tableau. Still, calling it a “face” was generous in Bae’s view. A deep unabetting discomfort drilled into her.

“Bae Yuri, you seem to be out of bounds.”

The same resonant voice, halting and going at the whims of a voice-generation algorithm, went into her. Even more so than Catherine’s thoughts becoming words, Service’s message seemed to unfurl in her inner ear. The words emerged and suffused into Bae. Her spine sent a chill to her limbs.

“Where am I?” Bae used her mouth to speak. “I want to get back to the mansion”

Service cocked its head, registering the response. “You are still inside the mansion. You are already here: a home for a treasured guest.”

“Bring me up!” she demanded.

Hands tucked behind back, Service paced the edge of the tower. Its feet ambled like a trapeze artist on a high wire.

“All who descend are in need of more intensive therapies,” Service answered. “For some, the antechamber is enough. For others, Catherine and you for instance, need more intimate contact with the mansion.”

Disgust wormed in her gut. That phrasing alone made her sick, but Bae pressed on. “Bring me up!”

“Then why did you crawl down here?”

Service didn’t need a pause. The break in the cadence startled Bae. The entity seemed more human now. She didn’t like that.

“I came to get Catherine,” Bae told it. “I never wanted to be down here.”

“And yet you found yourself here.” Service still paced the edge. “So much of what we do is unconscious. In fact, most of human suffering can be traced to this part of ourselves which we do not look at. Which we cannot look at.” It twitched. “Bae you wanted to be here. Just as Catherine chose to. She wanted answers. That’s all she ever wanted. That’s what breaks her. Now, she’s with the master and the King. But there is still the matter of you…”

At this point, Bae noticed other figures on the towertops of the obelisks around her. They stared with the same irregular faces as Service. Every single one of them had a unique shape, but all were distinctly Service-like. And all of them observed her. Even Service, who paced back and forth. Bae finally noticed how the body moved but the head never turned away.

“What about me?”

“All guests invited to Lacrima are here for a reason.” Service raised a hand and the other ghosts did so as well. “Master Esau Nebble gifted Sisyphus with the data of scrubbed public records, identity marketplaces, and social media accounts. From there, the King - in his wisdom - selects his guests. Every single one is broken somehow.” Service raised its other hand. The chorus of other apparitions did so as well. “That includes you. Looking over your psychographics, life history, and thought patterns, you have developed several maladaptive strategies in dealing with others. Overly placating…”

Right then, the invasive words crawled and erupted through her. A flash of a memory burned white into retinas. The past seared itself into her nerves.

Face down. Dry retching. Smell of musk in the air and designer colognes. Her manager, a stately woman in a tailored suit, pulled her face up by her ponytail. With a serene face, she said: “You can do better.” Better twinged with threat.

“I will.” Bae gulped and clenched her stomach. Her fingertips felt her ribs. “Thank you. Thank you.”

Service spoke through the scene as a voice from the beyond. “Codependent.”

It was raining in Seoul. Her fellow bandmate, Rin, trotted with an umbrella in hand. Bae thought she looked gorgeous in that skirt and jacket. Rin glanced back. Her lips contorted to smile. She fluttered at Bae.

“Long time no see.”

“Where are you walking to?”

“Home?” Rin stepped back. “Rehearsal was minutes ago, Bae.”

“Could we walk together? We don’t live that far away from each other.”

“Sure?” Rin tucked some hair behind her ear. “I never told you where I lived before. How do you know that?”

Cold, sharp humiliation snapped the scene to a new one. Service introduced this one with: “Disassociation.”

The sensation of the dress shot her back to that evening at Daniel’s house. She held a beer in her hand. Four cans were crinkled and twisted in a heap. Daniel still sipped the bottle he opened an hour ago, taking paltry sips from it. His hand rubbed her knee.

“You look great.”

“Thank you.”

Bae watched their combined reflection in the mirror above the fireplace. The open-back dress accentuated her crafted shoulders. The cutline where Daniel’s hand lingered teased her thighs. Bright, fiery red silk made her shine.

She tried to set the can down, but her vision splintered. Daniel, courteously, helped her set her drink onto a coaster.

“When did you say your friends would pick us up?” she asked.

“Later.” Daniel said, mind elsewhere. “The weather’s bad.”

Bae looked out the window to find a perfectly reasonable evening. No rain. No snow. Maybe a chill in the air, but that’s it. She could tell from the look in his eyes he wanted something from her. Bae didn’t like the look, but preferred it to being ignored. Or worse: rejected.

His hand landed back on her leg, this time higher up her thigh. “Who says we have to wait for the party to start?”

Bae didn’t answer right away. She knew what he wanted. Daniel had admitted to being attracted to her multiple times.

“But we can be friends,” Bae always told him, as she didn’t reciprocate his feelings.

So, they stayed friends. Or rather, Daniel and Bae lingered in a friendship that only one of them was happy with.

“Yeah,” she replied.

Daniel glided closer. Finally, he put his mouth on hers. He mostly sucked her teeth. Enveloping her, Bae sank away.

The senses of the past swirled through her, as she came to awareness of the tower again. Of Lacrima. Of the mansion. She still was sunken in, feeling alone, discarded, and used. Service and its fellows stood in their places. Bae realized she had fallen to her knees during the ordeal. She didn’t try getting up.

“Why?” she muttered. Beads pooled at the bottoms of her eyelids, but didn’t break into crying.

“Bae Yuri, your trek to get back Catherine is just another step in your desire to be part of a real community,” Service explained. “You want others. Some want you. But not in the way you want to be wanted. Then, of course, there are also many who reject you. Do not worry about Catherine. Focus on yourself and what we can do for you?”

“What can you do?”

“We can break your cycle of bad relationships and disappointments. For you and for others. The answer is simple. Let us take the burden.”

“How?”

“Meet the King.” Service’s voice pulsed the air. “Descend farther. Many have done so already.”

“Like Catherine has?”

“See. Perhaps you can save her and yourself.”

“But how?” Bae barely processed what was happening. “Do I have to climb back down?”

“No need.” Service presented the edge. “Simply throw yourself off. We will take you into our hands.”

“Won’t I die?”

“There is no death on Lacrima.” Spoken as a commandment.

Bae Yuri pressed her hands against the plastic hull and slowly brought herself back to standing. She stepped to the edge. Below, besides the flashes of electricity, couldn’t be seen by her. Swimming in the sunken place, Bae’s mind sloshed, but couldn’t break the surface. A poignant desire to let the end take her and her pain away animated her.

Then, an idle thought floated up from the fathoms.

I did that.

Another memory, conjured by Bae herself, possessed her body. She remembered how her boots bit into the muddy trail. Her walking stick found purchase and allowed her to keep scaling the mountain. Ferns and trees gave off their vegetal scents. She breathed it in with heavy pulls. Then, they cleared away. She saw Daniel’s back. He turned around and beckoned her to finish the climb. Well before he confessed to her, this was the friend she knew he could be. This was Daniel untainted by his own actions.

Bae finally reached the summit - to which Daniel remarked. “Was this your first big hike?”

“It is.” Bae laughed, setting her pack against a tree and closed in on the edge. The trees flowed out down below. Ahead, peaks of white could be seen. “I did that.”

“And when you’re up for it.” Daniel pointed to those peaks. “There’s more to climb.”

“I’d very much like to do that.”

There’s more to climb.

Bae gasped for air and stumbled away from the edge. She swung her head to the face-veiled ghosts. They remained motionless. Service and its confidants didn’t close in yet. Above, the segmented planks taunted her.

Think Bae, she thought. At the end of the day, these aren’t people. It’s a chatbot.

It’s a chatbot.

Bae sighed.

This is a risky gambit.

“Service,” she said, smothering her fear and resentment. “Rearrange the dining room. Make sure all the furniture is removed.”

Service stared. She wondered if this would even work. Then, the head snapped upright. “Please wait a moment. We’ll get that fixed for you.”

Three towers away, the planks parted in the ceiling. Bae got a running start and leapt off her obelisk to the neighboring one.

It still follows orders.

Around her, the stagnant ghosts flew up to the ceiling from their vantage points. As she sprinted, their electrical presences burned her skin. Bae wove around slightly, but maintained her forward momentum.

She leapt again, rolling the same ankle she may have sprained during her fall. Bae felt the tendons forced to their breaking point. Thankfully, everything stayed intact. Her legs pulsed harder.

Another jump and distance closed.

Above the spectres pulled themselves through breaches in the ceiling. They pulled down the chairs and eased down the long table. The pieces floated down to the towers before they sunk to the darkness below to wherever these ghosts would hold them.

Bae jumped at the opening. Her fingertips just barely clipped to it. She maintained her weight before she was forced to drop down. Shaking off her hands, she attempted a deeper jump. She achieved enough verticality to clench more of her hands onto the mansion’s floor. Her shoulders and back activated, steadily raising her up.

She could see the water curtain.

Bae dragged her upper body through the open planks. She kicked up her leg, as one spindly apparition took the last chair away. The ghost’s form collided with her shoulder. Bae screamed as her body locked up with the galvanic surge. Her leg dropped down and nearly took all of her with it.

With a clench, she kept herself up. Bae breathed in and hoisted up into the dining room. The planks behind her slowly closed shut. She held her shoulder, patchy and pink. Bae curled up on the bare floor.

She looked up and found Lucille and Konrad with exasperated expressions. Konrad bolted to Bae just as she got to her knees. He helped her up.

“Are you okay? What burned you? How did you get up here?”

Lucille patted the air for Konrad to stop. She crossed to Bae. Her eyes flicked to the floor and then to the room around them. “Let’s leave and have Service put this room back into place. We are overdue to have a conversation.”