#a wooden doll/mannequin who stole someone's voice

[disdoorted-crows]

the thing about having a ship that travels time and space, galaxies and universes, is this:

at some point, the vocal chords are removed from the throat of a woman and sewn carefully into that of a wooden soldier.

at the same point, thousands of years in the future before, and kitty-corner universes away, the same vocal chords are stolen and placed haphazardly into the larynx of a mannequin without a face.

the two are, from that point, inextricably linked by their voice.

sometimes, the toy soldier will awaken from pretending to sleep, and hear a voice that sounds like the one it stole echoing in its quarters. The Unknowing, it says, It Approaches.

sometimes, nikola orsinov will pause in her hastened scramble to frighten and change, and she, too, will hear a voice. sometimes it emanates from the coffin those two delivermen carry around. sometimes it comes from the tape recorders that always follow her after she's paid a visit to the archivist. it sounds like the one bleeding from her lips like wax, but it is not her own. I Am Not Real, it says. After They Have All Gone, As Brian Has Foreseen, I Will Simply Stop Pretending. What Else Will I Have?

sometimes, the toy soldier will feel something like a hand, shaking its shoulder. sometimes, it won't follow an order, and it will feel its wooden mind bounce around in its wooden skull, as if it is attempting to house a copy of itself.

sometimes, nikola orsinov will perform for her patron, as she is wont to do, dancing alone in a room with empty chairs facing her, and she will feel the urge to sing -- an urge that she never feels aside from these moments.

it's never been enough of a bother to investigate by beings such as them -- a puppet and the right hand of a god are not the best detectives -- but it makes itself known.

and at the end, at the very end, when the toy soldier's strings are cut and nikola orsinov's limbs are separated from her torso in a great fiery explosion, they are one and the same: I Am Alone.

[ol-razzle-dazazzle]

For Elise

I’d just like to preface this saying that THIS RELATIONSHIP IS NOT MEANT TO BE ROMANTIC OR SEXUAL. ANY MENTIONS OF SHIPPING AND PEDOPHILIA WILL BE BLOCKED. I DO NOT CONDONE SHIPPING WITH MINORS

Also tw for physical child abuse (between mori and his dad), murder, graphic depictions of violence, that kinda thing so please don’t read this if you will be discomforted by these.

This is meant to be an exploration into Mori’s backstory and Elise’s relationship, autonomy and how they both develop. The two are not shown in a romantic way, and the things Mori does are meant to be wrong. Critiquing this work is totally fine, and additions onto your thoughts are welcome, but anything resembling a minor adult relationship will be blocked immediately.

When I was younger I had an imaginary friend, as most children do.

I myself, was an imaginary fairy tale child never meant to be. A glorious fling at some long forgotten golden day ballroom. The only memory I have of her is seen only through her porcelain beauty in dolls. Father was a doll maker. I based my imaginary friend off her.

There is nothing stranger when you’re a child then being able to configure a person. I remember when I was the ripe age of 8 that I saw no longer the invisible then a mannequin, untouched girl my age lying down. Flat, soulless eyes.  Fair blonde hair like spun gold. Her eyes made no attempt to stare. Is this her? “Rinny?” I had never been called that name.

“That’s not my name.” I wave a hand and she gets up. “I like it! It’s cute.” She looks around, seeing the surrounding dolls. “Well?” She turns to me, and the childish mythical light returns to her. “Well what?” “Aren’t you going to make me wear one of these?”

I look around at the dolls, as she follows around me. “What’s you’re name?”

She giggles, “Elise, you know that already, Rinny.” Out of the corner of my eye I find a nice pink dress with frills and before I know it she’s already dashed towards it. “It’s lovely!” “It is…but…” It doesn’t fit, it doesn’t feel right. “Oh, at least make me try it!” How could I go against the emerald sparkle in her eyes?

“Okay…how do I do that?” “Just configure me like you did to make me move.” “Right, so I move my hand onto-” “You can’t just watch me change, jeez!” She sticks her tongue out, despite the fact that she’s just dashed around normally. “R-Right…” I turn around, and do some strange orchestration with my fingers, and… “Don’t I look adorable?” “Yes, you do.” I smile. “You’re not even looking!” She huffs, walking over to me, the soft clack of wooden clogs that almost slip off on her. “Haven’t you heard of fastening?” She chuckles. “What do you think?”

“…I don’t like it.” The words spill, it’s surprisingly easy to be honest with her. “Ah I know right! I hate it!” She grabs the dress, her eyes look different…pale, thin, reptilian almost. She grabs the frock, nails ripping into the expensive fabric and tearing it into pieces.

“E-Elise, what are you, stupid?!” I run towards the fabric, but to no avail- it’s merely a pile of rags.

Father would kill me.

“No…” She raised an eyebrow. “You didn’t like it, so I destroyed it.”

I groan, “Just because I hate it doesn’t mean it doesn’t deserve to exist.”

“Well you like me, and I deserve to exist, don’t I?”

“…” I can barely stare at her.

“See?” And with that laugh, I can’t stay mad- not that I was in the first place.

*****

Until he comes home. Father usually worked in other rooms, but when he needed to get lace…he noticed one of the dresses was missing.

Father usually drank. Drank to forget, forget ‘her’ and to forget me. As if my existence was some fairy tale like dream, just born from imagination.

However, the blows he struck upon me were reality.

I had always been a mouse. Quiet. I never made a sound. I cleaned, I helped Father when he was sick, it was if I was the one playing house. With my imaginary friends.

Where is she? I yelp as he throws me into the wall. If Mother was here, would she allow this? Is there any reason for my existence, aside from being spit at that I’m just a “Bastard.”

There’s a chuckle. As if the cherubs in heaven are laughing at my bruises. I look up, and am rewarded with another punch.

I stare at Father. I hate him. I want to kill him. But I could never, I’m not an idealized hero or whatever bullshit, I’m a scared little child.

He stopped moving, as if I willed it.

Father fell down, and I see her there.

“E-Elise?” She’s covered in blood, she clawed his organs as easily as fabric.

“Rinny.” She smiles, and she lets out a hand. “You control the world around you now.”

This was my first time my hands became covered in blood.

*****

School wasn’t particularly better. I had sold most of the dresses and dolls (much to Elise’s dismay), but I left all the red ones alone, she liked those best, and they suited her.

There was one problem though, as schoolchildren grew up, and nattered on about love and whatever else, I found no such thing. Despite the fact that we played house together, and she did my school tie in the mornings, I felt no need to set my lips upon anyone, let alone all that other…insanitary matters.

As time went on, she needed a bigger chair as she insisted fixing my collar.

Elise had stuck through everything with me, except one thing.

She never aged.

“Elise…can you come here for a moment?” I call out to her, wincing at my legs. It was to be expected, a bastard orphan with an imaginary friend, and a weakling at that. I was always frail. I never felt the need to run away.

“Of course!” She skipped over to me, but halfway through her smile dissolved, but continued nonetheless.

“Can I hug you?” It was rare that my voice shook, but I had realized that I haven’t felt human affection in…decades, at least. Even the batterings were somewhat bearable to simply feel skin.

She laughed. A long time, a strained time.

I stepped closer, she stepped back.

“…You know the answer to that. I’m not going to give you a false hope.”

She’s not real. She’s not real. She’s not real.

“Can I pretend?”

I felt plastic-like arms around me. “As long as you know you are.”

***** Another problem that came with school, is what would come after. I was smart enough; excelling at most things, be it writing or science. In true ‘nerd’ fashion, my only lacking subject was Physical Education.

I liked the feel of wearing a labcoat. It was like my very own ballgown, where I would twirl. Sometimes, if I could conjure her, Elise would appear, and (as she had learnt to float by now) we would dance and laugh until the world seemed to dull.

“You know, Rintarou- you could always give them some nice chemicals.” She peers over an experiment, poking at a beaker. “This one’s really pretty! It’s such a lovely shade of purple, anyone would want to drink it!”

“You know that would shut down your internal organs, right?” I can’t help but chuckle, but I would never do such a thing.

“Even soooo…lemme have it!” She smiles gleefully, and I flick her away.

I hear a set of footsteps. It’s not the same clack as Elise’s shoes.

“What’s he even doing here? Does he want to burn the place down?” “I hear that’s what happened with his dad.” “Really? Nah, such a pathetic idiot couldn’t even fight back.” “Let’s make him drink it!”

My mouth was clasped open, and my eyes widened at the poison, before flickering shut.

Ah, so this is how it ends. At least I’m wearing my borrowed labcoat. On second thought, maybe burning this school would be better…I want them to suffer. I want them to die.

Glass shattered on the floor.

And when I opened my eyes, they were dead.

I looked over at the cut open corpses, and Elise smiling innocently with a scalpel in her hand, eyes thin and dimples showing.

“Thank you.” The words came out of me breathlessly, but were said…nonchalantly. I was amazed at myself, for not crying or screaming. Before me are three dead bodies.

I controlled the world around me.

I smiled.

“Elise, hand me the scalpel.” She did, and I could swear her skin almost had some flesh to it.

The human body is such a fascinating thing, isn’t it? There’s so many complex things to it, so much filth, so many cells… and yet, Elise was merely…a thing. Not human, but even devoid of such things as guilt, she cared about me.

Maybe she was more human than I could ever be.

Three months later after the deaths of students were forgotten, I got asked what I wanted to do.

“I want to become a doctor.”

*****

And so I worked. Elise was upset, but managed to satisfy her imagination with designs of cute doctor attire. During all nighters where she held crayons cradled in her arms, I set a blanket over her, and reminded myself I needed sleep.

She was just as determined as I was to study, and with the help of all nighters and comically shaped flash cards, I managed to get into a med school.

It was then everything…ah, got better as much as it got worse.

*****

I met someone very strange there. For you see, I’d never met someone that had something like I did. An ability.

A woman who was probably the closest person befitting of a title such as 'friend’.

The next two years passed without a hitch. I noticed that Yosano’s patients during our internship were at 100% success rate, and she was taken into emergency.

As someone who was relatively calm myself, and had experienced death, I was alongside her, though sadly my patients died due to internal bleeding.

Yosano was an empathic doctor, as she grieved for the patients I lost more than I did. It was her only weakness, and soon she started to adopt some sadistic state to deal with it. Our patients were probably too scared to die ahahaha~

But there was one.

It was at 3 in the morning, Yosano had treated most of them, or they were sent into other sectors. 'You really shouldn’t let her do everything, you have to be the best doctor Rinny…’ Elise pouted, she finally stole away some medical equipment and wore a nurses’ garb with glee (even the initially 'tacky surgery stuff’)

But I wouldn’t be so cruel, and Elise knew that, as she flopped on the bed with a sigh. 'This is taking too long! Why do you want to be a doctor anyway?’ She kicked the sheets up.

Then he came in. A man of about sixty stepped shakily through the door. I could see the problem already in his leg, and it was my shift and Yosano’s to try and sleep.

“Shit…I think…yes, I found you.”

A strange thing to say to a doctor, as I didn’t recognize the man himself, and it was dark besides. I switched on the lights, and ushered him to the bed.

“Sir, you have a blood clot. In around 5 minutes we can treat it, though you’ll have to be careful to not put pressure on your leg.” It was a simple diagnosis, it wasn’t that bad. The man’s break was laboured and shook, even despite no further injury. He must’ve been running.

“Thank you…Doctor Rintarou.”

I glanced down at my name tag. How would he know my first name?

“I’m afraid I don’t recognize you, sir.”

He grabbed my coat to lean closer. “Don’t these eyes look familiar, Rintarou?”

“Like the eyes of my son, who was cut open in his final year.”

The grip tightened. He was choking me, but his feeble hands broke away as I wrenched free.

I’m not weak.

“Sir, I have a duty of care to save your life. The clot could prove harmful if left unchecked.” I smiled, despite sweat dripping down my collar.

“I’d rather be burned alive. I’m here because you killed him. I know you did.”

“But sir, you do know the official archives depicted a knife fight? Your son was taken in by the wrong group, it’s only natural…”

“You’re a fucking liar. I know it was you. Little Rintarou didn’t cry after that.”

“Your son was a miserable excuse of a human being.”

“I saw. Because when I was picking him up…”

“What a kind, lovely father you are. I wish I had one so respectable.”

“I saw your face was stained with purple. You were there with a child. Were you going to kill her too?”

I sigh, getting a scalpel. “Her name, sir, is Elise.”

“You didn’t even know his name. You don’t even know who he was.”

“His name?! His name means nothing! I know what he was. If it wasn’t for work reasons I could strip down and I could show you every little scratch your son wrote on me. His name! That’s what you’re here for, I’m here to make something of myself-”

“Everyone will know.” He smiles. He does share a smile with his son. Deplorable.

“I’ll tell them all.”

“The dead have no mouths.” I sneer, and plunge the scalpel into his throat.

“…What are you doing.” I turn, and I see her there. Yosano, eyes weary and gasping in horror.

“What have you done?!”

“You don’t know? Why, now how did you even pass the exam then, dear?” I feel a smile. I can’t stop, this is what it must be like when Elise finds a new ribbon.

She shoves me aside, and plunges the scalpel into his heart. “Come on… come on.”

“Yosano, why are you hurting our patient further?”

“Please…bring him back. Please, please. You shall not die.”

“Oh my.” The realization dawns on me. “You have an ability.”

She turns toward me, eyes wide. “What do you-”

“That’s why they all live.”

“That’s not true…”

“You can’t save him, he had too many internal injuries.” I smile, “He’s already dead.”

“You’re a monster.”

“I’m a doctor. And I will continue to be such…” I retrieve another knife, and stab her in the back.

“No you won’t. Get out.” She reaches for the knife behind her back, she’s fine.

For the first time, I ran.

*****

“Rinny, you should’ve been more careful.” Elise calls out. We’re in an alley, I clutch at my coat and it’s red.

“Now everything’s gone away. All that hard work.” She floats up to me.

“It’s fine. It’ll be fine.” I murmur to myself.

“He was a nice father… I’ve never seen someone defend family so much before.” Her words cut through me, but I know it’s what I think.

It’s tiring. Everything I had built up…two decades of work, and what for?

“The boss has been shot!”

Hmmm, perhaps my choice in alleyways was a bit /too/ dingy. “He needs to see a doc, right away!”

“Are you stupid? What, and just tell them, oh yeah, the port mafia boss wants a little patching up.”

Elise is tugging me. She knows where we’re going.

There’s a man bleeding out. Well, there are lots of men bleeding out, or dead. He’s murmuring, “Kill them, all of them, kill them all! ”

“They’re already dead, boss.” I see a man twice my age, smoking a cigarette as if he wasn’t standing in a field of death.

Well that’s a little hypocritical, considering…

“I know a doctor!” Shock courses through me, as Elise tugs on the man’s coat. “Rinny’s a doc! He can patch the boss up real good!”

They all stare up at me, as if judging whether I was fit to live.

“This scrawny guy?”

Elise kicks his shins, “Yeah! If anyone can, he can!” She stares up at me.

Do I really think that of myself?

“I’ll see what I can do.”

It was a bullet stuck in his shoulder. I still had some blades on me, so I managed to make short work.

However, I would like to add that it’s probably painful when you’re hearing, “Fuck it hurts! I swear, I’ll kill you! I’ll kill your whole family!”

I decided I didn’t like this man. As I was working on saving him I thought to myself 'I feel as if one day I will kill him’.

“We need something to stop the blood flow…Elise?”

She pouts, “Fine…” As she cuts at the sleeves on her dress, wrapping him up.

“Wait a sec… he’s got one.”

“What are you talking about?” Elise looks up.

“An ability? We’ve never even seen him before…”

“Let alone one that makes…this.” A man rustled Elise’s hair.

“She’s mine.”

“Yeah! He’s mine!” Elise quickly grips him away, sticking her tongue out. “He’s my ability.”

“Eh really?”

“Nope!”

“Elise…” Mori sighs softly, before smiling.

“So, you’re a doctor huh?”

“Of sorts…”

Elise smiled, “He’s going to get kicked out of med school because he killed people.”

Despite Elise’s slip, the people seem nervous, there’s an exchange of nods. The boss has passed out.

“So…how would you like to be a vet, uh…Rinny was it?”

“Ougai, its Mori Ougai.” I take extra measure to make the city light glint on my scalpel. “And I’m a doctor.”

“Well how about you take care of some ol’ dogs like us?”

***** “Hey Rinny, how come if you can 'configure me’, you never let me age for all those years?”

“Hm?” I turn towards Elise, who’s busy drawing the Mafia, in crayon. “Well…I’m not sure.”

“You said I looked like Mother, when you first made me up.” She muses, “But you never saw her aside from pictures, right?”

“Right…” I scoop her up, adjusting her ribbons. “Well, Elise was always there, and so I’ll leave you as you always are.”

“The perfect Elise.” She snickers.

“I wouldn’t change her any other way.”

Yes, she was the one constant in my life. Even as the world around me changed, as I changed from a meek worthless bastard to a much more confident and murderous bastard…she was always there.

'You can control the world around you now’.

And she finishes my thought, “But I’m your whole world, right?”