This is a multi-chaptered fanfiction, centering on the thoughts and emotions of Albedo and looking more into his past before Xenosaga Episode 1, focusing especially on his descent into mental breakdown. This is only the Prologue, which I sort of scribbled together only today, so I guarantee it will get better as the story progresses (meaning have mercy on me!). I'll most likely be editing it soon, as I'm not very satisfied with it...also...telling me what you think is very appreciated. 3
Hurt Me
Prologue
You aren't the only one with two hearts, Rubedo.
You forget again, like you have forgotten me.
I carry two of those resonant burdens within my hollow chest; one is missing, the other physically intact for a lonely eternity. Thousands upon thousands of painful years lay for me in the future, staring down at your dead carcass beneath my feet in days to come, watching the bone-metal disintegrate into whitened dust, the blood dissipate within the cold hands of Time. Thousands upon thousands of echoes within that beating vessel, tormenting me in my sleep, in my cowardly lifespan; I can hear it now, its horrific beating like a drum to my dead brain.
I cannot hear you, I want to say.
Rubedo, I cannot hear you. I cannot even hear myself; that weak, fragile weapon screaming within the chambered nautilus of my artificial mind. I am gone, but the body remains-sin to the untainted living.
I want nothing but death. You know that, brother.
You aren't the only one with two hearts. Have you truly forgotten, or do you just want to teach yourself to forget? It is our taboo, the tie that binds us; that destroys us and defines us, shapes our useless existence as weapons of warfare into something more.
We share the pain. We share the suffering.
We share the insanity.
You aren't the only one with two hearts, Rubedo. It's just that mine belong to you, fully and completely. I've given myself to you years ago, while we were young; while we were so seemingly innocent. As innocent as a nuclear bomb in its production phase; as indestructible as a grenade that has not yet been pulled. You had my heart. You had my soul, beating forever within your ribcage. And I had yours.
Yet you wrenched it away. Even after the fluorescent bulbs beat down upon us, melting our conjoined bodies from one physical being to two separate, dysfunctional pieces of a united vessel. You stole my ability to survive in this damned world with your words, flowing from your lips like toxic. Your lips that I would like no other but to tear apart with my vengeful hands, to rip at the jaw and gouge with my rigid fingertips. To taste the bitter blood of those loveless lips, those lips that I so wish to kiss. Those lips I have wished, in my undying dreams, in my laborious life to love me, in the way that only yours could; utter those few words that would bring me back to you, back to myself.
But you forget, Rubedo. Like always.
To think us U.R.T.V.'s, marionettes of human combat, were designed to be flawless. It is ironic, isn't it? Ironic that the embodiment of destruction cannot be destroyed; that the monster will breed on its blood like a parasite of death.
Ye shall be as gods.
I am Albedo, the White One-so pure in production, in the immaculacy of my appearance, I became blessed-no, cursed- to watch this lonely world for eternity. To watch the humans thrive, their fated cradle-curse as they continue their innocent lullabies until the Eternal. Mortal folly, to rise so virtuous and fall from the Heavens, damned by the God that created you.
Laughable, if it were not so tragic.
Rubedo, number 666. At times I wonder if we were inverted at birth; for I was the Fallen, after all. You are the High and Mighty Michael, your body gleaming in sickening virtue-concealing your wrath for the sinners, hiding your nightmares in your bullets. Condemning me to Hell; casting me into those flames of the Unknown.
I can see those days, clear as gems within my muddled mind. I can feel the fabric of your uniform, mechanic prisoner, as I clutched frantically to your body, fear engulfing me, even stronger than the waves of U-DO. I was on my knees, praying to the unhearing Christ, to Salvation.
How could I be the only one to regenerate? To heal those deliciously rippling wounds upon my body, breathe to life the dismembered pieces of my flesh. It was a gift, at first-the thought of never feeling, the terror of death was delightful, because as a child I harbored such frivolous fears. Yet what elated me even more than that fact was the thought of being forever entwined with my beloved twin, with my Rubedo. The future was to be a paradise; free of tears, of training, of U-DO. Yet that moment came, with your cold, cold eyes, the feeling of hope collapsing in my mind, of dread filling my being like the requiem to a dream.
"You're the only one who can regenerate!"
The only one. Your words a poison to my soul. You will never fully realize how you affect me, Rubedo-how you shaped me at that moment, how you always will.
"Rubedo," I begged.
Tell me it was a dream. A bitter nightmare, product of false data…fluxes in the system.
In my unbeating heart, you smile and hold me, tell me it was a joke; a silly child's act to rile me up.
Yet reality is never so kind.
You break me instead.
Every single time.
Every beating of my second heart, the drip of every tear of blood in mourning for my forever. I couldn't bear the thought of your death-we are the almighty marionettes of Satan, the heavy number 666. I am your other half-how can you die without me? How could you leave me?
I can still hear you scream, brother.
In every slice of my flesh, every impaling of my body-the beautiful symphony of roses, bloody petals falling gracefully from my prickled flesh-
Sometimes I can hear you scream.
Maybe that is why it gives me such pleasure. Touching what I can never have-the cold, unfeeling Body of Death-my wounds tease me; make me yearn for that beautiful crescendo of Time where I am bathing in a garden of my blood, when I am truly with peace.
But peace will never come. You made sure of that, my darling Rubedo. If I had found my condemnation crippling; the feeling of loss at never being by your side forever, of never being complete again, it was you who truly broke that sacred connection. With your beautiful cobalt eyes boring into my shattered soul, spiteful and indignant. How I want to rip those pretty lashes, tear into the sky-filled irises and dash your brains out with my bare hands. How I wish I could latch onto those flaming locks and destroy you, utterly and completely, absorbing you into my being until we were one yet again; until you were no more, nothing more than the answer to the ache within my heart.
Until I wouldn't have to see you die unless I did the doing.
Yet you are pathetic. A fool, a child controlled by your precious little emotions; your simpering, overbearingly human thoughts and thirst for virtue that defines you as a complete and utter failure. At times I am disgraced to be relative to such a lowly monster; at times I envy being chained to such a pure, unblemished creature. Yet I know that only you can bring about my death.
I want you to kill me, Rubedo. I want you to give me that pleasure of Death that only you may give; with your wings beating down upon my heart, destroying me fully and completely. I want to Fall again, to feel the burn of loathing in my heart, to feel the blood and know it will never end. I want a fountain of scarlet, of blood painting roses in my brain, overwhelming beauty of my prolonged demise.
But you forget, Rubedo. Like always.
That is why I will teach you.
Pain through pleasure, pleasure through pain.
Make me feel like you know I am alive again. Accept the thought that I can die.
Hate me.
Lie to me.
Hurt me.