68- Filling the Void
"Addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart," - Ephesians 5:19
The news about the saferoom was unsettling to say the least. So much drama, so much heartache for it all to be dashed away as fast as it had come. Sammy swore a number of things that should have made this impossible: one, that it must have been his fault it was locked. There was no way to bolster the door without someone on the inside to do it, but somehow he had done it- had to in order for him to leave it with no one within waiting for him. Two, when they did arrive to find their haven inaccessible, he pulled like hell; he tugged and he tugged both to offer his friend safety once more and to wipe off that growing look of sadness as it dawned upon her that all of her precious personal items might be gone forever.
Knowing Francine had to find her solace somewhere else, when she had asked to lose herself for a time within the studio, he allowed it. She came back saying the saferoom maybe was never locked at all. Or worse- he dared to fear but not dwell upon- that someone unlocked it.
But that was only the glaze on Sammy's stack of troubles. This world- his world- was proving much more unstable than he had realized, and his manner of discovering it was feeling how the foundation of his faith shook and shook which each thing peaking through the darkness of stolen memory.
A summary of his current perspective of himself currently that he was hardly a man kept alive by a force he couldn't comprehend; someday, he presumed to be the ink demon's choosing, he would be set free. And that, for a long time, was the extent of it! He didn't ask- didn't want to ask- what he was before all this and who he would be in a more glorious future.
But then Alice answered one of those two mysteries, and it left so very unsure if the latter would bear any resemblance to it- and if he would want it to.
And so with nothing else to do, Sammy turned to what comforted him, what cradled his weary soul without fail.
Francine observed with intent as her lost prophet sang his hymns.
A gentle, unique voice swept the saferoom with airy fervor, Sammy's upper back lounged against the wall as fingers plucked his favorite instrument's strings. The banjo sang back, vibrations clear as day both visually and audibly as oily tips brushed with practiced perfection. Even in all her own personal weariness, that made Francine smile; she had never known the banjo to be such a wonderful sound before she met the music director, but Sammy now had her convinced of its beauty for the rest of her life.
The rest of her life.
The woman frowned as she rested her closed hands on the table in front of her at that phrase's appearance in her inner dialogue. Sammy wasn't the only person unsure about the future. Ever since she first visited the band room, she had felt convinced that someday, it'd all be okay; she'd survive and she'd go home. She learned since, of course, that what was in between surviving and going home was important, but now that last part didn't seem so simple.
As Sammy titled his head back, that cartoonish mask of his leaving unsure if it was a firm stare to something out there or merely a mindless look to the above he hoped to see someday, Francine yet again found Joey's whispers in her heart. The only spot of color besides herself begged the young woman to not think about it anymore- to not bother rescuing the memory of those lives lost to the ink- and simply wait for the end to come. It was such a hopelessness in his sad eyes as he asked her this, and yet it was a hope he had for them nonetheless. And so staring ahead at the tar-like man she wanted to uncover since she first opened her eyes to the inky shroud of their curse, she felt so very uncertain what to do.
And ignorant to the parallel pains of Sammy's mind, she had to test it.
"Hey Sammy."
A flowing stop to his voice, a hum in his throat faded so that even its interruption sounded pleasant to the ear. That second face of his turned down more her way, scratched eyes still managing to look upon Francine in wait as he continued to strum the cords in his fingers.
What they saw was his friend leaning over the wooden table, tucking her chin into folded arms, her eyes half-lidded with something more tender than mere tiredness.
"When we get out of here…what do you think you're gonna do?"
It wasn't meant to be so poignant, but hell- it was. His fingers stopped playing too, an abrupt and unharmonious stop as being taken aback left him no longer aware of music entirely. He choked back something harsh; she didn't know. Francine had no awareness of his recent discomforts that left him unknowing if the future could be as disheartening as his newfound past, and so words with sting were pulled back for someone else another day. Before him was simply a soul that was still coping with the realities of the ink, and for her sake, he'd play along.
"I suppose I need you to be more specific than that," he replied hesitantly, unsure if specification would somehow make him more uncomfortable.
"I mean- like-" She hadn't thought this out. Francine pursed her lips as let her eyes dart across the marks of the table in search of answers. Her gaze fell upon that paper again- Henry and Boris, names written here before she had ever even first set foot in this sanctuary- and she had to pry it away. But it was just long enough of a gaze upon one representative of the studio's vast collection of mysteries for her to wonder once more what happened to everyone here, and so maybe that was what guided her next question.
"What are you gonna tell people about what happened?"
There were no words for how sick that made Sammy feel; no other question could be more precise to dig into his current insecurities and fears. At first he replied only with silence, and as it continued, Francine began to see that this wasn't a pause of ponderance but rather a paralysis of some sort taking his body and voice, and the moment she realized this, guilt started to ache straight into her bones.
"I'm- I'm sorry…" was the best she could give. Damn it, Joey had a point. This whole time she had to fight tooth and nail to get any sort of information about Sammy- and she had to struggle against him. Surely, at least some of what they found together was worth his knowing, but…
"…It's fine." As Sammy finally exhaled a lie, putting a hand dripping with stress to his head and let the banjo droop down to the floor with a limp grasp, Francine had maybe her first moment of clarity that he really didn't want to know for more of a reason than just being afraid to look for it.
But now she was left sitting here, watching him melt once more with a question she knew he wouldn't end up answering for her today.
Suddenly, a compromise to satisfy her misgivings came to be.
"…Do you want to know what I want to do when we get out?"
Through Sammy's misery, these words pierced the veil clouding his mind. The black obscuring the corners of his sight retreated, and a mouth slightly agape faced the woman who spoke so very softly. And she had a look to match- her gentle gaze remained, mouth slightly open herself as a glitter of some sort came to her eyes. She was realizing something much in the same way as when she reminded him of his favorite song some time ago.
And indeed, that was a telltale sign that something just as magical was ahead.
"…I want to have you listen to every song you've never heard."
Even as he didn't know exactly what to think of it, the very notion took his breath away. It made butterflies flutter between his ribs, both strange and uncomfortable as well as undeniably good. With the hollowing pain of her last inquiry still echoing in his chest, it was such a bizarre sensation that he couldn't sparse it into something that made sense.
So what he asked next was unidentified to be a reply or a distraction to this feeling she set aflame right from the shine in her eyes into the wind in his lungs.
"You know…" Sammy countered with an unexpected smoothness that was either sly with charm or tender with vulnerability, "I don't think you ever told me what your favorite song was."
And as her eyes widened with the unanticipated, he suddenly felt a smile carve into his face. A slight terror jumped through him as well, but…even if he wasn't so sure about himself and his own future, at least hers was ahead for him to see and take joy in reclaiming; for this moment, he'd make that enough, and he'd let go fears that maybe they won't be released to her old life at all.
The grin curled even deeper with a whimsy only she seemed able to bring to his face. "Tell me about the song you love the most. I would love to look forward to hearing it myself someday."
As surprise took her expression, Sammy gradually saw it grow into a mischievousness herself, and just then- he realized he forgot something.
"You don't have to wait for that," Francine replied with the most excited sort of quiet trembling her voice.
That oh so familiar phone pulled out of her pocket and after a few touches of instruction unintelligible to her fellow disciple, she left the device on the table and began to walk towards him.
Just as she took him by the hands- a gasp escaping his lips- music began to play.
One pluck of a string not far unlike his own, left just long enough to ring the air before more and more came behind. With a big grin fighting against the shyness in her eyes, Francine pulled him from the wall in tandem with the rhythm that began to sway like dancing water.
Just as her fingers intertwined with his, he heard something underneath the sweet sound of strings; a hum- almost like an animal, but…not. It was like magic itself echoing just barely through the walls.
And then as the song took flight, so did she- and she pulled him right along with her, slowly circling the living room in a dance. She'd sway him in and out, closer and farther like a pulse drummed through them.
Indeed, the music itself seemed to be alive.
To hear it was like listening to a single lifetime or maybe even more captured within one song- creation, love, war, death, sorrow, and finally- undeniably-…peace.
There was a beast among it all- a beautiful, entrancing wail of something lost, suffering, and playful all at the same time. Even if it wasn't always heard, it was still there; its sharp yet hushed cry would drift away into the background until it was unknown if it was still there or gone entirely. It didn't matter- this was the tune of its void, filling emptiness with sound like God forged all that breathed life.
And eventually it was clear to be a god that also could take it away.
As she spun him slowly but somehow so firmly around, it was almost like he could see it swirl around him; deep, starry blues for the quiet and striking fires like explosions for when sounds of peril snuck there way in- like cannons in a midnight sky. It was a lyricless song that somehow said more than mere words ever could, orchestrated by the spirit of an incomprehensible enchantment that enveloped them all the same.
Eventually it became clear to Sammy that this wasn't a song meant to simply accompany a story; it was a story in itself.
…It could even be his story.
Beginning and ending much the same way, sounding the same with different meanings after experiencing the thunderous heights in between. It was a song about faith, danger, and resolution; it was everything he saw himself to be, for better or worse.
Simple, purely, being.
This bizarre tune would haunt him for much longer than the six minutes it played, so enraptured bar after bar, note after note that it went by in only a few blinks of her eyes- a few satisfied, dreamy murmurs of her voice sighing and humming with the unspoken tale. The beat of this divine hymn would follow him forevermore, much like others always had through his god Bendy.
And just as the song began, it ended the same way, signaling the cycle of existence ready to end and start over, with Francine hesitantly but surely letting him into a bit of her world this time instead of her into his- the sound of harps not too far from the thump in his chest as their dance slowed into almost nothing, much like the quieting chant that surrounded them less and less.
Their inner thoughts were private, but as Francine shared her favorite song- feeling his hands in hers- there was a combined assurance made to describe all that was: the possibility that the creature who took away and the man that wanted them to forget were maybe the ones that gave the most of all.
It was the most they could do with what they had.
Author's Notes: The song featured in this chapter is Voidfish (plural) by Griffin McElroy and Rachel Rose Mitchell