What We Do: Chapter 2

While Zexion and Marluxia stared at each other from across the kitchen table, another universe quite far away and on a completely different time schedule was beginning to stir. Morning was peeking over the horizon where cookie-cutter houses lined up in rows, each painted a pastel tint of some cheerful color. The milkman was already making his rounds, tipping his cap to the paperboy as he passed.

The paperboy tossed his newspapers up each driveway, letting them skid to stop a faultless of the way up. It really was quite a perfect neighborhood where everyone cut their lawn and the ladies of the street played bridge on Friday nights while their husbands went out to have a smoke and a game of bowling.

As the newspaper skidded up the driveway of the second house on Fairweather Drive (it had been painted a cheerful color of yellow by the previous owners and the current residents hadn't found a need to repaint it), the alarm inside went off at the same time. It was an old mahogany alarm clock, the bell ringing loud enough to wake the dead. Because, as the man in the bed beside the alarm clock reasoned, he was as good as.

It took exactly 34 seconds for the owner of the alarm clock to finally disentangle himself (swearing profusely in the process) and smash his fist into the unfortunate appliance to turn it off. Oh, if only waking up was an easy process-like in movies where all it took was a simple sun beam through the window.

With a sigh, the man in bed looked over to address his companion, still heavily snoozing and sprawled out on the pillow beside him. "Dudley, really. You should have woken me up earlier," he muttered, throwing off the covers. "I have work today."

Said Dudley lifted his head once and regarded the blond-haired man with an expression reminiscent of something hopeful until he saw that the man was already leaving the bedroomand without even putting on his slippers. Dudley got up and followed him out.

In that same house, as the two went about their ritualistic business, there was a desk. It was backed up against a wall in the den, overflowing with stacks of notes and books. However, amid all the clutter was a smaller leather-bound book with clasps. Upon further examination, it was revealed to be a journal. The author was obviously well-versed in keeping a journal, for everything was neat and labeled properly, as if a continuation of previous practice. In fact, it seemed as though the entries were, indeed, a continuation of another journal entirely, for there was no introduction to speak of. The first page simply opened as,

June 3, 1950,

By the time I had been so ungratefully shoved into the confines of Castle Oblivion, I had already hypothesized that what a nobody is was defined by their actions. To be worthless, truly worthless would be defined solely by worthless acts, then. And, the more and more I analyzed my previous endeavors, the more and more I began to realize what it is that I had feared (so far as a nobody could fear): worthlessness.

Although I wielded a weapon and element, I was never considered a warrior; anyone who knew me knew what buttons to press in battle to have me felled fast enough. Though I was cunning and sharp, I was also hasty, temperamental, impatient, and often irrational. Number Six would have quickly diagnosed me with several psychological disorders of that nature had I existed, I'm sure. These traits led to unintentional disasters, some in the laboratory, some outside of it. Disasters nonetheless, with all fingers to point at me, indisputably.

Even though I had written volumes concerning my emptiness, I think it was that fact alone (that I was writing, writing, writing and not living it) that kept me from realizing the true gravity of what I had become. Years slipped between my pen and my notebooks until they stacked in cabinets, and yet not once had I ever thought about my nonexistence without a page in front of me. So when the time came for me to open my eyes (and it was all a matter of time), it was an experience reminiscent of being broad-sided by a semi truck while carrying an armful of groceries down the sidewalk. I didn't know what to save first-my 'groceries' (my lies, my theories), or myself.

I remember the moment it all crashed down upon me-everything about nonexistence, worthlessness, and what it meant for my consciousness to truly be hollow. Evening was soaking into the confines of my small room in the basement of Castle Oblivion and I had stepped out of the bathroom, traces of mist still clinging around my eyes as I dried my hair. My replica was laid out on the metal table on the other side of the room, his arms and legs at clinical angles that only a boy like him could achieve without popping something out of some socket somewhere. He didn't look up, didn't move as I came in and threw the towel down-never did, never would.

I traced a line from the replica to my own bed with my eyes. Why, oh, why did his metal gurney look more comfortable than my own sleeping arrangements? With a sigh that may or may not have had something to do with my back, I laid down against stark sheets.

I kept quiet as I thought, not wanting my usual muttering to make the replica uneasy (the last time he'd gotten annoyed, he stalked off into some dark confines of the lab and I didn't find him for days). But I thought, nonetheless, about how dreadful it all was. It was no easy task, this non-life. One might consider and assume: no life, no hardships. It seemed an easy enough presumption. Yet, oh, how wrong it was. At that very moment, my eyes peeled back in dreamless exhaustion, I was running through each and every failure that had ever met my doorstep as a Nobody. I couldn't count even half of them, and I was actually very efficient when it came to numbers.

Like it was a bedtime story, I spoke up. "Replica, why am I a Nobody?"

"That's an easy one." He said automatically, almost as if he'd been waiting for this question the entire evening. "Because you lost your heart."

"It's not a test, Replica. I am merely asking: why?"

"I don't understand the question."

I let an exasperated sigh push from my chest, weighed down by what seemed to be the entire world. "Nobodies are supposed to have originated only from Somebodies with strong hearts. And if that is the casewhy do I still cease to exist?"

It was natural that my replica didn't know how to respond. He rarely did-his childish mind focused on only one thing at a time, and most of the time that thing was not me. How typical.

This time, however, the replica managed a small, "Vexen?"

"What?"

"I still don't understand."

"Oh, use your head, you ridiculous puppet." I snapped. "I wouldn't have given you one if I didn't intend you to use it. Think about it-what am I? I'm buried away, I am not respected, I am not acknowledged. Why, oh, darkness, why must I be here? It's like" My fingers clenched in an out as I struggled to find the words, too poetic for my mouth to say correctly. "like I'm a waste of space." 'Like I'm an old refrigerator,' I almost added. But, somehow, I thought I said enough, for the replica was propped up on one elbow and looking at me, eyes like waxed linoleum. For a moment, I recalled how carefully I had placed them in those deep sockets, how meticulous I had been in choosing the blues that would match best. My fingers had dug in the jar again and again, brushing past faintly rocking orbs until I had plucked one up carefully, lovingly, as to not damage their graceful arcs. I could see he remembered that part, too.

What will it be like to see, Vexen?

It will hurt at first, but you'll like it once I've finished. Stay still now, and be good.

"No one's perfect." He told me. "Not as perfect as me, at least." A smile. A small, genuine replica smile. "But I think your heart had merit that the darkness saw. After all, it would take someone special to make something as perfect as me." He scooted a little on his metal table, as if resisting the urge to jump off. "Right?"

I found myself swallowing a lump. "Right."

"Right." And then the replica laid back down, the metal pins in his shoulders making a crisp sound against the table.

Right. I wanted to believe that it was nothing but an empty motion when I reached across my bed to throw him an extra blanket. It half-missed him, but he caught it in his fist, curious, as if there was some mistake.

"Keep it." I explained. "It's cold down here."