A/N: Epilogue because of a recent update...
"Smoking is bad for you, you know. Especially in your condition."
"You're one to talk."
Slick sits on his bed. Rather, this bed. He's not entirely sure where he is. He can't move thanks to the multiple wires attached to the robotic pieces that make up half of his being. A small Prospitian and some strange painted creature were in the room not too long ago, but now they're gone. So he's alone.
Well, not exactly.
"Besides," Slick continues, taking another drag from the one cigarette the alien had reluctantly provided, "'least one of my lungs is metal."
"You never smoked before though. Is it because of the health benefits? How silly."
"Oh shut up. You know the real reason."
"Mm."
They fall silent. The only sound in the room is the whirring of the machine keeping Slick alive. He inhales the smoke once more before looking over at the man sitting at the end of his bed, who has his back to him. His usually rigid shoulders are slumped.
"Droog."
The man sighs and looks up at the ceiling, as if he's looking right through it. Into the sky. "What is it, Jack?"
"What if none of this happened?"
"... What do you mean?"
"I mean," Slick swallows, "what if we got outta the vault and everything was okay? My arm wasn't missing, and we just went back to how things used to be... do you still think we'd..." He doesn't finish the sentence.
The other doesn't move.
"We'd what?"
Slick's mouth sets into a thin line, his eye staring blankly into his back. "We'd be more than just... what we were. I don't know."
"I can't answer that."
"Why not?"
"You know why."
He ignores the tight feeling in his chest. "Fuck, Diamonds, come on."
"Slick."
"Can you at least look at me?"
No reply. He just sits there. Looking up. Silent.
"... Please...?"
"I'm sorry."
And slowly his form vanishes, leaving Slick there. Alone. All alone.
He hates this. The way these robotic pieces seem to bend his dreams and consciousness into one, as if he's both asleep and awake at the same time, and it all seems so real. Yet it's not. There is no changing the fact that despite getting his revenge—killing Matchsticks, killing Sn0wman, burning it all—he still feels empty. Because there's nothing left. He's done and there's nothing to show for it. Nothing to look forward to in the end.
Nothing. No one. Not even Droog.
"You piece of shit," Slick swears, throwing the cigarette where the apparition had been just a moment ago. "You piece of fucking shit, son of a bitch—" There's a hiccup in his voice. He reaches up. Feels the red eye. Feels the eyepatch. But neither are damp.
He's crying without the tears. But crying all the same.
He keeps his palm over the eye patch. His right one. The two objects left to both console and torture him.
His body rocks a little, like a pendulum. The last clock yet to stop its relentless march through time.
Alone.
Tick. Tock.