HOLE MOUTH RED LIPSTICK SMEARED

Getting your guts rearranged in Vegas is a classic pastime. Maybe not this literally, though.

xexnoncores & Tyrastafr

⚠️ content warning ↑

December 17th, 2020

Rust and mold. Mold and rust. Amidst a plethora of polyester, polyethylene, styrofoam, and acrylic, a natural kind of rot creeps across their artificial surfaces like copper, growing from a singular entry point.

Mr. Redd (discontinued) sits on his bed and looks up at the ceiling.

Time-out is a childish way to refer to being locked in your room without food or water, but he didn’t need either for sustenance as much as humans did. And the deprivation wasn’t an intentional cruelty—his father just forgot the needs of his own creations sometimes. Dr. Wondertainment may have been a genius toy-maker, but it was the chemists of his company who deduced how to take care of metal, plastic, wax, and wood.

The decay is his fault. He knows this. Ever since he was a child, staying in one room for too long would cause it to fall apart. Especially when his emotions were sent into a tailspin. He was lucky he could have everything rebuilt ad nauseum in Wonderworld!™, but that didn't change the fact his father was aware of this and instructed him to consistently think about it whenever he was out in the “real world”. Be courteous of others and never stay the night anywhere. You’ll destroy their stuff, and possibly them.

Why was he made like this?

That was a question he had wrestled with since the day he was born. His father made him to embody something, but what exactly did the color red embody? What exactly was its parallel to his more genius sister, Isabel, who was poised to take over the company once his father had enough?

Was it the extra ‘d’ at the end of his name?

He eventually decided that his purpose was “creative destruction”. When he told this to his father, he was met with a heavy, mysterious type of quiet.

A knock at the door.

Mr. Redd doesn’t stir.

The knock grows louder.

He snaps his neck over. “What do you want?”

It takes a second for the door to open. A quivering body clad in a dustless black suit peers in nervously, shaking.

“Um—You—You have a letter.”

Mr. Redd sits up and blinks. “I’m surprised my father allowed me that.”

“We are all surprised too—”

Mr. Redd scoffs. “Get out of here.”

The person drops the letter. Mr. Redd rolls his eyes and prepares himself to ignore it until he notices the golden seal on the letter in the shape of a door.

He pauses. Is that—

He squints.

With silence that shimmers like a knife, he walks over and picks it up. His cracked red fingernails glide over the paper like a worshipper kneeling at the feet of the Madonna.

He opens it fervently.

“…Well I’ll be damned, Robert,” Mr. Redd says with a maniacal grin. “Your old man still hasn’t killed you yet.”

---

December 18th, 2020

Mr. Redd was allowed to travel back to Las Vegas on a single condition: Robert Carter is to remain unblemished, and untouched. Maiming a Marshall, Carter, and Dark executive—that was generally seen as signing your own death warrant.

Well, it wasn’t just a single condition. His PR rep was coming with him, but Robert got the impression she was being thrown to the sharks out of some sort of embarrassment for getting herself hurt during that one incident with the casino. Maybe he was just being pessimistic, but the perfect way to get rid of an employee who was involved in accidents was to keep giving them situations where they could create problems, so they could be fired with cause. It was a trick as old as Dr. Wondertainment himself.

They’d do that to you too if you weren’t an heir, his thoughts say.

Whatever. She wasn’t important. She wasn’t allowed at the dinner anyway, and Robert offered up his own personal bodyguards so Mr. Redd wouldn’t need to be babysat by people who treated gossip like a competitive sport. How he managed to function in a corporate sphere where people like that were allowed to exist, Robert has no idea.

Imagine if people gossiped about him. The mere thought of anyone considering his work performance lackluster makes his chest tighten.

The dinner is simple. Private restaurant deep in Vegas’s heart, the whole establishment cleared out just for them. It’s not Ambrose, as they had long since absconded out of the city—it’s a three Michelin star Pakistani restaurant, a rarity in this part of America, nay, the world.

Escorted in by his security, he takes a seat at the central table. He doesn’t take his gas mask off, instead letting its dense plastic sit heavy on his face.

His tail finally comes out as well. Several feet long, slender as a snake and just as mobile. Its silver body curls down through a gap in the bottom of the chair, ruby tip glimmering like the pyramidal Luxor Hotel. It twitches as he thinks, full of intentions that resisted categorization, but not money. Never money. This tail was bought with a whole lot of it.

Robert Carter wants to keep that kind of money, and he’s thought long and hard about why in the wake of this crimson disaster.

Even if he was sitting at the top of a pyramid he didn’t ask for, a birthright he didn’t entirely have a choice in, every day was an example to him why he ought not to complain and keep trudging along with what he has. You had people to clean for you, every kind of cuisine at your fingertips, new furniture everyday if you wanted. There was a distinct sense of power that came with walking down some nameless corridor that you gave importance to because of your name, your presence there.

People were lucky to be around you. They were lucky to know you. You could tell them what to do as much as you wanted, hold their lives in your hands like ants to a sugar cube.

So why can’t he make decisions befitting of that status?

Every day it felt like he was waking up to the world crushing him. A mountain of monotony ready to go while he stumbled into his million-dollar suit. Do this, do that, keep doing this, keep doing that. The to-do lists never ended.

He thinks of all of this waiting for Mr. Redd. He had considerably less, and his status was arguably more complicated. Being a creation of Dr. Wondertainment himself definitely came with some expectations, and Robert has never been able to figure exactly what Mr. Redd could possibly be expected to do.

It wasn’t like he ran the company, yeah? He was the COO, but the lawyers ran Wondertainment Inc. almost as much as the toymakers. That wasn’t even counting the other Little Misters, which all had various standby roles within the company, each more mysterious than the last.

Was Mr. Redd allowed to exist out of pity? Nobody had ever heard of the Doctor hating his own creations, but it wasn’t unheard of him to regret some.

Maybe he just needs to stop thinking about all of this and just have some fun. His father said he was in his head too much, especially when he didn’t need to be.

Robert sighs, flicking his tail back and forth underneath the chair.

“Mr. Carter?”

He recognizes that nasally voice. Robert looks up. Mr. Redd waves at him, flanked behind by his PR agent doing the same. She smiles flatly and closes the door as Mr. Redd runs over to hug him.

“Oh, I’ve missed you! Missed Vegas, honestly. I love all the bright red neon here.”

“I’ll bet you do.” Robert returns the hug only somewhat. Half of his mind tells him this is wrong because he’s doing something wrong here. He has to be. Why wouldn’t he?

“Do you know what we’re having tonight?” Mr. Redd asks as he backs up, cocking his head. He looks like a golden retriever ready to retrieve a shot duck.

“You should wait and see. I think you will like it.”

As Mr. Redd sits down, Robert realizes that he doesn’t actually know that. His chest tightens, and he considers the usual diet of Wondertainment employees: anomalously saccharine and not at all good for the liver. Fructose was a matter of life for them, as was all manners of other sugars, both make-believe and not. They drank more soda than they did water.

Still, it can’t hurt to try.

Robert sighs as the waiter comes along and asks for drinks. He orders sparkling water, Mr. Redd a glass of red wine. The waiter tells him the restaurant is halal.

Robert’s tail pricks. “I didn’t realize you drank,” he says as the waiter leaves.

“We get alcohol as gifts sometimes from other companies. That’s basically the only way to get it through customs in Wonderworld!™”

“Harsh.”

“Maybe so, but it’s for the best. Can’t have the kids accidentally getting into something.”

His tail darts to the side. “Are you even allowed to drink?”

Mr. Redd cocks his head. “Huh? What makes you assume I can’t?”

Robert’s tail curls in on itself. “Well—” He pauses. “I guess it’s because you— You—”

“Cause problems?”

Robert stiffens. He would purse his lips if he had them. He looks down at the table with hands firmly clenched to his sides.

“It’s okay, you can say it,” Mr. Redd says. “I cause problems for people, and there’s no getting around that.”

“You shouldn’t be so mean to yourself,” Robert replies. He stares at his napkin and utensils, wondering if Mr. Redd knows how to use them. If he doesn’t, Robert is in a world of trouble.

Mr. Redd shrugs. “I’m not. It’s just the truth.”

“It doesn’t have to be.”

“Why?”

Robert doesn't say anything to that.

Their food comes. First course is the hors d'oeuvres, small lamb kebabs drizzled tastefully with mint and cumin raita.

Robert pops the lid of his mask and slides the stick in. He holds his breath somewhat, his head buzzing with invisible eyes staring at him for something so unusual.

“What’s behind there?” Mr. Redd’s voice is clear like a bell without anyone else here.

“Nothing you need to worry about,” Robert tells him, and he hopes he doesn’t ask again.

“You can take that off here, you know. It’s just us.”

“You won’t convince me to satisfy your curiosity, Mr. Redd. Hasn’t your deadbeat of a father taught you about staring at people?”

Robert half-laughs, but the joke feels foreign on his tongue. Almost like he was pointing out some hideous secret that should remain hidden.

Why are you being so rude?

Mr. Redd’s visage is cavernous. His pale skin, gray like paling wax, shines in a sickly way as he continues to watch Robert eat slowly. The red streaks falling down his cheeks like crayon marks do little to help this impression, and, paired with his scarlet lips and red eyes, it feels all the more like a predator gazing down at some hideously wounded animal.

Deep breath. Robert can see just fine through his gas mask despite the fact he does not have eyes. He pulls his kebab out cleanly despite the fact he does not have teeth.

…No, the kebab isn’t clean, in fact. A thin film of gray, iridescent slime covers it, quickly inverting the colors of the stick from tan to blue.

Mr. Redd points. “What is that?”

Robert ignores the question.

Second course. Soup. Two of six.

Chicken curry, served with Ayam Cemani chicken. What is normally a reddish-orange is now stained with swirls of decorative black, complimenting the hyper-pigmented chicken which sits carved amidst bits of gold flake.

Robert watches Mr. Redd play with his knives.

“How do you like it so far?” He has to stop his voice from quivering.

Mr. Redd stares at his food. “We don’t eat much chicken in Wonderworld!™”

Robert raises his tail. “Really?”

“Yeah. Something to do with Isabel keeping a few Silkies as pets when we were little?”

“Before the corgis she cloned?”

“Before the corgis she cloned.”

It’s delicious.

Robert shudders as his plate is cleaned and Mr. Redd takes a napkin to his mouth. He had never noticed it before, but his cheeks look…rosy? Especially in the low, orange lights. It’s like someone dusted them with crimson blush.

“Is being a doll part of your whole—” Robert motions circularly around his face. “Thing?

“Oh, so I can’t ask about your face, but you can ask about mine?”

Robert’s tail stiffens. “No, I meant no—”

“Kidding!” Mr. Redd smiles wide. Robert feels his heartbeat rocket. “I’m kidding, Robert. I really am. Am I allowed to ask you to relax a little?”

“Why—Why wouldn’t you be?”

“It’s courtesy to ask to jab at someone. God knows your father could use some of that, honestly.”

“That’s—”

“None of my business?” Mr. Redd cocks his head without blinking. It’s a single smooth motion, like he was capable of turning his head one-hundred and eighty degrees. “Also, I’m not a doll, I’m a Little Mister. Big difference.”

Third course. Appetizer. It’s pakoras—Vidalia onions fried in organic gram flour, topped with dollops of sturgeon caviar.

Robert’s stomach growls.

“Are you enjoying the food?” Robert’s tail stiffens.

Why are you so nervous, idiot? Nothing is happening.

“It’s incredible,” Mr. Redd replies, putting one into his mouth. Robert’s face goes hot at his pearly white teeth, though he’s not really sure why. He’s imagining Mr. Redd dismembering him for his social inadequacies the same way he allegedly dismantled his pet parrots when he was little.

“Really? I…I’m glad.”

Mr. Redd nods, licking his lips after he’s finished his plate. “Yes, I’m glad you treated me to this as well. I really appreciate you Robert, you make me feel normal.”

Robert’s tail arches behind him. It twitches as he considers Mr. Redd’s words.

Normal?

“…Appreciate me?”

“Yes. Nobody else would be willing to do this for me, much less after how south everything went. I’m practically poison for the lawyers and PR people to touch.”

“It’s no big deal. I’m…just treating someone whose company I like.”

Robert thinks of the aquarium again. He thinks of all the years he’s known Mr. Redd, their occasional lunches and dinners. They had always known each other since they started working, but maybe something changed since the casino?

What a stupid question. Things are the same as they’ve always been. Keep your distance.

Fourth course. Salad. It’s kachumber, of course, a medium portion distributed in a spiral on a beautiful white plate. Robert knows where this restaurant gets all of its vegetables personally; he was assured by the head chef before he came in here.

“Do you like what you do?”

Mr. Redd gingerly spins a knife around in his fingers. “I love my twin sister,” he replies.

Weird segue. “Isabel? She’s that important to you?”

“Yes. I would say she’s the one that looks out for me more meaningfully than everyone else.”

“…So you’re aware of what people say about you?”

“That everyone thinks of me as something to babysit? Some kind of menace to children? Pfft, yeah. Have known it for years. The Doctor made me this way without remorse, so it’s only natural everyone else wants to make up for that.”

Robert doesn’t entirely understand what that means, but he doesn’t ask. Maybe Mr. Redd was talking about everyone else filling in the void where remorse for his existence should be—but that didn’t entirely make sense, because why would his father leave him by the wayside if that was the case? He loved whimsy and wonder too much for that, didn’t he?

Did Mr. Redd just not think that far, or was this more insidious somehow, something akin to leaving a dangerous dog to bite other children?

The magic of childhood wears off fast. That’s something Robert knows all too well, whisked to London from Karachi into his strange uncle’s house. It was all after his biological dad died too.

He tries not to think about that, and succeeds for once. It’s easy to focus on something else when Mr. Redd is here.

Robert relaxes.

He watches Mr. Redd’s face and gets lost in his smile as those hands picks at the last bits of chopped cucumber on his plate.

“Not the biggest fan of salads. But this was good.”

Robert’s tail swishes to the side. He’s proud of himself for the first time in a long while. “I’m glad you like it.”

Fifth course. Main course. Finally, after all this time.

A5 wagyu biryani. Robert’s tail twitches as the waiter brings it out. Mr. Redd stares at him intently, not even acknowledging the food or the thick, spicy aroma punching the air between them that seems to melt in with the lights to create a sensation for the ages, something only they’re sharing, as if only they could share it.

Robert doesn’t know why his face is heating up as Mr. Redd looks at him. He was attractive enough, but this has to be anxiety fooling him. He knew better than anyone else the boundary between attraction and repulsion was determined only by how much you could hold your lunch.

The demons he’d slept with for business deals taught him that much.

Maybe I just want something normal, for once.

Mr. Redd? Normal? Are you high?

Robert does not eat his food.

“Something wrong?” Mr. Redd asks. His fingernails this far away look like they’re bleeding.

Robert shakes his head, imagining his father behind him, his tall shadow drowning him with the gravity of a sun.

“This is one of my favorite dishes to eat out here in Vegas.”

Mr. Redd cocks his head. “I thought your favorite dish was chicken biryani.”

Robert’s tail scrapes the floor. “H-How—How did you know that—”

Mr. Redd looks down at his plate. “I’m also surprised they even have a halal restaurant in Vegas, with the fact you can get drunk in places like Taco Bell. What’s the point?”

Silence.

Please don’t hate me, Robert thinks. He wonders how Mr. Redd even knows all this to begin with.

“…Well, I wanted this restaurant here,” he starts, “and in Vegas, people love to try new things. That’s what vacation is for. This place isn’t marketed as being halal—it’s marketed as being different, and that’s how it brings in customers.”

Different. You’re different, Ruprecht had told him once. You’re so different I sometimes don’t know what to do with you. Everything you seem to succeed in seems in spite of your accomplishments, not because of it.

“…Being different is also good. I like different. I mean, that’s why we exist, don’t we? So our companies can have some fun every once in a while?”

Mr. Redd nods. Robert finishes his course. He wants to go home and scream.

“Last course?” Mr. Redd asks.

“Last course,” Robert repeats. His head is swimming.

Dessert. Saffron and cardamom ice cream. It’s golden yellow, surrounded by sprigs of lavender and rose petals arranged in a perfect circle.

“No kheer?” Mr. Redd asks.

Robert looks up just as he’s putting his spoon in. “At this point, I’m not surprised anymore by what you know.”

Mr. Redd shrugs his shoulders. “Boston has some really cool Indian restaurants I’ve heard Piper talk about.”

“…Yeah, we had to please the Michelin people somehow since they don’t serve wine here. They’re rather fond of ice cream, more than you can imagine.”

Mr. Redd smiles. “Who doesn’t like ice cream?”

Robert shrugs. “Lactose intolerant people?”

“Well, they can just die then.”

“That’s not very whimsical of you.”

“Aw, boo-hoo.”

Robert tries to hide his amusement, and fails. Every time he thinks he’s sinking, Mr. Redd seems to say something which brings him back. It’s an odd thing, to have your facade broken over and over again, but there are worse things to break. There are worse people to be broken by.

He knows he’s broken, always has been. It’s dawning on him more now, as he looks into Mr. Redd’s nonchalant face, thinking about dinner. He seemed rather okay with his lot in life, undisturbed by it. Robert would pay all the money in the world for a constitution like that; he would kill a lot of people just to be able to look at his face in the mirror again.

In the end, he wishes he could smile, show it off to Mr. Redd.

He wonders if he’d like it.

---

After dinner is over, they hug their goodbyes. Robert melts into Mr. Redd’s embrace much more readily than he did before.

“Do you have to go?”

Mr. Redd nods, pulling away. “Yeah, I do. Isabel misses me.”

“You’ve only been away a day,” Robert says with a lightness in his voice. His tail slides from side to side on the sidewalk; it’s fine here, because they’re behind the building. There’s no threat to normalcy.

“Yes, I’m aware. I also need to—”

“He’s got to get back to work,” Piper says, pointing towards the very red limousine she’s sitting inside. “Don’t want the demons finding out we’re here again.”

“Why is she worried about that?” Robert whispers.

Mr. Redd leans into his ear. “Do you not remember? They tore her into stuffing during the casino fiasco.”

Robert shrugs. “Let’s ditch her. You hate babysitters, don’t you?”

Mr. Redd’s eyes go wide. “What are you suggesting?”

Robert points to his own car, trying not to get caught in Mr. Redd’s stare too deeply. It’s a bright red Maserati, glittering like the city’s skyline during a helicopter ride.

“Let’s go back to my place, and you spend the night.”

“Huh?!” Mr. Redd turns around to Piper and back to him. She waves at him more furiously, and he bites his lip.

“I—I really should be good, and get back to—”

Robert slips his tail around his ankle and squeezes. The ruby tip glimmers hotly, throbbing.

Don’t leave him with her, asshole. Show him a good time.

“I’ll take my mask off for you if you come.”

Silence. Mr. Redd cranes his head like an owl, a small, sharp smile creeping across his face. His white teeth look alien in the night, almost like they wanted to glow.

“…Done.”

Robert would grin if he could. Piper gets out the car and starts waving them down frantically as they rush to the Corvette. Mr. Redd slips in with no resistance, buckling his seatbelt before Robert kicks the engine on and floors it down Las Vegas’s streets.

“Holy shit, you got exhaust all over her!” Mr. Redd exclaims. Piper hisses something at the both of them, but Robert readily ignores her, proud of himself for doing that to someone yelling at him for the first time in a while.

She can suck it. His dad can suck it. Everyone can suck it, just this once; he needs a break. He wants to go home.

He wonders as he drives where that even is.

---

Robert’s suite is massive.

The Empathy Suite of the Palms Casino Resort is as white as sea foam crashing on the shore. Fine marble snakes up and down in every corner, black veins running through them like streaks of seaweed. The delicate azure light of the Vegas night sky coasts in without restraint, staining the walls a deep azure hue that matches the nearly frigid temperature the room’s AC is holding it at.

Mr. Redd marvels at the space with wide eyes. Since he’s come in, his every second has been spent touching something, eyeing something. Gasping at how tall the ceiling was, how nice the lights looked, how high up they were from the rest of Vegas. He and Robert both look like rubies in seawater amidst all this blue.

Robert thinks it all pedestrian. He’s been here about a dozen times, each less spectacular than the last.

“Cerulean is my favorite color, you know.”

“Is it?” Robert cocks his head as he watches Mr. Redd with a swishing tail. He’s been staring at him this entire time with a shaky heartbeat; he can’t believe he’s lighting up every room he goes into, can’t believe his smile is this infectious. In his mind, it’s like a college student admiring campus for the first time.

Robert hasn’t been like this with a friend in a while. It feels nice. Maybe he should get out more.

“Yes,” Mr. Redd replies. “It’s not something I can admit to just anyone though—I gotta keep up my brand.”

Robert laughs. He laughs in a way that relaxes his shoulders and back. He’s always been a sloucher, but only because standing up straight felt like too much of an ask. Now, it feels like nothing at all.

“Your dad make you that way?” he asks.

Mr. Redd turns his neck to him. “Why do you keep asking me about him?”

“You’re not all that curious about my own father. Most people would want to know.”

“I was taught not to ask questions about the parents who yelled at their kids in Wonderworld!™”

Robert says nothing to that. Mr. Redd walks down some spiral stairs to the kitchen. It has a massive, vinyl island in the middle stained with blue glass to look art-deco modern.

Robert follows. He thinks it somewhat gaudy, always in the need of a bright red centerpiece to complete it.

“Your dad’s an ass,” Mr. Redd says, eyeing the knives. “I don’t wanna know about what y’all have going on.”

Robert breathes a sigh of relief. “I just wish sometimes he’d…understand.”

“Understand what?”

Robert shrugs. “I don’t know. Me, I guess.”

“What is ‘you?’”

Robert pauses. His tail stiffens, and then bounds up, curling in an arch behind him. Its polished shaft glitters brilliantly in the low lights.

“Me?”

“Yeah, you,” Mr. Redd points. “I don’t know what’s inside of you.”

Robert backs up a step. “What gives you the impression there’s anything other than organs?”

Mr. Redd points to the tail. He then points to Robert’s star shaped earrings which jingle as he walks. He points to his gas mask.

“Your whole get-up. Just look at it. I don’t know what’s in there, but I’ll bet it’s—”

“It’s not anything special,” Robert interrupts him. He turns around with his arms crossed.

Mr. Redd grabs a knife from the kitchen and approaches him gingerly. Robert knows he did that because he can hear the clink of the blade against the countertops.

“Really? You’ve…You’ve seen it?”

Robert peeks back at him but turns away impishly. He hopes Mr. Redd won’t be offended. “What’s it to you?”

He hears footsteps getting closer. Without looking, he walks towards a bright white couch.

Mr. Redd follows.

“This place is nice. I liked dinner. But—Mr. Carter—”

Mr. Redd goes silent. Robert wonders if he’s juggling the knife in his hands. His skin being made of wax meant it was hard to see if he ever cut himself.

“You promised me you’d show me what’s behind the mask.”

Robert peeks behind him again. Mr. Redd is precisely a body’s length behind his back, holding the knife firmly in his pale gray hand. Nebulous intentions wear thick on his face, and his pupils are pinpricks. In the light, he glows, like some sort of fire wanting to swallow the world whole.

“I—”

“I promise I won’t hurt you,” Mr. Redd says. He grins like he’s carving a body. “But a promise is a promise.”

“…I-Is this not enough for you?” Robert asks, asking this time with open arms. “I—I can show you more rooms. I can show you the pool. We haven’t seen that yet. They’re beautiful; I like them a lot.”

“I’m not interested,” Mr. Redd replies. “I prefer the princess castle we have in Wonderworld!™”

Robert crosses his arms.

“…I’m sorry,” he says lightly. Dourly. He coughs, and is suddenly reminded of how cold the room is.

“What are you sorry for?” Mr. Redd asks. He takes a step closer.

“…I failed you.”

“Huh?”

Don’t say shit like that unprompted, you jackass. He doesn’t know what the hell you’re talking about.

Robert sighs.

Mr. Redd pipes up after a few seconds. “Why does that matter to someone like you?”

“…You’re my friend.”

Mr. Redd tosses his knife in the air and catches it. “I thought all Marshall, Carter, and Dark executives treated the rest of the world as beneath them.”

Robert puts his hands in his pockets. “I took you out to my favorite restaurant, and you still think I see you as something beneath me?”

“Something is the operative word,” Mr. Redd says, and he twirls the knife in his hand. “Not much else to it.”

Robert’s chest tightens. His hands begin to tense, pins and needles crawling up his arms. He casts his gaze down to the floor, stuttering out the halfway thoughts drowning in his brain.

You fucked up, he thinks. You fucked up big time, again. Why did you even try?

Of course the one person we want to impress thinks of us as dirt. Like a dead donkey in the sun. You stupid jerk.

Robert shudders. Mr. Redd stares at him.

“Robert?”

No response. Robert quickly darts to the stairs, and Mr. Redd reaches out for him.

“Hey, wait!”

“Leave me alone!”

“Huh— No! You still have a deal to uphold!”

“Is that all I’m good for?!” he yells, and Mr. Redd goes quiet. “Deals, one-sided promises, and people always assuming who I am?!”

Mr. Redd freezes. “…Robert, what are you talking about?”

Robert shakes his head, furiously gripping the railing with his knuckles. “You’re my friend. You’re my friend, Mr. Redd. Please, I need you to understand that.”

“Robert, I don’t understand what is going on. Is this about the casino? Shit happens, man, that was just a one-time fluke. I don’t hold it against you or anything.”

“Goddamnit!” Robert yells, and ooze begins to seep out of his face. It pools at the bottom of his mask, slowly dribbling onto the floor and inverting its colors with a black iridescence.

“I just want to care about someone! I don’t want to be the fuckup everyone hates!”

“Whuh—Wait, what?!” Mr. Redd puts a hand to his mouth. It still has the knife in it. “Why me?!”

Robert whirls around, more liquid flying from his mask. He thinks of his father, thinks of him standing at the base of the stairs. He thinks of him in his office again, giving him a shallow apology for all of the yelling he’s done. He thinks of what he’d say if he were here now, cigar in one hand, glass of whiskey in the other.

Why do you continually mess everything up, Robert? Cut your losses. Go home. Just leave, and pretend this never happened. He’ll play along, surely.

“Because you don’t yell at me!”

Robert’s voice cracks. Mr. Redd stands stone-still. The air is hot between them, like sandpaper, grinding, grinding, grinding.

Robert bleeds his heart out.

“You’re the only one who understands— Understands me, tolerates me, wants me around in some capacity. At least, I thought you were…”

Mr. Redd walks up the steps with a curious stance. “…What about the other two juniors? Your other business partners? The Marshall and Darke?”

Robert sobs. “They must think me a fool…”

He backs up into the hallway, getting the liquid from his mask everywhere. It’s staining the pristine wool carpets with ugly shades of rainbow, fat droplets falling like mucus on sandalwood.

Mr. Redd climbs the stairs. “I thought—”

“L-Look, I’m sorry,” Robert interrupts. “There’s nothing I can do right.”

He’s going to tell everyone how useless you are. He’s going to tell everyone you’re just some useless dipshit who can’t keep up with his calendar like a normal person.

“…I don’t believe you.”

Mr. Redd gets closer. Robert looks up, freezes, and then inches closer towards the bedroom. His cries are muffled, like he’s suffocating underwater.

The knife still shines very brightly.

“I—” Mr. Redd pauses. He looks down at the ground.

“…Nobody’s ever called me a friend before. So I’m not really sure what to say here. But you definitely haven’t failed me at that in any way.”

Liar.

Robert doesn’t say anything.

“I—I mean that. I wasn’t—I—I didn’t ask for the Doctor to give me life, and I’m the one who still doesn’t know much about all of this—”

He quiets. His wide eyes look like pearls shot through the heart, bleeding garnets from their wounds.

“…Robert, I’m sorry. They don’t particularly trust you guys back in Wonderworld!™ anymore.”

“And you believed their lies over me?”

“Lies? You forced us to pay out millions of dollars through what was essentially corporate blackmail.”

Told you that was a stupid move. Hogarth didn’t save your ass at all.

“Does that really matter to you? These people who see you as a freak of nature, an aberration, something to hide away from all of the real toys they make?”

Mr. Redd looks up, his eyes boring holes into Robert’s chest. Without a chance to react, he’s rushing him down and grabbing Robert by the collar against an alabaster-colored wall. His eyes glimmer with a deep, frenetic energy.

Robert doesn’t resist. Let him do whatever he wants with him at this point. You’re too beyond saving.

“…It was the bravest thing I’d ever seen someone do,” Mr. Redd whispers. “I have a copy of the letter in a safe in my office, for safekeeping.”

Robert gasps, his breath fogging up the lens of his gas mask. He sputters, tilting it off his face for a moment to let the remaining liquid pooling in his face fall.

It stains his suit, and he doesn’t care. Mr. Redd watches with a steeled curiosity.

“…Really?”

“I’m sorry for what I said to you before—” Mr. Redd says with just a little bit of shake in his voice. “You’re—I didn’t mean it.”

“Why say it at all then?”

“I don’t know. Maybe I was scared.” He leans his head in towards Robert slowly. Their foreheads are almost touching. Mr. Redd’s cheeks are flush with energy. “…Maybe I was just scared of this. I’ve never had a friend before.”

Stop falling for this, Robert! He’s trying to backstab you!

Robert’s voice lowers to a soft whisper. “Not even the other Little Misters?”

“Dad doesn’t let me play with them anymore. He’s reconstructed them too much because of me.”

Robert’s breathe hitches, thinking of being on an operating table with Mr. Redd above him. Scalpels, saws, scissors and needles glitter hotly in the daydream, so real as to entice him to slide his hands up Mr. Redd’s wrists.

“Ah?”

Robert pulls him in as close as they can be. Their bodies are hot against each other, sticky almost. The liquid on Robert’s suit stains Mr. Redd’s suit an inverted neon hue.

What does it say about you that the most meaningful friend you have is a freak of nature maniac? Robert doesn’t fight the thoughts in his head anymore.

“Robert?” Mr. Redd doesn’t resist.

Maybe that’s the best I deserve then. He understands me more than the other juniors… And I want that to be inside and out.

“…I love the way you look when you want something, Redd,” Robert says.

“What does that have to do with this very close hug you’re involving me in?”

Right, the Little Misters are like dolls down there—

“I just like it,” Robert says. “I didn’t invite you to dinner for nothing. I didn’t make my offer to remove my mask for nothing. If there’s anyone in this world who can understand me—would appreciate this—thing I hide, then, then—!”

Robert inhales sharply. He undoes his hands from Mr. Redd’s wrists delicately to climb them up to the back of his head. Mr. Redd puts a hand over his mouth as he hears clasps click, and the gas mask falls to the ground.

“…Oh my goodness,” Mr. Redd says, awestruck.

Robert’s face is a massive hole. Black, like a void, but glittering with waves of rainbow iridescence like gasoline on a water puddle. It shimmers slowly in the blue-white lights, independent of Robert’s movement, like it had an internal metronome it was keeping time by.

Robert shakes. Mr. Redd touches his cheek.

“…It’s beautiful.”

“R-Really?” Robert’s voice chokes out as a feathery whisper.

“How did that get there?”

Robert sheepishly looks to the floor. “My father… He maimed me like this…”

“What’s inside?” Mr. Redd asks, his hand going from Robert’s cheek to hovering around the hole.

“My organs,” Robert replies quietly. He stands up straight now, putting his hands on Mr. Redd’s shoulders.

Mr. Redd smiles, excitement slipping into his voice like a forbidden trickle of water. “What do they look like?”

“You think they look different than a regular human’s?”

“I’ve got that hunch, yeah.”

Robert takes Mr. Redd’s hand and squeezes it into his own. It's lukewarm and waxy, slightly squishing to the touch. But it’s still solid.

“…Here, let me show you.”

Robert leads Mr. Redd into the bedroom decorated with pictures of sea-life. A star-shaped clock overlooks the pair like a beguiling panopticon, its five arms steady and mirror-like.

“Do your organs come through your face?” Mr. Redd asks with a peppy excitement. His eyes are as wide as plates, scarlet pupils screaming for bloody entertainment.

“Yeah,” Robert replies sheepishly as he sits down on the bed. “You can take them out and—”

Squelch.

Robert yelps. Mr. Redd’s hand darted so fast he couldn’t see anything at all. Before he can register what’s happening, he’s being pinned down against the bedsheets like a bug against corkboard.

“Ah—!”

Mr. Redd grins as his hand rummages around an extradimensional space. Robert doesn’t know how to precisely describe the feeling, but if he was forced to do so, he’d say it felt like he was gagging on a pipe.

“G-Guh—”

“Oh my god, something’s touching me!” Mr. Redd exclaims. He pulls out quickly, his hand inverted into all sorts of colors and coated with a thin film of slime.

But that’s not what he looks concerned about.

Robert cranes his head over slowly as Mr. Redd holds a small red starfish in his hands. It holds onto him intensely, its thousands of tube feet trying to crawl out of his grip.

He squeezes it.

“Th-That’s my—I think that’s my esophagus—” Robert says.

“How are you still talking then?” Mr. Redd asks with a tilt of the head.

Robert shrugs, face hot. He likes how it looks in his hand, something unclean being defied through adoration for a brief moment.

“You ask that, but not why my organs look like echinoderms.”

Mr. Redd giggles. “Touché.”

Without a word the knife he’d been keeping in his other hand manifests. He slips its blade against the center of the starfish, dragging it cleanly through. Crimson spills out wantonly, heavily, all the way through white calcium like waterfalls.

Robert coughs, sitting up with shaking arms.

“Y-You have to be careful,” he says with a jittery inhale. His tail is twitching, the tip red-hot. “My—My doctors still don’t know how they work, but they know if you take too much out of me—”

“You’ll die?” Mr. Redd throws the cut halves to the floor and leans in. He’s touching Robert’s forehead again.

A bead of sweat drips down Robert’s face. He leans in.

“…I don’t know. It feels like sinking into nothing. Just put me under some stars and I’ll be okay in about five hours.”

Mr. Redd’s eyes are wide. Robert doesn’t feel like he’s listening.

But that’s okay. That’s okay! This is okay. This has to be okay.

Whatever’ll happen as a result of it, damn that all to hell. Tonight’s his turn to be selfish, his turn to be like everyone else in his life because he’s always been punished for his selfishness, he’s always looked at weird for taking vacations, he’s always talked down to for business deals that only benefit him like the other two juniors didn’t have plenty of ventures they didn’t want to share.

Why can’t he just let go for one night? Not care about how anything goes just this one last time?

Maybe that was a gamble, but this is Vegas.

If this all goes well, maybe the voice in his head will go away…

Robert whines as Mr. Redd puts his hand in him again. His fingers wrap meticulously around the starfish that was supposed to be his stomach, and Robert can’t deny that he made some kind of beautifully heinous noise as Mr. Redd pulled it out and examined it.

“How—How do you—”

No time to respond. Again he goes. This time it’s his liver, and instead of slicing it open, Mr. Redd squeezes it so hard that Robert hears a loud crack. He watches a gush of blood cascade down onto pristine white sheets, bubbling like sea foam and mixing in hideously with the slime coming out of him. It coagulates into soft, pus-colored lumps.

Mr. Redd giggles to himself as Robert feels his hand inside of his guts again. Rummaging around, Robert gets hot, feels his arms prickle with goosebumps. With weakening strength, he guides his own hands up to Mr. Redd’s arms, as if to gingerly guide him like he didn’t have the intentions of a bulldozer.

There is no acknowledgment of this. Mr. Redd pull out his kidneys and his eyes. Each one is examined for a glorious, curious period of time before they are either cut in half or squeezed to bursting. The splattered gore flies like confetti.

Roberts’s head starts to go light. His grip on Mr. Redd slips.

“R-Redd—”

“How many do you have? Is your skin in there too? It’s your largest organ, did you know that? If it’s not in there, are your nerves? Your blood vessels? What about your—your—”

He pulls out Robert’s large and small intestines, two golden brittle star starfish with incredibly long arms that Mr. Redd pulls off individually. Laughing maniacally as he does, he throws them at the clock with perfect aim, snickering as red splatters everywhere like paint.

“Score!”

Robert would tell him to keep going if his vision wasn’t doubling. Fuck, he was right—the voices in his head have stopped.

Mr. Redd doesn’t acknowledge him and keeps going. Tongue, eyes, brain, and stomach. Pancreas, spleen, lungs, teeth—was this tiny black starfish his appendix?

Robert shakes as the liquid in his face begins to drip out en masse. It was if some invisible force was holding it back was quickly abandoning him.

First it starts slow, but quickly it begins to flood and stain his suit.

“Haha, is that vomit? Vomit? Vomit Mr. Carter? Hahahaaaaaa!!!”

Robert sinks deeply into the disturbed pillows and struggles to breathe. His chest feels empty, his abdomen cavernous. He sputters inhales and exhales, coughing as every liquid in his body makes itself felt.

“R-Redd—”

His voice is raspy, and he feels like he’s on cloud nine.

“P-Please—”

Mr. Redd doesn’t hear him and plunges in one more time. Out comes a large, glowing starfish, red like a ruby and with many, many arms.

Robert coughs again. The light’s edges softly wash over his limp body and the messy bed.

“…Is this your heart?”

Mr. Redd holds it up as one would a precious treasure.

“It’s beautiful, Robert. Why did you hide this from me?”

Robert doesn’t respond. His vision is getting dark, dark, darker.

Mr. Redd smiles and holds it close to his chest, taking a deep exhale that punctuates the quiet with a gentle softness. A gossamer feeling, fluttering like wind over the sea.

“I love it,” he whispers. Robert would say something in return, but he has nothing to give anymore. He has no more strength, no more will.

The last thing he see is the starfish touching Mr. Redd’s lips, smearing red onto them. That is the vision that stays with him, hovering over him in watery divisions that crumple and collapse into nothingness with every passing second. Every passing attempted breath.

The world goes dark. Peace at last. There is nothing better than to die at the hands of someone you care about.

---

Tension.

Saltwater, seaweed, pounding surf.

The arid air of the Mojave Desert pounds against the balcony of the Empathy Suite as Robert Shahid Carter stirs, his head heavy and his body wet with various fluids.

What happened? Where is he? God, he feels like he got run over by a car. Where is—

Where is Mr. Redd?

He sits up, his face drinking in the cold night wind and the five stars hanging in the sky.

“We have to hide the body,” a woman’s voice says. Robert can only barely make it out, but he can see the silhouette it comes from perfectly slinking around some gray curtains.

“Hide him? Are you sure?”

Mr. Redd.

“We can—We can wipe the cameras and pretend you were never here. Keep this a secret between us and your father, forever.”

Wait, is that his—

Piper bursts out onto the balcony with the focus of a bull in the ring. Robert yelps, throwing a towel over his face, and hiding. He hears Mr. Redd follow her with a nervous pace, and without missing a beat, the both of them say—

“Where did he go?”

Robert steels himself for a moment, before popping his head back to say: “Go away.”

Piper stares at him like she just saw someone get run over. Mr. Redd jumps for joy, whooping and hollering, running around babbling incoherently.

“Did you hear me?” Robert says, pointing to what he thinks is Piper. He’s lucky the towels over his face are relatively delicate and made of silk instead of cotton. He can’t see much here.

“Excuse me?”

“Robert!” Mr. Redd finally exclaims. “You’re alive!”

Robert sighs. “Why wouldn’t I be?”

“He dismembered you completely,” Piper hisses.

“Shut up,” he tells her. “Get out of here. You’re only going to make everything worse.”

Robert’s breathing quickens as he thinks of Piper being able to see his face through the towel. Turning around, he motions at the two to leave, but neither do.

“…I’m not leaving you two alone again,” Piper says sternly. “I’ve already fucked up once, I’m not fucking up again.”

“You’re already fucking up plenty by standing there looking at me,” Robert snaps.

Mr. Redd interjects with an unsteady tone. “H-How about I go inside and get your mask, huh Robbie? Then we can all play nice—”

Robert would smile if he could, if Piper wasn’t here. He nods instead, and sits down on a chair with his back facing her. He can just barely make out the Las Vegas skyline through the towel over his head.

As Mr. Redd leaves, he hears Piper sit down too. He wonders if her bubblegum pink hair is blowing in the wind, if she looks as gaudy as she did back at the restaurant in those frilly jeans she was wearing. Did she go back and change into something more sensible? She still sounds the same, melodic and Transatlantic, though now he can’t deny there’s an audible twang of concern in her voice that stains the air with a fetid aura.

“…I can hear you judging me from here,” Robert says loudly.

“He told me he killed you,” Piper replies, the usual whimsy in her voice completely gone and replaced with calculating extrapolation. She sounds like the Grim Reaper ate all of her candy.

“And?” Robert would roll his eyes at her if he had them, specifically to spite her. There was nothing she could do about it if he did; hell, he doubts there’s anything real she can do now. Mr. Redd probably called her because he got scared, not because she could actually do anything.

Getting ripped to shreds by demons proved that in his eyes.

“And?” Robert wonders if she crossed her arms with that statement. “And? Mr. Carter, please understand—”

“Don’t you start to fucking lecture me,” he snaps at her, and quickly he snaps his face to the side to make sure she gets the memo. He can just barely make her out, but he can tell she tenses up, and stands up. “I’ve had enough of that for one lifetime.”

“I am not here to lecture you,” Piper replies, her voice lowering to that of a stage whisper. “But— The fact still remains— Killing an MC&D executive is seen as—”

“God, be quiet,” he replies, and he knows he’s interrupting her. He feels somewhat good about it. “You know what you are, in the end, Ms. Elison?”

Piper is quiet. Robert wants to see her facial expression so badly. He wants to see her squirm and writhe under the weight of his influence.

“You are nothing, you understand me? You are just some good-for-nothing nanny who doesn’t understand the bigger pictures she deals with. And we are grown men, understand? Grown men who do not need babysitters or whiny little PR asshats like you running around, trying to spoil our fun, trying to tell us what to do. I’ve had enough of that from my own father and job, do you get that?”

He doesn’t see her nod.

“Do you understand Ms. Elison?”

Still nothing. Robert shakes his head and sighs, wanting to purse his lips and throw this towel on his face at her. Where is Mr. Redd? He needs his gas mask now.

“…Mr. Carter, we would all be dead if you really died,” Piper says, her voice choking on itself to a small degree. Her professional veneer is cracking, but into what?

“I know. And I don’t care.”

“You don’t care about Mr. Redd?”

“I’ll put some sort of special order out for him if he ever gets into trouble again. He’ll be safe. There, are you satisfied with that?”

Mr. Redd finally returns, smiling wildly. He waves Robert down, whooping and throwing the mask to him as soon as he’s got his attention. Robert wastes no time putting it on and facing Piper at last.

She looks scared. Terrified. There’s a palpable fear dripping from her eyes, small tears that seem to be almost totally involuntary. She wipes them away and stands straight with a determined look, now that Robert can see what she means. Robert finds this display of facetious bravery almost humorous.

God, I can’t believe I found someone even more pathetic than me.

“…Mr. Redd, remember to keep your publicist on a leash where she belongs,” he says sternly.

“And remember to keep your selfishness in check,” Piper pipes back, her brows furrowing and her fake smile drooping into a frown.

“Ah, but that’s my birthright,” Robert says. “If I’ve learned anything over the past few months, it’s that everyone else, my dad, the Doctor, Percival, you—they all get to be selfish. They all get to think of themselves. But what about me? What about Mr. Redd? Where’s the selfishness for us? There’s plenty to go around, no?”

Piper’s eyes go wide. Mr. Redd giggles like a schoolgirl.

“Robert, are you drunk right now?”

“I can’t get drunk.”

“Ah, well, what are you even talking about then?”

“Nothing. I just needed to get that off my chest where a nosy bitch could hear.”

Mr. Redd laughs. Piper doesn’t do anything. She stands wide-eyed like a doll as Robert joins in, eventually coming over to hug him. They’re both still covered in blood and various other bodily fluids, but neither cares.

“You promise I’m not in trouble?”

Robert nods. “Yeah, just make sure this doesn’t get back to anyone at corporate. Not sure they’d let you outside again if they knew what happened tonight.”

“Did me—really putting you under the stars work?” Mr. Redd pulls out of the hug to look Robert in the face with soft eyes. He looks like a beautiful wax replica of some unnamed celebrity, someone Robert wants to have attached to his hip as he was strolling down the Vegas Strip.

“Yes,” Robert replies. “And no, I don’t know why.”

Mr. Redd laughs. Robert thinks it sounds beautiful, like some sort of high-pitched bell. Perfect.

“Well then, promise we’ll do this again someday?”

“Yeah, I promise. I gotta get a clean-up crew here soon though, I’m so paying for all the sheets and carpet we ruined.”

“Aw, why not let me pay?”

Both of them look to Piper as if expecting her to interject. She just stares at them, spaced out.

“Ah, nevermind. Ms. Elison probably forgot our company credit card,” Mr. Redd says.

“She’s such a downer, you know?” Robert says.

“She’s the best at what she does—”

“But what she does is borrrrrrrrrring~!” Robert says with an exaggerated cadence. “This is why we don’t have PR reps. Too much trouble, and the company is too small.”

“Right, won’t Percival just eat you if she finds you distasteful?”

Robert laughs. “More like she summons you the office like you’re in grade school again. Which I loved, by the way, I went to Eaton.”

“Fancy~!”

Mr. Redd and Robert laugh together again as the wind blows and the air smells of blood and cherries. They hug once more, Robert’s heart beating fast as he thinks of them alone together again. His tail flicks like he remembers it exists, and he wraps it around Mr. Redd’s ankle.

“Come back to me again?”

Mr. Redd chuckles. “Come to Boston next time, please?”

“Done. Now get going before your dad says something. Or the lawyers, god forbid.”

They part, and Mr. Redd says something to Piper that Robert doesn’t hear. She does the same to him, and Robert rolls his eyes. He really doesn’t want to care about her, as it’s clear to him what little use she has, and what kind of person she is. Just like all the Wondertainers, she had a stick up her ass regarding looks, appearances, people and no idea of who actually made things run, but maybe he could put a word in sometimes to give her the just desserts she needed. Maybe a word to her manager, her boss, assuming Wondertainment still cared about what Marshall, Carter, and Dark Ltd. thought of their company and employees, but who wouldn’t?

Who wouldn’t?

It’s the most selfish thought in the world, and Robert revels in it as Piper and Mr. Redd leave. His ruby-tipped tail flicks as he thinks of Piper having to explain to her superior the faux pas she had made tonight. It makes his stomach warm and lights him up in a way he’s not felt in months, nay, years.

Who knew selfishness amidst depression could be the cure to all ills?

That’s what Vegas was for. That’s what this glorious, sinful, demon-filled city was made for, despite its halal restaurant and all of the good believers (of every religion) coming here.

Who wouldn’t want to plunge into a life of beautiful selfishness?

Robert decides whatever makes him feel good is worth pursuing now. He doesn’t know why he never endeavored to that before, but maybe it was all the fog in his head. Maybe it was the fact he couldn’t wake up in the morning without feeling like he wanted to die.

Who knows! Who cares, even. It’s his life now, his world, his future. His everything, his money, and his time.

It’s how he spends all of that counts now.

Nothing more, nothing less.

Mr. Redd would like that, wouldn’t he?

He’d like something as selfish as love, no?