SWAN 7 - Error In the System -

Song Without A Name
Part 7 / 83 billion
Oozed from the pores of
Lady Yate-xel

He sat on the floor in the basement, box in front of him, empty, its contents scattered around.

“Can I still have the boots?”

“Please.” With a smile. “Take everything you want.”

He wanted it all. The boots were NICE. They fit, they were shiny, they were great. And once he settled on taking those, he thought he’d take just one more thing. And then one more after that, and just one more to make it even… Soon the box was empty and what had been his stack of things he wanted to keep was a now a mess on the floor.

So Johnny sat. Staring at the everything in the basement. He really didn’t want to go back upstairs, didn’t want to show that he did, in fact, take everything. Didn’t want to show that he really needed it. Didn’t want to look weak, and even though he kept trying to convince himself that it was Edgar who was weak, he still felt more so for accepting all the things around him.

The stairs creaked above him. Edgar coming to see what Johnny had selected.

“What did you decide on?”

Johnny looked up at him, stared at him from the middle of the mess.

“All of it, I guess,” Johnny said bitterly.

“Are you going to take it all back to the school with you?” Edgar asked, kneeling to fold the shirts that Johnny had thrown randomly across the room. “I don’t think they’ll fit in your bag…”

“Trying to convince me not to take it now?”

“No, not at all. I was thinking, if you didn’t have space for it at home, then you could leave it here, you know, in the room upstairs. If you’re going to be here every weekend, there’s no need to bring that giant bag with you every time. You’d have everything here.”

Once again, this sounded intelligent, logical and perfectly reasonable. And again, Johnny wanted to fight it in some way, but there was no fight left in him for this topic.

“Okay.”

Edgar smiled. It was a real smile this time, not one of those dead tired smiles he’d had when he first woke up. Not a pained smile. Just an honest smile. He’d already finished folding most of the shirts before he spoke again.

“Want to help me carry all this upstairs?” Edgar was trying extremely hard to avoid a repeat of the screaming from earlier; Johnny could hear it in his tone. This may have been cowardice, this may have been intelligence, this may have been him making Johnny ‘happy.’

Johnny nodded silently in agreement, unfolded his legs from the tangled sitting position he’d assumed while sitting in the basement alone for half an hour, and picked up the CDs and his new boots, wrapping them in the blanket. He stood, waiting for Edgar to finish folding.

Edgar picked the stack of clothing up, and headed towards the stairs. He made it up with little difficulty, and stood at the top waiting for Johnny to do the same. Johnny, who was carrying some less cumbersome baggage, made it up significantly less clumsily. They brought the items to Johnny’s adopted room in the same way; Edgar first, then waiting for Johnny. Johnny remained silent throughout.

Something was still wrong. Johnny had been given gifts from people who announced in a book that they intended to investigate his ring of keys. Something wasn’t adding up. They seemed to think he was suspicious from the start, since, according to Edgar, they had wanted to let something else entirely happen to him, rather than let him live the life he currently was.

Edgar finished setting the clothes in semi-organized piles. Johnny dropped the CDs and boots somewhere close by, and stared at the wall for some time. Something still… wasn’t right.

“Nny, are you alright? Is something bothering you?”

Johnny turned, left the room, slipping slightly with the combination of his socks and the hardwood floors, and threw the door to the other room open. He tore the book off the shelf angrily, and half-slipped back into his room seconds later. Johnny threw the book at Edgar, and it landed somewhere near his feet with a small dust cloud.

“That is bothering me.”

Edgar reached down to pick it up, an expression of confusion and curiosity on his face. He opened the front and jumped a little. The more he read the more horrified his expression became.

“I… I didn’t know that this was… I mean, I never looked at the books on the shelf, I just filed them there to fill the space,” Edgar said, still in disbelief. He looked at every page with even more horror.

Johnny held out his hand. He would show Edgar the best part. Edgar slowly handed the book over to him, his eyes still glued to the pages as Johnny flipped through them. Johnny scanned a page until he found his own name, jammed his finger on the page and the spot and shoved the book in Edgar’s face.

“This,” Johnny said sharply.

Edgar’s eyes widened again, as his hands slowly grasped the book once more. Johnny took his hand away when he was sure Edgar knew what he was pointing at.

“What the fuck is it with the keys?” Edgar asked the book.

“They seem to think I’m something that needs looking in to, Edgar. Why? Why don’t they trust me in this book, but give me gifts in your basement?” Johnny was going to get answers, dammit. Edgar was going to fill these holes, and he was going to do it now.

“Nny, I don’t know… I mean, well, I have an idea, but the keys… They’re just keys, right? I mean, you got them from a psycho next door to you, right?”

Johnny would answer that, but Edgar wasn’t getting away from the original question. “As far as I know, they’re keys. He was weird looking, and a little creepy, but they’re just keys. They all look normal, that’s it. Keys. But what about me is making them suspicious?”

Edgar sighed, and took on that look of being pained again. “I can’t tell you.”

“Bullshit. Try again.”

“No, really, I can’t. I promised you I wouldn’t.”

“No, I’m fairly sure you haven’t said anything to me about it,” Johnny said. When Edgar started to protest, Johnny held a finger up to silence him. “And don’t tell me you told ‘past me,’ because we’ve been over this already.”

Edgar closed the book, and held it under one arm.

“Look,” he said, rubbing his forehead, “I don’t want to argue about who you are or aren’t anymore. I really don’t. I just…,” he looked up. “I just can’t tell you. The memories you have missing are all the things that would prevent your happiness in this life. You… or what was you…whichever… asked to forget it all. That’s why the holes are there in the first place. I can’t do it. I can’t tell you.”

Johnny thought about this, bit his lip a little. If previous him had gotten rid of those memories, and what Edgar said about memories making a person, would he … become the person Edgar said he had been if he regained said memories? Would the person he’d been demanding that Edgar see that he was …disappear? With the holes, he had become his own person (at least, if he was willing to accept Edgar’s theory) and if he filled them… he could lose himself.

Johnny smiled. He almost laughed at himself. He was stupid, Edgar’s story was stupid, this entire scenario was stupid. The smile grew the more he thought about everything. Somehow, whether it had been him asking to forget or not, he’d managed to tie himself up in a horrible time-line based doom plot, and ensure that his own life was fucked up forever with a few words. He crossed his arms, and looked at the floor.

And he laughed. Restrained just so his shoulders shook a bit at first, but it soon spiraled into laughter that hurt him somewhere by his hip.

Laughing and laughing.

He looked up several fits of laughter later, to see Edgar’s face in an expression of complete bewilderment.

Johnny wiped a tear from the corner of his eye, still shaking off the remnants of laughter. “Promised me, huh?” He clapped a hand on Edgar’s shoulder, “Alright then! Can’t argue with that!”

Edgar stammered something that might have become a question, but Johnny stepped behind him and not-so-gently started shoving him towards the door before he managed any full words.

“It’s been great, I’m going to try on some of these clothes, pack my stuff and get the hell out, okay?” Johnny said cheerily, pushing Edgar along the floor and into the hall way.

As soon as Edgar was out far enough, he slammed the door.

He closed his eyes, and let himself sink against the door, sliding to the floor. One hand still on the doorknob, the other grasping at the door. He clawed at the wood for something, he wasn’t sure what. It had been almost funny a moment ago, but now, he clenched his fist and felt intense hatred towards no one in particular. He really wanted it to be Edgar, but either Edgar wasn’t to blame, or else he was making up a great story that claimed he wasn’t.

Edgar asked if he was ok from the other side. Johnny ignored him.

Fist tighter, fingernails digging into flesh.

Dammit if something was wrong, dammit if he was never going to figure out who he was without ever being himself again, dammit if Edgar did or didn’t have a Jimmy drive. Dammit all, it was his fault somehow. Was it really going to be better this way? Maybe if he just found out something… small? Something that wouldn’t alter him terribly? Something that he could use as a test, to see if it really changed him. Everything seemed to have been orchestrated so he’d walk around full of holes for the rest of his life.

He determined his old self to be an asshole.

Where was the smallest hole? The smallest break in what little continuity he remembered… Clenching and unclenching his fist, he thought, searched, for something, anything, that could be tiny enough to give him the smallest feeling of what was missing. If he could find something not so bad in his prior self’s eyes, then maybe…

Nothing.

Nothing connected, it never had. There was no smallest piece. He had bits, he had pieces, he had worn and weathered patches of a mental blanket long since torn to ribbons.

Clenched and unclenched. Clenched again.

Clawed at the door again, for just a moment, before his fist slammed into it.

“FUCK!”

Slumped to the floor again. This time stretched onto the floor and tried to scream into the floorboards. Tried to use just barely painted nails to claw at something that wasn’t there. Tried to escape something he’d put himself into.

He continued trying to fix something by saying ‘fuck’ through his teeth, trying to tear his way out of it, but nothing mended itself, no solution made itself apparent, nothing sewed itself back together, and he let himself just collapse.

In a heap. A big pathetic heap. A pile of a life he’d managed to ruin before he’d started.

He was tired, so tired. Maybe, after waking, things will have fixed themselves…

Yes.

Maybe.

****

Edgar stood in the hallway, unsure of what had just happened. One moment, he was sure he was connecting with Johnny in joint confusion over this reincarnation issue, and the next Johnny was inside the room screaming and Edgar was outside the room horribly lost.

After what Edgar presumed to be some sort of spasm or psychotic fit left over from last life, Johnny had fallen completely silent. Had he blown a brain cell? Was he alright?

Edgar twisted the doorknob, and noted that Johnny apparently no longer had a death grip on it. He pushed on the door gently at first, but it didn’t seem to go anywhere. He braced his shoulder against it, and pushed harder, it didn’t open easily, nor all the way, but it was enough that Edgar could squeeze through.

It had been Johnny at the base of the door keeping it from opening. He looked as though he had passed out. From screaming and lack of air, perhaps? Edgar couldn’t be entirely sure what had caused the collapse, but thought perhaps something too emotional had just shut him down. Knowing Johnny, that was entirely possible. Although, the ‘screaming that lead to no air’ solution was pretty likely, too.

Edgar knelt down beside Johnny (who had twisted himself, face down, into a position that would have him hurting for days should he be allowed to remain in it) and shook him a little. This really was not the way Edgar had hoped to introduce Johnny to ‘happy’. Already, they seemed to be going backwards, and they hadn’t started.

Johnny wasn’t really responding, so Edgar shook him a little harder, and tried talking to him. “Nny? Nny, come on, wake up. Are you alright?”

Johnny mumbled something, and rolled over to face the ceiling. He opened his eyes slowly, and assumed an expression of misery. Edgar couldn’t tell if he had ever really been asleep. Either Johnny didn’t notice Edgar, or else he was choosing to ignore him.

“Nny?” Edgar tried again, “Are you okay?”

Johnny didn’t move from the floor and made no attempts to even glance in Edgar’s direction.

“I’m stuck this way,” Johnny said, closing his eyes again.

Edgar’s first thought was that Johnny had somehow paralyzed himself and that he would now be invisible and an invalid. Thankfully, Johnny moved seconds after he spoke. Bringing his palms to his eyes, Johnny sighed heavily.

“I can’t ever remember any of what I have missing. You said memories make the person. If I get what he wanted to forget, I’m him, and he’s me. I disappear. He’ll wake up in my body, and everything I am will be extra memories for him. And you’ll go off and be best friends and ride into the fucking sunset with your complete brains, and I’ll just… stop.”

Edgar bit his lip, tried to think of some other way to look at things, but Johnny’s perspective made a considerable amount of sense. Still, he’d try and make something up. “That’s not true…,” he started.

“I’m stuck, Edgar. All I’ve been looking for is how to get all these holes repaired, and now I find out that once they’re filled, I’m not going to be the same person who wanted them gone.” Johnny half-laughed. “I’ll be someone with all his memories who wants them erased, instead of someone missing them and wanting them back. I doomed myself to be fucked up before I started living all this.”

He sat up and looked at Edgar. “Who do you want me to kill, Edgar?”

How was he crazy already? Just like that? No warning, no nothing? No point at which Edgar could reverse the process? Homicidal again, just like that? He stammered some things in panicked disbelief, and felt something in his chest tighten.

“Nny, I... don’t understand. I mean, where did this…?” Communication skills? Gone.

“I can die, or he can," Johnny explained. "It seems that no matter what we do, we both lose, so let’s agree on how to, alright? Either I get memories back, like I wanted, but kill myself in the process, and you get your old me back, OR, I don’t get memories, like you want, but I stay myself, and you lose the guy you chased here.”

A sigh of relief escaped from Edgar as Nny spoke. While this logic was a little scary, and his willingness to just disappear depending on what Edgar chose was a quite frightening, Johnny wasn’t homicidal yet.

“Look,” Edgar said, considerably calmer, “I don’t want you to go anywhere, and contrary to what you’re saying, I don’t really want the old you back. I’d like you to remember being him to an extent, but you’re much better off like this. Trust me.”

Johnny looked skeptical.

“I don’t understand, then,” he said, turning to lean against the door, “why you chased him here. You got me instead. You should have just died and let it go. Now we’re both fucked up.”

“I’ve already told you this. I wanted to guarantee him, or some form of him, happiness. That’s all. That’s… you. I wasn’t going to allow them to just toss you to the side.” Edgar felt almost hurt that Johnny didn’t seem to fully appreciate what Edgar had done for him. Hurt, and a bit frustrated. Frustration, though, at this point, was no stranger to him.

Johnny traced a pattern on the wood floor near his thigh. “I would rather not have done this at all, then,” he said, watching his finger trace. “I wish you’d have just let them do what they wanted. I’m going to be half a person for the rest of forever if you have anything to say about it.”

Edgar glared at him. “Is that what you think?” Edgar demanded. “You think I’m here to stalk you through countless lifetimes in order to get the person I want out of it? You think I’m trying to keep you a ‘half-person’?”

Edgar grabbed Johnny’s tracing hand and squeezed it. For a moment, he wanted to make Johnny bleed. Wanted to dig nails into him. Make him see that he wasn’t half. Whole people bleed.

“Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare say you’re half a person. You’re living whatever you want to be living; you live a complete life as far as I see it. You’ve got nothing holding you back, and everything you have is your own. I’m living the half life if either of us is. None of what I have actually belongs to me, and I live here in this house answering to some cosmic nobodies everyday. You are every bit your own person, you’ve been telling me that. Do not dare tell me that someone I’m so fond of wants to think he’s half a person when I think so highly of him as he is.” Edgar flinched slightly at his own use of the word ‘fond.’ Johnny seemed to be jumpy enough about Edgar becoming like Jimmy; ‘fond’ was not going to help.

Johnny flexed a few fingers. “You know,” he said flatly, watching his fingers twitch in Edgar’s grasp, “you don’t have to crush my hands every time you want to make a point. I am, however… let’s say, ‘interested’ that you’re so fond of me. What, in your mind, is ‘fond’?”

Edgar blinked. Somehow, Johnny had managed to completely brush off the half person issue. One minute, it was certainly important to him, the next, he didn’t care so much about his memories as his hand and Edgar’s choice of words.

“My best friend, Nny. That’s it. I was fond of you before, when you were less than approachable, and I’m fond of you now. Maybe more so now. I enjoyed myself with you here yesterday, and you seemed to be pleased, too. I would say you’re fond of me, too.”

“And that’s it?” Johnny leaned in towards Edgar’s face, narrowing his eyes, staring over the rims of Edgar’s glasses into his eyes. Edgar inched slowly away as Johnny scrutinized him further.

“Yes,” Edgar managed with some degree of confidence. “That’s it.”

Still had a hold on Johnny’s hand.

Johnny backed away, but still appeared suspicious. He tugged at Edgar’s grasp, and Edgar released the grip. Edgar’s hand burned again, just like when Johnny had shook his hand at the school. He stared at it for a moment, intrigued.

“Why are you ‘fond’ of me?” Johnny asked.

Edgar looked up from his palm at Johnny, who was staring intently at Edgar, knees drawn up to his chin. Johnny asked again when Edgar didn’t give an immediate answer.

“Why?”

“You’re my best friend, Nny. What more do you want?”

“You’ve known me for two days.”

Edgar sighed. “‘Best’ is a relative term, Nny. You are, currently, the only friend I have, and even if you should turn out to be a horrible person, you’re still the best friend I’ve got. The best of something could be terrible in someone else’s opinion, but if it’s all you’ve got… If it’s the least awful of all…Not to say that you’re awful, but…”

Johnny smiled. Edgar couldn’t really see the smile on his lips so much as in his eyes. They took on a certain glint when something really pleased him.

“That’s the best thing I’ve ever heard you say,” Johnny said, his grin almost audible.

Edgar’s turn to smile. “Thank you.”

“Doesn’t mean everything you say doesn’t suck, that’s just the least sucky. ‘Best’ is relative, after all.” More of that smile.

Edgar laughed softly. “Touché.” He paused for a moment, and took an opportunity to just watch Johnny grin at him.

“That’s why I’m so fond of you. You think differently than most people. You’re brilliant.” He shrugged, and half laughed again. “At least, I think so.”

“Isn’t brilliant relative too?”

“Oh, probably.”

They sat in silence for a long time. Edgar poked at the book now and then, but didn’t want to bring it up again. It had managed to bring up more questions and more screaming than it was worth. Edgar would concern himself with all of this when Johnny was happier. Yes. Happy. Make Johnny happy.

After several minutes, Johnny finally broke the silence.

“What now?” He was asking Edgar, but watching Edgar’s fingers play with the pages of the book.

“I’m not sure I know what you mean.”

“What do I do now? Now that I feel like I’ve got a pack of winged and haloed lunatics after me because I’ve got a ring of keys, I can’t feel quite at ease, you know? And the more I stay here, the more they’ll try to cater to me or-”

“That’s indirect. I’ve told you that already. They sent those things for me, in hopes of making you happy.”

Johnny got a disgusted expression on his face.

“They…they’re supposed to be ‘Heaven’ and they give you stuff to make me happy? Things. Possessions. Wouldn’t they be…I don’t know, giving me enlightenment or something instead?”

Edgar shrugged. “Instant Conviction in a Box, just add water?”

“Are you still like that, Edgar?”

“Still like what?” Edgar looked at Johnny curiously.

“Do you still have faith?”

Edgar leaned towards Johnny a little, unsure of what he was hearing. “What faith?” he asked.

“You know… your faith in ‘God and all that.’ You told me that once, right? That you were into that kind of stuff?” Johnny was playing with a frayed bit of fabric on his pant leg, concentrating on how much of the thread he could pull before the pants fell apart, and didn’t seem to notice the wonder that Edgar was sure was coming through in his face.

“Nny…”

“I wondered if you still thought it was so great after being up there, or after living through this stuff. After seeing they’re a giant pack of suspicious fucks, I mean.”

“Nny.”

“I really don’t care for all of that myself. I guess since you’ve been up there, that pretty much proves that it’s there, but… my life is my own. I’m not devoting it to worshipping like some submissive puppy; I’m going to do something amazing. I have a hard time sitting back and being content with all that wholesome kind of shit. Do you understand?”

“Nny…,” Edgar repeated again, his hand shaking, “I… I didn’t tell you I had any faith.”

“Really? Huh… I swear you’ve told me that before. On the phone maybe? I mean, I told you that I envied it, because really, it’s kind of nice to just toss fate or a god into the equation when you’re really desperate… I know I told you that.”

Edgar watched Johnny play with the loose string on his pant leg. Part of his brain hadn’t processed this quite yet. He swallowed once. “I told you I had faith, and you said you envied me, yes. But not in this lifetime.”

Johnny’s eyes went wide as his gaze moved from his pants to Edgar’s face. They sat that way for some time, afraid to disrupt whatever it was that had made Johnny remember. Again, it was Johnny who spoke first.

“What now?”

“I don’t know.”

Edgar was scared. He wasn’t sure why, exactly, after all, Johnny had remembered him, and he had wanted that. Something was still frightening here. Something…

“Edgar… I don’t want to disappear.” Johnny’s eyes were still wide; Edgar wasn’t alone in his fear. However, he suspected the fear was for different reasons.

“You won’t,” Edgar said.

“How do you know? That memory came from no where! They could come flooding back on me, and drown me in my own thoughts! I could suffocate in this other person!” Johnny shook a little, and Edgar worried he’d collapse on the floor again.

“You won’t,” Edgar said, taking hold oh Johnny’s shoulders, “because you won’t be happy if you disappear, and I’m here to make you happy. I’m not going to let you disappear.”

****

“They have one of these people too, don’t they?”

“Yeah, I’m not worried about it. Mine and theirs would never get along anyway.”

****

It was then that Edgar noticed the stereo had never been turned off. In the silence that followed his promise to make Johnny happy, the song had drifted its way up the stairs. Johnny remained against the door, eyes still wide, Edgar’s hands still on his shoulders, but also seemed aware of the music.

"Barely had we landed on this planet Earth
Came to the conclusion survival was the word
Back in the beginning to lift the mental fog
Each and every person created their own god

Planning our protection huts were built for sleep
Making new discoveries of earthly energies
Huts turned into houses and wood became concrete
Natural progression but where would this all lead?

Far beyond the farthest corners
Of our stratosphere
While the planets go on spinning
We are banished here"

Not surprising to Edgar, Johnny knew all the words. Another song that sounded a little old, he noticed. There must not have been a lot of very current stuff buried deep in that choir office.

Edgar leaned back, and let go of Johnny’s shoulders. Johnny pulled his legs tightly against his chest, and pressed his forehead to his knees. He mumbled something that actually sounded like ‘I’m frightened.’ Edgar wanted to help, really, but felt he had done enough to make Johnny fearful of his intentions, so just sat. Johnny didn’t cry; there were no shaking shoulders or heaving gasps, he just kept himself in that balled up state while Edgar watched him.

"Now we are synthetic, genetic point the way
We'll be building humans from plastic parts one day
Somewhere a computer records us from afar
Looking for the error in the system on this star

Far beyond the farthest corners
Of our stratosphere
While the planets go on spinning
We are banished here"

Johnny looked up a few verses into the song. He looked at Edgar, blank expression on his face.

“Have you ever played any video games, Edgar?”

“Here and there. I used to play when I was little, you know, back when the house decorated itself.”

“What kind did you play?”

“I had a few of those big adventure ones. You know, where you’re the main guy, and you run around and collect people to get into a million random encounters with, all to go kill one big guy at the end? Those kind.”

“Oh, perfect.”

“Perfect?”

“You know the NPC’s? The non-playing characters? The little guys who are there just to support your character? The ones who have to repeat the same thing over and over? The ones … no one ever really looks at?”

“Yes…?”

"Out of our creation, we have lost control
Banished on a planet where dreams are bought and sold
Somewhere a computer observing how we are
Searching for the error in the system on this star

Far beyond the farthest corners
Of our stratosphere
While the planets go on spinning
We are banished here"

“I think I’m your NPC.”

07