Lucid stared at him, taking in the moment before all hell inevitably broke loose. Pilt's yellow hair floated gently in the wind, while a dim shade of purple coated the endless sky around them. The light was slowly fading, and everything beyond the train seemed to darken with each passing second.
It was then that Lucid realized something rather important. If this train blew up, everyone on board would die.
"Relax!" Pilt laughed, apparently finding Lucid's concern far more amusing than he should have. "You will probably be fine. Do you think I haven't noticed? You heal, you deflect attacks, and you fight like you have absolutely nothing on the line. What are you, an Enlightened?"
Pilt studied him more carefully, narrowing his eyes as the wind pushed strands of yellow hair across his face.
"If so, you must be one of considerable stage..." he finished.
The unfortunate reality was that the explosion itself probably would not harm Lucid that much. In fact, Lucid could have been thrown from the train entirely, fallen through the empty abyss below, and eventually landed on some distant shoreline as a miserable pile of biological matter. Given enough time, his body would probably pull itself back together.
It was not exactly an appealing experiment.
"Well, let us simply say that you would end up with several broken bones," Alice whispered inside his head. Her voice remained remarkably composed considering the mental image she had just helped create. "That trait of yours, Pierced Spine, has been performing wonders lately. Your continued survival is becoming almost respectable."
Lucid silently thanked her for the information, although he could have lived without the commentary.
Still, his own survival was not the dangerous part of the situation.
Everyone else's was.
It was Ayame and Arthur. If they fell from this height, Lucid did not need much imagination to understand that the landing would not be pleasant for either of them.
Lucid took a step forward, his foot pressing firmly against the metal roof.
Pilt immediately stood and turned to face him.
"Whoa, whoa, whoa."
He raised both hands in front of himself as though he could physically feel the killing intent coming from Lucid. His coat shifted with the movement, and for a brief moment, something underneath the fabric caught Lucid's attention.
There was something strapped to the inside of Pilt's coat.
Several small objects were secured beneath the inner lining, each one blinking with a faint light at regular intervals.
Lucid stopped.
Pilt lowered one hand and pulled his coat farther open, making sure Lucid could see them properly.
"That's what it is. Either you accept the debt," Pilt said, tapping one of the blinking objects with his finger, "or your friends pay the price for you. I'm sure it is something they would have gladly paid for."
Lucid took another step toward him.
The metal beneath his foot gave a quiet groan.
"Careful," Lucid warned. "Think about this. You will also die."
"Indeed!"
Pilt's answer came with such immediate enthusiasm that Lucid almost wondered whether the man had been waiting for someone to point that out.
Pilt spread his arms and allowed his coat to fall open around him.
"I have nothing left of my corporation anyway besides a measly share."
He glanced down at the blinking devices strapped beneath his coat before looking back at Lucid.
"And that little share is enough to pay for this wretched train and your one-brain-celled companions ten times over."
Lucid's expression stiffened.
'Christ, how much wealth does he possess?'
'Enough,' Alice replied.
"can we negotiate.."
"oh negating was inside taht domain lucid;.. we are passd that now"
the train starte to loutn up shiifnt h its asenet twords the sky above. The wind hurled passed them even greater now with such seppeed.
Lucid" arthur spoke up fromisndie.
"he put his hands to hseile hsi eyes but the fog still lcung to hsi face.
"Think about this... you will blow up as well there will be nothing left."
Pilt stared at him, and for the first time, Lucid noticed just how tired he looked.
It was not the kind of exhaustion that came from missing a few nights of sleep. There was something deeper behind his eyes, an aching weariness that Lucid recognized all too well. He had worn that same expression during those loops, when he had tried again and again to save a governor from a wicked man, only to watch everything fall apart regardless of what he changed.
Lucid knew what that exhaustion eventually became.
It was inevitable hopelessness. It was the kind of despair that came when someone had tried so many times that even trying again started to feel ridiculous.
"Then there will be no debt anymore," Pilt said. His tired eyes remained fixed on Lucid. "Isn't that what you like? Justice? Because it seems to me that was exactly what the Monolith and that girl needed. Justice."
Justice was not exactly a word Lucid liked wearing around his neck.
After suffering through more injustices than he cared to count, he had stopped believing the term carried much weight by itself. Anyone could call something justice. Usually, the person saying it happened to be the one holding the weapon.
"And by killing me, that fixes everything?"
"The debt will be off the table," Pilt answered ominously, though the faintest hint of a smile appeared on his exhausted face.
Lucid stared at him.
"Wait! Wait!"
He immediately threw both arms forward, as if his hands could physically stop whatever murderous calculation was currently taking place inside Pilt's head.
"Think about the inhabitants."
Lucid's thoughts scrambled frantically for something, anything, that could make the man reconsider. His mind returned to the slums and the enormous wealth gap that had plagued the city. Someone had once tried to take from the rich and give to the poor. The Generous Scoundrel, they had called that person.
Generous Scoundrel.
Lucid slowly lowered his hands.
His hazy thoughts suddenly aligned as he looked at Pilt, and realization struck him with enough force to make his eyes widen.
Wait a second.
"I fixed your crap!"
"After whatever scheme you pulled, I was the one who went in there. Not only did I get rid of the cultists, but I weakened the domain from the inside and made the nobles less hostile."
Lucid's voice grew louder as he spoke. His hands tightened at his sides while the wind pushed against his back, carrying the distant rumble of the train beneath his feet.
"I negotiated deals with the magistrate herself. I had to figure out what was happening in there while trying to keep everyone alive."
He took a step toward Pilt.
"And what did you do? You came in thinking that if you spent a couple of Cold Marks, everything would somehow fix itself. Well, it didn't. The reality is that you took an already twisted situation and made it worse."
Lucid raised his head and met Pilt's eyes directly.
"More fucked up than it already was!"
Alice remained silent.
Lucid noticed it immediately. Usually, she would have found something to say by now. A correction, an unnecessary observation, or some irritating comment about his choice of words. This time, there was nothing.
Pilt simply stared at him.
Lucid stood his ground, breathing heavily as the anger slowly drained from his face. The silence between them stretched until Pilt finally sighed.
"You really don't know anything, do you?"
Lucid's jaw tightened.
Pilt's expression did not change.
"I can't blame you for that. However, the situation still stands."
He looked directly at Lucid.
"Accept the debt, or say goodbye to everything."
His eyes narrowed.
Lucid did not answer.
His mind went through everything in that moment. He had already been a slave once. After escaping that, he had somehow ended up bound to another person inhabiting his own body, sharing his thoughts, his senses, and sometimes even his control.
He could not become a slave again.
Not after all this time.
Not after everything he had endured just to reach the point where he could finally believe that some part of his life belonged to him.
For once, he had thought he possessed some form of agency.
"Would any of this have even happened if you had just minded your own business?"
Pilt froze.
Lucid looked him dead in the eye. There was no anger behind the question this time. He had already shouted enough. Now he simply wanted an answer.
Pilt sighed.
"Whatever debt there is, I will pay it. I feel bad for you, my friend, but the issue still stands."
"So does mine," Lucid replied.
He stepped closer, refusing to look away.
"You caused all of this. I am here because of orders from the princess, nothing else. There was no divine intervention that placed me here so I could meddle in your affairs. No god sent me after you, and no grand force of fate pushed me onto this train."
Lucid placed a hand against his chest.
"I am here because of my own choices. I came here of my own volition, and my purpose is my friends."
His voice remained steady.
"So I am asking you again. Why should I be indebted to you?"
Pilt stared at him.
His hand slowly fell to his side.
"I can't predict a single thing..."
His composure finally cracked. Pilt clutched his forehead and gripped his hair with enough force to pull several strands from his scalp.
Lucid's eyes widened slightly.
He turned away.
'Do not let him continue. He is going to blow up the carriage,' Alice warned, her voice suddenly urgent.
"No... he won't," Lucid whispered.
'And what magnificent reasoning brought you to that conclusion?'
"He is too much of a corporate scumbag to do that."
Alice went quiet for a moment.
Lucid glanced around at the carriage beneath them.
"He knows the value of capital, after all. You can't exploit your workers to their fullest if you blow up the workplace."
'That is an appalling argument.'
"But it worked."
Lucid turned his head toward Pilt again. The humor left his expression almost as quickly as it had appeared.
"This is just another way for you to hunt for that relic, isn't it?"
Pilt stopped pulling at his hair.
Lucid watched him carefully.
"The relic that can revive people from the dead."
The wind rushed between them.
"I know, Pilt."
Pilt's hand slowly loosened from his hair.
"I know everything."
For the first time since climbing through the hatch, Pilt's cold expression completely disappeared.
"How...?"
"I have my ways."
Lucid turned fully toward him. He glanced at what Pilt was holding before extending an open hand.
"Now, if you put that away, why don't we work something out?"
Pilt stared at the offered hand.
Lucid gave him a small smile.
"I have a deal so good you would practically have an orgasm."
Pilt slowly shook his head.
Then he laughed.
It was not a sincere laugh. There was no amusement behind it, nor even the slightest trace of joy. It sounded like his mind had encountered something so ridiculous that laughter was the only response it had managed to produce.
Disbelief.
That was all Lucid could see on his face.
Pure, unrestrained disbelief.