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The curtain has closed on another adventure at The Amazing Digital Circus. It was an eventful one, not only adding to the roster, but subtracting from it too. Pomni has the same number of syllables as Kaufmo, meaning they don’t have to do a complete theme song overhaul, so that part worked out great. In Jax’s opinion, anyway.
Everyone has retreated to their rooms, officially concluding the day. Jax is sitting on his bed, his ear pressed against the wall, the one that separates his room from a certain ragdoll’s.
Some strange sounds are coming from her side and, surprisingly, he’s not the one at fault for it. While watching her squirm and stress over the hypothetical centipede he put in her room was very entertaining, he was sadly forced to reveal his bluff too early. During dinner, she had told Kinger about it and, in a rare display of competence, the old chess piece proposed to get rid of it for her afterwards. When Kinger’s search found nothing, Jax swooped in to tease her for being all too gullible. Zooble then proceeded to strangle him on Ragatha’s behalf.
So if his antics aren’t the cause of these noises, what is?
CRASH!
It couldn’t be that. She wouldn’t break so easily.
THUD!
THWACK!
…Although he might as well check it out, his curiosity won’t let him relax anyway.
As he picks through his collection of keys, he thinks curiosity is a handy trait to have, even if it occasionally clashes with his dedication to not giving a shit. Usually, he wouldn’t even enter the others’ rooms unless he’s sure that the owner is away. If anyone else finds out about his keys, he might lose them and the bit of freedom they grant him.
Thanks to today’s events, he already pushed it by letting Ragatha and Pomni in on the secret. He doesn’t regret that decision though, the positives outweighed the potential risk at the time — it would’ve been too much of a hassle to hide the key from them and he was itching to see what was up with the clown himself.
At least they weren’t the worst people to tell. Knowing the doll, she’ll chalk it up as one of his relatively harmless ways of coping and turn a blind eye to it. The newbie’s more of a wild card but she doesn’t know him well enough. He’s got a chance of her believing his ‘promise’ that he won’t go searching for her key if she doesn’t spill the beans.
All things considered, he supposes he’s glad that it’s Ragatha’s room this time. He doesn’t like sharing any more than he has to so, whether she’s abstracted or not, his secret isn’t going to spread. Not that he thinks this is another Kaufmo fiasco, but it’s a viable enough reason to bend his personal rules around. Grabbing the key to her room, he heads out and closes his door shut behind him.
With long legs like his, it only takes him a couple of steps to reach her place. He doesn’t bother with knocking or ringing the doorbell, it would only attract unwanted attention. No time is wasted as he crouches down to insert the key into the knob. It unlocks with a satisfying click and he pushes the door open with a grin.
That grin vanishes when he sees what’s inside. The room is in a state of complete disarray – open drawers with their contents spilled out, a toppled chair, and shards of broken glass litter the floor. The real kicker is the owner herself. Ragatha has a knife buried deep in the back of her head, huge pins sticking out of her legs, and her right arm is poised to swing a cleaver down on her left arm, which rests on a table. He could have laughed at the dumbstruck expression on her face when she spots him.
She looks like a deer in the headlights.
Seeing that this is definitely more trouble than it’s worth, Jax closes the door.
He stands up and dusts off any imaginary dirt. Once he’s fully straightened out, he finds himself face-to-face with Ragatha’s portrait. It’s something he’s seen a million times before, the easy smile paired with the half-lidded eye, it conveyed the calmness she was always trying to exude. Completely different to how she looked just before. Maybe this stark contrast is the reason why he continues to stare at it instead of heading back to his room.
His fingers twitch as they grip the key. This is dumb. He really should be walking away. He’s caught her in the act, she’s not gonna do any more things to herself now that she knows he knows. She’ll spend the rest of the night feeling guilty then be back to her normal self by the next day.
They don’t have to talk about it.
They don’t.
While he’s standing around like an idiot, the door swings open and a pair of plush hands pull him inside. Once his eyes focus, he sees that Ragatha has some sense in her now, the back of her head is notably knife-free at least.
She lets go of him and shuts the door. When she turns to him again, her expression is mimicking the one on her portrait. Unsuccessfully, he might add, it’s wobbly around the corners.
“Jax, I don’t suppose you could hand over your copy of my room key, could you?”
At that, his hand tucks the key away to hammer space — the cartoony physics in this world are actually quite fun on occasion. While he doesn’t dislike her, his freedom comes first before anything else and he’s not giving that up for anyone’s comfort.
“No dice, dolly. It takes a lot to nab one of these.” He motions towards her skewered legs. “Plus, it doesn’t exactly look like you’re in the best state of mind right now. How am I sure I can trust you?”
She winces and looks at her feet. Bending down, she starts to take the pins off. His eyes watch the motions intently. The sharp metal slivers glide smoothly out of her, leaving no trace behind. When she speaks again, it’s with that cloying sweetness she likes to use on anyone who’s panicking. Like he’s the one that needs help. Beneath his smile, he grits his teeth.
“I was a bit shaken up from today, so I needed to take a moment to let it out.” Having plucked out all the pins, she pops them in her comically large sewing kit. “There’s no need for anyone else to know about this, okay? I don’t want them to worry. You can go if you promise not to tell.”
To concern herself about other people and their perceptions at a time like this, she really is a piece of work. It all rubs him the wrong way, even with the fact that it’s working in his favor — seriously, all she’s asking him to do is swear to secrecy and he can leave, none of that emotional business. It’s what he already planned on before she pulled him in for an unsuccessful negotiation, but that was before and this is after. After he’s heard the tremor in her voice and after he’s seen how badly her facade is cracking. Against his rational thought, he refuses the easy exit she gives him.
Man, he can’t believe he’s doing this.
“Okay. Let it out then.”
For the second instance that night, he’s caught her off-guard. This time, he does let out a snicker when he sees the shock on her face.
“Wh-what?” she stutters out.
Casually, Jax makes his way to her bed. While he walks, he notices that the glass shards are gone, the world already reset them back to their unbroken states as vase and mirror.
“Before I go, I need some assurance that I won’t wake up to an abstraction smashing into my bedroom.” He falls back on the mattress so he’s half-sitting and half-lying down on it. “So, if you need to vent, then do it. I’m not gonna tell anyone.”
He pats the space next to him. Her bed is pillowy soft. It’s impossible not to relax a bit when you’re resting on it, perfect for getting him through this whole ordeal. When this is over, he makes a note to ask Caine to conjure up something similar for his room.
Having made himself comfortable, he glances back at Ragatha, who was rubbing her arm in hesitation. With how reluctant she is to join him, he could almost find it in himself to be offended. Almost. As it stands, he thinks it’s hilarious as all hell. His grin grows larger, probably taking up more than half of his face by now. He closes his eyes and listens to the slight sounds of movement as he waits. Eventually, he feels the mattress dip by his side. The silence remains unbroken for another stretch of time until he finally hears her.
“After you left us with Kaufmo—“
“It’s not my fault you guys were too slow at closing the door,” he interjects.
Even with his lids shut, he could tell his snide remark made her lose her nerve. She wearily breathes out.
“Maybe this wasn’t the best idea.”
He cracks an eye open when she starts to get up. In an attempt to keep it light, he pokes her on the shoulder.
“Oh come on, Rags. You know snarking is a sign that I’m paying attention.”
“I barely even started!”
Snappy reply aside, he does successfully stop her from standing the rest of the way. He also clocks that she’s opting not to lie back down. The tension in her shoulders loosens ever so slightly and she pivots to face him. Her eyebrows are creased together and she’s frowning. He restrains the urge to smooth out the wrinkles with his thumb.
“Even if that was the case, it’s easier for me to talk if you don’t cut in.” The exasperation in her voice as she says it is apparent. “Isn’t the whole point of this for me to let things out?”
“I hear ya and I will do my best,” he tells her, punctuating with the OK sign.
She briefly narrows her eyes at him, then turns away once she’s assured that he’ll keep his word.
“He didn’t attack right away, so I thought— I mean, I hoped that it could be fixed. At the start, it seemed like I was actually getting through to him… until he started tossing and slamming me around.”
What a surprise. You’d think with how long she’s been stuck here that she would’ve thrown in the towel by now. Abstraction can’t be undone. By denying that fact, she only brought herself closer to it.
Jax says none of this out loud. He just watches her, both eyes open this time.
“I haven’t gotten that close to an abstracted person in so long. I forgot how horrible their glitches felt…” she chokes out, “it’s like burning alive and never growing numb.”
A lump forms in his throat as he recalls his own experience. The abstraction, he doesn’t remember who it was, grabbed him by the foot and flung him across the room. Though the pain from the impact shortly disappeared like it tends to do, the excruciating glitching of his leg would not, not without the snap of their ringmaster’s fingers. The rest of the details are fuzzy now, all he remembers is his resolve to never get caught by one of those ever again. By the sound of things, the doll didn’t come away with the same conclusion.
“All those other times, Caine was either there or not far behind. It never lasted for as long as it did today.” Her hands clenched at the patchwork quilt helplessly. “Every last bit of me was hurting and there was nothing to keep my mind off of it. The best distraction I had was when I was dragging my body to the main area. The pattern of bringing my arm forward and pulling myself up over and over gave me something to focus on.”
So that’s how it happened. He didn’t know whether to be irritated or impressed. If the glitching started shortly after he left and only ended after Kaufmo was sent to the Cellar, it would take extreme mental fortitude to last through it without giving up and abstracting. On the other hand, it’s her fault for putting herself in that situation anyways. Look where it’s gotten her now, drained and teetering on the edge.
“The strange thing about it is, once it was gone, I started to miss it. I missed the pain and the glitching. That’s what I was doing when you walked in on me. I was trying to recreate some of that sensation again. Isn’t that so messed-up?” She laughs a terrible, broken laugh.
His skin crawls at the unfamiliar sound coming from her. He closes a hand around Ragatha’s forearm, unsure whether he does it for her or for himself. Then he tugs, a silent request to get her to sink back onto the mattress, and she follows. His hand lets go and drops palm-flat on the quilt, only a few inches away from hers.
“So,” he says slowly, glancing at her from the corner of his eye, “what did you miss about it, exactly?”
Staring distantly upwards, she hums thoughtfully.
“You know how it is. When we get hurt here, the pain is duller, somehow. A knife could be thrown at my head and I’d be more bothered by the fact that I was knocked off-balance than I would be with the actual sting. Whatever pain there even is also disappears as soon as I pull the knife out.” Exhaling deeply, she brings her arms up to hug herself. “Glitching was different. Although every bit of my body was screaming, I was feeling everything, feeling more than I’ve had for a while. It reminded me that I was alive, that I was human, not just a digital doll.”
It’s not that surprising. Self-destructive behavior is par for the course in the circus. In his early days, he had tried repeatedly to carve up his arm — desperate to see blood and bone and flesh and sinew, anything to assure himself he was tangible and real — only to see a hollow blackness when he managed to break through the shell of his model. No pain followed, only numbness as it speedily patched itself back to perfect periwinkle polygons. All the effort to expose a crack in the system, gone in a blink. That was the wake up call he needed to re-evaluate his whole approach towards being trapped in a mindless video game. After all, why choose to wallow in your suffering when you could choose to drown it out? Ragatha wouldn’t phrase it that way, but he believes it’s a statement they’d both agree on. Even though the events of this night further cement in his mind just how different their exact methods are from each other, it doesn’t mean he can’t teach her a thing or two about coping.
“Gotta say, dollface, whatever you were doing earlier seems like it wasn’t all that effective. Maybe you could try something else?”
Her hair makes a gentle rustling sound against the quilt as she moves to face him. There’s less space between them than he thought. He can see himself mirrored in her non-button eye.
“Like what?” she asks.
Deciding that he’s not one for literal self-reflection, he averts his gaze towards the ceiling.
“…Look, if you breathe a word about this to anyone, I’ll deny it and haunt you with centipedes every single day for the foreseeable future. Are we clear?”
“Crystal clear,” she says it so earnestly, if he wasn’t inclined to believe her before, he’d be persuaded to.
He takes a deep breath and starts.
“Eating is my favorite way to go about the whole ‘getting in touch with my humanity’ thing. I’m well aware we don’t need to and that digital food has no nutrients or whatever” — his lip curls at the memory of Kinger trying to correct him earlier — “but having food makes me feel more connected to my body, like I’m taking care of it. Plus, Caine’s gotten pretty good at having the food stimulate our senses in a way that’s close to the real thing. Considering how unreal everything is, that’s close enough.”
His chest is tight. Though he decided to tell Ragatha this, it doesn’t change how much he hates how pathetic it all is. He can already picture the empathy on her face the next time he offhandedly comments how hungry he is. To have her know that underneath the disinterest, underneath the nonchalance, is a genuine craving for some small comfort? It’s too vulnerable.
Too much.
A fabric hand pats his forearm, stopping him from going further down the rabbit hole of regret.
“Thanks for trusting me, Jax. It’s nice to know that you think about stuff like this, too.”
He doesn’t even realize how badly he wanted to hear her say it until she does. It’s the final push he needs to get back to his downbeat, wisecracking self. He moves his forearm away from her touch.
“Don’t get the wrong idea or anything. I’m not helping you out of the kindness of my heart. I’m only giving you a hand because it’s more fun to knock people down when you’re there to build them up.” Pausing to let the message sink in, he finally meets her eyes again and shoots her a grin. “So, you wanna duck out and grab a bite?”
Even after his admission of weakness, the ragdoll shakes her head.
“For me, the part I like the most about having food here is the routine. Food’s nice but the idea of eating it outside the set time kind of makes me feel uneasy, which is the last thing I need right now.” She pauses before she adds, “I’m really sorry.”
Jax fights the urge to groan in frustration. Why do people, her in particular, have to make it so hard for him to comfort them?
Not that the act of comforting is something he ever wants to do. This experience sure isn’t encouraging him to start.
“Don’t apologize. You just gotta figure out what works for you. Pain responses, eating food, it’s all part of a list of basic survival instincts. They’re still around even if they’re practically useless here.” He chuckles bitterly. “Kind of like us.”
His little side comment earns another frown from her.
“Don’t say that.”
“Whaaat? It’s funny ‘cause it’s true.”
The frown deepens but she doesn’t say anything else. With nothing to respond to, he doesn’t say a word either. The silence settles over them like a thick blanket on a hot summer night. It’s stifling, it’s uncomfortable, and he’s dying to get it off.
“Have you tried sleeping?”
As soon as the words leave his mouth, he wants to kick himself. Of course she tried that, she told him how important routine was to her a minute ago. Just because he’s unnerved doesn’t mean that he has to act like a complete idiot.
Gracious as always, Ragatha doesn’t acknowledge his lapse in judgement.
“It’s what I was trying to do, but I… couldn’t handle being alone with my thoughts,” she admits.
“So you need something to keep your mind occupied, something that you wouldn’t be alone for, and something that makes you feel more connected to your body,” he points out. “That ought to make it easier to think up a solution.”
“Well, when you put it like that…”
The next bit of quiet that follows is a lot less awkward now that they had a goal.
An idea crosses his mind, one that begins to simmer at the pit of his gut. It’s an absolute long shot but he’s confident enough in his ability to play it off as a joke if it backfires.
He puts in more effort than usual to have his voice come out breezy and casual though, if only to make sure.
“Do you want to make out?”
There has to be an award he could get for keeping his body so still and calm while every bit of him is cringing inside.
Ragatha shakes her head, creating a flurry of red. Before he could take that as an outright refusal, she stops and looks at him, knitted eyebrows and sheepish smile.
“I’m sorry, I don’t think I heard you right. What was that?”
Oh well, he did figure it was a long shot. He should take this chance to cut his losses and think of something else.
Except, he’s an instigator by nature, and he likes to push the envelope to see how far it will go.
“I think you did. I asked you if you wanted to make out.”
In response, the doll scowls and smacks his arm. It’s like being hit by a swinging pillow, it didn’t hurt all that much.
“Jax, that’s not funny,” she tells him sharply.
“And I’m not kidding!” He raises his hands in a surrender. “Listen, all the stuff I listed out before? This ticks the boxes.” He then hastily tacks on, “It doesn’t have to mean anything and it doesn’t even have to be me. I only figured I was the convenient option, seeing as I’m already here.”
That last statement was very much untrue. He wants her to choose him and have it mean something. At the same time, the very thought of it makes him want to gag.
Intimacy, in both the emotional and physical sense, is way out of his wheelhouse and here he is holding out both. He doesn’t know what it is about Ragatha that brings these out of him, he sure as hell wouldn’t go this far for the rest of them.
Speaking of the doll, she’s been awfully quiet.
It would be so easy for him to turn his head to the spot where she laid so he can parse her reaction. Yet his head remains pointed away, worried about what he might see.
As the mattress shifts, he feels her shuffling closer, and he reckons he’ll find out whether he’s ready for it or not. Poorly wishing to delay the inevitable, he stubbornly closes his eyes.
Her elbow nudges his arm and he imagines she’s propping herself up to look down at him.
Gingerly, Ragatha rests her forehead against his. She’s close enough that he can sense her warmth lingering on his lips and teeth. He would’ve felt her breath if it was a tangible thing here, not only a simulated action with an accompanying sound effect.
“Okay.”
With one word, she simultaneously puts his heart in a vice grip and floods him with relief.
Guess he didn’t really need to worry after all, she understands and she’s not holding it against him. Maybe she recognizes it since they feel the same way. It’s the need for an escape.
The circus is a rat race and they’re both so sick and tired of running.
So he cranes his neck to bridge the gap, pressing their lips together. There’s a slight fuzzy sensation from the point where their character meshes touch, brought on by the applied pressure.
Their avatars do not make it easy. His own head is made of (or is, at least, simulated to be) bendy rubber stretched over a hard plastic skull. With some effort, he could even open his mouth to make use of his teeth and tongue. Her mouth, meanwhile, is just a thin shape placed on top of her ragdoll face. It’s admittedly hard to feel the reciprocity when he starts. As they continue to move against each other though, he’s more conscious of the difference between the textures, between the coarseness of her fabric skin and the mild tackiness of her smooth vinyl mouth. It’s clumsy, yet the combination of newness and underlying desperation carry them over to some semblance of comfort.
Slowly, he moves to hover over her, cupping her cheek and guiding her so they don’t have to break apart. His lips press kisses along the edges where the textures intersect and Ragatha takes his head in her hands to bring him closer. Her cloth thumb strokes his cheek in a manner so gentle that it threatens to unravel his very being.
It’s so rare for her to allow herself to have this. To grab something with both hands just for her own sake and not for the sake of others. It gives him a total headrush, knowing that she wants what he’s offering.
Wants him.
His right arm moves towards the back of her head to bury itself in her chunky yarn hair and his left hand goes to encircle her waist. There’s a furrow in his brow as he tries to commit all these sensations to memory. No matter how much time passes in this endless digital hell, he wants to remember this. Her voice, the soft warmth of her body, the pleasant heat of her mouth. There’s humanity in all these. And he’s never getting it again. It’s kind of terrifying, knowing that he doesn’t feel like this with anyone else.
Getting attached to anyone is basically signing your death warrant in this place. Heck, it’s worse because you don’t even get to die, you get to lose your mind in a dark room for virtual eternity. You can walk off physical damage but the mental toll of losing someone to abstraction could pretty easily lead to your own. Once he figured it out, he made sure to keep others at arm’s length, to be an object of dislike that would quash any hope of friendship. Thinking of his fellow inmates as mere tools for his amusement also came with the added bonus of stimulating his mind. All the fun with nothing to weigh him down.
Then there’s her.
Contrary to popular belief, she was never his favorite target. Whenever he plays his tricks on her, she’s usually quick to dismiss the initial anger with a sigh and an eye roll, maybe even smile if she’s feeling particularly chipper. It always pisses him off. Her general attitude is exactly why he goes the extra mile to get under her skin, to have occasions when she’s unable to suppress the frustration — like when he trips her over one too many times or when he manages to procure centipedes to prank her with.
Additionally, messing with her while she’s in her protective mother hen mode is something he simultaneously dreads and looks forward to whenever the next sap gets sucked in. Nervous breakdowns are more common at the start, after all, so she really lays it on thick with the ‘sunshine and rainbows’ routine. She showers them with attention while Jax only gets a sprinkle. Fortunately for him, her exhaustive effort to be the one-woman welcoming committee comes with the great side effect of making her more irritable than usual. (The way that she laid into him earlier for his little centipede fib was a goddamn delight.) Sure, he doesn’t doubt that she’s sweet and cares for the people around her, but this whole schtick was absolute bullshit. Everyone finds out eventually.
Once the shine of the newness wears off, and the fledgling gets used to the new status quo, she stops doting on them and they become free game for Jax and Caine and all the circus freakishness. He could still recall the look on Gangle’s face the first time that Ragatha didn’t help her with her shattered comedy mask, only casting her a sorry glance before running off after Zooble. It brought him a great rush of vindication. Whether she knows it or not, there’s a callousness in how the ragdoll chooses what’s worthy of her energy. At some point, Gangle’s tears were decidedly not worth the effort. Just like Zooble stomping off to pass on adventures. And just like Kinger losing his memory. Not that he blames her, you don’t spend years in this place without harboring some anger and resentment about your situation. And there’s only so much positivity you can eke out before you start running empty.
It’s no good to sweep the negativity under the rug either. Kaufmo was always quick to diffuse the tension and make people laugh, yet the sight of a possible exit door broke the dam and released the flood of everything he tried to repress.
With Ragatha, every bit of genuine emotion he gets her to let out, good or bad, is a win. And he never felt more like a winner than he does at this moment. Coaxing the good out is a lot more difficult for him and his horrible personality, yet it’s hard to deny now how rewarding it can be. Running his hands through her hair and relishing in all their points of connection, he can admit that in his head at least.
What’s harder to admit is that he cares about her. That him figuring out what would get a rise out of her is more than just the fun challenge it started out as. That what began as distant observation has softened into a kind of admiration.
Despite him disagreeing with her methods, there was no denying that she was strong. Not counting Kinger, she has lasted here the longest. This steady, prevailing strength functioned as a tether at one point or another for the remaining circus crew. Any of Jax’s reservations about caring and getting hurt, she willingly tackles it head-on again and again. She greets any new face before anyone else does and she’s also the only one who’s reckless enough to continue engaging with abstractions. Her personal brand of fatalistic optimism can go toe-to-toe with his own destructive nihilism.
Their contrasting viewpoints should’ve acted as an active repellent against the other’s presence, instead they found themselves gravitating towards each other again and again.
Like she could read his mind, Ragatha wraps her arms around his shoulders, pressing herself against him with a pleased sigh. Fuck, this is way too surreal.
Early on, he hated her. Like she did with all the newbies, she hovered around him to try and ease the transition. He wasn’t taking it well and she hadn’t quite gotten the hang of her little song and dance yet. Every interaction was like pulling teeth until both of them found their footing. By circumstance, their rooms are next to each other, so Ragatha is the first person he sees when he leaves and the last he sees when he enters, he’s the same for her.
They became a part of each other’s routine. During adventures, it soon became obvious that people turned to them for guidance, probably since they’re the only ones who weren’t too burnt out or overwhelmed to think past their own head. This realization crept up on him. Their push and pull worked out so well for the group that he hadn’t noticed. At some point, they had started approaching each other about what they decided on, wanting to know their thoughts on it. Of course there are times where he’d go through with his plans regardless of what she thinks, yet somehow he’s more at ease when she’s there to back him up. Like a snowball rolling downhill, it just grew from there.
Every time the cast is gathered, his eyes immediately search for her raggedy red hair. She’s the one who hears his first snarky comment of the day and the last one of the night. Sometimes he idles outside his doorway while she says her goodbyes to the others, just to get her by herself. He could swear she also lingers a little longer when it’s only them. She worries about him less than she does with the rest and he takes pride in that. After all, it’s for that reason he gets to see more of her, more of the side that doesn’t have to worry about staying strong for everyone. The side that could just be.
Before he could catch himself, he breaks away from her lips to press an all too tender kiss on her cheek.
He stiffens and curses under his breath.
“$#%^.”
He pulls away.
Bad idea. The sight that greets him makes his heart catch in his throat.
Ragatha’s eye was blown wide, shiny with both wonder and unshed tears. Her mouth is parted, still in the shape of their broken kiss. She slowly becomes more aware of herself under the weight of his stare, red airbrush circles on her cheeks growing more visible with each passing second. He doesn’t know what she sees when she looks back at him, there’s a flash of worry that paints her features. Her beautiful, wondrous expression is replaced by her default placating smile and it makes Jax sick to his stomach.
A profound sense of loss washes over him when she unhooks her arms from their place around his shoulders and proceeds to gently pull his hands off of her body as she sits up.
Turning away, she tucks her hair behind a non-existent ear, only for it to fall right back in place.
“Umm, thank you for doing that.”
That wasn’t enough at all, he wanted to say. The whole goddamn point of it was for her to freely enjoy herself, to ground her in something that wasn’t pain and misery. Now she’s focused on handling the discomfort he created with that stupid cheek kiss. Though they’re still sitting closely on the bed, a wall is being put up. She’s handling him with kid-gloves, treating him the way she treats everyone else. He can’t let that happen. Nope. That’s not going to fly at all.
“I’m not done.”
Perhaps his conviction would’ve been more believable if he didn’t swear and recoil just a few seconds ago. Judging from her expression, she sure isn’t convinced.
“Really, you don’t have to force yourself.” The doll looks down at her lap, wringing her hands.
Call it a bit of wishful thinking on his part, but it seems to him that he’s not the only one who wants to keep going. If only he could get her to stop holding herself back on his account and understand that he’s not at all unwilling to do this with her.
“Ragatha.”
His use of her name gets her attention. She stops moving her hands.
“It’s like eating.”
That gets her to lift her head, though she still doesn’t face him.
“In what way?” she asks, caution lacing her tone.
“Do I have to spell it out for you?” His cheeks slowly grow warm. “It makes me feel more connected to my body. I like it.”
Her reply comes out strangled.
“Ah, I see.”
When he chances a glance at her, her steadily reddening face gets him like a knife between the ribs. It emboldens him, makes him a little more like his usual self. The corners of his mouth stretch wide into an insufferable grin. Scooting closer, he rests his head on his palms.
“Did you like it?” he asks.
If only he had a camera right now, the way her face scrunches up in defiant effort is absolutely precious, even more so with the accompanying blush. His large yellow eyes are drinking up every moment of it. Hopefully this gets it through to her that he isn’t some fragile flower. Though she tries to fight it, she eventually hangs her head, defeated.
“Yeah, I guess.”
“Then I guess it’s working,” he helpfully points out, flicking at her bow.
The action is received with less reaction than he has come to expect. Ragatha doesn’t budge. Her red hair covers her face like beaded curtains.
“There’s still something I don’t get,” she pipes up. “Why did you…stop?”
Because some of his dumb, mushy emotions leaked out. Because he’s definitely only here for the bodily sensation and he can’t care less about any sentimental attachment.
“Heh.” Jax rubs the back of his neck. “I was worried I was getting carried away and taking it too far.”
With luck, she’ll think that he means it in the physical way instead of what it actually is. It’s the closest to the truth he can be comfortable with telling.
A disbelieving pause follows his statement. He’s not sure if she picked up on the underlying insinuation or if she was simply stunned by the idea of Jax concerning himself with the comfort of other people. Whichever one it is, he figures he has to say something to ensure that she doesn’t see right through him.
“What? As much as I don’t respect people’s privacy, there’s still boundaries I don’t cross.” He hesitates. “Did you think I would—“
“No!” Ragatha frantically exclaims before withdrawing into herself again. “No, I wasn’t thinking that. I was only thinking about how nice it felt to not have to think so hard. I mean, ‘think’ doesn’t even sound like a real word to me anymore.”
Witnessing the effect it has on her is exciting. Whatever he has in place of a heart hammers below his chest and his usual toothsome display gets a little more gooey and genuine than he would prefer. He hopes that she isn’t able to tell the difference.
“Wow. That good, huh?”
The groan that follows as she buries her face in her hands brings them closer to their familiar territory.
“Please stop talking.”
After everything that’s been going on on this emotional roller coaster of a night, he finds it funny how she remains resolute about tacking on a ‘please’. Because of course she would.
She’s like a buoy that way. She’ll bob and waver but she won’t go under. He likes that about her. Not that he’ll ever say it.
Jax leans in close, right where the doll’s ear would be.
“Why don’t you make me?” he taunts.
Tilting her head to the side, she regards him with a degree of caution. Her red mouth twists up in contemplation. And though he’s aware how obvious he’s being with their close proximity, he can’t bring himself to tear his gaze away from it.
One of her hands drifts up to his shoulder, feather-light. Jax stifles the shiver that threatens to erupt from his skin when she moves it, tracing the slope to his neck, before resting between his nape and his jaw. She pulls him in, her nose softly grazing his cheek. Just short of their lips touching, she stops.
“Is this okay?”
He clicks his tongue impatiently.
“Yes, stop ask—“
Ragatha closes the gap. Finally.
There’s none of the clumsiness present in their first attempt. This time their movements are firm, resolute. His hands find Ragatha’s hips to bring her to his lap, which is a move he mentally congratulates himself for.
This little maneuver kicks things up a notch. Unlike before, when he hovered above her, he can now feel the soft pressure of her weight on him. It’s in her hands pawing aimlessly at his chest. It’s in the slight squeeze of her thighs bracketing his waist. It’s in the funny feeling he’s starting to get below, which is something to be careful about.
Pointedly diverting his attention to higher areas, Jax properly opens his mouth, bringing in his tongue to disrupt the newly familiar rhythm. Her lips part in surprise with an undercurrent of anticipation. He only gets a second to take it in before he gets preoccupied by something else; namely, the doll’s own tongue sliding against his.
The curious side of him rears its head to notice how Ragatha’s tongue doesn’t stick out of the flat plane of her mouth, a moving pink shape in a red backdrop. He chuckles at the reminder of their weird physicality. If she takes any offense to his laughter, she doesn’t show it. Besides, he doesn’t think she minds humoring him.
To test that theory, Jax’s hands slide down from her hips to cup her ass. Like her chest, it’s pretty ragdoll-accurate, meaning there’s not exactly much of a curve to it.
However…
…he gives it a squeeze.
Yep, the plushness of her body makes up for that.
In response to his little stunt, Ragatha gasps and bucks against him, sending a spike of pleasure through the both of them. Jax ducks his head into the crook of her neck to catch his breath.
“Hey,” he manages to croak out. “You sure you wanna do this?”
From his resting spot, he feels the self-conscious huff of her laugh as it shakes her shoulders.
“Yeah,” she says. “I really do.”
Those last three words ring in his ears and leave him lightheaded. He stays bending his neck to keep his face hidden, trying to regain his composure. He’s supposed to be arrogant, laid-back, and self-serving. Not nervous, or flustered, or whatever emotion is bringing him this close to trembling.
Sex has no place in Caine’s family-friendly digital wonderland. They simply don’t have the parts for it. They can’t even take their clothes off. Jax’s sense of touch is constantly being dulled by unremovable gloves and it drives him up the wall.
The AI wasn’t able to take all the options off the table, however.
On one particularly frustrating night, while he was lying in bed, Jax experimentally pressed his hand where his crotch should be and felt a twinge of something good. If he had to guess, Caine probably couldn’t distinguish between sexual and non-sexual stimulation all that well. Although the ringmaster may have removed the ‘offensive organs’, they still retained some sensitivity around those areas. This little loophole isn’t one that Jax exploits all that often despite this, owing in huge part to the fact that they can’t finish, which is a turn-off in more ways than one.
He also never attempted anything with another person. Mostly because the mere notion of propositioning any of these freaks and their freaky bodies makes him want to jump into The Cellar. Yet, when it comes down to it, he can hardly do better than Ragatha, and Ragatha can arguably do worse than him.
So he steadies himself, presses his lips on her throat again and again in an unhurried pace. She squirms as he does it, must be a sensitive spot. Her hands try to grip at his overalls, even though they keep sliding off. The most she can do is crease the fabric. The clothes are a part of him, just like everybody else’s was.
Ragatha’s model, though, was not quite the same.
Jax always wondered what was underneath her dress.
Owing to their current position, the hem of her skirt is hiked up to her knees. His hands leave her waist to place themselves along the edges of the cloth before going under it. Slowly, he slides them upwards. When he sneaks a peek at the ragdoll, he is greeted with a mix of embarrassment and quiet excitement. The sight makes him smirk against her neck.
A change of texture on each side catches on his fingertips and he looks down to find the answer to his question.
Underneath the ruffles of her petticoat, Ragatha has a pair of bike shorts, same color as her dress, cutting off at about half the length of her thighs.
A bit disappointing. He was hoping for actual underwear. Not that he can’t bring himself to complain too much.
Prior to this, he couldn’t even cross out the possibility that the space between her legs would be empty air. Finding out that this isn’t the case further sweetens the whole experience. It’s always good to know something for sure, there’s not a lot of things you can be certain of around here.
He thumbs at her inner thighs, just hard enough to get her to hiss through her teeth.
“Jax.”
Before he could say anything, fabric hands lift his head up for a deep kiss and the words melt on their tongues. He doesn’t remember the sensation being this intense. Maybe the lack of stimulation bumps it up a notch, a point that is hammered home when Ragatha lowers herself and grinds against him.
He’s not proud of the sound that he lets out but it helps that his mouth is covered by hers.
It’s pretty hot of Ragatha to take initiative, Jax won’t deny that he likes it. What he doesn’t like is when he’s not in control of the situation.
No further time is wasted in returning the motion, kickstarting a little back-and-forth. It’s sloppy as they try to get in the rhythm of it. Too fast. Too slow. Almost. They’re not even really kissing anymore, just panting into each other while they focus on getting it right.
When he thrusts up into her again, it’s still not quite there. As much as he enjoys having Ragatha bounce on his lap, maybe a change in position is in order.
Turning more towards the bed, he hooks one hand on the back of Ragatha’s knee while the other holds her waist. He hikes a leg up on the mattress and leans forward with a swift motion, not-so-gently dropping the doll onto the quilt.
She pouts at him in disapproval.
“A warning would’ve been nice.”
“If you’ve gone this far expecting niceness, then I don’t know what to tell you,” he teases, absently stroking her knee with his thumb as a small show of consolation.
Scoffing, she rolls her eye at him but relents. It’s a familiar response to his antics, only this one’s not the forced positive reaction he’s seen plenty of times before. He’d go as far as calling it fond exasperation, as if she sees this flaw and finds it endearing anyway. Jax does his best to act like the implications of this mean nothing to him.
Leaning down, he moves in just a few inches shy of her face.
“I’m gonna kiss you again. Figured I should warn you.”
That gets a laugh out of her.
“@$$#0!€,” she mutters, hooking an arm behind his neck to pull him in and cut off any comment he had about this rare instance of profanity. It’s the third time he’s been silenced with a kiss that night, she sure has been having fun with that.
Oh well, there’s better things to do than mourn the chance for a quip.
(Like doing Ragatha, for example.)
Bringing up his leg to join the other, he fully situates himself on the bed. Their lips separate with a wet pop as he sits up.
Below him, she’s a snapshot that he tucks away in the back of his mind for safekeeping. Cherry red hair fanning out on her white pillow. Body pliant and waiting. Her plastic eyes gleam up at him with want and some other thing he can’t quite name.
His gloved hands clutch the backs of her thighs to spread them outwards and bring them down, pressing on the mattress. With no further preamble, he lowers himself to meet her and moves.
The moans that leave them both are heavy, Jax even swears he can hear an echo. This, this is what they were after. So he repeats the motion, deep and slow. And he does it again. And again. And again. And as he does, his ears hone in on the symphony of sounds he’s able to draw out from the woman beneath him. He dives down to meet her mouth like he’s starving for it.
Pressing forward, he kisses a line down her neck and he nips at the juncture for good measure. The groan she tries to bite back sounds even better in her failure to stifle it.
Each and every thrust ripples through their bodies like a shockwave. Plush arms hold him snugly against her and he basks in the weight and warmth of it all.
None of his previous ventures in self-pleasure had prepared him for this. Anything of that nature in his life before the circus has been lost in the haze of foggy memories. Jax has long accepted that that reality was no longer his. What was his, what is his, is what’s happening now.
It’s his name that slips past her lips in short, shallow gasps. His shoulders that her mitten hands are gripping on to. Their bodies slotting the space between their legs together.
They’re the only things on each other’s mind. And Jax would be lying if he said the thought of it didn’t do something for him.
He really is on the edge, no doubt. It’s embarrassing how easily he finds himself there. He supposes the upside to not being able to get off is that it doesn’t actually end, and any potential gap caused by his inexperience is significantly lessened.
Though it’s not like looking at the bright side makes this any less torturous — all this chasing after a high that he knows he’ll never reach, it’s addictive. A pleasant buzz drones on in the back of his skull. Different from the static cling of abstraction, but similar in the way that someone could easily lose themselves in it.
As he was thinking that, Ragatha sinks her teeth into his neck, cutting into the haze with sharp intensity. Jax, honest-to-god, whimpers, his pace faltering momentarily. She soothes her tongue over the bite and he is consequently overtaken by the need for more friction.
He pauses to adjust his grip on her legs and bring them up. She takes the cue and wraps them over the backs of his thighs, leaving his hands free to roam. Well not quite right now, at the moment he’s got one planted on each side of the mattress while he cants his hips this way and that, getting accustomed to the change in position. She meets him halfway, making contact at the right time and hitting the spot that makes him feel there.
Before he gets too caught up in it, he remembers what he wanted to do with his hands. Yellow gloves slide up the doll’s body, coming to a rest just above her waist. The pads of his thumbs skim over where her tits would be, the contact delivered with a touch of that delicious pressure. He hears a sharp intake of breath and he smirks. Ragatha’s eye flies open from when it was scrunched closed in concentration. She only has a second to catch the smug look on Jax’s face before he ducks down, running the flat of his tongue to where his thumb was before and using his whole hand on the other side. The fabricated taste of cloth is not ideal, though he hardly seems to mind once she got her hands on his ears and started stroking them.
What even is the human equivalent for that? Hair-pulling? Maybe he just had really sensitive ears in his original body?
Okay, he’s drifting.
He moves his hand and mouth to alternate and, just to see what would happen, lightly bites into the plush texture of her chest. She jumps at the shock, giving his ears a particularly harsh pull as she does. The roughness and intensity of the action has him seeing stars.
If Jax thought he was close before, it was nothing compared to now. Whatever tension this was meant to release is doubling up instead. The pair of them rock against, into, each other, chasing after that much-desired friction that never seems like it’s enough. Every part of him is overwhelmed with just the thought of getting closer to her over everything else.
When all of a sudden, his ears pop and he’s got none of the contact he was having before.
He is sitting on the floor. Ragatha is on her bed. Caine hovers above them, striking a very standard ringmaster pose.
Ugh, he should have known.
“Sorry for the delay, my subway surfers.” The AI begins his spiel, oblivious to the discomfort he’s causing, as usual. “I did notice that your character meshes kept clipping into each other, but I thought it was just a momentary issue. When it kept happening again and again, I realized it was a serious glitch and came here to sort you wholesome banana fishes out! Rest assured that if this happens again, I’ll be on it like a necktie-wearing gorilla!!”
And of course he’s gonna be on alert for this kind of thing now. Regardless of whether or not he’s aware of the implications, it’s gonna be a pain in the ass to navigate around in the future.
He chuckles to himself. ‘In the future’. That’s a bold thing to assume.
“Now, does everyone here have their textures and rigging fully-functional and intact?”
From the tone of voice, it’s the kind of question where Caine’s not exactly listening for an answer. Jax doesn’t even bother giving a response. Ragatha, of course, does.
“Uh, ye—”
“Excellent! I’ll see you all later for the next adventure!”
With that, Caine disappears in a puff of smoke, leaving the two of them alone.
(Or, you know, as alone as they could be, as they’ve learned in the past few seconds.)
A beat passes. Jax scrubs his face while he attempts to process everything that just happened. Obviously neither of them are in the mood to pick up where they left off, so that begs the question as to where they’re going from here.
Don’t get him wrong, part of him is very much pissed at the interruption – however, now that his mind is free of heady distractions, it is eager to once again cling to the familiarity of social detachment and surrender to the natural digital order of things. Things were always going to turn out this way. He shouldn’t expect anything different.
The sound of laughter brings him out of his thoughts. Her laughter.
When their eyes lock, she simply shrugs and gives him a tired smile.
She was thinking the exact same thing.
So he laughs too. This life is such a joke that they might as well be in on it. The two of them know this better than anyone here. Day after day, they don their smiles like armor, like something to hide behind when things got bad.
The laughter dies down and they bring themselves up to stand on steady legs – the physical indicators of their previous activity have long subsided. This means that, when Ragatha smooths out her dress, she really does it as a chance to decompress rather than for any practical purpose. Once she’s ready, she looks up at him, crossing her arms to hug herself.
“Listen, Jax. I know this wasn’t how you expected it to go, and I want to thank you again for, you know, sticking around?”
He takes a moment to look at her, not for lack of anything to say, but just to watch her squirm. It’s what she gets for trying to handle him with care again. She averts her eyes, unnerved by the resulting silence.
Satisfied, Jax walks up to her and flicks her forehead.
“Don’t worry about it. At least I got to do something new,” he tells her with a wink.
The doll’s cheeks flush faintly, although the tension in her posture never fully goes away. This little detail catches his attention. While the two of them move towards the door, he wonders if she’ll tell him out of her own volition or if he has to prod her.
They’re silent as they walk, and when they reach the end, there’s still nothing. He even dawdles for a few extra seconds under the now open entryway. When it’s clear that she won’t say anything, he sighs, loud and put-upon.
“Come on. Do it already.”
“Um, do what?” she stammers.
“You’re holding yourself back from something,” he points out, rolling his eyes. “Whatever it is, just get it over with. I didn’t go through all of this for you to still lose your head by the end of it.”
As soon as he’s done pointing it out, her shoulders droop in resignation.
“You’re right,” she relents. “You’re right.”
Getting on her tiptoes, Ragatha leans in to press a tender kiss on his cheek.
It suddenly felt hard to breathe. He didn’t know what he thought she would do, but it certainly wasn’t that.
“Good night, Jax.”
She smiles, closing her door with a soft click, and leaving him in the same state that he was in before she pulled him inside her room.
Standing around like an idiot, staring at her portrait.
Try as he might, Jax could not stop the goofy grin from overtaking his face. The corners of his mouth creep upwards, all schmaltzy and wobbly from the mush and sap. He’s had years of practice in controlling his features, all to maintain his emotional distance, yet there’s something about this one that made it impossible to completely get rid of.
As he traverses the short stretch between his room and hers, he keeps his head facing the closest wall, in case anyone sees his fixed expression and thinks that the resident menace has gone soft.
When Jax gets back to his bed, he does something that’s very rare for him.
For the first time in a long time, he closes his eyes and he dreams.