Beyond the Dolls - Good Night, Sweetheart

October 2068. In their last night together, Blyen and Serìna bid each other farewell. The life of a doll cannot be extended and they both know this. One last goodbye is the most they can get, the most they can treasure, now that their daughter is born.

Warmth. The warmth of a long, fluffy tail wrapped around his body. Blyen couldn’t get enough of it, let himself bask in that slow, methodical stroking, the roughness of that fur texture. He combed it with two fingers, leaning on Serìna’s shoulder. Letting his cheek rest. Letting his eyes dry.

“How long?”

“Ten minutes and six seconds. Now five.”

It was late. Three in the night, in that flat peeking over the Nerifumo river. Noises from the highway traveled through the air, the monotone bellowing of the trucks treading the same ground over and over. The lights of the city were nothing but pale dots in an amorphous black mass, resting under the vigilant eye of the moon. Only some sporadic building showed signs of life. If not for them, New Langdon might as well have looked dead.

Serìna hugged Blyen again, rubbed her cheek on his. In her crib, Summer was dozing off, unaware of everything that happened around her. Kids, they said, formed memories only starting from their third or fourth year of life. That meant that Summer, their little Summer, would never remember that night. She would never remember her mother’s embrace. Her mother’s face. Her mother’s kindness. For Summer, Serìna would have been just a picture on a wall, a smiling young woman holding her triumphantly in her arms. How much would Summer look like her mom, when growing up? She had her hair, that much was sure, but also—somehow—inherited Blyen’s unusual violet irises. A curse, that eye color, which apparently moved down the family tree unmatched by any contender. His mother had them, his mother’s mother too, and his mother’s mother’s father no less. Summer Kay-Yoko Chill was going to be the fifth known member of their family to sport that unusual mutation. Shame almost all the others were dead.

Serìna licked his cheek, met his gaze. Calm. Serenity. That was all Blyen could find in the lakes of hope her irises had turned into. Acceptance. All the tears had already been shed. There was nothing more that could flow down her cheeks. So, she smiled at him, burrowing her head in his chest.

“We had a good run.”

“Wish it lasted longer.”

A gentle caress, their fingers intertwined. Watching the lonely Moon from their window, from their dark room. One last time, after making love. One last night of passion, before the inevitable. Now, there they were, hugging and cuddling as the clock ticked, each second marked by the the rusty hand. An analog wall clock of old, one Blyen found abandoned years earlier, one Serìna fixed with him.

“Nothing good lasts long, Bly. Take salmon, for example. You open the pack once and it’s already over… even if it’s premium salmon. Even if it cost one eye and a kidney.”

“That’s because you eat too much of it.”

“But never got fatter by one gram!”

Yes, because your body works like that, Blyen would have answered once. That remark now held a different, graver weight. Serìna was going to leave him because her body worked like that. A fact of life. A statement, not a question. One they tried to confute, one that they tried to turn into a falsity. Nature, though, wouldn’t bend to the whims of a retired fox hunter and his fox partner. Both of them were but specks of dust in the greater picture, too insignificant for history to even remember their names. So, he basked in her warmth instead, in that fragrance that enveloped Serìna wherever she went. He couldn’t have enough of it. He couldn’t have enough of her.

Blyen let her tail stroke his back, let her pointy fox ears twitch under his fingers. Serìna’s true shape, the one she hid to the rest of the world, only to reveal it to him and him alone. In the few moments she did that, he felt lucky. She could be herself with him. He could be himself with her. A match made in hell, but one of their own making. A renegade doll. A jaded cutthroat. What made him cling to her, what made her cling to him was still a mystery. It just happened. One day he was giving her shelter, the day right after she was topping him and telling him she wouldn’t leave.

Opportunistic behavior, at first, yes.

“This is just a transaction. You let me stay here as much as I want, I give you my body, all of it—every night, if necessary. I can’t leave this place. I have nowhere else to go.”

“And how would that be a me problem?”

“It isn’t, you’re right.”

A transaction, yes, nothing more. A safe house in exchange of her body: the only currency she had, the only currency she was taught she could spend. Not the best first impression, really, but there was no going back.

“What if I bring you to the police?”

“Do it, then. Or kill me. That’s the only way you’ll get rid of me, until I decide to leave.”

She was marking her territory already, his Serìna. In a way, that made his blood freeze.

“The neighbors will notice I’m hiding a fox.”

“Good thing foxes can hide their ears and tails, then.”

Crafty. Direct to the point. No false promises. No luring him in into a fake romance scam. She wanted shelter, she offered payment for it. She was clear about it from the very first moment. Blyen knew what the rules of the game were. He played by those rules too. Action, reaction, payment, end. It was supposed to be an inconvenience for a couple of days, maybe a week. He just needed to page Jakall or Reno, use their underworld feelers and find a place for the fox. Easy peasy.

Yes, nothing but a transaction. A short term commitment.

Her tail rubbed his belly button, caressed his abs. Her breasts pushed against his back.

Eight years. Eight years was an awfully long period of time.

And, at the same time, not long enough.

He felt her, felt her embrace, the soft touch of her fur, the small twitching of her ears, her lips on his neck.

Six minutes.

Maybe less.

Under the waning moon that observed from above, silent and unbothered by the woes of the mortals.

“How do you know…”

“I see it. It’s like a small timer, always at the corner of my vision. I can’t focus on it, I can’t look at it directly, but it’s always there—at the bottom of my mind. Once you know it’s there, you can’t ignore it anymore. It becomes part of you. Tick tock, tick tock. Every second left is a part of you that dies. It’s harrowing.”

“And what does it say, now?”

Serìna grabbed him tighter.

“…it doesn’t make a difference, does it?”

She licked his cheek, just a little more, bit him again and again. Marking her territory like she did countless other times, exerting her absolute authority over his body. Blyen let her do it, caressed her hand in turn. He gazed at her eyes, turned around towards the crib. His words crawled out of his lips, pulled out one syllable at a time.

“…let me wake Summer up, Seri.”

“Kids better sleep when the adults play.”

“It’s the last time she’s gonna see her mother.”

“…and won’t remember her anyway. Her long term memory hasn’t developed yet.”

“Who knows, maybe she will.”

Serìna bit his earlobe, wrapped her arms around his chest.

“You don’t take no for an answer, huh?”

“Do you?”

A sigh, her fangs left the comfort of Blyen’s skin. She stretched a little, leaving the bedsheets behind, slowly walking towards the crib. Here lay her angel, Summer. Dozing off. Breathing slowly. Two months old, the last present that cold world gifted her. But, of course, with a twist. Because nothing could go straight and without hitches.

“Your friends are idiots, have I already told you that?”

“Several times, in fact.”

“That doesn’t make them less idiotic.”

Summer was born with a tail. ‘A healthy human baby’, sure, in the sense that she didn’t have any expiration date attached. So why? Why was she born a half-fox? The process went wrong somewhere, yes, but it couldn’t be stopped. Summer was going to be born, tail or not. So, first thing first, they had to have it explanted. It was painful for Serìna and probably more painful for her sweet Summer, but there was no way out—the child of the fox would have had a way harsher life, if they didn’t act immediately. Kids were natural bullies, after all: If Summer kept her tail, they would have picked up on her to no end. No, her tail had to go, no matter how it sneaked into her daughter’s genetic make-up. Blyen’s friend, guaranteeing a one hundred percent success. Yeah, an idiot. The good kind of idiot, but still an idiot.

Her hands moved into the crib, delicately pulled up her sleeping infant. Two months old. Her legacy. Their legacy. Serìna held her kid close to her chest, felt her fast heartbeat through her skin, rubbed her forehead on that of her baby. Their legacy, yes. A neverending Summer that would melt the winter cold. Slowly, she came back to the bed, craving for Blyen’s warmth. He hugged Serìna, touched Summer’s cheek too, gently. Their little girl was still dozing off, peaceful—more peaceful than a kid her age had the right to be. Serìna held her tight in her arms, leaning in Blyen’s embrace. She twitched her ears, stroked her tail gently around her partner’s back, smirked at him.

“She’ll be so hungry tomorrow… and I won’t be there to feed her.”

“Claire will help.”

“Surprised she still has so much milk to spare after raising two cubs.”

“She’s surprised too. Neko biology is… something else, or so Renzo says.”

“Great, my kid breastfed by a French catgirl. I’m not even sure how to feel.”

“Don’t think about it.”

“Yeah, no. You’re right. I wish Languilla could do it instead. I miss her.”

“You’d leave our baby in the arms of a violent eel woman?”

“Better than a French catgirl. Langi was always there for me. I wish I could have…”

“…told her?”

She turned around to face Blyen.

“Yes. I wish I could have told her the whole truth… but I couldn’t. I didn’t.”

“…cancer was a good excuse. You can’t blame yourself for that.”

Serìna growled, pinched his nose, shook it among her fingers.

“I can, Blyen Chill. I can blame myself for whatever I want. I’m a free woman, not anyone’s property. And you can’t tell me how to feel.”

“Point taken.”

Their eyes locked. Wet eyes. Towering over wry smiles.

“How long…”

“Thirty seconds.”

In that instant, her tail warped back inside her body, her fox ears melted into their human counterpart. She had to do it, right. Keeping her real shape would have caused Blyen too many issues later, if the cops got involved. So, she hid it, turning back into a ‘normal woman’, one that basked in the arms of the man she loved. Their lips joined. Their tongues danced. Their fingers tangled. Thirty seconds. A blink. An eternity. An infinitesimal infinite time. A century, an instant. A millennium, a pulse. Twenty. Fifteen. Ten. Their embrace never ended. Their bodies never untangled. Nine. Eight. Seven. Six. Five. Their mouths left the comfort of each other. Their eyes locked again.

“Bly…? I feel… tired.”

Serìna leaned on him, rested her cheek on his chest. Her irises grew dimmer, her eyelids slowly slid down.

“So… so… tired.”

He caressed her hair one more time, holding her and their kid in his arms. Trembling. He was trembling. Every single one of his muscles was trembling. His lips were trembling. His teeth. His lungs. His heart. Every single atom in his body was shaken to the core.

“Seri…?”

His fingers caressed her blushed cheek, her peach-smooth skin.

“…thank you, Bly…”

Her voice broke down. Every syllable sputtered. Every letter crawling through her fangs in a slow slur.

“…thank… you… for…”

Silence.

Nothing else but

silence

Her breathe.

Gone.

Her heartbeat.

Gone.

Her warmth, though, lingered longer. Warmth that dispersed through Blyen’s skin.

In his arms, the doll, the human called Serìna Fumiko.

Had just expired.

Leaving only emptiness in her place.

And the hopeless cry of an infant,

waking up right after her mother fell asleep

for the last time.

^____^

< — ** — >

v

Every funeral worth that name always happened in the rain. Gray sky. Rain pouring down on the crowd. Mixing the tears with the water from above, paying one last tribute to the dead. God, though, couldn’t be that merciful.

A shining sun blazed in the midst of October, scorching the ground in a record heatwave. Not one cloud. Not one shred of shadow. It was as if the sun wanted its premium spot in that last show, front seat in witnessing the final act of a tragedy. Blyen would have cursed, if he still had energies to. But no, his eyes as dry as the desert. There was no more tears to shed. All he could do was tremble, shake, trying to contain those feelings, to stop them from ripping his head open.

Renzo and Claire being there helped. A lot. Claire lulling his Summer, holding the kid in her arms, while Renzo managed their own two children. A tiny island of happiness in a sea of sorrow.

What didn’t help, though, was the eel woman.

Kneeling in front of the gravestone.

Sobbing without crying.

Because eels couldn’t cry, they didn’t have tear ducts. But wailing?

She could do that.

She was doing it.

Emptying her lungs.

Screaming so loudly that her voice breached the sky.

“Seriiiii! Seriiii!”

A high pitched squeal, broken by guttural noises. No, eels couldn’t cry, there was no point in it. But the pain they felt was as real as that of any other living being.

“Seri! Don’t leave me, idiot! I need you! Seriiiii!”

Broken. Bent. Her head closed among her hands, her breath ragged. Blyen’s heart shrunk, crushed by an invisible hand that held it in its grip. Languilla, she was called. The woman who fought for Serìna, that helped her get good at her job. One titan, one monster that a common person would have found hideous, one that Serìna trusted like a sister.

A sister denied closure.

But still there.

Mourning her friend, like a regular human would.

Blood burst through Blyen’s brain, as he crunched his knuckles. All that propaganda talk about mutants being different and incapable of positive feelings was a load of bollocks. Heinz-Harald Boost couldn’t get buried six feet under soon enough, for all the damage his press machine did to public perception. But, wait, was he even still alive? No, alive or not, that didn’t matter at all. Human supremacists, all of them bastards, deserved a fate worse than death. So, if Boost were already dead, Blyen hoped that his remains could be tortured for eternity in the afterlife.

And, if there were no afterlife and, instead, the world was just a milkshake of information, he hoped that information could be deleted as soon as reasonably possible, erased forever to never be recovered ever again.

His hands relaxed, his heart slowed down. His eyes glanced around the small courtyard. Not many people, no. But that was fine. They kept the ceremony private, collected, small. Like Serìna wanted. Simple. No bells and whistles. Plain, even. Like she wanted to be. Wearing pullovers and jeans combos, muted colors that complemented her reserved personality. She found happiness in that simplicity, a happiness she shared with Blyen for eight long, short years.

Happiness shattered in the span of one night.

Languilla rose up, turned her neck around to face Blyen. Her eyes locked with his, her expression unreadable.

“…why?”

Her words slithered through her teeth, through her lips too.

“Why did you let her… do this?”

“Do what?”

She growled, towered over the human that stood before her.

“You knew she was dying!”

“…yes.”

“And you fucking filled her womb instead of trying to cure her?!”

Blyen breathed. Breathed. His breath paced quickly, his knuckles, all of his muscles, trembled. His eyes shot wide open, his teeth clattered.

“She asked me for it! She decided it! She wanted it!”

A shriek. A primal cry that pierced the heavens, that echoed in the small courtyard.

Breathe. Breathe. His knuckles ached, his muscles, his bones too. Everything ached.

“…yes, that’s what she wanted—what we wanted. If we didn’t do that, all of her resolve…”

Languilla looked down, her heart was pounding in her chest, her eyes twitching, her throat aching. Her arms closed around Blyen, catching him in a hug. Trembling. Shaking.

“I’m sorry, Chill. I…”

“I know how much she meant to you.”

“No, you don’t, but that’s fine. A thickheaded idiot can’t get it... but you were her thickheaded idiot. You get a pass.”

Blyen’s eyes ached. Dry. Still dry. All the tears had already left them. Languilla couldn’t cry. He had cried too much. So, they just hugged, in silence, in front of the grave. In front of that simple headstone, without ornaments or elaborate motifs. The one Serìna herself chose.

“…yes, you’re a thickheaded idiot, Chill, but you respected Seri’s decisions… more than you should have. Fuck, that gal could have used a reality check or two.”

“…all that salmon…”

“…huh, huh, always with rice and seaweed…”

“…yeah, that couldn’t be all that healthy, right?”

“She looked better than you, at least.”

“Who wouldn’t?”

They hugged closer, their expressions shifting just a little bit in a way that was hard to describe. Blyen broke the spell, left the comfort of Languilla’s arms, went back to the gravestone, kneeled in front of it. As if getting the cue, Renzo nodded to Claire, who nodded to Reno. The nods spread out, until everyone understood. Then, silently, the small crowd started to thin. Steps moving away, slowly, tracing paths in the dirt towards the gate. One by one, leaving Blyen and Serìna alone, in the anomalous warmth of that October day. Languilla hugged Blyen once more, before also moving away, following the flow. Claire hopped close, kneeling near him. A baby was complaining in her arms, waving her short hands while held in that unfamiliar hug. Blyen’s baby. Serìna’s baby. Their little Summer.

“Blyen, I think…”

“Yes, thanks.”

Claire nodded, left Summer in Blyen’s embrace. Then, she silently walked away, joining Renzo and her father on the other side of the fence. Solitude surrounded Blyen. A feeling of loneliness, of emptiness. Everyone was gone. Everyone except one person, standing a couple of meters away from him, with a not-yet-lit cigarette among her lips. The undertaker who oversaw Serìna’s funeral. She was a blond woman in her very late thirties, unfazed by the wrinkles and the first white strands. Not a word escaped her mouth for the duration of the ceremony. Her long black trench coat looked like a prop out of an old movie, and yet she donned it with some sort of elegance. Blyen’s eyes turned to her, met her bored gaze.

“I owe you one, Dr. Crawford.”

The woman shrugged, chewed the tip of her cigarette.

“Nah, you paid me enough for that—way more than I asked for. Don’t worry, though, her secret is in good hands.”

“What secret?”

She grinned at him, in what could have been called a terrifying, annoying grin.

“Yeah, right, what secret? There’s no secret, right? Your gal died of pancreatic cancer, as unfortunate as it is. Truly a sad story, Mr. Chill.”

A coroner doubling as an undertaker. An interesting specimen, that Dr. Alina Crawford. One that made his predicament, his burden, easier to deal with. Of course Serìna’s premature death would have triggered an inquiry. Of course the police would have tried to find out what caused her untimely demise. That was, however, the one saving grace of knowing exactly when it was going to happen. All what was left to do was making sure the right coroner was on duty that day and contacting said coroner. Explaining everything to her. Asking her to cover up for them. Paying her upfront for the funeral—because said coroner also doubled as a licensed undertaker.

One with a wallet where her heart was supposed to be, which arguably made things even more straightforward. Her eyes turned to Summer, the small child lying in Blyen’s arms.

“They look so cute when they’re small, then you start changing diapers and you want to kill yourself. Guh, even my little Jean looked so innocent—and look what she’s become! I’m lucky she hasn’t made me a grandma yet!”

“Isn’t she, like, twenty-two?”

“Yeah, yeah, she is. Which, considered how many guys she humped without getting pregnant, is already quite a record. I wish she didn’t take that from me, but it is what it is. Sucks to be a single mother.”

She relaxed her shoulders, bit her cigarette again. It was unfortunate, really, that Blyen Chill sat in such an uncomfortable age range. Thirty-two, about the same age as Veckert. Just a little too young for her and a little too old for her daughter. Such a valuable bachelor slightly out of grasp. Well, not really an impossible burden—she had seen ten-years-removed couples work exceedingly fine. Still, quite outside of her own comfort zone, good only for a one-night-short commitment, if at all. That was indeed a pity. A level-headed and sensible man like Blyen Chill was a hard find. Now, though, as a single father, he’d probably have flocks of ladies chasing him like rabid dogs. Or, at least, that’s what Dr. Crawford thought. She had been on the receiving end of the same gender-reversed situation, after bringing Jean into that cold, harsh world. None of her so-called pretenders lasted more than one month. It was due either to her abrasive personality or to her extreme standoffishness. Maybe, though, they were just dicks who couldn’t stand having a woman handle things better than them. Yeah, that was also a thing, one that happened more than once for sure.

Dr. Crawford bit her cigarette one more time. In hindsight, maybe, just maybe, settling for a woman would have been a better choice. Shame Veckert was taken now and that none of the other gals she knew struck her fancy. That neko dad, though… okay, grandpa, not dad, and he was, like, forty-eight, and, like, outside of the Venn diagram that encompassed her favorite races (nekos were only good for casual sex, after all), but, absent other opportunities…

She shook her head. That was neither the time nor the place to ponder on her terrible sentimental life. She turned her attention back to the small kid in Blyen’s arms, as the hand of her father rested on a simple, plain headstone—one Dr. Crawford designed with the help of her go-to engraver and, of course, her real customer.

Serìna Fumiko.

A young doll who lived her life to the fullest. One that went out on her terms.

Dr. Crawford shrugged, waved her hand at the man and his daughter.

“Well, off I go too. Things to see, people to meet, corpses to bury. I got another funeral in two hours. Full week, Chill. Full week.”

Blyen didn’t even reply. He nodded in silence, though, without even looking at her. Dr. Crawford stepped away, finally lighting her cigarette. A column of smoke emerged from its tip, floating up the clouds. In the distance, she could see a short hill with a tree. Not too high, though, mostly just a mound. On its top, though, two silhouettes caught her attention. They were too far for her to grasp their details, but she would have bet that they were two women—two young women. One with dark skin and white hair, the other with electric blue hair and fair complexion. Hand in hand. Dr. Crawford didn’t think much of it. She exhaled again, letting the nicotine do the reasoning. Yeah, right, who cared? There were always curious bystanders around funerals, it was a given—a rule of nature. Death was as fascinating as it was revolting. Morons slowed down on the highway to ogle at freshly crashed cars and wounded bodies, when not causing the incidents themselves. So, the image of the two strangers watching from afar didn’t faze her in the slightest.

If anything, it felt sad.

Maybe they knew her, Serìna. Maybe they wanted to join and greet her one last time. Maybe they simply couldn’t. Wanted fugitives. Petty criminals. Something like that. Likely, of course.

Unless they too were dolls.

Dr. Crawford drew another puff. Yeah, that was also a chance. Very outlandish colors, those two had. Even from afar, that was kind of clear. Two dolls watching an older model being buried, a reminder of the clock ticking on their heads. Tick tock, tick tock, life goes on until it doesn’t. Another puff, more smoke for the pile. Dr. Crawford walked away in silence, taking her gaze away from the odd couple.

“Will someone pay for your funeral, gals? I hope so.”

That was all her mind had to say, before finally leaving the graveyard behind and reaching the mourners on the other side of the fence.

Blyen too rose up from his knees, keeping Summer, his Summer, close to his chest, caressing her delicate skin as she cooed in his arms. His fingers touched the marble of the headstone, moved down the engraved name. A name. All what was left of the woman who shared almost a decade with him.

“Good night, sweetheart…”

His voice broke down. His heart ached.

“Good… night.”

One single tear.

One single tear flowed down his cheek.

Fell on the dirt.

Then another.

And another.

And another one.

A gentle summer rain, a drizzle in the middle of autumn.

His last gift to the doll, the fox, the woman, the partner, the mother that he’d never have back.

A one of a kind human being known as Serìna Fumiko.

One that the world took away from them too soon.