8Ptolomaea: the third round of Cocytus, named for Ptolemy
Reserved for traitors to their guests
If Madison's last words about Vivienne shattered Emma's heart, then being called a monster and having the motive for her actions thrown back in her face stomped on what's left of the pieces.
Madison locks herself up in a room and ignores all of her mother's pleas to open up. Sometimes Emma just sits by the door and listens as Madison pulls up the videos Vivienne had sent her during those sojourns in Antarctica. Clips of her and fellow researchers in their downtime just dicking around, as scientists do when left to their own devices. Vivienne wandering the frozen tundra to keep herself from going stir-crazy and encountering a lone seal; the seal yells at her and she yells back.
"And here is the magic happens," Vivienne's voice intones over what must be Outpost 32's main entrance. "Lasciate ogni speranza, voi ch'entrate."
Fucking Dante. Emma can't sleep for fear of nightmares; Monster Zero's teeth ripping and tearing into a frozen corpse like a meat grinder. Six fiery red eyes glaring down at her, hissing accusations as the middle gnaws, and gnaws, and gnaws...
"Oh, for god's sake, woman," Jonah quips as he walks by. He doesn't break stride or look at her. "Get over yourself and go to sleep."
Easy for him to say.
After a while Emma forces herself to stand, but her movements are impeded with one leg having fallen asleep. She leans her head against the door, trying to convince herself she's just waiting for the leg to wake up and she'll get to bed. There's no sound beyond the metal barrier. She raises a hand to knock one more time. She hesitates. Emma sighs, hand falling uselessly to her side.
'Abandon all hope,' indeed.
Limping down the hall, Emma hunts for an empty room to get some semblance of rest in; she doesn't need Jonah's crew to scrutinize and whisper about her. She's all too aware of what people think of her mental state. Emma recalls Mark accusing her of being out of her goddamn mind. Ilene must be calling her a bitch so many times by now. Serizawa had been composed even when warning her about the danger she's gotten into, but Emma can only imagine what he's going through without...
Without Vivienne.
It's Andrew all over again. After San Francisco she couldn't even look at small, irrelevant things without being reminded of him, and now the same rings true for Vivienne. She's... she was too good for this world. Madison's right. Vivienne had been a good friend to her during the divorce, and even well before that. Emma remembers how Vivienne would embrace her, how deceptively strong she was for such a tiny thing. How her eyes crinkle when she smiles, how light and gentle her laugh is, how effortlessly she can make you feel like everything's going to be fine. How she can make everything better just by being there.
And now she can't do any of those things anymore.
Emma's found an empty room and resigns herself to another restless night. She nearly jumps out of her skin when passing a mirror, because in the dim lighting it looks as if Vivienne's watching her from the glass.
You killed her. Madison's words still echo in the back of her head. She looks at her reflection, not recognizing the haggard creature staring blankly back at her, unable to meet its eyes. She was your friend, and how do you repay her kindness? She deserved better than that. She deserved better than YOU.
Emma tears her gaze away. She went down with her ship. She was a sacrifice for the greater good. This is bigger than any of us can understand.
Or are you too much of a coward to accept the truth?
Emma shakes her head, trying to shut the nagging voices up and situates herself on the cot, tries to focus on the here and now. Maybe, just maybe, sleep will unearth some clue to help her figure out what went wrong with Monster Zero.
"You look as bad as I feel."
Emma's eyes shoot open she wrinkles her nose at the smell of ozone and… meat? Something smells like meat that's been frozen for too long. That something is in here with her. Slowly she turns her gaze to see a figure sitting Indian-style at the foot of the cot. Their clothes are torn to shreds, one arm barely hanging onto its socket by a few bloody strings of muscle. Beads of cold sweat form on Emma's brow as she looks further up and sees a familiar face, the left side gored to reveal teeth and muscle tissue.
"Boo," Vivienne greets.
"JESUS!" Emma shrieks and tumbles off the cot in a panic.
Emma doesn't believe in ghosts, or the afterlife, and scrambles over herself to justify the presence of one very certainly dead Vivienne Graham sitting on her cot like a girl at a Halloween sleepover.
The thing that looks like Vivienne smiles… or, tries to. It feels more like a sardonic, vaguely manic tooth-baring grimace on the gored and bloody face of the friend she'd left behind (left to die) on the ice. The left eye is completely red from a burst blood vessel, the green iris gone dark. Something black – necrosis, frostbite, or something – inks its way up the visible patches of skin under her shredded clothing like a bolt of lightning in slow-motion.
"You should see the other guys," the revenant quips, her already velvety British accent turned into a sepulchral rasp.
"You're not real," Emma gasps out. "Mark was right. I've gone completely insane."
"About time you noticed," the revenant shrugs one shoulder. "If you need convincing that I'm not a hallucination, I can tell you Andrew's favorite yokai – onikuma."
Oh, Christ. Vivienne would know that. She and Serizawa practically introduced Andrew to the concept of yokai. Emma backs herself into an adjacent wall, hand over her mouth, and fights to keep from screaming. She blinks and suddenly Vivienne – or whatever it is – is standing in the middle of the room. The way she moves is all wrong.
"I leave home for a few days and look what happens." She's remarkably glib for being dead. "You've been busy. Not sure I care for your new friends."
Emma's brain is going a mile a minute, but all she can think to ask is, "How are you here?"
"I don't know. Maybe I'm just a chemical reaction in your brain. Maybe I'm haunting you. But, I might as well make the most of my time here. So for my first question, the million-dollar question: What the bloody, bloody, bloody hell do you think you're doing?"
If it's not the words, then there's something in the ghost's tone that puts Emma on the defensive.
"I'm saving the world!"
Vivienne feigns surprise. "Oh, I didn't realize! Is that what's been going on? You broke out Dragon Satan to be the star of your edgy Captain Planet reboot?"
The revenant blinks to the opposite end of the room, more passionately annoyed than anything. Good. If this really is Vivienne, that means she's not angry. Not yet.
"The eldritch abomination that can create hurricanes of biblical proportion and happily vaporizes whatever poor sods he likes, oh and yes – he has a sadistic streak going from here to Mars! Our hero, kids! Welcome to fucking Exterminatus! Hope you like the color yellow!"
Emma stands her ground, rises to meet the spirit on even footing. "Look, I know things haven't exactly gone according to plan for me, but—"
"You don't say! Since when have things ever gone according to plan with regards to the Titans? What was it Dr. Serizawa said – something about the arrogance of man? You didn't just open Pandora's Box or release a genie from its lamp, Emma. In case you haven't noticed, you just caused a literal end-of-the-world scenario! So tell me, what possessed you to put this plan into motion?"
Confronted with arguments against her sanity on all fronts, Emma knows she can't use the same point made to the Argo's crew – that whole plan having blown up spectacularly in her face in ways she never considered. The more Vivienne pushes her the more her own motives begin to sound completely asinine to her own ears, till she's forced to finally admit the turning point that led to this mess.
"I'm doing this for Andrew!"
There's a long beat. Vivienne's face can't seem to decide between incredulity and black rage.
She doesn't say so much as growl, "What."
Vivienne doesn't anger easily. At first Emma had thought she couldn't get angry. But she'd learned the hard way a few years ago, during the worst of her fallout with Mark, when Maddie would spend time with her favorite unrelated aunt, that Vivienne is – was – the type of person who, when sufficiently pissed off, would laugh and smile. Suffice to say, Emma is a little terrified whenever Vivienne Graham's smile becomes all teeth and no warmth.
And right now she's showing a lot of teeth.
Vivienne breaks out into a rasping, wheezing, disbelieving cackle and gives Emma a slow clap.
"Em, Em, Em. Are you aware of the definition of insanity? It's doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. By that logic, Dr. Serizawa and I should be the loonies after five years of sitting through every conceivable argument for killing the Titans – with no offered ideas on how exactly to do that, mind – and yet you. Oh, YOU.
"For Andrew, you say. As if you're the only one who's suffered. Then tell me, what about the people of Isla de Mara? How many lost their homes and families when you woke up Rodan? How many mothers lost their Andrews? Did you even wait for them to evacuate, or were you too consumed by your own delusions to even care?"
"You wouldn't understand, Vivienne," Emma tells her. "You're not a mother."
In an instant Emma is knocked flat on her back, stunned, seeing stars, and feeling like she's been hit by a car. Did – did she just get punched out by a fucking ghost, or hallucination, or–? No, she's just feeling light-headed from all the chaos and stress of recent events, she's collapsed from exhaustion, she's—
"How dare you." Vivienne's voice goes whisper-quiet but rumbles with the force of a coming storm. "You have the balls. To tell me to my face. That I wouldn't understand. Because of that?"
Her short, petite frame reappears in Emma's vision and kneels over her. The mirthless, sinister snarl of a grin is still there, only now her eyes are blazing with wrath and Emma forgets that Vivienne is dead; forgets that she can't actually do any harm. This is the anger of a kind, patient, gentle woman. Emma imagines herself as a mouse in the coils of a serpent.
When the good ones go angry, they're brutal.
Vivienne continues. "Need I remind you who took care of Madison while you dove into work and Mark drowned himself in the bottom of a bottle? She's not my blood, but I care for her like she is. I don't need to be a mother to understand that."
Something like jealousy rears its head in Emma's chest, remembering what Maddie had said to her. Look how far the best of Monarch has fallen; feeling her motherhood threatened by the dead.
"You want to know something?" Emma snaps, feeling bold. "Do you know what Madison told me not long ago, when we found out you died? She said she wished you were her mom instead of me."
Vivienne purses her torn lips, whistles long and low. "Wow."
"Yeah."
"Well, to be fair, were I Madison's mother I would never have colluded with eco-terrorists, betrayed my friends, released that freak from my outpost and slaughtered millions, or lied to her. And I thought Mark was a real piece of work – I died saving him, by the way. You're welcome."
"Yeah, thanks, but are you seriously saying that lying to my child is a worse offense than waking up Monster Zero?"
"I'm just doing it to spite him, but it's up there. To be rude to him is a courtesy."
The fluorescent lights buzz and flicker. All smarm and rage evaporate when Vivienne's glazed stare focuses on some point beyond Emma's field of vision. Though she wants to see what her undead guest is looking at, Emma is suddenly gripped by an intense dread she can feel in her bone marrow. Whatever Vivienne is looking at right now, is not safe. To keep looking at Vivienne, in the light, is safe. To move her eyes even an inch from where they rest now would spell certain death. The last time she'd felt fear like this was…
At this I turned and saw in front of me
Beneath my feet, a lake that, frozen fast
Had lost the look of water and seemed glass
The dark rot spreads up Vivienne's neck, to her mouth. "Oh, here he comes again. Slithering through what's left of my brain. The head is the seat of the soul." Without changing expression, or maybe even noticing, Vivienne claws at the rot on her arm so hard it would draw blood from living flesh. "You can't stop what you've unleashed."
"With the ORCA—"
"It doesn't matter. He may look like a Titan but he is not like them. Alter the frequency all you like. Plead with him, pray to him, offer him sacrifices, nothing will work. He does not bargain or reason. Broadcast the ORCA, and all he'll see is another alpha to put down."
By now the rot has reached her blood-red eye and the pupil clouds into a golden cataract; Vivienne covers her mouth with a hand. That's an old tic of hers when she's thinking or listening to someone, but this time it feels like she's hiding something… or holding something back?
Emma decides to risk movement despite the earlier dread, pushes herself to a sitting position.
"Vivienne," she starts, "You probably knew Monster Zero better than anyone. I don't have the right to ask this, but if there's something you can tell me, anything at all that can help me do something to fix this, please…"
The revenant blinks slowly at her. Vivienne has never had a malicious bone in her body, but Emma doesn't know if indirectly causing her friend's death has changed that. They just stare at each other a while, Emma pleadingly and Vivienne considering. Emma switches tactics.
"If not for me, then for Maddie."
Expression softening, Vivienne lowers her hand and speaks. Whatever's happened to her vocal chords renders her once soothing voice into a chthonic death rattle forced up from as low and deep as can be produced and though it sounds wrong coming out of Vivienne's mouth, it's strangely… hypnotic.
"Bodhisattva han nya ha ra mit ta
Fu i shiki shiki soku ze ku soku ze ku
Ko ku chu mu shiki mu ju so gyo"
At first it only registers in Emma's head as gibberish, but as Vivienne repeats it begins to sound vaguely familiar. A mantra. 'Bodhisattva' – a Buddhist mantra! But which one?
One of the lights suddenly explodes like a firecracker, interrupting, and a slight electrical shock goes through Emma's body.
"Nothing ominous about that," Vivienne deadpans.
"What was that?"
"My three-headed parole officer. I've probably done something to piss him off."
Vivienne rises to her feet – at least Emma thinks she does. There's something dreamlike and otherworldly in the way she moves now. She's leaving. The realization suddenly hits Emma like a freight train that regardless of whether this whole experience is real or in her head, this will be the last time she ever sees her old friend. This is the last time she'll have the chance to say—
"I'm sorry."
Emma knows the gesture is meaningless now, but it's got Vivienne's attention. The ghost cranes her neck around to regard her with one blood-red eye.
"I am so, so sorry. You've been nothing short of a saint to me, and I betrayed you. Betrayed everyone. Maddie loves you so much, and Serizawa… I just wish I could…"
Emma's voice cracks and she trails off at the end. Vivienne's eyes lower to the floor sadly. Then she shrugs her good shoulder.
"It's early yet. There's always a chance for redemption."
"I don't deserve having you for a friend," Emma sobs. "Why did you have to die and not me?"
Vivienne's eyes meet hers. Then her lips curl into a crooked grin and her good green eye winks shut. Her teeth are pointed.
"Maybe it's my turn to be contained."
Before Emma can ask what she means by that, the draconic mood vanishes from Vivienne's face and she gives her a parting smile – her old, beautiful one that promised things would get better. The apparition turns away and waves farewell without looking back.
"Prepare yourself, Doctor. Ragnarök awaits."
Emma wakes feeling no less rested than she'd been a few hours ago. She rubs both hands down her face, replays what transpired in her head. Just a dream. Pulling her boots back on Emma gets up to stretch, makes her way to the door. She stops when the unmistakable sound of cracking glass hits her ears. Emma looks down and her pulse spikes.
Glass from an exploded fluorescent light.
When Madison wakes up she overhears her mother and Jonah discussing their next course of action. Emma suggests the ORCA, broadcasting it from Fenway to distract Monster Zero and buy them enough time to figure out just what the hell it is. Madison examines a map of Monarch bunkers, notices how close they are now to Fenway Park. Now there's an idea, even if Jonah doesn't think so. But screw him. She's not going to sit here and wait until the end of the world blows over.
She's given a sudden jolt when her phone vibrates. Whipping it out of her pocket Madison squints at the screen, not understanding what she's looking at. This can't be right. But... she's heard about things like this happening; phone calls or texts from beyond the grave. A wave of goosebumps rolls up her body, but it's not a bad feeling. It almost feels like, things are going to be okay. That someone's got her back.
Madison looks at the text one more time before she starts formulating a plan.
Aunt Viv
Go raise some hell, slick.