The Yellow Python stands, his gaze stuck again on the broken forms of what look like those he was closest to, broken once again. The pain of what had brought him feeling more than alive in the cacophony of the fake circus. A part of him pangs in the sight of his fallen comrades, but as he looks on something comes to him.
Each of the mockeries on display seem to be made of wisps, lacking physical form. They are images, a test to prove correct. No more real than wisps of gas floating through the air.
“It’s not easy, not in the slightest. I still see it replay in my head again and again. I did everything that I could, even though it didn’t do enough to save them. The ledge to madness is easy to fall into, spiral into a path that will choke the life out of me.”
He looks downwards, reflecting for a brief moment as the thoughts start to come together, condensing from the foggy parts of his mind.
“But they aren’t here. Despite the visions, despite what I see here, it’s only a trick. What has happened cannot be changed, cannot be altered. No matter what my mind tries to come up with, it’s all smoke and mirrors. You have to move forward, to choose a fate of your own making.”
He faces the black eyes of Gemini, voice low but confident in his answer to the question she asked him. There is a steeled look to his form, understanding building a new resolve that was not there previously.
“I won’t. I see these as the illusions that they are, and while I may have failed I cannot let them haunt my every action. If I only focus on them, it will lead to a downward spiral, trapped in the illusions and chains in my mind. They will become a trap just for me.”
“Which is exactly what Nox wants. He’ll throw any sort of mixture or chemical to try and influence what we’ll do. He’s had no qualms on who he tries them on, and haunts each of his victims uniquely. But they have no substance.”
“All he can bring is smoke and mirrors, gas with no real body. All it takes is the right amount of willpower, and you blow away any fumes that he could really bring. He hides behind a mask because nothing remains once you peer behind his veil.”
He watches as Gemini grins with an unnerving smile, stepping back. The lights of the faux carnival skitter back into swarms of insects, vanishing back into the gloom of the ruins. His gaze lingers for just that moment as the facsimiles of his old friends collapse into insects, swallowed by the shadows until there is only him standing in the wreckage of some forgotten building.
Giving no more time to ghosts, he turns and makes his way back out of the No Man’s Land, a renewed fire in his gut.