God Bless Catastrophe - Chapter Seventeen | In Case You Haven't Heard, I'm Sick
[FINAL CHAPTER -Make Sure To Read Authors' Notes]
Pairing: Tora x Saga, allusions to Shou x Hiroto, Shou x OFC
(throughout entire story | BOLDED = specific to chapter)
Rating: R (solid)
Genre: Suspense, Drama, Action, Angst, Dark, AU, Chaptered
Story Summary: Sanity comes in many forms, but so does insanity. We all walk the line of both, a delicate balance of the pieces that constitute our make up - mentally, emotionally and physically. How many pieces can be removed, or added, before the balance is entirely destroyed? Where does the catalyst come from? Is there a bridge to repair damage done? Hiroto is both plagued by and coming to understand that maybe these sorts of questions can’t be answered.
"I’m not crazy…are you?"
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Hiroto capped and set his pen down on the cool table, letting his eyes trail up to the window. He waited a beat, knowing full well that the thick eyebrowed man stood on the other side. As he sat quietly and patiently, the door opened. He flipped through the dozens of pages and held them out for the man to take. There was a sour look on Hiroto’s face as the papers exchanged hands. It wasn’t unlike most of their encounters now.
Payton annoyed him because he continued to act as if it had never happened. Hiroto could recall each action as if it were but mere hours before. He remembered the way the body looked in the alley. He remembered when Payton frantically arrived and explained what had happened to Nao. He remembered Shiki’s aggression at Tora for acting out of turn a second night in a row. He remembered the look on Ash’s face when he insisted that everyone should be more concerned about Nao and he could recall every word Shou had uttered the night Aiko died. He also could still smell the blood on him, both metaphorical and physical, as well as the horrific images of bodies pinned to the ceiling. And the fire. The fire which was what damned him here. Had he not set the fire he would have actually had a foundation in calling Payton the crazy one; but no one believed a pyromaniac. Though Hiroto hardly considered himself such, it was still what the outside world saw looking in.
“It says the same thing…again. Just like last time and before that.” Hiroto’s voice was taut in his throat and he felt his lips slim. “You know the truth and you know what’s in there is the truth.”
Payton felt his hands tighten around the notebook and he pulled it close to his chest before he puckered his lips and shook his head. “I know, Ogata. I know that you believe it is the truth...but in reality the truth is that you’re delusional and that these hallucinations you believe you’ve had are detrimental to your health. You are a victim to them and I intend to help you break away.” He said softly, pushing the glasses he wore when working up further on the bridge of his nose.
“Stop calling me that.” Hiroto barked sharply before he pulled his chin in closer to his chest. “You’ve never called me that until we got here. You never…this isn’t you. This coat and this place. You don’t belong here either Payton-san. You’re not suited for labs or lies. The Payton Lionel that I knew fixed wounds caused by vampires...he tried to save lives. He didn't hide away and pretend as if people weren't dying. This is one magnificent lie. You know it.” He added pulling his arms up to fold them over his chest though Payton merely shook his head.
“I will not feed these fantasies, Ogata. We’ve talked about this; every day I have told you I will not succumb to your mythical world and my role in it. I will be blunt with you. You’re delusional; though I’ve used that word many times before. It’s as true now as it’s ever been; perhaps the more I say it, the better. You are misguide by these stories you’ve created to cover up what’s really going on. You’re sick. Very sick. It's not your fault in the least bit. But I’ll work with you, I’m not giving up.” There was an edge to Payton’s tone that infuriated Hiroto, it was almost as if Payton were passively shrugging off a child.
“It’s not fantasy. It’s not story. It’s real. Just stop…stop it Payton; you’re not fooling me. I know what you’re doing. I KNOW it!” He almost howled and Payton straightened in his spot, squaring his shoulders. Payton’s expression did not waiver and it was clear that he was unwilling to yield on the subject. His resolve was strong and he was positive his diagnosis was accurate.
“We’ll right this Ogata, we will. Though first we have to work through your fantasies and bring you back to reality. That’s the first step to your recovery.” Payton told him mildly. “I don’t believe in vampires, these things you call visuigo or magic. And I’m going to help you come to terms with the fact that these fabrications are covering for some larger issue. You can incorporate the ideas into your life, but as allegory - not as fact. You’re lines of understanding are blurred right now. We’ll work on that too.”
He was a nervous man and it showed right then, regardless of the sort of dedicated and knowledgeable doctor he was. He gave the orderly a little nod of his head and they came closer to Hiroto who asked firmly in a soft voice, “Please, let me out of here. I’m…not crazy. You know...you know I'm not. You know I'm not sick."
"Yes." Payton nodded his head, eyes set firmly on Hiroto. "Yes, you are. Your time spent in the mountains on so many occasions proved to be fatal for you, I'm afraid. This disease can be controlled, Ogata. This is not a death sentence, you must understand. We can help you--I can help you if you just cooperate."
Hiroto had tears glistening in his eyes as he shook his head roughly, reaching up and haphazardly running his fingers through his soft locks. "No...no. You have to stop this, you have to let me go. Nao-san...he's hurt and you have to help him. He's sick, not me...let me out." Hiroto choked through his hysterics. "Let me out!"
It wasn't just about Nao, in Hiroto's mind. It was about the fact that, not only had he not notice Nao's attachment sooner but that he had been responsible for Nao's being in the hospital from the fire. There were all the people in the building, the slaves - the sheep - the bleeders that he had brought harm to. All of that played on his mind despite the fact that he'd heard Payton say that Nao simply suffered from smoke inhalation as he was in the club when the fire started and that though no one died, he knew that to be a lie as well, there were still sever consequences for his actions.
“Take him.” Payton said, unable to meet Hiroto’s eye when he issued the direction. “I’ll read it and we’ll discuss it in our next session.” Payton turned and said to Hiroto’s retreating back as the orderly guided him away. Payton sighed uncomfortably in defeat when the second doctor, a peer to him, entered the room.
“Do you think you’re in it again?”
Payton looked down at the book in his arms. He squeezed it tighter to himself subconsciously and gave a little almost imperceivable nod. “Probably." He said simply.
She gave a return nod. “How many times do you think it says it?”
Payton’s eyes lifted and his chin tipped up so he was looking at her through the bottom half of his glasses. He pursed his lips before answering. “One hundred and thirteen.” He said passively. “Last time he wrote the phrase ‘I’m not crazy’ one hundred and twelve times, before that it was one hundred and eleven.”
“Does he document the story the same every time?” She shook her head.
Payton gave a small nod. “Absolutely. If there’s one thing he is - it’s convicted. He’s got a ghastly amount of conviction and resolve. He really believes this. But all sick people do. They always believe themselves. Its why they're here.”
“But...it’s strange that he would keep including you in these memories. I've never seen something like that.” She said passively with a small shrug. There was little real value to her words, it was more idle conversation to fill the empty air but Payton stiffened in his spot.
Payton shook his head, his eyes moving over to the door. “Not really. It’s fairly typical for patients to latch onto their doctors in this way. It’s sometimes subconsciously a parental role in which he’s thinking I’m scolding him or holding him back and that I’ve been part of his life all along. It’s a sort of trick of the brain because I’m comfortable to him in a place of discomfort."
"It’s the degeneration the disease is causing…so much of his brain tissue has been destroyed in the last few weeks. Lyme disease, you know, is curable and if caught soon enough, its damaging effects can be maintained. I’m afraid he’s simply at the mercy of numbers. There will always be someone that cannot recover from such brain destruction; we didn’t catch it fast enough. He can’t separate reality from fantasy and the only way to fix that is to trick the part of him that believes in fantasy. To convince it that it is wrong. We, for all intents and purposes, have to take away his imagination but not in a way that destroys his creativity and personality but controls false truths his mind makes up. There is a difference between blissful daydream and a delusional belief.”
Payton licked his lips, glancing backwards to where he had left Hiroto. A frown crossed over his face and he shook his head. “I will be in his writings until that happens because his brain is trying its hardest to make reality fit into his psychotic musings. Until he realizes that what he thinks happened didn’t, I will still be there, just a face that fills in a blank one.” Payton was speaking simply because medicine was what he did best and if questioned, even at the smallest degree, about it, he offered everything and anything he could.
His coworker offered him a little nod in the same nonchalant and disinterested way. She was passive and simply trying to be polite. “Ash seems to be doing better. You should take him home Payton. His nervous breakdowns have subsided. He would likely do better in a familiar area. I don’t understand why you stay here, in Japan I mean. Don't you have a family that misses you?” She had moved back to the door as if ready to leave after giving her own two cents. However she paused when she reached the threshold. She turned back causally, just as complacent. “What I don’t get is why you took him. Why you took him and now he writes pages and pages of fantastical stories in which you’re part of.”
Payton straightened in his spot. A heavy pink set of clouds crossed his cheeks warmly and he offered a small, almost defeated, smile. He gave a little shake of his head. “I - I guess…I just wanted to help. Right from the beginning, that’s all I wanted.” He drew the notebook out to look at its glossy surface and he sighed slightly.
“I wanted to help him.”
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Authors' Notes
Mandy: Whew….so…here we are; at the end. Now, I can tell you how this story was presented to Jackie. How I pitched it. I started by saying - I want to write a story in which one of the Alice Niners is in a mental hospital, we do it as flashbacks, but end it in such a way that it’s not clear if said Alice Niner is telling the truth or not; because they don’t know….they’re sick *or* not (depending on how you look at it).
VAMPIRES! I said. I want VAMPIRES! And hopefully VAMPIRES done right - but in such a way that the non believers can walk away from the story going okay that was cool and made sense but my foundation in grounded reality is not shaken, fun story; and so the believers could go WHAT THE FUCK PAYTON!?
We picked Payton and Ash, first because we were comfortable with them, as we’ve said dozens of times; but also because Ash, in this story and canon where he’s from, has a history of mental instability from his OCD. It made these two prime candidates for the supporting characters. We needed it to be presented in the way it was to make it end how we wanted it.
When this started I wanted Shou to be the one in the mental institute and Nao to be the host - and we talked about shipping Tora with the OFC and doing Hiroto/Shou full out. But I was set on Tora/Saga and fought for that angle while Jackie supported the Hiroto ‘voice’ from the get go. We also talked about blood-dolling Tora. In fact that was Jackie’s first choice and I said, no I want Nao because he’s so cheerful and goofy that it’ll be easier to tell on him that he’s ‘off’ - plus the weight loss thing would be more noticeable on him. She agreed readily. Hiroto, as stated in this chapter, was chosen because he’s ‘outdoorsy’ therefore would be more susceptible to getting the disease we needed to use. It was, as we planned the roles each would take, that they would all have their place in the story. Plus we wanted some tension with Tora/Saga because of Tora’s interest in the ‘world’ they’d gotten caught up in.
Now, a tid bit about us. We had decided early on we weren’t going to say what we thought the end was; that is if Hiroto really does have Lyme Disease and is crazy or if that’s just Payton’s cover to keep him safe. We didn’t want to simply because it meant that, by stating our opinion on the matter (as the authors), it would make it canon (for purposes of this story). With that said…if you are comfortable making up your own mind and don’t care/don’t want to know what we think…please stop reading now. Right here. Last chance…stop.
Okay, the rest of you *^_^* Welcome to part two. That is to say that we are believers - Jackie and I both knew all along that we thought, despite being happy in angst and darkness hold onto hope as best we can, Hiroto was right and that Payton is protecting him; as he promised. Because we knew, for the believers (like us) that we were leaving this story REALLY open ended. To the point that…well…it feels like the middle of the story. That’s because it is!! We wanted it to end sort of in tension and then when you picked your path you had to embrace that they are in a world of shit - or Hiroto made it up. We think…they’re still in a heap of trouble. I mean Hiroto’s life is still on the line, Ash too - and Nao…he’s still a doll. Just because he got a little singed doesn’t mean he’s cured. That is to say… we still have a long way to go for some sort of resolution for those of you who want to follow on. That’s where part two starts, so please feel free to come along with us if you so desire. We’d love to have you!!
As always…thank you for reading. Please be kind and let us know what you think. Are you a believer…or not so much? We’d love to hear!!
THANK YOU! Gosh so much for taking this journey with us. <3!
Jackie: Oh mercy me, God Bless Catastrophe, there's no way in hell we'll ever live to see through this so drive yourself insane tonight, its not that far away and I just filled up your tank earlier today.
That is from the song "Mercy Me" by Alkaline Trio and I think it is the epitome of this story--you can see why we named it what we did. :D I'm going to throw some numbers and dates out here...September 5th, 2009. That was twenty three days from today (September 28th). It took us twenty three days to do this, to write these seventeen chapters. Roughly seventy-three pages; 60,677 words later and we are only a fraction of the way done.
That is, of course, if you're a believer as Mandy said. ^_^
From chapter one all the way until chapter seventeen, there were hints everywhere. Simply because, as you probably already know, this end was pretty much already written. The skeleton of it was at least--we just took the time to fluff it up, add in details that matched the chapters before it and called it a day.
I hope that those that are looking forward to following us on the next installment of this, that you are ready for some fun. Because now that you are somewhat aware of this magical world, its going to be a blast. We won't have to spend a billion chapters explaining this to you. :D It's going to be a roller coaster right--I'm ready. I'm excited--I'm so excited. :D
Thank you so very much for reading and thank you for sticking it out until the end...sort of? The potential end. :D I had wanted to see Nao cry...its horrible of me but one of the things he I wanted was water works from him. I wanted to push him so far past his breaking pointed. Instead, I managed tears from everyone but Nao--at least not real, giant tears. So we shall hope for that in part two. ~_^ I'm kidding...sort of. :D
Oh and thats Payton in the graphic up there. :D In case that wasn't obvious already.
And so we go...