All Epilogue 22 - Condolences

Ryuji sat alone in his room, looking nowhere. Though his posture was rigid, there was a listlessness to his affect that made him look truly dead rather than what he actually was. It had been a few months since the death of his wife Caitlyn, and for most life had gone on like it always had. The regular routines in the church and around the small town they had built in the heart of the Undead Nation had resumed, and during the days that was enough to keep Ryuji occupied. But in the wee hours of the morning, when the halls were abandoned and the duties of the day all complete, the vampire had nothing to keep his attention. He tried to pick up his hobbies: his reading, his baking, his craftwork, his prayer, but everything seemed hollow and rote. Nothing seemed to have a point and he couldn’t keep his attention on anything. His wife was gone and he was left here alone; the silence of the nights was deafening. 
As he sat staring into nothingness, a slight vibrating sensation broke his reverie. He turned his head to regard his communication ring, the one that he kept mainly as a means to speak to Percival Webber. They weren’t particularly friends, and to say that Pierce and his rapidly-learning brethren troubled his late wife was a slight understatement, but Ryuji was gatekeeper to a collective of extremely powerful undead, several of whom were waiting for an opportunity to subjugate or hunt local vivan populations, and he could at least use the ring to call for emergency assistance in that regard. The vibrating pattern wasn’t the one that linked to Percival’s ring however, and he frowned in confusion. Twisting the outer band into place, he spoke into the darkness, knowing that the bearer of the other ring could hear him. “Hello?”
A man’s voice replied, one he hadn’t heard in several decades. “Hello.” Ryuji’s expression remained frowning, though the confusion had left. “I apologize if it’s an unreasonable time where you are. I’m not certain what the time difference is.”
“What do you want?” he asked bluntly.
“I heard about your wife,” Cohen said.
Ryuji’s fist clenched, and he spoke tightly, “If you say any…”
Cohen cut him off, “I’m sorry.”
“...What?”
“I’m sorry for your loss. Condolences. All of that.”
Ryuji blinked a few times, taken somewhat off-guard, “...Why?”
“Why what?”
“Why…?” he seemed to be unable to quite enunciate his question.
“What, why am I sorry?” he asked with a touch of incredulity. “Well, because despite our history, I won’t deny that the world lost a great woman in her. I don’t have access to the most world news, but I know she was recognized over here in Aive. Famous as a diplomat in a lot of countries, I’d imagine. Will be remembered as the one who legitimized the Undead Nation: a certainly not-insignificant triumph for civil rights. Those aren’t small things. And she was an ascendant, so she probably did much more I haven’t heard of over here. So it’s a loss for the plane. But moreso I’m sorry for your loss: she was your wife and it’s no secret you adored her, and I wanted to offer condolences.”
“...What would you know about it…” Ryuji asked quietly. “What would you know or care about loss?”
There was a long moment of silence before Cohen replied, “...I buried my mother when I was sixteen. It was...sudden. She’d always been somewhat sick, but…” He trailed off, inhaling sharply before continuing, “Buried my father at age 31. His wasn’t sudden, but he had an early-onset disease that corrodes your mind. Over the span of years he forgot everything, and he died mentally well before his body caught up. So, no, I’ve never had a wife, or anyone like that. But I have lost people. And it’s a horrid, sickening feeling. And I’m sorry you have to suffer it.” Ryuji didn’t reply. “...You really do think me that callous, don’t you?” Still, he said nothing. “...Would it help if I said I don’t blame Caitlyn at all?”
“Huh?”
“For her actions against me. I really don’t blame her. I don’t remotely agree with her methodology, and I still believe that collar was a human rights travesty, but...I can’t blame her.” Ryuji said nothing, and eventually Cohen continued, “...I am sorry, for what I did to her, back then. I can’t, to this day, really tell you why I acted that way, or did those things. The closest I can figure is that I was more than half mad with isolation and desperation. I had no escape, I was a prisoner and a pawn, and I was going to die in a hole with nothing but unfinished business and regret. It’s not an excuse, there’s no excuse for it, and it will always be one of my worst moments. It was unforgivable, and I am sorry. ...And I am the most sorry for trying to have you killed. I really, honestly, didn’t want to kill anyone, any of you, even at that point. I ordered the robots to kill you because I didn’t know you had a mind. Undead that are more than shambling puppets were...well, I’d have called them fairy tales. Meant to scare children, but not real. If I had known, I wouldn’t have...but that’s not an excuse either.”
“...”
“...It was horrific there. Heh,” he gave a single chuckle, lacking any humour, “Not surprised I went a bit insane. ...I could recognize some of them, you know. The people there, that had mutated. Recognized who they used to be. I tried to get through to them, treat them somehow, but...but they were dead. They were still moving and breathing, but they were all dead. ...I’d never intended that, anything like that. No one should have... “ He paused for a moment before continuing, “I could argue that I didn’t kill them, that everything that happened there wasn’t my intention, it wasn’t my fault because I was taken away and they tried to continue my research and things went wrong that I couldn’t control. But I am at fault. Don’t think I don’t know that. Don’t think I don’t regret that. I know that if I hadn’t tried to be covert, if I’d gone somewhere where I wouldn’t have been denied the legal right to run the tests legitimately, it wouldn’t have happened. Riolythe, maybe, or Yeto or even the Hobgoblin province. Anywhere but Asanon. If I had’ve paid better attention to what was happening, that I was letting them bring in too many volunteers, that there was this misguided religion-like zeal developing, I could have stopped it before everything collapsed. But I didn’t. I didn’t, and over a hundred people died horrifically, because of my negligence. And I know that is inexcusable, and I know that deserves punishment, and I accept that I need to be held accountable for my role in that tragedy. I know I committed crimes. But the way it happened, justice and fair retribution did not play into my trial, and my crimes were muddled between those of other people and a corrupt system. It doesn’t mean that my actions didn’t lead to a grotesque amount of lost life. And so I don’t blame your wife for wanting to administer justice.”
“...”
“I was wrong in those regards, and I deserve retribution for it. But I cannot give up on the research. I have always had overwhelming evidence that trials would work, long before I started the ill-fated tests back then, and I still have none that suggests that it will fail. I have tested on paper, in tissues, in mice, in monkeys, in myself. I truly believe that this will lead to success, for all Materians. But I will not repeat my mistakes. I will not conduct research anywhere that I’m forced underground. There will be checks and balances against...organizational issues, I guess the word is. I won’t repeat my negligence. But those people, those who died in that bunker, and the ones who were poisoned in Losanti...they believed in the research as well. They were told the risks, both medical and legal, and they bet their health, their well-being, their entire lives, on something they believed would make humanity better. My poor decisions led to their deaths through sabotage and circumstance, but what they, what we all believed in...it is still, by all evidence I have, sound. To abandon what might still be a legitimate leap forward for humanity, would be to undermine what amounted to their sacrifice.”
“...Why are you telling me this?”
“Heh. I don’t know...You always talk like I don’t feel. Like I don’t have or care about human emotions. I do. Of course I do. I feel guilt, and loss, and regret. All the time. ...But I’m a doctor, aren’t I? I can’t have the luxury of being overwhelmed by guilt. Patients die. Patients die, sometimes there was nothing you could do and perhaps sometimes there was, but either way you have to be able to keep working. Regardless of literally everything else, you need to keep moving forwards, keep doing everything you can. So I can’t very well let on much about how I feel. Heh,” he chuckled dryly again, “I suppose I do it too well. The Erzebet boy charged me with it too, with not feeling, years and years ago.” He sighed heavily, “I do feel. And I am, very honestly, sorry for your loss.” Ryuji sat silently for a long time, eventually prompting Cohen to ask, “...I suppose I’ll stop interrupting your...evening? Night? Whatever time it is there.”
“...You were in jail for ten years, right?”
He replied with some hesitancy, “Yes?” 
Ryuji looked almost thoughtful before he spoke, “...Ten years is a reasonable sentence for a misuse of alchemy charge. Or at least, it would have been fifty years ago. I’m not completely up-to-date on Asanon’s laws anymore. Medical misdemeanour would have gotten your licenses revoked which, functionally, they were. ...I don’t think a fair trial would have found you directly responsible for the deaths, even for manslaughter. If evidence corroborated your story, that someone else poisoned the twenty in Losanti, you killed the murderer in self-defence, and the others only died later because they were stranded without professional medical oversight, then there would be no charges against you for those deaths. Meanwhile, you mentioned that you were working on government projects the whole while. I would count that as community service served.” He straightened slightly as he said with a formal air, “By my understanding of the legal system, you have paid the dues for the crimes you committed. The issue is closed. Don’t let anything like that happen ever again.”
Cohen was quiet for a few seconds before he replied, “It won’t.”
“Good.”
Both men were quiet for a moment, before Cohen spoke again, “You know, I’ve been experimenting with something. It’s not quite ready yet, but I think I’m getting close. I wasn’t going to bother telling you until I had actually perfected it, but seeing as how I have your attention now…”
Ryuji’s face wrinkled slightly with distaste, “...What?”
“Synthetic blood. For the purposes of controlling undead hunger. It’s not quite where it needs to be yet, but I’ve had some success with…”
“What?!” Ryuji interrupted him, sitting forwards suddenly with the shock of the news.
“A synthetic substitute. So that an undead can be satiated without having to rely on living donors,” he explained simply. 
“You can…” Ryuji was overtaken by the implications of it. “...How? Why? Why are you making this and how can you…?”
Cohen replied, “Because I can. It’s a very interesting sort of alchemical challenge. I suppose you can consider it a sort of apology for my earlier prejudiced assumptions regarding the undead.”
Ryuji just seemed a bit stunned, “That’s…”
“I’ll keep you posted on my results,” Cohen said with a bit of chipper in his voice.
“...Yeah. Ok.”
“...I’ll be going now, then. Again, you have my condolences.”
Ryuji’s gaze became a bit distant as he looked towards the ground, “...Thank you.”
There was a bit of silence as it seemed the doctor was about to break the connection, before he added quickly, “...If, you’re bored, ever, you can call me through the ring. I mean, you probably aren’t, and I’m probably not good company, but I rarely sleep much and...well…”
The paladin’s look of confusion was slowly replaced with a strange sort of expression, nearly a wry smile, “...Alright. I’ll keep you in mind.”
“Oh!” he said with a twinge of pleasant surprise, “...Then I will talk to you later then.” Ryuji could hear the connection close, leaving him alone in the dark room once more. He leaned back, looking at the ceiling; the weight of mourning was beginning to lift, just a little.
Category:Advent of the All