hisapprentice | [Puzzle 018]

[For house 48]

[A typical day in this house begins with Luke up and about, making breakfast and tea. Whether Firo shows up to have any is up to him. School's back in session and he needs an earlier start, that's all. This morning is no different, Luke pulls on his sweater while walking into the kitchen, headed for the refrigerator. It's when he pulls open the door that everything gets weird - starting with the whole room losing its household vibe and becoming much more...archaeological.]

[Action]

[Incredulous adventures aside, Luke finds it difficult to adjust to the busier lifestyle that comes with school starting and warmer weather ending. It gets darker, colder, Luke grows lonelier. He's out and about in the autumn sun, off to his usual stop at the bakery (okay, okay, one of his three or four usual stops) when a brownish figure passes him going in the opposite direction.

Luke stops. Spinning left, he sees the figure retreating down the path the way he came, and though all logic tells him it can't be real, he takes off running after it.]

Professor! [Because there is no one else. It must be him.] Professor, wait! Just- hold on a minute, please!

[Luke did not realize a vision from the past could hurt so much. When Layton's back and top hat fade into a false mist and then nothingness, Luke has run himself all the way back across the village, nearer to the rec center. Out of breath and out of spirit, he sits down on a bench to stare at the dirt.

Today is awful.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

I see...

[Given the nature of his own world, he honestly doesn't find that to be an entirely bizarre concept.]

Who was 'he,' if you don't mind my asking?

A friend. [Not 'just' a friend; that's a worse lie than being fine.] From London. He used to be here, too.

You too?

[Then, realizing he should probably clarify what he means by that, he continues:]

That is to say, this isn't the first time I've heard of people seeing those who were here before. It seems to be happening quite frequently of late, though I don't have any idea why.

I don't know either. Something they're trying to do to upset us, I guess.

[Luke just assumes Jack's seen someone.]

They do seem to enjoy doing that to us.

[Jack hasn't... yet. He isn't expecting his luck to hold out forever, though.]

[Suspicious of Jack's abnormal gentleness-without-teasing, Luke looks at him from the side, not quite turning his head up.]

So who did you see?

[But Jack just shakes his head, a tiny smile playing about the corners of his lips.]

No one just yet, though I do have to wonder just how long that's going to be the case.

This is the first time it's happened to me. Seeing someone who isn't there, I mean. They make it look really real.

And you're sure he wasn't really real? Though I suppose if that were the case, we would have heard something from someone else about him actually being here...

I know he wouldn't've just walked away like that without answering me. Even if he...if he was upset with me, or something, he couldn't ignore that.

Hmm...

[Jack ponders this for a few moments.]

Perhaps they're trying to test our emotional resolve. See just how much it takes to get us to break down or think ourselves mad...

[You already are mad, Jack.

The thought makes Luke half-snort and try to pass it off as a cough, rubbing his nose.]

Maybe. I've seen a lot more than this that'd make me think I was crazy, though. They're not going to win.

[No arguments there. At least, not from Jack.]

This would be a rather effective way to do it, though. What better way to hit a person's heart than through the ones they love?

You almost sound like you've thought about this before.

[It's a somber flat tone, for a joke...but a joke it is, nonetheless.]

Hmm?

[That almost, almost catches Jack off guard, but he's quick enough to catch himself before the mask slips and put a smile back on his face.]

Well, it's difficult not to think about things like that when you've been here for such a long time.

[Jack has been there longer - Luke thinks, he didn't know him on arrival but he's fairly sure Jack was there before him. Still...]

It's not exactly an ordinary thing to think about.

It is when you've seen some of the things the Malnosso do.

[It's a plausible enough excuse, certainly. They HAVE been known to deliberately play with people's emotions on more than one occasion.]

I have seen some of the things they'll do. [He has been a conniving child criminal, an immortal tortured for the 'fun' of it, beaten up by emotionless robots...among other things.] It's been almost three years, and everything.

[Though he only counted two birthdays.]

Three years for you too? Then we must have arrived around the same time.

[There, easy subject change. Now they don't have to talk about things that could lead the discussion down a path Jack would prefer to avoid.]

I don't know. I got here in November. [He woke in the snow, as it happens, to someone shaking him.]

It was September for me, which makes it a two-month difference between the two of us. What a coincidence!

[Usually, when people say "what a coincidence!" they imply that it really wasn't one. The way people just show up out of the blue in Luceti makes it way more likely to be a real coincidence, though.]

Yeah, I guess it is. It's not as though we get to decide when we arrive.

[Given that the two of them are from completely different worlds, it's most likely that is the case... or is it?]

Or when we leave, either. All of those decisions are out of our hands as long as we're here.