"Come along, Nair." the woman grunts as she twists her waist vigorously, the joints popping audibly, "I'll need your help."

"Wait!" I protest, stiffly dismounting from Loaner, "You're not going to explain what's been going on here?"

"Ask your questions." the woman nods amicably, far less tense than before, "We should be safe for the time being."

My mysterious companion begins wandering toward the wreckage close by, sifting through it intently. Behind us, the trio in the animal suits remain on the stage, dancing endlessly to their audience of zero. The trumpets of the invisible orchestra echo all around us as the music begins playing from the top once again. 

"Finally!" I exclaim, "What? Where? Why? Who? How?"

"Pardon?" the woman pauses her labors as she digests my incoherent statement.

Don't look at me like that, I've been under a lot of stress lately. My mind stutters as it tries to get itself in order. 

"I know the how, but that doesn't explain anything." my mouth moves on its own accord before I even realize the nonsense noises coming out of it. 

"Take a deep breath Nair," the woman sighs as she pulls up a battered door covered in scorch marks from the pile of garbage, "You're probably experiencing an adrenaline crash right now."

"Alright. Alright. I got this." I say, taking her advice and breathing deep of the stagnant air, "Let's start with the who. Who are you?"

"My name is Al." the woman shrugs, "I'm not anyone. Just a former employee of Larson Dasar who came back to return a favor, that's all."

"Larson Dasar?" I quiz with my brows furrowed together, "Never heard of the name."

"Heard of the Thousand Copper Baron?" Al goes back to wrestling the broken door free from the wreckage, "That's him."

"Wow. You must go back way back with the Dasars then." I comment as I reach down to help Al out. Why would she be interested in this piece of junk anyway? It had been blown clear of its hinges ages ago. 

"Quite a way back." Al agrees somewhat sadly, "I was there when his grandchildren were born. Even looked after them for awhile before I went back to House Robeur."

"Oh." I mutter, taken off balance by the sudden shift in my companion's mood. Both of us continue digging through the rubble in silence, our work punctuated by the incongruous tune being played by the phantom orchestra. 

Mannish, flat chested woman. Looked after the Dasar patriarch's grandchildren. Always wears a veil. Don't tell me ... 

"You were Ramon's nursemaid?" I hazard a guess. 

"How did you know that?" Al shoots back, honestly curious, "You didn't even know the name of the House's founder."

"Yeah, but I've known Ramon for some time." I try to suppress the smirk creeping up over my face, "He has, how should I say this? An, uh, complex about you?"

Complex is putting it mildly. Ramon had plenty of maid uniforms back in his townhouse in Deshawn City and I'm sure those uniforms played a part whenever he had sex friends over. Ramon was also way to enthusiastic about me dressing up as his nursemaid cum bodyguard too. The way he kept licking his lips was downright creepy. 

"I see." Al simply replies. But she stops working, both hands listlessly by her sides. 

I gaze steadily at Al, but her black veil betrays nothing. As the the awkwardness grows increasingly difficult to bear, I set the partially unearthed door down and wander off to the side to give my I suppose colleague, some space. Pulling out a cigarette from my jacket, I light up and begin to watch the show being put on by the trio prancing about on the stage. 

The two guys in the dog and cat costumes gambol about, running in an exaggerated circle while the alligator performs a shuffle, sliding toward the edge of the stage. The alligator man then begins walking in place, waving his hand frantically at me. 

"Hello there." I cheer, waving back, "Nice show."

I take a long drag from the cigarette as the alligator man begins waving his hand even harder, nearly dislocating his wrist. Must be tough to keep performing when there's no one around to watch the show. Downright demoralizing it must be. No wonder the poor fellow is getting so excited. 

"Ramon needs love." Al finally manages to murmur as she joins me in looking blankly at the stage and its trio of performers. 

"From what I've seen, Ramon already has a loving family." I remark, clapping at the performers in encouragement. 

"He does, but its a rough kind of love." Al continues with obvious difficulty, "Fidelity is scorned in the Dasar House. A man needs to show that he's a man."

I bite my lip, thinking back to Ramon's antics back in Deshawn City. The famed conqueror of brothels. Fighting a dire bear to prove his manhood. 

"Ramon's not obsessed with women and sex." I conclude, "He's acting the way as expected by his family to act?"

"Yes." Al affirms, sounding very weary all of a sudden, "Larson was a successful man, but he had a rough upbringing. Some of that rubbed off on his son and from there, the grandchildren."

"A successful man must have many women." I remark, the picture becoming clearer, "And Ramon wants to show to his family that he's successful."

"Mm." Al agrees with a grunt, "It can be lonely, living in a family like that. Ramon's father had many women, as you can imagine."

"Wait. I've never seen Ramon's mother." I point out, "Nor the current patriarch's wife."

"And you wouldn't get a chance to see either of them." Al laughs humorlessly, "Both of them were cast off a long time ago. Ramon then latched on to me when I was assigned to guard him."

"I see .." I murmur, my eyes kept on the alligator man as he reaches out almost forlornly toward us, "And when you up and left to return to Deshawn City ..."

"He probably felt adrift." Al completes my thought, "Not that I was there to see it. But it's a reasonable guess."

Its a sad story, although one with a reasonable conclusion. Al had no obligation to Ramon other than as a paid employee. She wasn't obliged to stick around in Southmarsh just for his sake. The alligator man's hand begins to tremble from the strain of holding it out, but he keeps at it, fingers groping at the air. 

"What do you think of consolation love, Nair?" Al suddenly asks out of the blue. 

"Don't even know what that is." I dismiss, reaching for a clutch cigarettes. Its mean payment for watching the performance, but at least its something. 

"You can't have the one you really love," Al explains, "so you settle for the closest thing. What do you say about that?"

"Like how Ramon settled for you because his mother was gone?" I ask, my hackles rising. When I was pulled into that vision by the Logos, my double said something similar. 

Amanda loved me, but I didn't love her. I love -

Amanda. 

Mary. 

Am -

"Close enough." Al answers, "Its a rather sad thing isn't it?"

"We make compromises everyday." I shrug, trying to force down my unease, "There's nothing sad about them. Its just life."

"Life." a defeated groan comes out of Al's mouth, "You make it all sound so inevitable, Nair."

"Maybe that's because it is." I reply, walking forward to offer the cigarettes to the alligator man. 

"Stop." Al hisses the wistfulness gone from her voice, as she pulls me back hard by the collar, "What do you think you're doing?"

"Making a donation." I shake Al's hand off, "Don't have any spare change handy, so cigarettes are the next best thing."

"This is not the first time I've been here Nair." Al starts as her hand clamps once more over my collar. 

"That's obvious." I scoff. 

"And you know what has changed during the years?" Al doesn't relent, keeping a firm hold on me. 

"Not a clue." I mutter, "New routine the dancers are performing on stage?"

"No." Al whispers urgently to me, "There were only two dancers before."

"Two." I stop dead in my tracks. 

"The one in the alligator costume," Al continues, "he wasn't here before."

Meaning the guy beckoning to us. I swallow hard, feeling the man's eyes burning into us from under the cheap suit. 

"You said we were safe." I mutter back to Al, keeping one beady eye on the alligator man. He notices something is wrong as well and retracts his arm, still dancing in place. 

"We are safe," Al finally relaxes as the alligator man backs off, "as long as neither of us do anything stupid."

"The performers can't leave the stage then?" I query, walking back to the pile of wreckage with Al. 

"I've never seen them do so at least." the woman responds, "You're taking all of this with surprising calm, by the way."

"Not my first trip to bizzaro world." I make an exaggerated 'no problem' gesture with both arms, "Still, where are we, really?"

"Where it all began." Al shakes her head as she goes back to digging away at the rubble, "We're in a frozen fragment of time, buried under Southmarsh."

Buried. The same way Springvale kept its secrets buried. I nod, understanding the concept. But there's still so much left unknown. There's no Order corpses lying about for one. 

 "Where what began?" I demand, crossing both arms. 

"That day the angels of Pahlaver abandoned us." Al looks up to the night sky, her veil shaking lightly from the motion, "When we needed them the most. The creator gods were deaf to our pleas."

"The day of the Farmer's rampage." I murmur, rubbing my chin in thought, "And if the creator gods left man on that day, that means this place -"

Al keeps speaking, her entire body trembling from tension. 

"Is the place where the current world was born."