And the dilettantes with their open minds

Mary felt an uneasy feeling welling up in her gut. She tried to brush it aside and focus on the positive atmosphere Rose was cultivating, but as she took a bite out of the pot roast Dani had cooked for their lunch party, she couldn’t find it in her to enjoy it.

Not when Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin looked so… isolated.

It wasn’t just that she wasn’t talking to anyone- of course that wasn’t possible for her. No, what Mary saw was something else entirely.

Nobody was talking to her, either.

Conversations were going around all up and down the table, and even though Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin was situated right smack in the middle of it, with people on both sides of her, nobody was inviting her to take part.

That poor girl… she looks so lonely, Mary thought. She’d chewed all the flavor out of her food at this point and was just mushing it around in her mouth, that was how distracted she was. It’s like everybody is just ignoring her.

Mary knew that the other girls in her husband’s harem were good people, for the most part. Even the ones with more questionable behaviors. Nobody would be intentionally isolating the mute assassin, she believed.

And yet, it was undeniable that Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin was isolated.

They must all be thinking that there’s no reason to talk to her, since she can’t respond back. Or maybe… it’s because they’re wary about saying the wrong thing and upsetting her. She’s so hard to get a read on, that’s the problem. I just wish there was something we could do about it, Mary thought.

She chewed her lip slowly as she tried to think about what she should do. What was the right thing to do in this scenario? She could try talking to the assassin herself, but engaging in conversation with someone all the way on the other side of the table, while people were talking all around them, that just seemed like it might draw even more attention to the fact that Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin was all by herself.

…Why was she hesitating like this?

Mary knew what the right thing to do was. She wasn’t blind. The answer was staring her right in the face- she needed to speak up regardless. Because she noticed the girl’s loneliness, it was her job to fix it, of course!

Then, suddenly, Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin turned her head, and their eyes met. A moment of understanding passed between them, as they both recognized that they weren’t just looking past one another.

Mary was looking at her.

Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin was looking back.

This was it, her moment.

Mary opened her mouth, ready to engage the other girl in conversation-

Wait!

She froze in place before the words could even pass her lips. The sharp look in the assassin’s eyes, that furious, penetrating stare…

That wasn’t the usual bland, almost playful hostility that she ordinarily directed towards Mary.

It was darker.

Uglier.

Crueler.

Like she was rejecting even the idea of Mary’s presence.

…Okay, maybe that was a bit of an exaggeration. As Mary’s heartrate returned to normal, she realized, from looking at the assassin in front of her, that the other woman was not content with her position right now.

It wasn’t hate, or rage, but it was rejection. She had seen what Mary was about to do, and rejected it completely. The disgust emanating from her was palpable.

She was alone and lonely, but… she didn’t want Mary talking to her.

Why?

Mary just wanted to help. So why was the other girl rejecting her like this?

She didn’t know, she didn’t understand, she just sat there, frozen, not sure whether or not she should actually speak up now.

Would it be any help at all, if the other girl didn’t want to talk to her in the first place?

Am I really doing what she wants me to do? Mary wondered. Or am I just… trying to satisfy my own ego here? Acting like the bigshot, the only person who can talk to her properly and cure her loneliness… am I just trying to satisfy my pride if I talk to her now? When she doesn’t want me to?

She didn’t know the answer to that question. But she wished she did.

The look on Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin’s face… it wasn’t a good look. It was the look of someone who was lonely, and yet rejecting those who sought to help her with her loneliness. The kind of look that left Mary paralyzed with indecision.

Then the assassin turned her head away and went back to picking at her food, as if Mary didn’t even exist.

That part stung, too.

Mary bit her lip.

So, what should I do? She wondered. Should I speak up? Say something? Or… should… should I… remain silent?

Mary didn’t want to do that.

But she didn’t want to go against the other woman’s wishes, either.

She just… wanted to have everyone smiling and happy.

“That’s just like you,” a chilling voice sneered in her ear.

A voice she knew all too well.

Mary jumped in her seat and felt a shiver run down her spine. “Eh-Echo!” She gasped out, swinging her head around. What was her other self doing here?! Why had she come to disrupt Rose’s party like this!? What was the matter with her!?

Mary gazed disdainfully at a sneering face identical to the one she saw in the mirror every morning. Those were her freckled cheeks. Her stubby nose. Her broad forehead.

But the expression the woman was making… that delighted smirk, taking pleasure in Mary’s misery… that wasn’t something she would ever show.

It made her feel sick to her stomach.

“Don’t look at me like that!” Echo shook her head and gazed condemningly at Mary, as if somehow, she was in the wrong here. “What have I ever done to earn this much ire from my other self, hmm? It’s not fair at all…”

“Just go away!” Mary jumped to her feet. “You’re ruining Rose’s party by barging in like this and causing a scene, right, Rose?”

She turned towards the head of the table, confident that the last thing Rose would want right now is another her coming along and making a big scene in the middle of a party ostensibly meant to celebrate HER.

But what she saw made her blood run cold.

Rose wasn’t upset, or furious, or even bothered. Her face was smiling and her eyes were bright. She wasn’t even looking at Echo.

Nobody was.

Because nobody else was moving.

Mary stared in shock at the scene in front of her. Her friends were frozen in place like wax sculptures, paused mid-feast and focusing on everybody else except for herself and Echo. Gina’s glass of fruit juice was tilted up as she drank from it, but the liquid didn’t fall. Dani’s fork was halfway to her lips. Morgana was paused mid-chew. Vivian’s mouth was open in a wide laugh from deep in her belly, the sound of which could not be heard.

Everybody was frozen. Everybody was stopped. Like somebody had pressed the pause button on the entire room.

“…What is this?” Mary turned back to her other self and glared at her.

Echo clicked her tongue. “My, what a mean face. Was I always such a bitter, angry girl? …Yes, actually, I do believe I was.”

She twisted her smirk from ear to ear and doubled over with laughter. “Oh, Mary… I know what you’re thinking right now. That I’m here to cause a scene, or start trouble… I know that, because it’s what I would assume about myself! And I know myself a lot better than you know me.”

Echo paused, as Mary continued to glare at her.

She waved her hand at the pigtailed redhead. “…To be clear, Mary, this is the part where you protest ‘But we’re the same person!’ at the top of your lungs.”

“But we aren’t the same person,” Mary said bluntly. “You’re a part of me. You were… a past version of me, I should say. But you were corrupted by a transformation. Now… now I don’t know what you are, if I’m being honest.”

Echo’s eye twitched. She glared at Mary for a moment and fell silent. “…Is that how you see it, then?” She muttered.

“It’s the truth, isn’t it?” Mary asked her.

Echo didn’t deny it.

“…Putting all that aside, Mary… you’re right, my intentions for coming here certainly aren’t altruistic. At least, not in the way you would define altruism. You martyr, you.”

Mary’s eye twitched this time. “Oh?” She crossed her arms over her chest, not liking the insinuation that Echo honestly thought she was doing something altruistic here. “And what exactly ARE your intentions, then?” She demanded.

Echo smirked again. “…If I was here with bad intentions and to make a scene, I wouldn’t have paused the whole room, now would I have?” She pointed out.

Mary supposed not.

“Then why?” She asked, getting tired of her other self beating around the bush. Mary would never do that! She tried to be direct and forthright with people! …For the most part, anyway.

Echo just sighed and shook her head. “Mary, Mary, Mary…” she clicked her tongue in exasperation. “Mary.”

Mary chilled when she saw the cold gleam in her other self’s eyes. But she didn’t back down, and returned Echo’s cold glare with a glare of her own.

“That’s my name. You miss it?” She asked sarcastically.

“I think it suits you just as well as my name suits me,” Echo replied, ignoring the substance of Mary’s question. “The reason I put the whole room on pause like this is very simple.”

She walked towards her other self, clicking her cane against the floor. Then she lined up face to face with her other self, reached out, and caressed Mary’s cheek.

“You and I… we’re really long overdo for a conversation that’s just the two of us, aren’t we? No Nick, no Holly… just you and me. Two sides of the same coin, as it were.”

“In what universe is THAT the case?!” Mary snorted. But she shook all the same. Because as much as she would like to deny that she had anything in common with the woman in front of her, Echo, she knew, was in fact more like her than she would like to admit.

It was a sad thing, to see herself corrupted like this. Twisted by a transformation that should have been given to her.

Mary almost felt sorry for her other self. Almost.

“Do you think you’re better than me?” Echo narrowed her eyes. “A better person? Oh… oh, that’s rich, Mary, that’s really rich.”

She shook her head and scoffed. “No… Mary, if you had been given this transformation, you would have ended up just like me… gleefully plotting the downfall of everyone in this room!”

“Downfall? Don’t you think you’re exaggerating a bit?” Mary asked defensively, pulling away from her doppelganger and shoving her back. “You’re going a little hammy on the whole ‘villain’ thing, don’t you think? This isn’t a murder mystery where the culprit suddenly flies off the rails when his scheme has been discovered, you know.”

“Maybe not,” Echo conceded. “I have been… a little more ‘in-character’ than perhaps is necessary. But you see, Mary… I’m going to get my way. I’m going to corrupt everything you’ve ever loved… and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

She walked along the table and Mary followed her with her eyes. When she rounded the corner and stopped next to Nick, Mary froze.

“…Don’t.” That was all she said. Just a single word of warning. It would have been enough for Mary, but for Echo…

“Don’t?” Echo looked back at her. She reached down and brushed her fingers along Nick’s cheek. He was frozen in time, so he wouldn’t even notice it. Wouldn’t even feel it. “Don’t what, exactly?”

She leaned down and parted her lips right beside her cheek. Her eyes slid back towards Mary as she did so.

“Don’t… kiss him on the cheek? Or the lips, perhaps?”

“Don’t,” Mary repeated herself. She balled up her hands into fists. Why was Echo taunting her like this? “You know that he wouldn’t want you to do that. So don’t.”

“…You’re right,” Echo admitted, standing up straight. She settled for patting Nick affectionately on the head, instead. “He wouldn’t like that… look at you! Mary!” She clapped her hands together. “You’re such a good influence on me! You almost make me want to be a better person just by standing in the room with me!”

Mary narrowed her eyes. Somehow, she doubted that.

“But at the same time… you make me want to turn you into a worse person,” Echo said, clenching her teeth and trying to keep the venom out of her voice. …Well, not trying that hard, actually… …Or, at all, really.

Then she smiled.

“I told you before, Mary. I’m your duplicate. The part of you freed from your inhibitions. I can do whatever I want! …Can you say the same, I wonder…?” Echo mused, stroking her chin.

The way she was acting made Mary feel sick to her stomach. “Do you really think you can taunt me like this?” She asked. “I know what you’re doing. Freezing the whole room so we can have a conversation? Yeah, right. No, you’re trying to goad me into doing something I’ll regret! With everybody I care about frozen, what, I can do as I like? Just like you?”

She crossed her arms over her chest. “Well, I’m just going to stand here until you leave me alone, got that?”

Mary wasn’t going to fall for it. Echo was trying to tempt her. And she wouldn’t give into temptation!

…What temptation even was there to give into, anyway? Nothing Mary could see!

Echo stroked her chin again. “Such a good girl… acting like you don’t have those desires, those impulses, but… I know you do, Mary! I knoooooowww you dooooooo!”

Mary’s eye twitched. “Echo-”

“I told you, that we’re two sides of the same coin,” Echo interrupted her. She manifested a quarter into the air. “Call it. Heads, or tails. You remember that little game, don’t you, Mary? I sure don’t. I wasn’t a part of you when you played that. Deciding your future on the toss of a coin… deciding to be with Nick… or not…”

She glanced over at the frozen blonde sitting beside Mary’s husband. “…It was Rose who played that little trick on you, wasn’t it?”

“So, what if it was?” Mary snapped. “Rose was only trying to help me! Trying to make me see what I actually wanted! And it worked!”

Echo smirked. “…Oh. Did it, now?” She asked mockingly. “How lucky for you, Mary!”

The sarcasm oozing from her voice made Mary’s heart ache.

“Echo… just stop.”

“I’ll stop when you call it.”

Mary rolled her eyes. “Fine!” She groaned. “Just… just make it heads!”

Echo flipped the quarter into the air and slapped it down on her gloved wrist. She raised her hand to take a peek at it.

“Well?” Mary asked in exasperation.

“…Heads it is,” Echo said with a smile, banishing the coin. “You’re a lucky little girl, Mary, you realize that?”

Mary sighed. “It’s just a stupid coin toss,” she muttered.

“Oh, no, it’s SO much more than that!” Echo shook her head. “Because you see… I would have chosen heads, too.”

“Oh? Is that right? And your point being?” Mary prodded. “That we’re the same, just because we would have both chosen heads on a coin flip? I’m shaking in my cowboy boots, really.”

“You’ve developed quite a mouth on you!” Echo covered her own mouth in surprise. “I know I can be sharp-tongued, but the witty zingers… that’s so unlike you, Mary. I actually kind of like it!”

She flashed a gleeful smile. “…And yes, that was exactly my point,” she assured the other girl. “Like I told you, we’re two sides of the same coin… but the tragedy of it all is that only one side of the coin can ever see the light.”

That line stuck with Mary. It almost sounded like a confession. So… because I’m good, she has to be bad? What a load of garbage.

“Mary… you’re not any better,” Echo said, shaking her head. “Remind me, what was this party for, again?”

Mary blinked. “It’s… for Rose’s sake,” she said.

“And yet, here you are, making it all about you. You couldn’t let her have this one thing without trying to take all the attention for yourself, now could you?”

Echo clicked her tongue and shook her head. “Shameful, Mary, really.”

“What!?” Mary’s face turned red with disbelief. “Are you kidding me!? YOU’RE the one who dragged me into this conversation in the first place!” She exclaimed. “I’m not making anything ‘all about me’! YOU are!”

Echo shrugged. “You say that, but while everyone else was having a good time, chatting, and celebrating Rose… you weren’t doing any of that, were you? No, you were thinking about Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin and how lonely she is! And how bad that made you feel. You wanted to help her so bad because you’re such a good person! …Am I wrong?”

“Yes! I mean, no, I mean-! …Not in the way you’re saying!” Mary sputtered. Echo was trying to make it sound like Mary was a bad person for being concerned about someone else! Yes, the timing may not have been ideal, but that didn’t make her bad!

“Oh? So… you’re not going to talk to her, then?” Echo’s eyes widened and she covered her shocked gasp. “Why, Mary, I’m stunned! How selfish of you! Not helping out a friend who’s in desperate need of your support… really, that boggles my mind!”

Mary’s eye twitched and she glared furiously at Echo. “Just stop,” she growled, balling up her hands into fists.

“Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin doesn’t even want to talk to you, you know,” Echo pointed out. “You know what she does want? Because I do. Because you’re right, Mary- we AREN’T the same, not at all!”

She reached down and caressed the assassin’s cheek. Augmented Synthetic Humanoid Assassin gave no response to it.

“I’m a far better judge of character. And I know what’s in this girl’s heart. And someone like you won’t be able to reach it. Not as long as you keep presuming things about others!”

Mary didn’t know what that meant. She just knew it stung to hear. She clenched and unclenched her fists and just kept glaring at her other self, wishing there was some way to shut her up for good.

But she couldn’t get that lucky, unfortunately.