Mistakes Were Made

Chapter 49

It had been a little while since Law had come around the office. Neutrality was finally starting to relax a little. Chaos had taken a special interest in him since then and they walked into work together in the mornings. That turn of events had definitely helped Neutrality's nerves. Mostly.

Now actually getting into the office was less a brisk walk and more an acid trip. Still, there was no denying that the chance of anyone running into him along the way was almost nonexistent. Particularly Law.

Unable to leave the relatively safe space of the shared office limited Neutrality's day in unexpected ways. Places he'd never cared about now weren't simply uninteresting. They were off-limits. A fact that was surprisingly frustrating. He'd even had to start bringing in a box of granola bars. The vending machines had become enemy territory.

Having spent a depressing amount of time in the snack aisle at the store, they were good granola bars. A decent combination of tasty, crunch, and probably won't give you diabetes eventually. They were far superior to anything in the bastions of mediocrity that were the vending machines.

Neutrality took off his blue light glasses and pressed his palms to his eyes. He missed just being able to get up and take a walk. Even if it was just to a different bathroom on the same floor, for novelties sake.

On the whole, Neutrality knew very little had actually changed. The sense of claustrophobia wasn't from physical limitations but the stress of the situation. Despite how genuinely nauseating letting things continue as they were felt, there wasn't anything to be done.

Law seemed to have given up, but the same couldn't be said of Good. The few times he'd tried to venture out for any reason, Neutrality had seen them in the distance. Dressed immaculately, smiling benevolently, and circling like a fucking shark.

Like a dog stalled at an invisible fence, Good wouldn't get too close to Evil. Not if they could help it. No more than Law and Chaos would without some kind of extenuating circumstance. Opposed alignments didn't play nicely at the best of times.

Good wasn't as ham-fisted as Law, however. They didn't do anything that could be considered harassment. Instead, they lurked, but only in places where they could plausibly claim to have business or be passing through.

Neutrality knew it was bullshit. Good wanted something from him. There was no other plausible explanation for their behavior that he could see. Despite that, Good didn't leave an opening to file a complaint. So Neutrality was stuck running around like a criminal.

"Hey, Evil?" Neutrality called over the divider, holding up a pigeon blood red apple. On his way in, he'd taken a moment to sneak into a conference room and steal expensive fruit. He'd even forgone the basic courtesy of only taking one piece. Instead, he'd gotten enough to share and even snack on later.

Evil made a noise that was probably agreement, and Neutrality tossed them an apple. It was becoming a sort of ritual, him sharing snacks with the other admin. As much as they didn't exactly get along, Neutrality couldn't deny that Evils mere presence was helping him out.

That Evil likely only obliged because they got a kick out of pissing off Good by proxy wasn't any reason to be ungrateful. Really, Neutrality was starting to find it a little gratifying that Good was vexed in proportion to his own suffering.

With his own work done and feeling a bit depressed, Neutrality jumped over to Evils login. Though his interest in Dungeons had been limited, he'd found it was actually rather soothing to check in on one. Or at least 42 as she named herself was.

42 had quickly evolved from annoying imposition to a pet project. Neutrality made a point to check in and see what she'd been up to since the last time. The results were rarely uninteresting.

Seeing what 42 got up to, Neutrality had become curious enough to look at some other more veteran dungeons. He'd expected to find more developed visions and layered details. Instead, what he got was disappointment.

Some put the broad strokes of a theme to work but most didn't deviate significantly from the stock store resources. They certainly didn't spend three hours fussing with the proportions of stalactites until they were happy with how a chamber was framed.

"Hey, Evil… I've meant to ask. Is it really worth it to ignore the help desk and dick them over? I get the whole 'evil' thing, mostly. But, it just seems like they'd be better if they got some help," Neutrality said. It was a moment of suicidal curiosity that had been building since the incident with Law.

Neutrality's opinion of Evil had changed that day. Evil was still fearsome, but he didn't consider them belligerent. Getting more involved with them would invite trouble, but probably not destruction as Neutrality once feared.

That didn't banish his anxiety about their role in the former Neutrality leaving (disappearing?) from their position, but it softened it. Neutrality was willing to entertain the idea that, even if it wasn't reasonable or sufficient, there had been a reason for whatever had happened.

"...Feel free to take a look. Hell, feel free to help them if you want. Not like I mind you doing my work for me," Evil replied, ruby red apple frozen halfway to their lips. The only indication of emotion was a single raised brow. If anything, they sounded bored and went back to eating their snack. They took out a quarter of the fruit's mass in a single crunching bite.

"Okay?" Neutrality said, weirded out by how easily it went. He'd expected some resistance or at least to be told to go fuck himself. But, instead of questioning it, Neutrality decided to take the unexpected win. He opened the help desk, feeling excited at having something interesting to do.

Neutrality planned to start by looking at the queue. He wanted to see what had been open the longest unanswered. Only a grinding sound from across the divider stopped him.

Evil's face was contorted strangely. As if they were fighting with themself over something. Finally, the turmoil died down, and their face went slack. The expression that replaced it was almost unreadable.

"Don't open anything from LeetLordLoliKing3," Evil said, mouth twisting in distaste. Neutrality was immediately tempted to do just that. Only the fact that the ticket was labeled "YOU IT CUCKS" caused him to take Evil's word for it.

Unfortunately, the rest of the tickets weren't much of an improvement. Almost all of them were filled out incorrectly. The titles didn't convey any meaningful information.

A common problem for any help desk, but even the short summaries were pretty much garbage. Not good, but a Q&A could probably sort that out.

Feeling confident he could get things on track, Neutrality started reading the tickets. Five minutes in, he felt nothing but regret for abusing his eyes. The titles and summaries had been nasty but short. The body of the tickets were not better.

Nonsensical requests for mini-guns and lasers in fantasy settings aside, they never seemed to get to a point. Instead of laying out the problem, they were an unhinged mixture of back story, social tirade, and threats.

[How dare you deny the Chosen of Orclock what is his. Your viscera will adorn my throne room, you spineless code monkey.]

Neutrality stopped reading after the first three paragraphs of threats. After that, he skimmed, looking for what the problem was but never found anything coherent. Finally, opening a dungeon ticket, he hoped for something a bit better. Disappointment awaited him again.

[I know the formula for gunpowder! WHY NO GUNS!?]

Neutrality sighed as he looked at the dungeon in questions stats and skills. They might know the formula, he doubted it, but it was possible. The issue was that they didn't have any related skills in manufacturing or science fields.

The odds of them developing the entire process and working out the kinks for it were low. Of course, the system could be used to compensate to a degree, but that took creative thinking. Something Neutrality didn't imagine a Dungeon named KuroDeathShinigami13 had much of.

Neutrality stopped reading and looked over at Evil. They were looking a little paler than usual.

"You alright?" Neutrality asked. Evil always looked sickly to his eyes, but that was normal for them. Right now, they were a shade closer to ghastly than he was comfortable with.

"Fiiiiinnnne," Evil drawled unconvincingly. Neutrality wanted to press the point but decided against it. For all, he knew they were feeling better than usual or something weird like that.

"Do they threaten you a lot?" Neutrality asked instead. Evil shrugged in response, sipping canned chaos. Their features had scrunched a bit as they massaged below one of their horns. It was an odd gesture, one that reminded Neutrality of how he'd rub a temple when he had a headache.

"Do yourself a favor and don't look up anything you didn't understand. I disabled safe search on your interface like a month ago as a joke," Evil said. The warning came out like they were commenting on the weather. Neutrality shivered, glad he hadn't done that.

"Sorry about what I said earlier," Neutrality offered the apology sincerely. He disagreed with ignoring all of the tickets; that seemed lazy. Despite that, he could see how dealing with a deluge of trash would wear someone down.

"Why?" Evil asked.

"It wasn't fair to assume you were doing something without reason. Or that I even knew what exactly you were doing," Neutrality said. He was surprised by the near non-reaction.

"Fucking seriously? You still lean good for no reason," Evil said, feet up on their desk.

"Still?" Neutrality asked, surprised by the familiar tone. It was weird coming from Evil.

"You've been like that since freshman year. Always trying to be nice and getting kicked around for it," Evil replied.

"Freshman year? How would you even know that?" Neutrality asked.

"Because we had classes together… Wait, do you not recognize me?" Evil asked. Neutrality was shocked by the idea that he would. Evil looked like they were about to say something then swallowed the words.

"Gotta... piss?" Evil said blandly. They got up and left in the wrong direction. That didn't mean they were lying, though. Neutrality wondered if they would go piss somewhere or on someone specific. He decided not to linger on those kinds of thoughts.

"Hey Nu… Uhm… Do you not recognize them?" Chaos asked in a combination of signs and three languages.

"I went to a neutral university," Neutrality said with a shrug. There was no chance they'd had classes together.

"Yeah, so did they. Evil used to be Neutral before the… unpleasantness with the old Evil," Chaos explained.

"What?" Neutrality asked, too surprised to form a better question. When Chaos had told him that story, he'd thought that Evil had done something to the old Neutrality. Looking toward the retreating form, Neutrality felt a moment of vertigo.

Always in a hoodie, kind of a bastard, combative, feet up on the desk. Evil's image overlapped with a similar but less sinister one in Neutrality's memories. If he wasn't wrong, they'd had almost all the same classes together. He wouldn't have called them friends, but they'd known each other well.

A second wave hit as things started to click into place. Knowing his name was Kevin, not getting in his personal space, and not touching him. They were still evil, but they hadn't harassed him despite having every opportunity to.

"Were they being… nice to me?" Neutrality wondered for a moment. He wasn't sure, couldn't be since a long game was possible, but his experience suggested he had the right idea. Then, forgetting why he'd been trapped in the office for weeks, Neutrality hurried after Evil. They needed to talk.

Chaos followed, riding their office chair, which was suddenly self-propelling. A strange giggle issued from them as they went. Drama was afoot, and they would not miss it.

While the three system admins left, back at Evils desk, the apple began to smoke. The snow-white flesh beneath ruby red skin blackening where Evil had taken a bite.

A few minutes after the room had emptied, Good strode in. As if it were perfectly natural for them to be there. They bent down and crawled under Neutralities desk. An undignified act, to be sure, but necessary.

Good couldn't transgress Evil's personal space. So instead, underneath Neutrality's desk, they accessed the back of Evil's system unit. Good slotted a thumb drive into a port and then stood up. They didn't know what the point of the task was, but Good had their orders.

Law had been thwarted once and given up, but Good wasn't so easily deterred. They'd danced with Evil in one form or another for centuries. It was always a matter of patience, ingenuity, and sacrifice.

Good flinched a bit as they approached Evils desk but were determined. They looked fondly at the still smoking apple. The fruit was usually associated with evil. It was careless to think all foods followed broader symbolism.

This one was a holy apple from a lovely little pocket world of near-perfect order. Its inhabitants had created a garden, then laid down and entered a state of bliss. Good had left crates worth around various places in the office for the last few weeks. Neutrality hadn't disappointed and finally brought some back to the office to share.

Finally ready to go, Good took a moment to look over Neutrality's desk. It was orderly but operated on its own unique rules. That earned a disappointed tongue clucking.

It was sad how Neutrality always came so close to understanding the proper way of things. Yet, they always fell short. Good had tried their very best to guide Neutrality when they still worked out of the same office. To show them by example how to live.

The failure rankled, but Good accepted that they were not perfect yet. Good liked Neutrality, but they honestly liked everyone. No one was actually special to them. That was the province of Evil, to covet and to play favorites. Much like revenge which Evil would no doubt enact in short order.

Evil would figure out that they'd been poisoned. Neutrality would be the scapegoat for what Good had done. It was a needful sacrifice.