Chapter Text
Clockwork threw the door to Banhammer’s office open in frustration, holding a large bottle of water for the Banland warden.
Banhammer’s head was in his hands, just sitting there. He must have been thinking again. And why wouldn’t he?
“What is it?” Clockwork questioned, “Anything?”
“Ugh…” he sighed, sinking back into his chair. He was biting his nails.
She placed the bottle on his desk, “Hm, there goes your break for the month. Unfortunately.”
“This isn’t a joking matter, Clock,” he snapped.
“What? Do you have any leads?” she asked sarcastically, a hue of annoyance tinging her words.
“......”
He was hiding something.
“Tell me.”
He immediately leapt around the demand, “...Don’t bother me if you don’t care,” Banhammer grumbled, “I don’t need your help.”
“Oh, no, I do care! I care when Boombox gets sent to the hospital, that is…” Clockwork responded, clenching her fists.
Well, that list does ALSO include the deaths of Rocket and Sword but something about the entire situation just felt so… apathetic now. She was angry in the moments but now she felt so utterly empty or detached about it. Maybe those sentiments were just coping mechanisms for the lingering despair.
“Get out of my office!” Banhammer shouted at her, bashing his hands on his desk with emphasis.
“Oookay then,” she mumbled, turning to leave.
And that was the last time they saw each other.
That is… besides when she found his corpse disposed haphazardly onto the sidewalk. A fresh, gaping hole in his chest.
And Swords, she still felt so empty about the situation. Empty, with the slightest tinge of anger in the wake of her friends’ deaths. Something felt missing.
She guessed part of it was Banhammer’s disappearance. Even if he had been absent when he dove headfirst into these oddly-timed murders, it was still company. Everybody else had stopped talking to her even before Banhammer became next on the chopping block.
Sword died, she didn’t get a chance to speak to him. They were supposed to meet up the day after. She was angry about that.
Rocket’s dead, they had spoken a few days before his murder. She was pissed for not having done something with him to get him out of his situation.
Boombox got sent to the hospital, she didn’t bother to visit him. She’d been too enraged about what had happened at the Flipside concert so she thought it’d be for the best to back off. …And then he got sniped through his window.
Banhammer had died a few days ago, that was already evident. She was annoyed that she was missing him.
There was one person left. He was still alive but…
They hadn’t seen each other in a while. He stopped texting her, when was it… a month ago? And after Sword went to stay over with him that night…
…..
Aha. That assumption is frankly ridiculous!
But anyway, she would have expected Medkit to ghost her just not for this long of a time. That pissed her off too, almost more so than Banhammer’s death. Something must have been wrong, obviously. She just didn’t feel obligated to confront him about it because he wouldn’t have ignored her so readily if he had wanted her to fuck off. She obliged eventually after two weeks of pestering over text. If he wants to die to the murderer by himself then she couldn’t give less of a damn about him, he brought that upon himself by being a piece of garbage. She didn’t want to dispense her frustration all over him when he’s clearly in a rough spot too.
Her “heart” still shook with pain though.
Well, since Banhammer’s been dead, she had to take primary control over Banland. Windforce was in too much of a state of despair to take such a rigorous job anyway, she’d feel bad if she could. But all of those emotions were just replaced with a lingering rage. The anger made her a good guard, at least. A good guard over an entirely empty prison. She hadn’t been doing any investigation like Banhammer was since basically everyone she’s cared for is fucking dead anyway. Everyone else could fuck themselves to death for all she cared.
Though she slightly regretted being so unserious back then now that she thought about it. Even if her ability to care was so stunted in general, they were still friends. They brought happiness. And now it’s all gone. It’d be nice to avenge them but that idea felt so loathsome. Killing the murderer wouldn’t bring them back. And either way, if the killer was after every phighter then they’d be after her.
As if, any of them could challenge her, that’d just be absolutely moronic of them. She’ll kill them when they decide to stoop to that level of stupidity.
In the meantime, she still had Banhammer’s gear to play with. He still had it on him when she found his body so she just snatched it after the five-second “mourning” period. A consistent theme with the killer was that they’d been stealing the gears of their victims but they were probably too weak to steal Banhammer’s gear considering it weighs as much as her. So, it’s nice to have two different melee gears.
And if she had to make a guess for who the killer was…
….
No.
…It’s probably Scythe. She’s a serial killer and a gear launderer. It only makes sense.
Probably is why Medkit isn’t dead either. They work together.
Yeah…
And yet she still felt so apathetically empty now.