-INTERLUDE I: MOTH KILBY-

Moth Kilby adjusts their hat to sit at a jaunty angle atop their disheveled black hair, grinning, and knocks on the director’s door.

“Who is this?” They hear Tobias Fitzroy ask, followed by the sound of a cabinet shutting quickly, and the door opens. Tobias Fitzroy is gorgeous even on his off-days, not a hair out of place.

(He maintains his appearance with artifice, of course. Alla the famous guys do. Never met a celebrity who authentically looks like themself, never will.)

Tobias Fitzroy is gorgeous at first glance, but the trained eye - and Kilby considers themself trained as they get - notices something amiss - namely, that there seems to be black ink all over his hands. Why he hasn’t simply artificed it off yet perplexes Kilby. If they were able to do any significant amount of artifice, as they know Fitzroy is, they’d be doing it all the damn time, but they repressed their knack quite well as a child and, despite scant experiments, have been unable to train themself back into it.

There’s pinot noir stained on the corner of his mouth. Nasty, Kilby thinks. Use one of those cloth napkins which cost more than my kidneys to wipe it off, will ya? Rich bastard.

“Oh, it’s you. What do you want, Kilby?” Fitzroy asks, flat and threatening.

Kilby blanches. Fitzroy is scary, and all the things they think in their head are better thought than said aloud. Kilby is stupid, and they’ll admit that anyday, but they’re no idiot.

“Sir, yessir,” they say, laughing nervously, because Tobias Fitzroy is the scariest person they know, and they know some scary folks. “I’d been thinking, ya know...about my old behaviors and such, and, yaknow, I’m not proud of the person I was, but I was thinking...if there’s any way I can-”

“I don’t have time to deal with you,” Fitzroy says, rolling his eyes.

“Oh, stars, do I know the feeling! Most of the time I feel like I’ve got barely time enough to deal with me, but listen, sir, I’ve changed, listen, I promise. I’ve thought on my behavior, and how it’s been bad - on account of how it’s not been very good and such and all - and I think I’ve changed and I can do better, so if you would-”

Fitzroy’s eyes narrow. He’s suspicious, Kilby realizes, which is never a good thing but is especially not a good thing when the suspicious individual in question commands a criminal underworld and has a difficult-to-comprehend amount of money to spend as he pleases. Tobias Fitzroy is a terrifying man.

If he thinks Kilby’s a threat, well...that’s simply not good news. Not good news at all, no siree, they think, and it takes all their strength to keep them from blurting that out aloud. Moth Kilby has never been a good spy, on account of the fact that they tend to say whatever’s on their mind and say it loudly and confusingly and with starts and stops in strange places.

Interferes with a lot, that. Makes for especially bad spying, though.

They pull their hat down over their face - though, being a top-hat, it doesn’t entirely cooperate, and Kilby feels as if they’re needlessly straining the fabric, so they stop doing that, but then there’s no sensory input and no way to calm themself down so they thread their fingers together and strain until they can feel their joints threatening to crack.

“It’s just that since you fired me I ain’t been able to find work or such and I, well, I know you find me annoying but I think I’m good at what I used to do and I think I could do great if you just gave me a shot and-”

Fitzroy leers. Kilby’s heart sinks.

“...you’re gonna hurt me, ain’tcha?”

His eyes barely widen, and he shakes his head, scoffing. “...no, Kilby. You’re too stupid to be a threat, don’t worry. I would never take you for a competent conspirator against me. Thus, there’s no reason to hurt you.”

You hurt lotsa people who ain’t any threat to ya, Kilby doesn’t say, because that would be rude and then Fitzroy would beat them to a pulp with that expensive cane and then where would they be? Dead! And being dead isn’t where they want to end up so they keep their mouth shut and they don’t say anything and they nod, tears building in the corner of their eyes.

Was that bird what ya hung up like a dead chicken fronta the whole crowd a threat to ya?

They don’t say that either.

It’s always a shock when Fitzroy’s face turns sympathetic. Kilby isn’t a good just about anything but they’re a damned fantastic judge of character, and they know Fitzroy’s got no sympathy for just about anyone ‘cause he thinks beauty is pain and right makes might and eighteen-thousand-or-so other catchy slogans you’d hear in primary school.

“Oh, Kilby. Here.” He plucks one of the many rings - Kilby counts thirteen - he’s currently wearing off of his hand and drops it in theirs. “You need money? You need but ask.”

“Th-th-thank you, sir, yessir,” he stammers. “‘Snot just the money, though. Miss the stage, miss the lights, miss the thrills. Been doing my clown stuff in the streets but it’s not the damn same, is it?”

“I still have your phone number, Kilby. I’ll contact you if we ever need your specific brand of nonsense. Now...shoo. I have work to do.”

Kilby nods, sweeps off their hat, choruses another ‘sir, yessir, yes sir’, and turns on their heels with a smooth and sweeping motion to leave.

“Wait,” they hear from behind them.

They turn around, looking at Fitzroy, who is far more awkward than they’ve seen him in ages. “We could have lunch someday, if you really want me to think you’re mending your ways.”

“Oh!” Kilby hopes it’s not too obvious how immediately they brighten, the corners of their mouth jumping up like a spectacularly well-wound pogo stick. “I would love that! I would love that so much, yessir, that’d be fantastic and I’d be thrilled and-”

“...alright, alright. Wednesday, six in the evening, the Bitter End. Now off with you.”

“Right!” They say, saluting. “By the way, I actually sold my phone for food money a while back, uh, I’ll buy a new one now that I have the needs, uh, um, bye! Seeya!”

They whirl around and rush off, heart pounding with glee, before he can call them an idiot or a clown or some-such again.

The Bitter End? Why, that’s a place the proles and the reprobates eat - for Fitzroy to be seen somewhere so, well, so un-Ritzy is unthinkable, and Kilby has no doubt he’ll have the little cafe shut down entirely so it’s just the two of them. Just the two of them! Why,

Why, indeed?

Kilby frowns. No, Tobias Fitzroy would never do something like that. But then again, he used to let Kilby call him Toby and used to give them a job and used to be so kindly for a rich man, but now he’s, what, this shell? A shell usually can have something in it, or maybe not, but the point stands that they’ve run out of ways to metaphorise this and have yet to make up their thoughts in any way that makes sense to them, and surely if it makes no sense to them it’ll make less to any person on the planet with a single verifiable scrap of brain in them.

It’s very hard, they think, being themself sometimes, and they should appreciate some condolences from literally anyone, perhaps as a substitute for the usual choruses of “fuck off, Kilby, you annoying, stupid, idiot clown”.

They’re an idiot clown, they know, but that doesn’t mean they feel good about it. Mostly indifferent, actually.

Kilby frowns and pulls their hat down over their ears again. The feather in it has fallen to the floor - they scoop it up gingerly and stick it back in the brim. The feather is actually a dart, so leaving that lying on the floor would be an idea that would be bad and not very good.

“I can’t believe this,” they say aloud, though they’re not sure what it is they’re precisely disbelieving.

They stomp through the hallways, not bothering to walk normally because who cares, they’ll walk however they damnably want in this most pompous of clown shows, and no one on this damnable planet will stop them!

“Stop that,” they hear a strict, stern, uptight snooty rich-person voice say, and immediately freeze in place, looking back at the source of the noise like a child caught sticking their hair in a cookie-jar by their parent. Moth Kilby would not know about having parents or jars of cookies, but they suppose that’s as good a way of similizing it as any.

“Sorry, sorry, yessir, sorry,” they mutter on reflex.

The man in front of them is tall and well-manicured and quite handsome, hair perfectly curled. His name is John Donahue and he is a costumer, and he’s complained many times about having to costume someone like Kilby who, according to him, is ‘uncooperative’ and ‘stupid’. He’s not very nice, and Kilby thinks Toby would be better off spending his time with someone nice but poor and stupid, like Kilby, than someone rich and smart but really very mean, like John Donahue.

“You’d best be,” he says, and scoffs. Scoffing, by coincidence, is John Donahue’s favorite thing to do, as far as Kilby’s seen of the man.

Kilby scoffs back, and Donahue looks offended. Kilby supposes it wasn’t very much a gesture of solidarity, but they also think they should get a few free insults in without repercussions every now and then. They get insulted such a disproportionate amount. It’s only fair.

Next to Donahue, Morgana Fitzroy is sipping from a flute of absinthe. She looks at Kilby as though they are a rat dragged in by one of the Fitzroys’ seemingly endless supplies of cats.

“What are you doing here?” she asks, more bewildered than upset. “I thought father had fired you.”

“Aha! You thought-correctly, you thought right, but it’s fine, I’m not banned from the premises yet, Miss Morgana, no siree-”

Her eyes narrow. “Why not?”

Why not? Kilby blinks rapidly, and feels as if they’re about to induce a seizure in themself so they stop doing that. “I mean, wh-why aren’t you banned? H-Haha, funny, funny joke, yes, I’m joking - sorry, new boyfriend?”

She narrows her eyes, putting a hand over John Donahue’s mouth before he can answer. “People are banned for a reason, you know. With that Nemesis Jones guy snooping around in our business, it’s tense around here. Father doesn’t want people stumbling on anything, and the murders have made that a relevant concern. No idea who it benefited, killing her, unless someone just really wanted to kill people for the sake of it. At least the other end of his plan is going better...As for John and I...none of your business, Kilby. You don’t have a chance with me anyway.”

“With you?” They scoff. “I’m, like, I know I look young but I’m like ten years older than you. I’m a full thirty-five!”

“You don’t look it,” she comments.

“That’s what I said, but I am old! I’m near your old man’s age!”

“Don’t call him that.”

“Get out of my face,” Donahue adds. “Sorry, but you’re around a three, and I associate with sevens and above only. Anyway, Antony Fairchance and I have that meeting to go to once he’s out of his one with Fitzroy, and I certainly don’t want him seeing me around the likes of you.”

“Hmph!” Kilby exclaims, turning around and obediently leaving. Inside, they’re fuming. Only a remarkably juvenile and insecure individual would be so hung-up on the ten-point scale anyway, and, anyway, anyhow, Kilby is definitely at least a six-and-a-half if you ignore the clothes and go off pure looks. They have nice cheekbones and no rich asshole can take that from them.

They stop a fair bit away from the other two idiots and put their head against the wall and feel as if they might cry. Their hand is curled so tightly around the ring Toby gave them that it feels like it’s going to cut into their hand and break all their bones and that’s not good for someone who makes a portion of their income off juggling.

...he probably wouldn’t want them calling him Toby anymore, not even in their head, they think sadly.

Speaking of Toby...they can hear his voice, quietly, through the wall. Oh, boy! They know they shouldn’t, but they press their ear against the wall and squint hard even though it doesn’t really help them to listen and listen even harder.

“-important,” Fitzroy says, and then they can’t tell what he’s saying, and then, “-Kilby-” and they squint and strain very hard but they can’t hear what comes after, until, “-dealt with. Make sure of it. I’ll - the money - can’t be allowed to live.”

They recoil from the wall, eyes wide. Of course - it’s all a ruse, of course it is! Tobias Fitzroy thinks they’ve seen too much of something and wants them out of the way, and they know exactly what the something is and that doesn’t make it any more comforting, and they’re just left wondering why he didn’t do it years ago. Maybe he’s still got a touch of a soft-spot for an old friend and he’s willing to make them happy in their last moments before the sniper takes them out or whatever he has planned.

Their breathing is heavy. Kilby, like anyone else, finds death a scary, scary, scary no-good thought that they don’t want to think. They feel nauseous and weak-kneed and unsettled and they realize they only have one place to go for a circumstance like this.

Nemesis Jones, Morgana Fitzroy had mentioned. Here’s hoping the guy’s got some free spots on his docket. Literally a matter of life and death - not a life that matters to anyone, really, but it matters to Kilby, seeing as they’ve only got the one.

...same Nemesis Jones whose bleeding mug was plastered all over the newspapers, they think with a sinking feeling, but they’ll take whatever they can get.

~MOVEMENT I - THE CLOCKWORK MAIDEN - FIN~