The Manhunt/Chapter 13

Bastion Fanfarinet had expressed no qualms: the opportunity to rid himself of his destiny was too great, too rare to inspire any worry. While the three revelled in France, there was no time to sit down and think. When one’s life was short, one had to live what little of it one had.

Only when everything had been packed and arranged for Ever After High did the gravity of the situation come rushing up to Bastion Fanfarinet. It was a sharp and sudden acceleration, thrilling yet terrifying, and he had not been prepared to be suddenly struck by such worry.

In the evening the three were meant to leave, Bastion tried to throw up the sick feeling in his stomach, then took a good long look at himself in the mirror.

People had told him he never looked much like his uncle. His face gave the impression of a Fanfarinet, though no one could pin down exactly why. The expression? The atmosphere? Bastion Fanfarinet was hardly charming, and any handsomeness was more unapproachable than alluring.

His thoughts swirled to Death again, something that he thought far too much about. Then, to his five year plan.

Would people remember him? If so, as what? Before the erasure of destiny, he would be yet another Ambassador Fanfarinet, a piece of trash who deserved no grave fancier than the harsh bottom of a sea.

Then, there was Gabriel.

Dear Author, poor Gabriel.

He had so much life in him, so much vivacity. It was almost a shame that he was so willing to take up the role, and replace Bastion.

Gabriel Benoît deserved to live more than him.

That seemed certain.

He sighed, and stared intently at the mirror again – tried to think of himself in five years, yet only imagined that dark watery grave. Tried once more to think of happiness, it felt too unrealistic and taunting, and pushed that thought aside. Finally, he tried to think of living life on the edge.

A life with no plan had rarely appealed to him before.

Why did it call to him now?

What a mess he was.

No. He couldn’t be thinking like this. Not after expending effort, and a good week and a half working this damn thing out, he would be damned if he went back on his work like this.

Gabriel Benoît was the next Ambassador Fanfarinet.

And Bastion Fanfarinet just had to accept giving up something that had been a decent part of him for the past two years.

When Airmid had packed their bags and delicately carried the suitcase downstairs, Bastion was waiting. He had a certain air around him, and Airmid spotted it immediately. On his face was that expression one made when compiling thoughts.

“Just spill,” said the doctor. They were already tired from carrying the briefcase downstairs. It contained no longer just the analysis materials now, but also the precious journal.

Bastion sighed. When he began to speak, his words were almost a garbled blur. “I just don’t know whether this is right. We’ve told a guy that being a fairytale legacy meant that you lived your life with solid funds, that you can blow money on nice suits and replicas of paintings. For the first type of his life, we taught him what comfort means.”

They had sent him to one of Paris’ best tailors. They had bought him a replica of a favourite painting. He had lived a good life – a false slice of what being a legacy was like.

“I just think, since he’s never been hexposed to any of this before, that we’ll break him,” he frowned. “Airmid, is that bad? Am I a bad person?"

“Why do you think so?”

“I just– I don’t know. This is deceitful. I feel like this should be morally wrong.”

“If you think about it, it is his destiny, after all. It’s what supposed to happen,” Airmid looked solemnly into the distance. “People say that’s how the world’s supposed to work.”

The end justifies the means, Bastion told himself, the end justifies the m–

“Despite any controversies and my opinion,” Airmid said, “it’s still your life, your family and your story. I shouldn’t be intervening.”

“Didn’t you help the Junipers?” Bastion said.

“They were certain of what they were doing to fix their destiny. You, however, are totally winging it. That of course is ironic because I thought they were the birds.”

He bit back his tongue, and let Airmid continue the conversation.

“Ethics aside, how do you feel about Gabriel? In purely destiny terms, of course."

"He's perfect. The most accurate Fanfarinet I've seen,” the ghost of a smile was on Bastion’s face.

“The role he was born to play."

“More like die to play,” he quipped. A morbid smile broke on his face, and that morbid smile into a small laugh. “Sorry, that was terrible.”

Airmid Valerian blinked. “Did I just observe you make a joke? And laugh? Once I would have thought the world would collapse before you gave a genuine smile.”

“You mock me.”

“Hexcuse me, you’re fun to mock."

“Thank you,” he enunciated those words bluntly, but said them with a smile.

Gabriel arrived to the scene soon enough, carrying his own luggage with the chill ease of a villain.

It was scary how perfectly fitting he was.

(And even scarier, Bastion thought, why no one had bothered hunting him down before.)

“Morning,” Gabriel said with a curt nod of his head. “Might I comment on how surreal this all feels? In such a short period of time, to have one’s life change so quickly?”

He spoke with the chill, commanding ease of a villain too.

(Bastion knew that he should be internally spellebrating his loss of destiny.)

(Yet why did he feel nothing but dread?)

His plan had been simple. The village of BookEnd was a prime place to live -- both in terms of quality, and in terms of networking. If Gabriel could live there and pick up enough fairytale decorum through social osmosis, he would be well-trained.

Bastion had opened his mouth to reply, but before he could get a word out, his phone rang. With a quick gasp in mid-breath, he made a gesture to hexcuse himself from the conversation.

When he picked up the phone, his face had been calm, but that demeanour fell once he heard the voice at the other end.

“Mother?”

He said nothing, and only let the voice on the other end speaking. Disbelief was scarred into his face. “Yes– yes. I see… You– everything? Now? Right outside?”

And sure enough, there was a slick black car, with a man in a French suit.

(Bastion’s first thought was how jarringly modern this whole scene was.)

“Fanfarinet?” asked the man.

Slowly and skeptically, Bastion nodded, and glanced nervously at his two companions.

“I believe we should get in,” he said, the feeling of dread in his stomach returning. “I would rather not mess with the mother figure."

(It had been such an abrupt change of plans, yet Bastion was in confusion as to why he felt little over it.)

Conversation in the car had been awkward, painfully long and strained and dragged out.

Mostly it had been Gabriel posing questions – Bastion giving one-word answers and Airmid rambling about something only mildly related to said question.

He had prodded about Bas’ parents (“tolerable”), asked about where they were heading (“the France-Switzerland border”), and queried about the nature of the king they were to serve.

“Technically, we aren’t connected to any kingdom,” Bastion said. “We used to be, but when Fanfarinet Original started off the Princess Mayblossom story, his family were essentially fired. Instead of connecting ourselves to a kingdom each generation, they send the next Fanfarinet to live and work under the next King Merlin of the story.”

“And who does that happen to be this round?”

“Turnus Wyllt.”

“Wyllt? So is he actually a Merlin?”

Bastion blanked. “I… genuinely have no clue. It might be worth asking him, though.”

Upon thought, he had hardly made an effort to acquaintance himself with the guy who he was once supposed to be ambassador for.

There was something ironic about that, which Bastion couldn’t quite put his finger on.

When the three arrived, the car jolted to a stop in front of the Fanfarinet Villa.

Outside, stood a woman, short in stature but tall in prestige.

“So, the prodigal son returns."