#reader x ena

We found a blue bed, very easy to spot with all the dull colors, and it somehow brought us back to the casino… yeah, I’m not going to question it even if that’s all I want to do. At least I was back to the most familiar place I could be. I kept the relief to myself though, I wasn’t even off work yet… unless time skipped ahead from the other realms I went through just to find this ENA.

“Where to next, acquaintance?” ENA spoke from the red side, a small smile already there on her face like it was a habit.

“Just follow me, I’m pretty sure they should still be above the casino, and hopefully not busy if Froggy was actually able to get information out of that guy.” I explained, walking ahead and leading the way through the casino hall. I could hear the muffled voices of people gambling as we walked, it was refreshing for once to not have to deal with them and papers at the same time- I’m sorry receptionist.

I frowned as we approached the wide staircase. I could barely smell the blood from the ocean, mostly just the smoke that I barely took notice to when I was last here. Were entities smoking? Is that… even allowed? Maybe outside, but geez it was overwhelming. The good thing was that I didn’t really have lungs, or a nose, so I don’t know how I do have a sense of smell, but at least that allows me to not suffocate.

We got to ground level, where Froggy and… Dratula- I’m assuming his name is- we’re standing across from each other. “So over there is our manger-“ I gestured to Froggy, but ENA was already off doing her own thing, doing some odd dance movements as she approached the two.

“Hope you don’t mind, but could you tell me- WHERE THE HELL IS THE BOSS?!” ENA yelled as the red side of her face fell off like poorly glued on paper, now replaced with static as the Meanie side took control, bringing out a yellow megaphone from thin air… well she seems passionate about this.

“YESSS, I AM THE BOSS!!” Dratula laughed in an attempt to sound intimidating. I frowned. I thought this guy had information on the boss, not was the boss. In that case… if this is competition between businesses, this definitely would look like it.

“No you’re not! Idiot!” Froggy spoke up, looking over at ENA. “Don’t believe him, ENA. He is not the Boss.” He assured. Okay, well, that’s cleared up, don’t know why he’d want to claim himself as the boss anyways? Wouldn’t that just make entities target him?

Dratula clapped his hands. “OKAY, YOU GOT ME!! I AM NOT THE BOSS, NOR A PENGUIN, BUT- IN FACT-“ A small storm of thundering clouds formed above him. “THE GREAT DRATULAAA!!”

Froggy groaned in irritation, scratching the back of his head as if just his voice was causing him a migraine. “This guy is nuts. I can’t stand another minute with him!”

I eased my way over beside ENA to talk in case she needed any insight on anything, but I felt like if she were to ask a question it would be in no way I could understand.

“I AM NOT NUTS, I AM DRATULA.”

ENA clapped her hands, bringing all the attention to her. “What are your pain points? What’s your problem? What are our business struggles today? Let me help you invest in your future.” ENA’s salesman side spoke, talking like she’s recited this a bunch of times before in a mirror.

“Eh?! Is this another one of your prism schemes? Stop with those complex words, you’re making me dizzy.” Froggy crossed his arms, sounding skeptical of her. Again? Was there another ENA with a prism scheme I never heard about until now? Probably with how little I listen.

I cleared my throat. “Uh- if you want, I can interview her-“

“NOOOOO!! JUST TELL ME ABOUT THIS DUMB JOB ALREADY!!!” ENA’s Meanie side yelled in frustration, completely catching me off guard… she’s very forward.

Froggy seemed to show some interest instead of looking offended by calling the job dumb to my surprise. “Being proactive at work, eh? Good signal, good signal. Anyways, listen carefully-“ he pointed to Dratula. “It took a while, but this windbag finally spat out the Boss’s location.

The only problem is…

YOU’RE BOTH LATE.” Both? Who’s the other entity, I only brought o- oh… OH WAIT HE’S TALKING ABOUT ME. I looked over at ENA, the salesman side being in control with an open mouth smile, looking completely calm while I probably just looked worried.

“And now we’re running out of time to put that dead meat in its place!” Froggy stressed… are we murdering someone? I thought we just ran a casino with served food and drinks or something.

ENA glew for a moment, but I didn’t even flinch or react, I’ve seen too many crazy things, including entities randomly glowing, to react. ENA’s smile faltered. “Huh. Seems we’re out of the loop. Shall we review the job description?” She took off her hat, placing it over her chest, a wider smile forming on her face.

… wait- WE’RE-WE?! WHY AM I GETTING ROPED INTO THIS?! IS IT BECAUSE FROGGY REFERRED TO THE BOTH OF US FOR BEING LATE THAT SHE THINKS I’M HELPING HER- well, she did call me acquaintance earlier, so maybe she does. I’ll have to explain after that I was just there to bring her here, not to help with the boss situation.

The smoke seemed to be growing worse, as Froggy coughed a bit. “well, as you’d say in that wacky language of yours, we’re aiming for the Boss’s gut this mission. He’s our greatest… uhhh… “work target” yet.” Froggy explained, seeming to be struggling to figure out what to say.

“Understood: aim for the target.” ENA spoke with a light enthusiasm in her voice.

Froggy swiped his hand, as if trying to clear flies in front of him. “Ehh. Yeah.” He started coughing again, but it was more aggressive than last time, making me worry. “What is that? Who’s smoking that much-“ he coughed more, frog sounds coming from him due to how bad the smoke was. “NO GOOD. NO GOOD! All of this smoke in the way is really not doing any good for my lungs! I hate cigarette smoke! It’s the worst!

I frowned, growing concerned my manager was dieing. “Uh- Froggy, are you alright?” I winced at my words. That’s dumb, he’s clearly not alright, he’s literally suffocating.

“NO!”

“I AM DRATULA.”

“SHUT UP!”

ENA tilted her hat, speaking up. “Let’s arrange our next ambush at the scene. Could you point out the Boss’s location?”

Froggy motioned for ENA to come over. “Ehh. C’mere. Both of you. Here, here. Over here.” Never mind, both of us then. Me and ENA came over, listening in. Froggy looked over out at one of the distant islands you could barely make anything out on from all the smoke in the area. “Look, see that island? It seems the Boss is hiding there, ENA. But I think we should get rid of all the smoke first.”

ENA looked over at the island. “Well? Do we have ourselves a deal?” Froggy asked.

“The survey has been inspected and accepted.” ENA looked back over at Froggy.

He frowned. “Eh… I’ll take that as a yes.”

Froggy was about to walk off, and I felt like a mosquito for just giving another thing to pester him about, but I seriously needed an explanation to ENA and myself. “Wait- Froggy! Uh- I just need to get the point across, I was only here for the retrieving her and bringing her back not participating in the whole boss thing… right?”

He sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose, seeming agitated, which was definitely because of the smoke and the Dratula guy. “Initially, yes. But so far you’re doing well and didn’t come back a complete wreck. I can tell you have some potential, so you’ll be clearing the smoke with ENA, and if it doesn’t work out, we’ll be putting you to your regular work hours at the casino.”

He walked off to the dock, leaving me absolutely shocked. I was working with someone who wasn’t the receptionist, and involved going outside the island… I am not prepared for today.

“Seems we will now be partners in the progressing target missions.” ENA spoke up, tilting her head as she looked down at me. I nodded, still trying to come to collect myself with the growing stress of spending more time outside of my comfort zone. “In that case, we should start finding the suggested whereabouts of where to progress at first. Any intel of where we should start?” She asked.

I took a deep breath. You can get through this, once you get back, you can tell Froggy you’re never doing this again. It’ll be done and over with before you know it. “Uh- y- yeah, we can start out with the receptionist, she knows every corner around the place.”

“Dear co-worker, what may be your status in the community?” My running thoughts of fears and worries were cut short by ENA as I navigated through the casino past many gamblers, I stirred away especially from any who seem upset.

“Status?- oh, uh, job? Uhh, well, I just do minor things. Go over paper work of complaints or… mostly complaints, the other paper work is just so we can keep the place running, nothing really serious I have to set with Froggy, otherwise I go talk to the receptionist for help on things. When I’m not doing that, I’m sort of like a security guard, making sure no one goes absolutely haywire over loosing all their money, a lot of entities seem to get agitated quickly.” I explained.

Her Meanie side took control, scoffing. “SERIOUSLY? YOU? You look like you’re ready to cripple into a dried up raisin the moment you have to go talking to anyone.”

I blinked, not expecting the sudden switch. I should’ve felt offended or uncomfortable, wanting to back off or just not converse with her at all, but that weird pull made it hard to not want to keep talking to her, her words didn’t even bother me.

For some reason, I kept talking, more into detail of it which surprised me. “Well, I’d be lieing if I didn’t shut down the first few times I had to deal with guests like that, but I guess being around it so much got me use to it, so I’m less likely to shut down.”

“Is that why you’ve been wheeling your way around all the loudmouth’s?” She narrowed her eyes, having been observing my continuous avoidance towards the angry gamblers who were mostly falling through the floor or becoming static and errors.

“Ehhh, well, it’s better yet to not even go by them, they might as well just throw a fit at something that can actually speak to them.” I murmured as we finally got to the receptionist.

“Hey, receptionist! We have a new worker, her names ENA, uh- we just need some answers and then we’ll be out of your bubble!” I explained, but as expected, her attention landed on ENA. Was this some curse for SEEK’s to be noticed by the end of the situation, because that’s how it feels for me, unless it’s because of how timid I look that they just deliberately don’t want to talk to me first. I’d rather believe the second one, because the idea that it’s some sort of curse to not be recognized actually hurts.

“Ugh, you again!” Her attention turned to me. “And you.” I waved sheepishly. She looked back at ENA. “You smell poor! Go eat a TV dinner, you broke, pink-collared slug with your bloodied eye oozing half!” She waved at us to go away. The jabs at my blind eye I had gotten used to, but it still stung, it was a sensitive topic for me.

Why she referred to me as ENA’s other half, I’m not sure, maybe she knew about us being subspecies but just never talked about it, which seemed like her.

Salesman ENA spoke up, doing an odd motion like she was jotting down notes on her palm. “I’m afraid that the smoke here is polluting our lungs-“ then Meanie took control. “- LET’S CUT THE CRAP- YES! You will get rid of it for us so I can deal with the man in charge.” She went straight to the point, and didn’t seem to care involving me into it like Salesman ENA seemed to consistently do.

The receptionist reacted offended by ENA’s blunt tone, throwing back the same energy. “What?! I hope you are spitting some needy nonsense. You are too late! The Boss isn’t even born yet.” Her tone turned sassy, clicking her robotic claws. “Besides, it’s not on me to give an order like that! Now SHOO! Come back when you’re richer.” She patted one of her TV’s like they were her prized possessions. “You poor, needy, beggarly, hard up, schlocky, frowzy, scrimpy clodpoll.”

I sighed, burying my face in my hands, already knowing this would turn out into an argument with how the Receptionist is, and how Meanie ENA so far doesn’t back down at all until Salesman ENA takes control.

And just as I thought that, salesman ENA took control, which I didn’t expect. “Who else is involved in the decision-making?” Her head spun around along with her red arm following, holding her chin while her white sharped edge arm tapped against her hip.

“Ah, making more questions, are we? You seem rather… problematic.” She muttered, clicking her claws.

“Are you poor with words or what?! Let’s TALK, YOU CHEAP ASSISTANT!” Meanie ENA yelled through her megaphone, dragging a lot of attention to her.

I frowned, fidgeting with my hair to try and cover my face as much as possible while the two went at each other. The situation was getting overwhelming with how much yelling and arguing was happening, something I struggled to handle. Not exactly that something traumatic happened involving it, but I grew up in a home realm that was generally peaceful and quiet, so even now despite who knows how long I’ve been here for, I still struggled with getting use to arguing.

I could feel a spike of pain in my blind eye, making my mouth twitch. It’s bleeding… again. Gladly I didn’t take my bandage off, but it still sucks. Usually things are meant to heal and be done with, or at least not bleed so often. Not for me though. When I get too stressed, my blind eye starts bleeding, maybe it’s just me and the broken physics of the world, but it just feels like someone is poking and jabbing at my eye every time some stressful occasion happens. It’s upsetting, it’s an unnecessary response that I just want to go away. It’s sounds stupid, but the fact that my eye bleeds when I’m stressed just makes it feel like I want attention or comfort, maybe I do, I’ve never experienced it with someone I’m close with on a friendship level in a extremely long time because making friends outside of my home realm is impossible, so I just won’t even try, especially if I’d just make a fool of myself.

“We must go locate the Genie and find the Lonely Door.” Salesman ENA spoke up, bringing me back to reality. Geez I’ve been zoning out a lot today.

“Ah- uh- yes, the Lonely Door, only one is open currently, but it’s better than non.” I explained, frowning as I held my chin. “As for the Genie… uh… not familiar with that.”

“As recited by the kind French Receptionist, they are the only entity to turn off the smoke.” ENA informed me.

“Oh… well, that’s useful to know.” I nodded. “Well, let’s get going to get this finished so I can go back to my regular life.” I walked off, ENA following along as she chirped up small topics.

It was weird, but the more I talked to her, the more natural it all felt, like I’ve been here before, like I’ve already done this, and I just feel weirdly comfortable talking to her. It was weird. It’s probably because she’s one entity whose words stick out with the most confusing complexity to them that just makes it so much easier to understand… which also confused me.

Froggy had called ENA over the cups, complaining about the smoke and how his feet hurt, which concerned me, since wouldn’t it be that your lungs would hurt? Not your feet. Well, ENA’s only response to it was “heal heal frog a- Ping me in some moments.” which only left me wondering what the hell Meanie ENA was saying, but I guess I’ll never know.

Then when we got back to the surface, a coin cat entity called Kane had shown up out of nowhere, claiming to be the Boss. So now I’m just left wondering if there’s going to be more entities claiming to be the boss, since two have already by now, neither of them being that target. And for some reason it referred to the Genie as the Bathroom, I didn’t care to ask why.

And from there it just seemed like a whole ton more entities had appeared while we had been in the casino, so I went back to overthinking while ENA talked to the new entities, all of them, I was unfamiliar with, never seen them at the casino… actually, I think I saw the coin cat a few times trying to cheat at some of the gambling games just to get more coins.

“Well, seems we have everything cleared up on here, all extra information that I didn’t think we’d obtain from guests was… useful, I suppose.” I spoke out loud as we approached the Lonely Door, noticing how ENA’s gaze was lingering on me, like she was trying to figure something out like I have been for her this entire time.

“So, let’s get going-“

“Shadow!” I paused, hearing a familiar timid voice that belonged to no other than Coral Glasses, the one entity I had the most closest connection to, aside from the receptionist.

“Yeah, something up?” Both me and ENA looked towards Coral Glasses who was carrying some papers. I blinked, looking down at the papers. “Ah, I’m currently busy, I can’t get it done once I get back tho-“ she already handed me the papers.

“No no, it’s only something that can be done outside the island, unless there’s entities here that fit the criteria.” I took the papers from her as she talked, flipping through the sheets that looked to be needed to be filled in in certain areas. “It’s to find an entity that can organize the inauguration of Horse Door’s new Genie, so since you’re going out, can you fax blood samples if you find one?”

Eh, not good with being social outside the island, but hey, I’m going to definitely be interacting with other entities probably because of ENA, so might as well- as long as I remember. “Sure.” I shrugged.

“And uh…” Coral Glasses glanced over at ENA, almost sweating from anxiety of the interaction. She reminds me of how much more worse my social anxiety could be. “ENA?”

“Yep, that’s ENA, my new… potential co-worker.” I mumbled, barely paying notice to how ENA still seemed to be staring at me like she was trying to understand my origin. Do ENA’s know of SEEKS? Was she trying to figure out if I was that subspecies to hers?

“Ah… well… I wish you luck on that.” Coral Glasses, rubbed her neck, struggling to think up another response.

She bid farewell and walked off, leaving me alone with ENA. I turned to look at ENA, and she quickly went to the door, talking about the Boss and finding the G-BATHROOM.

We went up to the lonely door, where we got enveloped in blue squirming tendrils to transport us to the next realm. This felt like a changing point in my life, like this wasn’t just to get use to how broken everything was, like there was more to this. The previous pain came back even worse, like someone was shoving their whole hand into my eye and feeling around, just to try and get some reaction out of me

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