let's commit dissection. i have created a diagram for us to follow. each section is numbered by the order i thought of them in. sorry if it's hard to understand, i'll try to explain it.

THE CORPSE: nemuro is dead in this image. the machine has been broken. the human has died. life is no longer present for this vessel. of course, even the dead can be exploited in akio's world. here, his corpse has been opened up for the purpose of finding something useful.

THE HANDS: these are all hands that belong to people who contributed to nemuro's exploitation, subsequent death, the birth of mikage, and death again.

the first set of hands ( top center ) belong to the chida siblings: tokiko ( left, on cheek ) and mamiya ( right, on head ). i put them here to represent their place in nemuro's life: in his mind. his memories. they are gentle hands, petting and cradling his head/face, almost pacifying. it's a cold gesture. nemuro is already dead. his head is slightly turned, his cheek pressed into tokiko's palm.

the second set of hands ( middle center ) belongs to akio/dios: white gloved hands open up the curtains to reveal the spare parts. the replacement. the understudy turned main actor. the duelist, so to speak. with the white gloves, free of blood, there is an almost regal feel to this reveal. he is the director, after all. the ideal. the star. an operating theater used to be a place where observers can watch live surgeries. i wanted dios' association with the stage to be prevalent here.

the last set of hands ( bottom center ) belong to anthy/fakemiya: they are a dark red color. this is meant to be two things: the illusion of shadows behind the curtains, and the allusion of blood on her hands. while akio is credited as the mastermind, anthy is the one who is doing the dirty work. she is the one who is actively manipulating mikage. she is the one who is actively taking nemuro apart. she is the one who ultimately ensures their demise. she is holding a screwdriver in her left hand, the shank + tip of which is piercing through mikage. more on that later.

THE STAGE: i wanted the focus of this piece to be nemuro's insides, where mikage is found. the screwdriver held by anthy/fakemiya is what allowed access to nemuro's ventral cavity ( basically his entire front. ) the two curtains are an opening of the body's walls, and the curtains are a not-gory way to suggest the redness of blood and meat.

within the body is circuits and screens. the screens are meant to echo the specimen frames we see in the evil therapy elevator, and were supposed to have the bug phases with mikage's head taking up the leaf frame to represent his ultimate regression. but i opted to keep the screens as dead as the body.

the stage is many things. a body being dissected. a machine being taken apart. a coffin for the dead. an elevator to hell.

THE DUELIST: ... who is the actor, who is the perpetrator, who is the victim. nemuro himself was never a duelist: it was only when he chose death that he became one-- became mikage.

he is in the same pose that he's in during his descent in the elevator. he is curled in on himself, hand on the shoulder. the screwdriver, held by anthy/fake mamiya, is piercing through his left breast. it is a black rose, it is a sword, it is death. mikage, too, was already dead when akio decided to use him. he had already lost the moment he came back with the ring on.

the stage that is set up for him is one of futility. he will think he's in control, and he will think the stage is his own, and he will think it's his story to tell. we, of course, know that he's nothing.

THE TEXTURES: there are three.

on september 9th, 1947, a moth was found inside of the harvard mark II computer. it was aptly called the first "computer bug" found. i decided it would be fitting to use.

a blue screen of death. the modern association with computer errors.

a window from episode 22, in the room where nemuro finds tokiko kissing akio. it is specifically the right window. side note, it's interesting that tokiko/akio are on the left side; associated with the heart.