Rex realizes that perhaps he was wrong about his friends abandoning him in favor of life on Systar, so he decides to do some investigating.
What he finds out may be even worse than what he originally believed.
They wasted no time putting together a search and rescue for survivors. Bad Cop and Benny both volunteered to help with the effort, and left with Mayhem. One of the palace guards cuffed Emmet before he could escape- apparently that one had noticed him in Rex's company- and prodded him toward one of the surviving shuttles. Thankfully Metalbeard and Unikitty came to his rescue, convincing the guard to let him go with them and ushering him away.
"Lucy!" he cheered when he saw her again, wrapping his arms around her tightly. He didn't miss the way she stiffened in his hold, and pulled back to stare at her. "Lucy...?"
She was giving him a wary stare, subtly changing her stance to throw him as far away from her as possible if he made any sudden moves.
There was no recognition in her gaze.
He couldn't find his voice for a minute. She'd actually forgotten him. "Lucy, it's me... Emmet, remember? The Special? Remember the Piece of Resistance?" She only continued to stare uncomprehendingly at him. "You can't have forgotten how mad you were that it chose me, when you'd been searching for it for so long..."
"Em..." Realization dawned, and she looked horrified. "Oh my god," she breathed. "I can't believe I forgot- Emmet I am so sorry-"
He blinked away tears, smiling at her. "It's okay. You remembered." He leaned into her when she pulled him close, holding onto him as tightly as she dared, murmuring apology after apology to him. "Lucy, it's okay. It wasn't your fault."
Someone nearby cleared their throat. "Ah, actually, usually the first memories to go are the unwanted ones..." Business said. The friends turned to stare at him. Emmet's heart sank into his shoes.
Watevra glared at the former president. "Even I know that was the wrong thing to say," she admonished.
Business coughed. "Well it's not like there's a delicate way to put it..."
"You wanted to forget me...?" Emmet asked, giving Lucy a betrayed look.
"Emmet, it's not like that-"
"Is that really why you told me no?"
"Look, this is kind of a bad time for this-"
"You always say that," Emmet interrupted. "Will there ever be a good time?"
"I..." Lucy bit her lip, glancing away. Emmet sighed.
"Wait," Metalbeard murmured as he realized something. He narrowed his good eye at Business. "Ye know about the brainwashing?"
Business frowned in confusion at the sudden change of topic, then paled when he realized he'd been caught. "Uh- I mean-"
"Did ye have anything to do with this?!" the pirate thundered.
"No!" Business yelped. "I swear I didn't!"
"Brainwashing?" Watevra asked, utterly lost.
"I swear to The Man Upstairs, if ye had even the slightest bit to do with all this-"
"What do you mean by 'brainwashing'?" Watevra demanded. "Sirius, what are they talking about? Do you know what's going on?"
"Sirius?" Unikitty parroted. "Wait, you mean your first name isn't Lord?"
"No, my first name isn't Lord," Business grumbled. "Yes, I know what's going on, and no, nobody here has anything to do with it."
"T'ain't that Dangervest fellow the General mentioned, is it?"
"No, Rex doesn't have anything to do with it either," Emmet murmured. That earned him a few suspicious looks. "He means 'nobody here' as in 'nobody in our reality'. Right?"
Business sighed at the multitude of confused stares they were being given. "Alright everyone. Might as well sit down, this is gonna take a bit." They settled into the shuttle's seats. Business told the driver to take them back to the palace (which, from a distance, still looked to be intact) before beginning his story. "What I'm about to tell you probably isn't going to make much sense, but I promise every bit of it is the truth. I know you all remember me as having just... taken off to go play golf, of all things, but what really happened was that... after I was 'defeated', I was abandoned. Set aside because I'd played out my part of the story and was no longer of any use. I had to sit and watch as my city was destroyed by two squabbling siblings, and I was helpless to do anything about it." Emmet gave him an empathetic look, and Business remembered he wasn't the only one who'd paid a visit to the Realm of The Man Upstairs. He suddenly realized what that must have been like for the young man, to watch helplessly as Business hurt his friends, and fought not to flinch. "But then the little girl noticed me left aside, and since the boy clearly had no interest in me anymore, she brought me here. Gave me a second chance, to really be one of the good guys." He shrugged. "I did the best I know how."
"But that don't really explain the brainwashing bit," Metalbeard pointed out.
Emmet tapped his chin as he thought. "It does, though. If she has her own ideas and interpretations of who we are, and she's the one in control of our reality now..."
"...Then we change in accordance with who she thinks we are," Lucy finished, and shuddered. "I don't like this. Those beings- The Man Upstairs- they really have that much control over us? Is there any way to stop them?"
"I'm more worried about stopping Dangervest," Watevra spoke up. "He's the more immediate of our concerns, and the more accessible. I'll worry about fighting gods another day." She turned to Emmet. "You were with him. You seem to know him pretty well. What can you tell us about him?"
Emmet scratched his head. "Well, my story's probably going to be even less believable than President Business', but..."
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Emmet finished his tale by the time they arrived at the palace. Much to their relief, it had been unharmed, and Watevra took a moment to give orders to Mayhem to bring the refugees there. The others disembarked; only Watevra and Emmet held back, the latter unsure of how welcome he would be after his story. He gave Watevra a questioning look. She stared back at him, big blue eyes unblinking.
"...This really wasn't how I imagined our first meeting would go," she admitted after an uncomfortable stretch of silence.
Emmet gave her a weak smile. "What did you imagine?"
"Something a lot happier than this, that's for sure." She trembled, her bold hues fading to muted blues and grays. "I know I wasn't really... alive then, but... I can still remember feeling your warmth and kindness. I can't even begin to imagine the kind of devastation Rex must have felt for someone like you to become someone like him. And- and to choose to hold onto all that rage and pain, and take it out on us... To want to destroy everything, and actually have the power to do so..." She blinked tears out of her eyes, manifesting hands to wipe them from her face. "Dad, I'm scared."
His face turned beet red at being called 'dad', but he didn't hesitate to wrap his arms around her, doing his best to give the comfort she was looking for now that she no longer had to put on a brave face for her subjects. She sniffled into his shoulder. "Me too," he admitted. "But we'll get through this. There's still hope; he's not completely lost. I just need to figure out how to reach him..."
