Leo let the bleakness of the Bergman film wash over him for a while, a form of psychic palate cleanser.
After the high-pitched absurdity of Sir Reginald's badger-related demise, the quiet, contemplative misery of 1960s Swedish cinema was almost soothing.
But the Archive was persistent.
The diagnostic window, which he had minimized, began to flash with an insistent, rhythmic pulse, a digital migraine demanding his attention.
[SYSTEM PROTOCOL: POST-MORTEM USER ANALYSIS - STALLED]
[RESUMING ANALYSIS OF USER 001]
With a sigh that seemed to stir the very fabric of the void, Leo closed the film and faced the memory of his first, and perhaps most spectacular, failure. Lord Valerius. The name alone was enough to make Leo's non-existent teeth ache.
USER 001: LORD VALERIUS OF THE HOUSE OF MORNAY
DURATION OF CONNECTION: 4 HOURS, 22 MINUTES
CAUSE OF TERMINATION: PUBLIC EXECUTION FOR HIGH TREASON
STORY PROVIDED: HAMLET, PRINCE OF DENMARK
CULTURAL RESONANCE CHANGE: 0.0%
The memory bloomed, not with the dreary mud of Reginald's swamp, but with the cold, sterile opulence of a nobleman's solar.
Lord Valerius was a man who had been born with a silver spoon in his mouth and had spent his entire life complaining that it wasn't gold.
He was handsome, educated (by Aethel's dismal standards), and possessed an ego so vast it was a miracle it didn't have its own gravitational pull.
This was Leo's very first attempt.
He'd been a disembodied consciousness for only a few decades, a mere blink in his eternal sentence, and he was still brimming with a fierce, literary idealism.
He believed in the transformative power of art.
He believed that a single, perfect story could crack the foundations of this grey, miserable world.
And what story was more perfect, more profound, more transformative than Hamlet?
When he'd made contact, Valerius hadn't been surprised or scared.
He'd been delighted.
A voice in his head that knew all the stories of another, more interesting world?
He didn't see a muse; he saw a resource.
A secret weapon in his quest for social dominance.
"A spirit of the arts!" Valerius had declared, striking a pose by the window of his lavishly appointed room.
"How fitting that such a being should choose me as its vessel! I have long said that this court is a cultural wasteland. The King, my uncle, has the artistic sensibilities of a turnip."
That should have been the first red flag.
The casual, arrogant way he spoke of the King. But Leo, in his eagerness, had missed it.
He had spent hours narrating the tragic tale of the Prince of Denmark.
He'd poured all his soul into the performance, giving each character a distinct voice, from Hamlet's tortured soliloquies to Polonius's bumbling pontifications.
He'd explained the nuances of the language, the themes of revenge, madness, and political corruption.
Valerius had listened, not with the rapt attention of a student, but with the calculating eye of a jeweler appraising a gem. He wasn't interested in the tragedy or the poetry. He was interested in the performance.
"This Hamlet… he is a prince, you say?" Valerius had mused, tapping a manicured finger against his lips. "And his uncle, the King, is a usurper and a murderer?"
"Well, yes," Leo had replied, a flicker of unease beginning to form in his consciousness. "That is the central conflict of the play. It's a tragedy about the burden of knowledge and the paralysis of indecision."
"And this prince," Valerius continued, his eyes gleaming with a terrifying idea, "he uses a play, a performance, to expose the King's guilt?"
"The play's the thing," Leo had quoted, his voice weak, "wherein I'll catch the conscience of the King."
"Precisely!" Valerius had exclaimed, clapping his hands together. "It's brilliant! It's audacious! It's… it's something I would do!"
The feeling of unease in Leo's mind blossomed into full-blown panic. "Valerius, no. No, no, no. It's a story. It's fiction. You can't just… reenact it. Especially not here. Your uncle is the King. The actual, literal King."
But Valerius was no longer listening. He was pacing his room, his mind racing.
"The annual Feast of the Iron Moon is tonight. The entire court will be assembled. The King, my uncle, will be on his throne, fat and complacent. It's the perfect stage!"
"A stage for what?!" Leo had shrieked, his carefully constructed persona as a wise, ethereal muse shattering into a million pieces.
"For your own execution?! This is not Elsinore! Your uncle didn't murder your father! Your father died because he tried to see how many pickled eggs he could eat in one sitting!"
"Details, details," Valerius had waved a dismissive hand. "The spirit of the thing is the same. A corrupt court, a sensitive, intelligent prince trapped in a world that does not understand him. It is my life story!"
That evening, the great hall of the royal palace was a study in grey monotony.
The stone walls were bare, the tapestries depicted glorious moments from the history of tax collection, and the music was a series of droning, funereal notes played on a lute by a man who looked like he was about to fall asleep.
The King, a portly, balding man with a perpetually bored expression, sat on his iron throne, occasionally grunting in response to the fawning sycophants who surrounded him.
Leo, watching through Valerius's eyes, felt a sense of dread so profound it was almost physical.
Then, Valerius made his move. He strode into the center of the hall, his fine silk tunic a splash of defiant color in the sea of grey. He struck a dramatic pose, one hand on his heart, the other outstretched to the rafters.
"To be, or not to be," he began, his voice ringing with a theatricality that immediately silenced the dull murmur of the court.
Leo wanted to dematerialize, to cease to exist, to do anything other than witness what was about to happen.
He tried to sever the connection, but he was bound to his user, a helpless passenger on a train headed for a cliff.
Ah! The Cringe!
Valerius launched into a one-man, heavily abridged, and creatively reinterpreted version of Hamlet.
He played all the parts, leaping from one character to another with a manic energy that was both impressive and horrifying. He was Hamlet, brooding and melancholic.
He was Claudius, clutching a goblet of wine and radiating guilt. He was Gertrude, wringing her hands in despair.
For the first ten minutes, the court was simply confused.
They had no context for this.
They stared, mouths agape, as Valerius rolled on the floor in feigned madness, talked to an imaginary skull, and accused his mother of marrying his uncle with "most wicked speed."
The King, however, was not confused. He was listening very, very carefully. His bored expression had been replaced by a look of cold, calculating fury.
When Valerius got to the part about the play-within-a-play, he pointed an accusing finger directly at the throne.
"The play's the thing," he bellowed, his voice dripping with insinuation, "wherein I'll catch the conscience of the KING!"
He might as well have pulled out a dagger and lunged for the throne. The effect was the same. The silence in the hall was absolute, broken only by the sound of Valerius's own heavy breathing.
The King rose slowly from his throne. His voice, when he spoke, was quiet, but it carried the weight of absolute power.
"Lord Valerius," he said, his eyes like chips of ice. "You have entertained us. Now, my royal guards will entertain you. They have a short, one-act play of their own to perform. It is called 'The Traitor's Block.'"
Two guards, men the size of small mountains, seized Valerius by the arms. The arrogant lord's face, which had been flushed with artistic fervor, turned a pasty white.
"But… but it's art!" he stammered, his voice a pathetic squeak. "It's a metaphor! A commentary on the human condition!"
"It is treason," the King said flatly. "And the only commentary you will be making is with your head from the top of a spike on the city gates."
As the guards dragged him away, Valerius screamed, his final, desperate words a testament to his own spectacular stupidity: "Tell me the rest of the story, spirit! Does the prince get his revenge?!"
The memory faded, leaving Leo alone in the grey once more. He had offered the world a masterpiece, a profound exploration of the human soul.
And his user had turned it into a suicide note.
He had tried to catch the conscience of a king and had only succeeded in catching the eye of the royal executioner.
It was a lesson he would not soon forget.
Art, in the wrong hands, was not a tool for enlightenment.
It was a weapon.
And he had just handed it to a child playing with matches.