theairlock | week 4

Entry tags:

!round 2,
!week 4

week 4

[Just like the previous week the status quo is restored with frighteningly quick efficiency. PAL still makes the morning and night time announcements through the PIP on each Champion's arm, and still the Champion unitards are freshly laundered and re-hung each morning in their closets. Even the glass roses Choromatsu and Takumi broke after the trial in their fit of anger have been replaced with fresh ones. All signs that there was anything amiss this weekend are completely gone.

There's a new floor to explore, their "reward" for a job well done.]

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday

[ooc: Don't forget to to turn in your AC for week 3, submit your memory regains and put in your threads for the Benefactors!]

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['It was worse' had been an understatement on Church's part. A massive, massive understatement. But Ardyn didn't flinch or back off even though Luscinia quickly fled to an overhead tree branch--he'd seen this before, more times than he could count. Black corruption marring human skin, the mark of an affliction even the name of which was feared through Eos.]

Junpei.

[Ardyn reached out to rest one hand on Junpei's right arm, not fully realizing that was what a very different healer had once answered a similar hatred with.]

[When the prophecy is fulfilled-]

[Just for a minute...he could let himself think that prophecy had been about him, for Junpei's sake more than any other.]

You've every right to be angry, from the sound of things. More than that it sounds as though hatred is the least one might deserve for placing you in a situation such as that. And I can't say that something like that could possibly be truly alright, because clearly it isn't.

...But Church, Yuuri, myself--every last one of us; we're at your side, through everything. We will never abandon you or allow you to be left alone.

[Dauntless Order prevents mortal damage and restores HP.]

Edited 2017-06-07 20:47 (UTC)

[At first, it's almost enough to stop Junpei. He looks up at Ardyn with irises glowing in wide, darkened eye sockets, as suddenly open as if Ardyn had cracked him open with his promise.

But Junpei Tenmyouji's base state isn't as calm and accepting as Ardyn Lucis Caelum II's, and the words catch at a place in his heart too tender even for comfort. He yanks his arm back and stands with balled fists, bleeding black and the heartbreak of the young at his edges.]

You've known me for three weeks! How can you say that when Kanny--when Akane was the one who put me in the Nonary Game in the first place?!

[The past, trapped there in the wall of his words. Kanny. Akane. A dear, dear friend.]

Because it doesn't matter if we've known you for three weeks or three hundred years. [Ardyn answered calmly, not remotely missing the connotations Junpei's words had come with. There was a deep sense of betrayal Ardyn couldn't yet begin to comprehend, and wasn't sure he wanted to.]

We're still in this situation together--like it or not, we're your friends at this point all the same. And I'm willing to exercise a little faith and say none of us are the one truly responsible for what's happened.

Faith...

[Still boiling, Junpei stares at Ardyn for a long moment before he opens his mouth.]

Ha. Hahaha. Hahahaha...!

[He steps back into the trunk of his shade tree and slides down, covering his face with both hands. Finally, the Scourge begins to evaporate from his skin. Ardyn's offered him nothing to fight, no entry to battle, and Junpei's anger has nowhere to go.]

Sure... sure, that'll work out great for all of us. Just like it always does.

[En route to despair, his emotions hit that heavy filter again, like firelight through smoked glass, and fizzle out before most of it can reach him. Slowly, he calms and lowers his arms.]

I don't know if I told you, but it's common enough for the masterminds of these operations to join in the fun themselves. To observe the results up close, I suppose. You sure you want to risk your life and trust on your 'little faith'?

That's exactly what I'm doing.

[Ardyn was caught between the primary concern of worrying about Junpei and the secondary of what the hell am I, but the latter was very quickly eclipsed by the former as he answered without hesitation.]

I've risked my life on less than that. And if I'm wrong, you can blame me entirely for that.

...Fine. It doesn't fit logically with what we know, anyway.

[There. The rest of the overwhelming fuck you--doesn't go away, exactly, but gives a metaphorical snort and curls in and away, settling back into that muted not-muchness of the past two days. Junpei waits a beat to see the dragon might resurface then lets his head dip back against the tree and looks up at leaves, still green and obliviously innocent, as if nothing had even happened.]

...How do you do this...?

I don't know. It felt as though I was used to it at first, until I actually stopped to realize something was wrong. Then the anger started setting in, with Mai and a few times after that, and I--

['If I don't know what I am, how could you ever claim to know Ardyn Lucis Caelum even still exists?']

[Ardyn tried to repress a shudder with limited success, folding his arms.]

...I'm sorry. I mean that now more than I ever could as whatever I truly am. No one should have to carry this save for myself.

[He lifts his head from the bark to examine Ardyn for a moment. It's so strange, seeing Ardyn express so much, so naturally.]

I'mmmm pretty sure it can't be good for you, either. I mean... we did just get through affirming that it's not how you're supposed to be. And obviously you don't enjoy it, either.

But if someone has to have this problem--and I assure you at this point it seems that someone does--I would rather that individual were me rather than any of you.

...What would happen if someone didn't? Have this problem.

...It's complicated. The simplest way to explain my theory on the matter is that...it's something which can't be properly removed or erased. At least, not within my own powers even as they ordinarily should be.

[Ardyn looked almost guilty about that for some reason, like he knew he was being caught in a lie he wasn't prepared to explain or even handle the consequences of.]

[Wow. Junpei has officially met a liar worse than he is. The anger flares up, but only a tiny lick of the earlier flame--not enough to offset the concerned certainty that's been growing in him for the past three weeks.]

Ardyn. Have you considered... that if it's not something you can handle at full capacity, then maybe it's not something that should rest solely on you to handle?

...

[It was strange, how they'd cycled back to this weeks later and only now was Ardyn actually able to grasp why Junpei had been upset about the Crystal's prophecy. As much as he did love what he had been doing and it did genuinely make him happy to know he was saving others...hadn't it been exhausting, spending so much time away from Insomnia? Traveling almost constantly, no matter how welcomed he had been everywhere that traveling brought him?]

[...and despite even that, hadn't he always been alone in what he was truly doing? That was what Church had pointed out, that Ardyn had barely even understood something as ordinary as friendship because he had been the savior and king before all else.]

[And if this--whatever this was, whatever Ardyn Izunia was should have been the end result, was it that the savior hadn't been strong enough to deal with the problem or that he'd dealt with it entirely alone?]

I-

[But if he called it a mistake even for an instant then he cast aside the gratitude of all the lives he'd saved. If he dared regret what he'd done to himself in the name of protecting others, that was the same as wishing they'd never been saved at all.]

[Ardyn Izunia could clearly do that. But Ardyn Lucis Caelum, who faltered and ran his right hand through his hair, did not have the capacity to accept that.]

It's just...how things have to be, Junpei. It's too late to change now--it's likely been too late for centuries.

Bullshit. It's never too late to change something.

[The answer comes so quickly and so forcefully, it could almost be that unnatural fury again; but that's not an angry look on Junpei's face. Just irritated, maybe bull-headed--and very, very certain. Not the happy certainty of platitude, but the grim "yeah, I went toe-to-toe with some fuckin' Reavers, you want to tell me again they're not real?" sureness of experience.]

Nine years or nine centuries, Ardyn. You can take my word for that.

[Gods, he wished he could believe that.]

I don't think it that simple, Junpei.

I didn't say it was simple. I said it's never too late.

[lunafreya would disagree were she not, you know, dead]

Regardless, the point remains that you shouldn't be the one to deal with this. None of you should.

[Then obviously, as a corpse, she is wrong by default! Ha! Three points for Junpei.]

I have issues dealing with shoulds. I'm more of an is person. And since I am dealing with the problem, I think I can, as a reasonable damn adult sound of mind and body, decide to continue to deal with the problem as I see fit.

[You gonna take his decision from him like Akane, Ardyn? Huh?? You wanna GO???]

[wow, junpei]

...I'd like it if you were right. [Ardyn smiled, forlorn and tired.] I doubt that's the case, but I would like to be proven wrong.

Then I will! That's what I do.

[Here's the Champion Challenger, boys and girls, displaying all the emotional maturity of a twelve-year-old.]

So fuck your smug, self-sacrificing asshole. If I have to kick your ass to save it, I will.

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week 4

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