theairlock | week 6

Entry tags:

!round 2,
!week 6

week 6

[Even with three deaths two weeks in a row, life in the Fantasy Sweet returns to some semblance of normalcy come Sunday morning. The messes are cleaned up, the bodies are safe in the morgue (or in Kip's case, still in a liquor bottle in the garden) and with this new week comes a fresh crop of returning memories.

There is no new floor this week.

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday

[ooc: Don't forget to to turn in your activity for week 5, submit your memory regains and put in your threads for the Benefactors!]

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The cards don't account for the fact that I don't regret most things I've done.

Maybe they do? I don't pretend to know how this works. I'm on record for believing it doesn't and am just going along with it as long as it supports what I want to say and do anyway.

And what about when it stops enabling your terrible decisions?

I'm perfectly capable of enabling my own terrible decisions without the heart of the cards on my side. I mean--

[Waves his robot hand. Heyo.]

...Point taken.

[said his majesty king terrible decisions, having no ground to stand on here]

[Looking at Ardyn, knowing so badly that it's a bad idea, knowing it almost more keenly than he's known that breathless triumph of pivoting around death, Junpei adds one more terrible decision to his long, branching, convoluted list.]

...Should Ardyn Izunia trust Junpei Tenmyouji as his royal advisor?

[Six of hearts. Junpei's face clouds a little at that, but then he sets his right hand on top of the deck once more and asks before Ardyn can say anything:]

Can the man in front of me right now... trust me?

[And holding his breath, he turns the card over.

Ten of spades. Ten of swords.]

[He'd been halfway to rolling his eyes and saying something to the tune of see, I told you it was stupid as the six of hearts was turned over, but Junpei was already drawing another card before Ardyn had even opened his mouth to talk.]

[...And then he forgot he was going to say anything at all.]

[It was just random chance, obviously. That was the only reason for it, and yet Ardyn looked like the floor had just suddenly disappeared out from under him.]

[Junpei's as dumbstruck as Ardyn for a moment. Ten of spades--highest non-face card in the suit. And it's not just an answer, but a match.

Yes, says the card, according to his goofy, arbitrary, set-five-minutes-ago rules. Yes, he can trust you.]

[Then he slams both hands over the card so the bottom half still shows through, so they both have proof it's still there, proof no one can take away.]

No takebacks! You're stuck with me!

[He was so stupid and childish at times like these. And yet when things came down to it, Junpei had long since proven himself immeasurably strong. Resilient, too. He took the worst of situations and still kept coming back, still had the ability to remain immature while keeping himself togethe-]

[...he wasn't all that different from Noctis, wasn't he?]

[Whether it was the outburst or the sudden realization, Ardyn's exhaustion was broken by a halfhearted smile that was swiftly followed by a quiet, low chuckle.]

You're right, aren't you?

I--yes. I, uh, right. That's a thing I am. All the time.

[It's stupid. He was already embarrassed the moment the words flew out of his mouth, but he's so tired of losing friends, so frustrated with forever chasing phantoms who slip right through his fingers, pulling away faster than he can run that he just--he wants one person to stay.

(Yuuri.)

He wants all of them to stay. To be there when he reaches out.

(Church. Ardyn. Queenie. Finn.

Angel.)

When Ardyn doesn't shoot him down, when he laughs, when he says you're right, Junpei looks up at him like he's not sure his ears are working. Slowly, he straightens. Slowly, he draws his hands away from the card, leaving it free.

If you love something, let it go.

(Bullshit, Akane.)]

Hope that's not a problem for you.

[Ardyn reached over and picked up the card with his right hand, turning it over a few times almost idly. Ten swords--ten other Champions apart from himself, not counting the one former Overseer still remaining.]

[A veritable armory paired with the last armiger of the Lucian line. Whether those ten swords would find their way into his back or not...Ardyn had his doubts, after everything. When an entire planet turned on you, when you lived in darkness with the constant pulse of hatred muttering death, destruction, rage, Accursed--]

[...It wasn't easy to accept that most of those ten still so much as remained near him, when Ardyn couldn't even comprehend their sympathy in the face of all he'd done. And part of him, amidst all that hate and destruction, in the doubts of a healer who had been cast aside--part of him wondered if it would last.]

[Maybe someday, it would come to a confrontation between the former king and those who had believed in what he was. And if it did...then he knew the conclusion already. How it would end, how it would have to end.]

['Off my chair, jester. This is my ascension.']

[Ardyn laughed under his breath, a low chuckle as though a joke that was only funny to him had just briefly come to mind. He placed the card back on the table--face-up this time--and slid it back over to Junpei, the crystal in his ring briefly catching the light. Yellow eyes that were still clearly human focused on him across the table, calm and momentarily without the vicious anger that had fueled the Accursed for two thousand years.]

I trust you, Junpei Tenmyouji.

[Junpei's known epiphany, that elation of solving a puzzle, of unraveling a mystery, a thousand times. An exclamation point of the mind, purer than triumph and pride. Where there was nothing, suddenly, there was knowledge.

This feels like that. Tiles clicking into place. A key turning. He realizes he's holding his breath again and swallows, laughing a little himself, less like it's an inside joke and more like he's found something small that he lost. He ducks his head and runs a hand over his hair, suddenly a bit awkward. He's only twenty-two.]

I--I feel like I should be taking a knee or something.

[Kings and swords and knighthood. Bushido, too, he finds himself remembering. Thinks to himself, people aren't so different anywhere.

And yet. That's not what this is, is it?

Rather than a bow or a salute, what Junpei offers is a hand.]

I won't take it lightly. That's a promise.

Do spare me the dramatics, if you would. I get enough of that from Church.

[Whoever--whatever it was that was left now, in the wake of two thousand years' darkness and ten in a world of ruin, it wasn't the king of Lucis. Being met with formality now felt...annoying, more than it was unfitting.]

[So instead, he just reached out and took Junpei's hand with his own; deadened body temperature half-hidden under too many layers and fingerless gloves, but the ring that was once his birthright still in place.]

[Ten swords. One armiger.]

[For now, maybe that would be enough.]

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week 6

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