week 7

[airlockedmods]

[For the first time in several weeks there is no new memorial in the garden. No new body in the morgue, no bloody mess for the roombas to clean. Choromatsu is still in need of time to heal and constant vigilance but he's alive. They're all alive for once on a Sunday and, even with the terrible realizations their returning memories may bring, there's a sense of hope for the first time in a long time.

There is no new floor this week.

Sunday Monday Tuesday Wednesday Thursday



[ooc: Don't forget to to turn in your activity for week 6, submit your memory regains and put in your threads for the Benefactors!]

Comments

[scourgingstars]

['Maybe you just want to pretend like that part of you is dead because it's safer, isn't it? It's so much easier pushing things away instead of holding on to every bit of feeling you can.']

[...They hadn't spoken since then, for obvious reasons. But he'd have to be blind not to see the previous day had taken its toll on her, and continued to even now. He sighed to himself, pen and paper disappearing into a pocket in his vest as Ardyn got up and approached quietly.]

[They couldn't keep falling apart and arguing. Avoiding each other wasn't any better. The best course of action was to get this over with the best they were able to.]

...Could I have a word with you?

[goteachother]

[She doesn't even realize who it is at first. She just blinks up, smile already on her face though it's weak and not quite as brave as she might like. It's early. She's just tired. It's noth-

The smile falters, slips away when she sees just who it is and she looks down to her coffee again.]

If you've come to gloat, I'm not in the mood Ardyn.

[scourgingstars]

Not this time.

...I'd like to offer an apology for snapping at you, if you'll let me.

[goteachother]

...this time [soft and derisive under her breath. But then she blinks up at him, confused, leaning back as though even being this close is a danger when he's spouting nonsense like apologies.]

Why? This- This is what you wanted isn't it? Everyone's terrified. Probably someone's going to betray the people they love this week.

So you were right, congratulations.

[scourgingstars]

Queenie, I was worried all of you were going to betray me, not each other. This isn't the result that I wanted, even at my worst.

...You were right. I was afraid, and it was easier to hate everything and push all of you away because of it.

[goteachother]

How is betraying you any different than each other? You're part of the group Ardyn. Being so certain that anyone would turn around and stab you in the back means you think we're capable of doing the same to anyone here.

[Which is upsetting, obviously, and she sounds so hurt. After everything that happened yesterday though... it's all she can do not to start crying talking about betraying everyone first thing this morning. Which is why she's so startled by the rest of what he has to say.]

What? Even if I was right you'd never admit it like that. What are you talking about?

[scourgingstars]

Just...listen to me for a moment, please. [He pulled over a chair, sitting down across from her.] The person you argued with was someone forged by betrayal and hatred, who did so many terrible things that compassion itself was reviled and unwanted. I expected it because I'm used to it, both from myself and others. It seemed only natural that all of you would sacrifice the monster living among you to save yourselves.

[goteachother]

[A deep breath, a flicker of a glare at him sitting down at her table as though he belonged there. She hid it behind a long drink of her coffee. But she listens, doesn't interject or argue.]

If we were going to sacrifice a "monster" wouldn't we have killed Roland straight away? Not adapted our meal planning to make sure he was doing okay?

Everyone has things that have hurt them, look at Nari and Clarith. I know you don't want to hear it but that doesn't mean you can never have anything more.

[scourgingstars]

...Then tell me this, if you would.

What differentiates me from something like PAL in the first place? And don't say 'it's because you're one of us' or 'because you haven't hurt anyone here', that's not enough of a justification.

What is the difference between something inhuman that lies and manipulates for its own amusement, trampling on every living thing that stands in the way of its goals...and the murderous AI we've been living with for all these weeks?

I'm not mocking you right now. I want to know the difference as you see it, because if I can't understand that then I'll never understand why this group would so willingly align with one while abandoning the other.

[goteachother]

I gotta admit, I don't know anything about the computer thing. I don't know what PAL is exactly but that's just it... PAL is a thing. Something created by a person with it's own goals and objectives. But he ain' a person. He can't learn and grow and change like a human being.

You can. You've proven that by gettin as bitter and mean as you are. But that just means there's room for you to heal and grow too. Ain' never gonna happen if ya don't let it though, sweetie.

'm not sayin it'll happen over night or things'll be perfect but we're all strugglin here and if you don't let the people around you help it ain' just yourself that's sufferin for it.

You think it don' tear me up inside knowin how much Leonard cares about you and knowin how little you're willing to try? Or that it don' break Clarith's heart that she can't reach you? You act like if you just push us away nothin is gonna change for you or us.

[scourgingstars]

[Ardyn folded his hands on the table in front of him, looking to the black ring he still wore as he tried to recall what she'd told him before.] That was...what your cards said, was it not? Restoration, renewal. That if I relied on the rest of you, it would make a difference.

[He'd taken a terrible risk, one he knew was clawing at his now much clearer human mind with blackened hate and centuries of pain he'd both felt and caused.]

[Finally, he looked up at Queenie with a steady gaze that he managed to keep most of his uncertainty out of.]

...I still can't say I believe in fortune telling and divination, but I'd like to know if you think it too late for me to take another attempt at all of that.

[goteachother]

[This felt like a normal conversation, not that talking with him before hadn't been normal but he was always so defensive. As though the more optimistic and hopeful someone was the fast he wanted them to get the hell away from him. But this...

This was so much more open.]

Ardyn... It's taken you millenia ta even consider it. You think a week is gonna make a difference?

[scourgingstars]

That's what I'm asking you, Queenie.

Thirty-five years of being a selfless savior. Two thousand years of losing myself to spite and rage. Six or seven weeks of being something that was neither and yet both of the two at once.

I'm asking you, in absolute honesty, if it's too late to salvage what might still be human for just a little longer.

[goteachother]

It will never be too late, as long as you're willing to try.

[Which is something she fully believes. She expects him to scoff at her for it though, to call her foolish for wanting to hope that much.]

And I hope you are... for Leonard's sake.

[scourgingstars]

[And, in defiance of most likely all possible expectations, Ardyn...just laughed under his breath. It wasn't a mocking derision that left him, but something almost relieved and mixed with deep, deep exhaustion.]

I never expected him to take this as seriously as he did. Part of me still can't quite understand why he's fought this hard for this long.

...I don't want all of that struggling to have meant nothing.

[goteachother]

He's stubborn and apparently has a weakness for what most people would write off as a lost cause. Maybe that's part of it too. If I give up on you it'll hurt him. Even if he tries to pretend it don'

[She sighs, takes a swig of her coffee, and then leans forward, a little more open to whatever the hell is happening here.]

Ardyn what's goin on, honey? I know... someone like you has to think I'm just an airhead and a floozy but... I keep the people I care about close and I know he cares about you even if you don't believe I care about him. You seemed pretty determined that his feelings didn't matter last week so why now?

[scourgingstars]

...I don't think you anything of the sort. Compassionate to a fault, yes--but not stupid.

I did something careless after I left that meeting, Queenie. Maybe arguing with all of you set it off, or perhaps it was just a long decline into something that would have to break eventually, but it was careless all the same.

[He took a slow breath and sighed, raking a hand through his hair.]

After I left, I went to talk to PAL and made a deal with him. For the price of living with what I've done and what I became, he removed what made me 'Ardyn Izunia' in the first place.

I'm human again.

[goteachother]

[For a moment she just stared at him, head tilted like she didn't quite understand the depth of what he meant. He'd never stopped being human, so far as she saw it. He'd just had other things added in. But she stares, eyes slowly widening.]

You- with PAL?

[She shakes her head hard, dismissing the questions of how and instead she's jumping up from her seat so she can throw her arms around him, squeezing him tight in a hug.]

That ain' careless, sweetie. I'm so happy for you.

[She won't even say "I told you so".]

[scourgingstars]

-?!

[Ardyn froze up in genuine surprise, but Queenie would note the corpselike body temperature was definitely something warmer now.]

That's not--it's not that easy, Queenie, it's more complicated than just giving this back to me.

[goteachother]

Why?

[WHY DO YOU DO THIS EVERYTIME SHE HUGS YOU!?]

What's so complicated about it? Is it going to just fix everything like [finger snap] that? No. It ain' magic, I should know. And even then magic can't change who you fundamentally are.

But there's a chance, there's hope. So stop it.

Stop making up reasons why things can't just be better, dammit.

[And no she hasn't let go. In fact she might actually sit in your lap to make a point.]

[scourgingstars]

It's not going to fix everything. Not by any measure.

Queenie, just...think for a moment. Would PAL have given me anything I would only benefit from? The weight of a human conscience and emotions can't handle two thousand years of darkness and atrocities.

Ardyn Izunia and Ardyn Lucis Caelum can't coexist without tearing asunder the whole made of two halves. Either I live forever as a monster forcing away sentiment, or I live and die as a human crushed beneath hatred and devastation of the Accursed.

...neither option was ideal, but I got PAL to give me a choice. This is better than I was, there can be no arguing that. But it's just another way of falling apart while struggling to hold myself together.

[goteachother]

[And.. yeah, now she is sitting in your lap, Ardyn. Quiet for a long moment after that, considering the options, the weight of what he was saying. He had given up immortality to see that he could feel again and now he had to bear the weight of... something profoundly awful.

She couldn't help thinking of Credence, this poor man beaten down and abused by the world and then destroyed by the power it had given him. What could possibly make something like that better?

Then she gasped, looked up at him, voice barely more than a whisper.]

I could take it from you.

[scourgingstars]

No, you absolutely will not.

[That much was snapped in response, but without the outright venom that had become standard--if anything it was anger born of genuine worry. He was so occupied with what he thought Queenie was implying that he completely ignored the fact that she was in his personal space.]

It's contained. No one deserves to take on the Starscourge as I did, and no one ever will again.

[goteachother]

Not it but... the memory. If I can get my wand back... I could take away all those centuries. Bottle them up so you never have to see it again.

The parts that will break you with their weight...

[She reaches up, brushes her fingertips over his temple.]

I could just draw it out and it would vanish like smoke.

[scourgingstars]

...

[Ardyn immediately fell silent, staring at Queenie like he wasn't even sure what to think. Would it really be that simple? He'd forget the Accursed, forget the rampaging hatred of the scourge coursing through him...his exile, Niflheim, Lunafreya, Noctis, Izunia-]

...no. [He shook his head slightly; yellow eyes sharply determined as his voice turned to conviction.] I have no right to run away from this; that would be an act of the coward you called me back at that party. And I am not a coward, now or ever.

Even if it destroys me once we leave this place, that is my choice to make and my end to reach after a life far too long for my preference. This price is a fair one for my humanity after all the pain that I caused, and I will accept it.