airlockedmods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
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theairlock2017-06-25 10:59 am
airlockedmods) wrote in theairlock2017-06-25 10:59 am
week 7
[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!]
There is no new floor this week.
[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!]
no subject
[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.]
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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.
no subject
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.
no subject
[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.
no subject
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.
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[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.
no subject
There you go acting like your action don't impact anyone but yourself again. If you go and die after all of this? It'll destroy them. What makes you think leaving here is the end? Shouldn't that be your new beginning?
cw: suicidal ideation
I wouldn't take something like that lightly or without approaching the subject first. I'm telling you--I do not deserve to forget. I don't want a new beginning, I just...want to rest, after all this time.
It's fine if you don't understand. I won't blame you for that. But it was always the most likely conclusion whether you understand it or not.
Re: cw: suicidal ideation
[She sighs softly, leaning into him a little more.]
I think I can, though. Understand it. There's plenty of people that came back from the war and that's all they wanted, to make the memories stop, to be able to rest peacefully after fighting for so long. I can only imagine, with all your years, how much that is true for you.
There are so many things I could do to help, not just taking the memories away but dreamless sleep potions, cheering charms, there's dozens of ways to fight shell shock in the wizarding world... I just... [She draws her wand from a carefully disguised pocket and stares at it for a long moment, her head dropping to rest on his shoulder.]
can't.
no subject
...I've not been able to reach the Crystal's power since we arrived here. If I'd had my healing magic, then perhaps we wouldn't be down to the numbers we are. I could have saved even just one person, or taken Junpei's wounds that week we found him in the rest area. No matter how high the cost to myself--I would have done it. If I had even a fraction of my abilities, we'd have long since escaped.
And that's kept occurring to me every so often, ever since we arrived here. If I could have healed even one person, if I could have defended anyone, if I could even just cast Protect, then Larimer would be-
[He broke that off, pressing that hand to his face to stave off a headache.]
...I've been utterly useless to all of you from the very beginning. If a king can not protect himself, how is he to protect others?
no subject
You think I haven't thought that every moment we've been here? Never mind what I could have done with my wand but-
[She takes in a shaky breath, has to let it out slow to stop herself from getting too upset by this turn in the conversation.]
I can see into people's minds Ardyn. I could have seen what Lee was planning, I could have heard Angel's cries for help, I could have known that Roland was slipping... I could have stopped Choro before he thought that was his only option.
I could have told Kip not to try to be our goddamn hero and he would still be here. [And she loses that fight, breath catching in her throat as she presses her face into his scarves.]
Never mind the healing I could do or the things I could make happen with my wand, just being what I am would have saved so many of us. What makes you more responsible for protecting people than me?
no subject
[Deep breath.]
...you're right. It--that responsibility should never have fallen to any one of us. Not even me.
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The rules are different here. And, I've been saying this since the beginning, we can only get through this together. We all have to work together to make sure nothing else happens.
No matter how tempting
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[...]
It's not worth it. I think that we all know that, and yet...it won't be simple to merely discard the offer entirely.
no subject
I'm worried for Heart. He has so many he's lost.