theairlock | the final week

[Eight weeks. Eight weeks of friendship and love, death and loss, hope and despair all muddled together in a cocktail that's too sweet on the tongue and leaves an acid-y pit in the stomach. With nine of them left (ten counting their dear but lone surviving host), things look darker than ever. Come Sunday morning the last of the Champions missing memories will be returned to them while they sleep. For some of them this will reveal answers, for others it might just be a fate worse than death. They could even be death.

But how does the song go? "It's always darkest before the dawn"?

There are no announcements from PAL this week. Not even morning and evening announcements.

Sunday Monday Tuesday

[ooc: Welcome to endgame, everyone! We're all very proud of you for making it all the way to the end. As you can see this is going to be a short IC week but we promise things will not be going down until this weekend (7/7-7/9). On Tuesday we'll be unveiling the OOC post for what to expect during the final investigation. There is no official AC this week, just a check-in and as mentioned above characters will be at their true canon points on Sunday morning.

Buckle up, kids, the ride's not over yet.]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

You're fortunate you were able to find it, then.

...Should I ask why you rid yourself of it in the first place, or would that launch us into an exchange of information as to why I was about to throw an ancient conduit of divine power into the nearest tree?

...I think both of us maybe already have an inkling. Just a guess.

[But it... doesn't hurt to talk about it. Not really. What used to be all spikes and sharp edges has smoothed out to acceptance. He holds up the ring. It's clearly too small for any of his own fingers.]

I was going to give this to a girl named Akane Kurashiki. ...I did, actually, in one of the histories I remember. The one I remembered the week I got your powers.

[Also known as Junpei's terrible, horrible, no good, very bad week.]

Oh, I think that we do. You've caught me, that was a well-hidden offer to listen if you wished to mention it.

[ardyn. please.]

...I'm sure a memory like that didn't help matters. My apologies, I indirectly caused you quite some trouble.

[Junpei laughs, fiddling with the ring almost like a fidget spinner.]

Honestly, I was kind of glad for it? It gave me something to focus on besides how damn crapped-on I felt. Because I didn't remember the events leading up to that outcome, I didn't know how it all fit together. All I knew was I'd found her, and she was wearing the ring, and she took all of that away from me. You know, by stabbing me with a memory-wiping bracelet. I may have mentioned that to you once or twice.

[Or fifty times.]

But I've filled in most of the blanks since then.

I do, in fact, recall that subject coming up on occasion.

...So why take it back now? Was there something that important missing that you hadn't been aware of?

I don't think there's just one thing, really...

[He looks out across the garden as he thinks about it, as he tries to tug some kind of establishing cornerstone out of that bizarre flowchart of memory.]

I remember giving it to her, now. What I felt in that moment. I--hell. [He laughs again, more of a breath this time, and brushes his hair back from his forehead.] I never did answer you guys about why I kept sleeping like a weirdo in the bathtub all the time. Let's say... I had a really bad year. The kind of year... where I was destroying myself, I guess, because I refused to do anything but look for her.

But talking with her... hearing how she really felt about me... and coming full circle like that, giving her the ring she wanted to wear since she was a kid... And more than that, understanding that that was just one way things could turn out to be. There was another version of the story where I didn't give her the ring and she didn't leave and six billion people didn't die, and that doesn't mean that first history, the bad one, was meaningless. Because we still had that moment. And... because I survived, I'm sure that version of Junpei Tenmyouji lived on to find meaning in something else. Because that's just... what human beings do.

[He closes his hand around the ring, pressing the curves and edges into his palm.]

I think that's the kind of thing I have to make sure I remember.

[He brings his attention back around to Ardyn. Feels good, getting that all out, even if it's still really hard to make sense of his life for a non-SHIFTer audience.]

What about you? What're you keeping yours for? I'd've chucked it for sure.

[The finer details admittedly did escape Ardyn's understanding. The potential timelines and bad timelines and alternate timelines--he didn't quite get it in more than mere concept. What he did comprehend was the larger significance; that it happened, and in happening no matter the timeline or reality, that meant it wasn't meaningless.]

['We're sure this is real, right?']

['All of this is real. All that's happened has meant something.']

That sounds like an excellent reason. If you believe it meant something, then you should take care to remember what that meaning is.

[When Junpei asked about the Ring of the Lucii, Ardyn looked to his right hand--swords, crystal, miserable useless dragon.]

...Spite's a difficult thing to rid oneself of. Even now that I'm not carrying all that I was, I'm still furious. I hate Bahamut and the rest of the Astrals, I hate the people that turned on me so long ago, and they're merely the start of a long list of things I resent.

There was once another who put this ring on out of spite for Lucis, seeking the power to change his fate. Finding him unsuitable to wield their strength, the souls of the kings of ages past rejected him violently, burning his arm away for his impertinence.

[Ardyn curled his hand into a loose fist, smirking defiantly.]

I'm also unworthy to wear this ring, replica or otherwise. Bearing it regardless is sacrilege against the Draconian who granted us the Crystal and against a hundred generations of Lucian kings--Izunia's descendants. But they have no power to do anything about it.

My fate is my own now. No one, mortal or divine, will ever tell me what I am or am not meant for again.

Edited (i can't count.) 2017-07-06 17:15 (UTC)

[Junpei listens, and as he does, a grin grows brighter across his face.]

Damn right they won't.

[Spite family, tight family.]

Though I object to you matching me any more than is already weirdly happening. Come on, I had the cool vaporized arm thing before any of you. Guys are supposed to copy their dads, not the other way around.

It's hardly a wise decision, but it's mine to make. Who knows, I could even get a replacement with a sword hidden in it or something actually useful.

[Ardyn laughed, shrugging his shoulders.]

You may have liked Ravus' arm. His had claws and all manner of unnecessary embellishments to it.

the final week

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