week 6

[airlockedmods]

Week 6

[Six weeks. Twenty-three Champions whittled down to just seven. Where the halls of the station once felt crowded and loud now they're empty and echo when someone speaks too loudly. Again, the Champions will find themselves experiencing strange dreams on Sunday night but outside of the usual wake-up call there is no new floor announcement from CECE.

Like the trash compactor last week, the infirmary is pristine and sterile once again. As if nothing had ever happened.]


Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday



(( Welcome to Week 6! Don't forget to submit your memory regains and turn in your benefactor threads for sweet loot, too! There's going to be no AC this week.))

Comments

[playthedamncard]

...She never had a choice for what she was, who she could have been. I don't...what happened doesn't necessarily erase whatever we might have felt about her before. Does it?

[That sounds surprisingly like an earnest question, searching for opinions.]

[in4apounding]

...I don't know.

["Never had a choice about what she was," that sure hits somewhere deep.]

I thought she was our friend, but- ...do you really think she didn't have a choice? Even if- even if she was right, and she wasn't human, she was still a person.

[playthedamncard]

It's not a question about personhood, Penny. Or being human nor not human. It sounded like, what she was, whatever she was, combined with being chosen for that ridiculous magical war, and what the Grail really was, I don't know that she would have chosen differently. I don't know that she could have. In another time, another place, around different people...maybe. But in a way, it sounds like she was almost destined to do what she did.

Like she never had a chance to challenge her fate.

[in4apounding]

...I don't really know about fate. But. It's about what choices you make, right? Accepting things as they happen or- trying to change them. Like Lucina, and her father.

[She's trying to articulate something Big and Complicated here.]

Isn't that- like every day here? Choosing to accept the Overseers' rules or not.

[playthedamncard]

...No matter how many times she tried to explain some of the rules of her world, the laws of her magic, I never truly understood it. I just know she was alone. She was very alone and didn't know how to feel anything at all until Saber. And then she felt too much, I suppose. Too obsessed. Found a reason and latched on too tight, and she never could see right from wrong. Everything was funny to her, like a joke.

[She'd do anything for him, and while nothing like that, nothing near like that had happened in his world, there's a distressing pang of familiarity. Not in a maddening facsimile of love, but in giving his all and then some for one person. He'd nearly given his life. Several times. Just to reach out and see him again.]

I don't have the answers. I don't know if anything could have been different for her. I know she never had the chance to be a normal girl.

[He looks down at the rose in his hands, mulling it over.] I can use a different flower, if that would make you feel better. But I'm going to add something for her. Whether she deserves it or not.

[in4apounding]

[...Oh. Kaiba's not the only one feeling some slightly distressing familiarity here.]

...Mister Kaiba- you could say the same thing about me, almost. Before I left Atlas, there was- I wasn't just my father's daughter, or one of Mister Ironwood's students. I was his experiment, too. A military project. They still both cared for me very much! But- it wasn't really. Normal.

And then I met Ruby. The friend I mentioned? To her I was- I could pretend to be a real girl, with her. And then she found out the truth, and it didn't matter anyway. There's- there's a lot that I would do. For her.

[Would she kill for Ruby, and would it be any different from what Manaja had done, was the unspoken question.]

...give her- add something for Manaka. Whatever you think is appropriate. But- the other petals, the ones I used, they were from Ruby, I think. Her Semblance. Just- as long as it's not those.

[playthedamncard]

I think when it came to the war, and to Saber, that was her pretending to be a real girl. But she just...wasn't.

You. They got you right. No--you got you right.

[He sighs, spinning the flower lightly between his fingers.] We have all had choices to make to lead us exactly where we are today. To alter the patterns of our lives. Maybe that includes her. Maybe she chose to be as terrible and joyously murderous as she was, just as you chose to be Ruby's friend, just as she chose that what you were didn't matter.

[He turns to her fully, reaches for her hair.] May I?

[in4apounding]

...thank you, Mister Kaiba.

[What Manaka had done, she couldn't imagine being that cold. That THAT was what humanity had meant to her.]

[She blinks, looking up as Kaiba reaches for her.]

...Yes?

[playthedamncard]

[He's careful, even if he'd taken off as many thorns as he could so he wouldn't prick himself in the process of all this, as he tucks the rose into her hair.]

She's lucky to call you a friend.

[in4apounding]

I- oh gosh.

[Her head dips, embarrassed.]

She's- I'm the lucky one, really. Ruby's the best friend in the world. But- thank you. Mister Seto.

[playthedamncard]

Then it seems to me that you're both lucky. We'll get you back to her, one way or another.

[He chuckles.] I'd stick to one or the other. 'Mister Seto' just doesn't sound right.

[in4apounding]

...is just "Seto" all right then?

[She's not sure what's happening, but she feels like if she pushes it too hard the whole yhing is going to burst.]

[playthedamncard]

Akira's getting me acclimated to the usage. I suppose it's only fair now that I've started calling the lot of you by given name.

[in4apounding]

Akira's a good person. He kept my secret- or part of it, anyway. For a while.

[playthedamncard]

When he was checking blood.

He's good about it. He doesn't push or ask questions. Doesn't demand anything of anyone. Certainly the nicest terrorist I've ever met.

[in4apounding]

Is he a terrorist? Hm.

[She's quiet for a second.]

...He's ABSOLUTELY nicer than the White Fang.

[playthedamncard]

Technically speaking. We only have his side of the story, but I'm confident he's on the side of the people.

Or at the very least, he's on our side.