Week 8

[airlockedmods]

[This weekend has brought about some unusual questions about your resident robotic Overseer, but unfortunately, you've also lost two more of your own to an accidental death.

You've done your best with the star charts, but if anyone is coming to help you, there is no sign of it yet. SIS remains the only friendly face here, even as you've found that she holds her own secrets. Meanwhile, yet another new floor has opened up - the elevators are in perfect working order now, if any of you care to go and see it. That's four concourses now; one for each of your groups. There's an awful lot of dead, aren't there?]


Sunday | Monday | Tuesday | Wednesday | Thursday


(( Don't forget to check in, check your memory regains, and submit for regains! ))

Comments

Re: SUNDAY

[daughterofthemark]

["I BELIEVE IN OUR GROUP! I BELIEVE IN OUR FAMILY!!"

"Sir PAL... please... Let me see that she is alive..."

"PLAY EPISIDE TWENTY-NINE!"

"Kip Larimer had nowhere else to go."

"Then-- then it's all yours! I'm proud to call you my sister."

Arianna wakes up, whimpers, and tries to go back to sleep. Maybe she can dream that none of this has happened and everything is fine. That everything is okay, like it was before. That her family hasn't died for the sake of a television show.

Television show. It seems so obvious now.

Eventually she finally gives up on this and heads for the diner for... breakfast? Lunch? Neither, as it turns out, because she overshoots the second floor and ends up on the third. Confused and disoriented, having momentarily forgotten what to expect, she wanders onto Concourse 3. It's not long before she spots gate 2, which she stares at, and realizes where she is.

She runs away, as if fearing for her life, fleeing into the garden. Where she collapses, sobbing, to the apparent concern of several pigeons and one small robot.

Arianna does not leave the garden for the rest of the day.]

garden

[ratherdoweddings]

[Yurika comes into the garden with a pencil in her hand and some weird note on her PIP. She pauses and runs right over to Arianna.]

Arianna-chan!

Re: garden

[daughterofthemark]

Captain... Yurika...

[She doesn't move.

One of the pigeons kind of nudges her hand. She doesn't respond.]

[ratherdoweddings]

[Yurika drops the pencil in the grass and runs over to crouch beside her.]

Are you hurt? Did something happen?

[daughterofthemark]

[Sir Canaan jumps between them protectively. Dumpy does not, because he actually recognizes Yurika.]

I... everything... we...

[ratherdoweddings]

Oh! Hello, Mr. Bird! [She... waves?] You make friends easily, don't you?

[daughterofthemark]

His name is Sir Canaan.

[Arianna is quiet.]

I met him before.

[ratherdoweddings]

Nice to meet you, then, Sir Canaan.

[Yurika carefully puts her hand on Arianna's shoulder.]

You remembered the end of yours, too, didn't you?

[daughterofthemark]

[Sir Canaan seems satisfied with this.]

Sir Kip was alive. Dame Queenie was alive. Rii-san... Rii-san called me her sister.

garden

[motherfucking_ghost]

[This place is one of some memories, and for a moment, he thinks Junpei died for this. But the bitter thought is pushed away. There's pigeon cooing!

...And...there's...girlcrying noises...]

...Ari? Twilight Sparkle? What is it, what's wrong?

[Besides everything.]

[daughterofthemark]

[Oh, Church! Sir Canaan knows you!
You do not get the pigeon stinkeye.]

Sir Church...

[She shrinks into herself a little more.]

[motherfucking_ghost]

[That's right, he's a good pigeon friend. Church sits by her and wraps his arms around her because when is there a bad time for a hug?]

What happened?

[daughterofthemark]

[This is a bad time for Arianna in general, but a hug is welcome nonetheless.]

I remembered. We... we were happy...

[motherfucking_ghost]

...Yeah. Yeah, we were, and we're gonna be again.

[daughterofthemark]

These memories... they should have been happy memories. --they were. I'm certain of it. There was a time when I thought of our wedding, and... I was happy...

[motherfucking_ghost]

The happy memories don't make you happy?

[daughterofthemark]

[She shakes her head.]

I can think only of how much I've lost.

garden

[induality]

[Fukawa visited the Concourses-- it felt necessary. The people that died in her round were among the ones "honored" in this awful place. It was... she had to. But on her way out, she sees a purple blur flying out of Concourse 3. She blinks for a moment, caught off guard and then it clicks and she flinches. It takes her a moment but she eventually takes the uneasy steps to the garden, where she went.]

...

[The sound of her despair hurts her heart. She gently steps through the garden towards the poor girl.]

Arianna...

[daughterofthemark]

[Sir Canaan is... cautiously optimistic, perching nearby and keeping an eye on Fukawa but not acting overtly disagreeable. The last unfamiliar lady who came by turned out to be coo(l), maybe this one will, too. Dumpy, meanwhile, questions nothing.]

Dame Touko.

[Arianna cringes just slightly.]

I... my apologies.

[She isn't sure what she's apologizing for. Crying? Everything she's tried and failed to do? Being in the garden? Maybe even just having important memories with Clarith that Fukawa doesn't share. She definitely feels guilty about something.]

[induality]

[Fukawa looks around a little bit out of the corners of her eyes. This is... ah.

She's not even sure why she thought she was cut out to do this. But she couldn't just leave her. Arianna was... too kind for this damn place. It resulted in Fukawa sometimes having a hard time completely believing her-- because what kind of person is really just that kind and pure.

It's one of the things she regrets now. Doubting her. She lost so much-- and deserved so little of it.

Arianna needed the support right now. And bad at it as she was prone to being... she was here, when others weren't.]

Wh-what are you apologizing for, idiot?

[Fukawa sits on the ground in font of her.]

I'm... the one who should be apologizing.

[daughterofthemark]

[Arianna looks up. That's not the kind of response she expected. Not that she really knew what to expect.]

You've done nothing to apologize for. I... I am the one who is entirely useless. I thought so highly of myself before, and--all I can do is... this.

[induality]

[Hearing this, from Arianna is... frustrating. Fukawa clenches her fists in her lap and--

She reaches out and slaps Arianna.]

S-Snap out of it!

[Fukawa takes a deep breath.]

So... so what if you're useless? You don't have to be useful! Do you think I'm here because I expect something from you?! Maybe... maybe I want to support you a little!!

1/2

[daughterofthemark]

[Sir Canaan freaks out, chirping loudly and preparing to attack this interloper, but Dumpy floats in front of him and screeches something that might have been meant as "wait, listen."



Arianna reels.



That was definitely not what she expected from... anyone ever, really.



She stares for a moment, unsure how to react. Her hand drifts up to feel her cheek, and she flinches at her own touch.]

2/2

[daughterofthemark]

[...but then comprehension sets in. It's a different approach, but it's the same thing after all.]

The others keep saying things like that. Even Lord Ardyn wrote something like that in his letter to me. I'm glad for your support, but--you don't understand. How can none of you understand? How can you think it's all right for me to be useless? You especially, Dame Touko--how can you support me when it's because of my uselessness that Clarith is dead?

[induality]

[Fukawa's nose scrunches up and her lip curls up. It's a frustrated look. Because... it's like looking in a mirror. And she didn't see it until now. Hadn't looked until now.]

That's a-awfully selfish of you isn't it? Do you really think... I haven't felt the same thing?

Clarith, Soma... Byakuya... I wasn't able to save a damn one of them. S-so you couldn't stop something that wasn't your fault. None of us could. No one here is blaming you.

When Byakuya died-- I should have been there. I should have had that damn phone on me. I should have stopped Varric. But I wasn't. I didn't. I couldn't. And I've regretted it this whole time.

[She puts a hand on Arianna's head.]

We both... need to let it go.