[That just makes it worse, somehow. Her vibes are extremely bad right now.]
Stupid Gojou. Yes, it's so cruel and unfair, that we cared more when Childe incapacitated a woman and electrocuted her with a toaster than when Mineo shot that same person so he wouldn't do it again.
[GOD. well. yeah. he just keeps his hand there? but also he's rolling his eyes. Or like. would be, if you could tell. The expression is obvious though, he's just agreeing whole-heartedly on that shit.]
I know, we're all monsters, aren't we. If only we could examine our own beliefs, we too might understand that maybe killing a cold-blooded killer is bad actually.
Just because we said it while we ate cake doesn't make it less true. [She doesn't move away from his hand on her shoulder. Just. The vibes aren't getting better.]
. . . If it wasn't obvious, Vira was the blonde, but Mineo pulled the trigger. I'm not sure what all of the rest of that was about, but I think they did it. Ridiculous. Ah, but this is -
Did I ever tell you about my aunts? There's an old story they used to tell me that relates to this situation.
The Blessed Sisters Lachrimorta and Aisamorta. My great-aunts. They both went blind before I was born, and spent most of their time in silent prayer. But I spent a great deal of time with them when I was young. I believe they considered themselves. . . responsible, for my birth, more than one would expect, so they took their time teaching me hymns and the stories of our house.
I - here, I think Mineo tried to text me - will you tell him I'm not interested? [She'll hand him her phone, which is open to a message, and will continue talking while he takes his time reading.]
One such story involved the Priestess Crushed Under Newly Laid Rock. It is among our drearier passages. It concerns a time, several thousand years ago, when there was an underground leak of contaminants into the ceremonial pool. The priestess, whose name has been lost to time, was one of the leaders of the Black Vestrals in those days. She was known as the most holy and devout of the penitents, often committing to vows and punishments that shocked even the leadership of the House. For example, she submitted to be made a sewn tongue, the specifics of the ritual meaning she was unable to speak in any form except prayers. Anything she wanted to say, she would have to phrase as a devotion to God.
Anyway, when the contamination came to be known, the other Houses sent builders to attempt to repair the damage to the underground burial chambers, to the areas outside the Tomb. But she came upon them in their work one day, and discovered that one member of a particular group of builders from the Eighth House were attempting to sabotage the Tomb itself. She knew the message she wanted to convey - [A little spike of emotion right here.] someone and at least one other all want us dead. Others seem to be hesitant, but that seems to be their win condition - but the notion of conveying it through the form of catechism eluded her, and the sewn tongue prevented her from expressing more. So she lay there day and night by the Tomb, aware that these Eighth sinners had lied to them and meant them harm.
Eventually, she was discovered, and was martyred when she was crushed beneath the rock she laid. But before her death, she had written a beautiful hymn that described all she had learnt, and upon discovery of her body, though she knew the Eighth intended to prevent her revival at any cost, she was able to sing to the Reverend Mother her woeful tale.
I would be happy to sing it for you, if you would like to hear.
[Molly does take his time, scrolling through - and then tilting his head while he listens to the story.
His emotions are ... something. A clench of anxiety, maybe, but mostly just. absorbing this, the story, the meaning, for the moment. Unsure what to do with all of it. He then types a little into the phone - to play act sending a message back to Mineo - and then offers it back.]
Perhaps you best. Went to a lot of trouble to make sure it got heard, didn't she?
[You're killing me. She'll just start reciting various prayers; I'm not going to write them and they don't seem to have particular meaning. But then just.]
It's hard to know what any of these really mean - it's only an old story, and the years have likely altered the intended message.
One must question the source of these things, and what is lost in transcription, but. . . the gist of it is easy to understand. Lied to by someone feigning assistance, but really serving their own ends. The Eighth have their own beliefs, and ours and theirs have never been aligned. They dislike how we cling to our dead.
Hesitant does not mean opposed. At the least, it is a significant omission.
[She feels like some creeps like Gluttony might try.]
There is a lot I might forgive, I think. Sometimes, people who die are assholes. But. . . [Fuck. Just bad energy.] No one forced anyone to make certain promises, or become sweet companions and confidants. Did they.
At least some of them. But in the story-- [...He struggles for a second.] The Ninth never intended to play by the win conditions at all, right? That we were going to try and find another way?
[He'll just. pull her into a hug, if she'll allow it. But he's shaking his head.]
I don't know how the story ends. My aunts are lunatic mass murderers. I'm sure how they told it was grisly.
[She goes fairly stiff, when he hugs her.]
I'll ask around, and see if anyone else has. If I hear something good, I'll tell you. If I hear something bad, should I tell you that, too? Or keep it to myself?
[There's some of the same waves of fear she had felt, but ... things cut off, when she asks that question. Then it's just a strange sort of sense of sickening nostalgia, for a conversation he's played on repeat in his head so much. Heard the voice ringing between his ears the whole time.
`You sure you don't wanna pretend for a while more?`
The same damned question, isn't it? Still, he's got the same answer, when he thinks it over.]
Best hear all of it, I think. No point in hiding now.
[You know the feeling when you're on one of those carnival rides and it hits the top of the arc and then just drops you? Neither of them do, because Molly is from a fantasy world with no roller coasters, and Harrow is from a sci-fi world with probably no amusement parks. But it's that sort of weightless feeling in your stomach when the bottom drops out.
But there's also a bit of gratitude? For telling him. That she's here.]
That's all I know, really. It said some of the dead were gone, "no way to save."
[She's a little calmer now, because so much of her fear was about having to decide what to say, and whether to lie, and whether she could keep the lie going.]
It was from Eleanor and Mahito, but - Eleanor's letters have generally been useful.
[She chews her lip a little, sighs, bleeding out a little nervous tension as she reconsiders the way to approach this, the emotional spike gone.]
I had a conversation about this, with Wrath, I think. She. . . admitted there were things that if we knew of, we might see her differently. In that conversation, I expressed skepticism about the wish granting in general, and I accused her of letting you believe something the Avatars didn't know to be possible.
She said there was no way to save the dead once they've been consumed, but also that she had never seen the indulgence desire granting method work, so it was not impossible that could still work to save the dead.
[There's hearing something, and not believing it. refusing to look it in the eye. And there's finally accepting that you might know something.
It's infinitely better to know. Or, well, it isn't. It's horrible to know. An instant searing knife between the ribs. But it'd be worse to not be told, to be lead around by the nose by all sides, wouldn't it? The Avatars keeping him in the dark to keep indulging and keep marching closer to a cliffside he didn't know was coming. The living out of some crazy desire to keep him sane and functioning. The dead so that he'd keep trying to find a way out for them for his own vested interests.
He just clings a little tighter to her. Maybe a bit childishly. Right now he feels a fucking fool and a half.]
Fucking foolish to have told me. Do they think-- Do they think telling me that Beau is gone is going to make me fight hard to try and save the souls of serial killers and cursed spirits?
[She's just generating sad and comforting feelings right back at him. And a lot of anger, still. That's still very much there. She doesn't think he's a fool. She thinks he was betrayed, badly. There's a lot she'd be able to accept as a pragmatic decision; she's lied to protect her own, too. But he didn't deserve to be treated this was and that is guiding a lot of her reaction.]
Molly. [A little gently.] I think Eleanor said so, because she realized no one had. [This one thing probably wasn't a calculation. That's not really Eleanor.] I don't know why they send it to who they do. Mine is from Douman, and they know I loathed them.
I know she did. I'm saying she should have been smarter about it, kept it from me. It was stupid not to be. I'm very fucking stubborn, I- [he's choking up a bit now. not really crying? he doesn't know if he could do that right now. he feels like gluttony when the creature had ripped out their insides.] I just wouldn't have accepted it until it was too late.
[And sickeningly he's grateful for that too. He's on his knees by now, just drowning in whatever he's managing to feel that isn't just a broiling mix of rage and grief. All the things he's never had to feel before. Hadn't wanted to. He'd been able to shrug off being told by Gluttony, had pushed the problem down the line another few days, but
she's not really in the other room, and he knew that, didn't he? foolish.
the truth always has its due. it always wants something. he doesn't know what to do with any of it, he doesn't know what to do.]
[Oh, are we going to lie on the floor despondently? We can do that. It's fine. She's not a very comfortable person to cling to, being covered in a bunch of bones, but she will sit there with him, an arm around him.
And when he asks, she pauses, letting a lot of feelings wash over her before replacing them with something calm.
Have a gentle smooch on the forehead right back, baby.]
I don't have any particular expectations of that, idiot. I think they're all ones of your own.
[But it seems like he does expect himself to be a good person.]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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[A little spike of anger.]
He was cruel, today. He hurt Sasazuka. He endangered Vira.
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. . . Fair enough. I doubt he intended either of those things. But-- I see your point.
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[The anxiety swell is just getting worse and worse.]
I knew it would be all right, as soon as I knew it would him. No one would vote for him. But it didn't - it didn't need to even be a question.
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I know. I understand.
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Stupid Gojou. Yes, it's so cruel and unfair, that we cared more when Childe incapacitated a woman and electrocuted her with a toaster than when Mineo shot that same person so he wouldn't do it again.
We've all been exposed as hypocrites, haven't we?
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I know, we're all monsters, aren't we. If only we could examine our own beliefs, we too might understand that maybe killing a cold-blooded killer is bad actually.
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. . . If it wasn't obvious, Vira was the blonde, but Mineo pulled the trigger. I'm not sure what all of the rest of that was about, but I think they did it. Ridiculous. Ah, but this is -
Did I ever tell you about my aunts? There's an old story they used to tell me that relates to this situation.
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You've only mentioned them in passing. What's the story then.
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I - here, I think Mineo tried to text me - will you tell him I'm not interested? [She'll hand him her phone, which is open to a message, and will continue talking while he takes his time reading.]
One such story involved the Priestess Crushed Under Newly Laid Rock. It is among our drearier passages. It concerns a time, several thousand years ago, when there was an underground leak of contaminants into the ceremonial pool. The priestess, whose name has been lost to time, was one of the leaders of the Black Vestrals in those days. She was known as the most holy and devout of the penitents, often committing to vows and punishments that shocked even the leadership of the House. For example, she submitted to be made a sewn tongue, the specifics of the ritual meaning she was unable to speak in any form except prayers. Anything she wanted to say, she would have to phrase as a devotion to God.
Anyway, when the contamination came to be known, the other Houses sent builders to attempt to repair the damage to the underground burial chambers, to the areas outside the Tomb. But she came upon them in their work one day, and discovered that one member of a particular group of builders from the Eighth House were attempting to sabotage the Tomb itself. She knew the message she wanted to convey - [A little spike of emotion right here.] someone and at least one other all want us dead. Others seem to be hesitant, but that seems to be their win condition - but the notion of conveying it through the form of catechism eluded her, and the sewn tongue prevented her from expressing more. So she lay there day and night by the Tomb, aware that these Eighth sinners had lied to them and meant them harm.
Eventually, she was discovered, and was martyred when she was crushed beneath the rock she laid. But before her death, she had written a beautiful hymn that described all she had learnt, and upon discovery of her body, though she knew the Eighth intended to prevent her revival at any cost, she was able to sing to the Reverend Mother her woeful tale.
I would be happy to sing it for you, if you would like to hear.
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His emotions are ... something. A clench of anxiety, maybe, but mostly just. absorbing this, the story, the meaning, for the moment. Unsure what to do with all of it. He then types a little into the phone - to play act sending a message back to Mineo - and then offers it back.]
Perhaps you best. Went to a lot of trouble to make sure it got heard, didn't she?
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It's hard to know what any of these really mean - it's only an old story, and the years have likely altered the intended message.
One must question the source of these things, and what is lost in transcription, but. . . the gist of it is easy to understand. Lied to by someone feigning assistance, but really serving their own ends. The Eighth have their own beliefs, and ours and theirs have never been aligned. They dislike how we cling to our dead.
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But not all of them. There's-- they aren't a united front, it seems.
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[She feels like some creeps like Gluttony might try.]
There is a lot I might forgive, I think. Sometimes, people who die are assholes. But. . . [Fuck. Just bad energy.] No one forced anyone to make certain promises, or become sweet companions and confidants. Did they.
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[But he's conflicted too, but he's-- there's just too many attachments, too many complications.]
... But the Eigth are just people too. Making the same sorts of mistakes the Ninth does.
[His eyes flick to the floor, and then up to Harrow.]
The hymn also compels us to keep looking.
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[A spike of bad feelings again - just waves of fear, almost to the point of nausea.]
. . . I heard some received messages from the dead this week, again. Did you get anything?
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[He'll just. pull her into a hug, if she'll allow it. But he's shaking his head.]
Nope. Haven't heard anything.
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[She goes fairly stiff, when he hugs her.]
I'll ask around, and see if anyone else has. If I hear something good, I'll tell you. If I hear something bad, should I tell you that, too? Or keep it to myself?
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`You sure you don't wanna pretend for a while more?`
The same damned question, isn't it? Still, he's got the same answer, when he thinks it over.]
Best hear all of it, I think. No point in hiding now.
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I did hear something, and it was bad. I'm sorry.
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But there's also a bit of gratitude? For telling him. That she's here.]
Go on then.
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[She's a little calmer now, because so much of her fear was about having to decide what to say, and whether to lie, and whether she could keep the lie going.]
It was from Eleanor and Mahito, but - Eleanor's letters have generally been useful.
[She chews her lip a little, sighs, bleeding out a little nervous tension as she reconsiders the way to approach this, the emotional spike gone.]
I had a conversation about this, with Wrath, I think. She. . . admitted there were things that if we knew of, we might see her differently. In that conversation, I expressed skepticism about the wish granting in general, and I accused her of letting you believe something the Avatars didn't know to be possible.
She said there was no way to save the dead once they've been consumed, but also that she had never seen the indulgence desire granting method work, so it was not impossible that could still work to save the dead.
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It's infinitely better to know. Or, well, it isn't. It's horrible to know. An instant searing knife between the ribs. But it'd be worse to not be told, to be lead around by the nose by all sides, wouldn't it? The Avatars keeping him in the dark to keep indulging and keep marching closer to a cliffside he didn't know was coming. The living out of some crazy desire to keep him sane and functioning. The dead so that he'd keep trying to find a way out for them for his own vested interests.
He just clings a little tighter to her. Maybe a bit childishly. Right now he feels a fucking fool and a half.]
Fucking foolish to have told me. Do they think-- Do they think telling me that Beau is gone is going to make me fight hard to try and save the souls of serial killers and cursed spirits?
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Molly. [A little gently.] I think Eleanor said so, because she realized no one had. [This one thing probably wasn't a calculation. That's not really Eleanor.] I don't know why they send it to who they do. Mine is from Douman, and they know I loathed them.
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[And sickeningly he's grateful for that too. He's on his knees by now, just drowning in whatever he's managing to feel that isn't just a broiling mix of rage and grief. All the things he's never had to feel before. Hadn't wanted to. He'd been able to shrug off being told by Gluttony, had pushed the problem down the line another few days, but
she's not really in the other room, and he knew that, didn't he? foolish.
the truth always has its due. it always wants something. he doesn't know what to do with any of it, he doesn't know what to do.]
How good of a person am I expected to be?
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And when he asks, she pauses, letting a lot of feelings wash over her before replacing them with something calm.
Have a gentle smooch on the forehead right back, baby.]
I don't have any particular expectations of that, idiot. I think they're all ones of your own.
[But it seems like he does expect himself to be a good person.]
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