terriblepurpose | Deer Country Contact

[After going through his omni and noticing a string of texts that grew increasingly difficult to read, and after hashing out a deal with the brought-low John, there's someone L absolutely must contact.

It's an ungodly hour, befitting someone whose sense of time is jolted out of tune by the lost days of death. L's quite drunk, which Paul might suspect given their bond, but he's typing with his typical clarity. Lycka might be helping out a bit as the waves lick at his ankles where he's lying on the beach.]

Are you there?

[He hopes that Paul answers, and not the white-hot tirade of a mad sermon.]

We need to talk, if you're there.

[Drunkenness is one of those sets of sensations that the structure of the Bond between them seems to mute. He is aware of it only if he tries to be, and then only as the knowledge that it is occurring. He supposes it is, in some way, one of Doorway's strange considerations.]

I'm here.

[He knew when Lazarus came back. The presence of a renewed shadow heartbeat was difficult to overlook after having grown so accustomed to its presence. He could have reached out then. All the reasons he didn't are tired and worn thin, as he is.]

Go ahead.

[Paul answered; that's a good sign, even if L feels like he's already asked for too much.

Lycka pulls him away from the lapping water, propping him against a stone wall not unlike the one L used for shelter while he gave Paul his moon drop. It's easier to type like this, and to see responses, with the support at his back. Satisfied, she releases herself from her sense of duty to do the only thing that seems to make her happy lately: diving into the sea to hunt.]

Shōyō seems to need space right now, and I understand if it's the same for you.

[He thinks, hollowly, to the vows he repeated. Did he break them? Does that mean that Paul has no obligation to keep them? He's not made for this, he was never made for this, and there's a cold, tight fist gripping his guts as he looks out toward the sea, again, where things are so much colder, but also so much more straightforward.

He starts to rise, using the stone wall for support. Like a flash, Lycka's shoving him down again, as clear a stay put as any creature could possibly express without words, so hard that he knocks and bruises his elbow.

He'll know tomorrow, after the shimmering numbness of the liquor has faded to leave nausea and aching.]

I wanted to tell you that I've taken steps to make sure it never happens again.

[The message is, at first, bewildering. The idea of being angry at Lazarus, wanting him at arm's length, never crossed Paul's mind. His rage (what he remembers of it) had only blazed in two directions, and neither of them were aimed at his consumed mentor.

But it isn't as though Paul can blame him for his doubt. There have been recriminations thick in the air as flies at the height of this summer, and Lazarus seems to always wait for Paul to change his mind as it is.]

I'm not angry with you. I understand why you didn't answer my messages.

[Which he has yet to explain, or to even listen to himself. He knows they're unpleasant. That's enough.]

I'm glad you're back. Are you busy?

[L's fingertip traces the words I'm glad you're back. He wants to touch the very concept of them, and also to reject them for the obvious lie they have to be. He starts to type that makes one, but stops himself.

The whole reason this is a problem in the first place is because he was dating Shoyo and Bonded with Paul. If those things weren't true, he'd have his own privately painful death and a powerful chip to bargain with, and no messy emotional collateral damage to contend with. He could burn forever, here, instead of for just twenty five obsessive years ending abruptly on a rainy November day.

He draws his knees closer to his chest, shivering in spite of the balmy July air, answering the question that should be straightforward but, as usual, manages not to be.]

A little. I'm not too busy to talk, or I wouldn't have messaged you.

[The remoteness of textual communication is a barrier that Paul understands the value of. He knows that Lazarus is intoxicated, likely relying on the medium to buffer his words. Keeping himself safe behind a locked door in a room with a puzzle.

Normally, Paul would respect that privacy. He'd take the allusion to being a 'little' busy as a hint. He'd give Lazarus space, thinking that was what was being asked of him, and retreat into his own isolated hurt.

He switches his Omni to a voice channel.]

Are you all right? [Softly, without reproach or judgment.] You've been drinking. Are you with anyone, besides Lycka?

[L immediately switches back to text for his reply, almost reflexively. Voices give away so much, and he's slurring and slow. He's never been this drunk before.

He hears Paul, lets the words swirl and sink into saturated grey matter, and, with a sigh, matches voice for voice. The switch flips back.]

It's not as though I'm proud, but I wasn't trying to hide it. I won't try to hide that I'm just with Lycka... or...

[Is he alright? Shoyo. The demons down under the sea. Panic and aching compresses his chest, but the counter-weight is so violent it leaves him nearly buoyant. His voice is bright and breathless.]

Paul, I got him. I got something I needed, that scared him... I got him and now he won't hurt you or Shoyo.

[The words tumble out with the giddiness of hyperventilation. The high high, to counter the lowest of lows. The reason, the shining treasure he considers such a great win. If the world crashes down around him, he has this; the waves crash in the background and they could swallow him, and he wouldn't even care, so long as he has this.]

Mutually assured destruction... John understands that language. And so do I.

[I'm not judging you for it takes shape in Paul's mouth, ready to be spoken, as Lazarus first explains his drunkenness. If there was anyone who deserved to be able to drown his pains today, it would be the man turned to salt and ash by God. The assurance falls away unspoken as Lazarus continues, intoxicated by something that concerns Paul far more.

Lazarus is prone to brilliant fixation. Paul has seen how eagerly and desperately by turns he throws himself into his dreams and investigations and projects, without regard for his own limits until they cut him on their broken edges.

And then there's John, and Paul bites the raw inside of his cheek to keep himself quiet. It only lasts a heartbeat, and he does not think about it.]

So you're celebrating?

[He already had his boots out. He begins to pull them on, seared leather creaking in reminder he needs to replace them soon. Iron and thin milk blend on his tongue. The ocean whispers in his ear.]

...celebrating.

[He echoes the word, with his own additions. They sound like surprise and disquieted aversion, as though he's cracked an egg to find a rotten yolk.]

It seemed like Shoyo thought that, too.

[And he truly, sincerely does not understand why.]

I could have come back with nothing. I came back with something, and it's mine forever now. That's what I have; that might be all I have. I'm glad it's not nothing, but I am not celebrating.

[Another odd catch, unexpected. Paul pauses in lacing his boots, looking at the Omni beside him.]

Why not?

[There's more concern than surprise laced through the question, his apprehension only growing. The waves keep crashing in the background.]

You came back with something. You've found a way to keep us safe. [Softer, in repetition.] You came back.

I think that's worth celebrating a little. Isn't it?

[There's a long silence, waves crashing. L's voice sounds constricted when he answers, not quite choked, as one who has practiced this, cultivating it so that he can communicate even through tremendous emotional strife.]

I know how much it hurt when I died. He took me apart like it was nothing, and I had just enough time to realize what was happening before it was over. Every part of it hurt, like nothing else I've ever felt.

I don't know what Shoyo saw, but in the dream, I can't imagine there would have been anything left of me. I know that you felt that, too, and I'm too sorry to celebrate. I know what it cost; you know what it cost even though you never should have had to.

Shoyo just doesn't understand, but it's not his fault, especially if what he saw was gruesome. When we arrived and explored the shipwrecks together, the corpses were new and upsetting to him. I can only imagine the effect all that blood and gristle in his own bed would have had on him.

[He doesn't say that something is over that he needed. He doesn't say that the end of the Emperor's reign was the goal, and also the death knell of a purpose precious to him.]

I'll put myself right again by tomorrow. I'm not right with anything, just now. Lycka is looking after me, just so you know... I'm not in danger. You won't feel pain tonight.

Edited 2022-07-20 17:45 (UTC)

[Paul recognizes the nuances of that tone, even without the visual cues that must accompany it. Too much dilation in the pupil, the minute shifts of muscle and bone in defensive enclosure. He's left silent too long in its passing, struggling with his own honed control -

- and then, like a cord stretched too tight, biting into his palm, he lets it go.]

It was a nosebleed.

[Quiet, worn down to bone, afflicted with a tremor of pain and sorrow that dyes each word black.]

That's all he saw. He took you to the hospital, and he brought you back a squid, and he put you in his tub and asked me what to feed you.

[His grief that of a lover, forlorn desolation turned to fury.]

I don't- Lazarus, I don't care. You didn't do that to me. I know you didn't, and I know who did, and I'm just glad you're back.

I want to see you. Please. Even if we don't celebrate, it's- [a hitch in his words, his breathing uneven] I'm so tired. Aren't you tired?

A nosebleed.

[He repeats it, in slurred bemusement. Overall a blessing, or so he would have said before. Death is death, and it doesn't really matter whether it arrives as a pile of melted meat or a pale, silent body that looks like it might as well just be sleeping.

This is the completest account of events he's managed to get so far; he's grateful for it, however unfortunate the fallout... and then he has a chance to be truly surprised, because others have been angry for him, for good reason, but Paul actually doesn't seem to be.

Another thing to be grateful for, because now that Paul asks that?]

I am tired. Down to my very soul... I just don't know how to stop. I never have.

[He answers in a voice that's almost lost in the rush of waves, not because he's closer to them, but because he's quieter, a struggling candle in a lantern left open to the sea spray.]

I'll see you. If that's what you really want. I had just hoped to be myself again by the time that happened.

[Because this pathetic iteration, succumbing to numbness and vice, isn't him, of course, and he takes a meager refuge in that framing. It's just a weaker, stupider stranger keeping house in his body for awhile while the "real" and tired him takes his much-needed rest.]

I'm on the beach, near the wall we took you behind when--

[Paul knows when; there's no other qualifier.]

[Lazarus says he doesn't know how to stop, and a steel jaw closes around Paul's heart, tightens until he feels it squirm under the foreign grip of teeth. He pushes up from where he sits and slides his name across a board mounted to the wall, takes down the packed bag he leaves hanging by the door at all time he's not wearing it.]

I know the one. [He slings it over his shoulders, heading out the door.] I'll be there soon. Don't go anywhere.

[It doesn't take long, between Lanterns and his well-worn shortcuts across the city, until sand is whispering under his boots again. He spots Lazarus and pauses, briefly, before he closes the gap, sitting down beside him with a small nod. Sophia bounds from his shoulder to the beach and hops across it towards the sea and Lycka.]

Hey, Lazarus.

[He takes his pack off and puts it beneath his knees, then leans back on his hands, head tipped to look up at the stars.]

It's a beautiful night to be out. [Conversational, like they're picking back up with no time lapsed at all.] Are you cold?

[In the time since the last message, L's remained true to the request to not go anywhere, on a literal level if not in spirit. His back against the rough and sandy stone with his legs stretched out in front of him, he'd started to drift periodically into a hypnagogic state. He sees a locked trap door in the sand between his feet, one too high to reach in the clouds. Dreamwalking necessitates dreaming, and he's not sure if he can't manage it or if he isn't letting himself.

Unlike the dim outlines of impossible doors on the backs of his eyelids, Paul is not a hallucination when he arrives, taking a relaxed seat beside him and speaking to him in a way that is friendly, pleasant, and casual, in spite of the circumstances. It's meant to put him at ease, he's sure... but how? In the way of a dog with a trip to the vet in its future, whose owner is trying to avoid alarming it?

He's not a dog, and Paul's not his owner. He has to do his best to make the framing feel more equal, even if it's difficult now that Paul is making calming observations about the world and L has sought his calm artificially, in the manner or a coward or a cheater.

His own backpack isn't anywhere to be seen. He's in the same rumpled sleeping clothes he died in, and his omni is in his hand.

He looks surprised when Paul asks him if he's cold, but the reason for his surprise is every bit as bewildering as the feeling itself.]

...yes.

[He's chilled, actually, and hasn't notice thought about it until just now.]

Not that it makes the night less beautiful.

[He stares skyward, trying to follow Paul's gaze, but he's seeing the stars double.]

[Paul nods, sitting forward to open his pack and produce a light folded blanket he shakes out and, without asking permission, drapes around Lazarus' thin shoulders. It doesn't do anything to dispel the notion that Paul has come here to look after Lazarus as is his quietly solicitous habit.

What might is how he shuffles closer on the sand and leans against Lazarus' side with the quiet, heavy sigh of an animal settling into a nest, tipping his head to rest on narrow bone covered in soft wool. In contrast to Lazarus' chill, Paul is febrile, almost unpleasantly so.]

No. It doesn't.

[He lets his eyes close, listening to the lapping of waves and the distant cries of gulls.]

I never know how to stop either.

[If he was sober, L might protest the blanket, but drinking grounds his body just as much it frees his mind from the weight of the world. He shivers, leaning into the drape of the blanket over his shoulders and allows Paul to lean closer to a frame that's unwound from its typical guarded tenseness. His skeleton, at present, seems like it's doing the absolute least to hold him together, but perhaps that's an effect of his own warped and fuzzy perception.

What comes through clearly, the single bright station in a field of distorted airwaves, is the fact that Paul is present, seeming both to provide and seek shelter from one of the few things they both fear.]

That's no good.

[He sighs the words unevenly, as though he thinks this similarity is funny and sad and, overall, not truly surprising.]

Truly, the world needs people like that, who persist beyond the point of reason to determine exactly how and why something breaks. Innovation tends not to occur alongside complacency... so, it's really too bad that the world also hates those people, when they have enough troubles.

[There's nothing amused about Paul's ripple of laughter. It's a product of the easy surprise that comes with certain exhaustions, tinged with affection.]

Going philosophical on me, old man?

[The endearment almost catches on his teeth before he articulates it. He's glad it doesn't, in a twinge of still unhealed heartsickness. He understands well the way that one person can't substitute for another, and that it's an unkindness to shade people over with your ghosts.

But he can be reminded, and that's not so bad.]

I don't hate you. [It's not difficult to say.] I don't think you hate me, either. So there you have it. Two of us, and the world.

[He laughs at "old man"; whether or not Paul means it as a term of endearment is unclear to him, but the sound is startled and delighted. He's always felt old, in a way, but having died at the age of 25 in his own world, it's not like he ever actually got to be. No one's ever called him that, in jest or affection or dead seriousness, and now that someone has, he realizes he loves it.

If Paul is reminded of someone else by saying the words, then L is reminded that a future is possible here, at a moment that matters by a person who matters.]

It happens that I like you very much, even when it's painful. Perhaps especially then, because I'm reminded of how much I actually have to lose. Most people aren't fortunate enough to really understand the value.

[From his own advanced and mature age of seventeen, twenty five is practically senescent - but more than that, it's a matter of attitude, of experience. Gurney Halleck wasn't a greybeard mumbling by an open fire, either.

He likes Lazarus' laugh, a ripple of sound surprisingly bright from someone so wan. He can feel it through his side and in his own chest, this close. He'll remember what brought it out of him.]

I like you very much, too. And I know what you mean. [He releases a puff of air.] It would easier if we didn't understand, wouldn't it? If the only thing there was in front of us was the puzzle.

But then we'd miss this.

I thought so, earlier... that it might be easier to not understand. It turns out that it's much simpler to make yourself very sick, than to truly shut that off.

[The laughter's shadow lingers in his voice, but it's tinged with a little bit of misery, now. It's been a hard night; he wonders whether he's punishing himself, or acting this way because some part of him believes he deserves a reprieve.]

Lycka puts up with a lot. She likes this, though... the space, the hunt. I think it's the only time she's really happy.

[ Somewhere in the waves, a mouse swims with unnatural grace, her corporeal form no barrier to movement. She is an Omen, a creature of the soul, so she is not foreign to this alien sea, but her shape will never know it as a home. Not like Lycka, sleek and powerful, the apex of her environment when within it - and never quite at home outside of it. ]

It's difficult. Not being able to do what you're made for.

[ Of course he's not just talking about Lycka. He's not just talking about himself, either. ]

Or trying not to do it. [ He sighs, barely. ] Humans are made to connect with one another. We can't help ourselves.

[L can't laugh at that; he can't feel anything but a little barb below his ribs, to realize that is is difficult, that what he's "made for" is so specific and distant.

It's not just the cold air, he knows he can feel the cold water on Lycka's face as she darts and dodges and takes her prey.]

Even so... what cannot adapt must die.

[He'd died. Not for lack of adapting; perhaps for mutating, adapting too much, standing out to the point of failure. He might hide his face if it was not so dark already.]

I've tried so hard to adapt...

[I want to be an island]

I don't know how to be that sort of human being. I know what I wanted... I know what I got. And I know that, on some level, Shoyo will never understand it. The same way most people will not ever understand it, my thinking was absurd, for believing that it would ever be understood.

Edited 2022-08-09 06:12 (UTC)

[ Paul listens to Lazarus talk about trying, and it's the trailing fingers of a ghost across the span of his shoulders. He hunches against the cold, tighter to Lazarus' side. ]

Someone [ Kaworu ] told me once that humans will never fully understand each other, because we're afraid of letting ourselves be known completely. That if we ever knew each other that wholly, we'd end up being the same, and there would be no distinction between us and the other.

[ They'd all be an ocean, like the one stretched out beside them, dreaming and thoughtless. Maybe that's all there is out there, past the horizon and down in the depths. ]

Maybe that's true.

[ He takes a deeper breath, holds it long enough to press against the rhythm of his heart. ]

But you're still trying. You still...you want it. And that's not absurd. It might not be perfect, but it's better than not trying at all.

[His shallow breath shudders as Paul's body constricts and crushes closer against his side. Being held tightly is comforting to him, even being held too tightly; there's a kind of peaceful resignation to it, the understanding that there are forces strong enough to shake and humble him and drain all possible fight or argument from him. Whether it's as profound and abstract as fate, or simply a set of arms that care enough to hold him, there is no firmer reminder that he is not disembodied, that some consequence grounds his existence.]

That sounds like something Kaworu would say.

[It's his blithe and askance way of saying that he doesn't quite agree. Maybe it's because he feels, now, as though he's been on both sides of it.]

I believe that most of us basically want the same things: to be secure, to have esteem, to be loved. But I've never come across two people who defined those things the same way.

[Care enough to worship me.

Care enough to use me.

Care enough to destroy me.

He smiles palely against Paul's shoulder.]

I was born beneath the promise of a highly flawed life. Exceeding expectations isn't too difficult, when there are in fact none at all. You don't know what that's like... it's not your fault.

[Paul couldn't know, could he, what it's like to have slipped into the world accidentally and irregularly. He can't imagine what it's like to be wrapped in resentment before any sort of blanket, a bastard orphan constantly hungry in a world that made more sense before he so rudely interrupted it.

Not that an ascended birth and every expectation doesn't come with its own set of questions and griefs.]

Is it easier, in general, to forgive what you don't understand? When we're the hardest on ourselves... I'd think that knowing someone and finding that they're the same would make them the most unforgivable.

Deer Country Contact

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