YOU — “No. There is still a chance.”
DOLORES DEI — “You think so?” Her voice is weary.
EMPATHY — Everything about her is weary. She is the Innocence of weariness, of heroically borne suffering.
CONCEPTUALIZATION — That is the picture you have painted for yourself, at any rate.
YOU — “You looked back. That’s the memory, the moment, that I can’t stop returning to. You looked back. I had a chance, for just that moment…”
DOLORES DEI — She meets your eye, gaze still forever cast back over her shoulder. Time stops. The stars are stilled, the ocean silent. There is *nothing* beyond this memory. Nothing at all. All of infinity is contained in this single moment when anything and everything was possible.
“Oh, Harry…” She sighs, soft as eiderdown. “We never had any chance.”
And just like that, the wave of time collapses under its own weight, obliterating everything. This moment was six years ago. She is gone from here. Gone, gone…
PAIN THRESHOLD — You cannot leave. There was nothing outside of this moment, and now there is nothing at all. It’s all gone. There is no point. I’m sorry. I can’t do this any longer.
VOLITION — Please, don’t say that…
“Okay. Well, fuck me, then.”
“How would *you* know?! You gave up! You didn’t even try!”
“We *must* have had a chance, at some point… Doesn’t everyone get a chance, if nothing more?”
“How could you say that…?”
DOLORES DEI — “Because it’s true,” she says, matter-of-fact. “There is no moment in time that you can turn back to, no branching paths, no infinity. There is only what happened. I looked back… and then away.” She closes her eyes, turning her back to you.
“The moment ended. *We* ended. That is all.”
SHIVERS — A wave crashes against an unseen shore, ocean spray tickling the back of your neck. You shiver, but no one shivers with you. You are alone in this intersection. Why are you here?
“Why can’t *I* end?! Why can’t this all just stop? Please, make it stop…”
“Ended? I’ve barely even started! I got a chance to start completely over as somebody new! I don’t need you anymore! You’re just dead weight to me now.”
“No. That wasn’t the real ending. We’re a part of something so much bigger than this intersection, telling a story that encapsulates all of history! There’s *more* to this, it *means* something.”
“Then… What am I supposed to do now…?”
DOLORES DEI — “No, Harry.” She turns back to you again now, and she looks… sad.
“We were not metaphors. We were people. Our narrative was not intelligently designed. It simply followed the patterns of history, because those are the only patterns we *know.* We tried to create something new, but we failed. There is no narrative reward for our failure, no satisfactory ending. There is only the immutable past and the unknowable future.”
RHETORIC — There is no assurance of what is good or deserved or what may bring relief. There is no assurance of punishment, either. There is no assurance of anything. Not even of a future. I don’t know what to say to make this bearable.
VOLITION — Even so… As long as you live, *something* is promised. Can you live with that?
I can’t, I just can’t do this anymore…
I can. It’s enough.
I don’t know. I just don’t know.
I can at least try for a little longer…
VOLITION — That’s all I ask. That’s enough.
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nishiki 12, 29?? 👀 i want to create chaos -squishy
sorry this was so late aghsdhahdh I always write too much and then have to whittle things down a bit so my thoughts are comprehensible
12. sexuality hc?
wellll I can pretty easily accept either gay or bi, but the way I interpret some of his actions/history/behavior/etc makes my personal view of him lean more towards gay than anything.
he’s never really shown real interest/attraction to women beyond using them as status symbols, and the whole thing with yumi made no sense (for him and kiryu both- you know my opinion on that plotpoint by now) and if I had to explain it rather than ignore it I’d have to say it was a weird half-assed excuse he came up with to explain some of his actions instead of addressing his actual issues at first.
but yeah I mean come on. have you SEEN reina. she’s cool and ridiculously pretty and goes above and beyond to care for him and others in general and etc etc etc, she was interested for YEARS and he never reciprocated At All. to me the Easiest explanation for that, whether he was aware of it or not (probably not), is just. him not really being into women. and possibly (at least at first) respecting reina enough to not fake her out and treat her like the girls that he had hang around him at the bars to look good to his superiors. in fact I think if he were to open up about all this to anyone it would be her (drunk, crying).
idk, a lot about him just sort of makes sense when you consider him to be gay and very repressed. boy’s got identity issues off the SHITS already, so it ties into that quite naturally.
29. how do you think they would be as a parent?
I think it depends on where he is in his recovery (mentally and physically) and the circumstances leading to that parenthood. similar to kiryu, I think he’d connect with orphans well and empathize with them strongly for obvious reasons. if he were to spend time in okinawa, perhaps to help him recover after The Incident, he’d be pretty closed off and prickly with everyone, kids included, at first– but honestly I think they’d help alot to get him to open up, regain trust, and enjoy life again. I don’t think he’d want to do it alone, or trust himself to, but he could end up fitting in pretty naturally as a guardian to them, and on the flip side, he’d benefit from having genuine care and lack of judgment through a tough recovery.
(I think he’d become quickly attached to riona above all else due to them sharing some feelings about their burn scars and how they look, and survivors guilt surrounding their parents)
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