acatalepsy_logs | [OPEN] Well. That Didn't Go Quite As Planned

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[OPEN] Well. That Didn't Go Quite As Planned

Who: EVERYONE
Where: The Temple of Beginnings
When: Immediately After The End.
Rating: PG-13, may vary by thread
What: You fall, you pick yourself back up and you move on. Or at least, you try.

Fished Out Of Water
One minute, you are witnessing the fabric of an entire world implode as it is literally ripped apart by powers unknown. The next, that tell-tale twist somewhere beneath your sternum, before you are bodily YANKED away from Akvos, away from the ocean and the Queen and the King and the Princess.

And land back on (mostly) solid, dry ground.

Welcome back to the Temple of Beginnings. Don't worry, there's no hurry for you to get back up just yet.

Hey, Howya Doin'?
Once you do get back up, now is the time to be taking stock of the situation - yours, your friends, and even those new merfolk neighbours (who may need a hand getting their fins back into the water). There is also the missing members of the Circle to consider: people who disappeared on the journey to Akvos, and those who never made it back..

(There's also that small matter with a certain 'witchess-san' that may be a cause for concern to some more than others.)

Whatever the case, it's a lot to process right now. Take the time you have, because you don't know if it'll be enough for what you need.

[[ OOC: Here's an open post for threads reacting to the end of the Akvos world hop. Feel free to use the above prompts, and/or make your own! ]]

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[He nods, still turned away from her, and swallows, running his hand over Sumo's head.]

Go ahead, take em. I keep- Sumo keeps trying to come up to me right when I go to throw.

[The hand on Sumo's head moves slowly down his spine, really gently, and for a second he's murmuring.]

Dogs are pretty fuckin dumb, aren't they.

[Hank clears his throat, leaning back and looking up at the sky, jaw tight, swallowing again.]

Anyway, uh- if throwing shit around helps, it oughta be easy to find something better to beat up on than some dinky little rocks. For you, anyway. It's easier if you're small.

They’re not dumb...

[mumblemumble...]

Mister...[Ayano touches her knees, leaning in a bit closer to him. She takes another rock and tosses the pair of them into the distance.]

I’m really sorry for bothering you. I don’t think it’s my place to try to talk to anyone right now.

[She takes another rock, and this time instead of throwing it squeezes it in her palm until her knuckles turn white.]

...I’m lonely, see. It’s stupid, but I thought, if you had the idea to come out here too, then...

[Wince.]

I’m not really sure what I’m doing. Or saying. Sorry.

[Hank grimaces up at the clouds. She needs- something, obviously. This kid - and who knows if this is true, there are a whole lotta weirdoes here with a whole lot of weird fuckin stories - but this might of been the first disaster on this scale she's ever fucking seen. And even if it wasn't, shit, it wasn't his large-scale intro to how horrific the world can be and look at him. She needs something. What she needs is for him to get his shit together.

Hank closes his eyes on the clouds, takes a deep breath, and forces all the shit that got stirred up by how bad an owner he is to this poor fucking dog back down his throat. Okay. Okay.]

Don't apologize to me, I don't own the damn lake.

[As soon as he hears that come out of his mouth Hank looks down at the ground, grimacing. Cut down on the cursing, he thinks, jesus. When someone sounds all tentative like that, especially a kid, the last thing they need to hear is his fucking mouth. He can do this. Okay.

He shakes his head, toning his voice down enough that it hopefully sounds almost casual, apologetic.]

Come on, sit down, we can share the view. You needed to come out here too, huh?

[The more relaxed tone, the open ended question, it invites her to talk about her emotions and shit if she needs to, without pushing if she doesn't. There we go. That's good. That's better.]

[There’s a lot more going on than meets the eye with this guy, isn’t there? OR maybe it’s...exactly what meets the eye. It’s a strange feeling that he gives her. A feeling that he’s a little bit dangerous, but also...]

It’s been a long time since...

[she shakes her head, thinking better about whatever she was about to launch into.]

...Everyone gets a power, right?

What’s yours?

[Hank raises his eyebrows at the topic switch, not considering actually telling her for a second. It's not like it's some big mysterious secret that people - sometimes, according to some stupid secret magic rule he's not allowed to know - get whatever nasty shit he happens to be feeling shoved inside their heads when they touch him. It's not- whatever, it's not important enough to make a big deal out of but he doesn't like talking about it, and isn't really feeling like forcing himself to now when it's so obviously not what she was going to say. He decides to go with her first topic first, follow the second only if she insists on it.]

What if I said my special superpower was hearing the end of people's sentences?

[His voice is dry, and he gives her a really faint, crooked little smile - not great, but the best he can work up - as he says it. The kid wants to talk. Needs to, maybe. If this is what she needs to talk about it won't hurt to make a little joke, soften things up enough to make it maybe a little easier to say it.]

A long time since what?

[There’s a faint smile, because Dad humor is generally always appreciated. More so than funny, it feels like an act of kindness. A bridge.]

It’s complicated. Things have...changed for me. I’m not used to being around other people, so much so that I’ve been having trouble, ah...making friends. Or talking to anyone. I’ve caused a lot of trouble, and no matter how much I tell myself it’s not a big deal, I’m still here all by myself, in a scary new place...

I thought, “maybe I should just watch over others without getting involved.”

I was really stupid to think I could do that.

[Hank leans back on his hands with a wry look, a huff of breath out his nose.]

If we could just decide not to get involved whenever we wanted human history would of gone a whole lot differently.

[He lets that sit a second before going back to the rest of what she'd said. Hank's a good listener when he wants to be - kind of a job requirement - and he has a guess as to what she's getting at.]

You have anyone to go to about- this? About what- um, what went down when- [He falters for more than one reason, here. A part of him still wants to make Little Mermaid jokes when he thinks about it, about just being there under the fucking ocean. That's the part of him that knows that place was stupid, cartoonish, unreal, and it clashes hard against the part of him that goes all still and sick and horrified when he thinks about it. He shuts the door on all that shit and pushes past it. This isn't about him. Thank god.] -earlier, what happened? You know anyone here well enough to talk about it?

[Ayano does her best to make, at the very least, brief eye contact:]

I don’t.

[Her gaze turns back towards the lake, and she continues rolling the rock in her palm.]

It’s like...I forgot how to form relationships. And when you aren’t able to form relationships, you aren’t able to help people either.

My superpower...It was kindness. Always kindness. And now...[She places her free hand over her heart.]

It’s been replaced with something much more selfish. [And when you’re used to being the one making the sacrifice, watching others lose lives in your stead isn’t so easy. The feeling that won’t leave her guts. It’s guilt, right?]

Well, that sounds like a lot of- [He pauses. Is he still not cursing? No, it's fine, this time it's for making a point, and if it looks like he's starting to intimidate her he'll cut back.] -a whole lotta bullshit.

Look, what kind of 'selfish' are we talking? Not calling someone back, cutting people off in traffic? You can't be kind all the time, believe me. Sometimes you're just going to be selfish. That's just how people are.

I know. It is a whole lot of...that.

And even knowing that, I still struggled to do anything. [Ayano opens her palm and takes the rock from inside it with her right hand.]

It’s selfish because...it’s a power that only helps me. [She takes the sharpest point of the rock and presses it to her left arm, digging it down and scratching herself with it as hard as she can. Except...her skin doesn’t break, in fact, the edge of the rock snaps and crumbles into dust. ]

What happened back there, all I was capable of doing was surviving. Only helping me. It’s really...a pitiful thing.

[He's about to say she's losing him, he doesn't know what she's talking about, when she tries to cut her fucking hand open.]

Hey!

[He only has time for that, to call out that sharp, alarmed word and start to reach out before the rock just goes and breaks, and then it clicks. He doesn't want it to, he doesn't want to be able to follow the logic of this place so easy, but he does and he breathes out hard, turning away with a noise of disgust and then turns back, rubbing his hand over his face.]

Jesus, you couldn't of warned me?

[He doesn't give her a chance to answer, just takes the fear she struck up in him just now and uses it to barrel forward into something that sounds angry.]

You know what I did? Back there? You know what I spent all my time doing? [He reaches over to pick up his bottle of moonshine and shakes it, eyebrows raised.] Kept me from screamin, so. Hey. Maybe you coulda done something more with that, stepped in front of a couple more spears or, I don't know. Maybe you could of done more for those people if you'd just spent the whole time working as a human shield, but if we're talking about selfish? At least you wanted to help, you just couldn't figure out a way to do it. That's not selfish, it's...

[The longer he went on the more his anger goes dim, like he's a whole fire trying to keep going on only a little twig for fuel. He sets the bottle back on the ground, watching it instead of her. He sighs, feeling the fire go out. Guilt hunches up his shoulders and slides into his voice, taking its place; so much for trying to be gentle with her, god damn it.]

You wanted to help. You want to help next time. That's not selfish. That's what I meant. Okay?

[She shrinks down a bit at his scolding, smiling bitterly at her own stupidity, and her own failure.]

Sorry. That was stupid of me. I’m actually...really stupid. I’m dumb. I get bad grades on everything, I make poor decisions...

[As a person, she has enough composure to keep herself from crying, but she does start to lightly shake.]

Now I’m...complaining to a stranger about something that I couldn’t help, as if I can’t change anything about myself.

Some...bad stuff happened to me, and I thought, being here, I’d be able to start over like nothing happened. But here I am, still hiding from other people, still hurting myself for no good reason.

I’m...really sorry.

[He doesn't look up at her, just listens and grimaces down at the ground and tries to pummel himself into being the adult, here. She's obviously - delicate, is probably the word, needs kid gloves that Hank can't seem to pull on all the way. She apologizes, probably for the rock thing, and then puts herself down so hard for all that other shit that Hank can't even pretend to be frustrated with her about it. It's not a trick he loves being on the other end of, being played into feeling pity instead of anger, or whatever else it was he would of been feeling right now, but she's a kid, and he was supposed to be careful with her, and he wasn't.

Okay. He can start this up again, this adult thing. Give it another try.

He sighs.]

I guess we're both sorry. Just- tell people what's gonna go down before you do shit like that, okay? I don't need to see some kid- fuck, I just don't need to see that kind of thing today. But we're both sorry, it's fine, let's move on.

[He can do better than that.]

I'm sorry for going off like that. Don't apologize for complaining to me, okay? I wouldn't of told you to sit down if I didn't want to hear what you have to say. So uh, go ahead and talk if you need to, and I'll keep my mouth shut. Promise.

[He tries a smile again, still wry, still faint, still the best he can do.]

I’m saying a lot now, but...the truth is, I’m not good at being honest. I think that...I’m only able to tell you about this is because I don’t know you.

Besides, I think...I’ve already said plenty.

[Excavating herself like this is cathartic, though. And very much so. She has to stop and wonder. Was it so easy because he’s a stranger? Or was it the fact that she saw he was struggling too? He must get this from a lot of people her age, but...there’s a bit of him that reminds him of her Father. But then, she could never be honest with him, either.]

I probably should have asked this earlier, but...Who are you, exactly...?

[That actually gets some distant cousin of laughter out of Hank, a huff of air and an amused tilt to his eyebrows.]

So you tell me you can only talk to me cause I'm a stranger and then you ask me who I am? Maybe I shouldn't tell you. Maybe I should just let you keep thinkin of me as 'that weirdo who cries on his dog'.

[He tilts the neck of his bottle toward said dog and then, as he speaks, toward himself, doing the introductions.]

He's Sumo, if you need a name here. I'm an asshole. Nice to meet you, I guess. Nice as anything can be, right now.

[He shrugs a shoulder and then starts to hold out his free hand for her to shake, remembers his 'power', and changes the gesture into rubbing at his pants, instead. He aims a tight, unhappy smile at the ground, then at her. Not every introduction needs a handshake. It's fine.]

[Ayano frowns at the almost-handshake. Maybe he’s being careful touching her because of the thing with the rock? She doesn’t know.]

It’s easier because you’re a stranger, but that doesn’t mean I should keep you that way because it’s more convenient for me...

[She’ll bow at his dog instead.]

But it’s nice to meet you, Sumo.

Sumo and...I’m definitely not calling you “A-hole”.

[He raises his eyebrows, watching her bow, and looks a little amused at the way she says his self appointed nickname.]

You're one of those kids, huh? Well, uh. You know Sumo's name now, if you can talk to him about the stuff you need to talk about, I'll tell you my name. If not you're just gonna have to think of something else to call me, this place is bad enough without even havin a stranger or two to talk to. I already got one nickname anyway, maybe yours'll be more honest.

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[OPEN] Well. That Didn't Go Quite As Planned

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