all this work gone to waste

[lipochrome]

Who: gideon nav and cr
What: a july catch-all
When: mid-late july
Where: the beach, cobra kai, gaze

Content Warnings: marked in comment headers, but expect death, grief, corruption, religious and family trauma

Comments

[peripheries]

I tried to save you. I... promised myself to Mariana if I could save you and...

[His voice breaks off, lost to a more violent wind that whips across the shore from the sea. He wants to apologize. And not just to her. But there's a childish hope that if he does, the words will travel on that wind to everyone that he wronged on that boat and on the beach.

But he can't.

Instead, he just hangs his silver head in shame.]

[lipochrome]

You shouldn't have had to.

[ Gideon's voice takes on a force, almost harsh edge. There's an anger there, and it's all directed inward, like a spike through the chest. Gideon digs her nails into her forearms, arms crossed in front of her chest, and she hopes she feels some pain, any amount of what she deserves. Anything. ]

I should have known. He never wanted me, even from the start. He just wanted a sword. I should have told you to stay away. Parents aren't -- they're not for people like me.

[ People being a generous term. She was an asshole to even try. ]

[peripheries]

I have no parents either.

[He doesn't know what else to say. Maybe because he's thinking the same thing about how he tried to slot himself into a space that wasn't meant for something like him. And now he'd gotten so good at pretending he doesn't know how to reality.]

I want you.

cw: child death

[lipochrome]

[ Later, Gideon will regret this. Her pain isn't something that's meant to be thrust onto Kaworu. She's supposed to keep it locked away, an immovable rock rolled over it. ]

You shouldn't.

[ Gideon looks up at Kaworu, eyes damp and bloodshot. He's so small, like this. So much like - ]

I was supposed to look after this girl, Jeannemary. And instead she fucking died while I - while I napped, and her necromancer too. But I thought - I thought things could be different -

[ Laughter overtakes the rest of Gideon's words, and she curls in on herself even tighter, as if that'll make it stop. ]

I'm an idiot. You deserve better. Trust me, there's only one thing I'm good for, and it's not this.

[peripheries]

I don't know what I deserve. I don't understand how any of that works. I think... humans just created it to make the world make sense to them.

[He drops down into a crouch next to her, eyes wide, and unsure. He doesn't know what to say, so he reaches out a hand. A comforting hand. A hand that desires to be held in return.]

I just don't want you to leave.

[lipochrome]

[ Gideon doesn't take the hand, at first. She meant what she said, about not deserving. If she takes that hand, she thinks, he'll know, somehow, that she is gross. Unclean. A failure, rotten to the core, and always has been.

But Gideon has always been selfish. She rests a numb, cold hand in his. She doesn't feel the contact. She doesn't feel much of anything, right now. ]

He deserves to die. [ Said dispassionately, a fact. There's only one he. ] And I'm supposed to do it. That's why they made me.

[peripheries]

I was told that we're allowed to be more than what we were made for here.

[He grips her hand tightly, like a lifeline. He feels her hand in his, the cold skin with all its grooves and calluses that make it familiar to him. There's echoes of emotions in that touch, bouncing around in the cave of flat corruption.]

Do you think that was a lie?

[lipochrome]

[ The touch is familiar. The familiarity hurts, but at least it feels like something. Hurt is better than nothing. She focuses on the pressure, tries to let that be a substitute for sensation. It doesn't really work.

She shakes her head. ]

No. You still can. The people who made you aren't here. But I can't be anything but this. [ a bomb. a tool. ] Not while he's still here.

[peripheries]

If you can't then I can't either.

[It's not an observation, it's a childish defiance. He and Gideon are the same. They have to be. Because if they are the same they can understand each other. They won't be alone.]

We... we can get rid of him.

[lipochrome]

[ Gideon doesn't really understand Kaworu's logic, but she doesn't need to. She doesn't want to be alone, either. That's what all this is about, isn't? Being so afraid of loneliness that you can convince yourself a man incapable of love might love you. ]

That's what I'm made for. I'm a bomb sent to kill him.

[ Gideon looks Kaworu in the eye, a reflection of his defiance. ]

And that's what I'm gonna do.