deercountry | (mostly open) oh this love would kill me

Entry tags:

(mostly open) oh this love would kill me

Who: Ange, Ruby, and you!
What: Ruby and Ange's wedding, and all their CR is invited!
When: Late October
Where: The rebuilt Clockhouse

Content Warnings: Semi-irresponsible weapon usage.

Sometime around the beginning of October invitations would have started to be sent out to the various people in Trench Ange and Ruby know - announcing the two girls' wedding at the end of the month.

When the day itself comes, people will find the location - the newly rebuilt Clockhouse, which some of the invitees may have helped rebuild in the first place - tastefully decorated. Some of the house's stranger features have been covered up by decorations in red and gold, mostly taking on the shapes of roses and butterflies all over the place.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[anna tilts her head.]

No you're not. [she raises a hand, palm down, like she's measuring the height of someone smaller than her.] Beatrice was about this tall and didn't look anything like you. And I'm pretty sure Ange wouldn't have invited her to her wedding.

[it's by the grace of johnny lawrence himself that anna isn't jumping direct to starting drama. that, and it's her little sister's wedding, and she's definitely not about to cause any problems here. this can be a normal human conversation between two extremely normal humans.]

I assure you that I am Beatrice.

[ There's a tinge of annoyance in her voice. She's the Golden Witch! People should recognize and respect that! She makes a soft sound of annoyance in the back of her throat. ]

Technically she invited her brother, Battler. I'm his wife, so I came with him as a plus one.

[you know what. sure. fine. she'd heard so much absolutely wild and convoluted stuff that it probably makes sense, somewhere in the middle of all of it. it probably makes sense that someone's alternate personality has become fully realized. (it's not as though it's foreign to anna, either, but she isn't consciously aware of that, is she?) still. anna can be rude about it.]

All right, Sayo, do what you want. Just don't cause any trouble. My sister and her wife have been through enough without any new problems showing up right now. And I'm damn good with an axe if I have to be. [she rocks on her back foot and sticks a matte black hand into her pocket, and she smirks. that part is a joke.]

I am not Sayo!

[ She actually stamps a foot and her expression sours a little. ]

I am Beatrice. There is a difference and if she were here she'd tell you the same thing! Hmph!

[ She crosses her arms and pouts for a moment, staring at Anna with a raw, almost childish displeasure. ]

I promised Battler I wouldn't cause problems and besides Ange and I have made our peace. You needn't threaten me. Don't think I'll forget it, though.

[well, that reaction isn't very sayo-like. she tries to remember that long conversation at her bar, and what she finds is that sayo had acted absolutely unlike the way beatrice is acting; sayo had taken great lengths to describe every single piece of misery she had experienced in her life, and the rise of beatrice as a persona, and the creation of so many lies that all came crashing down at once in the worst possible way.]

I wasn't seriously threatening you, Beatrice. [she decides to let it drop. if it were a serious threat, beatrice would know.] I'm not going to be responsible for any drama around here. But I didn't know that Ange's brother was here, or that you had married him. I had a much different idea of what happened on Rokkenjima.

Mm. Well, we haven't had a fancy party or ceremony or anything. He didn't want to upstage his little sister.

[ She gestures, encompassing the whole party and laughs. ]

Well... consider me the embodiment of Sayo's certainty. A Witch who in one way or another, controlled the fate of Rokkenjima and the contents of the box in which it was placed following that horrible night.

[anna pinches the bridge of her nose. yeah. sure.]

Well, Ange wouldn't lie to me, so this is probably just some alternate universe bullshit, and I can totally deal with that. All right, cool. [and, for academic reasons and no other, she asks what she's not certain she's drunk enough to be prepared to handle the answer for.] So, uh, how exactly does that work, again?

Magic.

[ Beatrice says blithely. She waits for a moment, just to see how Anna reacts, then breaks into giggling. ]

Kihihihihi! Or did you mean the cat box?

[her stare goes level. right. golden witch. of course the answer is magic. and then beatrice says something else, and she sips at her drink to hide the sigh.]

I know about Schrödinger. So you're collapsing a waveform right here in front of all of us. And how's my sister taking to your little quantum experiment?

You mean Ange? If she's your sister than we're certainly sisters-in-law and we must get to know one another better.

[ Beatrice practically the purrs the words with unconstrained delight. ]

She seems to be taking it well enough. We had a little chat last month and I think we've come to something like understanding. I doubt she'll ever like me, but she accepts that I'm important to her brother.

[anna carefully crosses an arm over her chest to support the elbow of the one holding her glass. she's not wearing gloves with her suit, yet her hands are still both solid black, and with the collar of her shirt open it might be easy to see the seam running across her neck, too. but she's focusing on taking in the whole everything of beatrice rather than calling attention to the robotic parts of her that would certainly disqualify the two of them from being sisters-in-law. (that's how it works, right?)]

You're lucky that you already made amends with Ange, or I'd be collapsing a waveform or two in your face right about now. There, that's something you can know about me. I'll throw hands over my sister's safety. And what would you do to keep her safe?

Many have tried. Few have succeeded. KihihiHIHI!

[ Well, some have tried. Beatrice arches a brow, still all smiles in the face of Anna's disapproval and her cool demeanor. She speaks, her voice growing in pitch and fervor. ]

I would rain misfortune and misery on anyone who threatens her. If she asks my aid, I will be at her side and all my power will be hers to command in a moment--I would burn all the world to ash on her behalf!

She is precious to me--precious to my dear and beloved Battler. That is all that matters now in this place, this Trench beyond my fragment and my game of Rokkenjima!

[ Her eyes are wild and her grin menacing and horrible for a brief moment. Inhuman. ]

That is what I would do for her!

Edited 2022-10-11 01:48 (UTC)

[she grimaces like beatrice is going to give her tinnitus, and mutters out,] God, I wish you would stop doing that. [and then she listens to the hell of love that she would visit on anyone who would hurt ange, and the only displeasure in her expression is generalized towards everything else about beatrice.]

[there's fear, too. the fear seems natural; it helps her realize that the golden witch is either unstable or extremely confident, and there's no reason it can't be both. she stands there for a moment, just thinking of what to say.]

Does she want that from you? [it isn't a pointed question, and it's not trying to start a fight. no, it's because—damn it all, she recognizes herself in the frightening answer.] Because I've fucked up before. All I can give isn't everything she wants.

[ 'Unstable' and 'extremely confident' are both excellent descriptors of the Golden Witch. ]

Whether she wants it or not, she has it.

[ Beatrice says, clearly not really caring if Ange wants it. Because Beatrice has given her power over to Ange Ushiromiya-Rose and she shall have it. ]

[she nods, a quiet agreement that things aren't that simple. if that's what she's getting from this, at least. it's hard to tell. she's known beatrice for only a handful of minutes and, despite everything that ange has told her, truly does believe that beatrice has made some kind of amends here. to be talking about ange like this, and to be married to the brother who ange loves more than anything.]

Then it sounds like she'd be in good hands between the two of us. Even if she weren't getting married to someone whose scythe is also a gun. Name's Anna. [short A. german.] Anna Amarande. Silver witch, minus the witch. I've known Ange for just about a year, but her happiness is one of the most important things in my life.

Ange has no shortage of protectors who would burn down the world for her here, I'm finding out. It's good. She was a lonely girl growing up and having people around here who care for her is good for her. Less likely to run off and sell her soul to a Witch in exchange for a chance to see her brother, for one thing.

[ A chuckle. Agreeing to work for Bernkastel? Chump move there, Ange. Even though Beato technically works for Lambdadelta. ]

She is a forceful girl and I'm not surprised she made an impression on you. She and her brother are both like that.

—Sorry, she did what?

[she looks over the rim of her glass at beatrice. that sounds so unlike ange, and yet, it wouldn't surprise anna in the slightest. there's a little shock, but it's mostly amusement, maybe because she still isn't sure what to make of beatrice and if she's being fed a bunch of lies right now.]

I have to assume that's more quantum BS. 'Cause I think she probably would've told me that part of the story at some point.

She agreed to work for the Witch, Bernkastel, in exchange for being allowed to come to the cat box where Battler and I were playing out our little game. She would join Battler in opposing me and attempting to deny witches.

She had a single condition laid on her, that if she were to reveal who she was to him she'd be torn apart into tiny, tiny little pieces. Battler was despondent--he thought he had lost and didn't know which way to turn. To encourage him, she revealed herself.

[ Beatrice says this without relish. It had been a hard thing to watch, and she couldn't deny that she felt sympathy for Battler and Ange at that moment, even if they were opponents. ]

So she suffered the consequences. What happened to her after that, I can't say exactly. I didn't see her again until I arrived here.

Did she.

[anna stays there with her arms half-crossed, pondering that information carefully. she'd have to talk about this with ange later, but she already knows in the back of her head that she won't. she'll get there by the end of the night.]

You know, I'm really starting to feel like the life I had before coming here fits right in with everyone else's lives, and I don't know how much I like that. [there's a lot of ways she could fit in. this isn't her favorite.] Bernkastel's a new name for me. Anything interesting you can share about them?

She was a Voyager, permitted to travel between fragments, and the Witch of Miracles. She and Lambdadelta, the Witch of Certainty, played these little games to amuse themselves, because the one thing that a Witch, who is immortal, cannot abide is to be bored. Lambdadelta was my patron, the one who granted me my own identity as a Witch, thanks to the certainty of my plans for revenge. Bernkastel is a cold, cruel creature. It's said she was herself once a girl trapped for a hundred years upon a game board, a hundred years of earnestly yearning for a miracle is what elevated her to become a Witch.

[ She flicks her pipe with her hand, scattering sweet tobacco smoke about her. ]

She was the patron of my opponent, Battler. There is little else I know of her, I am afraid.

[anna nods along, trying to piece everything together. she doesn't know how ΛΔ plays into it, but she doesn't necessarily care. because all of this just sounds even more complicated than what she'd already known, and if she's honest, beatrice is a much less compelling storyteller than sayo. so when the golden witch stops talking, she drops her arm to her side and sips from her glass like she's the one who had been giving all this information.]

Magic. [a beat. it's not as funny when she does the same joke.] So this whole... thing, whoever was actually there on Rokkenjima, you're all just chess pieces for some unknowable third power? 'Cause I gotta say, B, I didn't expect that to be where I relate to you guys.

[ Sorry, she's used to talking to Battler. He wants the facts, not a good story, usually. That and she just likes to be a little long winded. Beatrice scoffs softly. ]

You could say that. And Ange is ultimately the smallest and least of all the pieces on the board, at the very end. Or she was. I think that might change, in the future, but I can't be sure.

We were all there on Rokkenjima. And we all weren't.

[ Beatrice smirks. ]

Ah, you relate to us? How wonderful that we can elicit a touch of your sympathy.

[anna rolls her eye.]

Don't need to relate to you to sympathize with all the tragedies crashing up against each other. Ange and Sayo and now you are all telling me things that paint what is, I think, the single most miserable picture I've ever heard of what happened on that island.

[no judgment or anything, certainly not from anna. she knows that everyone has a lot of complicated garbage in their lives and she is trying very hard to reconcile all of it; she's heard about the creation of beatrice, but she's also heard about what ange had to live through because of beatrice. it's hard.]

Nah, I'm just saying. [she raises a hand up to her shoulder level, palm out.] Hey, how's it going, Anna Amarande, pawn granted unimaginable powers in an unknowable shadow war. [and she raps her chest, being sure not to rumple her tie.] Same for the girl living inside me.

It was a miserable place. I was the manifestation of a curse that began long before Sayo or Ange were born and finally ended only with that fateful night.

[ Is Beatrice getting meta? A little. It's kind of her thing, after all. She raises her pipe and takes a lingering puff on it, idle. Then she stretches out a hand and clasps Anna's to give a gentle shake and a dignified curtsy. ]

A pleasure, Miss Amarande. I didn't know you had another girl living inside of you! Fascinating.

I don't make a big deal out of it.

[if she wanted to make things more comfortable for herself, she'd start smoking right now off her own cigarettes, but she elects not to. she's also, of course, lying about making a big deal out of A2. lots of choices being made here.]

If you hang out around the right people here, you might run into a couple of us with more souls than our bodies were built to handle. It's not as normal as it is where I came from, but there's still a few of us. Feels a little bit like you might get what that feels like.

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