deercountry | 15 . JOHNUARY

Waver Velvet was grateful for many things that had come his way since arriving in Trench. Chief of which being that he was himself for the moment...

If, perhaps, with a little extra. As one last smack in the face, Madame Generosity had seen to turn him into a centaur once more in a reflection of Bausphonette's joke from the previous summer. It was possible that he might never be free... But this was okay.

"I'm already apparently attending Idiot University, but I'm sure I don't need you to teach me about the little death. I already know what that one is, thanks."

John, to his credit, keeps an incredibly straight face. It is clearly a struggle. He sits back, eyebrows raised.

"I believe you. I'll ask you something else, if you'll forgive me."

There is a beat of hanging silence, a building sense of dread, and then:

"Why the long face?"

Because he's a horse now. Get it.

Just... This face.

What the fuck, John?

Edited 2023-02-23 20:00 (UTC)

Heat reddened Waver's cheeks and ears immediately with the horrible pun and the attention called to his continued status of being a plaything to the Pthumerians. Growling under his breath, Waver snatched up the nearest item-- a bundle of fragrant flowers sitting in a vase of water-- and threw them in John's face.

"You've lived for Ten Thousand Years, and my teenage students tell better jokes!"

Edited 2023-02-23 20:11 (UTC)

Naturally, this called all attention to them-- and Waver felt his horsey knees buckle as he sank to the floor.

Thoroughly embarrassed, he buried his face in his hands and groaned.

"You don't just ask someone why they are a horse, John!"

Edited 2023-02-23 20:01 (UTC)

John has endured many reactions to his jokes, over the years. For the past ten thousand, those reactions have been pretty restrained. It's bad form to groan at God's puns, apparently; it's forbidden to turn around and slug him. This means he is completely unprepared for the moment Waver throws a vase of flowers in his face.

God recoils with a splutter. There are little bits of leaf sticking to his brow, water dripping down his chin. He now has a lapful of soggy and aggressively fragrant roses, some with the thorns still on. He picks these up gingerly and sets them on the table while Waver collapses in utter, horsey anguish.

"Fair, but. For sake of argument. You do appear to be a horse."

"it's not my fault that Bausphomette has a worse sense of humor than you!"

Waver didn't move, and his voice was muffled by the table while his tail flicked in apparent horsey defiance. This wasn't the first time he was locked in such a form, but it was both inconvenient and embarrassing.

He looked up finally, glowering at John while peeking above his shirt sleeves.

"It's got something to do with a teacher in classical myth being a centaur, I bet. Also, with how my King is very fond of stories of one of the centaur's students."

John does have to sympathize: he's met Bausphomette's sense of humor. While Waver lies there bemoaning his situation, little tail flicks and all, John mops water and bits of leaf off his chin with his sleeve. Neither of them looks particularly elegant.

"Knowing this place? It'll stick around until you jump through the right hoops. Bonding exercises," and here he gestures to the table and its cheerful getting-to-know-you questions, "and playing nice."

You know: not throwing water in a guy's face. Or smiting anyone for it, if anyone's keeping count.

Waver would do him one better.

Heaving a long suffering sigh, Waver sat up and regarded John with the wearied expression of a man used to handling a couple dozen excited teenagers handling explosive materials in a centuries old wooden structure at the same time.

He wasn't keen on taking bullshit.

"Quit making my Cav implode and I'll consider it."

January's over, but everyone's still inviting themselves into the Nine Houses, eh? There is a flicker of real surprise, and then drawn consideration, from John. He thumbs the last bit of leaf off his jawline and lowers his damp sleeve, regarding Waver with held interest.

"Go ahead and unpack that one for me."

Eyeroll.

Waver was done playing nice on this matter and carrying his Lordly title over it. John in many ways just didn't deserve the effort-- and, thus, Waver could act as himself.

"Early on after I arrived, Anna and I realized that our personalities and methods click so well that it would be ideal for the both of us to act as partners, so to speak. I'm not used to working on my own, and she also benefits greatly from having a Wizard class alongside her Knight class. It's really an excellent balance."

He sighed, and raked his hands through his loose hair-- and, annoyed momentarily by the length, he pulled a tie from his pocket and pulled it back.

"The last thing she did in July before pulling a Kate Bush on everyone was leave a note on my door. And, about that time when she returned was when she referred to herself as my Cav and how I'm her Necro. Mind you-- I don't know a damn thing about any of this. Duty is also a dick and refuses to explain anything. Anna did the best she could, so my understanding is that I've got Responsibilities as her partner.

"But-- after her Lyctor alternate killed my Space Hacker alternate, she's completely stopped using those terms. I'm Still her partner, though. I need to follow up so I can do my due diligence to help her... Which, up until now, I've been unable to find a way to even access you to ask Anything."

Waver huffed, but didn't break his gaze with John. This frustration had been building for Months, and it was only in February that he realized how dire the situation truly was. He had been bothered by John's influence on Anna's life before, but reasoned that Anna was an adult and could make adult decisions. But, now...

"Apollonia has left her with a rage and grief that isn't her own and the she that has no idea what to do with. I know you're nothing but Yourself and that she's responsible for her own choices-- but, fuck. I have no way of helping her ,and do you have any idea how maddening it is to watch this keep happening?"

... He wanted a cigarette. Badly.

Edited 2023-03-11 14:09 (UTC)

She called him her cav, and stopped once she remembered having one. Once she remembered ten thousand years of not having one anymore. She still remembers.

John hadn't known— well. There's a lot he hadn't known about the workings of Anna's social life, and to come up against it like this, the raw underbelly of what it's done to her, leaves him in ringing silence. His fingers have drifted to his brow, hard to the creases as though he might press a headache back into place. For a moment he worries his lip with the edge of his teeth, gaze gone faraway.

In the end, he just shuts his eyes and exhales slow. His hand falls, and for a moment, he is carefully still.

"I can imagine." He's lost all attention on Waver's horse legs, Waver's outburst with the flower pot. There's still water trickled into the hollow of his throat, his collar soaked, but he seems to have forgotten. "But this isn't a haunting I can exorcise... not without doing some other damage. Whatever has stayed with her, it's hers to contend with."

The chair doesn't shock him. God has not made anyone forget for ten thousand years, and she'd kill him for it, anyway. What would be the point?

"She was a lyctor. However briefly, it was real to her... It was real to everyone." To him. He knows what he was to her: he might understand it better than she does. "But it's done. We bury the dead and hush the ghosts. I'm not coming after her."

It's a flattening, a simplification of the truth. It's true enough to matter.

"... I'm not saying that you'll go after her,"

He said in soft, level tones-- recalling everything he had known about the life and experiences of Alexandria to find that lightness he needed. Life as a mage, even a third rate one, didn't lend itself towards sincerity or working with others. While he could do so, and had done so a multitude of times, there was always an edge he couldn't cross.

But, in another life he had known.

Anna wasn't that only one left with memories of a life that wasn't her's.

"I'm saying that I need more information. This is all beyond anything I know, and anything oh my Earth. But, I'll learn it, if you'll help me. I'll do whatever I can to help my friend."

"How did she take that pitch?"

He's gone wry, gentle but not sympathetic. John has closed himself off: he settles forward again, drops his hands to lace his fingers, rubbing his thumb along the edge of a palm as though to soothe himself. There are still bits of flower sticking to his shirtfront, but he's moved on.

"I can only guess at her story, and it's not the kind to tell at this table." The implication that he'd tell it at all nearly gets him shocked, but they seem to let this pass on technicality. "This one's out of my hands. Ten thousand years is hell on anyone, and to dig out those stories isn't a kindness... it's better to let it lie."

They don't shock him, because he believes it. More than not.

"... That's right, the timer."

He had been so caught up in frustrations that he had forgotten this detail. How much longer did they have, he wondered? Could they stall it?

He heaved a sigh. The story John told was roughly the same as what Duty had said. Softer, not as abrupt, and not with the tones of reproach and objection.

Waver was aware that he was an outsider; Anna had never treated him as such, and talked to him as if he knew exactly what she referring to.

"Honestly? I don't think she can even imagine a world where anyone can help her." He said, shoulders visibly slumping. He had planned to have his emotional guards in place and approach John as Lord El Melloi II.

Instead, there only sat Waver Velvet. Or... Perhaps Mackenzie.

"But this is a world where time doesn't work the same way," he added, musing now. "It can flow as free as the tides, and pluck any version of us from any time out of the sea."

It was a sea that bore the wishes of generations and only promised the unknown. Like Okeanos, the sea that would forever be his rival for his King's attention.

"There's evidently another world where I'm reunited with the first man I loved," he said quietly. "That's not a world I know beyond these shores. I don't doubt that there's a world where we can free Anna Amarande from the burdens of Apollonia."

Edited 2023-03-30 23:48 (UTC)

It's a nice sentiment. John's expression draws slightly, shadowed with something weary and dark, at she can't imagine a world where anyone can help her. It doesn't really lighten at the pep talk, the quiet belief that anything can happen because the alternatives are too bleak to bear. That one good ending must promise the possibility of every other.

Around here, it's always the same tune: people say rebirth and renewal, but what they mean is that every wound will heal without a scar. No fire, no flood, no ashes for the phoenix— no life you have to trade for a fresh start— just a blind hope that it all stops hurting, even while everything else stays the same.

Their time is up. God looks tired.

"Some burdens," he says, "are too heavy to cast off. You just learn to bear the weight."

15 . JOHNUARY

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