deercountry | we begin vindicated [open]

Entry tags:

we begin vindicated [open]

Who: Anna Amarande and you!
What: Event catch-all
When: Throughout December
Where: In Trench, in the sixth layer of Recollé, and 9,920 years in the future

Content Warnings: Eye trauma, explosions, hunting, blood, likely mentions of sacrificial death and depersonalization

Creating a Winter Mourning comes as an easy feat to Anna. She's been doing more than enough of it lately in a much more literal sense. Having a blessing towards some of the Pthumerians she hasn't had the chance to commune with yet probably can't be a bad thing.

It's glowing, the light serving as a gently pulsing beacon outside her window. Looking at it is almost mesmerizing; for a moment, it feels like it's going to bring peace to the torment that she's been feeling inside since the month turned. She reaches out and touches it, and in an instant...

a. we forget who we were meant to be

It's 2019. From the other wall of a glass jar, a white-haired woman with one eye is crawling through a ruined, sickly-green lab. She is not screaming in pain, but she is crying. No blood spills from her face, but she still would never wish anyone to see her like this. Her hand comes down on shards of broken glass, but she barely registers it. The air around her swirls with white souls that, in the flickering light and the ambient energy, almost seem to take form around the pathetic, destroyed woman.

Anna never wondered what she looked like when this happened. She knows everything about the events that just transpired, and her spectral head looks to the area that her younger self is crawling from. The brain that stole her eye is dead, and within this sixth layer of reality, the boundary between Anna, A2, 2B, and Kainé is thinner than ever. It's a wonder that she's able to maintain her own form even as a memory, because as she thinks about it all, she can feel her body flickering to take on the shape of the other women. She looks around to see if anyone followed her down—if she's experiencing her own memories then it makes sense someone else is there with her—and mutters somewhat musically, "Pay no attention to the ghost that follows."

b. a broken image of how it should be

It's 11,941, give or take a year, and two YoRHa units stand off to the side watching an enormous explosion in the distance. Anna, or at least the person who people have come to know as Anna, stands behind a cleaner, less ruined version of the android she's turning into. That android is on her knees, almost ready to weep, in front of a massive army of bronze-bodied, red-eyed machines. In an instant, the android shoves herself to her feet and screams a battle cry. A wave of debris follows from the explosion, taking out nearly everything between her and the epicenter. The shockwave stops before it can reach the android, but she won't let that stop her from trying to take down every last machine in her path. Her sword, less elegant than the one on Anna's back, flashes as she goes on the attack.

Anna stands there, her eyepatch fresh and new in black, her clothing an elegant, meticulously-stitched dress, her heels adding even more height to her form. She is not moving, though, not joining the fight. Because she knows full well what this is and what just happened. The person next to her may elect to join the fight with the not-truly-nameless android, the one whose appearance would match Anna's perfectly were it not for the eyepatch, or they may wish to stand back and speak with her. The bloodlust that often fuels Anna in these battles is not present at the moment; instead, she almost seems relieved.

c. crack a smile and lie through our teeth

Or, perhaps, she doesn't touch the Mourning. She leaves it to rest in her home and takes her blade out with her to the streets. Her longcoat high, the brim of her hat over her face, her eyepatch gone revealing the intimidating black-gold glass beneath it. Her blade stays in one hand, and the gun that Ruby Rose has been training her how to use is in the other. Shields are nice, but not if they engender passivity.

She stalks the streets in the pale moonlight, succumbing to the vengeance deep within her. Emotions that should be directed inward are ready to explode outward, and she is fully prepared to become a creature of persistence. An android designed only for combat, ready to lash out at the world that has stolen her from the city she loves.

A hunter must hunt. She has no need for traps, for subterfuge. The Amaranth's strategy has never once progressed beyond having a sword. She stands there on the wet cobblestones, stock still in front of what may be prey or what may be an ally, insofar as there are any allies to be had in this wretched night. She tilts her head up and sniffs the air. "What's that smell?" she rasps out. "The sweet blood... it sings to me." It may be gauche to tell someone your blood type, but are you willing to risk silence?

d. in the end we would rather be anything but lonely

((more prompts to be added. if you're interested in more, DM me or hit me up on

roseward!!)))

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

It sure is something to wrap one's head around. Time travel isn't even the weird thing to Ange. She's used to that - she's gone through it herself. And people being connected across worlds also isn't too strange to her.

It's just.. the idea of two souls in one body. That's the part that feels a little newer, a little more odd. Especially since Ange has always just seen Anna as.. well, Anna. Where is A2 in all of that? What role does she play? Is she part of Anna's personality, or does Anna only have A2's memories, and nothing else?

.. would asking about any of that be weird?

Ange has no clue. It leaves her staring at A2 in the distance for a moment, and then back at Anna. Still thinking, still trying to get used to this odd, overwhelming memory.

"She's strong."

It's a bit of a simple observation, isn't it. But what else is Ange supposed to say, given everything that's going on here? It feels like the most obvious thing to note in the face of all of it.

"She is."

There's too much silence between them for that to be the only thing on Ange's mind, Anna thinks. But Anna's also not really giving much else to go off. That's a good little starting point, she thinks. A2's strength.

"She wins this fight, you know. But she's already lost everyone." She's looking away, up to the mechanical ring floating in the sky in line of sight with where the moon would be, easy to miss if you don't already know it's there. "Everyone she loved is dead. Everything she thought was true about her world was wrong. She can't go back to the way it used to be, so she stays here, on Earth."

And back to the carnage. There's a break in the machines. A2 stands still, her body shaking, the ground wet at her feet with motor oil and blood and tears. The steam escaping from her chest as she comes out of B-Mode evaporates quickly. Anna's seen it enough times.

"And she never finds anyone else. She's branded a runaway, a traitor. People come to take her in, or maybe to befriend her. And she never lets them get close enough to try. The only way she knows how to react to the horrible pain she's in is to suffer with it alone." A whisper in the back of her mind as she looks to Ange again. Do you get the gist of this song now?

"Sounds familiar," Ange softly says. After all, she thinks it wouldn't even take someone particularly sharp here to see where Anna is heading with that. It's pretty obvious, considering the last conversation they had. A2 and Anna - they both operate by the same standard. Ange doesn't know if it's because of their connection, or if their connection is because of how similar they are.

Perhaps it's the same as asking whether the chicken or the egg came first.

But there's no doubt that Anna is saying all of this not just about A2, but herself as well. Not wanting or daring to let people close. Trying to suffer all by yourself.

And this scene seems so unbearably lonely to look at, more than anything. Someone fighting so desperately, despite everything and everyone being gone. Even though it'd be so much easier to just lie down and give up.

.. perhaps it's not too dissimilar from what Ange herself was trying to do back home either.

"Do you think things would have been different for her if she would have tried to let someone in after all?"

The question is about A2. But it's not just asked for A2's sake.

It doesn't take someone too sharp to realise that, either.

Mm. Would it have? They're talking about two people who are the same person right now, of course. Anna takes a long moment and watches A2 fight. There's rage in her strikes, there is sorrow, there is pain. This is her genesis. The woman in her nightmares who terrified Anna, one of the deeper fears that she thought one day she would have no choice but to turn into.

But by listening and learning about A2's pain, Anna learned to accept her. Even to love her, as much as one can love a part of oneself that feels so foreign that your body has screamed its rejection and been silenced.

"I think so. Someone did get to her, once," she says, beginning to play with the edges of metaphor to soothe her anxiety. "Listening to whatever she decided to reveal, whenever she decided to do it. Waiting patiently for her to say what she wanted out loud. But by the time they met, A2's story was already over."

Without saying it outright and shoving a blade through this paper-thin curtain they've formed around the actual issue, Anna struggles to form a complete sentence to punctuate that. There was never anything she could've done to truly change the way A2's story ended, no matter how poetically she liked to think of it.

"But other stories are still being written. And there's a few people around here holding a pen."

The metaphor is indeed paperthin, but Ange is tactful enough to not smash it. At least not with Anna. She might have done it with someone she disliked, but in this case.. it doesn't feel right. Especially not while they're still standing right here in this memory, that is both Anna's and not at the same time.

"I guess not all stories have a happy ending."

Like A2. It might have been too late for her. Her story may no longer be able to be changed. But Anna's story is still being worked on. It can still get better - and Ange believes it will, as long as the other just doesn't give up.

There's another slight moment of silence, but then Ange shakes her head. There's no point in saying that out loud when they've practically already discussed it.

"How does it feel for you to watch this?" Since it's a little bit different than them being shown memories that are directly and entirely their own, compared to the slightly more complicated connection between A2 and Anna. ".. you seem pretty calm, you know."

Which could be faked, but also could maybe not be. Ange can't tell for sure in this specific moment.

"I feel pretty calm," she says, and it's easy to admit and not a lie at all, really. It's only a lie by how much she's understating it; she's overjoyed, inside, to have a real, tangible answer to a question that's plagued her since she came here.

"I've seen this a lot. It's how things worked, back home. You just get... vivid flashes of memory like this. Whenever someone plucks your string and your soul starts resonating harder." She's dancing so close to why she's relieved right now, and whether she has the faith in Ange to pick up on what she's putting down is still an unknown. Her hand curls against her chest near her heart and she doesn't even bother stopping it this time.

"I could tell you every last scene of this battle. I could tell you everything about what she's feeling. Because it's all inside of me, too. It might as well be my own memory." It is, isn't it? By now. "I've played it over and over, in my head and in my dreams. I know her. And I know that right now, she doesn't want to win this fight. But she knows she has to."

"It is your own memory," Ange slowly states, "if you're being shown it like this."

It feels like the natural conclusion. Sure, Anna's situation is different than her own, but Ange also got to see memories of her other self. Herself from the past, from back before her consciousness seemed to shift into a different Ange. Those memories were all her own in that sense.

That means this memory must be Anna's own as well, even though it's slightly more complicated and nuanced than it would be for the average person.

".. or were you worried that you wouldn't see it anymore in this place?"

Ange is not purposefully trying to seek something out within Anna here, really. It's more just that she is always glad for any situation where she can turn all attention towards someone else, rather than herself. It's all part of actively avoiding the spotlight.

"Or, rather.. is this the first time you've been able to see her again, ever since you showed up in Trench?" Ange tries to think if Anna mentioned it having happened before in this city.

She can't recall.

Huh. Being known doesn't seem so mortifying now that it's happened.

Anna's quiet, ostensibly to debate the right question to answer, but she already knows that Ange has picked up on everything. Smart girl. If anyone was gonna do it, she's glad it was her.

"Haven't heard from her at all before this," she says quietly with her head turned away, towards the battle, because even with only one eye it's hard to make contact with someone else's when she gets emotional. "People stop resonating when they leave Recollé. That's just what happens." Sometimes when they didn't leave, too, but staying within the bounds of the city has always been a constant. She inhales like she's trying to control herself. It would truly be embarrassing to cry right now, so she's going to try her best not to.

"This whole time I've been taking it on faith that she's still here with me. But you know me," she says. "Got a bit of a problem keeping faith. This is proof."

Ange can at least understand the sentiment. If it's something that's so important to Anna, yet there was absolutely no sign of it in Trench - then of course she would have been upset about it. She must have felt off. Maybe it's what drove her even further into her own negative emotions, the worry about so many different things at once building up.

Even now Anna still seems to be struggling, though perhaps in a slightly different way. Perhaps with overwhelming relief at realising that these memories, this connection, is still here with her.

Even when it seemed like it might not have for months.

There's a slight pause where Ange tries to think of what to do here, but then she just decides to go for it. Especially when she remembers the way Anna touched her when Ange was the weak one, the one in bed, only barely having survived a trip through that awful meat factory-like place.

So the girl moves to grab Anna's hand, holding it in her own. She doesn't say anything about it, nor draw attention to it in any way. Ange just keeps talking on, as if nothing happened, even though she is now definitely holding that hand, and even giving it a faint squeeze that's most likely meant to be reassuring.

"Guess that means you'll have a slightly easier time in Trench now, huh?" Ange, too, stares at the battle. "You'll never be alone. Because she's there with you, regardless of anything else."

Oh. Huh. Letting people touch her is something she forgot she liked. It's the natural result of being kind to others, or it should be, but she never expects it to be returned to her the way that Ange is returning it now. She squeezes Ange's hand back while she watches A2 work towards a victory that she's won thousands of times by now.

"I already wasn't alone anymore," she replies quietly. It's not as hard-fought an admission as she expected it to be, but with Ange right here, how could she say anything else? "But you're right. Now I know that there's not this... missing piece of me, somewhere out in a world I can't go back to."

She still has people back home, and she will miss them until the day she sees them again. Into eternity, in Lillian's case, and beyond that. If she can find a way back there to return to their lives, she wants that very desperately. But she can feel her roots beginning to grow here, and maybe it's because Ange is helping her plant her feet.

(Across Trench, outside of the memory, an immortal flower in a blood-nourished graveyard begins to perk up.)

"I don't think I'm gonna have a night like that again."

.. what an admission. Ange is honestly a little surprised to hear the other say it. After all, for all of Ange's preaching to Anna, it took her about half a year feeling absolutely miserable and lonely half of the time in Deerington before she ever got this far.

If Ange were a bit more of a prideful person, she might assume the reason for it going so fast is her own help. But she knows it's because the people are generally very decent here in Trench, even if the place itself might not be.

It might have helped Anna realise she's got an entire support network, ready if she needs it.

"Who knew that it'd take seeing a memory of a huge battle to have better nights."

It's obviously a joke, since it's simplifying the current situation by.. a lot. But that's exactly what Ange is saying it. If Anna is feeling a little better, than they don't need to drag themselves down into something sadder again.

They can just stay at the level of dumb, deadpan jokes. Perhaps with some slight genuine emotion sprinkled in, considering the next thing Ange adds, still not quite letting go of the other's hand.

".. I'm glad to hear it though."

"Yeah," she says, cutting it like she has more to add to it but coming up dry for a long while. It's a good joke, she thinks, and exactly the right kind of downplaying that makes Anna comfortable. She feels that way a lot next to Ange, she's noticing. Good vibes with her. It feels like they can say a lot between each other without using very many words at all.

"Glad you got me to say it," she finishes, finally. It's not much, but she's never been good showing her appreciation. She just watches the mechanical slaughter continue, and maybe it's her imagination, but maybe she sees A2 standing a little taller out there as she sways with the wind of the battlefield. Anna reflects that, her back straightening, her breath calming. She's still holding hands and doesn't want to stop.

"All right, well. For real, if you wanna know anything about what's going on," she starts, and for a moment the veil is... not really going back up, no, but she's just calling attention to something else in the room. "I'm feeling pretty open book right about now. Or we could just wait this out and watch her win."

"No.." Ange slowly answers, shaking her head.

It's odd. They're watching a memory, and technically there should be some end to it at some point, but Ange doesn't feel the need to rush. Maybe it's since there's some sort of calm within this relief of hearing Anna say that she's going to be okay - that she can become okay in the first place.

If that is so, then they can take their time.

"I'd like to hear some more about this situation." Especially if Anna doesn't mind talking about it. After all, Ange has heard some about the way A2 and Anna are connected now, but she still knows very little about A2 in general.

Other than that she's fighting, anyway. That she's lost everything, but that she's still fighting.

"You can tell me whatever you want to say about it." Ange shakes her head, feeling that's not the right word. It's not this situation that's important, it's-- "About her."

She looks from A2 towards Anna. "I'll listen."

There's a lot she could tell Ange right now. About YoRHa, and the machine war, and about the literal, direct interpretation of what she's hearing Ange ask. But she's not a fool. She knows what's really important here, what's really being asked.

"I met A2 a couple years ago," she starts, and she's almost somber about it to begin with. "I don't even remember the first thing I learned from her. But I remember being afraid of her at first. All I knew for the longest time was that she was this... combat android, someone who took orders from someone that I didn't think she could disobey. Someone who just walked a program that had been written for her by someone she'd never be able to fight back against."

Which had been terrifying in its own way, but as much as this is about Anna right now, it's not about that part of Anna. There's more to discuss about A2. "I was wrong, of course," she says, turning her head and looking over at Ange. As if that wasn't obvious by now. She bends her knees, lowers herself to the ground. It seems appropriate to be sitting down for this. She has a more comfortable view of the sky from down here.

"I learned more about her. I learned about this," and she extends her hand palm-up towards the battle they're watching. "How she's the sole survivor of all of this. How she lost everything she loved in the name of a lie, and how she's just... so full of hatred towards the people who took it from her." But, and here's where she pauses for a moment to actually try to think of the right words. She wants to be poignant for Ange. For herself, too.

"But I know what hate looks like too, you know? I know it never comes out of nowhere. And after a while... heh, actually, this memory is what taught me, now that I think about it. I just knew she was in an unbearable amount of pain." She lets that stay on its own for a long moment as she leans forward, pulls up her knees, rests arms on them and her chin on her arms. It's a fantastically inelegant look for someone dressed in what she guesses is gothic lolita.

"And like... I know she's been hurting for years. She'll do anything to make the pain of being betrayed and losing everyone who matters to her go away, and killing things is all she really knows how to do." This is where it always gets a little stupid, in her mind. It's embarrassing to admit. Cringe, almost, if she wanted to sound like a fucking Minecraft Youtuber. She sighs. "If I'm supposed to be a vessel for her soul, and I know a different way to bring her peace, I just want to do it for her. Even if she can't feel me pulling on her as much as she's pulling on me."

Her hand curls against her chest.

"She's part of who I am. And if she doesn't have anyone else left to show her what it feels like to be loved, I want to be the one to do it."

It's kind of interesting to Ange, the idea of being connected to someone completely different than yourself. Even if it wasn't for her personal involvement with Anna, she still would have found the idea conceptually interesting. Even with all of the multiverse shenanigans she has seen up to this point, this is still totally new to her.

But she tries to not let herself get too lost in that thought. Not when this story is more just than an interesting concept - it's Anna's life. It's her connection, something that matters so much to her.

Feeling a little awkward while being the only one standing, Ange moves to sit down, humming at the last thing the other says.

"I think you're already doing that. Just through existing."

Even though she isn't too sure how their connection works on A2's side. Anna says the other can feel it less, but.. can she still even feel it a little? If so--

"When you're at that point, when it feels like you've lost everything, and you don't know what to do to get it back, so you just desperately start doing whatever.." Ah, now isn't that familiar, a voice whispers to Ange in the back of her head. "At that point even the smallest things matter. If she could feel that there was even just one person thinking of her out there, she'd be able to go on for a while longer."

Ha. Oh, yeah. Yeah, that feels so, so familiar that it's not at all a wonder anymore why she and Ange get along so well. This conversation is heavy enough without talking about the tiny, tiny things that pulled Anna back from the ledge in a frantic attempt to save herself (that actually ended up working), but she—again, she's stricken with the idea that, like. This is a kid. Not a kid kid, no, but... but probably about the same age Anna was when everything started going south for her. She glances over at Ange with the weight of understanding slowing the way her head turns.

"Yeah. I think that's what I want for her. But maybe that's selfish, too," she adds, with a downward note to the words. "I don't think I can do anything for her except hope that something resonates between us so she can feel it. Out there in the abyss of dead worlds that she comes from, you know?" She puts her hand on the ground; it's still pretty alive now, but it won't stay that way forever.

"But hey. Maybe she's not the only one focusing on the small things. If all I have to go on is faith, that's a good enough reason for me to keep moving forward," she says, and maybe it's not as striking a difference as it could be anymore from the Anna who last spoke to Ange. "I've put my faith in worse things."

"How is that selfish?" There's almost a hint of something scolding in Ange's tone - almost. It doesn't quite reach, but her tone is so close to it. Maybe it just doesn't get all the way there because Ange's tone always has that deadpan quality to it when she speaks.

"You're doing your best for her sake, too."

After all, if Anna would give up, if she would die or disappear.. then A2 would be fully alone. There wouldn't even the faintest bond left between them.

Ange shakes her head.

"Seriously, you're way too hard on yourself. I bet she wouldn't be nearly as hard on you if she got to meet you."

That gets a dry laugh. Just say it out loud, why don't you? Incredible.

"Maybe you're right. But listen, you come from a place where you're never good enough for your parents and you'll walk away the same way," she says, but there's a lightness to it suggesting that she really doesn't want to dwell. There's been enough unearthed tonight; the soil can rest for now.

"It'd be nice to get the chance to meet her in person one day," she starts, not willing to stand up and talk to A2 right now. It's not the right time. "I met someone who knew her, once. She called her horribly lonely, but one of the strongest androids she'd ever met because of it. And I remember asking if A2 was happy." She looks at the woman who is just about to win this battle, who doesn't look like she knows what happiness even is anymore. And she smiles. "She said that she was happier now. That A2 pushes past all this and finds a way not to be as alone anymore. I don't know what did it or how it happened, but... maybe I had something to do with it after all."

.. maybe Anna did have something to do with it. Maybe she didn't. Who knows..?

It's impossible to say. Especially for Ange, who is an outsider to both of their worlds to begin with. But if Anna is willing that she caused some sort of positive change for the other, then Ange will gladly let the other believe that. Anna seems like she could use basically any kind of positive reinforcement in her life at all.

"Maybe you will meet her one day." Ange doesn't say it like it's a certain thing - but on the other hand, she doesn't seem to be totally dismissing the possibility either as she's staring at Anna.

After all--

"If you are connected, then maybe she will be drawn to Trench, just as you have been." It honestly doesn't seem impossible at all to Ange. If this place has a pull on Anna's soul, then why not also on the soul that's linked with it? "You might have to start preparing now. Thinking of what you'd tell her if you would meet her face to face."

Oh, god. That almost makes Anna blanch a little. For some reason it's just never actually crossed her mind, and she sits up a little straighter as she turns her head back to Ange.

"You don't really think that could happen? Shit." And the surprise of it paints the silence between her words. "Oh, that's gonna get weird. What's up, A2, you don't know me yet but I know pretty much everything about you without you even telling me."

She seems to be considering the possibility for a moment, but really there's just so many potential things she could ask that she doesn't even begin to know how to find where the thread starts. "You ever had a moment like that? Where there's someone you actually have the chance of meeting for the first time and you just don't know where to begin?"

Ange nods when Anna asks if she thinks so - because Ange definitely does. Sure, she doesn't think the chance is necessarily big, considering that she's been in Deerington for such a long time, and now in Trench, without even someone with a very slight connection to herself popping up.. but who knows? Perhaps the stronger bond between Anna and A2 might make the other pop up here.

She's telling herself to keep a look out. Just in case.

But then Anna speaks on, asking that question, and.. Ange releases a breath, a bit of an odd expression on her face as she stares off at A2's battle.

"Kind of. One time I saw my brother again for the first time in a long while, and he had no idea it was me he was talking to. But I wasn't allowed to tell him who I was, so it was a different sort of awkward situation entirely."

But it's still a similarly awkward enough vibe that she thinks she can kind of understand what it'd be like for Anna to actually talk to A2. To someone she knows so much about, without ever having met her.

It's not really that different, she finds herself idly thinking. They have no idea who they are to each other, Anna and A2, and it would probably be the kind of thing that she has to keep a secret in most circumstances anyway.

"That sounds pretty bad," she offers, the words still not coming out right when it comes to family. "Well. Maybe him and A2 will both show up here and we can come clean about who we are to them. That'd be... nice, right?"

It's a guess. She's pretty sure it would be nice for both of them, but... well, it's all hypothetical right now, isn't it? "I think I'd just... I don't know. I would just hope that I did right by her. And probably apologize that she ended up here. Anything else I could say to her, I don't think she'd understand."

"Guess that'd just mean you've got to start hanging out with her if she does show up here. Befriend her the normal way."

Is Ange remaining suspiciously quiet on the matter of her brother? Yes, yes, she is. But there's so many layers of messy stuff wrapped up in her current relationship with her brother that she doesn't really want to think about this. It feels easier like this, with her being the only person from her world in Trench. Ange certainly doesn't believe that any memory of home could show up anymore, if it hasn't in the year and a half she was back in Deerington.

So it's much easier to instead focus on other people's problems. Like Anna's own.

"You're better at that sort of thing than you think you are, you know." After all, she befriended Ange. It's the unsaid implication here, but it's a pretty obvious one.

"Ha. Maybe I am, Ange," she says, cutting off any sort of dismissive nickname to refer to her by her actual name instead. Making and keeping friends is like any muscle. If you go long enough without using it, it atrophies. And Anna hasn't had proper muscles in a very long time, much less the time between Recollé and now.

"Maybe it just took me a bit to remember how to do it," she says, putting her thoughts into the world just a little bit more. "But, you know. Stuff like this takes work, takes time. Takes good people to help bring me back around to the way it used to be." Another line that's not too difficult to draw, an obvious implication that she trusts Ange to understand.

"I figure I could probably fake my way through meeting someone I already know a lot about. Like, what's the actual worst that could happen, you know?"

Ange pauses.

Then, when she does speak up, her voice is very much at its usual deadpan. It's not quite sarcastic, though - not in any malicious way. Instead the deadpan sounds extremely casual.

"I don't know, they might think you are some sort of assassin sent to come murder them and get the draw on you first."

Because of course that's what would happen. That elaborate scenario is obviously the most likely thing to happen, right?

Remarking that is the easiest way to lighten the mood as much as possible. (With murder! Obviously!)

we begin vindicated [open]

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