deercountry | (closed)

Entry tags:

(closed)

Who: Lance (

azurestar) and various
What: Catchall for September.
When: During September's event and possibly the TDM.
Where: The Gate, Cellar Door, Willful Machine, River of Regrets

Content Warnings: Probably talk of ptsd, general violence, will add as needed

[This post is for closed starters with anyone who wants a thread with Lance but doesn't have a top level or open post themselves. If you'd like a thread with Lance for September's event or perhaps using some of October's TDM prompts somehow just contact me any of the following ways:

spypigeon, charley#8222 on discord or PM this journal. Thanks!]

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Well, not when I'm all lit up like this. It used to be I couldn't touch anyone at any time. And… it was pretty awful.

Jeeze...

I love touching people. That would break me.

Wait- no.. that sounded so wrong. Do you know what I mean?? I'm a very tactile person!

[fhdjkgldags forget the corpses, he wants to die now just tip him over into the goop]

[Lance looks at him in some surprise and then he finds himself laughing. It's a nice release after talking about one of his many regrets. Then he grins with a glint in his eye.]

You sure that's it? Or is there some dark kinky secret you're keeping from everyone, Bolin?

[Bolin buries his face in his hands and groans. When he pulls back, he is bright red and crosses his arms over his chest. What can you even say to that.]

No, I don't. I don't have any secrets. I'm an open book.

[Lance chuckles a little more and then gives Bolin a break. Chances are, this horror cruise isn't over yet and neither of them should be caught off guard by what they're about to see going forward. But his glow has gone completely out, that's a plus.]

Everyone's got at least one secret, buuuut I'll do you a solid and won't ask.

I mean, you don't have to? But I literally have zero secrets. Secrets don't make friends.

Suuuure, sure. Whatever you say.

[Lance clearly doesn't believe him and waves the subject off with a hand. It looks like they're coming up on the next effigy, so he doesn't want to get sucked down that line of conversation only for one or both of them to be emotionally blindsided.]

[Bolin just shrugs and lets it go. He doesn't care either way. And just like that his attention is on the banks of the canyon. And sure enough Korra and Asami are up there on the rocks, backs to them, poised in a still, stretched position. Like their heads are sinking into their bodies. Like their shoulder blades are about to collapse and break backwards through their clothes.

Korra's hair looks matted which isn't super unusual but so does Asami's and that.. that's just wrong.]

Oh no...

[He should have known better than to think he wouldn't see this again. But at least this time he knows what it is and he doesn't make a fool of himself trying to call for them.

They aren't their friends anymore. They're just corpses. And they've been there for a while from the look of it. Swollen and ripe. One of Asami's eyes has been claimed by a hungry crow. And then, as they pass and the wind picks up just right, comes the smell.

But where can he go? They're on a boat, alone, on a secluded river and those two bodies... they aren't the only ones.

You know who Bolin has wronged? Personally? Who he's felt intensely guilty towards for messing up? The Beifongs.

And one by one their bodies appear- strung up in a web of their own metal wires, impaled on spikes bearing the Earth Kingdom's military crest, his hero Toph, her daughters and grandchildren, all of them collateral damage in Kuvira's plans. And Bolin had the chance to see it early but he didn't. He believed what he was doing was right- so intensely right- that he didn't feel the changing wind. He could have stopped all this so much sooner. If only he'd listened to Opal.

Opal..

Opal who he misses so much. Who he's wanted to see so badly since leaving home to come here.. who he thinks about all the time and wonders about and hopes she's finally happy now that he's gone and she can move on with her life...

There she is on the rocks. In her fancy airbender suit like a sweet little flying squirrel- suspended in the air by wire like she's about to be drawn and quartered. She will be, eventually, as she bloats and rots and falls into human soup on the rocks below. The worms feasting on her brothers wave from the view down there. What a lovely day. They seem to be waving at Lance, too.

Hello. We're having a picnic. Why don't you join us. You look delicious, boy.]

[Lance has seen some gory things and smelled rot before, you never quite forget or recover from seeing a mountain of corpses stitched together. Even so, it's hard to look at and he doesn't need to be an empath to tell these are people important to Bolin.

He can feel Bolin's distress rise to the surface and practically choke him and by now he's learned that Bolin responds well to touch. Like he once used to. He reaches across the boat and grips Bolin's knee since it's the closest part of him he can reach. Just to squeeze and hold for a minute and let go, to ground him and remind him that he's not alone here.]

Hey, man. You need a minute?

[A minute to just sit and collect himself, to sit in silence without any pressure to speak. Lance usually needs moments like that himself, and sometimes he never gets around to saying anything at all. But they both know that this is not a situation where they have that luxury. The river wants them to talk about it and he's seen what happens when you don't.]

[The touch is nice and Bolin instinctively leans into it a little. Relaxes into it a little. It's so much like what Mako would do and it's the exactly right kind of touch for someone like Bolin. Not hard and jarring and startling, just firm and anchoring.

A heavy sigh and Bolin digs the heels of his palms into his eyes for a long beat before growling and dropping them loosely into his lap.]

I though I'd got this out with Mako but I guess not... those people over there.. that girl in the red and yellow. That's Opal... my girlfriend back home. After the Earth Queen was murdered a woman called Kuvira rose to power to unite the shattered Kingdom.. And I joined her army because I thought the cause was good...

Opal tried to tell me it wasn't what I thought it was and she and all those people over there.. her family was captured.. And then we broke up and I had to try to win her back but if I'd just listened to her about Kuvira then maybe I could have blown the whistle sooner. Because it wasn't a good cause! She was crazy and I didn't see it soon enough.. so.. so many people got hurt.

[Which he knows it never going to make sense but it all falls out of him in a rush that he can't put it into a coherent linear string.]

I'm so stupid.

[Lance's brows draw together in sympathy and concern, an intense understanding of how Bolin feels making his throat tight for a bit. And he lets him get it out, explain the situation and how it makes him feel and waits a moment to let it hang between them.]

…You're not stupid, Bolin. [He shakes his head, knowing that just saying it isn't going to make him believe it.] I've made a lot of mistakes like that, so've some of the smartest and bravest people I know. The best we can do is learn from them and make things as right as we can make them.

[He looks at him earnestly.] So… how'd you make it right?

[It's asked with an unwavering confidence in Bolin's character. He doesn't need to ask if Bolin tried to make it right in the first place because Bolin is a good person and he knows he would have.]

[Bolin slumps down a little more while Lance talks but he is actively listening. He sure feels stupid, but it was a mistake made with the best of intentions.

Then again, those are the bricks that pave the road to Hell. And he sure found his way there.

But he also found his way back, mostly, he's working on it. But Lance is right, he didn't just lay down.]

Well.. we um. Kuvira brought her super weapon on the arm of a giant mecha and attacked the capital, Republic City. Which is where I'm from. So we fought her.

[Even though he'd suggested leaving and regrouping, Korra wanted to stay. And so they stayed. It was the right call, even at the cost.]

We lost a lot of people that day. Good people. Almost lost Mako too.. but we took her down and brought her to justice. I wish that was the end of it but it was the beginning of the end so it's still good.

I just can't help but feel like I should have paid more attention and realized she was keeping me exactly where she wanted me to use as a negotiating pawn. And I know it's too little too late but looking back it's like.. come on, Bolin. It was obvious! Arhg!

This always happens to me, I don't know why I keep trusting the wrong people and falling into their traps over and over again.

[Lance's brows go up when Bolin mentions a giant mecha. He is more than a little familiar with giant robots, but it's surprising to hear that someone from a world that he'd gotten the impression was technologically in the past has.

That's not what matters here, though. Bolin's criticism of himself is extremely relatable for him. He wants to continue to tell him all the reasons he's not an idiot but he knows from experience that's not going to help much. Also, it seems he doesn't have all the information, his eyebrows draw together.]

How many times has that happened?

[Yeah tech in Bolin's world is. It's an evolving thing.]

Man, so many times. Tricked, kidnapped, brainwashed, you name it. What is it about me that screams I'm here! Take advantage of me!

Edited 2021-12-07 03:42 (UTC)

[Lance takes a moment to contemplate that very difficult question. It's not that the answer isn't clear, it's just the how to answer it. And the many layers to it.]

…You've got a good heart, Bolin. And there's a lot of people in the world who see that as a weakness they can use, but it's not. And you don't have to be a guy who stops wanting to believe in the best of people to protect yourself from the ones who'd do that to you. You just gotta… stop blaming just yourself and start blaming the people who used you. Once you stop focusing completely on all the things you did wrong, maybe next time you can see the signs of what they're doing wrong before they do it.

[He listens and nods a little bit. It's all good advice. And it isn't even particularly new advice- but foresight isn't his strong suit and it never will be.]

Yeah.. I need to work on that. I know the world is just like.. well don't be such a good heart and you won't get into trouble, toughen up Bolin, people are terrible! But I can't help that. I can't change who I am. I know the world is a horrible place full of horrible people, I've known them my whole life. I-

[He sighs, frustrated, feeling like he's going around in circles. Full of memories of childhood. Of Mako telling him to toughen up. Of drunk men teasing them with stupid games and food and gangs using them to run messages and bets down backstreet alleys under threat of being abandoned again. People with power taking him in and him falling for it every single time. What is he even trying to say anymore?? He crosses his arms over his chest, tightly, longing to be anywhere else.]

It's fine. It doesn't matter. I'm sick of this stupid river, already.

[Lance looks a bit deflated by that, bothered to hear Bolin talk like who he is is wrong just because bad people use him for it. After a short silence, he lets out a breath.]

I don't want you to toughen up, man. I like who you are. The world… especially places like this, breaks good people all the time, and the last thing I want is to see you stop being you just because of what other people might do. Maybe it's on everyone else to stop being crappy.

[A pause and then he offers an idea:]

Maybe your mistake wasn't that you didn't see what was wrong with Kuvira and the others, it's that you didn't listen to the people who did. Try trusting the people who love you a bit more to see those things for you.

[Wow Lance, right in the jugular, huh.

Because he's right. He's absolutely right. Mako had warned him back then and they fought about it. He didn't understand how someone like Kuvira was any different than someone like Korra. Two women who just wanted to, and felt the duty to, help the world. That fight feels so stupid in hindsight.]

Yeah.. yeah I think you're probably right.

[He wets his lips and glances up at the sky like okay. Never Mind, are you appeased now? Is this enough for you, yet?

Bolin looks back to Lance. What he's said is kind and gentle and nice. Lance is such a solid dude.]

You're a good friend, Lance.

[Lance smiles slightly and looks around as the river shifts. It appears that Never Mind is indeed appeased.]

So are you, man. Looks like we're getting out of here.

Oh! Oh man. [A huge sigh of relief]

Let's never speak of this again

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