we_meet_again | Phone inbox

CEO: Can I come over?

Cobalt: always

[Knock knock on your balcony then, Cobalt.

Sorry. He doesn't really want to talk to the rest of your unit at the moment. Just you]

[convenient. he was already out on the balcony, collecting stems of lavender and placing them on a piece of paper on the ground beside him.

He looks tired, and tense, with angry, fresh, sensitiv-treated burns on his bare forearms.]

H'llo.

[Sits down next to him]

You look like shit.

That happens, sometimes.

[snips a sprig of lavender]

How are you holding up?

[He's wearing a scarf to cover most of his neck because otherwise he'll pick at the tattoo that has formed there and down most of his torso.

Otherwise, he looks his normal cranky self]

Fine.

Future is Now played the way they wanted with no regrets.

Public reaction aside - do you feel the same?

[he accidentally chops off the end of the branch. A tuft of leaves sprinkles onto the ground.]

Yes and no.

I don't regret the way we played. We asked ourselves what we wanted to do and that was the answer. We made our choice, accepted the consequences, and we stuck with it to the end.

It was the most at peace I've ever felt, in a game like this.

I'm unhappy about Sunshine. Once it was too late to change tack, he panicked and had a meltdown. He had a lot of internal conflict about whether it was more important to allow us our autonomy to choose the best course of action for ourselves, or whether it was more important to protect us at all costs.

Seems Heart Soldier had that problem, too.

Edited 2019-06-22 05:20 (UTC)

Are you surprised by either?

Yeah, kinda?

Sunshine told us that he preferred that we didn't get hurt, but that it was more important that we played in the way we could live with. So we did. But it turned out us putting ourselves in danger wasn't a way that he could live with, which we didn't know. I don't think any of us -- Sunshine included -- fully appreciated just how much he couldn't tolerate it until it suddenly came to a head. The panic attack kind of blindsided all four of us, I think.

So, that's a thing we need to work on.

Edited 2019-06-24 07:15 (UTC)

Heart Soldier, though... I don't know I'm necessarily surprised, but I'm still angry. They knew exactly what we were doing, and why, and they did that anyway.

[Hums thoughtfully about the bit about Sunshine. Yes, he'll touch on that in a minute. In the meantime]

I'm no expert on feelings. Clearly.

But I do have a certain expertise on facebonded soul twins.

If the reverse would have happened, what do you think pep would have done?

...

Twice I have been in situations where a person I cared about decided to suicide in front of me. One of those people was someone I cherish above all others.

They said that was what they wanted, so I respected their wishes, and they died while I watched. It sucked, but I don't regret not interfering. Sometimes there are things that people need to do, and they need to do those things more than they need to live. Especially when death is impermanent, here.

If the roles had been reversed in yesterday's game, I want to believe that we would have respected their wishes, or at least waited to assist until we'd gotten ourselves out of danger, first. Because if a person has decided to tank themselves out of the gate, there's a reason. And I'd want to trust that they knew what they were doing, and they'd made the choice that they needed to make.

...But, of course, maybe I'm projecting. I have no way of knowing for sure what we would have done.

Cried, probably.

Edited (remembered a second time this happened!) 2019-06-24 18:00 (UTC)

...

That's because you're an inherently selfless person, Cobalt.

The rest of us are not so generous. Nor as observant.

...Selfless, huh?

We were trying to protect ourselves from the pain of having to watch our loved ones die again. And, in doing so, we took all that fear and stress and shoved it onto them, instead. They nearly had to watch us kill ourselves. And they were not... [clips a sprig of lavender from the bush] ...happy with us, about that.

And it makes sense. It's a horrible feeling, to watch the people you care about suffer. It's so horrible that we decided our own death was easier for us to bear, if we could stop that from happening one more time.

Kill other people so your unit can live, kill your unit so other people can live... if it comes down to "playing in a way you can live with" then the decision is inherently selfish no matter what you do, isn't it?

But "selfish" doesn't necessarily mean wrong or bad. Sometimes "selfish" just means taking care of your own needs, which we all need to do to be healthy.

I was talking about selfless in the terms of you letting the people you care about make their own choices. Even if you know they're wrong.

[Pauses. Thinking about how best to word this]

Dying so others can live is a choice. Living at the expense of others is also a choice.

And I had no issue with your choice. To be fucking blunt, when I saw what you were doing, I told my unitmates not to offer your unit aid - even though that was their gut reaction. And I didn't do it for any fucking noble reason. What you said is true - your unit usually comes out unscathed. So if you wanted to throw yourself under the bus, then by all means - join the rest of us in the experience.

The problem is your unit as a whole is too well-liked or others feel too protective of it to let you go down in flames. You're all poster children for innocence and hope and---

[Vague hand motion. Those things]

You need to really work on sabotaging your PR if you want to be able to get away with a stunt like that.

I don't think any of us are ever going to do that again.

Thank you for not sending us any assistance, though, even if it wasn't for our sakes. I really wanted you guys to live. And I'm glad to hear you're all doing well.

Sorry about all the drama.

[There's a long pause after that as if Intensity was (somehow miraculously) actually thinking about the words before they came out of his mouth]

Why wouldn't you do it again?

Because even after playing like that, nothing changed. We still lived, people we cared about still died, we hurt the feelings of people we care about, and we've been blamed for the deaths of the people who tried to save us.

A couple people in particular were so upset with me they made me promise not to do it again, so I won't. Same thing happened with Wednesday. I don't know about Yugi, but I know this has been hitting him pretty hard, so I doubt he'd try again, either. I think the only way Sunshine would do it is if he were in a game completely by himself. Other people in our unit want to survive at all costs, so self-sacrifice isn't even on the table for them on the first place.

The only way we'd play this way is if everyone present consented to it, but now there's almost nobody left who would consent. So.

Why did you promise them you wouldn't? If you felt that strongly how you played.

People made it clear that they were hurt and upset by the way we played.

The whole reason we played like that in the first place is because we didn't want to see the people we care about get hurt. So if we hurt them in the process, what are we even doing? And if we do it again even after they made their feelings clear, isn't that even worse?

I promised so they wouldn't have to worry that I'll do it again. I don't want to punish people for caring about me.

So what? You'll bow to their whims instead. Is that what they want? Is that what you want?

People are going to get hurt regardless. Whether it's because they died or saw someone else died or for any reason really. You would have gotten hurt if your plan had worked. Though you might have found that brand of hurt more preferable.

...

Do you really think people will think less of you if you stood your ground and said that was how you wanted to play?

I don't think I could honestly look the people I care about in the eyes and tell them "I'm going to play this way and I don't care if you get hurt." If they tell me that they're hurt, then I don't feel good about playing that way any more. So I don't know if it's "bowing to their whims" so much as trying my best to listen to their concerns and find a different solution.

Everything is compromises and there's no good answer, 'cause as you said, people are always going to get hurt regardless. I want to do my best to play in a way that I can live with but sometimes even that feels impossible. Killing other units so we can live makes me hate myself beyond words. But the alternative is letting us die and that's unbearable to the other people in my unit, who are also trying to play the game in ways that they can live with. Dying hurts. Surviving hurts. Killing hurts. Allowing yourself to be killed hurts. All the solutions are bad.

I don't know what to do. I'm just... doing my best...!

...

Then let's narrow this done in scope, Cobalt. Just you and me.

What would you want me to do? If I were to respect however way you wanted to play --- what would you selfishly want to do?

[he puts his scissors down and sits back on his heels, thinking.]

If I were in a game by myself, and nobody cared if I lived or died...

I want to live. But I don't want to live at the expense of other people.

I would want you to take care of yourself and do what you need to do. If you left me alone that would be awesome, but you need to hit me, hit me. No guilt, no drama, just kill me and then come have drinks with me afterward or something.

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