[ they're truly just minding their own business, starting the morning, recovering from - honestly, a terrible weekend. hung texts the public chat to suggest king's game as a group, all of them still left, because, well, they probably desperately need it. some minor distraction. something to bring them together.
but, now - this. he watches the memory play out in the panels, shocked into stillness at the desperation in it all. the bloodshed. the single gutpunch that nearly takes him out right away at the love for a father, the love from a father, the loss of one.
it's hard to not feel anxious for jolyne by the end of it, and he lowers a hand to curl around one of her fists. the same as before - your heart is a muscle the size of your fist, trying to coax it open. trying, really, to reassure himself that it's all there. that it's not unraveled. ]
[ you would think that you could mind your own business! after the excitement of last week! jolyne, for a while, just stands there, and the coffee cup that she was holding has just completely been crushed in her hand, the coffee just poured over her palm. good thing it's iced.
good thing the one he's touched is the only one that's at her side, and it takes a moment, but eventually she opens her hand for his gently.
[ he takes that hand with both of his, enveloping it in warm fur, a gentle touch. a tight squeeze follows, fretful, but it is good to hear her voice. there's no water, there's no blood - it's just the two of them.
That... it depends on the definition of okay, haha.
[ she just squeezes. that's right. she's all here. stone free? it's nowhere in her body, no matter how hard she tries to call the last thing her father ever gave her. the water? far away. distant. dreaming. she almost misses it now. ]
I mean... I should be asking you that, shouldn't I?
[ she's just glancing away quietly. she learned how not to cry a long time ago. the last time she did, it was in a green field of grass, the dawn breeze sweeping it upwards, heavenwards, like it'd known it'd lost one of its own that day. but that's another story. she just shakes her head. ]
It's over, I'm fine.
[ sharper than she intends, and she winces at her own voice. there's hesitation in her voice, and then... ]
Everyone's final day comes eventually... doesn't it? [ she presses her lips into a thin line before she speaks again after another heartbeat of silence. ] That's where I'll go when this is all over. That's my end.
[ despite the sharpness, hung - hung doesn't flinch away, or draw back, and instead shifts his grip to lace their fingers together. like maybe weaving them together, like this, will help to tether her in place. especially if that's what she's going back to. ]
... you'd have a chance to change it, now, wouldn't you? Time supposedly stops, back home. While we're here. You'd be able to change your ending and go with Emporio.
[ this doesn't change the death of her father. the likely death of her friends. but she could live. she and emporio could get out of there alive, together, and be alright, be safe.
it's not said with naivety. rather, it's said with something akin to hope. because for as fleeting as this competition really is, with two months feeling so long but barely any time at all, this is still...
jolyne is someone that's left a mark on his life. one that he'll never be rid of. ]
As nice as that would be. I can't. I stayed back for a reason.
I was the one Pucci wanted. He'd hunt us down to the ends of the Earth for the rest of my life, for the rest of Emporio's life.
[ she squeezes their hands together further. she's angry, and it's not because of hung or anything else beyond the fact that they could have run together, hand in hand, but because of one fucking man, because of the blood in her veins, the star on her shoulder that burns like a brand. ]
How is that any way to live... for a boy who was born in a prison? Who never saw the outside world? Running his entire life with me, and where would I go? I'm a runaway convict... I'd get thrown back in jail at best... and Emporio would get swallowed up by the system that fails kids like him every day.
[ there's a brief moment where all she can do is swallow the thickness and pain in her jaw. ]
[ hung shakes his head slowly at that, but doesn't interrupt. doesn't dispute it. she's right - he became an orphan later on in life, but he's seen what happens to them. in lungmen alone, they've only recently started to get their act together for people that need the help. for people that have lost their families, lost their lives, with nowhere they could possibly go but on the streets.
the slums have always been better than nothing.
but where will emporio go, without her? without the friends that he had relied on? that open-ended ending... the unknown that he was being sent off to... who will look out for him, if not jolyne. ]
You're whole, here, Jolyne. You're alive. If you go back like this, maybe you can win that fight with your life. And then you and Emporio wouldn't have anything to worry about - you could just live.
[ or you could come back to terra with me, he does not say. because he could see just how much that little boy meant to her, in that moment. and, here, now, it's all the more obvious. ]
[ her heart hurts, it actually hurts. it feels like something is curling up and dying inside of her and she pulls her hand out of his just to place both of her hands firmly on either side of his jaw. she looks him firmly, eyes intense, sharp. ]
Not alone... not without...
[ oh not without anyone. she will fail, and she knows it... hates it. she will fail her part, but she will have given emporio a chance, to find survival, to know peace. i'm the one you want, i'm the one you want, come at me she remembers, the only thoughts she had with burning lungs, reeling back her fist. ]
It was never going to be a fight I could win on my own, whole again or not. I knew that when I cut my string and let Emporio go.
[ his ears flatten further against his hair, and he just - looks at her. really looks at her, as he takes that information in. but what would happen to emporio? would you really be safe? and what if any of her friends were still...
his expression crumples into something that hurts for her, not anything else. ]
... it's never fair, is it? [ hung can't help but ask it, because he comes from a dystopic world where you have to do what you can to find joy and live your life, but any day. any moment. you could find yourself facing death. he understands that, and he knows how hard it is to go it alone, but this is so much worse, somehow. ]
Would you... would you still take this as a second chance to keep living? [ please don't throw it away. please live. surely emporio would want that. surely all of her friends would.
having lost his own father, he knows that, surely, he would want that for his daughter. ]
[ that's the question isn't it? what would happen without her? she isn't exactly sure, and she's terrified to find out - but she's already said her goodbye, hasn't she? she's already sent herself to the waters. she just closes her eyes and takes in a deep breath before bringing herself to look at him again, this time with her expression, once strained, now softening up a bit more. ]
... I'm trying to, y'know?
[ just giving him as much of a smile as she can. it's hard... it feels herculean. but for hung, she can do it. ]
You don't need to force a smile for me, Jolyne. But I'll help you however I can.
[ here, or back home. he'd be willing to go with her, fight with her, no matter what it is. because it's - someone that he cares about. hung cares so much for her, and what happens to her, that he now can't imagine life without her.
whatever happiness she can have.
the only issue is that she gets to see another set of comic panels. ]
Hung.
It's been a while. I returned to Lungmen just to have another bite of your cooking. I took this hat when I escaped, because you'll look silly with it on your head. But you probably won't want it.
They say in Lungmen, to get by, you have to be clever and "flexible." You're not sure you can ever be the kind of flexible that they're asking for, but you'll certainly still do your best - that's what your dad would want. Maybe you'll see if Uncle Li will give you a job, maybe even your dad's old job, if you can't make it, here.
Things are already tough, living outside of a true city. But that's where you and the others find yourselves, traveling almost in a pack. At least you can all count on each other, nebulous as that trust might be in the long run for some, and they rely on you for making the meals - you have value and use here, even if you're reluctant to do some of the jobs that have been asked of your group.
None of them think you're cut out to be a mercenary. You agree.
She's there with you, though. Meng. You look out for everyone, of course, but she's always there to look out for you in return. You work well together, and have since the moment that you joined the group. Jobs feel easier - if still dangerous - when it's the two of you running point, and you become her shield as she lays waste to her opponents. A Liberi so small as her is a deceptive force to be reckoned with.
Especially when she starts to slip into something you have no explanation for.
Oripathy doesn't do this. Oripathy kills, slow and miserable or brutal and all at once. But it doesn't make someone lose their mind like this.
The others call her a monster. You could never. She's Meng - she's your friend. She's someone you love, someone that you've fought alongside, someone you trust. Whatever is happening to her, whatever's turning this strength into something dangerous, it doesn't make her a monster.
For a long time, it's directed at your enemies. The targets you're sent to infiltrate.
And, then... she attacks all of you. It's so sudden that you can't even predict it, but it is no less devastating in every way possible. Originium and rock shatter alike as she throws your companions around, sends one flying so hard through a spire that you're not even sure if he's made it to the other side, to the ground on a rough landing, alive. She even turns on you, her closest friend, and even you - even you, you struggle as you try to call out to her, head cracked into the hard rock ground beneath you, feeling the hands around your throat that'll surely bruise under your fur, trying to fight her off just as much as you're trying to fight for air.
You manage.
Barely.
And you have to get the worse off, the ones still alive, to Lungmen. You have to get them to a hospital. You have to leave.
You don't want to. It would mean leaving her, and doesn't she need help, too?
She tells you to, anyways, through lucid tears, looking at her hands for what she's done. Yells at you to take the others and go. To get away.
...
Meng stands on the dock as the small boat forges through the roiling waves of a storm, and you look back at her. You look back, and you refuse to look away even after she's nothing but a speck, until she's nothing but a memory, burned into your mind.
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no subject
but, now - this. he watches the memory play out in the panels, shocked into stillness at the desperation in it all. the bloodshed. the single gutpunch that nearly takes him out right away at the love for a father, the love from a father, the loss of one.
it's hard to not feel anxious for jolyne by the end of it, and he lowers a hand to curl around one of her fists. the same as before - your heart is a muscle the size of your fist, trying to coax it open. trying, really, to reassure himself that it's all there. that it's not unraveled. ]
no subject
good thing the one he's touched is the only one that's at her side, and it takes a moment, but eventually she opens her hand for his gently.
finally, her voice, a little raw: ]
Hey... hey. It's all good. I'm here.
[ she squeezes back. her hand is whole. ]
no subject
[ he takes that hand with both of his, enveloping it in warm fur, a gentle touch. a tight squeeze follows, fretful, but it is good to hear her voice. there's no water, there's no blood - it's just the two of them.
but it doesn't change that it happened. ]
... you're here. Are you okay?
no subject
[ she just squeezes. that's right. she's all here. stone free? it's nowhere in her body, no matter how hard she tries to call the last thing her father ever gave her. the water? far away. distant. dreaming. she almost misses it now. ]
I mean... I should be asking you that, shouldn't I?
no subject
[ had to see it again. had to experience it again. hear the screams, see her father die in front of her, know that her friends were... ]
I'm just worried about you.
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It's over, I'm fine.
[ sharper than she intends, and she winces at her own voice. there's hesitation in her voice, and then... ]
Everyone's final day comes eventually... doesn't it? [ she presses her lips into a thin line before she speaks again after another heartbeat of silence. ] That's where I'll go when this is all over. That's my end.
no subject
... you'd have a chance to change it, now, wouldn't you? Time supposedly stops, back home. While we're here. You'd be able to change your ending and go with Emporio.
[ this doesn't change the death of her father. the likely death of her friends. but she could live. she and emporio could get out of there alive, together, and be alright, be safe.
it's not said with naivety. rather, it's said with something akin to hope. because for as fleeting as this competition really is, with two months feeling so long but barely any time at all, this is still...
jolyne is someone that's left a mark on his life. one that he'll never be rid of. ]
no subject
I was the one Pucci wanted. He'd hunt us down to the ends of the Earth for the rest of my life, for the rest of Emporio's life.
[ she squeezes their hands together further. she's angry, and it's not because of hung or anything else beyond the fact that they could have run together, hand in hand, but because of one fucking man, because of the blood in her veins, the star on her shoulder that burns like a brand. ]
How is that any way to live... for a boy who was born in a prison? Who never saw the outside world? Running his entire life with me, and where would I go? I'm a runaway convict... I'd get thrown back in jail at best... and Emporio would get swallowed up by the system that fails kids like him every day.
[ there's a brief moment where all she can do is swallow the thickness and pain in her jaw. ]
no subject
the slums have always been better than nothing.
but where will emporio go, without her? without the friends that he had relied on? that open-ended ending... the unknown that he was being sent off to... who will look out for him, if not jolyne. ]
You're whole, here, Jolyne. You're alive. If you go back like this, maybe you can win that fight with your life. And then you and Emporio wouldn't have anything to worry about - you could just live.
[ or you could come back to terra with me, he does not say. because he could see just how much that little boy meant to her, in that moment. and, here, now, it's all the more obvious. ]
no subject
Not alone... not without...
[ oh not without anyone. she will fail, and she knows it... hates it. she will fail her part, but she will have given emporio a chance, to find survival, to know peace. i'm the one you want, i'm the one you want, come at me she remembers, the only thoughts she had with burning lungs, reeling back her fist. ]
It was never going to be a fight I could win on my own, whole again or not. I knew that when I cut my string and let Emporio go.
no subject
his expression crumples into something that hurts for her, not anything else. ]
... it's never fair, is it? [ hung can't help but ask it, because he comes from a dystopic world where you have to do what you can to find joy and live your life, but any day. any moment. you could find yourself facing death. he understands that, and he knows how hard it is to go it alone, but this is so much worse, somehow. ]
Would you... would you still take this as a second chance to keep living? [ please don't throw it away. please live. surely emporio would want that. surely all of her friends would.
having lost his own father, he knows that, surely, he would want that for his daughter. ]
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... I'm trying to, y'know?
[ just giving him as much of a smile as she can. it's hard... it feels herculean. but for hung, she can do it. ]
If anything. I'm enjoying it so far.
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You don't need to force a smile for me, Jolyne. But I'll help you however I can.
[ here, or back home. he'd be willing to go with her, fight with her, no matter what it is. because it's - someone that he cares about. hung cares so much for her, and what happens to her, that he now can't imagine life without her.
whatever happiness she can have.
the only issue is that she gets to see another set of comic panels. ]