After...party...?

[diesifkilled]

[SO THAT SURE WAS AN EXECUTION, HUH

Shirou's just been kind of staring off into space, still holding on to Usagi's hand, ever since Kon and Natsume's deaths. Just when it starts to look like he might stay like that all hecking night, he suddenly blinks and looks around.]

I'm going to go get some food.

[And indeed, he disappears off to the lodge and returns a little later with a huge pile of beautifully made sandwiches and other snacks. Did he have them prepared, or did he just make them really fast somehow? Who knows.

Anyway, there are now sandwiches. And the shack might still be on fire. This is fine.]

Comments

[particlebarrier]

[As long as Lenka's silent, Lance may be too focused on what he's doing to notice him right away. There's just too much going on in his mind and the physical distraction of training feels like just about the only thing that's keeping him together right now.

But eventually, he does spot Lenka. And he does pause. Normally he'd smile, but "normal" feels like a concept from centuries ago. Of course, Lance knows he's not the only one who feels anry or is grieving, and that knowledge alone would get him to try and make other people (and thus himself) feel better, but he's having a bit of a selfish moment.]

What did Clarke die for?

[The question is utterly toneless, and he still hasn't put the sword down yet.]

[soylentprotag]

[He doesn't turn away, or flinch, or step back at the question.

It's a variation on a question he's asked himself, at himself and at others, a hundred times, a thousand times in these short few weeks. All his life. It's a question that's never far from his mind and never will be, because death is something that dogs his steps and shadows every single thing in his life; so all he does is keep silent for a moment. Digging for one answer among dozens. More than dozens.

There are a lot of skeletons in the attic.

Eventually, softly and without expression:]

I don't know. That's up to all of us.

[It's not an answer, because there is no answer that will satisfy either of them. No answer that will satisfy any one of them at this point. He doesn't try for it. There's no sign of tears this time. Just his steady, flat stare.]

[particlebarrier]

[The reply gets a darkly bitter laugh from Lance. It doesn't last long, but the frustration behind it goes deeper than just what happened today. Weeks of people dying, his own potentially fatal run in with Nine, the zombies -- all of it just crushing him under an enormous pile of responsibility that he never asked for, and never really wanted. but is now going to have to embrace because absolutely nobody here knows what they're doing and the consequences just keep piling higher and higher.]

...Well. We sure bungled that one up. She died to save Natsume and Kon and we sent them straight to their graves.

[Briefly, his grip tightens on the sword, but he does lower it and the sword resumes its normal bayard form.]

I know that's not technically on us, I know that's on Red's superiors. But that doesn't make if feel any better.

[soylentprotag]

[His stare doesn't waver when that laugh hits the air -- he absorbs it, like everything else tonight, still and silent and unreflecting like the lake next to them. There's no one really here but them and Red, he'd understood at some point, and no one and nothing would save them but themselves. That part is something he's almost always understood. He'd been taught it a long, long time ago now.

Responsibility. The messy, wide radius of it is almost shapeless now, splashed across the lot of them like so much mud and grime. But he's used to living down in the mud. He just doesn't know which direction, exactly, is up. No, nobody here knows what they're doing.]

We made the choice. I made that choice. [there's no softness in his tone] Clarke wanted them to live. We wanted them to live. This world didn't.

[All of it is said in the same quiet, flat tone. There's no accusation there. Just bald statements of the truth. Post-trial moments may be him at his most unvarnished; he's normally at least a little more tactful than this. That makes two of them.]

They died, so the rest of us will live.

[And he's not trying to comfort. Because no, that's not any better. It's just the way it is.]

[particlebarrier]

[He drops eye contact for a moment, staring down at the sand. There's so much bitterness boiling over at once that it's hard to know where to start with any of it.]

This world doesn't care. It doesn't take sides like that. If we'd all voted the same way, we could have minimized the loss.

[This world still has its rules; their mistake was in trying to outwit those rules. Not presenting a unified front. It'd been right there on the goddamn hippie text files. They see Ren as a "unifying risk." Why - why hadn't they picked up on this and utilized their knowledge better? He grits his teeth briefly, then looks back up at Lenka.]

We should have all voted for Ichigo. [He said as much before storming off after the execution. On some level, he knows that's "wrong" but he hadn't felt a lick of shame for it when he said it then, and he still doesn't feel any now.]

Those two could've been saved that way and Ichigo could've upheld his promise to protect Kon.

[soylentprotag]

[He's quiet for a moment.

He's not so sure the world itself doesn't care -- there's a vague memory of Red's face, when she'd tossed her cellphone, her face when she'd given him her answers, everything, and he shouldn't be remembering that just like he probably shouldn't have trusted her at all... but.

In his heart of hearts, or perhaps in the back of his mind all along, Lenka knows what the easier solution would be. People want to survive. Most of them want to live, a handful notwithstanding, and even that handful has something to live for. People band together like that. They're easier to aim.

There's just a lot holding him back from that sort of aiming.]

We were trying to minimize the loss. But it's not that easy to move people, Lance.

[He stares down at his wrist. The right one, the one that had been covered with bandages and now with an elbow-length glove.]

This group... do you think they're more open to those who want to sacrifice themselves, now? [there's no indication as to the intent behind the question, still soft and toneless] Can you guarantee that a vote for Ichigo would have happened?

[particlebarrier]

I don't know, Lenka.

[[His response is immediate, and snappier in tone than Lance intended. There's pounding in his ears as he's forced to reflect on his conduct and relative inaction today. But even so, he didn't mean to take it on Lenka, so he repeats himself - softer and more controlled.]

I don't know. All I know is that I didn't try making a more convincing argument even though I agreed with what Ichigo was saying because I get where he's coming from.

[He looks up at the sky and the stars above. Somewhere out there, his family is at home. His three siblings laughing and playing on the beach, all carefree, not knowing anything about the Galra or about the numerous times he's almost died trying to fend off Zarkon and his army. Throat tightening, Lance swallows.]

All I'm saying is that if it were one of my brothers or sister that was on trial like Kon was today, I wouldn't have been able to forgive anyone who hadn't voted for me.

[soylentprotag]

[Lenka doesn't react to the snappish tone, or to the beginnings of Lance's explanation -- because it's true, they perhaps should have waited for more alternatives than they did, perhaps they shouldn't have scrambled for time, perhaps Red had lied; the maybes are more than compelling and numerous than any of the answers they do have or have ever gotten.

The maybes are what's going to stay with them, walking around with coral lines on their faces and crystallized smiles, long after the executions are over.

Something about what Lance says last though... something in his posture seems to freeze, and he doesn't say anything. It's not a thinking sort of silence; it's the type of silence that shatters, a single drop of water enough to put an end to things. Nothing breaks. His shoulders slump, as though something heavy has crawled onto them and taken root. Or maybe it simply sprouted, the roots already deeper than anything grown here.]

And you'd be right. Ichigo would be right.

[He doesn't say anything else. He's not here to make excuses.]

[particlebarrier]

[Whatever Lance was expecting to hear back from Lenka, it isn't this. Not that he thinks his own position is unreasonable or irrational, but given how Mitsuru and Shirou had both seemed to think of it as, at least superficially, ridiculous to agree with Ichigo, he had expected more push back, more resistance, more something. Not flat out agreement.

He stares at Lenka for a long moment, suddenly filled with so many questions about who Lenka really is outside of camp. Lenka's past, Lenka's family. He doesn't know any of this because they've all been so focused on trying to learn as much as possible about a common enemy and trying to survive, that they ironically don't have as much room to learn about those you would consider friends.

It seems like a cruel irony. Somehow with Clarke gone, that thought is especially sobering. Lance walks closer.]

.... you okay?