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 Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 10:11 pm
Chance hummed again, glancing skyward.
"What about looking at things in a different perspective?" he asked curiously. "I mean, like...instead of, say, taking the main road, you take a detour. Same destination, different route."
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Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 10:29 pm
"I'd be lost." It was an answer and a joke rolled into one, spoken from a face so steeled into place he'd win at poker with a bad hand.
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Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 10:42 pm
Chance smiled a little, exhaling a breath and laughing, though it wasn't at Otto, merely the situation and the answer itself.
"You said not having the answer to something is frustrating," he said thoughtfully, tapping a black-painted finger against his chin. "That having things not concrete in front of you is frustrating, Maybe you're asking the wrong questions?"
It wasn't said with any sort of condescension or joking, Chance looking genuinely curious as he turned his head towards Otto.
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Posted: Sat Mar 07, 2015 10:59 pm
"Ugggghhhh..." Otto groaned, the fuse in his head cutting out. Smoke in the gears. An overheated system. He flopped onto his back and heaved a sigh. "Too vague. I don't even know what we're talkin' about anymore. Roads in space or some s**t."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 8:34 am
He laughed.
"Sorry, sorry," said Chance, waving a hand. "Didn't mean to make it over complicated or messy, my bad."
His eyes went back to the telescope and the stars above.
"I'm always a fan of just honesty and doing what you like, I guess, it's hard to comprehend anything different."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 9:24 am
Chance laughed, and somehow Otto was back at ease. Though to be fair it was hard to feel anything other than peaceful while he stared up at the sky from here. Chance's motto, it seemed, sounded a lot like advice he'd been hearing from around the island. It was so odd. If it was so easy for them, why had it been hard for him? What wiring was at fault for making him feel the need to question everything, and weight his actions on a moral scale? "Go with what you know, I guess." He murmured idly, resting his hands under his head. "Guess that keeps your life drama free."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 9:36 am
Chance crossed one ankle over the other and leaned back on his hands. He was still sitting up, but Otto had laid down, staring up at the sky, and Chance watched him curiously for a moment, dark eyes inscrutable. Somehow he seemed as though there was something underlying the frustrations about "nothingness" and finding the right path.
He laughed, the sound quieter this time as Chance lay back as well, folding his arms beneath his head.
"For the most part," he said mildly. "Sometimes it doesn't work out too well, I will admit. I've been known on occassion to have stumbled into something I should have, but I've tried to keep most emotions at bay to prevent exactly that from happening."
He shrugged. "I screw up from time to time, of course."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 9:53 am
Keeping his emotions out of it. That sure seemed like a thing. Otto, despite himself, tended to be emotional about everything. He'd been trying to build a shell, one that would keep him numb and uncaring. To truly accept nothingness in his heart, even though he'd said himself the very idea of it scared him. "There's no perfect system, huh?" No matter what, Otto would never really find a way to keep out of trouble and allow himself to relax and embrace himself for all he was. No way to let himself enjoy certain pleasures without running into trouble along the way. Was getting in trouble all he feared? He hoped he at least worried more for what his actions did to others, despite often wishing he'd stop caring. Troublesome. Burdensome. His heart was a storm of questions and worries, always doubting and fearing. But when he stared up at that sky, and imagined a place so vast and big it went beyond comprehension, he wondered if his tiny, overflowing and stormy heart could ever hope to be that big and forgiving with it's occupants. Or maybe it was his brain that was the problem. Maybe he needed to overcome his own psyche, and relieve the tension somehow. It rarely stopped working and thinking, overanalyzing to a point where it was redundant to even hope for answers. He dared to ask something then. He took a tentative breath, almost hesitating for a moment. "You ever doubt who you are?" He murmured uncertainly, "You... I dunno.. sounds like you got yourself figured out. But like... you ever have trouble definin' yourself?"
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 10:12 am
"It doesn't have to be perfect, it just has to work," said Chance with a smile, still looking skyward. He lifted one hand, idly smoothing back the curls from his face and exhaled a breath; the sky, in all of its infinite vastness and intensity, never got old, but now he wondered too what it would be like if there was just "nothingness."
It was a relatively unpleasant thought. He shook it off, turning his head to look at Otto, and Chance gave a soft hum, lips pressed together.
"I had a pretty messed up childhood," he said, lips quirking up into a slightly wry expression. "My mother slept around, didn't give a ******** who she ******** - I still have no idea who my dad is - and back then I had no idea how to act. I kept asking her why she was doing what she was doing, but she'd just tell me she knew what she was doing, and that she was doing this because she loved me, and that I should just let her do it."
He shook his head slowly, memories ebbing into him like the soft pull of the tide. "Sometimes I wondered why the hell I even existed, what my purpose was other than to just get pushed around by my mother's exes. I grew up thinking that it was normal not to show emotion, because that's what I taught myself to get by: to tamp it all down so that those assholes wouldn't get off on me showing that side of myself."
And somewhere along the line he'd just forgotten how to feel them again, forgotten that they had even existed. Chance closed his eyes.
"It was easier when I left. Went to a home for orphaned boys, which was an adventure, but it at least told me what I didn't want to do, which was wind up on the streets dealing drugs or slumming around the place doing s**t all. That's the kind of thing my mother's exes did, and I didn't want to be on their level, so I did what I had to do."
A pause, and then -
"That was kind of long winded," said Chance ruefully, propping himself up on one elbow to look over at Otto. "Sorry about that. But long story short, I'm just making s**t up as I go. People ask me what I want to do, what I would have done if I hadn't come here, and I've got no idea. I try things out, see if I like them, see how I feel about them, and if they're s**t or if I don't particularly enjoy it, then I just move on, let it go, and find something that I do like."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 10:36 am
Otto got himself a brief history lesson on Chance; detailing why he was the way he was. Not to feel anything. It was a defence mechanism. Yet even Otto knew, despite wishing he felt little, that emotions had a lot to do with living. Experiencing them was hard, and complicated. But sometimes they felt so good. He related in some manner of speaking. Wondering why he existed at all. Pondered the point and reason of existing. Wondered if it would really be so terrible if he just poofed from this world. It reminded him why he'd bee such a grouchy a** when he first got to Deus. It was because of his own father. He expected so fiercely to be reprimanded just for standing in the wrong place at the wrong time, that he got uppity and bent out of shape from a simple hello. He was so used to not having a kind friend, that he saw enemies in every face that approached him. So even though he'd wanted their love and attention, he always made excuses, and pushed them away. Was this why he didn't know who he was now? Had he evolved so drastically, he could not see himself anymore? Otto shook his head at Chance. "S'fine." Long winded or not, it had been helpful. Chance wasn't any better at knowing himself and who he was more than any other hunter. He just... kept moving. Letting experiences and circumstances dictate what happened next. Otto was letting such things shape him; mould him. For better or for worse, he supposed. Maybe he didn't know himself because he was so used to denying outside influences, he'd only known the small container he allowed himself to grow in. Was he just.. growing up? Was this all it was? A fish in a bowl, tossed into the ocean and feeling out of sorts. "I might be over thinking s**t after all.." He murmured aloud. He couldn't be Chance. He could only do things his own way. Mimicking the creeds of someone else would feel just as alien to him. He let out a slow breath. "Totally been over thinking.."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 10:49 am
His coffee had grown lukewarm, but Chance took another sip of it anyway, mostly so that he had something to do with his hands.
"Overthinking s**t is a hard habit to break," he said with a slight smile as he lowered the mug again and pushed shaggy curls from his eyes. "I overthink s**t all the time. But sometimes it's just easier to set it all aside for something enjoyable instead, something that doesn't take a lot of thinking. There's nothing wrong with thinking seriously about things, but there's also nothing wrong with letting yourself have some time to just take part in something pleasurable or fun or exciting just because of that, not for any other reason."
He shrugged one shoulder. "Isn't that how life is supposed to be? You try all sorts of things out to see how it feels?"
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 11:31 am
He watched Chance speak and push away stubborn curls from his eyes, his mind idly turning through thoughts, both relevant and ones that seemed to fly around the tracks willy nilly. He thought to himself if there was a proper way to tell himself when it'd be okay to let go of his thoughts and just feel the moment, and when it might be better to think harder on something. He knew better that, of course, there was no guide book for such a thing. Another reason he was coming to the conclusion that making mistakes was okay. He'd end up hurt, or he'd hurt someone else. He may end up embarrassed or humiliated. But then... there really was no other way of learning, was there? No. That was it, really. He'd been wanting answers, but he would never find any this way. No answer existed to his questions. All he could do was guess, act and wait. "Yeah.." He murmured, his gaze unfocusing and drifting away. "I get too bent out of shape trying to make sure I do things right or perfect right off the bat." Another senseless tactic brought on by his father, and even Caelius to some degree. Get it right, or pay the price. A painful price. From a smack over the head to his face in a wall. Really, leaving home wasn't much different after all. "Funny enough, I rarely get things right anyway." So why bother worrying? Maybe if he just assumed it'd go to Hell... no, then he'd never do anything again. He needed to hope for the best. That was the only way he'd ever move forward. He took another deep breath in, and then out, letting his chest rise and fall. Let the stress go, he thought. Just let it go.
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 11:39 am
Otto was certainly an interesting character; Chance found himself curious as to what lay behind the distant gaze, wondering what it was that had him so conflicted. Being on the island itself seemed to make people change to adapt, and apparently it had some adverse effects on some and differences on others.
"Perfection is just an illusion anyway," said Chance mildly. "There is no real perfect way to do anything. Sometimes it takes a while to get to where you want, and it's almost always messy, from what I've seen, or it just different from how it started.
"But I don't think there's necessarily a 'right' or a 'wrong,' here, either," he added, tugging absently on a blade of grass. "Just different levels of the same thing. No one gets it 'right,' we all just do what we can to get to where we want and to get what we want. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn't, and if it doesn't, that's still okay, you learn something new, right?"
The corners of his lips twitched. "Besides, sometimes letting everything go is just the way to start over again and try something new."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 11:55 am
Letting it go and starting anew. He liked that idea. And yet... "It's not runnin' away is it?" He asked, looking up at Chance again. It was hard to get a proper look at the man, the dim light of the sky and training field's few lights making visibility blurred. "Letting it all go, and just start fresh, I mean."
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Posted: Sun Mar 08, 2015 12:26 pm
"Not in my experience," said Chance mildly. "Running away implies that you gave up. Taking a new direction just means exactly that - something wasn't working for you, so you changed the path you were going on to try and see what else there was."
He hummed a little and asked cautiously, "Is there something you're trying to not run away from?"
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