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 Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2022 12:12 am
Three weeks.
It was almost tragic, that poor Murikabushi seemed to expect that he'd know everything about being a Senshi after only three weeks. Kerberos knew he'd been just as full of himself back then, of course, but...wow, damn. It really was stark, seeing it in someone who was brand new to power.
Kerberos smiled, wryly. "Yeah, see, that makes sense," he said, shaking his head. "But you're not gonna be perfect at this from minute one. I....was really bad, for a long while."
And then he'd found Avalon, and he'd been very good, at being what the Negaverse wanted him to be.
"I'm sorry you had to deal with that, in school," he said. He wished he could remember, to offer any kind of support--but that was all gone, along with the person he used to be, who according to a discarded driver's license in a wallet he'd found when he powered down for the first time after purifying had been named "Alex Masters," and who he knew very little else about.
Kerberos exhaled.
"Yeah, that's pretty much it. The Negaverse...Metallia, the thing at the core of all of it...she wants to consume. To destroy. If she gets her way, she'll suck Earth dry of every resource it has, human or otherwise, and then she'll probably fly off to attach herself to another planet." Maybe Velencya. Maybe some other world that was scrabbling by, isolated in space. "When I joined them, I thought I was making a choice--and I thought I knew what cohice I was making. But I had no idea."
He smiled, bitterly.
"You know, just in case you do think I had it all figured out from day one. I was in the Negaverse, too. I just...got dragged out, insisting I didn't deserve a chance at redemption the whole way." He shook his head. "And there I go, rambling away. Sorry."
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2022 12:52 am
Attentively, Reiki tried to drink in every word coming from Kerberos right now. Regardless of their respective teams, or what anyone on their respective teams thought of each other, or how the cats who worked for Kerberos’s team sucked and had left Reiki to rot, getting, uh……any information from someone who knew better? Was worth more than platinum, more than the British Crown Jewels, and more than the dream of ever getting to tell his Onibaba maternal grandmother exactly where she could ******** go.
Well. Maybe not more than the last thing. The dream of getting to tell Onibaba-sama off did mean quite a lot to Reiki.
All of it went down pretty easily……until one revelation in particular made Reiki’s mouth drop. For a long moment, all he could do was gape at Kerberos, trying to force his brain to reconcile the person in front of him now—so calm, so patient, so compassionate, so literally everything that a magical girl was supposed to be—with the Negaverse. With being part of the Negaverse. With having joined the Negaverse willingly and only gotten out of their ranks, from the sound of it, kicking and screaming.
Also, wait: people could swap sides out of the Negaverse? Corruption didn’t last forever? Then……then, that meant……maybe, if someone could get Toráin away from the people who’d dragged him into their ranks? Then maybe, someone could help Toráin get out of that horrible place. (And Valjean too, but Reiki didn’t have the same level of personal investment in what happened to him.)
So gobsmacked he was, it took a sharp shake of the head for Reiki to rouse himself back into being able to reply. Even then, all he managed to say was, “No, that—it’s okay, I promise? But, uh…if—would you mind if—I just… Could I try again? On the magic? …I feel like I want to give it one more shot? If you’re okay with it?”
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2022 1:12 am
Kerberos watched the shift in expression, the shock on Murikabushi's face. Yeah, he supposed that now, years removed from it, he didn't much look like someone who had once been in the Negaverse, all things considered. All in white, glowing with Transcendence power, and trying to be a better person than he'd been...
He'd come a long way, and he knew it.
He nodded his assent, and grinned.
"Hit me with your best shot," he challenged, and he took a breath to prepare. Whatever Murikabushi had up his sleeve, Kerberos wanted to see it.
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Posted: Thu Jun 16, 2022 1:24 am
Kerberos’s grin spread to Reiki’s face almost immediately. Hard to avoid, really. For one thing, Reiki was nothing if not a useless homosexual, and even though Levi’s butt-wings were still significantly prettier than Kerberos’s—not least because they had the decency to be black—Kerberos himself was exceptionally pretty.
For another thing, the entire conversation had, despite its ups and downs—or maybe because of them—left Reiki feeling significantly more assured about……pretty much everything. Or at least, everything coming to Reiki’s mind at the moment. Yeah.… He had been expecting too much of himself. Undeniably. Maybe that had made his magic scared to come out and play. But…alright, he was new at this, but going to try his best and only expect for the attack to please, please go off, this time.
A deep breath. An extended arm. Then, yanking the invisible cord, Reiki called out, “Gnawing Hunger!”—and finally felt the rush of power swelling up in his chest.Noir Songbird Extending an arm, Murikabushi bends his wrist back; as he calls the name of his attack, he curls his fingers into a fist, then jerks his hand down as if tugging a cord. Enemies within 10 feet of him begin to feel a powerful hunger or sense of craving, one they feel cannot be sated, and yet, they are compelled to try. This craving can be for anything—food, drink, affection/intimacy, alcohol or narcotics, the answers to the math homework, etc.—but it is quite distracting. This spell lasts for 25 seconds, and Murikabushi can use it three times per battle.
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Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2022 10:16 pm
Kerberos thought he was ready for the attack. Hunger was fine--and he expected Murikabushi's attack to inflict hunger.
What he had not accounted for was how very possible it was to hunger for something that was distinctly not food.
It had been a long time since he'd really craved alcohol--the addiction was mostly dormant, managed with years of sobriety and smartly avoiding the things that triggered it. It took care, and thought, and gently enforcing his boundaries on other people, but he was proud of his sobriety.
Murikabushi's amgic slammed him with the worst craving he'd had in years. It nearly staggered him--pure force of will kept him upright, kept him smiling, because he didn't want to scare this new Senshi whose magic was apparently already unreliable. But oh, he wanted a drink, like he hadn't for a long time, even though the thought of it made nausea rise in his throat.
"Well," Kerberos said, forcing himself to stay as upbeat as he could manage, "definitely worked that time. Not bad," he said.
He took a breath.
"I, uh. I should go."
A quick wave, a turn, and he fled.
It was cowardly, to run away--but he wanted to hide on his world, where there was nothing he could drink, until the urge to do so stopped trying to claw its way out from under his skin.
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Posted: Sun Jun 19, 2022 11:10 pm
The elation at getting off the attack was short-lived. One moment, Reiki’s heart was racing, fluttering delightedly because it had worked! Against a person! Finally, he’d get to know what his magic did to someone other than the latest weird monster-girl who showed up with a mind to eat Reiki’s starseed in order to assert her dominance as the Almighty Prettiest.
The next, a chill washed over him as he watched Kerberos turn to run. “It…but…” Part of Reiki wanted to call out, but he couldn’t make himself do it. Couldn’t get his mouth around the words, not until Kerberos was so far gone, he wouldn’t have heard, even if Reiki had yelled.
He couldn’t make himself yell, either. Instead, his arm dropped to his side, and he heard himself weakly intone, “…It didn’t even do anything…”
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