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 Posted: Thu Apr 13, 2023 8:19 pm
Lilith nodded. It was a reasonable statement, to insist that she sohuld talk to Keiko. It made sense. She absolutely should. But "should" was a powerful word, and it was hard to guess if her path would cross with Keiko's again before it crossed with a Princess.
"I'd like to, if we get the chance to talk. It's not as if I have a phone number I can call," she sighed. How convenient that would be, but it would put them both at risk. Someone might try to track it down, or its mere existence would be used as proof of her treason. "But as far as I can tell, there's no way to know what someone will or won't remember."
She leaned over, though, when he produced his phone, and couldn't help cooing a little over the very lovely puppy he showed her.
"Oh! She's so sweet, of course you wouldn't want to leave her." And a dog was much harder than a girlfriend--Keiko was a sapient human, who could be explained to. Cersei was a dog, who needed her human.
"I think it makes perfect sense," she said, softly. "It....there's so much involved in this. So much to give up." She sighed, and scrolled throguh a few more pictures--at least Cersei was easy to smile at. "Is there some way you could keep her? Give her to a friend, maybe? Or is she more of a one-human dog?"
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Posted: Thu Apr 13, 2023 8:46 pm
“Yeah, that’s fair,” Reiki said without even needing to think about it. If communicating across factions had been easy, then he wouldn’t have spent so many nights wandering around, looking for anyone from Team Faustite, only to end up pawning off attempted apology cupcakes on Amsvartnir, Kerberos, or Fang because once again, Reiki hadn’t found anyone.
“You’d think that, for all their technical expertise and desire to help senshi, the Mauvians wouldn’t keep us so siloed off from each other, but……” He shrugged. “Then again, I guess there’s a lot of inherent safety concerns. No way of knowing if some Order Mauvian isn’t attached to one of the self-righteous lunatics who think they’re better than the rest of us because they got Awakened by Order cats, so it’s their divinely given right to put us down with fire and blood. Or on the flip-side, no way of knowing if some real go-getter Negaverse or Dark Mirror senshi might not haul a hapless Order senshi off to Prince Remarque or whoever your top bosses are, then go like ‘Why don’t we teach them how great and happy and wonderful our factions, whether they want us to or not.’”
Talking about Cersei, though, made him sigh sadly. “She isn’t really a one-dog human, I think?” Gently mussing his fingers through his bangs, Reiki considered everything another moment. “She kinda used to be, when we first found each other at the shelter? I don’t know what all she went through, but she used to be so scared of meeting new people—and new dogs, for that matter—like she was just waiting for them to hurt her. She’s opened up a lot since then. And she already has some spare bowls and toys at my parents’ place, my brother’s, and my QPP’s. It’s just……”
With a deep breath, Reiki cast a glance around the park. Everything still seemed quiet, utterly without incident worth reporting. “I’ve powered up in front of her, y’know? A lot of times. Court senshi can mirror-walk, I have a full-length mirror in my room, makes sense to power-up there. And she knows that she’s allowed in my bed, so she usually chooses to be. And whatever glamour keeps people from connecting our civilian selves to our powered-up versions, we can talk our way around it—like, I knew the Dark Mirror Eternal who took me to Awaken as civilians, so when he rescued me from a youma one night after one of my shows, he was all ‘It’s me’ with his civilian name? But……”
Slouching, he shook his head. “Doesn’t seem to work with Cersei. No matter how many times she sees me power up, she still looks so lost, and confused, and sad……which I guess makes sense from her perspective, right? There’s somebody who looks and smells and talks like her person, but her brain says that he can’t be her person. And, like, what if that just gets worse if I leave the Mirror and have to become somebody else anyway? What if she’s always looking for me, waiting for me to come home, and I’m literally right there but she can’t tell anymore?”
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Posted: Thu Apr 13, 2023 11:30 pm
Lilith shrugged. "Plenty of reason to not want to enable that kind of communication, honestly. Like you said, there's zealots on all sides--and the Negaverse can also be very concerned about treason." She huffed, tiredly.
Certainly, she knew.
His explanation about the dog made her chest ache. How depressing would that be, to have her never quite realize that her person was right there? The poor pup, it had to be incredibly hard on her as it was.
"Oh, that....yeah, I see what you mean. It would be so hard on the poor thing, and on you, I'd imagine--having her never quite be able to recognize you like that...." She shook her head. "It's all...messy. We lose people we love, either way."
She stood up, and offered Muri back his phone.
"I should go. But...thank you. For listening. And I hope...you're able to find a way to get what you want."
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Posted: Thu Apr 13, 2023 11:55 pm
“‘Messy’ is the perfect word for it, yeah. That and ‘painful.’ Maybe even ‘unfair,’” Reiki agreed, with another soft sigh. They hadn’t even remotely touched on the Elsa of it all.
The Levi of it all.
He’d mentioned knowing the Eternal who’d helped Awaken him, but not who Elsa was to him. Nor how he felt about Elsa. Nor how afraid he was about how Levi might react to the way Reiki was feeling about the Dark Mirror Court, and how Reiki was almost definitely torpedoing his chances of ever getting to be anything but a friend to Levi. He already didn’t deserve a boy so high-quality. The way he felt about a senshi faction where Levi apparently fit right in and had since his own Awakening? Would no doubt prove that Levi was too good for Reiki, forever and ever, because obviously. This logic made perfect sense and was completely unassailable.
But—Reiki could burn that bridge when he got there.
For now, it was enough to give Lilith a small, genuine smile. “Thanks for the talk, Rocky—I.” His smile faltered slightly as he gestured at nothing in particular. “That—it’s a Bible thing? Well. It’s a Bible, medieval midrashim, and Rocky Horror Picture Show thing? The verse in the Book of Isaiah that gave rise to a lot of Lilith myths? The actual English translation of the line with the ‘Lilith’ word in it—the King James goes with ‘screech owl,’ and I know some version we used in Sunday school said ‘nightjar’? But unless you just render it as ‘Lilith’ like the New Revised Standard Version, the most accurate version is probably ‘night-creature’? And then, uh.”
He shrugged as if begging her to please pretend that this made sense to anyone but him. “In Rocky Horror, you know, Janet has her ‘Touch-A Touch-A Touch Me’ number……wherein she calls Rocky ‘creature of the night’ over and over again. So, uh……hence, nicknames.” Reiki waved his hand at nothing in particular, and SIGHED DRAMATICALLY. “Anyway, my point is: take care of yourself, yeah?”
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