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 Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:13 pm
After leaving the park and letting Yuki take Cersei home, Reiki felt completely on-edge. Everything about the city around him felt too quiet, even after meeting up with Volterra, and an air of dread hung in the air. Part of him expected Faustite to lurk around some corner or another, ready to do gods only knew what to stop Reiki from leaving the Court. Another part of him wanted to kick the part of him that felt like he wouldn’t mind Faustite showing up, as if Reiki didn’t know that dramatically telling him off would likely end in things being very much on fire.
Worst of all, the relatively simple matter of finding a goddamn mirror was proving difficult. Four different alleyways, he and Volterra had already checked down to no avail. The one they stood in now made Reiki groan in disgust with their tragic circumstances.
“There’s usually a good mirror around here,” he said, pacing back and forth in front of the dumpster, checking either side of it despite the abundant lack of a mirror because he felt so certain that one should have been here. “I know there’s one around Scandals, but I’d rather not go there if we can avoid it? Last thing we need right now is to find out that some a*****e kept tabs on my aura whenever I powered up to take my makeup off backstage, and now they think we’re setting Mirrorwraiths on the other performers.”
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Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:14 pm
Volterra felt like biting something. The anxiety that ne would never, ever admit that ne felt rose in the back of nis throat like bile threatening to bring friends along for the ride on the emergency escape hatch from nis body. Actually, there probably was some amount of bile involved, but if ne thought about it too long, then the emergency escape hatch would definitely (and violently) be ripped open. And that, truly, was one of the, if not the, last thing ne wanted.
"Ugh," ne said in response, shaking nis head. "I wish we had a map we could access. Like, voice activated something or other—maybe our compacts could turn into some kind of mirror compass that would point us to the nearest connected mirror. Not that would really help us, when we're leaving, but… Maybe Bélénos or Lete or Remarque would care?"
Ne sputtered nis lips a little, looking around and hating feeling helpless. "Stupid things, honestly. Be nice if we could find one more easily than this. Maybe if we break into Target and hit the dressing rooms, one of those will be a connected mirror, hah."
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Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:14 pm
“All mirrors are connected to Mirrorspace, actually,” Reiki pointed out, still looking around for the one that he thought would have been here. Motioning for Volterra to follow him, he headed deeper into the alley. “A lot of reflective surfaces that we don’t always necessarily think of as mirrors, too. Up on Astraya, that one time? I mirror-walked through a surface that wasn’t really a mirror and used it to get into an otherwise very blocked-off area.”
Where he had subsequently tried to help that Jeff Goldblum knockoff-looking ******** who’d been extremely rude to him for existing while Chaos. But that wasn’t the central point, right now. So, Reiki mentally filed it away to ruminate on later.
“The big thing we need to look for is something that’s big enough for us to walk through,” he explained with a small sigh. Down closer toward another dumpster, he spotted something leaning against the brick wall, covered with a black sheet. Oh, that did look promising. Leading Volterra toward it, Reiki added, “None of which is to say that nobody could use a map of mirrors, or a compass in the compact, since I’m pretty sure that everyone in the Court would benefit from that? But I don’t know how you’d go about making it—especially since the Court’s Mauvians are technically the Negaverse’s, they just work with the Court anyway? At least you wouldn’t need to filter anything, as long as the mirrors are big enough.…”
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Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:15 pm
Volterra nodded. Hmm… Well, it wasn't nis problem to solve, anymore. Not that ne had really been trying. If nis cousin really wanted to try to solve this problem for a bunch of people that they were leaving behind, then he could. The longer this went on, the more jittery ne got—though ne would never admit nis nerves. Ne couldn't trust anyone.
Except, ne supposed, nis cousin. Nis sibling. Sighing, ne rubbed nis hands over nis face and pressed hard on nis eyes. The starbursts exploded, swirls of color alongside that long, familiar pain that helped to distract nem from anything that might make nem just run away and never return.
"Well…" Ne sighed again, going up to the now-obvious mirror that Muri was headed towards. Ne pulled off the cloth—yup. Big mirror. One they could walk through. <******** hell, why did seeing it make nem even more nervous?
"Muri…" No, no, why was nis voice shaking?? "Muri, promise me you'll walk out of there alive. Please. Once we get in, get through, and start dealing with this whole stupid thing to escape, that you won't give up."
Tell me so I don't give up, either. I'm doing it for you. I can't do it if I don't know if you'll be there by the time I'm done. All the words ne wanted to say stuck in nis throat, clawing at nis insides, begging to be freed, but nis mouth refused to open, the air refused to move through nis vocal cords and start making all the noises that meant so much. That meant ne cared. That meant they would do this together and win and go home, changed irrevocably, but still Haruhi and Reiki, in all the ways that mattered, even if they'd be Kyoya and Kiyoshi, instead.
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Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:15 pm
As Volterra unmasked the mirror, Reiki sighed in relief. Thank ********, they didn’t need to look any further for their entrance into Mirrorspace. He was ready to go, and turned back to reach for Volterra’s hand……only to pause when he saw Volterra looking so shaken. Hearing Volterra sound so tense and nervous, he let his hand drop.
Making the promise would be easy, but Reiki took a deep breath first.
Nodding, he looked Volterra in the eye. “I promise that I won’t give up,” he said. “We’re going to go in there together; I’ll slow us down enough to reach Mirrorspace. Then, we need to split up. The labyrinth in there can’t give both of us what we want if we’re together. For all we know, Mirrorspace has our Mirrorseals stored in completely different places. But we’ll go off in our own directions, and we’ll focus on how much we want those copies……how much we want to leave. Then, whatever Mirrorspace throws at us to trick us into staying, we’re smarter than that. We’ll tell it to go ******** itself, and then we’ll meet up back at North End Park.”
He gently ruffled his fingers through his bangs. “If you get there before I do? Just follow the two White Moon Eternal auras. Kerberos and Ida are sitting at his bench. They’re both pretty distinctive, and they’ll help you stay safe until I get there.”
Reiki didn’t want this process to take too long, but at the same time, he perfectly knew his own penchant for drama. Not preparing for the chance of him taking way too long to get this done………felt kinda irresponsible, like in the extreme.
Holding out his hand for Volterra again, he gave nem a small, hopeful smile. “I’ll come back in one piece, ‘Terra. And so will you. If you’re ready?”
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Posted: Thu Apr 11, 2024 1:15 pm
Volterra sighed in great relief, taking Muri's hand once more. It was reassuring to hear. All of it. So ne squeezed back.
"Thank you. I'm ready."
Here goes nothing, ne thought, as they stepped through.
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