walktodeath | Week 1, Thursday

[Raven makes a humming noise, examining the circus itself before them. It's not quite an agreement but it's close.]

...There's been no real incident so far.

[She'd like it if nobody died but... she's not an optimist.]

We're only here for another week. They'll get more pushy about it.

I imagine so... and we seem to have some quite volatile people among us, which makes it surprising that nobody complied yet.

[ Well, to be fair to Dimitri he seemed outraged at the idea of killing anybody on command, but he's not the only suspect. ]

Maybe they really suck at picking their offers to us?

I don't know. Their offer to me is pretty significant.

[It's a recent wound that's been allowed to fester since she came here.]

I'm just used to rejecting deals with the devil. I know how that goes.

You certainly seem to have lived a colorful life before coming here.

[ Tokiko can't imagine what was going on in Raven's world, really. She doesn't even watch enough TV to say with confidence that it sounds 'like a TV show'. ]

The people we need to be wary off are probably the one's with nothing to lose and everything to gain. Whoever that applies to.

...Doesn't that apply to both of us?

[She definitely has nothing to lose. Everything to gain is a bit... well.]

I think when you really have nothing to lose, you don't care as much about gaining. But.

Dimitri's probably someone to be wary of. [Just. In general.]

[ Tokiko laughs, both at the mention of Dimitri (deserved) and at the assessment of others. ]

Well, I have nothing to lose and nothing to gain for sure - but usually my own person is a poor frame of reference for how other people feel.

I imagine some may be desperate.

...I think desperation comes when you've still got something to lose, something you're afraid of losing.

[She sighs.]

I've got nothing. I can't even go home after this.

[ Oh. ]

I never thought I'd be saying this to somebody, but we're way too alike, aren't we?

[ And surely the resemblances will end, surely there will come a time very soon when they cannot understand one another at all, but... ah. This is not like being accepted, not quite. It's a different joy. ]

Having nothing is its own kind of freedom though. Now we can make our choices entirely for ourselves, not bound to anybody or anything.

...Probably. It's not something I'd wish on anybody.

[It's not an unfamiliar sentiment for her. At least not as much. She's determined, in her own way, to continue viewing others with compassion, even when it's hard.

But Tokiko's next statement gets a pained smile.]

Not living bound to anyone or anything... It's a weird concept for me to grasp. It's what my father wanted, so he could take control of me. Even if I was too happy or too sad or too angry...

...But he's gone now, and I didn't even have to die to stop him.

[ That's a very different way of relating to one's father than Tokiko has - to her, her father was the most precious. His control was welcome, expected, desired.

Raven's father clearly was not the same mild mannered type of man as Tokimune Kurosu though. ]

If it left you in a state to be controlled then you were still bound - to him. But that doesn't apply to you anymore. I think that makes this a different kind of freedom, no?

It meant I had to practice complete self control, to temper all my emotions so that I wouldn't lose myself to him.

It's just... overwhelming. To not have him there. [It should be a relief but... when you've spent your entire life telling yourself that every feeling you have is something to be ashamed of...]

[ Ah, that is the opposite of what Tokiko just imagined, because she'd been thinking in too mundane terms. Picturing a father who wants to suppress her feelings so she'd obey him, not... whatever this is alluding to. Raven definitely has the more colorful life. ]

This... probably doesn't relate, but I've also fashioned my life around my father. He adopted me at a young age and gave me all that I had, so I felt my place in life was to match his expectations.

Now with him gone, I can decide for myself what I want to do. I'm... finding there isn't much at all.

Do you want something for yourself?

[It's almost the polar opposite of her situation, but she looks at Tokiko thoughtfully. Shaping yourself to imitate your father or shaping yourself to spite your father... the result is the same, in the end.]

...A friend of mine did the same thing. Shaped himself after the man who adopted him. He found it... suffocating, after a while. But even when he tried to escape that shadow, he still acted the same way.

I don't know. I wanted... to spend my life with my friends. But they're all gone. I spent most of my life carefully not wanting anything at all. It'll take some getting used to.

If I survive this game, anyway.

[ This is... a lot to hear, not because it's so out there but because it's so familiar. Tokiko's only wish had been to live with Natsuki, forever. That had been her career goal, her everything. Simply spending time at the side of the girl who accepted her and made her laugh... but Natsuki is gone.

And Tokiko has no desires of her own.

The only difference is that to Tokiko, not wanting anything came easily. It's nothing she ever had to be particularly careful about - simply responding to the world around her had always been enough. ]

Our lives are so unbelievably different that I am starting to find it surreal how much our current situation has in common.

[She's always known her life to be... unique. Something out of a fairy tale or a horror novel. A cautionary tale about why you shouldn't play around with the occult haphazardly, or else you'll create the greatest deformity to walk the Earth.

Seeing someone haunted by a similar loneliness is... odd.]

...I suspect we've both had our own turns at being the sole survivor, right?

Indeed.

I suspect the scale of my losses is a little smaller than yours but it still encompasses everyone I was close to - my entire large family and my only friend.

[ Not that she's that torn up about most of her family. They were hardly family to begin with, given Tokiko had never been able to be honest to them until very recently. It was a difficult bond at best. ]

I guess it depends on what you consider, well, "my loss."

[They lost all of human society beyond fringe remnants driven underground or corporations who sold out to Darkseid like LexCorp.

But it's not like the human race was... hers to lose. Not like it was Clark's.]

I lost my friends, my mother, and my home. Well, I lost my home twice. Once to my father, once to another monster.

Edited 2022-08-25 21:39 (UTC)

My condolences.

[ She tries out how that feels to say, but then she just breaks into a smile. ]

That just sounds weird. You and I are past that kind of platitude.

I always wonder why people say it to begin with.

[She returns the smile with a genuine one of her own. Which is more of a rarity. It's not like she's ever been one to smile over her trauma, that's more Beast Boy's deal, but there is a comfort in finding something amusing in the morbid nature of their conversation.]

[ That execution was... something. Not nearly as gruesome as Tokiko had expected, but certainly more unsettling. The whatever-the-fuck with Jester just being an added bonus.

With the situation changed as is now, she thinks she should touch base with the people she actually gets along with - 'trust' would be a big word.

In lack of ways to knock on a tent, she runs her fingernails over Raven's tent flap... ]

It's Tokiko. Do you have some time?

[Raven hung back and tried not to watch the execution, and left almost immediately as soon as it was over.

Simon's words still rung in her head. She calls out from inside.]

...Come in.

[ Tokiko will do just that. She's smiling as usual, but by this point that will hardly come as a surprise anymore. ]

How are you feeling?

[Raven is sat, cross-legged on the bed. Her eyes flicker open as Tokiko steps inside, and her mouth twists slightly into a grimace.]

Not sure how to feel, really.

...I didn't like Simon or Zelos. I don't know if I should feel guilty about their deaths.

For what it's worth, I don't think you should.

[ Tokiko helps herself to a chair so she can sit across from Raven - she's not sure they're really close enough that she could join her on the bed, so this seems adequate enough. ]

It's the rules of this place that forced this to happen. I can't determine something so grand as to whether or not even Keyes deserved death, but I can say that we acted in our best conscience. What we did was what we felt we had to do at the moment.

Even if you voted for Wilder, it is not you who truly condemned him.

...I think the weird part is... well, I don't. Part of me even blames Zelos. He wouldn't let me use my power on him and then we had no way...

[This confession comes with a degree of shame, knowing it's not really fair, but she's less inclined to hide it in front of Tokiko for whatever reason.]

I feel guiltier that there wasn't anything we could do about Diluc and Fujino.

...I liked them.

Yes, me too. Fujino-san was pleasant to talk to and Diluc-san gave his honest consideration to me when I was discussing the matters of my soul. We were nothing but passing acquaintances, but I would have liked to speak to them more.

[ She pauses for a moment. ]

You tried something, right? With Fujino-san?

[Ah. That.]

...Yeah. It was stupid. [She sighs.]

I tried to bring her back. Using my powers.

[ .... ]

Did you ever do that before?

Edited 2022-08-22 00:45 (UTC)

...Only once.

[And she's not sure it ended up mattering in the end.]

A boy. One of my only living friends. And... one that I had feelings for.

[ That sounds like a movie plotline to Tokiko... but it was real for Raven. Multiple realities are weird. ]

Did he... appreciate it?

[It was extremely cliche, but yep, it happened.

She pauses at the question, considering. Tokiko is probably expecting a short answer as to whether or not death is kinder or not and Raven's not even sure. She's asked the same so many times.]

...I think when I met him... if it had happened around then, he wouldn't have. He was convinced he deserved it, that he was only playing pretend at being good, and that it would be easier for the world and the people he loved if he died. [It's part of why they both understood each-other, and her tone probably indicates this. That it's a sentiment she understands.]

But by the time he did, I think... he'd found things he wanted to live for, even for just a little while longer.

[ That is indeed an answer that is a bit more detailed than she was expecting or maybe even hoping for. It gives her something to chew on for a bit.

... things really were so much easier before magic and souls and multiple worlds were introduced to her world-view. ]

Doesn't that just mean he died a better death, not having wasted his life and having found fulfillment? Not that he should have wanted to die or that death is a good thing, but... having found those things, he was finally living every day to the fullest and appreciating how precious life is.

[It's... wrong. That statement in some way bothers Raven the slightest bit. The idea that happiness makes death easier...]

...I wouldn't say any of us were living life to the fullest.

The planet was ruined beyond repair, most of our friends were dead, his brother went mad from an attempt at saving his life, his father had been turned into the puppet of the man responsible for all of our suffering. He just wanted to live to protect what was left.

So did I. It just... took me longer to realize there was anything left to fight for.

[ That makes Tokiko go quiet. She's no good at relating to others. This is like a story in a book and even there she struggles at understanding the motivations of individual characters. There is nothing she has to draw on in her own experiences that makes any of this easier to contextualize.

Except death, of course. Raven has said it before that all her friends were dead. Death is the common ground, always, for everyone. ]

What did you fight for, in the end? What was the thing that was left?

[She can tell that Tokiko is struggling with what she's saying. But, it's important to her, and she hopes she can help by sharing it. She spent so much of her life feeling like she was better off dead. She's still not sure she believes she deserves to live. And yet...]

...The idea that even despite everything we've lost, we could create a future worth living in. And prevent this from ever happening again.

[ This feels extremely abstract to Tokiko. She's a callous person after all - ideals like justice and freedom mean little to her, when her immediate environment is so much more important. She doesn't like going against the wishes of those around her, but something so grandiose as happiness for others, for strangers... Tokiko can tell it is 'right' to think this way and she can be glad for Raven to have found this resolve, but to be inspired herself is a difficult feat.

Still, she smiles. ]

You're truly a good person, despite all adversity.

I'm not. [It's fast. Instant, really. Like it's an argument she's used to having.]

I just wanted to live in that world for myself. [...] Making sure it didn't repeat... that was Clark's motivation. He was the one who found me and convinced me. I think, deep down, I just wanted revenge. I know my father did.

I think, if I was a good person, I wouldn't have chosen to live knowing the threat my life meant for everyone around me. [And now she's the last one standing, or at least the last one who remembers. Funny how that works.]

[ That is more comprehensible again, for better or for worse. ]

Even knowing people will keep dying around you, you choose to live for yourself?

[ A clarification after a moment of pause: ] I don't mean this in the altruistic 'oh no, you will get people killed' way. I, too, would keep on living for myself as long as I saw my own happiness on that path.

...

I tried to end it. Once.

[She looks down at her feet as she talks about it. Even now, when none of it matters at the end of the world, she's not sure if she regrets being unable to go through with it or the attempt.]

...I wanted to believe that I could live in the world and be something other than a curse on the world. My friends wanted that for me too, but after they died...

Hm... I might be more selfish than that.

[ Which is an odd thing to say given how much, just how much of her life has been dedicated to nothing but pleasing her father - and how much she would have liked to keep going like that, forever a being of gratitude. If only he hadn't asked something else of her. ]

I wanted to live with Natsuki for the rest of my days - but Natsuki is dead. And if I am truly cursed, then there is a high likelihood that my curse killed her.

I don't want to replace her. She's given me everything I could possibly want. She made me happy. But even if I were to go on and make connections of different kinds, find different people... I would be dooming them over and over.

So honestly, I'd rather vanish from this world by my own choice and for my own happiness than try to be a boon to a reality in which I cannot have anybody to myself.

[Hmmm. She doesn't think that makes Tokiko a worse person at all, mainly because her own guilt won't allow her to accept the idea. There's always been a feeling for her, that every moral victory she wins over her father, proving herself to be something more than what he wanted her to be, was less her own victory and more a victory of the hands that made her.

It would be so easy to just embrace her bestial nature, to kill and conquer and to join her father's side in ruling the world. Or it would have been. But she didn't, because there were others there to teach her that there were better ways.]

...I understand that.

It's not fair that those are the choices we're given though, is it?

It isn't.

[ 'It isn't fair' is the kind of thing Natsuki would have said. Natsuki, who would always get upset on Tokiko's behalf about realities that Tokiko herself had readily accepted as-is.

Looking at her own condition on somebody else, Tokiko can understand it at least a little bit, that idea of 'fairness'. ]

But I think it's pointless to lament it when that won't change a thing anyway.

[ .... ]

What are you going to do, after all this?

I try not to think about what is and isn't fair, generally. It'd drive me mad otherwise.

[But still. It needed saying. And maybe now she can feel the sheer amount of anger she's kept buried inside of her at her father and even her mother for being stupid enough to try an occult ritual she didn't understand.

Tokiko's right. It doesn't mean a damn thing, what is and isn't fair.]

...I don't know. I can't go home.

Will you?

[ Tokiko shakes her head decisively. She's got nothing waiting for her at home except the family fortune (useful, but not compelling on its own) and possibly jail time (extremely not compelling). ]

Definitely not. Though I haven't decided what to do either - if going anywhere is worth it at all, what I will do in that place...

Week 1, Thursday

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NOW WITH BONUS WEEK 1 SUNDAY

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here comes the suicidal ideation cws

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suicidal ideation cw

cw for past suicide attempts

cw suicidal ideation

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