Week 1, Thursday

[walktodeath]

[ It's been a remarkably non-bloody week, for what has been announced on Monday. Tokiko keeps waiting for somebody to die and it's... nothing. Ironically, Murder Circus might be the least death she has seen in quite a bit. She doesn't know what to do with it.

She doesn't know what to do with herself either. She's almost tempted to start learning circus tricks at this rate, just to have something to do.

But there's Raven, looking like she equally has nothing to do. Talking to Raven is better than circus tricks. ]

I'm surprised we're all still alive.

[ What a greeting. ]

Comments

[azaroth]

[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.

[walktodeath]

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?

[azaroth]

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.

[walktodeath]

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.

[azaroth]

...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.]

[walktodeath]

[ 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.

[azaroth]

...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.

[walktodeath]

[ 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.

[azaroth]

...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.

[walktodeath]

[ 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?

[azaroth]

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...]

[walktodeath]

[ 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?

[azaroth]

[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.

[walktodeath]

[ 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.

[azaroth]

[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?

[walktodeath]

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. ]

[azaroth]

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.

[walktodeath]

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.

[azaroth]

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.]