exsiliumlogs | [People to See/Things to do]

Entry tags:

[People to See/Things to do]

Date: The afternoon of the 8th; the evening of the 9th; throughout the day of the 11th
Location: Apartment 608 x2 combo; various shops and streets throughout Exsilium
Characters: Asch, Kido, and Elliot; two redheads and a colonel; and then, finally, Asch and whoever decides to hassle him.
Summary: An evening of cooking and recipe exchanges, as promised, plus maybe some roommate interference; Jade actually explains something; and then one redhead out on the town, celebrating being alive... sort of. You know, in the most tsunnish way possible.
Warnings: Talk of death possible in the open prompt, and certain in the second one.

Closed to Kido and Elliot -

[The kitchen is as clean as he can make it in an hour or two - really, Asch should have made Elliot learn to mop, but that's a lesson in self-sufficiency for another day. For right now, it's good enough for having a guest over, especially one who knows how inadequate Elliot is when it comes to housekeeping. Maybe the idiot will stick around long enough to learn a thing or two about cooking.

When he goes to open the door, his sleeves are uncharacteristically pushed up past his elbows, revealing a couple of scars across the back of his right hand and forearm. He's also very nearly smiling.]

Come on in.

[No standing on ceremony here; he doesn't wait for a reply before heading back towards the kitchen, although he does stop long enough to glance at the kitten curled up on the couch, fast asleep.]

Closed to Jade and Luke -

[He'd been expecting Jade to come calling after that encounter in the streets, and on some level Asch was waiting for it. He's still not exactly ready to answer the door when it's knocked on, with a bit of flour on his shirt and the kitchen still only half-cleaned up. His hair is pulled back with one of the elastic hairbands he'd picked up in the town, although a few strands of his bangs are falling into his face when he opens the door. His slightly frazzled expression becomes more serious when he sees the man standing in front of his door, and Asch winds up leaving a few streaks of flour across his forehead as he pushes his hair back in an attempt to make himself a little more presentable.]

Jade. It's about time. Mind the cat.

[The aforementioned ball of white fluff peeks around from behind Asch's ankle, looking curiously up at Jade with two differently colored eyes. Asch nudges her away from the door with one heel before stepping back to let Jade inside, gesturing towards the standard set-up of couch and chairs in the living room.]

I'll make some tea, if you can give me a few minutes.

[A pause, as he turns back to the kitchen.]

...If you want to bring Luke over, just bang on the wall. I already told him what I know.

[That the fonons of his body were leaving for his replica's - Asch's words aren't entirely free of resentment, but he manages to hide it by focusing on clearing enough space on the stove for a kettle. The kitten follows him there, winding around his ankles as he slides a few cookies off a cooling rack into a plastic container.]

Open -

[Someone got their obligations done early this morning, and seems to have taken a day on the town - Asch can be found poking through any number of the smaller shops today, but it seems like whatever he's looking for, he's not having much luck finding it. His search seems to be mostly through the more expensive jewelry in the antiques stores; it's the more old-fashioned gold that catches his eye, not the brightly colored plastics, although none of it seems to catch his attention longer than a few moments, anyway.

Later, he can be found inside a small bakery, looking over an assortment of cakes, pies, and other sweet things. For the most part, he seems to be making faces at them, apparently finding them all too sweet for his liking. Eventually, he points out a fruit tart, and once the baker has put it in a nice little box for him, he steps back out into the rain, settling down to one of the smaller cafe tables under a cover nearby to eat. There's a second chair there that he doesn't seem to be paying any attention to...

Finally, later in the evening, he's slipping around the back alleys of the city, a bit farther out from the Hold. For the most part, he ignores the buildings that are obviously occupied; instead, his attention is on the ones that don't have anyone living in them, most of which are in sore need of fixing up. He passes, and then comes back to, what seems to have been a restaurant of some kind in years past - the windows are broken through, however, and even from the outside the damage of a large fire is obvious. Asch doesn't look like he particularly cares, though - when he can't yank the boards from the door easily, he goes in through one of the windows instead, his boots crunching on broken glass.]

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[Luke doesn't usually take fon calls when he's napping, but a sharp pain jerks him right out of a vague, summer-tinted dream about the manor and right back into reality. He bolts upward on the couch and immediately regrets it, overcome with dizziness and everything else.]

Asch? What's...

[Ow. Fuck ow. Okay, something about Jade? He runs his hands through his hair to try and flatten it some, then hurriedly slips on his coat and goes next door. Due to the difficulties of a recent addition to his apartment, Luke has grown accustomed to slipping into Asch's so that he can use the facilities. It's unlocked for that reason. Unless Asch wants to deal with a shark-toothed alien and all.

Luke shuts the door behind him, expression tentative and worried.]

What's going on?

[Jade stay silent ignoring both Asch and the cat. Not deliberately or consciously; simply because he can neither completely shut down nor fully process the situation. It is one thing to discuss theory with Dist and resolve that a friend will be lost forever. It is an entirely different thing to say this to Asch and Luke, surviving past their deaths.]

Luke. If you have a moment, I'd like to discuss a technical matter relevant to both you and Asch.

[Asch only barely looks up when Luke enters, kind of half-absently waving Luke towards a seat. The more serious Jade acts, the more you should be worried; even barely knowing the man, Asch knows that much. Jade has been all business since the moment he arrived, therefore, things were as serious as they could possibly get.

As though it wasn't a matter of life and death before, anyway.

The kitten soon grows bored of being ignored by Jade, and jumps onto the couch and then Asch's lap instead. He doesn't pay too much attention to her, either.]

[Luke wrings his hands for a moment, glancing between Jade and Asch like the answers will become apparent immediately. He knows Jade when he gets serious. There's not even a terrible joke to help the mood, and that makes him uncomfortable.]

... Okay.

[He's not sure what this could be about. Maybe it's about the difference in timelines, or the whole... resurrecting the dead thing. He won't know until he sits down. So, despite the hummingbird-beating of his heart, he takes a seat at the other end of the couch, and keeps his hands and knees to himself.]

Is this about the Initiative bringing me back?

Not precisely.

[He can't stop himself from noticing the way his mood has, in its way, affected each of them. He is sorry for that. He has no desire to cause pain to either of these boys.

But then, isn't that what he is about to do? There is something truly cruel in what he is about to say to them. If they were not both here, if there were no chance of it affecting them, then he would have held his tongue. It's tempting to do so even now.

Yet he must speak.

Jade sighs, shutting his eyes, as if tired of all this. When he opens his eyes and speaks, it is calmly, as if this were any other explanation. And yet he cannot quite manage dispassion.]

I understand that Asch has shared the details of his own fonon separation. Spinoza's explanation of the Big Bang, however, was misleading when translated into laymen's terms. Asch, you misunderstood him.

[Was he trying avoid saying it? How . . . pointless. He shouldn't put them through that agony.]

The proposed theory for the Big Bang is that, when perfect isofons come into contact, the physical and fonic strength of the original decreases, as Spinoza said.

However, the original does not die at the expense of the replica. Once the Big Bang begins, the original's fonons are drawn to the replica, causing the decrease in strength, until the original finally dies. At that point, the original will be reconstructed from the replica. The original survives. Only the replica's memories remain.

Edited 2013-04-10 04:02 (UTC)

[It takes a moment to process. Asch sits there, and he's so still it's like he's not even breathing. He... wasn't going to die? He was going to...

His eyes slide towards Luke, taking the replica in like it's the first time. The fonons going to Luke, collecting in his replica's body -

His voice is quiet, almost hesitant, which is unusual considering how normally blunt and to the point he is.]

So what you're saying is, I would have died, and woken up in his body?

[That's... a lot of information at once. Luke is still trying to process that conversation, the one they had about fonon separation, when Jade sweeps into an explanation of perfect isofons and their fates. And all at once, nothing seems to make sense anymore.

Luke is dead. He doesn't have a body. Is Asch-- is Asch supposed to have his body? Is that...

He looks at his own hands.

Asch is already asking the most obvious question, so Luke adds another.]

What do you mean by the replica's memories?

[His voice sounds weak and shaky even to his own ears. Worse than Asch's. He's already dead, but he hasn't quite dealt with it.]

Yes, Asch. That's correct.

[Jade sets his attention only on words, facts, figures. Everything else—everything else is impossible.]

As to your question, Luke, the original would retain its own memories but would also have those of its replica.

[...His hands, already balled up into fists, clench. A vicious thought worms into his head - that's why Jade had allowed Luke to go to the Tower of Rem. Not because Asch, as the original, was the more useful; Asch would have been the survivor either way. But it's exactly the kind of mercy Jade would give, to let Luke die as himself.

He can't blame the man. He feels a bit ill.]

So... That's that, then.

[It's just something to say, because he feels like he should say something. He doesn't want Luke's memories, doesn't want the replica's left-behind feelings and thoughts crowding in on his own; he gets enough of that through their connection, but that he has control over, that he can handle.]

Is there any way to stop it, once it's begun?

[His voice isn't hopeful.]

[Luke doesn't need to ask if it's true. If Jade thought he should tell both of them, together, then it's as true as true gets.

He isn't sure how to feel. He looks at his hands as if they aren't familiar to him. There isn't a hair out of place on Jade, but somehow he doesn't make sense either. None of this makes any sense, and grasping it is as futile as trying to squeeze sand.

In the hollow space left by his shock, Luke can only process one thing.]

But-- Asch and I are different. You can't just put our memories together. [He just can't see it. Can't imagine it. Yet another thing about this world that doesn't make sense.] My memories are mine. All my stupid mistakes and all the things I loved...

Those memories are all I have, and you're saying-- you're saying he'll have to bear that weight for the rest of his life? In my body?!

If only one of us can come back, at least let him be himself!

[Jade loathes the hopelessness in Asch's voice. He cannot stand the rising emotion in Luke's. But of course, those voices are the same.

He answers Luke first.]

That is simply the science.

[Science does not have compassion any more than it has cruelty. Just as he told Kido. It merely is.

Jade touches his fingers to his glasses.]

There is no way known. The second pair of isofons confirmed the theory, but your case has a number of variables that throw the theory into uncertainty. [He tells them this as much like a report as he can manage, but Jade knows that much of the uncertainty is his own desire. He wants them to be different. He wants to be wrong.] Asch's sword appears to be able to assist him, potentially postponing the event indefinitely. While we are here, I am willing to research a more permanent solution, however low the odds.

[Jade had accepted that fate cannot be changed. The dead cannot be brought back to life. All things come to an end.

The Initiative have taken that away. If death is not allowed, then Jade will take every measure to ensure that Asch and Luke can have the lives they deserve.]

Edited 2013-04-10 09:28 (UTC)

[More so than Jade, Asch has turned his attention to Luke, a startled expression on his face. He doesn't know what to think of Luke's outburst, other than that Luke's declaration of caring was apparently genuine. The problem is that Asch has lived for years without thinking that he was a person that anyone would care about -

He's as shocked by this as he is by the rest of the conversation. Finally, his expression conflicted, he looks back at Jade.]

...I'll assist in any way I can.

[Even if it isn't a final death, he has no desire for Luke's body, Luke's memories. His own memories are painful enough; he doesn't need to pile on what his replica remembers, Akzeriuth and Van and his own death from that other point on the timeline. He has enough guilt, without being the killer of the replica that everyone chose over him.]

[Luke's fingers tighten in the fabric of his coat until they turn as bone white as the rest of it. Jade isn't exactly telling them to give up hope that they might come back. In fact, it might even be a good thing that Asch-- at least Asch will return. Asch will live on.

But he's not going to be living as himself. Luke doesn't want that. He wouldn't want to live with Asch's burden in the form of memories, so why would Asch want his? Luke's already taken so many lives... The weight is his alone. He's always known.

He simmers somewhat at Jade's emotionless statement. It would be easier if he could stand being angry at him, angry at being so cold. But that, too, isn't something he wants. So he sits here, trembling and looking at the floor, and wondering if anything can really be done.]

... There's more than one path to the future. [His voice is still shaky at the edges, but his expression is hard.] We can't change what's already happened, but... we have a lot of resources here. Someone might be able to help.

We should try.

Thank you both.

[Jade would not quite call it a relief, but some of what weighed on him is gone, or lesser now. He can focus on protecting these two boys instead of striking them in the face with the coldness of science.]

I want you both to tell me if you notice anything unusual. Asch, you're already aware of the signs. Luke, your case has advanced significantly, but please inform me if you notice any unexpected increase in strength or anything similar.

I'll keep you updated.

[He assumes, of course, that Jade means "anything that is unusual for you" because it's not like their lives are ever typical human fare. Of course, the whole thing is complicated a bit by the fact that the Initiative's weapons are supposed to make them stronger - Asch's gaze slides to the Sword of Lorelei that's propped near the door.

After a moment, he lifts the forgotten kitten from his lap and deposits her next to Luke, standing up to fetch the weapon and lay it across the table in front of Jade.]

Here. You may as well examine this while we're all here.

[He lets out a breath he didn't know he was holding.] ... Okay.

[When Asch gets up, Luke takes this opportunity to steal the kitten for his own lap, lavishing much-needed attention on little Arietta. Petting a cat doesn't exactly distract him from the matter at hand, but it makes him feel calmer somehow. He eyes the Sword of Lorelei, having held it and fought with it before coming here, and he's not exactly eager to touch it again.

It's always been Asch's. And it's always been a reminder.]

I don't have the Jewel anymore.

[Jade looks over the sword. He notices nothing immediately different about it, but he takes a moment longer to scrutinize it.

No, nothing. He glances up at Luke. And he smiles.]

Luke. What did I tell you about leaving it to the servants to keep track of your things?

[He offers the sword back to Asch.] Nothing is immediately apparent. I can look at it in more detail when I have better equipment, if you wish.

[Oh, look, Jade's joking again. That's a weird kind of relief. Asch almost smiles, although it's more a reaction of "okay, I can relax now" than any kind of humour.]

Any time.

[Being helpful to Jade in this situation ultimately helps him, after all. Asch takes the weapon and walks over to put it back in its place by the door.

In Luke's lap, Arietta headbutts his hand a bit for more pettings.]

[He looks surprised at the smile, and then a bit abashed.]

It's in the sword, right where I left it. [Jeez, Jade. You're a douche. But teasing Luke must mean things are going to get better, maybe. Or at least better before they get worse.

He sighs softly and itches beneath the kitten's chin. Any moment now, he's sure he's gonna get kicked out.]

[Teenagers slightly calmed by Jade's horrible attitude (he hopes), Jade pushes himself to his feet.]

If you two have no further questions?

What, not going to stay for tea after all that?

[That's pretty rude, Jade. He put that pot on special for you.]

Fine, get out of here.

[Bugface returns.]

Not right now.

[Luke makes no move to leave immediately. He's... trying to wrap his head around all this. So he'll just harass the kitten instead.]

[Jade stops and smiles. It's a sly expression. Is it them or himself that he comforts with that normality?]

Asch. I had no idea you were that welcoming of my company. Of course I'll stay for tea.

You're welcome to stay.

[That to Jade - Asch turns on Luke and the kitten, jerking his thumb towards the door.]

You can get out.

[Luke looks a little flabbergasted. Then again, this is Asch. So he gets up, kitten and all, and looks like he's going to take the kitten too.]

sorry about the delay, had a lot of shit to do today apparently

nonsense your tag is PERFECTLY TIMED for just as I got to my Jadetags <3

Perfect timing all around then

EXCEPT IT'S RAID NIGHT

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