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Who: The Signless (

sufferist) & The Disciple (

scribes)
Where: A shady underpass
When: Uh. Sometime. Someday. A couple days after the people in the towers are rescued?
What: The second meeting between two trolls that were once lovers and are now enemies.
Warnings: None yet.

Disciple had searched for him for a long time after their first meeting. There was little that had been answered when they talked, if anything it had only brought about more questions. With time to process everything that had happened and been said, Di had to admit she wasn't particularly proud of how she had reacted to this Signless. She had let her emotions get the best of her, and had in all likelihood jumped to believe him too quickly. Partly out of shock, and perhaps a small part out of wishful thinking.

Yet she wasn't ready to draw any conclusions just yet. While her research had yielded nothing into the possibility of the dead being brought back to life, she acknowledged how little she knew and how little she had access to. There was one way she could find out the truth about this troll, but to do that she needed to speak with him once more.

Yet despite how hard and long she looked, she had not been able to find him again.

Unlike last time in which she had been able to find some direction, her attempts yielded nothing. Regardless, she wasn't ready to give up. It was strange then how she finally came across him when she wasn't searching for hints of his whereabouts. Or less she came across him, and more took notice of him. It had almost been funny to realize that he had been following her, and Di had to wonder how long it had been going on. Had she just not noticed? If so she was woefully out practice.

Whatever he case may be, perhaps this was exactly what she needed. She paid him no mind, hoping that he had not caught onto the fact she was aware of his actions. Instead she made her way to a less populated area of the city.

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She jumped at the sudden explosion and pursed her lips, feeling her own anger begin to rise. She did not allow herself to raise her voice, however, and spoke in a low, if terse tone.

"Yes. He is dead. As is the Dolorosa. As are so many of our followers. So tell me, how is it that you think the best idea is to cast their lives aside? To work for those who made gave them such terrible ends? We're all going to die--of course we are. That is life but you make the best of what you have. You make it worthwhile, something you can be proud of, something that makes it worthwhile."

Edited 2014-05-08 22:13 (UTC)

"You have no idea what it means to die for this cause! You lived on where so many died, and you would expect them to consider it good enough!" he yells back, letting his voice rise without restraint.

At that some of Di's restraint finally did snap.

"I was ready to die for this cause! I always have been. I was supposed to, and I am ready to lay my life on the line for it and for you. Do you think I would be here if not? Do you think I would still be with the Sufferists after what they did, if not? I'm fighting back--" And there she cut herself off, face twisting as she almost said something she did not want to admit to anyone.

"I'm not going to pretend to know what it's like, but I'm not letting anyone's death be in vain." She had quieted again, feeling bleak.

"Everyone's death is in vain," he growls, unmoved by her own eruption of feeling, even though the air around them has started to glimmer with the energy of congealing emotion.

Her eyes traveled around them, wary of the strange look their surroundings had taken. She recalled the strange shield he had conjured on their previous encounter, and wondered if this was a sign he was about to do it again.

"That is not true. A death can come at the end of a long and fulfilled life. That's what we are working towards--so that every troll on Alternia can have a chance at that. As for those who died trying to achieve that...I can't speak for them, but neither would I demean those who fought for the cause by assuming that they all have regrets."

"This discussion is pointless," he hisses, evidently losing patience. He swings his hand through the air dismissively, turning away. "You have nothing to prove to me Disciple."

She didn't want it to end like this, with barely any more information than what she had started with.

She didn't want him to go.

Whether he was real or not, despite how deep some of his words stung, and despite the fact that all they were doing was arguing his presence was the only anchor she had in this life. It was only around him that she really felt awake, and that she wasn't just slogging through the "right" and moral motions and choices.

Figuring out who he was, and trying to save him from the Witch who held him tightly in her grip was the only thing that really felt real. It was the only thing that felt her own, and the only thing she had even the vaguest sense of direction with.

"Signless!" She spread her arms out to her sides, beseechingly. "When all is said and done, when you have killed all the people you've been ordered to...what will you do? What will you have gained?"

He doesn't go, for what it's worth. But he stays where he is, just staring at the ground again, with a weary sort of conviction.

"I don't know," he says, quieter now. "But it probably won't be my decision."

That he remained meant something for her, even if he continued to keep himself at a distance. Maybe she should be the one to close it. There wasn't much she could say to prolong this conversation, as much as she would like to. Words were failing her in light of how much of a failure this conversation had been thus far.

Still. There was one more thing she had to lay on the ground, so with her arms folded tightly around her she took a couple slow, but steady steps towards him.

He turns to stare at her as she approaches, but he doesn't say anything. His eyes just linger blankly on her, unthreatened and distant, but ever so faintly curious. What could she possibly be hoping for here? After everything he's said and done?

So he doesn't raise a hand to stop her, despite everything. He just stares on, almost challenging.

She meets his gaze, and for a moment is overcome with yearning. She had always been an affectionate woman, and it really hit her how much she has missed it since she awakened. It's a sensation she quickly squashes. The former Disciple takes a deep breath and begins to speak, not caring if the following words made her seem pathetic.

"I hope you find whatever it is that you need, Geshua. And I hope that you change your mind about the path you've been set on," one she still did not think was wholly of his choosing, "Regardless of whether you do your don't, my home is open to you." She had a suspicion he either already knew where she lived, or could easily find it if he chose to, considering how he had easily found Kankri and how easily he had followed her around.

"Whether it's to stay there permanently, whether it's simply to talk, or whether..." She trailed off. If he had to kill her, she at least wanted it to be head on. Perhaps it was foolish of her to continue to try and coax him to open up to her, but she had to believe there was still a part of him that cared. After all he has had to opportunities to kill her with ease now, and had taken neither.

"It will always be open."

The look he gives her is one of total incomprehension, for once more bewildered than angry. He just straight up does not know how to interpret that, and it has him visibly lost. Like something isn't connecting.

"I can't...just do that," he says.

She studies his reaction and at his words, she can't help but feel inclined to believe they may just be sincere. In the Empire mind controlling him in anyway? That is something they could easily do, but if that was the case she'd be dead right now, as would Karkat.

"Let me help you, Geshua. I don't know how much I can do, but I will do all that I can." Her eyes remained on his, pleading, voice barely above a whisper and once more she risked reach out for one of his hands to clasp it between her own.

She manages to get his hand in hers mostly because he seems too distracted and confused to respond differently. He just keeps looking at her like he's hoping it will reveal something he doesn't understand about the situation, but no answers are forthcoming. His eyes narrow.

A red glow begins to grow around their joined hands, with a faintly liquid like fluidity. His expression is thoughtful and searching - whatever he's doing it doesn't appear to be aggressive. At least not yet.

Where his eyes are confused and lost, hers and pleading and determined. She only breaks their held gaze when she feels that strange glowing liquid around her hands.

Instinct tells her that she should let go. Who knows what that substance is, what it is capable of and what it can do to her. Yet she fights those urges and holds on. She can hardly expect him to trust her, if she doesn’t show him some degree of trust and she really does want to trust him. It is well worth the risk.

"I know there is not a lot I realize about your situation, but we can find a way," she continues when met with silence, "and I promise I will never give up on doing whatever I can to help." She gives his hand a gentle squeeze, feel how familiarly warm they are. Even renewed as they are, this hand was almost as familiar to her as her own.

Emotion in liquid form. Blood. It's the particular channel of his psionic ability, and physical contact just makes it stronger. He's listening to what she's saying, but more than anything he's focusing on the feeling of her own blood, and the emotional bonds it represents.

His demeanor is strange, almost alien, as he does this. Like he's too far away mentally to fully acknowledge the intimacy of her promises. Information trickles into his awareness, communicating him in a way words just can't.

With one of his claws, he moves to cut her palm with a quick but assertive movement.

At that Di tenses a bit and just stares at their hands. It didn't hurt, it was more surprising than anything but she can feel that trickle of blood as it slides down her palm.

Now she is becoming almost as lost as he. What purpose was that supposed to have served? He didn't seem angry or put off by her words and a small cut like that wasn't going to hurt her.

She raised her eyes back up to his, questioning.

The blood contact sends a chill of clarity through his connection. He closes his eyes, shivering faintly, and then pulls his hand away from hers while pulling the aura of red liquid with it. He gathers it in his palm as a small mote of red energy.

"There are some things you cannot control," he says, his entire disposition having calmed considerably.

What the hell had that been about?

She looks at her palm, now with slightly smeared olive blood covering it and frowns.

"That's true. There are a lot of things I can't control--or anyone, for that matter. I'm not going to let that shake my resolve, and I won't allow myself to confuse what I can't and what I can change."

And even if Signless was lost to her forever, she would continue to fight not matter the impossibilities.

"Don't try to make it into a meaningless generality," he says softly, cupping his hands around the mote of psionic energy. "I'm telling you that this is not within your control. You should disappear."

She gave a small shake of her head, eyes focused on the mote in his hands, feeling tired and lost herself.

"I'm not going to give up just like that, no matter what the end may be." She did know what else to say at this point. It was a much more successful conversation than their last, even if only marginally so. Di was glad for that, but everything that had been said weighed on her.

Perhaps it was time they finally parted, hopefully, only for a while.

"But I will leave you," a pause and then she added, "thank you...for bothering. To speak to me, I mean."

"I wasn't expecting you," he says, looking up at her, as if in explanation. Both of them being alive now was likely not a factor any of them had considered.

She shook her head. "I wasn't expecting you either." And she still didn't know if she was ultimately happy for it or not.

"Do you wish I weren't here?"

It takes him a few moments to answer that, and even then it's not really an answer. He doesn't have one, and he doesn't want to think about it too hard. He doesn't have it in him.

"It doesn't matter," he says.

She had regretted the words the moment they slipped out of her mouth. As he had said the last time, this wasn't about her, or them, or what they once had. This was about him. Figuring him out, helping him from whatever situation he was in--if he even was in one, without jeopardizing the cause or Karkat's safety.

The Disciple had to accept what had been between her and Signless, whether he was dead or standing before her, was gone.

With this acknowledgment his answer surprised her all the more, and made her feel strangely better. Not good, but better. "No, I guess it doesn't." Whether either of them wanted the other here or not, the cards had been dealt and they would just have to play with them.

She dawdled for a moment, as if she still had more to say but then just gave a nod. "Until next time, I suppose." She would make certain there was a next time, and she only hoped it would be under better conditions.

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sufferist - 2014-05-15 04:08 (UTC) - Expand

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