meadowlark | @yalena.yardeen

So let all the other fellows do the thinking? The smart ones? Not including yourself?

A fair enough argument, though I’d hardly call a train ride like this one all that riveting. Still, time is what you make of it! Find yourself a drink, and there are plenty of places to sit.

Aw, you're so sweet - thinking I'm one of the smart ones. (/ω＼)･:*:･

A good detective does not draw conclusions before they've taken in all the details that they're able to dig up, you know. I've always been a fan of a closed-room mystery, even though ours is only "closed" in the sense that we can't go back on the scene. Not yet, I'd say.

I’m nothing but a flatterer.

I would argue that this makes you sound as if you simply don’t want to put in the effort to investigate until later, if not for the fact that I’m of a similar mind. So let’s just relax and enjoy the ride in the deep, deep underground. We’ve no choice.

In the meanwhile, regale me of your tales in the dream world. I’m dreadfully curious.

It's so stuffy down here, and I've been underground QUITE often in my lifetime(s).

Oh dreams. So, I saw you but it wasn't you, it was like a memory-dream version of you, which is funny because I got to thinking: could it have ACTUALLY been you, just reenacting a memory and wouldn't THAT have been funny. The boy with the golden hair wouldn't let me scold you though, which was silly of him. It was just a dream and he was so nervous. You had a stupid scarf and everything.

Lifetime(s)?

Oh, you were waltzing about Prompto’s head, then? Let me guess, in a facility where they churned out machine-like soldiers, one by one. That’s indeed a memory, though I hardly remember reenacting it this time around.

As for the scarf, you know what they say. There’s no accounting for taste.

Prompto, that's his name - makes it easier for me to find him, you're so helpful.

And no, there were a bunch of frightful looking monsters, but no soldiers. You were there, with someone else. So charming in your terrible scarf - are you a bad man, mister? He wouldn't let me go speak to you, practically leapt out of his own skin to stop me. I've felt your insides - they're familiar to me.

[ and he skips right on out about answering the "lifetime(s)" query!!! ]

Lifetime(s?)

[lmao.]

[ u would, ardyn ]

You wouldn't count "before" as one life, and "now" as a second?

Isn’t that just the usual crawl of time? The past and the present? If there’s no death to split it in twain, then two lives it is not.

Oh, I probably died somewhere in between. I was injured just before I woke up with all of my painstakingly-grown hair shaved off and a brand new belly scar. If we dreamed new realities, who's to say bringing someone back from the dead isn't easy.

It was easy for me.

But unless you know for sure, isn’t it nothing more than assumption? As far as I’m concerned, you’re still running on your first life. May the second be ever delayed.

Run into a bit of trouble before arriving in this world?

Mister, you're so pushy! Assumptions! Concerns! How cute of you to wonder after the likes of me, a simple man. I'm practically immortal as it is, but so easily the flesh yields to injury caused at the hand of another.

I upset him, very much. He was only acting out in deserved vengeance. That's all, really.

Practically immortal. Words that would have more meaning if certain talents were not so cleanly ripped away from us in this place.

You keep teasing me with an untold story. Am I still supposed to hold my tongue and my questions at a statement like that?

Mm, my talents were the result of training - at the least. I can feel them still, just muted and kept away from me upon pain of pain. Perhaps there will, one day, be a discovered work around - it's not like I'm that powerful, I don't know why they thought to lock away my core.

Anyways, if I don't tease you with all sorts of things, you'll likely grow bored of me once you've got everything you want. I've touched your skin, remember! I'm not a fool who ignores what's in front of me - though, if you want to bargain for a tale... I'll take a space in your lodgings in exchange for my untold story. Mister Ardyn Sky, I think you're a man who'll like this tale, so it's well-worth it.

I've still a bit of muscle memory born of training left in me, too. Not even they can take that away from me. But I take it you refer to more than just that?

But very well. [Well that was easy.] But you must regale me with your story first, and then I shall be the most generous host while you room with us. You do have my word on that.

How agreeable!

Now, do you want to hear it with accompanying theatrics, or just through flat text?

Always the theatrics! Don't mistake me for a man who would ever prefer otherwise.

[And that's probably the most sincere thing he's relayed all day.]

And who am I to deny?

You see, there once was a terrible villain! !!(ﾉ*ﾟДﾟ)ﾉ The worst villain that China had ever known, notorious for his deviation from the good and righteous path of traditional knowledge into the depths of the depraved and dangerous path of demonic cultivation! He was so terrible, he killed even the people he loved the most - and two of those people were the parents of the boy who would one day find out that - oh my! The villain was reincarnated into a new body, and he was traveling alongside him at times!

(#｀皿´) When the boy found this out, he was so betrayed! So wounded he was by the lies and silence, by the fact that the villain knew who he was and remained silent. What a terrible man. The worst monster of his time. So, the boy ran him through with his sword and rightfully so, wouldn't you think?

[ it sounds cute but oh, the face he makes is

a wretched one, by far ]

I lied to him, is all. I'm rather good at lying and hurting people, but didn't you catch that when we touched?

Edited 2019-04-28 00:30 (UTC)

[Ah. Well that’s not a story to be disappointed by. Part of it rings louder than the rest (notorious for his deviation from the good and righteous path), almost awakening an dead thing rotting in Ardyn’s core: empathy, a silent understanding running parallel with those who suffered a fall from grace.

Almost awakening it. But corpses are harder to reanimate when they’ve been lying motionless for so long.]

Dear me. Are you telling me that the camaraderie and friendship born from traveling together meant nothing in the face of a betrayal from a lifetime past?

As for your lies, it isn’t so bad. You’re not the only person to wrap yourself in them to harm others, and perhaps to keep yourself protected. And you won’t be the last. What you felt through our bond, mutual or otherwise, is nothing to be ashamed of. Are you ashamed?

I wasn't a very nice person, but nice people don't really accomplish anything during a time of war. Or ever.

[ camaraderie and friendship pale in comparison to the reveal that, someone you admired was the cause of your family's deaths. the betrayal that jin ling had felt... wei wuxian doesn't deny him his anger, he can't. ]

I'm not ashamed, but I don't know exactly how I feel. You're much... MORE than I was, far older and denser. I can't deny that you didn't feel like my old home, all bleak and sickly and dark things. I just don't know how to feel about finding such a strange connection with a place that helped make me into what I was, what I am?, and an old man like you, mister.

What can I say? I look very good for my age; it surprises many.

However, were you comfortable with your past, you'd be comfortable with me. None of this "I don't know exactly how I feel". No uncertainty, only embracing what once was, knowing that such darkness will always leave its mark, no matter how much time has passed.

So it's as I said. Ashamed, or at least a little embarrassed. Or maybe uncomfortable? Ah, all of the above.

Oh, don't go putting words in my mouth so soon, mister Ardyn. If you're really as old as you're suggesting, you've had much more time to settle into who and what you are - I'm so much younger ( and prettier ), why RUSH my second chance at existence into the inevitable abyss?

What is there to rush, when you're already knee-deep in it? My suggestion is that you only accept the inevitable and therefore thrive in its existence. It's what I've done, all these years. It makes life so much less of a facade.

And come now, at least admit that I'm ruggedly handsome.

I'll have to find something to trade you in exchange for some of that story. AND I'll say that your appearance is certainly eye-opening to me, in terms of what people could find attractive~~~~

Edited 2019-05-07 02:27 (UTC)

Perhaps it’s a story I’ll keep to myself, only to be shared with those who know how to properly flatter a man.

(no subject)

laozu - 2019-05-07 20:46 (UTC) - Expand