[Week 2] Late late late evening 321

[breakaleginhalf]

[The voice that chimes in on the network is tired, and aching, and a whole host of other things Gil is very obviously holding back only tenuously.]

Someone needs... can someone go check on Matthew. Please. Liminal Space. He's...

[A long silence.]

...I dunno if he's-- he's not cavosophia. He's not. [It almost sounds more like he's reassuring himself.] But I-- ...Ghalib hurt him.

Comments

[desperate_times_right]

You know I can’t exactly judge you over nightmare overlays anyway.

It’s just that like, she’s gonna die, you know? What’s left of her. And it’s going to be because of me. Either I’m controlling her and get her killed or she goes catatonic again when I leave here and they fucking ... mercy kill her or whatever. This is all she’s got left and I’ve got to make it count.

[breakaleginhalf]

Dude, it is not your fucking fault. You're not the one that was like, hey, here's a great idea, let's rip out someone's psyche and see what happens! Doesn't matter if there's nothing there to fill it, no one cared about her anyway!

[The self-loathing is very, very real.]

...you just got stuck in it. ['Because of me.']

[desperate_times_right]

You didn’t choose this either, you know.

[breakaleginhalf]

What can I say, I'm used to being the bad guy.

[Not that this is the usual way it played out for him. He was supposed to be the Monster, not the Villain.]

[desperate_times_right]

Listen, we know whose fault it is, what happened to Hana. And we know whose fault it is that we’re experiencing this shit at all.

If I didn’t feel responsible for the rest of this woman’s life I’d want to strike too.

[breakaleginhalf]

[The huff he gives almost sounds amused.] Right?

I can see why they did the first time, jesus fucking christ. Everything about this is the worst.

[desperate_times_right]

It sounds like this god king was like your guy but worse.

[breakaleginhalf]

What d'you expect, he was my great grandfather.

[desperate_times_right]

Hey, mine had decent parents and she still turned out like this.

[breakaleginhalf]

Yours didn't inherit insanity. Grandpa was like, obsessed with telling Ghalib stories about what the good old days were like, when the Magnators were the ruling class and cavosophia were just, like-- he made them sound like happy little butlers. Or like. Harry Potter house elves. A whole mindless race of Dobbies.

[desperate_times_right]

... Fuck, that’s what he said, wasn’t it. ‘Charming little slaves.’ I couldn’t remember.

[breakaleginhalf]

[There is an extended, guilty silence.]

...h-he... didn't know you'd hear that.

[desperate_times_right]

If it helps any, I don’t think she did.

[breakaleginhalf]

Oh my fucking god...

[desperate_times_right]

I was just starting to wake up then, I think. It’s all kind of woozy and sideways.

[breakaleginhalf]

Fucking shit me sideways, the fucking ego--

[Wherever that sentence was going, it drops in favour of a sudden sharp focus, as Gil's attention turns back to the real world.]

--wait, hold on.

[desperate_times_right]

What - are you still in the caves? I don’t think I have to tell you there’s bandits down there!

[breakaleginhalf]

[There's no reply; whatever it is, he's focusing on more than the network.

And very quickly, turns out turns out it's not bandits.

And if Chloe tries calling him after that, she gets no response.]