[ the quick look chanced seconds before yields a pale sight, and he has to wonder just how unheard-of such things are, to rin. he thought he would get used to the cyclical reminders of the sheer polarity of their respective worlds and yet...
the loss of colour, the wide eyes - it speaks of more reminders, and he decides that those will never abate.
a shrug, nonchalant in its obscurity, ] Dunno. Was the start of my memories. An obedient dog in a kennel.
We were all implanted with a Spine. Source of all our enhancements. [ an off handed wave to the bandage across his neck. it felt odd, revisiting old shadows again. but they were always at his feet, after all, so the recollections come nauseatingly quick. ] See, the old hag wanted to create the perfect attack dog. And breed the perfect leader -
- most of our training was against older versions of similar experiments. First time I saw the Spine go berserk was on Lily - [ bitter, bitter name and even now his voice falters at it, ] - she tore a throat clean out. It was also when we started thinking about trying to escape the facility.
It was kind of a stupid idea but. We all fell hard for it. [ perhaps, to a point he fell hardest. after all, he accepted the old hag's proposal out of some inane need to save the rest. too blind to see what his own success would mean for them all. arthur had been right, of course. once this experiment had reached a success, they would be the ones put to slaughter and oh was it bloody and messy. ] Promises were made, that sort of thing. [ they had spoken of promises once before. then, he did not want to say more and maybe this is still all he will say but. rin was sharp, he'd string the implication of failure quick. ]
I guess that brings me to my point - the Spine. The whole purpose, like I said, was to make a leader - someone to master the rest of her mindless fucking army.
See, everyone had to get out of that place. Lily...Giovanni. They wanted to see real flowers - [ he wouldn't have mentioned that, hell, he shouldn't have mentioned it but the white beneath and around him, the delicate bloom served as catalyst. he sighs. ] - and the hag put me through a big test. First time I met Dog.
Funny thing was, she gave me a choice. I could have said no. But - I thought getting stronger would save everyone else. [ he leans back now, splays fingertips through the petals and finds the cold, smooth surface of the concrete and it feels better. it felt terrible, to have words as save leaving his mouth. he hardly even recognized the intonation of his own voice because saving was the last thing he had done.
hell, even when he thought he had set everyone free - part of a mechanism to cope, at war with self loathing - that wasn't true, was it? he failed. he failed lily, and he failed giovanni. the one that was left alive and still in the clutches of that perverted bitch.
so he lives with it all, guilt and hate as sharp as teeth. ] What you saw, a few days ago? That was the Spine going berserk.
[ promises. heine speaks steadily, offering just enough scaffolding to allow rin to fill in the terrible details.
and he does fill them in. heine's reluctance - or inability - to give him a specific age. genetic experimentation. he must have been born in a lab. treated like a rat in a cage.
--he remembers, suddenly, the way he'd described heine to zack. like an albino bunny rabbit. like an albino lab rat.
more than that: heine speaks with a kind of detachment that rin can't understand. can't define as anything other than mechanical, as if he's ripped away his soft underbelly only to reveal an endoskeleton of steel. it would be in keeping with the theme, after all.
they wanted to see real flowers.
what is heine's colorless account of his past leaving out? what else has he suffered? how many times has he taken life as a child, as a tool to be fitted to the hand of a nameless evil? maybe heine's lack of embellishment means that rin comes away with a worse picture: he paints it all in that brown-red stain that had remained with him even after he'd cleaned heine's - now his own - knife in the grass. ]
Sorry.
[ the details about the "dog" - as heine calls it -- seem negligible now. if he'd been through all that heine is describing, maybe he would have walked around with his hatred apple-red in his cheeks for all the world to see. maybe he wouldn't have been as strong as heine is now, folding years and years of pain into gruff silence.
he doesn't realize he's crying until he hears the dampness in his own voice. he swipes at his cheeks, too disquieted to be embarrassed. ]
About the flowers.
[ he'll hear the rest of heine's story, but -- he needed to get that out. ]
( ooc; get it like the cafe in boston?? i'm disowned already might as well continue. )
Would have thought you'd be more sorry about the "asshole" part. [ a jibe of dismissal because that has always been how heine copes. the flowers were a gesture borne from limited facts and, blatantly put, it got the message across - if the message was you're an asshole. it was an odd way of writing it, on the proverbial petals of something so transient, but heine was still learning the bullshit of romanticism, of flowers and language that rin seems to have full fluency in.
the tearstained eyes...they puzzle him. they perplex him and he wonders at it all too briefly; what is it like to cry? why?
he settles on the memory. the pits of darkness, the disgustingly - pleasantly warm red and the sickening sound of a crushed skull, a lastbreath plea. ] So - said yes to her test. That's when I first talked to the collar, I guess. Or whatever it is. He's a messy eater with a shit sense of humor.
[ their personality is written in polarity that nears similarity. if he thinks about it too hard, he will find that he does not know where he ends and the dog begins. ] I was different from the rest in whatever way she ended up changing me.
[ words feels like echoes, and his chest the cavern. ] When a spine goes berserk, there's no - control. No inhibitions. Kind of like an override - a defense mechanism or something.
[ he was the product of all of this, not the creator. no matter how close he walked ot the below even after getting out, there's still too much he didn't know. ]
Once her test was completed, it was as we predicted. The rest of the experiments weren't needed any more.
[ the implication would be enough, but he continues because he lives in a world of followthrough. ] She triggered the collars. Triggered them to fight -
I only remember some things from then, since I wasn't - lucid. I only came to in a pit of blood...
I killed them. Killed them all. Lily - [ a breath, before steel sets back and he watches the scenery. watches through and past it. past rin beside him and the stench of flowers. ] - then I broke out of the facility.
First time seeing the sky left a bitter aftertaste, too. [ a drag of air, slow and steady and he tilts his head up, scrapes the sky. ] There's more to it, but that's the main point...
[ and finally, he chances a look back to the other with persistent nonchalance, finds himself curious to hear what rin will say. what would his perceptions, with all the innocence in the world gathered in the blossoms of a tree, would suggest. ]
( ooc: like... bane of my existence... you started this )
[ he still has trouble.
heine must be telling the truth. he has nothing to gain by lying -- rin has nothing that he might want, nothing that he couldn't otherwise take by force. heine narrates like he's telling someone else's story, reading from a technical manual, far away from the present moment.
that must be how he copes. taking someone's life seems impossible to rin, but to kill someone he'd loved --
rin should feel revulsion or fear. something. he'd nearly died in the same way, the dog goading him into a fight he would have surely lost. and yet he can only think of a fragment of the heine he sees now, a child with eyes like blood, frame too small to contain the violence that had been implanted in him.
rin tears a cherry blossom to shreds between index finger and thumb, the mulch catching between nail and fingertip. the springtime scent is too sweet in his throat.
he doesn't know what to say.
a moment passes. rin's eyes fill and fill and fill; he has to turn away, swallowing the knot in his throat. he thinks about the memorial he'd erected in the shrine. about the concrete dust in his throat after the dog had smashed his fist down. about that text heine had sent him when he'd first agreed to teach rin to fight.
it's stupid. of course he knows what to say. ]
That's all?
[ his voice is rough with tears, but no less decisive for it. he snorts, a soft sound broken up by the hitch of his breath; he has to pause to swipe at his face again. ]
Big deal. We get you a leash and a muzzle to go with that collar and --
[ there's ferocity in the way he's staring at heine. a challenge. for what, rin himself wouldn't be able to say. ]
[ he isn't lying. the thought would never even cross his mind; if he speaks of this, it will only be the truth as he remembers it.
it is the best he can give, and it is no longer about owing rin explanations but vocalizing the little pains that had bloomed and burned ever since his breaking point. ever since he saw the reality of his world.
distance is better and it always has been; companion to solitude. he looks away, away from the eyes that glaze over wetly, away from the crushed flowers falling and clinging to fingers.
its at times like this he feels hollow. like glass, each noise a ring against the frame of his ribs, the vertebrae of this cursed spine. had he really changed from that birdlike child with eyes brighter than the rest of the white around the expanse of all of them?
he couldn't know for sure. never sure.
the answer doesn't catch him off guard, but the sound of the voice does and he glances back up, a sharp action with drawing brows. a pause, before his mouth curls into lopsided thats too angular to be a smile. ] Wish it was that simple.
- But if you ever try to pull that shit, I will bite you. [ it's a threat and something that tries to be a joke as he tries to pull himself back forward, even if he has never lived directly in now.
still, the wet eyes are persistently troubling to something that tries for apathy. ] Why are - What's with your face?
[ like heine doesn't know. rin sends him a dirty look, complete with tears and snot, then wipes at his face a third time. he feels washed out, drawn too tight. like he's the one who's just shared his story. ]
Nothing — ! Nothing.
[ the answer is too quick, too defensive, but rin doesn't want that particular line of questioning to go any further.
better, instead, to shift the focus back onto heine. to take on the authoritative tone to which he'd struggled to develop when he'd first been named captain.
if it's a little too watery for comfort, so be it. rin's glare has to be enough to fend off any further questions. ]
Still. We should try to come up with some kind of back-up plan if you're worried you might not be in control.
[ what he doesn't say: there are kids around here. little girls, even. the potential for a new crop of guilt for heine to carry around with him.
[ with all things considered, there's a fair chance heine doesn't. he's seen tears; he's seen lily sob about flowers and the little specks of tears nill could get. but he never understood. his eyes might have stung once, twice, but they are dry dry as gunpowder and concrete.
he is the one that spilled his proverbial guts and yet rin is the one that sniffs emotions down.
then he speaks of control and it's another pang of blackcoloured guilt, and loathing. ] Don't you think I've tried?
[ there's no anger in that and he hinges forward, a quick bend to his knees and a rise upwards, smooth as shadows. brushes away petals that cling to the dark trousers, to his jacket before folding hands into pockets.
he knows what a slip of control means. he knows that if the hound comes again, he may not be able to stop the flow of blood that follows through, stained in the grooves of his collar, under his skin. ] I won't stay dead, so that's out.
I can't be collared.
The only one that can control the Spine is - [ a break of tone, nearly indiscernible. ] - the old hag.
And if I ever meet her again, I won't give her the chance. [ mother, monster.
rin raises a good question, and the truth is more simple than anything. heine has coped in his very volatile way, and it left him with little knowledge of how to control. all he knows is fight, and that is all he can do against that ugly shit. ] - It's...impossible. For a thing like me. [ for the first time, he sounds young. she'll of a boy he was, coming to in blinding white.
[ it doesn't matter. rin's not going to be the one to explain crying to heine, especially when he's still not owning up to the fact that he is, in fact, still shedding tears.
i won't stay dead.
that in and of itself is a terrifying statement, one ripe with meaning so disquieting that rin can't quite take in the shape of it. what does heine want, then? does he think dying would make up for a death that wasn't his fault? ]
You're not a thing.
[ the words flung from him like a jab, soaked again now that the flood has been unstoppered. rin, furious at himself - and at heine for saying something as idiotic as that - takes a deep breath, trying to control himself. ]
And none of that stuff is your fault.
[ heine was just a kid. scared and alone and forced into something incomprehensible in its cruelty.
rin doesn't understand. of course rin doesn't understand. cruelty comes in many forms in the world from which he came, but none of those involve what heine is admitting to him. ]
Besides -- you're the one standing here now. He didn't kill me, even though he could've. I don't know how we can fix this, but -- we're gonna find a way.
[ rin sounds like he believes it. because he does. ]
You give up, and I'll find a nice deep part of the flood to toss you into until you change your mind. Alright?
[ he already has an idea forming. tadashi's tech combined with rin's willingness to help. ]
[ that catches him offguard. perhaps it shouldn't have, when everything about rin was written in unfamiliar sentiment, an unfamiliar shade of red that burned rather than stained.
yet he angles himself around, ghost of a brow raised. time and time again he finds himself needing to step back in order to understand the steps of the conversation, only finding the solidity of incomprehension.
the truth was, he was fine with dying. he was fine with dying as long as he could take all that goddamn below with him.( where was naoto to be his last resort with that sword of hers ). ]
- It's fine. [ an answer made for scars, and a parry to the jab even if it lacks clarity to what he was answering. acceptance against anger and it is odd to be the one standing still for once.
for some reason, he wants to laugh, for a quick short breath like a shot, he does. ] Fix? [ we? ] I can't. Dunno how to. The only things that could fix it are buried behind whatever past we're part of now.
It won't help me here, but back home - there were swords. Or at least one sword for sure that was meant to punish disobedient dogs. Took a long time to heal from that shit. [ his side still remembered that pain. the draw-pull of the blade sharp and slow. ]
Ah - look, [ he hesitates, fumbles and looks for words he isn't used to giving. even rin's attempt at a threatpromise is lost, momentarily. ] - if the other guy shows up again. Get away. It's not a good idea to stick around.
[ sloppy concern. convincing heine of anything that could hint at experimental would be an event in and of itself.
a moment, and he adds with a twist to his lip, and he takes an indirect step forward. ] And Rin? I'd like to see you try and toss me anywhere.
[ and he looks to his feet, where blossoms pool. ] Ah - what do I do with these now?
It's nice. A little bit of color in all of — [ he sweeps an arm around him, indicating the flood. the cracked concrete. the silence. ] — this.
[ a few petals, disturbed by the movement, flutter to life about him. rin's mind is a lifetime away, thinking about all that must be done in order to make this work: a meeting with tadashi, more information about the dog, foolproof tech that will - if only for a time - wipe that hangdog look from heine's face.
the silence doesn't last long. rin's determination has only been set in stone in the moments since, his gaze upon heine now brimming with careful consideration. ]
I'm serious. Not about some sword that can hurt you -- I'm thinking, maybe some kind of containment field? If the dog can't get out, then you can't hurt me or anyone else. Until we all know it's safe to let you out.
[ it doesn't matter if heine's pessimism is thick enough to clot their air between them. rin will make all the plans, rin will tie the fucking bow on top, if that's what it takes to make all of this work out.
but he softens with the quip, enough to continue the rally: ]
'sides. If it's strong enough to contain you, I'm pretty sure I can toss you wherever I want. You game?
[ rin will probably go ahead with this whether or not he has heine's permission, but better that he go through the motions first. ]
[ it's nice he says and somehow heine does not think to agree, a grunt in some half-assed disagreement.
colour was maybe a little odd to have in the periphery of his surroundings, though it isn't a thought he really lingered much on, and even now it only comes in passing because what rin says next has him bristling, rising on hackles.
retort a near snap that breaches canines, ] - don't even try it, Rin.
The dog and I - you don't get it at all, do you? We're the same thing. [ he eases back, bark dying out against the breeze and he forces an exhale in its place. containment field in theory did not sound bad. but it would suppose him knowing when he was going to snap and his smirk is cruel at the very thought. it always is. ] And you know, sometimes it's not because I lose control, it's because I let it.
[ the idea, to him, seems too far. seems too much and too unreal and even if it wasn't he wouldn't dare hope something like that could work.] Besides, wouldnt trying to make any of that shit up just make it an experiment?
I'm not into that whole masochism thing. [ somehow, the collar barked in disagreement, all the bullet holes and wounds and reckless drives somewhere dug up in his past, in his flesh without any record. just a dog whose too much smoke to die. ] - Ugh, I'm not going to willingly jump into an experiment.
[ heine's pessimism is thick enough to built walls no one will climb. he will refuse. over and over because involving more people sounded terrible. because he didn't know if he wanted it to work and somehow thinking that the only thing that could put him down was a sword was okay, was better than some bullshit science field that could not possibly mix well with a collar he was master to and knew next to nothing of. besides, where would they find someone who knows enough about that?
someone who wouldn't be exactly like einsturzen. ] So, no Rin. I'm not game.
[ the red of his eyes only serves to emphasize how cutting his glare is. ] End of discussion. [ he won't be centre point of your goddamn saviour complex. ]
I'm not going to ask anyone to experiment on you. That's not - after all of what you just told me, I'd never suggest anything like that.
[ and it's frustrating to see that heine doesn't trust him enough to see his good will for what it is.
yet — can rin truly blame him? taken as a child, stripped of his humanity, forced to live with a bastardization of his own worst traits lurking in the shadows of his heart. one wrong turn and the ribcage closes, the blood turns sour in his mouth. maybe that's all that rin is, a moment away from his thoughts, a distraction.
worse than that, rin can't blame him. there are monsters and monsters lurking in tellus, each of which wouldn't think twice before grinding human bone and sinew to dust. but heine's worst fears are inside of him.
of course rin can't blame him. ]
But -- you think I don't see how rattled you are?
[ this is the only way rin knows to reach out. maybe tellus has stripped him of his softness, his ability to drop the gnashing teeth and flame-bright eyes.
but heine - of all people - should understand. ]
You think this tough-guy shit is gonna hide any of that?
[ it's not about saving all of them - rin knows fully well how small his hands are, how great and vast the universe is. it's not even about saving the other inhabitants of tellus, though that would be the logical argument.
it's about that edge of desperation that rin can read in the tight angles of heine's body, as clearly as if he'd spoken it aloud.
i just want to help, is what rin is telegraphing. a thin, wavering note that he wishes he could make audible. ]
Newsflash: it isn't.
[ it doesn't matter. even if heine tells him to fuck off, rin's going to do what he thinks is best. ]
Isnt it? Isn't it exactly what you're suggesting? [ maybe that is harsh. it's certainly unfair, since rin's suggestions come from that space between his ribs that housed colour and sentiment and something heine will never comprehend.
he still remembers the walls he woke to; there was nothing else and rin says it rattles him and it does. and he hates that it is as clear as surface of water, even if some things are still distorted against the proverbial liquid.
firered eyes and heine turnstile scarlet of his away and laughs. actually laughs, harsh raspwhisper and the tight angles of his body coil at the subtle vibration, hands stuffed into his pockets. ] Really.
You think you can fix it? [ the reason aside, it's a laughable idea.
or maybe there was a part of him that did not want to let the dog go. to not have the potential to block that thing out, because that would mean letting go of that guilt, if his intentions, if that need. of that purpose, assigned to a stray.
it comes down to this; rin doesn't know what is best for him and heine would never allow that truth to show through. the burden was his own, shoulders used to the weight. his smile is uncomfortable and thin, rin's whisper thin intentions lost on deafened ears. ] We're from completely different worlds. Didn't think I would have to remind you.
[ even though the strange light in heine's eyes is foreign. though he stands like the scarecrow rin has oft likened him too, bones in the guise of limbs, lumps of coal for eyes. like something too different for rin to reach out and recognize as human.
except that's not true. only a moment ago, heine had proved just how human he is. even if he doesn't want to admit it. even if he's so deeply embroiled in his own self-hatred that accepting help seems anathema. ]
Unless you're too proud to accept help.
[ it's a shot in the dark, rin's verbal gun empty of ammunition. heine stands on some distant precipice that rin can't reach; acting as a guide would be impossible.
rin makes up his mind in that moment, away and apart from the conversation at hand. even if he gives in today, he's not going to stop. he'll talk to tadashi, he'll talk to every single medical and technical expert amongst their numbers if it means helping heine find a solution that works for him.
if it means losing heine's friendship, so be it. some things are worth more.
in the end, whether heine wears that sickle-curve of a smile or not, he's still made of flesh and bone. there's still a beating heart hidden within. and rin's come to care about its perpetuity, even if heine seems to have lost hope long ago. ]
Che - [ a click of his tongue, and the rise and fall of a shoulde in a shrug, a creak of cartilage in its socket.
rin speaks of pride and it should make heine rise in his hackles. should parry the jab, like a starved dig eager to action. except he speaks of pride and heine covets his lack of admittance. in silence like of a doberman's jaw, wet and unyielding. his pride sits in his throat, in his chest. I'm the thump thump thump of rotten heart because pride and guilt is the very thread which weaves the paperthin blue of his veins.
and that's fine. ] Accept help?
Or some daydream? [ he cannot accept. will not. because nothing about his nature would allow him otherwise. and the hound bays in echo, hungry and messy and crude and for a moment longer,heine does not remember where he starts and the collar ends.
perhaps he never will. ] Look. I told you what you needed to know. That's it. I'm not asking for help. [ so stop shoving it down my throat is implied.]
[ rin nearly forms a rebuttal, crude in his own desire to make heine see his perspective.
and then he looses his tethered breath. it's not worth it. ]
Fine.
[ rin doesn't let anything go so easily, though.
maybe it's a virtue. maybe it's a personality defect.
but heine stands before him like he's proving something, folding the edges of his paper-thin skin back to show blood and bone and sinew. like it's nothing. like all that he's been through is another chapter in the story of his life, unremarkable in all respects.
and it isn't. it deserves the attention that rin's giving it. heine shouldn't have to live like this, isolated except for a moment here and a moment there, not unhappy so much as unfeeling.
he makes judgment after judgment, and it's folly or it's kindness or it's some corrosive mixture of both.
either way, this isn't the end of it.
rin looks away, both hands clutched like anchors in the ocean of flowers around him, and doesn't try to perpetuate the argument. ]
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
so much speaking ;;
the loss of colour, the wide eyes - it speaks of more reminders, and he decides that those will never abate.
a shrug, nonchalant in its obscurity, ] Dunno. Was the start of my memories. An obedient dog in a kennel.
We were all implanted with a Spine. Source of all our enhancements. [ an off handed wave to the bandage across his neck. it felt odd, revisiting old shadows again. but they were always at his feet, after all, so the recollections come nauseatingly quick. ] See, the old hag wanted to create the perfect attack dog. And breed the perfect leader -
- most of our training was against older versions of similar experiments. First time I saw the Spine go berserk was on Lily - [ bitter, bitter name and even now his voice falters at it, ] - she tore a throat clean out. It was also when we started thinking about trying to escape the facility.
It was kind of a stupid idea but. We all fell hard for it. [ perhaps, to a point he fell hardest. after all, he accepted the old hag's proposal out of some inane need to save the rest. too blind to see what his own success would mean for them all. arthur had been right, of course. once this experiment had reached a success, they would be the ones put to slaughter and oh was it bloody and messy. ] Promises were made, that sort of thing. [ they had spoken of promises once before. then, he did not want to say more and maybe this is still all he will say but. rin was sharp, he'd string the implication of failure quick. ]
I guess that brings me to my point - the Spine. The whole purpose, like I said, was to make a leader - someone to master the rest of her mindless fucking army.
See, everyone had to get out of that place. Lily...Giovanni. They wanted to see real flowers - [ he wouldn't have mentioned that, hell, he shouldn't have mentioned it but the white beneath and around him, the delicate bloom served as catalyst. he sighs. ] - and the hag put me through a big test. First time I met Dog.
Funny thing was, she gave me a choice. I could have said no. But - I thought getting stronger would save everyone else. [ he leans back now, splays fingertips through the petals and finds the cold, smooth surface of the concrete and it feels better. it felt terrible, to have words as save leaving his mouth. he hardly even recognized the intonation of his own voice because saving was the last thing he had done.
hell, even when he thought he had set everyone free - part of a mechanism to cope, at war with self loathing - that wasn't true, was it? he failed. he failed lily, and he failed giovanni. the one that was left alive and still in the clutches of that perverted bitch.
so he lives with it all, guilt and hate as sharp as teeth. ] What you saw, a few days ago? That was the Spine going berserk.
so mUCH PAIN
and he does fill them in. heine's reluctance - or inability - to give him a specific age. genetic experimentation. he must have been born in a lab. treated like a rat in a cage.
--he remembers, suddenly, the way he'd described heine to zack. like an albino bunny rabbit. like an albino lab rat.
more than that: heine speaks with a kind of detachment that rin can't understand. can't define as anything other than mechanical, as if he's ripped away his soft underbelly only to reveal an endoskeleton of steel. it would be in keeping with the theme, after all.
they wanted to see real flowers.
what is heine's colorless account of his past leaving out? what else has he suffered? how many times has he taken life as a child, as a tool to be fitted to the hand of a nameless evil? maybe heine's lack of embellishment means that rin comes away with a worse picture: he paints it all in that brown-red stain that had remained with him even after he'd cleaned heine's - now his own - knife in the grass. ]
Sorry.
[ the details about the "dog" - as heine calls it -- seem negligible now. if he'd been through all that heine is describing, maybe he would have walked around with his hatred apple-red in his cheeks for all the world to see. maybe he wouldn't have been as strong as heine is now, folding years and years of pain into gruff silence.
he doesn't realize he's crying until he hears the dampness in his own voice. he swipes at his cheeks, too disquieted to be embarrassed. ]
About the flowers.
[ he'll hear the rest of heine's story, but -- he needed to get that out. ]
too much. au bon pAIN
Would have thought you'd be more sorry about the "asshole" part. [ a jibe of dismissal because that has always been how heine copes. the flowers were a gesture borne from limited facts and, blatantly put, it got the message across - if the message was you're an asshole. it was an odd way of writing it, on the proverbial petals of something so transient, but heine was still learning the bullshit of romanticism, of flowers and language that rin seems to have full fluency in.
the tearstained eyes...they puzzle him. they perplex him and he wonders at it all too briefly; what is it like to cry? why?
he settles on the memory. the pits of darkness, the disgustingly - pleasantly warm red and the sickening sound of a crushed skull, a lastbreath plea. ] So - said yes to her test. That's when I first talked to the collar, I guess. Or whatever it is. He's a messy eater with a shit sense of humor.
[ their personality is written in polarity that nears similarity. if he thinks about it too hard, he will find that he does not know where he ends and the dog begins. ] I was different from the rest in whatever way she ended up changing me.
[ words feels like echoes, and his chest the cavern. ] When a spine goes berserk, there's no - control. No inhibitions. Kind of like an override - a defense mechanism or something.
[ he was the product of all of this, not the creator. no matter how close he walked ot the below even after getting out, there's still too much he didn't know. ]
Once her test was completed, it was as we predicted. The rest of the experiments weren't needed any more.
[ the implication would be enough, but he continues because he lives in a world of followthrough. ] She triggered the collars. Triggered them to fight -
I only remember some things from then, since I wasn't - lucid. I only came to in a pit of blood...
I killed them. Killed them all. Lily - [ a breath, before steel sets back and he watches the scenery. watches through and past it. past rin beside him and the stench of flowers. ] - then I broke out of the facility.
First time seeing the sky left a bitter aftertaste, too. [ a drag of air, slow and steady and he tilts his head up, scrapes the sky. ] There's more to it, but that's the main point...
[ and finally, he chances a look back to the other with persistent nonchalance, finds himself curious to hear what rin will say. what would his perceptions, with all the innocence in the world gathered in the blossoms of a tree, would suggest. ]
you are the pain of my existence
[ he still has trouble.
heine must be telling the truth. he has nothing to gain by lying -- rin has nothing that he might want, nothing that he couldn't otherwise take by force. heine narrates like he's telling someone else's story, reading from a technical manual, far away from the present moment.
that must be how he copes. taking someone's life seems impossible to rin, but to kill someone he'd loved --
rin should feel revulsion or fear. something. he'd nearly died in the same way, the dog goading him into a fight he would have surely lost. and yet he can only think of a fragment of the heine he sees now, a child with eyes like blood, frame too small to contain the violence that had been implanted in him.
rin tears a cherry blossom to shreds between index finger and thumb, the mulch catching between nail and fingertip. the springtime scent is too sweet in his throat.
he doesn't know what to say.
a moment passes. rin's eyes fill and fill and fill; he has to turn away, swallowing the knot in his throat. he thinks about the memorial he'd erected in the shrine. about the concrete dust in his throat after the dog had smashed his fist down. about that text heine had sent him when he'd first agreed to teach rin to fight.
it's stupid. of course he knows what to say. ]
That's all?
[ his voice is rough with tears, but no less decisive for it. he snorts, a soft sound broken up by the hitch of his breath; he has to pause to swipe at his face again. ]
Big deal. We get you a leash and a muzzle to go with that collar and --
[ there's ferocity in the way he's staring at heine. a challenge. for what, rin himself wouldn't be able to say. ]
-- problem solved.
my dreams and aspirations
it is the best he can give, and it is no longer about owing rin explanations but vocalizing the little pains that had bloomed and burned ever since his breaking point. ever since he saw the reality of his world.
distance is better and it always has been; companion to solitude. he looks away, away from the eyes that glaze over wetly, away from the crushed flowers falling and clinging to fingers.
its at times like this he feels hollow. like glass, each noise a ring against the frame of his ribs, the vertebrae of this cursed spine. had he really changed from that birdlike child with eyes brighter than the rest of the white around the expanse of all of them?
he couldn't know for sure. never sure.
the answer doesn't catch him off guard, but the sound of the voice does and he glances back up, a sharp action with drawing brows. a pause, before his mouth curls into lopsided thats too angular to be a smile. ] Wish it was that simple.
- But if you ever try to pull that shit, I will bite you. [ it's a threat and something that tries to be a joke as he tries to pull himself back forward, even if he has never lived directly in now.
still, the wet eyes are persistently troubling to something that tries for apathy. ] Why are - What's with your face?
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Nothing — ! Nothing.
[ the answer is too quick, too defensive, but rin doesn't want that particular line of questioning to go any further.
better, instead, to shift the focus back onto heine. to take on the authoritative tone to which he'd struggled to develop when he'd first been named captain.
if it's a little too watery for comfort, so be it. rin's glare has to be enough to fend off any further questions. ]
Still. We should try to come up with some kind of back-up plan if you're worried you might not be in control.
[ what he doesn't say: there are kids around here. little girls, even. the potential for a new crop of guilt for heine to carry around with him.
then, a little softer -- ]
You up for that?
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he is the one that spilled his proverbial guts and yet rin is the one that sniffs emotions down.
then he speaks of control and it's another pang of blackcoloured guilt, and loathing. ] Don't you think I've tried?
[ there's no anger in that and he hinges forward, a quick bend to his knees and a rise upwards, smooth as shadows. brushes away petals that cling to the dark trousers, to his jacket before folding hands into pockets.
he knows what a slip of control means. he knows that if the hound comes again, he may not be able to stop the flow of blood that follows through, stained in the grooves of his collar, under his skin. ] I won't stay dead, so that's out.
I can't be collared.
The only one that can control the Spine is - [ a break of tone, nearly indiscernible. ] - the old hag.
And if I ever meet her again, I won't give her the chance. [ mother, monster.
rin raises a good question, and the truth is more simple than anything. heine has coped in his very volatile way, and it left him with little knowledge of how to control. all he knows is fight, and that is all he can do against that ugly shit. ] - It's...impossible. For a thing like me. [ for the first time, he sounds young. she'll of a boy he was, coming to in blinding white.
he'd rather move on. ]
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i won't stay dead.
that in and of itself is a terrifying statement, one ripe with meaning so disquieting that rin can't quite take in the shape of it. what does heine want, then? does he think dying would make up for a death that wasn't his fault? ]
You're not a thing.
[ the words flung from him like a jab, soaked again now that the flood has been unstoppered. rin, furious at himself - and at heine for saying something as idiotic as that - takes a deep breath, trying to control himself. ]
And none of that stuff is your fault.
[ heine was just a kid. scared and alone and forced into something incomprehensible in its cruelty.
rin doesn't understand. of course rin doesn't understand. cruelty comes in many forms in the world from which he came, but none of those involve what heine is admitting to him. ]
Besides -- you're the one standing here now. He didn't kill me, even though he could've. I don't know how we can fix this, but -- we're gonna find a way.
[ rin sounds like he believes it. because he does. ]
You give up, and I'll find a nice deep part of the flood to toss you into until you change your mind. Alright?
[ he already has an idea forming. tadashi's tech combined with rin's willingness to help. ]
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yet he angles himself around, ghost of a brow raised. time and time again he finds himself needing to step back in order to understand the steps of the conversation, only finding the solidity of incomprehension.
the truth was, he was fine with dying. he was fine with dying as long as he could take all that goddamn below with him.( where was naoto to be his last resort with that sword of hers ). ]
- It's fine. [ an answer made for scars, and a parry to the jab even if it lacks clarity to what he was answering. acceptance against anger and it is odd to be the one standing still for once.
for some reason, he wants to laugh, for a quick short breath like a shot, he does. ] Fix? [ we? ] I can't. Dunno how to. The only things that could fix it are buried behind whatever past we're part of now.
It won't help me here, but back home - there were swords. Or at least one sword for sure that was meant to punish disobedient dogs. Took a long time to heal from that shit. [ his side still remembered that pain. the draw-pull of the blade sharp and slow. ]
Ah - look, [ he hesitates, fumbles and looks for words he isn't used to giving. even rin's attempt at a threatpromise is lost, momentarily. ] - if the other guy shows up again. Get away. It's not a good idea to stick around.
[ sloppy concern. convincing heine of anything that could hint at experimental would be an event in and of itself.
a moment, and he adds with a twist to his lip, and he takes an indirect step forward. ] And Rin? I'd like to see you try and toss me anywhere.
[ and he looks to his feet, where blossoms pool. ] Ah - what do I do with these now?
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[ a few petals, disturbed by the movement, flutter to life about him. rin's mind is a lifetime away, thinking about all that must be done in order to make this work: a meeting with tadashi, more information about the dog, foolproof tech that will - if only for a time - wipe that hangdog look from heine's face.
the silence doesn't last long. rin's determination has only been set in stone in the moments since, his gaze upon heine now brimming with careful consideration. ]
I'm serious. Not about some sword that can hurt you -- I'm thinking, maybe some kind of containment field? If the dog can't get out, then you can't hurt me or anyone else. Until we all know it's safe to let you out.
[ it doesn't matter if heine's pessimism is thick enough to clot their air between them. rin will make all the plans, rin will tie the fucking bow on top, if that's what it takes to make all of this work out.
but he softens with the quip, enough to continue the rally: ]
'sides. If it's strong enough to contain you, I'm pretty sure I can toss you wherever I want. You game?
[ rin will probably go ahead with this whether or not he has heine's permission, but better that he go through the motions first. ]
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colour was maybe a little odd to have in the periphery of his surroundings, though it isn't a thought he really lingered much on, and even now it only comes in passing because what rin says next has him bristling, rising on hackles.
retort a near snap that breaches canines, ] - don't even try it, Rin.
The dog and I - you don't get it at all, do you? We're the same thing. [ he eases back, bark dying out against the breeze and he forces an exhale in its place. containment field in theory did not sound bad. but it would suppose him knowing when he was going to snap and his smirk is cruel at the very thought. it always is. ] And you know, sometimes it's not because I lose control, it's because I let it.
[ the idea, to him, seems too far. seems too much and too unreal and even if it wasn't he wouldn't dare hope something like that could work.] Besides, wouldnt trying to make any of that shit up just make it an experiment?
I'm not into that whole masochism thing. [ somehow, the collar barked in disagreement, all the bullet holes and wounds and reckless drives somewhere dug up in his past, in his flesh without any record. just a dog whose too much smoke to die. ] - Ugh, I'm not going to willingly jump into an experiment.
[ heine's pessimism is thick enough to built walls no one will climb. he will refuse. over and over because involving more people sounded terrible. because he didn't know if he wanted it to work and somehow thinking that the only thing that could put him down was a sword was okay, was better than some bullshit science field that could not possibly mix well with a collar he was master to and knew next to nothing of. besides, where would they find someone who knows enough about that?
someone who wouldn't be exactly like einsturzen. ] So, no Rin. I'm not game.
[ the red of his eyes only serves to emphasize how cutting his glare is. ] End of discussion. [ he won't be centre point of your goddamn saviour complex. ]
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[ and it's frustrating to see that heine doesn't trust him enough to see his good will for what it is.
yet — can rin truly blame him? taken as a child, stripped of his humanity, forced to live with a bastardization of his own worst traits lurking in the shadows of his heart. one wrong turn and the ribcage closes, the blood turns sour in his mouth. maybe that's all that rin is, a moment away from his thoughts, a distraction.
worse than that, rin can't blame him. there are monsters and monsters lurking in tellus, each of which wouldn't think twice before grinding human bone and sinew to dust. but heine's worst fears are inside of him.
of course rin can't blame him. ]
But -- you think I don't see how rattled you are?
[ this is the only way rin knows to reach out. maybe tellus has stripped him of his softness, his ability to drop the gnashing teeth and flame-bright eyes.
but heine - of all people - should understand. ]
You think this tough-guy shit is gonna hide any of that?
[ it's not about saving all of them - rin knows fully well how small his hands are, how great and vast the universe is. it's not even about saving the other inhabitants of tellus, though that would be the logical argument.
it's about that edge of desperation that rin can read in the tight angles of heine's body, as clearly as if he'd spoken it aloud.
i just want to help, is what rin is telegraphing. a thin, wavering note that he wishes he could make audible. ]
Newsflash: it isn't.
[ it doesn't matter. even if heine tells him to fuck off, rin's going to do what he thinks is best. ]
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he still remembers the walls he woke to; there was nothing else and rin says it rattles him and it does. and he hates that it is as clear as surface of water, even if some things are still distorted against the proverbial liquid.
firered eyes and heine turnstile scarlet of his away and laughs. actually laughs, harsh raspwhisper and the tight angles of his body coil at the subtle vibration, hands stuffed into his pockets. ] Really.
You think you can fix it? [ the reason aside, it's a laughable idea.
or maybe there was a part of him that did not want to let the dog go. to not have the potential to block that thing out, because that would mean letting go of that guilt, if his intentions, if that need. of that purpose, assigned to a stray.
it comes down to this; rin doesn't know what is best for him and heine would never allow that truth to show through. the burden was his own, shoulders used to the weight. his smile is uncomfortable and thin, rin's whisper thin intentions lost on deafened ears. ] We're from completely different worlds. Didn't think I would have to remind you.
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[ even though the strange light in heine's eyes is foreign. though he stands like the scarecrow rin has oft likened him too, bones in the guise of limbs, lumps of coal for eyes. like something too different for rin to reach out and recognize as human.
except that's not true. only a moment ago, heine had proved just how human he is. even if he doesn't want to admit it. even if he's so deeply embroiled in his own self-hatred that accepting help seems anathema. ]
Unless you're too proud to accept help.
[ it's a shot in the dark, rin's verbal gun empty of ammunition. heine stands on some distant precipice that rin can't reach; acting as a guide would be impossible.
rin makes up his mind in that moment, away and apart from the conversation at hand. even if he gives in today, he's not going to stop. he'll talk to tadashi, he'll talk to every single medical and technical expert amongst their numbers if it means helping heine find a solution that works for him.
if it means losing heine's friendship, so be it. some things are worth more.
in the end, whether heine wears that sickle-curve of a smile or not, he's still made of flesh and bone. there's still a beating heart hidden within. and rin's come to care about its perpetuity, even if heine seems to have lost hope long ago. ]
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rin speaks of pride and it should make heine rise in his hackles. should parry the jab, like a starved dig eager to action. except he speaks of pride and heine covets his lack of admittance. in silence like of a doberman's jaw, wet and unyielding. his pride sits in his throat, in his chest. I'm the thump thump thump of rotten heart because pride and guilt is the very thread which weaves the paperthin blue of his veins.
and that's fine. ] Accept help?
Or some daydream? [ he cannot accept. will not. because nothing about his nature would allow him otherwise. and the hound bays in echo, hungry and messy and crude and for a moment longer,heine does not remember where he starts and the collar ends.
perhaps he never will. ] Look. I told you what you needed to know. That's it. I'm not asking for help. [ so stop shoving it down my throat is implied.]
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and then he looses his tethered breath. it's not worth it. ]
Fine.
[ rin doesn't let anything go so easily, though.
maybe it's a virtue. maybe it's a personality defect.
but heine stands before him like he's proving something, folding the edges of his paper-thin skin back to show blood and bone and sinew. like it's nothing. like all that he's been through is another chapter in the story of his life, unremarkable in all respects.
and it isn't. it deserves the attention that rin's giving it. heine shouldn't have to live like this, isolated except for a moment here and a moment there, not unhappy so much as unfeeling.
he makes judgment after judgment, and it's folly or it's kindness or it's some corrosive mixture of both.
either way, this isn't the end of it.
rin looks away, both hands clutched like anchors in the ocean of flowers around him, and doesn't try to perpetuate the argument. ]