[Maybe there's no smoke, but the effect is still nice. Verso can picture – not remember, just imagine – hearing about how the chimneys worked as a boy and wondering if that meant he would see flames rise from them instead of smoke, so he can appreciate this little realisation of a fantasy he's never had, too.]
Nah. It's looking pretty good.
[And he watches for a while in silence, until he notices a shift in the chroma in the room, melancholic and otherworldly. It settles on Verso's shoulders like a chill, and when he looks up from a train he notices the boy standing there watching them. Faceless and gray, dressed in finery, the smoke of Gommage wafting off of him.
Verso's met him a few times over the decades, always presumably by chance. He'll run into him looking over one scene of destruction or another, or else reflecting on a once-loved place or on people who he's starting to forget and the pains they've inflicted upon him that he'll never escape. Clive might have come across him too – Verso doesn't know – but he gestures towards him all the same, a gentle look who's here before he focuses back on the faceless boy.]
Hi.
[This time, the boy doesn't speak. He simply approaches the train, steps slow and unsure, then holds out one of his fingers above the wisp, keeping it in place and following the train as it circles. It takes a moment for Verso to realise what he's doing, but when he notices that Gommage smoke rising from his finger, he lets out a soft laugh.]
[ Verso watches the train, and Clive watches Verso watch the train. Which means that Clive is a half-step slower to note the new presence in the room, even though he, too, feels that slight otherworldly chill when the faceless boy materializes.
Clive doesn't startle, exactly, but he does come close to it. A reflexive tightening of his shoulders, a bracing of his weight against the floor, both of which relent the moment he takes in the size and shape of this newcomer and the way Verso invites him into their space with gentle ease.
Hi, Verso says, as if he's speaking to yet another relative Clive hasn't heard about. He releases the breath he didn't know he'd been holding, low and through his teeth, and lets his expression ease from frown to careful neutral. ]
Ah. [ A soft exclamation, momentarily unsure of what else to say. His attention fixes on the gnarled hollow of where the boy's face should be, as if someone tore it out in a fit of rage or grief.
Who? Why? Both questions Clive could think to ask, but refrains from. It would be rude to speak of the child as if he wasn't there. ]
...I see we have more train fans in the room, now.
[ So, this. Gentle, tentative. He's yet to encounter anyone in this half-state of Gommage, and doesn't know what to make of it― another one of Clea's unfortunate experiments, perhaps? His expression shifts, half-sympathetic. ]
Fan? Oh, no. He's our most eminent train aficionado.
[The boy looks at Clive and makes a sound that's like a whisper, a wail, a cry of longing for something well outside of his reach. He likes the train, how it moves, those swirls of green chroma powering it onwards. Nothing, perhaps, like the trains of Paris and Lumiere, grand and full of people, but it has been a very long time since he's seen any train run, and nearly as long since he's had the opportunity to play. So, behind that unsettling sound are expressions of a happiness that he knows will be fleeting and a gratitude that he hasn't felt in some time.
He never stays long. Verso's always wondered why, but of course he's never asked. Better to let the boy be than to become something else that questions him. Often, his form remains in place after the conversation ends, a ghost of a thought of a feeling of a boy, but this time he only lingers long enough to follow the train around the track once before dissipating into thin air.
The chroma shifts back to normal. Verso settles heavier against Clive.]
I think he likes you.
[Spoken with kind of knowing that only stems from being. Even if that being is imperfect. There's a bit of relief there, too, and a sadness that rises up in spite of the rest. Earlier, Clive had accused his parents of torturing him. Verso thinks they're torturing what's left of their son even worse, but it's not a competition and that doesn't need to be said.
Some clarity probably should be offered, though, so he adds.]
[ The boy's scraped-thin whisper is... haunting. Like a gasp, a wheeze, a dying breath. For a moment, Clive is reminded of Alicia and her scarred silence; for a more terrifying beat, he thinks of flame, of a man searching for oxygen in a burning house.
Desaturated, devoid of context, the boy lingers until－ he doesn't. Gone as quickly as he came, a stuttering of a film reel that played the wrong few strips. The chill dissipates, and the vice around Clive's heart loosens with that disappearance.
It comes back quickly, though, that feeling of invisible fingers clenched around his heart. Not even the comfortable and now-familiar weight of someone beloved can keep the next revelation from hitting Clive like an avalanche.
Verso.
Verso, not third person. Verso, an entity separate from the man currently tucked against Clive's side. Verso, the man who－
(Clive hears that susurrous whisper again, that longing wail, like smoke from a chimney.) ]
...How?
[ Stunned into monosyllables. Clive turns his head, eyes wide, disbelieving. He shifts without truly moving, one hand instinctively reaching for Verso's (his Verso's) wrist, as if he, too, will disappear if Clive lets him. ]
Remember when I told you there's a fragment of Verso's soul here?
[Verso shrugs against Clive, heaves out a hefty breath.
He still remembers when he first found out. Back then he hadn't really known any better, so he'd been curious. Very, very curious. Monoco had to take him aside and slap him upside the head with the truth, and it hadn't immediately registered because up until then, Verso had believed that the fragment of the real Verso's soul was something more abstract, an essence lacking physical substance or even intelligence, consciousness, a sense of self.
Learning he was wrong felt... horrible. Like he was about to vomit up the whole essence of his own existence.
Naturally, those thoughts go unspoken.]
That's him. Exactly as he was when he painted this canvas world.
[More or less, anyway, but that doesn't feel like a distinction that needs to be made.]
I don't know how or... I don't know anything except that he spends most of his time painting. And when he does show up he'll talk to anyone willing to listen, but it's like he's missing too many pieces, so he struggles. Even though he's, uh, he's fully aware of what's happening.
[ The avalanche doesn't stop; the snow keeps piling on. Clive, too, had assumed something more nebulous when Verso mentioned a fragment of the painter's soul― like, say, the sky, or the earth, or the rain. A lifeforce circulating around them, the atmosphere, the air they breathe. The reality of this world persisting as the shape of the other Verso's soul.
Apparently not. Apparently, the shape of the other Verso's soul is very much human. A boy. A hollowed-out boy who speaks with no voice, who touches without touching, who fades as he persists.
It knocks the breath out of Clive. Without knowing, he mirrors this Verso's past nausea; shock mixes with a kneejerk rejection of this truth, some sort of mental self-preservation instinct that keeps him from fully believing that the spirit of the dead could be entombed in the form of a disintegrating child. "Exactly as he was". ]
―Fuck, [ is strained. ] Fuck.
[ Inadvertently, his grip around Verso's wrist tightens. A clench that might have bruised if it lasted longer than the heartbeat second it did. He quickly relents, but the hold, looser now, stays.
God, fuck. Something close to terror coils in his gut, cold and cloying― it tightens his throat, makes it hard to form words. ]
And he's... [ Oh, this is fucking horrific. It strikes Clive that he has no idea how to finish that thought; he has no idea what he wants to say. ] ...Is there no way to...?
[ What. Save him? Fix him? The other Verso is dead― or, well. Should be dead.
Fuck. His eyes shutter, and his free hand rakes through messy black bangs. Fuck. ]
[It's far from lost on Verso that this is probably the most compassion Verso's soul has received in entirely too long, and the flames of that cruelty, that injustice, flare against the backs of his eyes. So, he stays silent as Clive processes everything – insofar as it can be processed, anyway – and doesn't even flinch when that hold on his wrist becomes something sharp and painful. Wondering if that little boy can sense Clive's reaction, too, the way he had picked up on Verso's reminiscence over the train.
He doesn't know whether to hope for that or not; sometimes, seeing a stranger feel more for you than you own family does, well, it only deepens the wound. But other times, it's validating and healing and a beacon of a promise that there may come a tomorrow where things are better. All he can do is cross his fingers and believe in the latter. It's usually the case for him, and they're two pieces from the same fractured life, so maybe. Maybe.
When the pressure of Clive's hold releases, Verso applies a little of his own, a gentler squeeze that lies about things being okay. And, eventually, once Clive manages all the words he can speak, and after Verso has given them space to exist, an answer comes. Sort of.]
I don't know. Most what I do know came from Esquie and Monoco, and what they know came from another version of Verso, so it's all... second-hand. Maybe third. I can't even say for sure whether the Paintress and Renoir realise how... complete the souls at the centre of the canvases truly are.
[Which is probably denial. The most powerful Painter in the world surely understands the worst of the natures of the artform. And the whole notion that lives in those canvases are less valid – soulless imitations of something real – must have stemmed from an understanding of the opposite and a refusal to accept that they are playing god with real lives, causing immense harm to real people, treating actual human beings – even ones that carry the soul of their own son – like props to whichever of their own needs they seek to have fulfilled.
All the same, that not-knowing is another complication Verso's long struggled to juggle. If Lumiere is to have a tomorrow, he has to wonder what that will mean for the boy who's been forced to paint the destruction of his family for decades now. Is that something he can move on from? Would happier tomorrows be something he wants to paint, if they came with a promise of inevitability rather than with the threat of more fractures, more battles, more wars waged atop the lives of everyone in the Canvas?
Questions he may never have the answer to, so questions that he doesn't speak aloud. Instead:]
I'm... sorry to keep adding to your load, but.
[They have to fight for him, too. Whatever that means.]
If they knew, [ regarding that bit about the Paintress and Renoir realizing that the last vestiges of the son that they lost remain in that shape, that disintegrating little boy, ] they couldn't possibly keep doing this.
[ 'This', nebulous. A gesture with his free hand, towards everything and nothing at all. This manor, what lies beyond it, the Nevrons, the Monolith. Tasking the soul of a boy who looks barely ten summers old (and this, Clive knows, is pure projection－ his own memories of being torn from his brother when his brother was that age, small and frail and helpless) to keep passively existing on the battlefield that his family has made of his haven.
It's sick. Clive can't fathom it. He doesn't know which is worse: willful ignorance, or understanding and ignoring. ]
It's no load to bear. That child needs saving.
[ Thank fucking god he knows now, what sits in the center of this world. Who sits in the center of this world, rather. It's likely that he doesn't even know the half of it, but something raw and bleeding in Clive's heart can't stomach the thought of a boy-shaped sacrifice. It's one thing to wear regret or resignation in the face of impossible choices without clear outcomes, but there are some indignities that Clive can't weather.
It shows. He hums with that anger under his skin, fire-red chroma seething in his gut.
('Saving', he says, like it's ever that easy; they're no longer playing pretend, and there are no such things as knights or lords or politics that can be solved through gallantry. But it's all Clive has, really.) ]
[The train keeps moving along the track, mote of light still at its chimney, light continuing to shine from its windows. Smoke gone with the boy. Verso casts it a final glance before shifting the whole of his focus onto Clive, lifting himself so he can press his forehead to Clive's – a gesture he's noticed that Clive gravitates towards – and cups his cheeks in both his hands. Centring, he hopes, and not restrictive.
We're hoisting the whole Canvas on our backs. It's a load.
[And not an easy one to balance. Maybe there's a reality in which Verso's soul and the Painters and the Lumierans can all be saved. Verso doesn't see how when the simple fact of the matter is that if that little boy stops painting, then nothing more will happen, but as he's just admitted, there are many things he doesn't know about the nature of Painting and how a canvas might perpetuate itself.
Either way, he's not about to point that out to Clive now. Being immortal may have exposed Verso to a great many of experiences, but it's also set him in his ways, and no good will come of tainting Clive's perspective before it has room to fully develop.
So, he shakes his head, forehead brushing against Clive's, and lets out another sigh. Saving that boy is a distant prospect, one that sits firmly beyond everything else they need to accomplish. But there might be other ways for them to be there for him.]
You should keep doing things like this, you know, see if it gets him to come out more. Try to get him talking like you did with me. I mean... Hope is one hell of an armour against the darkness, and you, you're good at inspiring it. I think that's the kind of saving he needs most right now.
[ You feel like hope. A phrase seared into Clive's skull back from the first time they set foot inside this manor, back when Clive was similarly-reeling from other, now-accepted reality-shattering revelations. The enormity of that trust isn't lost on Clive; he knows what it means for a man who has sat in the gulf of despair to speak about possibilities without cynicism.
And yes, maybe something that holds that much weight should be a burden. As much of a burden as the prospect of finding a future for a dead man's soul should be. But two hands bracket Clive's frowning face to anchor him to the present, and, despite everything, Clive's first instinct is to think about how lucky he is. Lucky to have Verso, lucky to have purpose.
He relaxes into the cradle of Verso's palms, and receives that gentle nudge like a homecoming. Speaking and touching and belonging. He presses one of his own hands to the back of Verso's, keeping it in place. ]
I did this to make you smile too, you know.
[ Which isn't a pushback against the saving― Clive would very much like to do that, obviously. He'll hold this anger and disbelief close to his chest for when he needs the strength to push through their impossible odds; he'll remember that sighed groan and the caved-in space where rounded cheeks and wide eyes should be.
But― ]
―What does it feel like for you? To see him?
[ To have found out? To see that unmirrored not-self, lingering and fading? ]
Is it a terrible thing, for me to want to save the both of you?
[They should be angry, Verso knows. They should want to tear down the Monolith bare-handed if that's what it takes, let that be their method of self-expression against the godlike, broken humans at the centre of the world who have yet to pay its people any mind. And they should probably be more cautious about how they hope and what they hope for and when they wield it as a shield against the inevitable because there's a long, long way to fall from the top of the Monolith to the depths below. And Verso, at least, knows he can't survive many more plummets.
But he's an idiot. An idiot in love with Clive, an idiot in love with the world, an idiot that loves the people he's never met and those he wishes he never had. And he doesn't have the anger in him. He's far too stubborn to completely give in to despair.
So, naturally, he laughs at the first of what Clive says.]
I know. [And he pulls back, only to show Clive how he smiles. Soft yet rich. Genuine. Rising to his eyes and crinkling the lines on his forehead.] You should also keep doing that.
[Because what got lost in the reminiscence and reunion is this: Verso was wholly charmed – is still charmed, those rare clacks of the train passing over certain parts of the tracks serving as a nice soundtrack to the moment – and he likes seeing how Clive interacts with the world, all the different ways he applies his chroma, all the beauty and potential he sees that Verso might have blinded himself to long, long ago.
Clive's question brings him greater pause. Not because it's particularly difficult to answer, but because the answer has taken on many forms over the years. Anger, frustration, that easy self-loathing born of a resentment of how much suffering is linked to his existence. Pity, futility, an obfuscating petulance that changed his perspective for a while, altering his course down wrong direction after wrong direction. In some ways, Verso had gone through the stages of grief, mourning for an innocence that's been ground into ash, and now, maybe he's not at acceptance but he's able to see things differently, at least.]
It feels... like a relief, seeing that he's strong enough to keep persevering. And a bit like inspiration, too. If he hasn't lost himself after all this time, then I can keep steady, too. More or less. I don't know whether I see myself in him or not – [That's far too complicated a matter for him to really sit in for long.] – but I know what it was like to be that boy and I don't want to let him down.
[How strange it must be, he thinks, to see a painted representation of your older self running amuck in a world of your creation, a world that was never meant to harbour human life. How much worse that would become, he knows, if his existence followed the same course of Aline's grief and Renoir's need for control, a pissing-on of that little boy's legacy, a final statement on the cost of dreaming.]
So, it's not terrible. We're kind of a package deal. I'm sorry I didn't tell you about him sooner.
[ Clive is angry. There are things he can't bring himself to say to Verso about what he feels about Verso's family, painted or otherwise, because he understands that these things won't be pleasant to hear.
And he wonders if these things will mar Verso's perception of Clive, of that fragile 'hope'. Time and time again, there have been assertions and reassertions of Clive's supposed goodness, but that goodness ignores (or, at least, Clive thinks) the nature of what he is: a creature, a living sword. His creator has baked this fire-clad weapon into him, and he can choose to slink away into the darkness to hide it, or learn to wield it against the people who conceived him.
Against the family-shaped Something that Verso still holds dear to him, that is. Now, more than any other time, Clive feels wholly undeserving of that sweet smile cast his way; now, more than any other time, he struggles with the notion of whether he can save anyone without also breaking hearts in the process.
But he holds that within himself. It only manifests as a silence, a tension-bound frown that unravels more slowly than he would've liked. He reminds himself, as Verso talks and finishes with sorry, that this isn't about him or his doubt. That he hates making Verso apologize for anything, warranted or not. ]
...You're strong. The both of you, to have pressed on. [ This first. ] That he appears in front of you speaks volumes, I think. You can be trusted. [ Finally, something in the ballpark of a half-smile. ] You see what he sees, when others don't. Different pairs of eyes [ or, well. One pair, but. Semantics. ], trained on the same reality.
[ Slightly strained, but entirely sincere. Gently, he lifts Verso's hands from his face and holds them in his own, lowering them to his lap to settle on one bent knee. ]
And yes, you could have told me sooner, [ he concedes, ] but it seems the sort of thing that's difficult to weave naturally into conversation.
[ A little grimly, but without bitterness. The reality is that this world isn't built for patience because none of them have any fucking time, it's a virtue that Clive wants to exercise when he can, to the people he loves. And oh, how he loves. ]
[Ah. So maybe Clive is angry, after all. That silence speaks it in whispers, and the way Clive's frown barely moves to meet Verso's smile says the rest. Something is Amiss. Capital A. Important, though Verso can't guess at what. He can only stand there and listen while Clive metes out warmth to him and other in equal measure, the curl of his own lips trending downward, the look in his eyes shifting from apologetic to concerned even after Clive finds some semblance of a smile again.
And especially with that lingering strain and the grimness that follows.
Verso taps his fingers against Clive's knee, a synchronised one, two, three, four, four, three, two, one. Grounding in some ways, but he also feels a bit like he's unintentionally emphasising this still-nebulous sense of wrongness floating in the air between them. So, he stops, and purses his lips, and pulls back a little, getting a better look at Clive and tries to listen to what his expression and his stature speak on his behalf, too. All the things that have changed between the moment he set the train into motion and now. Too many things for Verso to pretend he hasn't noticed.]
What's wrong?
[Obviously, he's upset about what he's just learned. It sucks. It's bullshit. It's a bunch of other things that no words can adequately express because it's the soul of a child, in the body of a child, with the mind of a child being forced to paint death, and that's horrific. Verso understands completely.
But he also feels like there's something more to it than that. Words that are difficult to speak, maybe. Or perhaps a hiding away for one of their sakes or another, which doesn't sit particularly well with him. Not that he'll put up a fight if Clive says otherwise, though; they don't have to share everything with each other, and the silences in between the things they do share are truths in their own right. They don't have to cause harm.]
[ What a question. Clive's expression pinches to meet it, the half-smile on his lips arrested in its trajectory to become something fuller, shrinking into an open-mouthed ah, a silent you-caught-me. Not particularly subtle; nothing about Clive is, when it comes to obfuscation.
The answer to what's wrong feels somewhat like being asked about his opinions about his mother. There's the reality of things, and then there's the emotional factor of things that are insurmountable and impossible to speak－ even now, he and Joshua don't speak of her. Or, more accurately, Clive understands that Joshua refrains from speaking about her in Clive's presence.
There's no way to express the Dessendres are my enemy without it skimming close to a I hate your family; it's a childish, petulant thing to think. Not at all like hope or warmth.
But he offers it. Always will. Unlike Ifrit, deception isn't a blade he wields particularly well, nor wants to. ]
...Verso. I won't always offer the kind of saving that you or that boy will like.
[ Though, god, wouldn't it be nice, if all it took for the world to find equilibrium was moving toy trains and finding motes of joy in unlikely places? If only. Maybe none of them would be dead, if that were the case.
Scarlet chroma festers in his chest. The air seems to shift around him, temperature hiking half a degree. ]
Clea Dessendre made a weapon to be wielded. And now that I control it― as much as I'm able, at any rate－ I'll choose to wield it against those that you consider family.
[ "Crossing a line", Clive had called it earlier. Without sheepishness, he rests his focus on Verso, calm but searching. Tense, but unflinching. ]
[After a moment's pause, Verso guides one of Clive's hands up to the scar over his eye, that black swirl of ink, then down to the scar on his throat, all the way up to the other side of his face where those lion-scratches mar his cheek and dip above his hairline. All inflicted by fights he's waged against his father, all marks he willingly, stubbornly bears all these decades later. You're not alone in that determination, the gesture says.]
You raise that blade against Alicia and I don't think I'll ever forgive you. But everyone else... Clive, they're the ones who chose violence. And if it comes to that, I'm not going to let you face them by yourself.
[Or try to talk him out of it, or insist on following every other path they could possibly follow before committing to one where they draw Dessendre blood, or anything else that might set them down opposing paths. There's emphasis in every syllable Verso speaks, a light in his eyes that's blisteringly bright with honesty.]
Verso, he also understands that. He's seen the same things I have.
[In the end, neither of them are going to like whatever comes. Any ending brought about will be devastating in one way or another. Nothing a boy should have to accept. Nothing a man should have to be punished with for sacrificing his life. Yet, the only things offered to them all the same.]
So, it's okay. You shouldn't care for them. They don't deserve your mercy, mon feu.
[ Conviction, glittering like obstinate light littering the dark of a night sky. Verso wears beautiful masks, but there's nothing quite like the keen edge of his weary, decades-sharp honesty. Clive takes it in, and holds it up to the content of his words.
(Something strangely joyous blazes in Clive's chest when Verso mentions Alicia and says I won't forgive you. It's a vehemence that Clive is happy to file away and remember for a long while.)
Silence reigns for a few beats. He touches along those scars, the marks of survival Verso wears on his skin, and listens to the angry voice in his own heart, the one that sounds a lot like a coal-plated monster with a bad attitude, that says trust this. ]
I doubt they'll ask for it.
[ Mercy, he means. ]
They'll fight, blind to how much it hurts you. And that bothers me. That they'll never understand.
[ A breath, then, softer: ] And that we need to play this game at their level. That I have to become the monster that they made me, even in defiance of their goals.
What path do you think I could cleave for you, by the end of all this?
[Which is not entirely unfair. In moments where the odds favour them and the only thing obliteration offers is finality, he might plead for something akin to mercy. Incapacitation. Imprisonment. Life in whatever form it might take because he's a hypocrite in this, too, wanting to hold close those who no longer have a purpose, wanting to lift his own purpose before them until they yield to it and to whatever follows.
The rest of what Clive says, though... Renoir would end Verso in an instant; Clea, too, if she could remember how to be merciless against him. Aline just needs to convince herself that he's a fake of a fake. And by moving forward, he is feeding that monster inside of himself. There's no way around that, even if Verso desperately wishes he could find one.
Verso guides Clive's hand one more time, bringing his palm to his lips.]
And I can't answer that. Sometimes, it feels like we have all the potential in the world, and others... [He sighs. Doesn't complete the thought. Knows it's not necessary.] I just... If we have a future, then we have one. And if we don't... then we had this.
[A love that at least Verso never would have imagined. Chroma-sharing passion. The kind of honesty that blooms more. Firelight and starlight, smiles and laughter, touch and texture and sound. More kisses peppered against Clive's palm. Then:]
Either way, we can try to go out on a high note, right? Play the game at their level, but win it at ours?
[ He doesn't, in fact, doubt that Verso might ask for mercy. And god, how dreadful to think that he'll have to say no to it.
Bridges, crossing, etc. As ever, he can spend the rest of whatever life he has atoning if he hurts Verso in the process of this grand journey that they have in front of them－ if, in fact, Verso decides he wants to stick around to let Clive do the atoning. If not, that's still the future they'll have to contend with.
Finally, finally, Clive lets himself smile at we had this, and the flurry of soft touches that follow. After all that's said and done, this is really the only thing that he needs: the confidence to say that they made music.
A long sigh. ]
...Perhaps we can drop a train on them.
[ Not exactly deflating, but giving Verso more of his weight. Arms wrap around him again, relenting in a way that isn't quite surrender, but a bone-deep need to remind himself what "we had this" feels like. So that he doesn't forget, even when he creeps closer and closer to channeling more and more of his inner fire.
That's only a half-joke, by the way. Ifrit could absolutely drop a train on someone. ]
[Record scratch. Verso pulls back a bit to look at Clive, not even intentionally, just driven by that same part of him that will one day look upon the wrecked trains beyond where they'd travelled into Frozen Hearts and ask, mournfully, how could they do that? Perhaps Clive also shouldn't doubt that Verso might ask for mercy for the trains, because at the very least, should things escalate to that point, he would pause.
There's no cause for them to destroy anything now, though, except for maybe what's left of the half-drank wine and barely touched charcuterie, so he manages a laugh.]
I don't think Verso would like that.
[It's him. He's Verso. Though to be fair, the soul version would probably also be sad, so it's not completely dishonest. Just, you know, a grown-ass man not wanting to ask that they be nice to the inanimate and already broken-down train cars littering the landscape for his own sake because that's ridiculous.
But, that done and said, Verso becomes a more active participant in the way they hold each other, pulling Clive into a proper hug, the kind that works out tension, the kind that Verso can feel in his muscles.]
Maybe a nice chunk of building. I'd say rocks but then you'd be making Esquie sad, and that isn't any better.
[ They shouldn't joke about harming Verso's family. But this is the most they can do with the bleakness of it all, and it is likely that the Dessendres will be far less kind to Clive if and when their standoffs do happen. So this is the game they'll play, and Clive will have to hold on to what Verso said about playing it on their own terms.
Which brings him to the thought that there has to be things they can honor along their way to destruction, and that there are two of them that he can note right away: trains and rocks. The former is easy, the latter... not so much. But Esquie is Verso's rock (ha), and so, Clive has no choice but to make sure his precious people (and Esquie) are not made sad by his future rampages. ]
I'll let Ifrit know.
[ As he nests into the embrace for a good, solid moment. Breathing Verso in, still committing this weight and warmth to memory. He doesn't want any part of this precious man to erode, and doesn't want any more of that eroded child to pare down to even more vague parts. Once upon a time, this world must have been so much kinder to the both of them. That's what Clive wants.
He also kind of wants more wine. A flick of his wrist behind Verso's back, and he lets green chroma dissipate under the toy train's tracks, letting it slow to a graceful halt. ]
...Tell me if I ever start feeling less like hope and more like despair, mon étoile.
[Though, if it does happen, then it'll probably be obvious before Verso can find the words, as prone as he is towards slipping into despair and as slow as he can be to realise what's happening before he's slipped too deep into it to be able to easily pull himself back up. But that's another problem to toss onto the mountainous pile of issues they'll face another day.
Together, Verso reminds himself, and so he adds:]
And you tell me if I seem like I'm getting distant.
[A request that he understands is easier said than done; how can one tell the difference between the kind of distance that lasts, at worst, until the morning and shouldn't be prodded, and the one that functions like a malignancy? That'll be a particularly unfun experience for Clive, Verso reckons, having to figure out the difference between I'm fine and I'm fine when not even Verso always understands the nuance separating one from the other, but, again, today's thoughts, tomorrow's problems.
Today's problem is that Verso's wine fuzzies have never had a chance to take root, and Clive's were burned off by anger, and Verso's not confident that they'll be afforded more than five minutes of peace before something else swoops in to turn relaxation into an even greater luxury, so he releases Clive from his immortal love grip to refill both glasses with wine before lifting his own up in a pseudo toast.]
I'd like to enjoy you as much as I can, while I can.
[ A strange sort of cognitive dissonance, to promise together as they make contingency plans for when that together becomes more tenuous. It's not the sort of thing Clive wants to speak about at too much length, lest the hypotheticals start encroaching into the reality than they currently have.
Not everything is doom and gloom. Clive knows about the other Verso now－ a boy who likes trains, which is something he'll try to remember more starkly than the haunting meander of his mournful song－ and he now has some measure of rapport with his Verso regarding his feelings on the Dessendres and the limits of his empathy for them. Obvious things, perhaps, but sometimes it's better to air the things that've been left festering in his head before they metastasize.
A hum, and Clive takes his wineglass. ]
...I did say that I wouldn't let you hide for too long.
[ Clink. Rim to rim, and Clive waits for Verso to take a sip of his alcohol before craning in and kissing some of it off of his lips. A promise and a gentle threat, in one. ]
I don't want to lose you.
[ Which, like, was the point of all this. Clive's anger and his conviction may be fixed parts of his personality, but still－ Verso isn't someone he can easily discard. ]
[Clive did tell him that. Verso isn't sure he's come anywhere close to making clear the extent of his inclination to hide away, but not also doesn't feel like the time to provide that clarity. Not when Clive is already grappling with what the future holds for them and what he might have to do in order to bring it about. Verso doesn't want his family to suffer – of course he doesn't – but he also knows that it's not his place to get in the way of any retribution that Clive or the other Lumierans believe they deserve for the decades of strife they've inflicted upon them, stealing away their families year after year because they only believed their own were worth preserving.
Admitting that it's possible to wound him to the point where it takes years to get him back on track – that doesn't feel particularly fair. So, that keeps him silent as well.
The kiss doesn't, though; he lets out a content purr of a hum at the end of it, surrendering that bit of wine to Clive's lips as if he'd always intended it as an offering.]
You won't.
[Maybe it's a questionable thing to promise, but it's wholly meant all the same. Verso does run away. He hides. But he always comes back because he's never running from the people he cares about, he's running from himself. So:]
I might lose me, but you won't.
[A repetition for the sake of making it more emphatic the second time around. Verso may still lie as a matter of habit, but he doesn't make promises he doesn't intend to keep. Not like this, anyway.]
Settling back on his hands with his glass of wine still full, Clive marinates on what that might mean. Where Verso might go, and what he might turn into when the clarity of his own self slips from him, and he's left with... gods know what. Maybe Clive has skimmed against the barest outlines of what losing Verso might mean when he'd pulled away after their encounter with Clea, had tried to take blame for fire-based trauma attributable to one Verso and not the other, but―
―he's not sure. He never will be. But the other side of that coin is what Verso offers, that Clive will always know what his North Star looks like, and that's the diamond they've mined from all this inexorable pressure. ]
Even if you lose yourself, [ he ventures, ] I'll find you. And be by your side, like this.
[ A gentle scoot, shoulder to shoulder. ]
Together, until you catch your breath again. Until you find your music.
[ For emphasis: a drumming of his fingers, along Verso's knee. The sequence he'd played earlier, to the timing of a heartbeat. ]
Lost, but never abandoned. ...I won't let the latter happen.
[Abandoned is a word with resonance. Not one that Verso's really claimed in the past – there's a drama to it, an emotional bravado that he often swerves away from when it comes to himself – but one that he sits with for a moment, now, thinking about how the grief over losing the other Verso has isolated him from everyone he's ever loved. Whether Clive means to target that or not, Verso doesn't know, can't know, isn't sure he wants to know. It doesn't really matter. Clive helps Verso to feel things at a depth he'd thought he'd filled in decades ago.
So, in lieu of the words that escape him, Verso leans in for another kiss. One that evolves quickly enough that he's soon putting down his wine glass and taking Clive's face in his hands instead, a gesture of stay. There's passion in it, and a speaking of many things that don't have words in the first place, but nothing heated, nothing escalating. It's the kind of kiss that might have been broken by the taste of salt were Verso more taken by the wine, but that instead ends as softly as it began, and with only the taste of wine on their lips.]
That's how you protect me, mon feu.
[Not by throwing himself headlong into battle, or by taking blows intended for Verso, or by sacrificing any piece of himself so that Verso might remain whole – or as whole as he can manage under the circumstances. Not by hoarding the burden of whatever awaits them, either, or becoming the monster so that Verso might retain his own humanity. None of that. It isn't the kind of together Verso wants.]
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flamebrand) wrote2024-09-08 02:07 pm
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Nah. It's looking pretty good.
[And he watches for a while in silence, until he notices a shift in the chroma in the room, melancholic and otherworldly. It settles on Verso's shoulders like a chill, and when he looks up from a train he notices the boy standing there watching them. Faceless and gray, dressed in finery, the smoke of Gommage wafting off of him.
Verso's met him a few times over the decades, always presumably by chance. He'll run into him looking over one scene of destruction or another, or else reflecting on a once-loved place or on people who he's starting to forget and the pains they've inflicted upon him that he'll never escape. Clive might have come across him too – Verso doesn't know – but he gestures towards him all the same, a gentle look who's here before he focuses back on the faceless boy.]
Hi.
[This time, the boy doesn't speak. He simply approaches the train, steps slow and unsure, then holds out one of his fingers above the wisp, keeping it in place and following the train as it circles. It takes a moment for Verso to realise what he's doing, but when he notices that Gommage smoke rising from his finger, he lets out a soft laugh.]
Nice one. Thanks.
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Clive doesn't startle, exactly, but he does come close to it. A reflexive tightening of his shoulders, a bracing of his weight against the floor, both of which relent the moment he takes in the size and shape of this newcomer and the way Verso invites him into their space with gentle ease.
Hi, Verso says, as if he's speaking to yet another relative Clive hasn't heard about. He releases the breath he didn't know he'd been holding, low and through his teeth, and lets his expression ease from frown to careful neutral. ]
Ah. [ A soft exclamation, momentarily unsure of what else to say. His attention fixes on the gnarled hollow of where the boy's face should be, as if someone tore it out in a fit of rage or grief.
Who? Why? Both questions Clive could think to ask, but refrains from. It would be rude to speak of the child as if he wasn't there. ]
...I see we have more train fans in the room, now.
[ So, this. Gentle, tentative. He's yet to encounter anyone in this half-state of Gommage, and doesn't know what to make of it― another one of Clea's unfortunate experiments, perhaps? His expression shifts, half-sympathetic. ]
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[The boy looks at Clive and makes a sound that's like a whisper, a wail, a cry of longing for something well outside of his reach. He likes the train, how it moves, those swirls of green chroma powering it onwards. Nothing, perhaps, like the trains of Paris and Lumiere, grand and full of people, but it has been a very long time since he's seen any train run, and nearly as long since he's had the opportunity to play. So, behind that unsettling sound are expressions of a happiness that he knows will be fleeting and a gratitude that he hasn't felt in some time.
He never stays long. Verso's always wondered why, but of course he's never asked. Better to let the boy be than to become something else that questions him. Often, his form remains in place after the conversation ends, a ghost of a thought of a feeling of a boy, but this time he only lingers long enough to follow the train around the track once before dissipating into thin air.
The chroma shifts back to normal. Verso settles heavier against Clive.]
I think he likes you.
[Spoken with kind of knowing that only stems from being. Even if that being is imperfect. There's a bit of relief there, too, and a sadness that rises up in spite of the rest. Earlier, Clive had accused his parents of torturing him. Verso thinks they're torturing what's left of their son even worse, but it's not a competition and that doesn't need to be said.
Some clarity probably should be offered, though, so he adds.]
Verso.
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Desaturated, devoid of context, the boy lingers until－ he doesn't. Gone as quickly as he came, a stuttering of a film reel that played the wrong few strips. The chill dissipates, and the vice around Clive's heart loosens with that disappearance.
It comes back quickly, though, that feeling of invisible fingers clenched around his heart. Not even the comfortable and now-familiar weight of someone beloved can keep the next revelation from hitting Clive like an avalanche.
Verso.
Verso, not third person. Verso, an entity separate from the man currently tucked against Clive's side. Verso, the man who－
(Clive hears that susurrous whisper again, that longing wail, like smoke from a chimney.) ]
...How?
[ Stunned into monosyllables. Clive turns his head, eyes wide, disbelieving. He shifts without truly moving, one hand instinctively reaching for Verso's (his Verso's) wrist, as if he, too, will disappear if Clive lets him. ]
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[Verso shrugs against Clive, heaves out a hefty breath.
He still remembers when he first found out. Back then he hadn't really known any better, so he'd been curious. Very, very curious. Monoco had to take him aside and slap him upside the head with the truth, and it hadn't immediately registered because up until then, Verso had believed that the fragment of the real Verso's soul was something more abstract, an essence lacking physical substance or even intelligence, consciousness, a sense of self.
Learning he was wrong felt... horrible. Like he was about to vomit up the whole essence of his own existence.
Naturally, those thoughts go unspoken.]
That's him. Exactly as he was when he painted this canvas world.
[More or less, anyway, but that doesn't feel like a distinction that needs to be made.]
I don't know how or... I don't know anything except that he spends most of his time painting. And when he does show up he'll talk to anyone willing to listen, but it's like he's missing too many pieces, so he struggles. Even though he's, uh, he's fully aware of what's happening.
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Apparently not. Apparently, the shape of the other Verso's soul is very much human. A boy. A hollowed-out boy who speaks with no voice, who touches without touching, who fades as he persists.
It knocks the breath out of Clive. Without knowing, he mirrors this Verso's past nausea; shock mixes with a kneejerk rejection of this truth, some sort of mental self-preservation instinct that keeps him from fully believing that the spirit of the dead could be entombed in the form of a disintegrating child. "Exactly as he was". ]
―Fuck, [ is strained. ] Fuck.
[ Inadvertently, his grip around Verso's wrist tightens. A clench that might have bruised if it lasted longer than the heartbeat second it did. He quickly relents, but the hold, looser now, stays.
God, fuck. Something close to terror coils in his gut, cold and cloying― it tightens his throat, makes it hard to form words. ]
And he's... [ Oh, this is fucking horrific. It strikes Clive that he has no idea how to finish that thought; he has no idea what he wants to say. ] ...Is there no way to...?
[ What. Save him? Fix him? The other Verso is dead― or, well. Should be dead.
Fuck. His eyes shutter, and his free hand rakes through messy black bangs. Fuck. ]
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He doesn't know whether to hope for that or not; sometimes, seeing a stranger feel more for you than you own family does, well, it only deepens the wound. But other times, it's validating and healing and a beacon of a promise that there may come a tomorrow where things are better. All he can do is cross his fingers and believe in the latter. It's usually the case for him, and they're two pieces from the same fractured life, so maybe. Maybe.
When the pressure of Clive's hold releases, Verso applies a little of his own, a gentler squeeze that lies about things being okay. And, eventually, once Clive manages all the words he can speak, and after Verso has given them space to exist, an answer comes. Sort of.]
I don't know. Most what I do know came from Esquie and Monoco, and what they know came from another version of Verso, so it's all... second-hand. Maybe third. I can't even say for sure whether the Paintress and Renoir realise how... complete the souls at the centre of the canvases truly are.
[Which is probably denial. The most powerful Painter in the world surely understands the worst of the natures of the artform. And the whole notion that lives in those canvases are less valid – soulless imitations of something real – must have stemmed from an understanding of the opposite and a refusal to accept that they are playing god with real lives, causing immense harm to real people, treating actual human beings – even ones that carry the soul of their own son – like props to whichever of their own needs they seek to have fulfilled.
All the same, that not-knowing is another complication Verso's long struggled to juggle. If Lumiere is to have a tomorrow, he has to wonder what that will mean for the boy who's been forced to paint the destruction of his family for decades now. Is that something he can move on from? Would happier tomorrows be something he wants to paint, if they came with a promise of inevitability rather than with the threat of more fractures, more battles, more wars waged atop the lives of everyone in the Canvas?
Questions he may never have the answer to, so questions that he doesn't speak aloud. Instead:]
I'm... sorry to keep adding to your load, but.
[They have to fight for him, too. Whatever that means.]
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[ 'This', nebulous. A gesture with his free hand, towards everything and nothing at all. This manor, what lies beyond it, the Nevrons, the Monolith. Tasking the soul of a boy who looks barely ten summers old (and this, Clive knows, is pure projection－ his own memories of being torn from his brother when his brother was that age, small and frail and helpless) to keep passively existing on the battlefield that his family has made of his haven.
It's sick. Clive can't fathom it. He doesn't know which is worse: willful ignorance, or understanding and ignoring. ]
It's no load to bear. That child needs saving.
[ Thank fucking god he knows now, what sits in the center of this world. Who sits in the center of this world, rather. It's likely that he doesn't even know the half of it, but something raw and bleeding in Clive's heart can't stomach the thought of a boy-shaped sacrifice. It's one thing to wear regret or resignation in the face of impossible choices without clear outcomes, but there are some indignities that Clive can't weather.
It shows. He hums with that anger under his skin, fire-red chroma seething in his gut.
('Saving', he says, like it's ever that easy; they're no longer playing pretend, and there are no such things as knights or lords or politics that can be solved through gallantry. But it's all Clive has, really.) ]
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We're hoisting the whole Canvas on our backs. It's a load.
[And not an easy one to balance. Maybe there's a reality in which Verso's soul and the Painters and the Lumierans can all be saved. Verso doesn't see how when the simple fact of the matter is that if that little boy stops painting, then nothing more will happen, but as he's just admitted, there are many things he doesn't know about the nature of Painting and how a canvas might perpetuate itself.
Either way, he's not about to point that out to Clive now. Being immortal may have exposed Verso to a great many of experiences, but it's also set him in his ways, and no good will come of tainting Clive's perspective before it has room to fully develop.
So, he shakes his head, forehead brushing against Clive's, and lets out another sigh. Saving that boy is a distant prospect, one that sits firmly beyond everything else they need to accomplish. But there might be other ways for them to be there for him.]
You should keep doing things like this, you know, see if it gets him to come out more. Try to get him talking like you did with me. I mean... Hope is one hell of an armour against the darkness, and you, you're good at inspiring it. I think that's the kind of saving he needs most right now.
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And yes, maybe something that holds that much weight should be a burden. As much of a burden as the prospect of finding a future for a dead man's soul should be. But two hands bracket Clive's frowning face to anchor him to the present, and, despite everything, Clive's first instinct is to think about how lucky he is. Lucky to have Verso, lucky to have purpose.
He relaxes into the cradle of Verso's palms, and receives that gentle nudge like a homecoming. Speaking and touching and belonging. He presses one of his own hands to the back of Verso's, keeping it in place. ]
I did this to make you smile too, you know.
[ Which isn't a pushback against the saving― Clive would very much like to do that, obviously. He'll hold this anger and disbelief close to his chest for when he needs the strength to push through their impossible odds; he'll remember that sighed groan and the caved-in space where rounded cheeks and wide eyes should be.
But― ]
―What does it feel like for you? To see him?
[ To have found out? To see that unmirrored not-self, lingering and fading? ]
Is it a terrible thing, for me to want to save the both of you?
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But he's an idiot. An idiot in love with Clive, an idiot in love with the world, an idiot that loves the people he's never met and those he wishes he never had. And he doesn't have the anger in him. He's far too stubborn to completely give in to despair.
So, naturally, he laughs at the first of what Clive says.]
I know. [And he pulls back, only to show Clive how he smiles. Soft yet rich. Genuine. Rising to his eyes and crinkling the lines on his forehead.] You should also keep doing that.
[Because what got lost in the reminiscence and reunion is this: Verso was wholly charmed – is still charmed, those rare clacks of the train passing over certain parts of the tracks serving as a nice soundtrack to the moment – and he likes seeing how Clive interacts with the world, all the different ways he applies his chroma, all the beauty and potential he sees that Verso might have blinded himself to long, long ago.
Clive's question brings him greater pause. Not because it's particularly difficult to answer, but because the answer has taken on many forms over the years. Anger, frustration, that easy self-loathing born of a resentment of how much suffering is linked to his existence. Pity, futility, an obfuscating petulance that changed his perspective for a while, altering his course down wrong direction after wrong direction. In some ways, Verso had gone through the stages of grief, mourning for an innocence that's been ground into ash, and now, maybe he's not at acceptance but he's able to see things differently, at least.]
It feels... like a relief, seeing that he's strong enough to keep persevering. And a bit like inspiration, too. If he hasn't lost himself after all this time, then I can keep steady, too. More or less. I don't know whether I see myself in him or not – [That's far too complicated a matter for him to really sit in for long.] – but I know what it was like to be that boy and I don't want to let him down.
[How strange it must be, he thinks, to see a painted representation of your older self running amuck in a world of your creation, a world that was never meant to harbour human life. How much worse that would become, he knows, if his existence followed the same course of Aline's grief and Renoir's need for control, a pissing-on of that little boy's legacy, a final statement on the cost of dreaming.]
So, it's not terrible. We're kind of a package deal. I'm sorry I didn't tell you about him sooner.
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And he wonders if these things will mar Verso's perception of Clive, of that fragile 'hope'. Time and time again, there have been assertions and reassertions of Clive's supposed goodness, but that goodness ignores (or, at least, Clive thinks) the nature of what he is: a creature, a living sword. His creator has baked this fire-clad weapon into him, and he can choose to slink away into the darkness to hide it, or learn to wield it against the people who conceived him.
Against the family-shaped Something that Verso still holds dear to him, that is. Now, more than any other time, Clive feels wholly undeserving of that sweet smile cast his way; now, more than any other time, he struggles with the notion of whether he can save anyone without also breaking hearts in the process.
But he holds that within himself. It only manifests as a silence, a tension-bound frown that unravels more slowly than he would've liked. He reminds himself, as Verso talks and finishes with sorry, that this isn't about him or his doubt. That he hates making Verso apologize for anything, warranted or not. ]
...You're strong. The both of you, to have pressed on. [ This first. ] That he appears in front of you speaks volumes, I think. You can be trusted. [ Finally, something in the ballpark of a half-smile. ] You see what he sees, when others don't. Different pairs of eyes [ or, well. One pair, but. Semantics. ], trained on the same reality.
[ Slightly strained, but entirely sincere. Gently, he lifts Verso's hands from his face and holds them in his own, lowering them to his lap to settle on one bent knee. ]
And yes, you could have told me sooner, [ he concedes, ] but it seems the sort of thing that's difficult to weave naturally into conversation.
[ A little grimly, but without bitterness. The reality is that this world isn't built for patience because none of them have any fucking time, it's a virtue that Clive wants to exercise when he can, to the people he loves. And oh, how he loves. ]
no subject
And especially with that lingering strain and the grimness that follows.
Verso taps his fingers against Clive's knee, a synchronised one, two, three, four, four, three, two, one. Grounding in some ways, but he also feels a bit like he's unintentionally emphasising this still-nebulous sense of wrongness floating in the air between them. So, he stops, and purses his lips, and pulls back a little, getting a better look at Clive and tries to listen to what his expression and his stature speak on his behalf, too. All the things that have changed between the moment he set the train into motion and now. Too many things for Verso to pretend he hasn't noticed.]
What's wrong?
[Obviously, he's upset about what he's just learned. It sucks. It's bullshit. It's a bunch of other things that no words can adequately express because it's the soul of a child, in the body of a child, with the mind of a child being forced to paint death, and that's horrific. Verso understands completely.
But he also feels like there's something more to it than that. Words that are difficult to speak, maybe. Or perhaps a hiding away for one of their sakes or another, which doesn't sit particularly well with him. Not that he'll put up a fight if Clive says otherwise, though; they don't have to share everything with each other, and the silences in between the things they do share are truths in their own right. They don't have to cause harm.]
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The answer to what's wrong feels somewhat like being asked about his opinions about his mother. There's the reality of things, and then there's the emotional factor of things that are insurmountable and impossible to speak－ even now, he and Joshua don't speak of her. Or, more accurately, Clive understands that Joshua refrains from speaking about her in Clive's presence.
There's no way to express the Dessendres are my enemy without it skimming close to a I hate your family; it's a childish, petulant thing to think. Not at all like hope or warmth.
But he offers it. Always will. Unlike Ifrit, deception isn't a blade he wields particularly well, nor wants to. ]
...Verso. I won't always offer the kind of saving that you or that boy will like.
[ Though, god, wouldn't it be nice, if all it took for the world to find equilibrium was moving toy trains and finding motes of joy in unlikely places? If only. Maybe none of them would be dead, if that were the case.
Scarlet chroma festers in his chest. The air seems to shift around him, temperature hiking half a degree. ]
Clea Dessendre made a weapon to be wielded. And now that I control it― as much as I'm able, at any rate－ I'll choose to wield it against those that you consider family.
[ "Crossing a line", Clive had called it earlier. Without sheepishness, he rests his focus on Verso, calm but searching. Tense, but unflinching. ]
I can't care for them the way you do.
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[After a moment's pause, Verso guides one of Clive's hands up to the scar over his eye, that black swirl of ink, then down to the scar on his throat, all the way up to the other side of his face where those lion-scratches mar his cheek and dip above his hairline. All inflicted by fights he's waged against his father, all marks he willingly, stubbornly bears all these decades later. You're not alone in that determination, the gesture says.]
You raise that blade against Alicia and I don't think I'll ever forgive you. But everyone else... Clive, they're the ones who chose violence. And if it comes to that, I'm not going to let you face them by yourself.
[Or try to talk him out of it, or insist on following every other path they could possibly follow before committing to one where they draw Dessendre blood, or anything else that might set them down opposing paths. There's emphasis in every syllable Verso speaks, a light in his eyes that's blisteringly bright with honesty.]
Verso, he also understands that. He's seen the same things I have.
[In the end, neither of them are going to like whatever comes. Any ending brought about will be devastating in one way or another. Nothing a boy should have to accept. Nothing a man should have to be punished with for sacrificing his life. Yet, the only things offered to them all the same.]
So, it's okay. You shouldn't care for them. They don't deserve your mercy, mon feu.
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(Something strangely joyous blazes in Clive's chest when Verso mentions Alicia and says I won't forgive you. It's a vehemence that Clive is happy to file away and remember for a long while.)
Silence reigns for a few beats. He touches along those scars, the marks of survival Verso wears on his skin, and listens to the angry voice in his own heart, the one that sounds a lot like a coal-plated monster with a bad attitude, that says trust this. ]
I doubt they'll ask for it.
[ Mercy, he means. ]
They'll fight, blind to how much it hurts you. And that bothers me. That they'll never understand.
[ A breath, then, softer: ] And that we need to play this game at their level. That I have to become the monster that they made me, even in defiance of their goals.
What path do you think I could cleave for you, by the end of all this?
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[Which is not entirely unfair. In moments where the odds favour them and the only thing obliteration offers is finality, he might plead for something akin to mercy. Incapacitation. Imprisonment. Life in whatever form it might take because he's a hypocrite in this, too, wanting to hold close those who no longer have a purpose, wanting to lift his own purpose before them until they yield to it and to whatever follows.
The rest of what Clive says, though... Renoir would end Verso in an instant; Clea, too, if she could remember how to be merciless against him. Aline just needs to convince herself that he's a fake of a fake. And by moving forward, he is feeding that monster inside of himself. There's no way around that, even if Verso desperately wishes he could find one.
Verso guides Clive's hand one more time, bringing his palm to his lips.]
And I can't answer that. Sometimes, it feels like we have all the potential in the world, and others... [He sighs. Doesn't complete the thought. Knows it's not necessary.] I just... If we have a future, then we have one. And if we don't... then we had this.
[A love that at least Verso never would have imagined. Chroma-sharing passion. The kind of honesty that blooms more. Firelight and starlight, smiles and laughter, touch and texture and sound. More kisses peppered against Clive's palm. Then:]
Either way, we can try to go out on a high note, right? Play the game at their level, but win it at ours?
no subject
Bridges, crossing, etc. As ever, he can spend the rest of whatever life he has atoning if he hurts Verso in the process of this grand journey that they have in front of them－ if, in fact, Verso decides he wants to stick around to let Clive do the atoning. If not, that's still the future they'll have to contend with.
Finally, finally, Clive lets himself smile at we had this, and the flurry of soft touches that follow. After all that's said and done, this is really the only thing that he needs: the confidence to say that they made music.
A long sigh. ]
...Perhaps we can drop a train on them.
[ Not exactly deflating, but giving Verso more of his weight. Arms wrap around him again, relenting in a way that isn't quite surrender, but a bone-deep need to remind himself what "we had this" feels like. So that he doesn't forget, even when he creeps closer and closer to channeling more and more of his inner fire.
That's only a half-joke, by the way. Ifrit could absolutely drop a train on someone. ]
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There's no cause for them to destroy anything now, though, except for maybe what's left of the half-drank wine and barely touched charcuterie, so he manages a laugh.]
I don't think Verso would like that.
[It's him. He's Verso. Though to be fair, the soul version would probably also be sad, so it's not completely dishonest. Just, you know, a grown-ass man not wanting to ask that they be nice to the inanimate and already broken-down train cars littering the landscape for his own sake because that's ridiculous.
But, that done and said, Verso becomes a more active participant in the way they hold each other, pulling Clive into a proper hug, the kind that works out tension, the kind that Verso can feel in his muscles.]
Maybe a nice chunk of building. I'd say rocks but then you'd be making Esquie sad, and that isn't any better.
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Which brings him to the thought that there has to be things they can honor along their way to destruction, and that there are two of them that he can note right away: trains and rocks. The former is easy, the latter... not so much. But Esquie is Verso's rock (ha), and so, Clive has no choice but to make sure his precious people (and Esquie) are not made sad by his future rampages. ]
I'll let Ifrit know.
[ As he nests into the embrace for a good, solid moment. Breathing Verso in, still committing this weight and warmth to memory. He doesn't want any part of this precious man to erode, and doesn't want any more of that eroded child to pare down to even more vague parts. Once upon a time, this world must have been so much kinder to the both of them. That's what Clive wants.
He also kind of wants more wine. A flick of his wrist behind Verso's back, and he lets green chroma dissipate under the toy train's tracks, letting it slow to a graceful halt. ]
...Tell me if I ever start feeling less like hope and more like despair, mon étoile.
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[Though, if it does happen, then it'll probably be obvious before Verso can find the words, as prone as he is towards slipping into despair and as slow as he can be to realise what's happening before he's slipped too deep into it to be able to easily pull himself back up. But that's another problem to toss onto the mountainous pile of issues they'll face another day.
Together, Verso reminds himself, and so he adds:]
And you tell me if I seem like I'm getting distant.
[A request that he understands is easier said than done; how can one tell the difference between the kind of distance that lasts, at worst, until the morning and shouldn't be prodded, and the one that functions like a malignancy? That'll be a particularly unfun experience for Clive, Verso reckons, having to figure out the difference between I'm fine and I'm fine when not even Verso always understands the nuance separating one from the other, but, again, today's thoughts, tomorrow's problems.
Today's problem is that Verso's wine fuzzies have never had a chance to take root, and Clive's were burned off by anger, and Verso's not confident that they'll be afforded more than five minutes of peace before something else swoops in to turn relaxation into an even greater luxury, so he releases Clive from his immortal love grip to refill both glasses with wine before lifting his own up in a pseudo toast.]
I'd like to enjoy you as much as I can, while I can.
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Not everything is doom and gloom. Clive knows about the other Verso now－ a boy who likes trains, which is something he'll try to remember more starkly than the haunting meander of his mournful song－ and he now has some measure of rapport with his Verso regarding his feelings on the Dessendres and the limits of his empathy for them. Obvious things, perhaps, but sometimes it's better to air the things that've been left festering in his head before they metastasize.
A hum, and Clive takes his wineglass. ]
...I did say that I wouldn't let you hide for too long.
[ Clink. Rim to rim, and Clive waits for Verso to take a sip of his alcohol before craning in and kissing some of it off of his lips. A promise and a gentle threat, in one. ]
I don't want to lose you.
[ Which, like, was the point of all this. Clive's anger and his conviction may be fixed parts of his personality, but still－ Verso isn't someone he can easily discard. ]
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Admitting that it's possible to wound him to the point where it takes years to get him back on track – that doesn't feel particularly fair. So, that keeps him silent as well.
The kiss doesn't, though; he lets out a content purr of a hum at the end of it, surrendering that bit of wine to Clive's lips as if he'd always intended it as an offering.]
You won't.
[Maybe it's a questionable thing to promise, but it's wholly meant all the same. Verso does run away. He hides. But he always comes back because he's never running from the people he cares about, he's running from himself. So:]
I might lose me, but you won't.
[A repetition for the sake of making it more emphatic the second time around. Verso may still lie as a matter of habit, but he doesn't make promises he doesn't intend to keep. Not like this, anyway.]
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Settling back on his hands with his glass of wine still full, Clive marinates on what that might mean. Where Verso might go, and what he might turn into when the clarity of his own self slips from him, and he's left with... gods know what. Maybe Clive has skimmed against the barest outlines of what losing Verso might mean when he'd pulled away after their encounter with Clea, had tried to take blame for fire-based trauma attributable to one Verso and not the other, but―
―he's not sure. He never will be. But the other side of that coin is what Verso offers, that Clive will always know what his North Star looks like, and that's the diamond they've mined from all this inexorable pressure. ]
Even if you lose yourself, [ he ventures, ] I'll find you. And be by your side, like this.
[ A gentle scoot, shoulder to shoulder. ]
Together, until you catch your breath again. Until you find your music.
[ For emphasis: a drumming of his fingers, along Verso's knee. The sequence he'd played earlier, to the timing of a heartbeat. ]
Lost, but never abandoned. ...I won't let the latter happen.
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So, in lieu of the words that escape him, Verso leans in for another kiss. One that evolves quickly enough that he's soon putting down his wine glass and taking Clive's face in his hands instead, a gesture of stay. There's passion in it, and a speaking of many things that don't have words in the first place, but nothing heated, nothing escalating. It's the kind of kiss that might have been broken by the taste of salt were Verso more taken by the wine, but that instead ends as softly as it began, and with only the taste of wine on their lips.]
That's how you protect me, mon feu.
[Not by throwing himself headlong into battle, or by taking blows intended for Verso, or by sacrificing any piece of himself so that Verso might remain whole – or as whole as he can manage under the circumstances. Not by hoarding the burden of whatever awaits them, either, or becoming the monster so that Verso might retain his own humanity. None of that. It isn't the kind of together Verso wants.]
And how I protect you.
[By saving each other from themselves.]
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