thoughtformed | (no subject)

Wow.

[Watching John successfully recover from flipping it turnways calls up a reemergence of her customary half-smile; she pretends not to notice his outstretched arms for the moment.]

Air like that is, to put it succinctly, unreal.

Hey, I almost had it.

[ No, no he really didn't, but okay. It'll be better next time, probably. (It won't.)

A person with the sense to be self-conscious about anything would drop it, but John just flaps his hands a little bit in a motion of stop being silly and get over here. ]

I don't know about you, but usually when I am bummed out about friends disappearing, I like to hug other people who are bummed out.

I'm not bummed out.

[Maybe. Kanaya was one thing; she'll miss her. Davesprite is different. Davesprite is her ectobiological siblings with four months alone in a dead world and an inevitable death sentence.]

Assuming everything works the way I suspect it does, how much trouble can he get into with you and Jade on the party boat?

[Which was the other problem: how much trouble could any of them run into? Gaining the ability to sift through outcomes and inevitabilities with clarity hadn't given her much in the way of reassurance. How far ahead she could even reason out was limited here, by the game's absence, her own relative tardiness in the timeline. Maybe she should have been trying harder. Fucking around living out childish fantasies and being tricked into inadvertently creating the Green Sun and, oh yeah, getting her only remaining family killed in the process, apparently hadn't done much to caution against such behavior in the future. Aradia was right - was she playing house, pretending there wasn't more she could be doing?]

[...]

[Maybe bummed out was the right phrase for it after all.]

Okay.

[John if you tell anyone about this she will throw a bathtub through your wall :(]

[ Please don't, he needs that wall. And that bathtub.

Oh, Rose.

For a while John doesn't say anything, just fastens his arms across Rose's back and leans his head on her shoulder. ]

Everything is going to be okay.

[ Rose said it herself, but that doesn't mean she doesn't need to hear it. And John means it sincerely. He won't let things be any other way. But then again, what can he actually do? He isn't the guy on the party boat. He can't make sure that the people who get released stay safe, can't change anything that happens in the game anymore. It's been hard accepting that for him, there might not be any going back.

But even though the alpha timeline is out of his control, John has to believe it's all going to work out. Davesprite is going to be okay. He believes it so strongly, and when he says it, it's not an empty platitude.

He hopes Rose can tell.

He hopes he's right. ]

Of course.

[The whole point of all the stupid things she's pulled from the start of the game was that she never doubted she could make things okay, somehow. Everyone has made it, one way or another, this far. If there's a way to succeed she has no doubt she will find it. It's just...

No one was supposed to die. She'd do anything to make sure everyone survived. It's the relative paralyzation of action that has its hold on her now. Somewhere out there is Rose Lalonde, clearing a path, arranging the pieces - but here she can do nothing.

Or maybe it's the knowledge that the game really is still out there, waiting for every one of them. Here, at least, is safety.

She finally pulls away with a sigh. It's an unproductive line of thought.]

Of course, everything will turn out fine. [Another sigh.] It's not permanent.

[ See, the thing about being best friends with Rose is one can never quite tell what she's thinking, just how deep those thoughts run. So when she pulls away, John squeezes her shoulders and offers a truly positive smile before letting go. ]

Of course it will. I bet you anything the island grows another Davesprite in a month. There is never a shortage of Striders.

[ Which actually doesn't make it suck any less, but it's still a nice thought. Another Davesprite, maybe one even farther along than the rest of them who can reassure them that yep, everything was totally okay.

John glances up at the ceiling, eyebrows raised high. ]

He seriously made a nest on your roof though? You can take the douche from the bird but you can't take the bird from the douche.

[ John that doesn't even make sense. ]

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REMEMBER ME SORRY I'M THE LATEST EVER