[ as things were going to be played out, lavi figured that a death was to be expected, he had noticed some sort of discussion among some of the members of his fellow amethyst but had other things preoccupying his mind at that time. oh, how he has come to regret that.
while he would much prefer to spend time close to his fellow dormmates, there's another person who deserves a visit—a check up—to know about the machinations of amethyst. he didn't know where to start, honestly, so he's quite glad that it didn't take him very long to run into her.
and, well, all it takes is a quick glimpse of something for it to be burned into lavi's memory so no matter how quickly she'll respond to him approaching her, it'll be a sight that he won't forget. either way, here is the local shadowman rabbit who will be crouching close to her, but not too close even as a shadow. ]
[Lot of good it'll do her, but she does in fact move to stand immediately the moment the little rabbit's shadow creeps up on her. Most of their conversations relate to the fate of the Troupe, a conviction she will continue to take seriously.]
Lavi. Dear. My apologies. Were you looking for me, or just returning to your dorms? I didn't see the others on my way.
[She understands he may also want to be with them, the recognition of and regret for their loss evident in her tone even if she doesn't say it with words.]
[ if there was anything good to come out of this "environment" it would be that lavi has been forced to be better at reading into people's feelings and empathizing with them more. perhaps to his detriment in some ways. ]
I was looking for you; I'll have time to spend with the others but— [ how does he say this? what's the best way to approach it? he could just say it out from the gate but that would be unkind and they both deserve better than that.
he thinks back to just earlier in the week between a comical and clumsy "lesson" between a few of the others in his dorm. how he had played music for them and... he really had been focused on himself instead of anything else. ] —Dehya was the one who held your secret, correct?
I wanted to know if she mentioned anything to you that might have played a factor in what happened.
She did. [Hold her secret, that is; that's her answer to that, soft-voiced and a little tender. The pull hasn't fully left, if only because she kept it buried down so very deep. The catch-22 of hiding things.
But at the question, Cantarella's mouth lines out into an uncharacteristic and solid frown.] ...Once hers was returned to her, did she speak with you about it at all?
[Dehya is gone, so perhaps Cantarella still feels the need to safeguard it, even knowing how much they all mean to one another.]
Your secret? No, she didn't mentioned it but... [ his voice trails as he debates how to direct things. even if people are lost to history, it doesn't mean they hadn't meant anything. he already failed at being able to do his job correctly long before he came here. "he" was different for a reason.
lavi speaks with a bit of a smile in his voice. as much as he wants to quick with this, she also deserves to know this. a piece of history that deserves to be known. ]
She was pretty nervous before your dance with her, you know. I don't know if it was Elan sensing how anxious she was or something else, but he offered to teach her and Louis how to dance.
I provided mood music.
[ he says the last part with as much cheer as he can in a situation like this. his shadow taking the shape of a music conductor. baton and all. ]
[It isn't about her secret, necessarily, but about Dehya's, but Cantarella doesn't broach the gap to correct him before he says what he wants to say. Her eyebrows lift a little at the mental image, but, well, it also stings.]
...No wonder she was more confident. [Still nervous as anything, but that hadn't stopped Dehya from showing up, rose in hand. So she'd practiced, then...even in the bowels of this miserable place, it had to have been a moment of fun and joy.] She flat-out refused at the ball, the first time. It reminds her of a different time in her life.
[...So she'll hold that, too, she guesses.]
You lot always do seem to be at the locus of trouble.
We are, aren't we? [ there's no other option than to laugh nervously at himself at her obvious observation of the most obvious things to be about his dorm. ] But typically the trouble we cause is mainly towards ourselves! You know, something akin to hazing one another for the betterment of the rest.
[ this is the most generous take on the nonsense that has been happening behind dorm doors but we don't have to unpack everything that amethyst has been up to and/or what they haven't done. but, unfortunately for everyone now, some of the things that have happened have impacted so, so many people and with that lavi felt some level of responsibility. ]
However, even I couldn't have expected them to have to tried to do something as crazy as what they decided do.
[ his voice sobers up and sounds apologetic. even his shadow changes from the conductor's outfit to his more typical silhouette as he hands his head. ]
...and to keep it from me and Professor. I hadn't realized that they would have tried to experiment with the mechanics of how some people are able to stay up during curfew and who don't. [ ... ] Had Dehya told you about that?
[ again, if he doesn't have to say it then they can just focus on how to move forward but if she didn't then...well, she deserved to know. ]
Hah... [Rather humorlessly.] It seems we've all been testing a few things.
[NOT AS OF THE WRITING OF THIS PC SO JUST IN CASE I AM RETROACTIVELY MADE A LIAR OUT OF, she will give him a slightly cagey answer in the interest of getting it from someone who's always said things more or less exactly as they are, even when he hasn't been able to:]
Tell me, Lavi.
[Hopefully, he can? He's not couching his words, so Cantarella is banking on nothing getting in his way.]
One of the first questions that I was asked by when I came back to the dorm was "how was I able to stay awake" while no one else seemed to be able to wake up. At the time, I hadn't thought much of my words... I just gave them the best answer that I could.
[ his shadow silhouette shrinks in size as before he continues. there's guilt, perhaps misplaced, in his tone and how he carries himself. he couldn't have guessed. he wouldn't have known. ]
"I wonder if intent mattered to some degree." [ ... ] "Intent can't be completely ruled out."
[ he remember saying it all too clearly but not clearly enough all at once. ]
And so, that's what she and Louis wanted to test out. If having the intent to kill the other would result in them being able to bypass the sleep that overtakes all of us. They split up and stayed at different locations and held the intent to kill one instead of sticking together.
[ "Now, here's a headscratcher... This one's about self-sacrifice!" how could such simple sentences cause so many emotions within a chest that no longer existed absent of a heart. it wasn't the first time he had gotten angry and now...he hopes it isn't the last time. ]
[Cantarella leans back against the wall of the dormitory catacombs, itself a shelf completely devoid of bodies. For quite a while, she is silent. The tremor in her voice only lasts long enough for the first sentence to get out.]
And what does that matter? [Illusions are no match for poison, after all.] What is even the point here, at the end of it all, in so senseless an act? [Everything that Cantarella had ever given to once keep innocent lives from being turned into kindling boils, left too long over too much heat. Sacrifice for what? The one that makes the most sense is like a guilty sting, given it's something she, too, has been trying to find the best way to fix.]
yeah.... her reaction is to be expected. not that it makes it any easier for lavi nor does it give him any idea of how best he should respond to it. he had asked similar questions and gotten angry for similar reasons. pushing the boundaries. knowing where they stood.
lavi understood it. it was what was necessary and sometimes that's what must be done but it didn't make things easier to deal with. ]
According to the agreements in the contracts, they wouldn't have been allowed to hurt one another. [ ... ] Or perhaps it was because of that reason.
[ BECAUSE AT THE PRESENT MOMENT OF THIS PC THIS HAS YET TO BE 100% CONFIRMED...i speak in hypotheticals. ]
We all have been dubious about the contracts that everyone has made, and I made my opinions about them known far earlier than what came out during the "production" that you held. "Shelter", "Innocent"... Is having intent enough to disqualify someone from being innocent even if they haven't done anything?
[He's likely never seen her eyes so dark and narrow or heard her voice so oddly pitchy. It's rough at the moment.]
What is it that we keep being told over and over? We are here for the sin of wanting, that the hatred fueling this place is spawned from it. What else is wanting but intent that hasn't fully been resolved?
[Cantarella chafes her fingers together, looking down at her completely empty hand. Then, she lifts her head.]
Lavi. Dehya's memory isn't mine to tell and never was. So I will tell you mine. For the good of all, the Fisalia once made a regular and necessary sacrifice. To connect with and preserve the Divine, they needed to find girls with the strongest will, selecting them through trials in which these girls were made to poison one another, struggle, survive, and die, until only one remained.
When I was down there, with all those other girls, my awakened powers hid them from the prying eyes of the abyss so that I would be crowned the sole "survivor" in the wake of their elimination.
And when I became head, I put an end to the trials altogether. No one can make medicine from poison and the other way around better than a Fisalia. No more needless sacrifice. There may be more than one moral to this story, but first and foremost, understand that I have always sought another way.
[ oh certainly not but he always got an impression that there was something lurking under the surface. all of the women here had dark secrets that they held close to their chests and didn't want people seeing. what he hadn't expected, though, was for cantarella to divulge her secret to him...though the contents of it made sense.
it explained so many things about her, gave weight to her words and actions... whereas lavi had walked on the line between companionship and indifference, cantarella held a sincerity to her actions even if they were expressed in ways that were atypical or saddled with something else along with it. it's only when she's done speaking does lavi begin his response—his voice neutral but strained. ]
...and yet, knowing all of that, it's what they still wanted to test and believe that the contracts would make sure that nothing would go wrong. Or, if things didn't end as they hoped, then— [ mind, despite everything he has been saying, he has stood with none of them. it's likely why they kept this secret to themselves, but his frustrations came out regardless. ] I'm sure that's what they were thinking, too.
In their way of imagining things and understanding what was being told, they thought that this could have been another way of sorts. Probably. I won't speak more for them than I already have, especially not when I've never agreed with it.
[ never ever, absolutely not, if there was another way—if they just understood things better. if he could express himself more appropriately. he shakes his head. ]
Thank you for sharing your secret with me, Cantarella. [ he grows back to his normal size and mulls over his next step... it's only fair, so— ] If you're interested, then I can also share mine with you. I feel that it's only fair that I offer mine.
trial kneecapped me so bad on this but i'm sneaking in during endgame anyway because i want
Of course it is. It's precisely the kind of thinking... that makes some people the ones who pave the paths for others.
[She still can't help but wonder, had she held onto Dehya's secret, the way the possessive and covetous voice of the deep wanted her to, if this would not have happened.
...The trouble is that Dehya seems to have always been that type of person, regardless of what was taken or returned to her. Maybe that's the message after all.]
I'd never force you to compromise something so tender unless you wanted to share it willingly. This isn't a business transaction... though I know you better as a shadow than I knew you as a boy, so perhaps I'd like to hear it for that alone.
[Because she's interested in him, and not because she's cutting a deal for information.]
[ she says she only knew him as a shadow than as a boy, but it didn't matter, really. knowing one meant knowing both. a truth that she would learn shortly. ]
I've made it pretty obvious that I'm a chronicler of sorts, haven't I? A person who loves reading, history, and learning all that there is wherever I go—maintaining the perspective of both sides of any story or event. A Bookman.
[ a title; a role; a name to define him and the lifestyle he has welcomed and walked. though it also meant that it was a path that barely left an impression on anyone's mind, existing on both sides to any event. ]
If you haven't already guessed it, but in order to do that correctly, I couldn't afford myself to form bonds or to stay in a place for too long. A true account of history can't have any bias. So, once I finished a "recording", I would move on—discard the people who I met, the person that they knew... A name, a person, that history would forget and no ink would be wasted on them.
[ even the people who might have said they wouldn't have forgotten would. they would be forgotten by time and the person they met wasn't even real. just an account, a reference, for what had come. he speaks with a coldness in his voice, numb and even. ]
The "Lavi" you know here is the 49th version of myself that I've had to recreate for my current recording. A practiced act to make sure that I could blend in with everyone without drawing too much attention to myself. [ living so lightly that his touch barely reaches people. to leave only the briefest of impressions that no one is supposed to remember. a temporary friendly face. ] ...but this is a failed version of myself as a Bookman because I started to question what I was recording. I found myself caring about the people who I met; the people I traveled with. I prioritized them and got myself involved far more than I needed to.
I don't know who "Lavi" really is, but whoever they are, they've made connections with people who can no longer be just ink on paper.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
while he would much prefer to spend time close to his fellow dormmates, there's another person who deserves a visit—a check up—to know about the machinations of amethyst. he didn't know where to start, honestly, so he's quite glad that it didn't take him very long to run into her.
and, well, all it takes is a quick glimpse of something for it to be burned into lavi's memory so no matter how quickly she'll respond to him approaching her, it'll be a sight that he won't forget. either way, here is the local shadowman rabbit who will be crouching close to her, but not too close even as a shadow. ]
Cantarella?
no subject
Lavi. Dear. My apologies. Were you looking for me, or just returning to your dorms? I didn't see the others on my way.
[She understands he may also want to be with them, the recognition of and regret for their loss evident in her tone even if she doesn't say it with words.]
no subject
I was looking for you; I'll have time to spend with the others but— [ how does he say this? what's the best way to approach it? he could just say it out from the gate but that would be unkind and they both deserve better than that.
he thinks back to just earlier in the week between a comical and clumsy "lesson" between a few of the others in his dorm. how he had played music for them and... he really had been focused on himself instead of anything else. ] —Dehya was the one who held your secret, correct?
I wanted to know if she mentioned anything to you that might have played a factor in what happened.
no subject
But at the question, Cantarella's mouth lines out into an uncharacteristic and solid frown.] ...Once hers was returned to her, did she speak with you about it at all?
[Dehya is gone, so perhaps Cantarella still feels the need to safeguard it, even knowing how much they all mean to one another.]
no subject
lavi speaks with a bit of a smile in his voice. as much as he wants to quick with this, she also deserves to know this. a piece of history that deserves to be known. ]
She was pretty nervous before your dance with her, you know. I don't know if it was Elan sensing how anxious she was or something else, but he offered to teach her and Louis how to dance.
I provided mood music.
[ he says the last part with as much cheer as he can in a situation like this. his shadow taking the shape of a music conductor. baton and all. ]
no subject
...No wonder she was more confident. [Still nervous as anything, but that hadn't stopped Dehya from showing up, rose in hand. So she'd practiced, then...even in the bowels of this miserable place, it had to have been a moment of fun and joy.] She flat-out refused at the ball, the first time. It reminds her of a different time in her life.
[...So she'll hold that, too, she guesses.]
You lot always do seem to be at the locus of trouble.
no subject
[ this is the most generous take on the nonsense that has been happening behind dorm doors but we don't have to unpack everything that amethyst has been up to and/or what they haven't done. but, unfortunately for everyone now, some of the things that have happened have impacted so, so many people and with that lavi felt some level of responsibility. ]
However, even I couldn't have expected them to have to tried to do something as crazy as what they decided do.
[ his voice sobers up and sounds apologetic. even his shadow changes from the conductor's outfit to his more typical silhouette as he hands his head. ]
...and to keep it from me and Professor. I hadn't realized that they would have tried to experiment with the mechanics of how some people are able to stay up during curfew and who don't. [ ... ] Had Dehya told you about that?
[ again, if he doesn't have to say it then they can just focus on how to move forward but if she didn't then...well, she deserved to know. ]
no subject
[NOT AS OF THE WRITING OF THIS PC SO JUST IN CASE I AM RETROACTIVELY MADE A LIAR OUT OF, she will give him a slightly cagey answer in the interest of getting it from someone who's always said things more or less exactly as they are, even when he hasn't been able to:]
Tell me, Lavi.
[Hopefully, he can? He's not couching his words, so Cantarella is banking on nothing getting in his way.]
no subject
[ his shadow silhouette shrinks in size as before he continues. there's guilt, perhaps misplaced, in his tone and how he carries himself. he couldn't have guessed. he wouldn't have known. ]
"I wonder if intent mattered to some degree." [ ... ] "Intent can't be completely ruled out."
[ he remember saying it all too clearly but not clearly enough all at once. ]
And so, that's what she and Louis wanted to test out. If having the intent to kill the other would result in them being able to bypass the sleep that overtakes all of us. They split up and stayed at different locations and held the intent to kill one instead of sticking together.
[ "Now, here's a headscratcher... This one's about self-sacrifice!" how could such simple sentences cause so many emotions within a chest that no longer existed absent of a heart. it wasn't the first time he had gotten angry and now...he hopes it isn't the last time. ]
no subject
[Cantarella leans back against the wall of the dormitory catacombs, itself a shelf completely devoid of bodies. For quite a while, she is silent. The tremor in her voice only lasts long enough for the first sentence to get out.]
And what does that matter? [Illusions are no match for poison, after all.] What is even the point here, at the end of it all, in so senseless an act? [Everything that Cantarella had ever given to once keep innocent lives from being turned into kindling boils, left too long over too much heat. Sacrifice for what? The one that makes the most sense is like a guilty sting, given it's something she, too, has been trying to find the best way to fix.]
Was it all of them? [All, what? Seven?]
no subject
yeah.... her reaction is to be expected. not that it makes it any easier for lavi nor does it give him any idea of how best he should respond to it. he had asked similar questions and gotten angry for similar reasons. pushing the boundaries. knowing where they stood.
lavi understood it. it was what was necessary and sometimes that's what must be done but it didn't make things easier to deal with. ]
According to the agreements in the contracts, they wouldn't have been allowed to hurt one another. [ ... ] Or perhaps it was because of that reason.
[ BECAUSE AT THE PRESENT MOMENT OF THIS PC THIS HAS YET TO BE 100% CONFIRMED...i speak in hypotheticals. ]
We all have been dubious about the contracts that everyone has made, and I made my opinions about them known far earlier than what came out during the "production" that you held. "Shelter", "Innocent"... Is having intent enough to disqualify someone from being innocent even if they haven't done anything?
no subject
What is it that we keep being told over and over? We are here for the sin of wanting, that the hatred fueling this place is spawned from it. What else is wanting but intent that hasn't fully been resolved?
[Cantarella chafes her fingers together, looking down at her completely empty hand. Then, she lifts her head.]
Lavi. Dehya's memory isn't mine to tell and never was. So I will tell you mine. For the good of all, the Fisalia once made a regular and necessary sacrifice. To connect with and preserve the Divine, they needed to find girls with the strongest will, selecting them through trials in which these girls were made to poison one another, struggle, survive, and die, until only one remained.
When I was down there, with all those other girls, my awakened powers hid them from the prying eyes of the abyss so that I would be crowned the sole "survivor" in the wake of their elimination.
And when I became head, I put an end to the trials altogether. No one can make medicine from poison and the other way around better than a Fisalia. No more needless sacrifice. There may be more than one moral to this story, but first and foremost, understand that I have always sought another way.
no subject
it explained so many things about her, gave weight to her words and actions... whereas lavi had walked on the line between companionship and indifference, cantarella held a sincerity to her actions even if they were expressed in ways that were atypical or saddled with something else along with it. it's only when she's done speaking does lavi begin his response—his voice neutral but strained. ]
...and yet, knowing all of that, it's what they still wanted to test and believe that the contracts would make sure that nothing would go wrong. Or, if things didn't end as they hoped, then— [ mind, despite everything he has been saying, he has stood with none of them. it's likely why they kept this secret to themselves, but his frustrations came out regardless. ] I'm sure that's what they were thinking, too.
In their way of imagining things and understanding what was being told, they thought that this could have been another way of sorts. Probably. I won't speak more for them than I already have, especially not when I've never agreed with it.
[ never ever, absolutely not, if there was another way—if they just understood things better. if he could express himself more appropriately. he shakes his head. ]
Thank you for sharing your secret with me, Cantarella. [ he grows back to his normal size and mulls over his next step... it's only fair, so— ] If you're interested, then I can also share mine with you. I feel that it's only fair that I offer mine.
trial kneecapped me so bad on this but i'm sneaking in during endgame anyway because i want
[She still can't help but wonder, had she held onto Dehya's secret, the way the possessive and covetous voice of the deep wanted her to, if this would not have happened.
...The trouble is that Dehya seems to have always been that type of person, regardless of what was taken or returned to her. Maybe that's the message after all.]
I'd never force you to compromise something so tender unless you wanted to share it willingly. This isn't a business transaction... though I know you better as a shadow than I knew you as a boy, so perhaps I'd like to hear it for that alone.
[Because she's interested in him, and not because she's cutting a deal for information.]
me crying of the timing of this
I've made it pretty obvious that I'm a chronicler of sorts, haven't I? A person who loves reading, history, and learning all that there is wherever I go—maintaining the perspective of both sides of any story or event. A Bookman.
[ a title; a role; a name to define him and the lifestyle he has welcomed and walked. though it also meant that it was a path that barely left an impression on anyone's mind, existing on both sides to any event. ]
If you haven't already guessed it, but in order to do that correctly, I couldn't afford myself to form bonds or to stay in a place for too long. A true account of history can't have any bias. So, once I finished a "recording", I would move on—discard the people who I met, the person that they knew... A name, a person, that history would forget and no ink would be wasted on them.
[ even the people who might have said they wouldn't have forgotten would. they would be forgotten by time and the person they met wasn't even real. just an account, a reference, for what had come. he speaks with a coldness in his voice, numb and even. ]
The "Lavi" you know here is the 49th version of myself that I've had to recreate for my current recording. A practiced act to make sure that I could blend in with everyone without drawing too much attention to myself. [ living so lightly that his touch barely reaches people. to leave only the briefest of impressions that no one is supposed to remember. a temporary friendly face. ] ...but this is a failed version of myself as a Bookman because I started to question what I was recording. I found myself caring about the people who I met; the people I traveled with. I prioritized them and got myself involved far more than I needed to.
I don't know who "Lavi" really is, but whoever they are, they've made connections with people who can no longer be just ink on paper.