[closed]

[tinged]

Who ꕤ Hani, Mithrun, Miharu, Noe, Tylor, Dehya, Albedo, Shoka
What ꕤ area runs, past & upcoming event overflows
When ꕤ second half of august, first half of september
Where ꕤ Piling Ruined Venom Fang, Heartless Black Exile, Thirsting Prostrated Epistemophile (Wanderhalle Library)
Content Warnings ꕤ Hani, Mithrun, QST like UST but questionable. Tylor. will update as needed!


ꕤ Piling Ruined Venom Fang | Results (CW: Suggestive)
ꕤ Heartless Black Exile | Results
ꕤ Wanderhalle Library | Recreational
ꕤ Before Meteor 8/31 | Text to In-Game
ꕤ Protected Corpse's Holy Relic | Results

(( please DM me on discord @ scheris if you wanna be plotty! ))

Comments

[tinged]

[ that took longer than hani wanted. they still feel a little keyed up from the battle, but they let go of their weapon, letting the staff dematerialize into their inventory.

a breath. then, oh -

they manage a smile. mithrun’s offering is probably just that, a pragmatic exchange rather than a gift. it’s… still something. still cute enough that they laugh a little as they slot out two cocktails to make room for the sake. ]

Thank you… Mithrun-kun, Morgan-kun.

[ now that their hands are free, they take both of his. fingers curl into scarred skin, stroking, contemplative. finally, hushed: ]

Earlier… what you said. Did you mean me, or… the idea of me? The idea of what you think I am?

[tablescraps]

( The idea of them?

They let Hani hold onto his hands like they're doing him a favor while he considers what they mean. The thing is - can anyone really know another person? Don't people all just tumble through life, seeing a picture of a person through their rear view mirror, and never head on? He's not a complex person, but, Solipsistic as it might be, he can't expect anyone to really know him, the way he can't find himself to really know anybody else. Every man is an island. Such that it is.

But maybe Hani, Hayanari, feels there is a true, objective self, that can be quantifiably be defined.

So he looks at them, even though he doesn't know if he sees them as they are. )

... What are you?

( I don't know. That's his answer. His idea of Hani, yes. But he doesn't know Hani to know if what he thinks Hani is and what Hani feels they are are one in the same.

So, what is Hani? What is "me"? )

[tinged]

[ who are they? who is hani, this person who doesn’t even have a proper name. who is hani, who loved and laughed with a heart untouched, a mona lisa that would watch the louvre burn and smile still. and hani now, who loves and laughs is… ]

… More brittle than I realized.

[ in another life, it would have been more human. maybe that’s still the case here. humans ache over the strangest things. a single comment and a fire settles insidiously in their lungs.

this is how justy and hani are alike, their struggles seemingly invisible through the force of their smiles.

and this is where they feel the beginnings of something ugly in them. they’ve never minded being hani before because hani finds everyone beautiful. thinks the very being of each and every person catches the eye like marbles glinting in the sun. but if they suddenly become the hand stopping someone’s marble from shining, clutching it tight in their selfish, beautiful hands, then they -

maybe they’re wrong for mithrun? they had been so happy to be right for justy. but that’s how it is, they know, you can’t be right for everyone.

but you can learn to be less wrong, can’t you? hani squeezes his hands, unable to find the words. eventually, they just settle on a smile, a little frayed at the corners, but there. ]

[tablescraps]

( He lets them work it out, in all their quiet, in all their uncertainty. Mithrun hovers near the surface of all things; he isn't so good with people. Before, he could read them, but now looking at a person's face is like hearing the sound of a language he forgot. He doesn't know the nuance. He doesn't get the meaning. And he lacks the desire to know a person beyond their function, often. And perhaps Hani isn't very good at theirs - the one he's assigned them, anyway.

Brittle, like a machine? Brittle, like withered leaves? He considers this as the moments tick on, winding his way to the understanding that, like him, Hani might not always have a word for what they're feeling. Maybe they don't know what the feeling is, themself.

The smile settles in, and he studies it with his same, impassive gaze, and he doesn't say anything for a moment.

Then, finally, he slips one hand free. He brings it up, the arc of it slowing as it nears Hani's face like they might be delicate to the touch, might crack brittle like they'd said, and he lays a finger along the lips, at the edge of the frayed smile, the other fingers so light they brush against Hani's skin, down to their jaw. )

... I think I dislike you brittle.

( Maybe he can't understand Hani when they don't understand themself, but he can answer what he sees. He can speak as plainly as he can, from the heart, even if the effect turns around his meaning. )

[tinged]

Oh.

[ nearly voiceless, as though too much noise would disturb mithrun's fingers on their skin.

butterflies of happiness should be dancing around in their stomach right now, because mithrun initiating touch is rare. so precious. and what's even more so are the handful of words he almost never says: like and want and their counterparts. that only come out with careful thought and heavy consideration.

is this also happiness though? the knots twisting in their stomach? a little bitter, a little wistful.

hani presses back against mithrun’s fingers, swallowing fire and coal, mouth twitching slightly as they remain undecided on the topic of happiness.

but what they can say is: ]

I wish I could have heard that the other way - those beautiful words of yours. [ though they know what he means. as expected, they really don’t like that blessing. ] But thank you for touching me, and thank you for meaning it.

[tablescraps]

( There's an irony that's not lost on him here, that one of the rare times he finds the words for what he means to say, he's blocked from conveying it completely. Maybe it is, in some ways, just a sign of what his hunger doomed him to: this life of being a little bit out of sync with everyone else.

Such that it is. He can't do much for it. All he can think is that Hani looks nice while working through their unease. Maybe it's because he understands lacking. Maybe it's because Mithrun isn't looking really to thrive, but to find someone he can let himself end in.

Though he doesn't know it, the suggestion of a smile curves his lips, his thumb light against Hani's own. )

... If you ask me to speak honestly with you again...

( I will.

He trails off, intentionally. The conclusion of what he says would be flipped, but only if he says it. Better, then, for Hani to understand the things he leaves unsaid - and he leaves so many things in his head. Maybe it's best for anyone who wants to know him to start imagining what he's always leaving lying around in there.

For now, his touch lingers, and he looks like he means to say something else. Instead, though, he lets his fingers slip, and pulls Hani forward, to the end of the Area. There's a language of touch he's learning from Hani and Tylor that he's not yet so fluent in. But he has interest, slightly, in learning more.

Not long after they've exited the run and received the blessing Mithrun intended to show Hani, though, Hani will get a text, with the thing he meant to say: )

Let me get to know you.

( However brittle it may be. )