It's Curtains Mods (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
stagemanagers) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
curtainsdown2021-06-12 11:09 pm
stagemanagers) wrote in curtainsdown2021-06-12 11:09 pm
Entry tags:
the mark of those who cannot be saved
[You remember dying. Maybe the memory is clear and bright and your body still aches from the cause. Maybe it was fast enough that you didn't feel it and don't remember what you went through. But no matter how you went out, that's no excuse for truancy! Which is to say: you are still in the school.
For those executed, you will wake up in your beds. The dormitories look exactly as they did when you first arrived, without any of the changes or personal effects you and your dormmates might have made. The only real difference is that the little cot in Ambassador isn't there.
For those who were victims, you will wake where your body was discovered. All of your injuries are gone, and you feel fine. It's almost like you're still alive - but you remember what happened to you. It couldn't have just been a dream, could it?
The school looks much as you remember it, save perhaps for a few key differences. For one, there's no groundhog murals anywhere. Where things were green on the other side, like banners or paint, you'll find that here they're blood red.
The doors, for the moment, are still locked. Looks like even death couldn't free you.]
Week 1 | Week 2 | Week 3 | Week 4 | Week 5
(( ooc: Welcome to deadland, everyone! It mostly resembles the school here, and new floors will be revealed after new people die. For example, the second area will unlock after the week 3 dead arrive, and so on. Also, all dead characters will wake up at their actual canonpoint, with all lost memories restored. Have fun being dead! ))
For those executed, you will wake up in your beds. The dormitories look exactly as they did when you first arrived, without any of the changes or personal effects you and your dormmates might have made. The only real difference is that the little cot in Ambassador isn't there.
For those who were victims, you will wake where your body was discovered. All of your injuries are gone, and you feel fine. It's almost like you're still alive - but you remember what happened to you. It couldn't have just been a dream, could it?
The school looks much as you remember it, save perhaps for a few key differences. For one, there's no groundhog murals anywhere. Where things were green on the other side, like banners or paint, you'll find that here they're blood red.
The doors, for the moment, are still locked. Looks like even death couldn't free you.]
(( ooc: Welcome to deadland, everyone! It mostly resembles the school here, and new floors will be revealed after new people die. For example, the second area will unlock after the week 3 dead arrive, and so on. Also, all dead characters will wake up at their actual canonpoint, with all lost memories restored. Have fun being dead! ))
no subject
If they were here, then Rina...
He's afraid. He's afraid for himself, of what might happen when he finds her, but he has to find her. He called himself a monster during that trial because he believed it wholeheartedly to be true, but if he left her alone now...well. He truly would be living up to that idea.
He's had the time to process his memories at this point. He understands, a little too well, that everything he'd done...it was all essentially for nothing. The pain he'd felt, the sacrifices he thought he needed to make...it didn't matter. His father was rescued in the end, and even though the battle to get there was hard fought, they found their happy ending.
Not that it matters now that he's dead. But. There's only room for regret, now.
He races from the building the moment he realizes that Rina would be around, and though the fear makes him want to meander, he knows where she would be. Where she should still be...and so he'll take the awful trek there, trying to avoid the same path he'd taken when he carried her corpse.
Rina will hear Varian calling for her long before he actually breaks into the garden.]
Rina!! Rinaaa!!
no subject
What's she more afraid of though? That the feeling came true and he died after all?
Or of him. The boy that killed her.
She doesn't know what to do, how to handle this conflicting emotion. This desire of wanting him to be okay mixed with also wanting him to stay the hell away from her. So tearfully as he calls for her, growing ever closer, she grabs the shroud and pulls it back over her head, trying to hide like her first day in the school all over again, shaking like a leaf. ]
no subject
But that's not how it's going to be. He can see the pink shroud underneath the tree far ahead of where he stumbled in, and his heart sinks. The flowers scattered around it make him briefly terrified that he's not going to find Rina as she was in life, but...
Once more, a corpse. Could that even happen? Even with everyone else being alive, could she still be-
He takes a couple steps forward, not paying as much attention as he probably ought to the water he's getting very dangerously close to. It isn't until he's close enough to see the shroud trembling that he gasps under his breath, nearly falling to his knees right then and there.
But he doesn't rush her. He doesn't come closer than he is now, with a good several feet between them.]
R...Rina...? Is...are you...
...there?
no subject
I-I’m h-here…
no subject
......but she's scared. Of him.
Part of him wants to leave. To turn around and leave and just...give her space. He doesn't want to be responsible for yet more suffering that Rina did literally nothing to deserve. His presence is nothing more than a hindrance at that point, and now that he's realizing that to be true...
It hurts. God, it hurts. But he doesn't feel like he's deserving of any sympathy here, either. He killed her, accidental or no, and that's not something he'll ever be able to take back.
Varian stays still and quiet for a long time, until eventually...he moves to sit at the trunk of the tree, his back to the side. He's still some distance away from Rina- not getting too close and certainly not trying to touch her- but instead close enough for her to hear him when he speaks. It just doesn't matter when he doesn't know what to say.
So instead, he'll sing. Soft, barely more than a whisper under his breath as he wraps his shaking arms around his knees.]
You don't have to be perfect
I'm going somewhere with everyone
If there is something I can do
I'm going to find it...
no subject
And that just makes it more painful.
After a moment of silence (save for the occasional sniffle or hiccup), she sings back in a quiet voice: ]
I mean... No more hiding now...
Changing... So I'm trying now...
[ The shroud rustles and then Rina is pulling it off, sitting up once more. Considering the blank look she usually has and the fact that she was under a box last time she cried anywhere near this much, it might be a bit alarming to see how she looks now: eyes already getting red and puffy, cheeks still stained with tears, her lip quivering and her eyebrows just lightly furrowed. She's still shaking and one hand is balled up in the shroud tight while the other is still protectively touching her stomach.
She is uh... having a time. ]
no subject
Varian looks over when he hears the soft shifting of the shroud, and...honestly? He was expecting to see her tears...but he had no idea it would hurt him this badly.
But truthfully, it's seeing her alive that's truly getting him. She's no longer pale in death, no longer bleeding from a wound he couldn't have hoped to repair. She looks exactly as she did in those moments before he'd pushed her, and his hands still feel heavy from doing it even now, and he just...]
R-rina, I-
[He hasn't called her "Rina-chan" in some time. Not even during the trial did he use it.
He didn't feel deserving.]
I'm so...so sorry.
[He stresses thinly, his throat tightening when he realizes she's keeping her hand over where that stake had stabbed through her. It prompts Varian to pull away, scooting back a few inches in the grass because as much as he wants to come near and hold her, to dry her tears and be there for her, he can't bear the thought of hurting her anymore.
Not again.]
I don't...don't know how I can ever make up for what I did to you. You didn't understand, you d-didn't deserve-
[His breath hitches, his hands drawing close to himself.]
I r-really messed up.
no subject
You…
[ The only thing that might… is opening the flood gates and stop holding them in. ]
YOU REALLY DID!!
[ It’s more than just a shout. It’s an angry, devastated screech that sounds horrible even to her ears and she regrets it as soon as it’s out but that doesn’t stop her. ]
You really, really did…! And I… you’re right!! I didn’t understand! You wouldn’t let me understand!!
[ She’s crying again now, and her white knuckle balled up fists come up to her face to cover her eyes as she does. The sobs keep punctuating the screaming, the only time she really has to actually breathe. ]
All I did was care about you - and I care about you so much, Varian! I just wanted to be there for you, like you were for me and now?!
You… You killed me, Varian!! I’m never… I’m never going to see my friends or family again! All my dreams… they’re all over now…! And now you’re dead too! Do you realize that was the last thing I wanted to see happen?! That that was the very thing I was afraid of most?! Why I followed you at all?!
[ She presses her palms even more into her eye sockets, until it starts to hurt. And still she doesn’t yet stop, but her voice begins to waver as she runs out of steam. ]
And that’s… that’s what hurts the most! Because despite what you did I still have feelings for you! And it’s painful! Because my mind wants to both run to you and away from you!! And I don’t… I don’t know what…
[ And then it’s all out. That’s as much as she could get out of her system before just breaking down into strained sobs. ]
1/2
He did kill her. Accident or not, it doesn't really matter when the outcome is the same. He pushed her away over something that could have very easily been fixed with some simple communication, but Varian had been too stubborn and upset to even be honest with her about his feelings. He could, at the very least, have told her that it wasn't something he was comfortable discussing and leave it at that...not drag her through the mud for simply attempting to understand. Trying to help.
He can feel the ghost of the wish bracelet she'd put on him still burning against the inside of his wrist, the thread having caught and burned a mark against his skin when it snapped.
A sorry, he's realizing, isn't going to cut it this time.]
Rina...
[It's so much more complicated than that.
He glances down after a moment, just for a second when she's started to cry again and isn't looking at him directly. Varian knows he can't just leave this at that, he has to say something, but knowing what best to say is...hard. He's a social, extroverted person, but he's never dealt with others his age before his memories of Kiera and Catalina returned, neither of which were quite like Rina. And Rina...well.
He loves her in a way he didn't for them. He cares about her on a deeper level, both as his friend and his family...and he's realizing in this moment he might have severed that before it even truly began.]
no subject
He simply doesn't know.
"I'm sorry" is on the tip of his tongue, but he bites it back. Do not apologize right now, Varian. That isn't what she wants, or needs, to hear.]
I...I c...can give you some space.
[He finally manages, soft and quiet. He doesn't ask if she wants it; instead, it's an offer, because it's the best he can think to give right now. He doesn't want to give some sort of ultimatum- we'll talk later, whenever you're ready to talk, none of that- just.
Space. For a little while...maybe...
However long it takes.]
no subject
But he proved she’s not safe with him anymore. She might not be safe with anyone.
She wipes her eyes with her palms and hugs herself tightly, already tired from all this crying. She refuses to look at Varian, knowing if she does she’ll just feel conflicted all over again.
In the end she just… lays back down, staring at the sky for a brief moment before turning into her side.
Facing away from him. ]
no subject
And Varian took all of that away fom her, simply because he'd been too afraid of ruining something else precious to him.
He won't stop her as she turns away, simply watching in still silence as she moves to curl in on herself in the now oppressively lonely garden. It's a place Varian simply does not see as happy or comforting anymore...at least, not as much as he once did. It only reminds him of how he had to carry her here, struggling to put one foot in front of the other until he'd finally brought her to her final resting place.
In the end, Varian draws back, curled against the other side of the tree where Rina won't see him. He sits there quiet, not speaking or doing anything for what feels like a very long time.
Eventually though...she'll hear him stand, his footprints receding from her as he leaves.]