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Vergilius ([personal profile] immortalpoet) wrote2024-03-07 12:18 am

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red gaze
NAME Vergilius
CIVILIAN_NAME Red Gaze
TEAM Brimstone
HOUSING_NUMBER 11
ignoreher: (36)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 12:12 am (UTC)(link)
... Around others. It's something she-- I always wanted, and why I think my first life went the way it did in the end.

[ people who saw what elijah did, who wanted to see what she did, who...

... ended up so far away, not a hand reaching out to anyone else. could anyone? after enoch had died, after carmen had begun to drown in her own guilt, could anyone have reached out? elijah's own had remained curled around her clipboard, her pen, and not a thought to it. had anyone thought to reach for her? she didn't see it if so, malkuth knows that.

her words continue, quiet in their pain. ]


I spent a lot of time alone before everyone else began to wake to their third life, actually. I had an Assistant who helped me fight and sort books, but I still felt lonely until the next Librarian woke up. Even if it wasn't... easy to connect, to reintroduce ourselves and find ways to pass the time when we weren't needed, it was still a relief to know he was there.

[ she remembers the grasping conversations, hands unable to stay idle, how until the library began to fill with life it was only a small comfort that yesod, netzach, and lastly hod had sat just above her. ]

I like to be around others. [ more decisive this time. ] But I'm fine if "others" is just a single person, like you.
ignoreher: (04)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 12:24 am (UTC)(link)
You're good company.

[ and she means it. there's no doubt in her words, just a kind of open honesty that continues to bleed out. ]

It might sound silly, but you're the one of the only people from the City I don't feel lonely around. I've been missing my coworkers a lot... but not when I'm with you.
ignoreher: (05)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 12:37 am (UTC)(link)
[ and she laughs at that, eyes closing habitually and cutting their gaze for a moment, until they open again with a shake of her head. ]

You wish. Reds... are really similar, but you could never, ever replace her, and I'd never, ever want you to. I'm reminded of her, but that doesn't mean you're a replacement -- it means that I'm used to the kind of person you are, even vaguely.

[ her hand feels heavy as she sets the half-gone drink down, a clumsy clink she barely registers. ]

It'd be unkind to you, to her, to treat you as one. [ it was cruel for angela to be sought as one, and yet rejected. ] I'm not lonely around you because we're the same.
ignoreher: (22)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 12:52 am (UTC)(link)
But we're both waterfowl.

[ with their wonderful oil that coats their feathers, that lets them escape the pond they're sat in rather than drown in it. malkuth finally turns her gaze back to the band amidst a new song, a sigh passing her lips. ]

Other birds couldn't choose to go with their flow even if they wanted to, you know. But... at the same time, I don't think we're special because of that. It's just why we help each other out.

[ to her, that's why. ]
ignoreher: (05)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 04:28 am (UTC)(link)
Anything, really. We're responsible for the birds that can't fly, because their wings have been clipped, because they're waterlogged, because they don't think they can leave the pond they sit stagnate on...

[ she trails off, then takes her glass up again for a lack of anything to do and sips at it again. long, thoughtless sips. maybe her words are a bit slower in that way drink ebbs at you, the way it had beneath blossoming trees, but she awake as she focuses across the room. two bands are better than one. ]

Don't you think you're opening a path for those sinners of yours? You're their guide, after all. Maybe they can't see the way to go... the pond they're sitting in might be dammed, or has a small opening they can't find... but you know the flow. You know the way, even if they're the ones who have to choose to go down it themselves.

[ that's flow, you choose to go or you don't; inevitable as it is, either you follow the river or the river swells until it drowns you. that's what she's thinking, picturing. easier that than herself on the dance floor she wants to join, tucked against someone she does or doesn't know.

they're the same, they are. ]
ignoreher: (05)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 04:43 am (UTC)(link)
They might. But I don't really care if they do or not. I let others' opinions control me for longer than I really should've.

[ some people take pride in it; others don't. she's the former. but it's come from untold suffering, from reinforced will, and she looks down into the rest of her drink before she tips it back to finish it off. ]

... I think I found a new favorite drink thanks to you, Mr. Gaze! And a new place to go.
ignoreher: (07)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 04:56 am (UTC)(link)
You're not even gonna offer? I wouldn't say no.

[ ... mm. a thoughtful tilt of her head, but it's more like a body lean she catches herself on the stool next to her with so she doesn't fall off. ]

Though even if you don't have two left feet, I think I would right now -- not that I've danced before, but Kaito said he'd be my partner to learn one when the next class opened up... There's a lot more people on that dance floor than before, and I'm pretty sure I'd bump into someone.

[ there is not, for the record, that many more people on the dance floor than when they came in. ]
ignoreher: (04)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 05:16 am (UTC)(link)
[ there's not, huh... that's kind of familiar. the road had been wobbly too, hadn't it. ]

Fighting and dancing are the same. That's why... I can't say.

[ wow. she's better at keeping this secret drunk than she is sober. anyway let her... gently slide off this stool... carefully. the vague understanding that it hit like a truck, and that she shouldn't have accepted another drink tonight, is very much there. but she doesn't want to dance with someone she doesn't know, and-- ]

If we're both not experienced, then I don't feel so bad.

[ in her effort to take a hand she's more got a palm on his knee, but it's fine, she's looking up at him with her reddened face and hopeful eyes. the dance doesn't seem so bad. it's nothing fancy footwork wise, just more for couples who want an excuse to keep their hands on each other, but it is yet another experience she'd like and can't imagine who else she'd bring to a bar.

besides, they're already here. what's the harm? ]


Just one?

[ he should say no. ]
ignoreher: (10)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 05:51 am (UTC)(link)
Just one, [ she promises, and her hand finds his a little easier when her gaze escapes his.

just one, as she stumbles back harmlessly in her bid to pull him from his seat, to the dance floor reserved for people who aren't them, who've never killed someone or died trying. his hand is calloused in ways hers aren't, scarred, and malkuth wishes vaguely she had the time to map them out like she might the structure of a building, from foundation to the decor.

just as vaguely, she pauses and looks at his face; she remembers touching that too, now, the same lack of hesitation and buzzing mind. ]


... You're like the train rings.

[ fucking nonsense ]
ignoreher: (34)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 02:09 pm (UTC)(link)
Really tall. I don't know if it'll be comfortable to reach...

[ but she'll try anyway, reaching up to mimic someone else as her hands lay around his neck and she leans against him. the world stops rocking, which is nice, and she closes her eyes. vergilius is solid, grounding, and malkuth breathes out a terribly sad sigh. ]

It's not...

[ her dance................ she's in mourning. ]
ignoreher: (04)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-30 03:25 pm (UTC)(link)
[ oh, that's


better and worse, better for her hands and worse for her stomach as it tumbles. she shakes her head, light and still held down by the hands shackling her to him, him to her. they're weighty, but in a nice way. ]


It wasn't comfortable. It is now.

[ since he's been considerate and leaned a little, letting her fingers lock a bit more together as if sealing a dealing. physical contact, affection, is something she isn't used to, but it feels easier when her mind can't cling to it the way it might other times; it isn't something scary normally either, but it isn't something easy to give or receive.

she can tease and poke kaito like he does her, she can hug march and hold her hand like she's done before, but... for others, there's a certain boundary they need to cross themselves first. malkuth can't assume it's fine, or that they'd be welcome to it, though there's a difference in dragging someone along and--

this, something like this. her mind drifts to how she'll be dancing with kaito too once the class opens, hands touching in a different way, and if this has got her heart squeezing in a way it hasn't before-- that'll be worse, somehow, in a way she doesn't, can't think about. she remains in the moment, tilting her head up to look at vergilius and then away again just as fast. ]


I don't think I should drink around you.

[ but it's said with more of a laugh than anything serious. ]
ignoreher: (22)

[personal profile] ignoreher 2024-03-31 01:06 am (UTC)(link)
I'll only complain if you leave me here.

[ which he won't, even if he has to sack her... she made him promise that. her eyes close and she rests her head on him too, exhaling softly. malkuth thinks she could fall asleep like this. vergilius wouldn't let her (would he?) but she could, right on her two feet and held so nicely. ]

... I'll try to write something so I don't forget this time. Just in case. What was that drink called? Ginger... something or other. I like it. I'm gonna get it next time, too. Just one. I'll write that down. Do you know about the importance of-- of dipping?

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