thenearshore | † There's a light, there's a sun †

Who: Allen Walker, Lavi, and later Lux
Where: Takamagahara
When: June 27th
Summary: Prayer #20: Spring Cleaning. Lavi and Allen come across a giant ~~area boss~~ muck ayakashi the day both of Allen's shinki are bonding on their own British mission halfway across the world. This will only end in blight and tears yet somehow a very sad shounen victory, clearly. ~~The idiots rolled a 20 out of 20.~~

[ Takamagahara. The streets are sticky with more than just a bit of spring mud as it would seem like a bog has risen up from the ground, through storm grates and whatever place it could find to ooze from. Sucking down anyone it could who treads without care--and appearing just a bit too translucent to be truly solid. Too otherworldly to be truly grounded in reality.

Something that builds up and up until it slowly begins to tower like a lurching mountain. A heavy schlucking sound as it moves; first a roil of blob that becomes a mountain. Begins to reach almost as if it's trying to grow arms--before slushing in a heavy wave against a building. (Growing more solid?

...More intelligent? Something that will blight anything in its path that it can.)

It's why Allen arrives at the outskirts of its floodpath somewhat breathlessly. Breathless--and noticeably without either of his shinki as well. But keeping at a safe height on rooftop, coming cresting finally where he could see the devastation the ayakashi--the biggest he's seen aside from the harmless whale-like one in the sky before... he has to stop and suck in his breath, his left eye adjusting to the presence that spreads out almost as far as the eye can see from its epicenter.

It's tainted half the city... ]

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It sounds nice, but we barely got by... [ He's smiling though. More gently, as he leans back a little on his palms and looks to her. ]

Lux... [ He hesitates a little, but it's only to consider his words. The weight of them. ]

...why can't you? Live a life like that still. [ He's dead serious, smiling like it's such a simple and obvious sort of thing. So gently and like it's a very quiet, very important sort of thing.

Even if: ] Sometimes...

[ Even if his expression becomes a bit more gentle. A bit more faraway as his eyes slide back in front, looking over the placid water. ]

Sometimes I think if I wasn't the person I am now that—if I could do anything, it'd still be that. Just trying to do something to make people smile. Because everything he existed for—it was that.

But then I realize—there isn't really anything that's keeping me from still doing that too. And that it's too easy to forget about how important that is even with everything else that might be going on.

So I think if that's a life you want to live, you should live it. [ Fond—

It's in a sad-sweet, fond sort of way he looks back to her when he says that. ]

There isn't any reason why we can't, is there?

Edited 2017-04-10 02:39 (UTC)

[ Why did she suddenly feel like she was standing on a precipice? Staring at Allen as he asked that question, such a simple one at that, her smile fell away, shifting. In that moment, she looked positively struck, not expecting him to say something like that so plainly. Like it was such a natural sort of thing.

Why couldn't she?

Why couldn't they?

It was strange, how her mind seemed to try to come up with endless reasons of why it couldn't be that simple, but each time was left with nothing. No real reason with any sort of logic or substance; maybe in a lifetime long past, a world away that she couldn't remember and wondered... if there was much point sometimes, when all it did was create difficult situations like this that hardly made sense:

Why hesitate? Why did she continue to try to come up with a reason to hold herself back?

If she could do anything, if she could live a life that she wanted... ]

[ To take a step back and forget what she saw, or to take a breath and a leap into the unknown.

Even if... ]

I can't say for certain the kind of person I was; I try not to think about it whenever possible. But I think—no, I know she would have found a way to talk herself out of it.

[ Even if it seemed like he had to ask her permission for something like this. To help her realize that even when she felt like she might have been standing there by herself, perhaps she wasn't the only one.

Still sitting on her knees, she leaned forward slowly. Rising slightly so that she might close some distance between them, yet still give him his space. ]

But I've been so caught up in trying to be what I believed that person to be that I've doubted myself more often than not. And I'm not sure that something like that is fair—to you, to her, or to myself.

I said it myself, didn't I? If we're not good at doing things the way we're expected, then we make our own way.

[ Head tilted slightly, her smile somehow uncertain yet still strong, surprisingly bright even in the dark of night.

If that is the path laid out before us—I think I would rather forge our own. ]

And even if there might be a reason, I don't want to hear it. I won't.

Edited 2017-04-10 03:51 (UTC)

! [ Saying it so plainly like that... his eyes can't help but widen. Lux...

Is that your roundabout way of agreeing?

You never used to talk so plainly of what it is you actually wanted. What she wanted to fight for, what she wanted to live for... It was what always bothered him when they first met. The house of cards she'd built around herself to the point where it seemed like the ideals, the ones she actually fought for, didn't match up with what she told herself. The earnest and passionate heart of idealism that was tied up like a bird in a gilded cage. So to talk like this now...

Honestly, he blinks a bit owlishly down the bridge of his nose at her for a second. Like she's actually managed to startle him. ]

Edited 2017-04-10 04:18 (UTC)

[ Just for a second.

Before he laughs quietly, soft and under his breath like just maybe that's the best sort of thing. And while he doesn't lean or reach for her he does relax then, his own chin dipping for a moment as a smile curls his lips.

Heh.. ]

Saying it like that.. [ If anything... if anything, talking with a warm certainty like that—

...he sounds relieved. ]

There isn't anything I could do to change your mind even if I wanted to, is there. [ Is he teasing?

He just might be. With the best possible intentions. ]

Edited 2017-04-10 04:16 (UTC)

[ She should probably ask why he looked at her like that, so absolutely perplexed and startled. Really, she didn't think she was the type who let herself get so caught up by something like that, but at the same time, the way that she acted from the moment she arrived on the Far Shore—

So tightly wound, yet wanting desperately to break free from something. To reach out, to live and feel, yet being terrified at the very thought. But in moment when she let herself get caught up, when she ignored the voice in the back of her mind telling her that it was dangerous, that it was shameful or any number of things...

While it might not have been true before (she couldn't say), she was the only one holding herself back. And the thought of fighting, laughing, living, and being able to share that with others...

His laughter was contagious, and it was impossible for her to keep a light giggle from her own voice as she tried to tease back. ]

Not a thing, my mind is made up. Although you're welcome to try, I suppose.

[ Why did this feel so freeing, to smile and laugh like this? Was it because of the state he was in earlier, or...

Or because she suddenly had a reason to let go? To be herself.

Thank you... Thank you so much... ]

Edited 2017-04-10 04:47 (UTC)

† There's a light, there's a sun †

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