puppycrush2 | week three

Entry tags:

!week: three,
dates

week three | dates

You worked up your courage and asked someone out on a date! Good job!

Now you have to hope the producers are kind re: where they send you.

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[ It's a small consolation in the grand scheme of things, but he supposes it's a consolation all the same. So, she did try to save this sixth world... and she did come here looking for a way to at least do damage control. A more skeptical or hateful person might try to pick apart everything she's said and run it through a sieve for lies — and while Josuke sometimes wishes he were like that, he finds that most of the time, he's not. It's not in his nature to grill people... ]

Okay, but you do get why someone would think that, right? I'm not the paranoid type, but you really didn't give me a choice.

[ He curls up a little more, trying to largen the distance between his head and the underside of the table. Josuke feels stubborn and defensive about this — he doesn't want to have it implied for even a second that he's the one overreacting. In his mind, he was totally right to think it was a possibility, even though from the sound of things, it's not. Tacking it on bluntly: ]

Not to mention you lied about it for two weeks, [ Only at this point does some of the hurt start to bleed through, his body tense and thrumming with adrenaline. ] Because you knew how people would react.

I held back on the truth longer than I should have. [ He's right. ] I was afraid and I was selfish, and I hurt you and the others and you had every reason to think I was a threat after that.

[ She shifts, drawing her legs closer to her chest, resting her chin on her knees. ]

And I knew it was wrong but it felt nice for once to not have to fight for my life or think about how everything was riding on me and all the blood on my hands, I could just be normal and have friends and I know--

[ Tears blur her eyes now, shoulders quivering, for all that she's doing her best to get the words out. It'd be easier, to suck it up and speak steadily and calmly. Cry later. Like she always did.

But she's not going to run from it now. ]

I don't have the confidence. When they told me I'd have to erase an entire world and its--everyone, I almost let them kill me right then and there. But one of them told me--I can't let my world lose to his. Even if it's too much for me to handle. I had to keep going. I had to prove why my world had been the one to win in the first place and why it could survive now. I--

I saw them once, Josuke. When someone was trying to drive me mad in an attack. Every single person who got killed in the attack on the base, the people I met in the Lostbelts, the people I can never see again, everyone who was lost, all talking to me, and so much of that is my fault and I could have told her that she didn't have to put me through that because I already see them when I sleep. Out of the corner of my eye when I turn the corner. Everywhere.

I have to keep standing up. [ She draws in a shaky breath, doing her best to swallow a sob. ] N-no matter what.

[ He doesn't feel vindicated, hearing her repeat back that it was her fault, that she was selfish and that she did hurt him. It just makes him feel bitter and sad. Were it not for the need to shield his hair from getting stuck in discarded candy, he'd probably be covering his face with a hand, to mask at least some of his distress. Torn between being angry, confused, and hurt, he doesn't know how to feel. Or what he should express. He wishes Mr. Jotaro were here, to help him understand what to do when faced with dilemmas like this, if he should stamp this flame out, or try to believe it might grow gentler on its own. Tightly: ]

I can't imagine what that's like.

[ He can only try to be truthful — and it's true, he can't know what kind of toll that has on a person. To have fight so that your world is the one that survives. Like most things, it's not so black and white. But he'd known that already. ]

I've never killed anyone... but there's been a few times where I couldn't save people. One of them was just a kid. And I still don't feel right, don't think I ever will.

[ Will that even make sense to her? He wonders if his own plight might seem trivial or minuscule in comparison to the sheer scale of blood on her hands... it feels like there's a giant chasm between the two of them, and he's unsure how or if it can even be bridged.

One precious life he'd failed to save, two parents forced to always wonder if their child will come home... he can't get it out of his mind that there have been countless people like that that she's wiped away. How is he, or any contestant, different from those people? She won't destroy their worlds, sure. But she would, if she had to, seems to be the implication. It's frightening as it is sobering. ]

So I don't know.... if how I feel will even make sense to you. [ He crouches a little more into himself, so that he can cover his eyes with a hand, as if nursing a headache. Josuke makes a genuine attempt to speak his mind; he's not saying that to be disparaging, but because he's genuinely uncertain if Ritsuka can even comprehend how differently a life might weigh in his hands. Lives have slipped through her fingers too, but far, far more have been crushed in her palms. ] And I know you're too deep in it to back out...

[ "Sunk cost fallacy," maybe. He pauses, gears turning in his head. She has no choice but to keep going, or all this loss was for nothing. It makes him feel a bit sick. He doesn't want to talk about the people who's lives has slipped through his fingers, so he keeps going without pausing — he doesn't want to be the one being asked questions. ]

If the wish is real, and assuming it works... then what are you going to wish for? Tell me that, next.

[ The weight of a life isn't worth comparing. It's devastating to have the life of someone slip through your fingers and it's devastating to have to let go of so many more. That she'd had to do what she did still makes her feel sick when she thinks about it and she can't not think about it. ]

There were... a lot of people who died in front of me, that I couldn't save. And the ones I erased...

... You're really kind, Josuke. I don't want you to imagine it or to know what it's like to fight to save your world. And I don't want anyone's forgiveness, because I don't want anyone to ever think this is okay.

[ Ritsuka is little more than a quivering ball of misery at the moment, honestly, head lifted from her knees only enough to be heard. ]

I don't know. About the wish. If I could trust it, I'd want to hold on to it and figure out if there's a way to stabilize the existence of those people and give them a second chance. See what else I have to do with the driving force behind this mess. I can't just say "I want it so this never happened," because it'd just probably mean those Lostbelts didn't ever exist in the first place when they were only brought out because of that force. And the other Masters would still be dead.

... I can't give you a direct answer right now, because of that. I'm sorry.

[ In however small a way, her answer is a relief. It shows him that she humanizes those people in the Lostbelts... they're not a sea of faceless victims. Each and every one was a person with a life that, if they were brought back, would have deserved to live out to its fullest. his hand drops, and he keeps his gaze pinned at the shoddy Olive Garden carpet, expression hard to read. ]

It's fine. [ He says, not really sounding fine, but at least seeming to accept her answer. Bluntly: ] Just didn't want you to say "I'd get rid of the last one with it."

[ The last Lostbelt standing in her way. If the only thing on her mind regarding getting the wish was completing her mission, killing billions more in the process, he thinks he wouldn't have any other choice but to stop her. And he really didn't want that, even if he would follow through, would've put her in the ground if he had to. His question had been an ultimatum, though Ritsuka herself hadn't known it. If he heard an answer he didn't like to that question, there would be no going back with him. All things considered, it's the most merciful answer she could have offered.

It's not that comforting, but at least now he knows she's still trying to find a way out from underneath this weight. There's still hope, maybe... for some of the people in the last one. However: ]

But I don't think there's any way to bring people back, wish or Grail or second chance whatever the hell else. There's no power strong enough to restore someone's life after it's lost... not even mine.

[ He's brought people back from the brink of death countless times. It's why he knows, perhaps more than anyone, that once a soul is gone, it's gone forever. He shakes his head, mournful. ]

You're better off trying to save the ones are left — and swearing to me you're gonna do it.

[ She doesn't need a wish to deal with the final Lostbelt, she doesn't say. She's made it this far without it, beyond her own wish to live. That had never been the problem. The problem had been the cost.

He's got a valid point, though. Even when she'd been sent to handle Singularities and restore the timeline without sacrificing anyone, well before all of this had occurred, she'd been told that those who had died in the original history were still going to die in the Singularity. That was how it had happened. There was nothing she could have done to change that.

But the Crypters had been revived. And some had died again, but...

Well, it's best not to dwell on that specifically, and Ritsuka lifts her head to stare at Josuke with burning eyes. ]

If I can find a way to save the ones in the final Lostbelt, I will. And that's not a swear to anyone, that's just a given. There's no way I'd back down on that if the option existed.

[ It's the best he can really ask for, given the circumstances. Now it's just a matter of making sure she follows through with it. He meets her eyes , his own still clouded with something like anguish, but he can see the fire still burning there, despite the weight on her. He wishes there were more to do, more lives that could be saved, but he learned over the last summer that as much as he wishes time could be turned back, actions undone, it's just not realistic. She'll always have to live with the fact that she's wiped out nations and nations of people, just as he's never going to be able to fully look past it. His fighting spirit rises up to meet and push back against hers. ]

"If you can" isn't enough. [ No, now that he knows billions of lives hang in the balance, he feels that he can't turn away from this or just send her on his way. Knowing about the potential for them all to be lost, and not doing anything about it... he couldn't live with himself. ] If the damn thing is real, I'll give you my wish if that's what it takes. There has to be a way... to overcome it.

[ There are people with extraordinary powers here, himself included. He can't just let this lie. When his hand finally completely leaves his face, he looks pale, but his expression is stubborn, full of grit. Josuke is gentle by nature, empathetic towards everyone, even those he doesn't get along with. But here, it's clear just how deeply things like this affect him; he knows, in his heart of hearts, he won't be at peace until he knows how the cards will fall down regarding this. He feels a bone-deep need to safeguard the lives of those people, now that they've come into his periphery. ]

I just... don't want anyone else to have to die for this. It's not right.

The "if" is the same "if" as "if it's real".

[ That much she can't control. He knows it as much as she does, as far as she's concerned. Right now, they still don't know about this wish. What form it takes. Anything. ]

I didn't have the options back there to save those people. If they exist here, why wouldn't I make use of them? Believe me, I know this isn't right.

[ She doesn't need that to be expressed. She's known that from the beginning. She's struggled to find some other way. She'd thought a bright spot had appeared and then she'd had to watch Britain and its faeries and its human livestock burn. ]

I won't let them die.

[ She'd refuse to let anyone help her when it came to taking down the Lostbelts. But saving the people... ]

... So please... help me save them, if mine... isn't enough.

Edited 2024-11-26 20:21 (UTC)

[ At least with this, he doesn't have to feel conflicted. If it's for the sake of saving them, then of course he's going to give it his all — even if he had a use for the wish, he would have forfeited it for something of this scale quite easily. ]

Yeah. [ He agrees shakily, not quite feeling up to saying as personal as I'll help you. A part of him is still wary... and wanting to tread carefully while facing a situation so out of his league. All at once, he feels a lot of pressure on his shoulders to figure this out with her — he can only imagine what that pressure has been like to carry alone. Purposefully vague: ] My relatives might know more about this kind of thing... I'll talk to them.

[ Mr. Jotaro and Mr. Joestar saved the world two times over. They'll know better how to handle scale like this, or at least help him not feel so small in the face of it. At the forefront of his mind, too, is what will happen if it all falls through. He'll have no choice but to face off against Ritsuka then, and he doesn't want that either.

Dabbing a bead of sweat from his temple, he shifts uncomfortably again. The small, dark, cramped space around them isn't helping. ]

There are probably others here that'd want to help a cause like this... [ Will and Ryuji come to mind, as does Mark, though he's not sure how much a normal person like him might be able to help (crowd laugh track). ] You should try asking around.

[ There might be others without uses for their wishes, assuming they're real. more than that, he doesn't want the weight of all this carried by a small handful of people. ]

Yeah, I'll talk to them. [ ... There's some pretty amazing people here, she knows that. Lessing... they've already talked about things. Asa's got a whole mess on her hands. Sanji needs to save his crew member. But maybe she'll see if Will knows anything that might help. ]

... Thanks.

[ For a lot of things, but he was vague and she can be too, exhaling quietly and swiping a hand over her eyes. ]

If that's it, then--I'm gonna tell them I'm not feeling well so you can get out of here.

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