[OPEN][BACKDATED] Stitch me back, one by one!

[chronomancer]

Characters: Jade!Eridan Ampora, and YOU!
Setting: Floor 15, the workshop.
Format: I'll start with action, but I'll match you.
Summary: In which Eridan pretends he knows how to sew. Spoilers, he doesn't. Backdated to before the Labyrinth event!
Warning: None? I'll add if necessary.

[It's really not that hard, he figures, to use his torn jacket as a pattern and make a new one with some scraps of red fabric lying around. It's just. Cutting fabric and sewing it together. How hard can it be?

Apparently, very hard and not really a project for the uninitiated.

He's left the whole mess on a workbench for now, focusing on patching up his other pair of pants. That, at least, he's relatively used to. It's not the neatest of stitch-work, but at least it'll hold.

At least, he thinks with grim amusement, he has two hands now, to do this. Otherwise it'd be well and truly hopeless.]

Comments

Gira got a REPLACEMENT HEART! ...It doesn't seem to work. :C

[mutab1e]

[Equius just sat there and worked for quite a while, completely silent. Any sounds or movement would cause Eridan to look up at him, and that was something he wanted to avoid; enough that, instead of just excusing himself, he forced himself to sit there and work and not look up at Eridan, no matter what. It got somewhat easier as he went deeper into the project, and after a short while, the second shirt was folded neatly on top of the first. He would see if they fit later.]

[Work. Work was good. He would have preferred some tools and a metal shell to work with, but as long as it was occupying his hands, he could focus more on a thing that made him feel better a bit less worse, the signless shirts.]

[...Oh, if Eridan was making shirts as well, he would want the paint. Though chances are Equius would be out of here before they were needed, because his plan was to leave as soon as he finished. So, under the guise of grabbing more pins, he started setting out a few jars of paint; random colors, but Eridan would see jade in there if he looked carefully.]

I'm sorry, I bought them wholesale. ;C

[chronomancer]

[At length, Eridan gave up. He couldn't hold it in, and fuck if he got a hemospectrum lecture for his efforts. At least Equius wouldn't be acting like a scared squeakbeast.]

I wish you wouldn't do that, you know.

[He kept his eyes on his sewing, which was now coming out squished together, tight and nearly bunching up the fabric. His voice was soft and apologetic, lacking the bite of acid humor that he injected on it more out of habit than anything else by now.]

Put yourself down all the time.

Ahh, it's the thought that counts. u3u

[mutab1e]

[The tone of voice was... surprising. Of the many reactions he thought Eridan would have upon speaking to him again (including the outstanding variable of 'none, as he'll never speak to me again'), whatever that was wasn't one of them. So he stopped the laughable excuse for doing something and turned around with the pins in one hand, listening.]

...I'm sorry. But... there's no point in avoiding it, really...

[He's got an expression and tone that suggests he's much, much more acquainted with this fact than he really should be. Maryam knew firsthand about him, and no doubt she blew his problems out of proportion for the others, but at the very least everyone knew. Besides, he didn't believe he knew how to go about life not putting himself down, but he was keeping that thought very well contained at the back of his head, Eridan, he doesn't need any pesky inquiring jadebloods making it blaze up again, thank you very much.]

Re: Ahh, it's the thought that counts. u3u

[chronomancer]

[Eridan arched his shoulders in an exaggerated shrug.]

...believe me when I say I know.

[And he did! Honestly, but it didn't make it any less annoying to contemplate.]

But that doesn't change the fact I wish you wouldn't. It just means I know you won't stop.

[And that was... sad. For reasons he'd rather not think about in depth.]

[mutab1e]

...What's the... problem with it?

[Legitimate question, one he almost looks scared to ask. He doesn't want another Look and contradictory statement, okay. The first one was bad enough.]

[chronomancer]

[Eridan snorts, staring intently at his stitches and most definitely not at Equius.]

How would you feel if you knew someone back home who constantly insisted both moons are orange. Or that there's only one moon. Or something like that. Kept telling you over and over, and you know they believe it, and it won't matter that you know for a fact they're wrong, they'll never see your way. But they'll also won't stop insisting about this thing they're so sure about, and which you're dead certain they're wrong.

[At some point, the hypothetical question turned into a full rant. Eridan stopped because he realized he'd bent the poor needle in the process and stared at it for a moment. He sighed.]

Something like that.

[mutab1e]

But that has nothing to do with--

[...Wait.]

[Loading... loading...]

...That's different.

[chronomancer]

[Eridan smiled wryly, and chanced a look up at Equius.]

Trust me, it really, really isn't.

shoot me now. /headdesk

[mutab1e]

Yes it is, because you can look out the window and you can clearly see that there are two moons, and they're not orange, and you can prove to the other person that they're wrong. Because it's a fact.

[chronomancer]

...well, okay, that's the one thing this is different, but not for the reasons you think.

[He snorts and reaches to grab a new needle, given the bent one will not unbend itself. He sighs.]

I have proof, very convincing proof, it is the most amazing of proofs. But I can't show it to you.

[He pauses a moment, trying to pass the thread by the needle's eye, tongue peeking between his teeth as he does. It takes a few tries. He smiles a little humorlessly at this triumph.]

It's actually rather infuriating. Your lucky number's seven, for the record.

[mutab1e]

Wet the tip of the string first, it gets rid of the frayed edges. Um. I mean--[...It came out before he could stop himself, okay. Shut up.]

[He looks a bit baffled at Eridan's whole thing there, but charges bravely on anyhow. He's not even going to ask about the lucky number, which is fortunate; there are two things it's easy to set him off on lectures about, and those are the hemospectrum and math.] ...Why? Did you leave it in the Veil or...?

[chronomancer]

[He flashed a ghost of a smile at Equius request, but it melted away as he asked.]

Oh no, I've known this long before we got stuck in the Veil. It's not the kind of proof you carry around, I mean.

[mutab1e]

Well... what is it, then?

[He's just completely lost here, and isn't even bothering to hide it.]

[chronomancer]

[He's quiet for a moment, a long moment, actually, and not just because he's trying to get back into the swing of his sewing, horribly squished as it now is. Or because he desperately needs something to do with his hands least he starts fidgeting with his claws.

At length then, and very, very quietly, Eridan speaks.]

If you were really as useless and worthless as you think you are, the timelines wouldn't doom themselves, after you die.

[mutab1e]

...That's because I'm the Space player, Eridan.

All of those became doomed because I had to fulfill certain objectives to proceed, and I couldn't do that if I was dead. [Hey, he coded this game, alright. He knows a bit about what he's expected to do -- or at least, he does now. In the beginning he was screaming his head off like a rabid monkey. But that's a different story.] It has nothing to do with my personal ability, only my job within the game.

[chronomancer]

...even after you were done?

[He arches an eyebrow.]

I'm the Time player, remember? I know a thing or two about doomed timelines.

[mutab1e]

...

[This, he has no answer to. Good job, you've stumped an Equius.]

[chronomancer]

Yeah.

[He shrugs, moving on with his too-tight stitches and his guilt complex. Yeah.]

[mutab1e]

[The Let's-Ruin-Every-Conversation-We-Start Brigade strikes again. He'd figure out what he did in the timeline to cause its destruction later. For now, he decided to jump onto the other half od Eridan's rant.]

...What did you mean about the number seven?

[chronomancer]

Ah, nothing, nothing.

[Eridan offered Equius a small, wane smile.]

Time player nonsense, that's all.

[mutab1e]

What... kind of Time player nonsense?

[Great, now he looks worried.]

[chronomancer]

[Oh crap. Eridan offers a small smile.]

The kind I've already taken care of. Don't worry.

[mutab1e]

...Alright.

[He doesn't look entirely convinced, but it's not his place to argue...]

[...After all, Eridan is the Time player, not him.]

[At that moment, he seems to realize that there was a pile of fabric and thread on the table that belonged to him, and he wasn't really doing anything with it. It was... confusing, really, all of what Eridan had said. The lucky number he wasn't as concerned about. But the doomed timelines. Why? After he died, why did they all doom themselves? He immediately jumped to the possibility that there was some chain reaction caused by his lack of presence, um... there was only one person who really cared enough about him to react. And that was...]

[...oh. Oh dear.]

...Eridan... if I may ask... um, how did the doomed timelines... meet their fate?

[chronomancer]

It's... never the same.

[He works diligently, bit by bit, more concentrated on picking his words carefully than keeping his stitches even.]

The alpha is like clockwork, everything has to fit the way it's meant to, or everything goes to hell. It's not always melodramatic, either. But little changes start to pile up, decisions come too early or too late or not at all. Knowledge is never found. Goals are never accomplished. And in the end everything and everyone dies, one way or another, only the alpha survives.

[He reached the end of the thread he'd cut, so he tied it up and leaned in to bite the needle free and start the process again. At least now his row of stitches is a bit more presentable? If on the terribly squished side of business.]

The moment a timeline is doomed, well, it's doomed. Death for all the involved.

[mutab1e]

[Well, that doesn't make figuring it out any easier, but at least it makes some sense. If everything worked out (somehow), then there had to be an opposite version where it didn't. That would mean that the 'alpha' timeline would be... the luckiest? Or the one that served the most purpose? (He hated to say it, but that was simultaneously worrying and comforting.) So... would there be a timeline where Feferi remained in control? Was that doomed too? Why?]

[So many questions. ...Regardless, he had pried far enough. And they had work to do.]