Kariya Matou (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
vermicompost) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
towerofanimus2013-01-13 02:33 am
vermicompost) wrote in towerofanimus2013-01-13 02:33 am
Long lost days of you and me
Characters: Kariya Matou and open
Setting: The dormitories and the meadow (or anywhere else, if anyone would like to take him somewhere, as he isn't very mobile on his own– he likes visitors, and trips.)
Format: Action to start, but prose is fine, too
Summary: It's only been a year or so, by Kariya's reckoning (when he can remember), but time and magical parasites have taken their toll.
Warnings: blood and possible body horror or angst
Kariya's Room:
[It's difficult for him to move at all, yet he has his wheelchair, and he can push it a little ways. It's hard for him to leave the dormitories, yet sometimes he still tries. Not now. For the moment, he's resting in his room, his eyes closed, even though he isn't sleeping. It's hard for him to fall asleep.
His body is smaller than it used to be. He's shrunk. Both his eyes are oddly whitish, both sides of him equally affected by what lives within him. His pale skin is all lines and veins, and the movement of the worms within him is evident beneath it, where it shows. His skin appears so thin, it seems it might break at any moment. All of him seems like it might break. Sometimes it does. His skin cracks in lines where it's thinnest, and the blood seeps out. He hardly notices when that happens. Maybe it's because it happens all the time, or maybe he simply isn't thinking clearly enough to realize.
He mutters to himself sometimes, and today is no exception. Sakura, he says often, or he mumbles something about going back home. Back home. He's going to get there. He'll go back to the War, he'll fight and he'll win, and he'll make everything all right again. Suddenly, he speaks, his voice firming, loud enough to be heard clearly.]
I'll help everyone go home.
[That's what he'll do.]
The Dormitory Hallways:
[Kariya wheels himself slowly along. He probably won't get very far, but he likes the feeling of moving forward. (He hasn't told anyone he was going.) He likes to travel. He used to travel once, didn't he? He feels so confined when he's in his room too long, trapped in one place. It's better to get out and around. Unfortunately, the corridors are so confusingly, frustratingly similar.
When he's gone a certain distance, he forgets how far he's come and where he was headed. He stops in the middle of the hallway, not sure whether to go forward or back. Maybe if he waits here long enough, he'll remember. Or maybe it wasn't so important. This is a change of scenery, isn't it? He sits back and gazes down the corridor, a wasted figure with white hair, waiting for someone or something interesting to arrive. He can't see very well, but his expression, if anyone were close enough to read it, is a hopeful one.]
The Meadow:
[It's a good day when he can get to the meadow. Some days, he's stronger, if only a little. The meadow is his favorite floor. It's beautiful there. It makes him smile. The grass and the flowers remind him of the park where he used to play with the children. Sometimes he thinks it is that park. But not today. No, he's thinking more clearly today. He moves a thin arm and manages to take out his photograph, from where he always keeps it, in the pocket of his jacket. It's wrinkled and torn and stained with blood, but it's his. His picture of his family: that's Aoi standing beside him, his wife, and with them are two little girls: their two daughters, Rin and Sakura. When he goes home, he'll see them again. They'll be happy again.
He's forgotten that he never married, that he never had children. But why would he want to remember a thing like that?]
Setting: The dormitories and the meadow (or anywhere else, if anyone would like to take him somewhere, as he isn't very mobile on his own– he likes visitors, and trips.)
Format: Action to start, but prose is fine, too
Summary: It's only been a year or so, by Kariya's reckoning (when he can remember), but time and magical parasites have taken their toll.
Warnings: blood and possible body horror or angst
Kariya's Room:
[It's difficult for him to move at all, yet he has his wheelchair, and he can push it a little ways. It's hard for him to leave the dormitories, yet sometimes he still tries. Not now. For the moment, he's resting in his room, his eyes closed, even though he isn't sleeping. It's hard for him to fall asleep.
His body is smaller than it used to be. He's shrunk. Both his eyes are oddly whitish, both sides of him equally affected by what lives within him. His pale skin is all lines and veins, and the movement of the worms within him is evident beneath it, where it shows. His skin appears so thin, it seems it might break at any moment. All of him seems like it might break. Sometimes it does. His skin cracks in lines where it's thinnest, and the blood seeps out. He hardly notices when that happens. Maybe it's because it happens all the time, or maybe he simply isn't thinking clearly enough to realize.
He mutters to himself sometimes, and today is no exception. Sakura, he says often, or he mumbles something about going back home. Back home. He's going to get there. He'll go back to the War, he'll fight and he'll win, and he'll make everything all right again. Suddenly, he speaks, his voice firming, loud enough to be heard clearly.]
I'll help everyone go home.
[That's what he'll do.]
The Dormitory Hallways:
[Kariya wheels himself slowly along. He probably won't get very far, but he likes the feeling of moving forward. (He hasn't told anyone he was going.) He likes to travel. He used to travel once, didn't he? He feels so confined when he's in his room too long, trapped in one place. It's better to get out and around. Unfortunately, the corridors are so confusingly, frustratingly similar.
When he's gone a certain distance, he forgets how far he's come and where he was headed. He stops in the middle of the hallway, not sure whether to go forward or back. Maybe if he waits here long enough, he'll remember. Or maybe it wasn't so important. This is a change of scenery, isn't it? He sits back and gazes down the corridor, a wasted figure with white hair, waiting for someone or something interesting to arrive. He can't see very well, but his expression, if anyone were close enough to read it, is a hopeful one.]
The Meadow:
[It's a good day when he can get to the meadow. Some days, he's stronger, if only a little. The meadow is his favorite floor. It's beautiful there. It makes him smile. The grass and the flowers remind him of the park where he used to play with the children. Sometimes he thinks it is that park. But not today. No, he's thinking more clearly today. He moves a thin arm and manages to take out his photograph, from where he always keeps it, in the pocket of his jacket. It's wrinkled and torn and stained with blood, but it's his. His picture of his family: that's Aoi standing beside him, his wife, and with them are two little girls: their two daughters, Rin and Sakura. When he goes home, he'll see them again. They'll be happy again.
He's forgotten that he never married, that he never had children. But why would he want to remember a thing like that?]
no subject
You're not thinking–
[But when Lancer laughs, he relaxes.]
You're joking, aren't you? [Kariya is slow to catch on to jokes.] I don't think Rin is interested in things like that. [Not the fierce, red-eyed Rin he knows, and loves as much as he'd loved her as a child.] But if she were, of course it would have to be someone good enough.
[Someone who looked after her, who was loyal to her, someone strong and capable.]
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[He still has a shit-eating grin plastered on his face.]
Still, you're right. She's probably not interested. She's got more important things.
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She wouldn't be interested in you.
[Kariya says this bluntly, but he doesn't mean it harshly.]
I wish she would find someone she likes. Sometimes I think she might... [But he trails off, with a shake of his head.]
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[Or at least she used to be. He sounds just a little more serious as he says this.]
But I'm probably not her type.
[Discounting the insanity, he could still list a multitude of reasons why an actual romance between them would fail.]
Oh? She might? Congratulations, then!
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Probably not.
No, I don't know– [Kariya is just a bit flustered.] She hasn't said anything, so please don't tell her I said anything. It's just, little things. Maybe it's nothing.
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Would I? Oh no, I think that's more something a mother would know.
[And Aoi isn't here, of course. It's been so long since he's seen her.]
I wish her mother were here. She'd be able to help me with these things.
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But you're all she has right now. So you get the final say.
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But mothers know more about these things, don't they? When I was Rin's age, I was already dating her mother, so I don't have much experience.
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[That's what happened when you started charming ladies when young. All the older men urged you to hurry up and find the perfect woman so you wouldn't steal away all their wives.]
And I've never raised a child to her age before.
[He lets himself wonder for a moment what an adult Connla would be like. More responsible than his father, most likely.]
no subject
[He sobers as Lancer mentions not raising a child to her age. It's not the first time they've spoken of Lancer's family, and he doesn't like to bring up painful subjects. After all, he's avoiding his own painful subjects so well.]
I'm sorry.
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[Now that he's older and more inured to pain of the emotional kind, he can easily speak of these things.]
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Spoilers: he doesn't.]If you win the War, you could ask to make things different.
[The War, in Kariya's mind, has become a strange, shadowy, promising thing, which awaits them when they go home. He doesn't quite remember the details, or when he does, they come in pieces.
He knows the winners have their wishes granted.]
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That's not something I'd use the Grail for.
[Even if he did have a wish on the Grail, or if there existed a perfect Holy Grail that could grant a wish without so much sacrifice, he wouldn't use it for that. The past molded him into who he was. He couldn't change that, even if it was tragic. Besides, miracles were something for the living, not the dead.]
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[Including warping all of time. But he doesn't exactly remember his role in the War very well.]
But I don't have to wish that, since they're here with me.
[His belief that Sakura is in the Tower comes and goes, as is the case with his mind in general.]
If I had the Grail, I would wish for them to be happy.
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[Again, no comment on Sakura.]
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[He frowns.]
Didn't I? It was for something important.
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[He would rather no one mess with the Grail again. Not after someone tried to use Rin as one.]
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There was something I wanted, more than anything. I shouldn't have forgotten. [He's still trying to remember.] I forget things sometimes. Too often now.
What would you wish for, Lancer? A good fight, you said?
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[He nods.]
That was why I answered the Grail's call. But just getting called into the War, getting the chance to meet and fight against all the other Servants--you can call that wish one that's already been fulfilled. So if I did get the Grail, maybe I'll just wish for a beer.
I want an AU where Lancer wins and wishes for the most evil beer
So your wish was already granted. You're lucky, then.
I want it too
I'm a pretty lucky guy, all things considered.
[
Lies you have E-rank luck]no subject
I'm lucky too, to have my family.
[But he sounds uncertain as he says that. He pauses.]
When people disappear from here, do you think they go home, or do you think they die? There are graves in the graveyard for the people who've gone, and they don't come back. Maybe there's a way we can really die here. [Sometimes he does think it would be better for him to die. If not for Rin and for the pressing need he feels to go home, to do something important, he might try dying. It might be a relief.]
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I don't know. If they died, their bodies would be in the grave, right?
[He just didn't feel like digging any up to find out.]
But a lot of the time, they're pretty healthy before they disappear. If they died, what made them just...die like that?
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If the administrators can bring us back to life, they can kill us, can't they? It seems like they can do anything to us that they want. [Now he's getting melancholy again.]
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