towerofanimus | Only a shadow of what it seems (backdated to the 6th)

Characters: Enoch and anyone
Setting: Floor 48, backdated to the 6th
Format: Doesn't matter!
Summary: Enoch has a new job! While he wouldn't necessarily mind being given something productive to do, this doesn't exactly count as productive considering they aren't real graves...
Warnings: Grieving I guess? Mention of a child's death.

He cut an eerie figure, himself, dirty brown cloak wrapped around him with the hood pulled all the way up. Only the duster in his hand marked him as working here, and only the gleam of white armor occasionally visible as he walked hinted at his identity, with his head constantly bowed. There were few flowers that survived the snowfall, so the watering can hadn't been necessary.

Enoch didn't like this floor. Each and every grave marker represented someone completely isolated from other people, all alone with nothing but the ruins of their world to call home. Perhaps some could starve to death; that one young man had said he foraged for food. Perhaps they would find release. But to die that way...

Oh, he didn't want to be here. He was actually somewhat glad the tower had doubled in size, taking it away from the dorms. But he'd received a letter in the morning telling him he was now in charge of maintaining it. And as much as it may hurt him, he knew disobeying would probably bring consequences.

Even though it wasn't the same at all. Even though it wasn't maintaining a peaceful rest. Even though reading names he remembered and seeing flashes of distraught faces in his mind's eye was worse than any instance of realizing they're dead now ever was on Earth...

...okay maybe he didn't want to do this. He fell to his knees at the grave that read Ryotaro Dojima - his first roommate here, someone who, like him, dearly wished for the presence of a loved one. Did he grieve over his daughter's little corpse even while she was right here in the tower he had just left? His eyes stung with tears - he'd only been gone a week. He hadn't seen Dojima in months. Was the man even sane anymore?

Wrapping his arms tight across his stomach, he forced himself to his feet and moved on, cleaning the newest rows of graves and again collapsing at the pain of considering each person here, trapped and all alone... Even if he didn't know who they were.

But he had finished the first day of his job, so he could afford to sit here on his knees and quietly weep, shaking with the pain of reopened wounds.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

*But then it's gone.*

Laws and rules exist for reasons. You cannot steal because it denies a man his rightful property and creates an air of distrust. You cannot kill because life is sacred.

But sometimes someone steals out of desperation and takes something they or their loved ones need to survive.

Tell me, Lucifel, what is the intent of calling this wrong? Hasn't everything I've said avoided what makes this 'wrong'?

Of course, in that case its an extraordinary situation, in which it's okay to act like that if-!

...

[Wait a moment, Lucifel needs a second or two to think.

... Did he just... contradict himself?]

*Enoch smiles as Lucifel cuts himself off. Not, of course, the smug sort of smile Lucifel himself might have had the situation been reversed, but a genuinely kind smile.

He reaches out to gently take the journal from his hand, freeing one hand immediately to take the one that had just been holding the book.*

So you see... Everything will be fine, once Dax finds a way to restore our worlds.

[He hated to admit it but he had forgotten to take this part into consideration. It had come to his mind before but that he would get so worked up over this one fact...

It got him thinking, that much is sure.]

...

[he was about to say that Enoch shouldn't trust the people who lead this place so blindly, but he wasn't in the mood to have Enoch tell him something different again.]

*It was only Dax that Enoch trusted, and even then only after speaking to him. If his people intuition could be called "blind", then yes, it was blind trust.

Enoch gives Lucifel's hand a light squeeze before letting go.* For now...we should worry about having a world to return to, first.

[Lucifel rather wanted to be safe than sorry. So until he is proven wrong he would continue not to trust any of them.]

Right.

*Enoch gathered both journals in his arms. He was worried he'd managed to insult Lucifel by pointing out the flaw in his logic, but it was honestly better to have said that.*

Ah...Sola is here, in the tower...

Is she?

[Lucifel isn't so much insulted but impressed. Then again, he and the other have spent over 300 years together, it shouldn't surprise him.]

Yes...she was the only one here who knew me from before this place for months.

*And it's still kind of weird to have two of the archangels around now. He's still kind of adjusting to Lucifel being right next to him again even though it hadn't even been a year since he'd seen him.*

[It's better than having no archangel around, isn't it?]

So you have a friend here.

*Much better. He's just...still kind of adjusting.

Enoch nods.* She keeps to herself, though. Meridian meant everything to her. She was part of its soil. Losing it must be so much worse for her... I rarely see her.

I can't say that I understand her situation.

[Lucifel isn't sure if Sola losing her "soil" could be compared to losing every connection he has to heaven.]

...You can't? She's lost everything she was, the home that gave her a purpose. Her devotion to her city was so strong, she would rather use immense amounts of energy to repair it and hold it together than find a new home. She knew to do nothing but provide for it and us like she had as its earth spirit.

It would be...

*No. He won't compare it directly to losing Heaven. Because the Archangels' presence here means it really is gone...*

[Perhaps it's also his denial of Heaven being gone showing.]

It would be...? Come one Enoch, speak what's on your mind.

[He is waiting for an answer of him. All he has to do is say what he is thinking.]

Imagine not having a purpose, Lucifel. Imagine your purpose became irrelevant, and there was no way to replace it.

It would be like that.

Hmm...

[See that look on his face? He is trying to imagine what Enoch just said.]

*...Angels aren't normally very good at this, he knows. He's fishing for something more concrete...*

...If you can't...she's been hurt badly, and doesn't speak to many people that I've seen.

[Yeah, angels aren't that good when it comes to such things.]

Not even to you?

I don't see her that often. I don't know where she goes in the meantime...

Only a shadow of what it seems (backdated to the 6th)

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