Endgame: Gathered on This Beach of the Tumid River

[animusmods]

Characters: open
Setting: all around the Tower from the 25th of May to the 1st of June
Format: any
Summary: A general mingle for all characters throughout the Tower.
Warnings: Standard Animus warnings; please note anything specific in the subject headers of your threads

[The Tower is stagnant, the only signs of activity confined to the second block. There isn't much time left; it might be a good idea to rest and do whatever strikes your fancy before the timer hits zero.]

Comments

HOW CAN I BRACE MYSELF WHEN THERE ARE NO BREAKS ON THE HEARTPUNCH TRAIN

[sageprincess]

[Nice enough, but unnatural without a fake sun to even create the illusion of daylight. Only a still darkness behind the veils of leaves. She prefers his company over the scenery - but perhaps that's fitting, with the irony of what he says next.]

Mm, if only we had a blanket and some tea to go with it.

[Ever wistful, because even pretending that's their only worry in the world right now is something of a temporary relief.]

i guess you will just have to buckle in

[keepscalm]

If only. [What he wouldn't do for tea right now. It's just not right, how long he's gone without the real thing.

Seeing an opportunity for a segue, England fidgets with the hand that isn't at the end of the arm laced with Zelda's. It shouldn't be that hard — he already wrote to her about a similar gesture, and the meaning is echoed here, as well. But...it's not just about protecting her as he would his own, though that is a great honour for anyone who understands the importance of a nation's people.

It's about being her friend.]

I don't have a blanket, but. Well. [He holds out his opposite hand palm-up, to present to her the respectfully folded flag in his hand. Not that it's exactly recognisable as a flag, at the moment.] ...it's...kept me warm in a more metaphorical sense, I suppose.

[He keeps his eyes pointed away from her, his face angled just slightly towards the ground.]

I don't have confidence in these seatbelts

[sageprincess]

[Her smile fades somewhat at his awkward continuation, head tilting curiously as he brings the bundle of fabric he's been carrying to her attention. It's not really recognizable as a flag, no, and it's especially difficult with what limited light there is, but she's seen the dash of red over white and then blue before-- in passing, for the most part, but...]

... Wait, but that is... You had that hanging on your wall, did you not?

[She's not taking it quite yet, and honestly she isn't even certain if she can. It's one thing to accept a little embroidered version made specifically for her, but the one he personally kept in his room, as she did with her map...?]

hueheuheue

[keepscalm]

I did, yes. [Despite knowing it was only glamour, it was still reassuring, especially as the end of the countdown came closer and closer.]

It's...the flag of my kingdom. The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland. [Seeming to realise that this might not mean much to her, especially as she mostly knows him as simply England, he stumbles to clarify.] That is— my family.

[It's the first he's really spoken of his family outside of America. There was never much love lost between any of them, but England has felt their absence here, as well. He chews his bottom lip for a moment and runs his thumb over the cloth in his hand. Then, he inches it a bit further towards Zelda.] ...I'd like you to have it.

[He's always had a poorly-defined concept of family, as most nations do. But now that he's been uprooted from his nation proper for almost three years, this small group of people he's linked himself to are all he has. From the citizens he never met, to his colonies, to his little brother, to those he has simply sworn to protect.

They're the closest thing he has to a family here. In truth, probably the closest thing he's had to a loving family in centuries.

And Zelda is a part of that family. He wants her to know that.]

NOPE THE SEATBELTS DO NOTHING

[sageprincess]

[Her brows draw together as he explains.]

Your... family?

[There are many things she doesn't understand about nations like Arthur. Many things she simply will never understand, like how they have families in the first place, and the implications thereof. But she does understand family, as little experience as she has had being a part of one. And she understands what he's saying by simply offering that precious length of fabric.

She understands it feels right, to consider him her family.

It's a soft, quiet thing, when she takes the folded flag. Slow, reverent, she holds it to her heart as she shuts her eyes, the tremble of her lower lip betraying how much this means to her. But only for so long, because in the next moment she's unhooking her other arm from his so she might slip it around his waist, pulling herself close to bury her face in his shoulder. She does not sob openly, as it seems she has so often done during their stay here, though she cannot entirely stop her voice from cracking a bit.]

... Thank you, Arthur. Thank you so much.

[It may not last long (it never lasts long), but she has a family again.]