IC INBOX

[kisha]

username: QUICKFISH

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Comments

[theseuschip]

[ that’s multiple layers of depressing as her instinctual answer to that question but ok, moving on ]

I’m not looking for intel, just wondering how you’re doing in there. It sounds... really bad.

[kisha]

[because why else would he message her????????]

I may not be able to hold a bow, but I can still fight if need be.

[theseuschip]

[ ....Hayame..... ]

So... is that your way of saying morale’s good, or did you think I messaged to make sure you’re still “useful” or something? Because I didn’t.

[kisha]

That is what is relevant now.

And I am.

If you ask after morale, I know not what to tell you.

[Still useful. Not dead yet. Not completely disgraced.]

[theseuschip]

[ that sounds too simple to be true, but usually Hayame only seems to let feelings slip through nuclear-level rage, so there’s not much to extrapolate from, either. ]

Really? Well... you take to new bodies better than I do.

[kisha]

I do not take to it.

I cannot take it off.

[theseuschip]

That’s kind of why I messaged.
I figured you’d either be getting used to it, or... you know, feeling like you’re in a cage inside a cage. I just know I’d probably be in bad shape in there.

[ being the one to always broach the topic of Emotions is strangely familiar — although Catherine is much friendlier — but the care with which he has to word things to bring them up without implying Hayame has any, or hitting any other triggers, is new. And tricky. ]

[kisha]

[very... very tricky... it's hard to see good intention when you don't really believe it exists most of the time]

And? So you messaged me to make me wallow in this suffocating flesh? To listen to me weep like some sort of sniveling maiden?

[theseuschip]

Sometimes it helps to talk about it, that’s all. What good would it even do me to gloat about it?

[kisha]

What good would it even do to talk about it?

[theseuschip]

It might make you feel better?

[ what makes this slightly less tricky is talking to Hayame where Simon can’t see her terrifying angry faces ]

[kisha]

I assure you it will not.

[what is with all these huggy emotion weirdos why don't they understand that the best way to cope is represssion and hate fire???]

[theseuschip]

If you say so.
I just don’t know how you can bottle everything up like that. Being stuck in the wrong time, place, and body all at once is isolating enough as it is.

[ she’s either dealing with it way better than Simon did, or way, way worse.

maybe both, her method doesn’t sound super healthy. ]

[kisha]

Because unlike some people I am not trying to flaunt my weaknesses about for all to see!

[theseuschip]

Being thrown into bad circumstances doesn’t make somebody weak.

[kisha]

Letting then affect you does.

[what kind of worlds did these people grow up on???]

[theseuschip]

It’s really not that simple.
So, there’s no room in the Warrior Code for mercy and compassion? Or is that just you?

[kisha]

Mercy and compassion are the prerogative of the strong. As is deciding what makes a warrior- I cannot take credit for that.

[theseuschip]

Why not? You don’t seem to have a problem deciding what makes other people weak.
A lot of people would say that mercy and compassion are strengths, not optional favors.

[kisha]

All you need to decide that is eyes!

And a weakling, no matter their desire to give, will never find themself in position to do so. Is it a foreign tongue I speak? Is that why you never understand what it is I say?

[theseuschip]

I understand it, I just don’t agree with it. It’s not that black and white. Nobody just goes through life totally unaffected by their experiences.

[kisha]

But the strong know what they can show and what they cannot. It is as if you intentionally mishear me!

[... no hayame ur also just really bad at explaining urself]

[theseuschip]

That’s not what you said.
Why does it even matter? Why is being strong so much more important than everything else?

[kisha]

The weak spend their lives suffering and their deaths forgotten.

I will not die like that.

[er- live like that]

[theseuschip]

[ hayame oh my god ]

What is it with the dying thing? Nobody’s asking you to. We’d all really prefer it if you didn’t die, actually.