janescayre | Duocaeli Inbox

[..................

This is the clumsiest attempt at a diversion she's ever seen.]

Did I run into a "knife"? Did I run "with" knives? What are you trying to say?

Turn off your autocorrect. You're spitting enough nonsense without it.

Edited (I'M SORRY) 2023-05-14 03:36 (UTC)

Flowers? I sent those for Meryl! Did they show up at your doorstep? I'm SO sorry, I can come get them if you still have them.

[ There's a brief pause, where Vash debates not addressing the second part at all, but in the end he adds: ]

I meant Knives. He goes by Millions Knives, usually. I don't know if you've seen him around. Usually when people are upset with me and I don't know why, it's because they've met him and mistaken him for me.

I'm guessing you're in the same kind of situation. With ✂️..? [ You know, since she's also a twin. ]

Edited 2023-05-14 14:58 (UTC)

[Of course they're for Meryl. Even if she just got here, the woman's already cleaning up. God, what must it be like, wrapping every man you meet around your little finger? Mind you Vash seemed like such a dope, it wouldn't take any particular skill to bewitch him.

And —

The air in her room seems stifling, suddenly. She stares down this message like it's the barrel of a gun. First that Brickston character, then Kim Dokja. Now Vash. Syo has been making the rounds again.

At least none of them have turned up as bodies.

Nothing about this "Knives" person rings a bell, either. If Vash is being mistaken for him, then...and he's relating it to her and Syo...That can't be right. No.

Her fingers tremble as she types, three ominous dots lingering on the other man's phone for far too long.]

Are you trying to blackmail me?

What?? No! I just figured we were in the same situation, that's all. I don't want anything.

I mean, not unless you still have those flowers..? I'd really like to give them to Meryl. She's a friend from back home - you can ask her if you don't believe me.

And what situation might that be?

You better explain yourself. Right now. Or I'll tell everyone you WERE blackmailing me.

[UNO REVERSE. Also the slightly less incriminating crime she could accuse him of, since she was yelling about denying him her body earlier.]

You two are from the same place? Seriously?

[Though come to think of it, they both described their homes as desert wastelands...damn. everybody came in with friends but her 😔]

Having someone who looks almost exactly like you running around stabbing people? I don't know if you know, but I met the girl with the scissors. And then I met the scissors. Multiple times. It's fine -- I'm not trying to blackmail you -- I just don't want you to get into the same situation if you run into Knives. Just avoid him if you can, okay?

As for Meryl... We've been traveling together for a while now, with some other friends. She's a good person. You should be nice to her if you meet her. Maybe you can be friends too :)

[It's as if he's pushed a straw through her head and sucked up all the brains. She's completely blanked out.

By now she's been through this with several folks. At home, after a wretched trial gone wrong with no where to hide thereafter. In the Future Foundation, where she was denied the right to full membership, full personhood, to new clothes — she was still in that awful junior high uniform as it fell to rags off her body — in Towa City, with Komaru, who was so dopey she went along with just about anything. Then so tenderhearted that she pushed past the horror to take her hand. Syo's hand, her own. And she never let go.

This is...it's the sort of blasé dismissal Han Sooyoung used when telling her she could stay in the apartment, in spite of being a fucking serial killer. It infuriates her, it mortifies her, it makes her nervous. There's a catch, right?

Then there's the other half of it. "Knives". More accurate to say, the other half of him. She's not reading this incorrectly, is she? A man who commits atrocities while wearing Vash's skin. Those crimes doubling back, being paid for by the wrong man.

Now she just wants to cry.]

It's the same for you?

[God, imagine bursting into tears over a fucking text message. Fukawa snatches kleenex by the bunch and mashes it against her face. The flowers are forgotten, pretty little Meryl is forgotten. She can't believe it. She really can't believe it.]

I thought I was the only one.

[And hurriedly, realizing her error too late:]

I'm sorry. I'm sorry that she did that to you. I won't let her near you again. I can move out. Please don't tell anyone.

Edited 2023-05-16 14:25 (UTC)

I mean, honestly? I thought I was the only one, too. It sounds like something you made up when you try to explain it to other people, you know? So I usually don't try to explain. I just let them make up their minds and do my best.

DON'T MOVE OUT. I'd really like it if you stayed, and maybe we could talk more? I'm not hurt or anything, it's okay. I can look after myself so you don't have to worry. I won't tell anyone anything.

I'll swear it on my mom's grave, if that's what it takes.

[ On Rem's grave, he means, but he doesn't expect her to understand without the context of who Rem is to him. She'd always called herself their mom, and he'd lost her before he'd ever really been able to call her that in return. He'd never felt worthy of it.

Still, he doesn't think that Rem would mind this small transgression. She would have wanted him to reach out, even if it scares him more than a little bit to be this kind of honest. ]

[She blows a hell of a snot glob into the napkins and winces. Wrests her glasses off, she doesn't need them to read her damn phone. There's a glut of tears coming now, the messy, inconsolable kind, the likes of which she hasn't shed since she'd stared down Komaru in that temple courtyard.

Why do you believe in me?!

It gutted her then and it's gutting her now. Why would this guy believe in her? They'd met once. Even if they had this singular wretched commonality, it's astounding that he'd throw all his good faith in her after being attacked by Syo. Not even once, but several times? How does blind faith come so easy to these people?]

You're so stupid I could choke. I can't believe you'd just let us keep hanging around after all that. How many times did she come after you? Why? When was this? I don't remember when it could have happened.

[Can't. Shouldn't, really, except in the spaces between her waking hours. And she hasn't blacked out nearly enough to cause this much strife. Between the day they met and now, there's no way Syo came after him again and again and again. She'd have noticed something, goddammit.]

If you really want to talk then I don't have much choice, do I?

You can't bring this up with anyone else and neither can I. It's practically mandatory.

Should I assume if I see you acting weird that it's actually him?

Edited 2023-05-19 13:24 (UTC)

You don't seem so bad. It doesn't feel right that you should exile yourself for what someone else is doing. Maybe you're right about me being stupid, but there's nothing you or she could do that would make me feel any different.

It only happened once. It was a memory -- I got in the way of her trying to hurt someone, and she didn't really like that. [ So you know, she didn't attack him out of nowhere. ]

If the first thing he does is look at you with disdain, then it's probably him, yeah. He's not a big fan of people in general. He's... we're working on that, I guess.

What's your name, anyway? And hers? I didn't exactly get to ask...

Edited 2023-05-23 21:47 (UTC)

You can say that now. You weren't there when she was at her worst.

[Case in point: his clarification. When she found herself here one of the first things she'd done is check the news. Old reports, true crime boards. And nothing had come up. No scissor-wielding maniacs, no slew of adorable boys being pinned up for show.

And thanks to Kim Dokja, she's actually got a clue as to what her other half was doing around here: collecting debts for some local mobster. Horrific, but not half so frightening as the alternative.]

So it happened in the fake memories? You should count yourself lucky. She's already made a mess of things with other people. I don't think she'll kill anyone but she's still dangerous. Stay the hell away from her.

I'll keep that in mind about "Knives" though. What a half-assed name. Did he pick it himself?

I'm Fukawa. And don't laugh, but she's calling herself Genocider Syo. It's humiliating to be associated with her at all, much less put up with a crappy title like that.

I've seen a lot of people at their worst. I'm not going to change my mind. Whatever she's done, her actions shouldn't condemn you.

[ Even as he writes it, he realizes there's some hypocrisy there, but it's... different. Even she admits that her twin wouldn't kill anyone. Knives has already done that countless times back home, and he's tried here, too. ]

Don't worry, I'm not planning to look for her or anything like that. [ He genuinely means to stick to that plan, especially when Fukawa is already so distraught about the things Syo has done. If they run into each other again, he might disengage, but he'll do his best not to escalate anything. He gets it, honestly. The last thing he wants is anyone getting into it with Nai, even if they have the best intentions. ]

He did pick it himself. I'm guessing "Genocider Syo" did the same? I'm sure she has her reasons. He does, too. I don't think it's funny just... frustrating.

[ SIBLINGS, YOU KNOW. ]

For whatever it's worth, I'm sorry we had to commiserate over something like this.

You'd think so but most people feel otherwise.

And no, that's what the newspapers called her. She just went along with it. I don't understand why. I supposed it helped that Syo could be a boy's or a girl's name, everyone assumed it was a man behind her crimes.

Frustrating is an understatement. I never thought I'd meet someone with the same problem in a million years. An evil other half is such a hackneyed trope, even when the best writers use it the whole plot becomes a farce. One real life case is a freak anomaly, but two? I'd chuck this book straight into the fireplace if I were reading it.

Then again, maybe that has something to do with why we were chosen to come here in the first place. Whatever force is behind all this has no interest in unremarkable people.

I hope this Knives calms the hell down and realizes what kind of situation he's in. Syo seems to have done so, mostly. Try not to die out there, by his doing or your own.

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