iamvice | 002. and his shoes were pointy-toed. // open post.

[ He doesn't tolerate the contact for very long. In fact, his response is characteristically swift and brutal: a well-placed smack to dislodge your grip, followed up by a blow right to your stomach, with the right amount of force to bring you to your knees.

( Jessiah, stop this. )

Congratulations, LaRue: here's yet another achievement to your name. Getting Fenris to voice such open disapproval towards his Card for the first time in decades. ]

Is that all you're ever going to do? [ Breathe in, breath out. Scramble for some inner fucking peace. (Nope, it isn't working. FYI: you probably shouldn't should so loud either; this is Arcadia, after all.) ] Go off and do something shitty, and crawl back to apologize later? Seems like that's the goddamned story of your life, LaRue.

[ He's doubling over, the breath knocked out of him entirely as his knees crumple beneath him and his palms find the floor.

He doesn't know what to say, Jessie. What the hell do you want him to say? That all of that's not true? That he can't possibly make mistakes -- he's made plenty, he's apologized for them because it would have been a shit thing to do, not say sorry when he really was sorry ( for falling short, for misunderstanding, for being a kid flung into the world of grown-ups, for being too slow, too fragile, too human even. )

He's trying to catch his breath, his stomach sucked in as he shakily pushes up from the floor to stand again because it's fall ten times get up even once and that should be good enough for once.

One hand coming out to brace fingers on the wall. He's going to get up. He's going to stand and take this and not whimper at your feet. ]

[ And all the while, you'll be able to feel the way Jessie's watching your every move. He's dangerously still, the kind of stillness that comes with a man who's ready to lash out at any moment.

(The tension of the moment is a physical thing now, manifested in the snapping of a Social Link, those sympathetic ties on steroids. Your friendship's ripping apart at the seams, just barely managing to hold itself together in light of the widening gap between you both.) ]

Did you even think, for one second, about the people you were going to leave behind? There could have been a way. You just didn't bother looking for one!

[ And there it is, the reason why your link isn't shattering completely. It's because at the end of it all, Jessiah Vice is angry beyond words because he's got emotions to spare for you in the first place. ]

There wasn't any time to think, Jessie! [ The words wrench themselves from his throat, his heart. He can't take anything back, and even if you asked him now -- he's not sure he would even do that. ]

All I could see was Hell all over again: outmatched even if the numbers should have been on our side, a former member of the Searing Wind come back from the dead in a way that has Grendal's interference written all over it. We had to send people home because too many had gone fuck-all crazy from whatever the hell it is that's out there in the Bone Hills.

[ He hadn't wanted to open his mouth for fear of all the words spilling out without filter. But he's tired. He's hurting. He just... he would like soldier on and somehow wrap Arcadia up and if that's fucking selfish so be it because he'd like a place to maybe grieve for the loss of two friends who he'd had the responsibility of looking out for only to fuck it all up. He can't even be altogether glad that Coach ascended. He can't, not when he still catches himself reaching for the rings that used to sit on either pinky finger. ]

You wanna hit me again? Go ahead.

[ It might have seemed, until that moment, that it was impossible to pour into a single glance all of the contempt, spite, grief, and rage that a man could have accumulated over a given time period. He's silent for a full minute, doing nothing but stare back at you, before he's turning away. He fetches his phone. ]

I'm not going to waste any more time on you.

[ A push of the button, and a portal right to the Dark Hour opens up. There's a light at the end of that path. You may be able to make out his office. ]

[ And in that long, exceedingly tense minute, he doesn't look away. He's looking straight back at you all the way until you turn to fetch your phone and then his gaze drops, shoulders drooping as his bottom of of teeth catch on his upper lip.

He can see the office, well beyond the Hour. There's an ache in his chest that the sting his his gut can't hold a candle to. He can also feel the tight knot of the link that ties you two together. ( There was a time that he would avoid looking up, for fear of staring at people's clocks. It's different this time, as a Card, to see the Arcana -- vibrant and alive. He doesn't look this time; he knows the Link's reversed in that same instinctive feeling of one knowing that things aren't right. ) ]

I'm sorry, Jessie. [ He looks away; adds, softly: ] Safe trip back.

002. and his shoes were pointy-toed. // open post.

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