Jono Starsmore (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
furnaceface) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
fandomhigh2011-01-23 09:47 am
furnaceface) wrote in fandomhigh2011-01-23 09:47 am
Entry tags:
Library, [01/23]
Today was a 'busy work' sort of day in the library. Jonothon had even showed up for his shift early, like he'd threatened to do earlier in the week, armed with incentive and not much else.
There were things that were eating at him. So he had to throw himself bodily into whatever task he might notice today, because if he was thinking about alphabetizing the misplaced books throughout the entire sci-fi section, or about straightening all of the dog-eared pages that he stumbled over, or poking through the system to figure out who needed to get notices for late books, then he wasn't thinking about anything else.
That worked nicely in his favour.
Off to the side, he had a few books waiting, at least. He'd taken a few moments today to dig out a few favourites, as per Rosalind's request. Something else to drown his thoughts under, he was certain. But he wasn't complaining.
[Open!]
There were things that were eating at him. So he had to throw himself bodily into whatever task he might notice today, because if he was thinking about alphabetizing the misplaced books throughout the entire sci-fi section, or about straightening all of the dog-eared pages that he stumbled over, or poking through the system to figure out who needed to get notices for late books, then he wasn't thinking about anything else.
That worked nicely in his favour.
Off to the side, he had a few books waiting, at least. He'd taken a few moments today to dig out a few favourites, as per Rosalind's request. Something else to drown his thoughts under, he was certain. But he wasn't complaining.
[Open!]
Re: Talk to Jono
Which he'd then also feel badly about. Of course.
//She's gone,// he said, as if he was coming to that realization possibly for the first time all over again. //Maybe... maybe she was, even when we found her. Or...//
Or maybe she was sitting inside of her own head, screaming as they turned against her, tore her to shreds, burned her...
He'd never know.
Re: Talk to Jono
Death, or watch yourself destroy everyone you love, while you're powerless to stop it. It wasn't a hard choice.
Re: Talk to Jono
That didn't make it hurt any less, either.
//I suppose... she would be,// he agreed, with a small shrug of his shoulders. He didn't put much stock in what she would or wouldn't be. He'd never asked Didi what came after death. He'd never wanted to know. But there was that part of him that almost wished that there wasn't anything after it. A sudden stop would be...
It would be some kind of reassurance that whatever came after death wasn't just as fucked-up as what had gone on during that 'life' thing.
//I just...// He winced. //It was me. That did that. I mean. That... I can't... Just...//
Words, again.
Re: Talk to Jono
"Y-you did what you had to do," she said firmly. "What she would have wanted you to do. I know it's harder on you, that way, but ... you saved her. From wh-what might have happened. I ... I asked Squall. In case I ever ..."
Squall's sword will pierce my heart. I guess it's okay if it's you, Squall. Nobody else.
Re: Talk to Jono
//You would do this to him?//
There was no coming back from this. This wasn't just murder. It was killing a piece of yourself, too. It didn't matter the reason. He'd stood in a New York city that was just a sampling of an entire world of tortured souls and twisted flesh and agony. But he'd killed her.
Re: Talk to Jono
If he had to kill the one thing he had let himself love?
It was different. Squall wasn't Jono. Raven wasn't Rinoa. Jono had been manipulated, forced to commit horrors against his will. It wasn't the same thing.
She tried to believe that it was different enough that she wasn't condemning Squall to this same pain. Squall, her Squall.
She couldn't. She couldn't possibly. Except ...
Except, Hyne's wrath brought down in flames, she couldn't possibly run the risk of hurting anyone else. Squall was her Knight. He had chosen to be her Knight. He was a SeeD; SeeDs were destined to fight Sorceresses. That was the entire point of Garden. If not Squall, who? An army, sent against her? Rows of soldiers with angry faces, coming for her. Intent on killing her. Savoring the idea. They might be cruel, they might make her suffer, they might break her before they finished her off.
Worse, what if they failed? Adel had conquered all of Esthar without so much as an accomplice. And then she'd used Esthar to start a global war.
Images tumbled through her mind. Bodies on a battlefield. Edea, murdering the president and announcing herself as his replacement. Squall, with eyes as dead as Jono's. How was she supposed to ...
"I ..." She slumped over, shaky hands covering her eyes. "I don't ... I don't know what I-I'm supposed to do."
Re: Talk to Jono
//Not him,// he replied, his voice tones of emotion more than syllable, each one desperate and dead all at the same time. //Anybody but him...//
Nobody deserved to feel this way. Jonothon already did. Karla. And Karla seemed to be doing better at finding her feet again than Jono was, but then, Karla had somebody she could cling to, and Jono... Doubted that he could hold anybody ever again.
That wasn't him overreacting. That wasn't his usual tendency to beat himself up because of the way he looked in the mirror. He knew for a fact, now, first-hand, that his body was more weapon than man. That all it took was a second, one bad decision, a slip of focus, and it would all get away from him. He'd killed demons and Jhinka and soldiers who were attacking him, trying to end his life.
And Raven.
Re: Talk to Jono
Somehow, it had never occurred to her how selfish it was, to ask that of Squall. How easily it could break him into pieces.
But there was more to it than that, making it a complicated, twisted nightmarish mess.
"An- ... anyone else," she said, very softly, "he'd kill first."
He promised to be her Knight. She had a feeling he wouldn't back down from that, even if she was evil.
She also imagined that Jono would have done much the same, for Raven, if he hadn't been possessed at the time.
Re: Talk to Jono
He would have. Which was why, possession or no, he was going to dwell on it, beat himself up over it.
One way or another...
//Then you had better not give him any reason to.//
That was the best that he had.
Re: Talk to Jono
She wouldn't put Squall through this. No matter what that meant. She was going to be a good Sorceress.
And if she felt herself slipping, she was going to remember Jono, sitting here, with the blood of his girlfriend on his hands.
"Is there ..." Her voice trailed off. "I wish I knew what to say," she said. "Something useful or helpful I could do. I want to be all mothering and wrap you in a blanket and pet your hair but I don't think you'd go for that."
Re: Talk to Jono
//Please, don't,// he replied, more feeling than actual words, again. Words were difficult to form, when he could barely string together a coherent thought. Emotions made sense even without the added benefit of consonants and vowels, backing them up. //Don't touch me.//
And then a flicker of guilt in the shape of his fire, barely a heartbeat of it before he clamped down and cut off that open flow of emotion again.
Re: Talk to Jono
"I wasn't," she said quickly. "I w-wouldn't. I ..."
Her heart was breaking, and she couldn't even soothe him. She didn't know how.
"Jono, this isn't your fault. It isn't."
Re: Talk to Jono
He shrugged a little, wrapping his arms around himself, staring down at the floor.
//It might as well be.//
He'd seen it coming.