[AFTERMATH] Past Present Future

[shibrogane]

Is it so hard to believe I was ashamed?

Noeh didn't look up from her tea.

I tried to focus it on the schema, but it wouldn't take. If I could've focused it on the schema, I wouldn't have needed anyone's consent or approval. But every time I tried, it failed. I wouldn't have even thought to use a human sacrifice until I saw Melany with the magic. It warped to her will. It was like the fundamental laws of the universe warped around her. That was what I needed, I needed the magic to do something it didn't do naturally, so... I took a risk.

She looked down at her hands. You were a fetch for a very long time. Something like eight cycles. Almost a thousand years.

Melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

"Not really."

Shiloh was staring down at his tea too.

"I would've been pretty goddamn disgusted with myself."

The convection still spun tiny wafts of steam up from his tea.

"Eight cycles is a really long time," He said quietly. Did that mean eight cycles where Oliver was an only child? Did that shatter the whole illusion he'd built up with Jamie—that him and Jamie had always been tethered through the cycles since before there were any—because that would've been eight cycles where they'd probably never met, where Shiloh still remembered whatever version of Jamie he had at the time. Was that a Shiloh who suffered that long thousand year stretch? Or had he been content?

"How come I decided to return to the cycles?"

shibrogane

 

[shibrogane]

You didn't, said Noeh. You were killed. I don't remember what you did, but you displeased the Spinel Lady. It's incredibly hard to do that as a fetch... She broke your neck and destroyed you.

Melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

Shiloh took that surprisingly well. Actually, he laughed, and unlike all the sarcastic chuckles and deadpan emotions he was feeling, he actually felt something like joy, like a just desserts, like that moment had apparently signified something. "Glad to know I was just as much of a hellion then as I was this time." Shiloh was a defeatist through and through, but sometimes—sometimes—he felt like he won, and here he was with the last goddamn laugh after all. He cared about Melany now as a friend, but the Spinel Lady was a very vivid fracture in his head compared to the former. They weren't the same person. Maybe it was his own naivety and ignorance that cultivated that, but he believed it. "Momma didn't raise a quitter, I guess."

Whoever his mom was.

"Enough about that, we got kinda sidetracked." His posture was more relaxed at least, "This is kind of weird, but can you tell if you're one of the... y'know? Triplets?" He blinked at her, "Since we bound the magic to something inorganic, I dunno how all of that is going to settle out, what filters are necessary... what're you gonna do now? Hang out here?"

shibrogane

 

[shibrogane]

I'm not anymore, sighed Noeh. Even mentally she sounded relieved. Tired, but relieved. And yeah, I think... This is the house I grew up in, you know. So I'm going to stay here for a while. Why bother going to the otherworld when I don't exist there?

Melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

Shiloh blinked, "Actually, you do. Sort've." He sat back in the chair, "I mean, when I got my hands on the original charter and had the finger prints identified on it, you definitely existed. You and Pride and Pax together, just y'know, as Minerva and Jennifer and Ming..." He trailed off. "I don't know the extent of the police reports, but Mercer said you were all basically pronounced missing. I think Pax was pronounced dead. I mean, Pax is dead, I dunno if anyone told you, but I guess he really wanted to die anyway..."

Shiloh sighed. "You might have to deal with a lot of weird legal bullshit if you decided to cross back over, but you have a name there at the very least. I could ask Mercer for more specifics—" An idea he didn't look thrilled about, but—"Since I know being around him makes you really... uncomfortable. Sorry, it's just—it's hard not to notice. I know what that looks like..." Shiloh trailed off softly. "But I can't blame you if you wanna stay here either. The way magic is received on my side is kinda... terrible. I wish it wasn't like that. I hate hiding."

shibrogane

 

[shibrogane]

What is there for me on that side, asked Noeh. And the other me you speak of, she's subjectively five years older than I would be. I'm twenty-six; she'd be thirty-one...

She trailed off.

Well, I'm glad one of the three of us got what we wanted, she said. I'm sorry you have to hide. You should come over here whenever you need to un-hide. I'm around.

Melancholies

 

[Melancholies]

"I'm just saying the options open." Shiloh shrugged. "In case it's ever something you wanted."

"Thanks for the offer though. And I mean, let me know if you ever need anything too." He finished his tea quietly. "I'm glad we got to talk like this. Even if this magic s**t has it's claws in all of us like this, I guess it's nice to be able to move forward maybe..."

He was mulling something over. "Just don't feel like you gotta hide stuff from me, okay? I'm tryin' real hard not to develop a complex here." He sort of sounded like he was kidding, but he really wasn't. "I ain't gonna tell anyone nothin'. I ain't a snitch." Shiloh stared into the bottom, empty mug in his hands. "Did you wanna stay 'n catch up for a little while longer? I can go if you want some alone time."

shibrogane

 

[shibrogane]

You can stay, if you want, said Noeh. But, um. I don't know. A lot of stuff you want to know... it's stuff I don't talk about because it hurts. So... just... keep that in mind, when you're ... complexing, I guess.

Melancholies

and this is what we call a wrap