action & gemini network | un: lillium

[ornamentals]

WHO: Kni & You
WHERE: Action part takes place at the Cottage & Network is on Gemini
WHEN: 7/31
WHAT: Congratulations, your Butter Knife has evolved into a Steak Knife! (Kni canon updated and just woke up from a three day sleep)
WARNINGS: Spoilers for Episode 9 of Tristamp, possible talk of bodily injuries (past). I'll update and tag any threads that may need a warning.

[ action - locked to cottage crew ]

[waking up to that birthday-visiting skeleton as the last five years back on that sandpit of a planet slip through his mind like some vividly intense dream isn't exactly what he would have preferred, but it is what it is. the uninvited guest slips away in the moments between kni looking down at the gun he remembers giving to vash before--

ah, his head is pounding.

for now, the gun is tucked away into the back of his dresser as something to conteplate later. the sensation of waking up after so much happening, back in his bed in his room in this world is a jarring experience. he only notices after standing up that his clothes have shrunk - or that he's grown. of course, after five years...

he needs to go outside, feel something more tangible than wooden floors under his feet and maybe, if he's lucky, some rain.]

[ network - gemini | un: lillium ]

[network users are treated to video feed of three very plump chickens (blue, white, and black respectively) running up to kni as he walks towards the chicken coop outside.]

Did you miss me? It's only been a few days.

[kni's voice is different, definitely a bit older now.]

Mary, you look bigger... I bet Vash overfed everyone, didn't he? [mary, in all of her fluffy black plummage, clucks merrily with her sisters as kni crouches down to crumble up a cracker over the grass for the girls to scratch at. he sighs behind the screen.] I suppose it can't be helped.

Comments

video: un:trienemybest

[droptheious]

[ Varian has been here a while, he's seen people go to sleep and awaken with time passed- never this long, though. ]

...Wow, that's uh- how long as it been for you? [A pause- he knows Kni's world is terrible.] ...Is everything okay?

video: un: lillium

[ornamentals]

Only five years. It really felt like nothing at all.

[not long enough, there was still so much left to do still.

his expression doesn't change by much, the slight pull of a polite smile only wavering just a little.]

Why wouldn't I be? Aside from being a little tired... I feel fine.

[not a lie, but definitely not the whole truth.]

[droptheious]

Only five years? Kni, five years is a pretty long time by human standards, hate to break it to you buddy, but there it is.

[ Kni, please.

Varian's just, Looking. He is looking and he is not stopping. ]

Uh-huh. I mean, it's just that you don't come from the best place? And I figure things might have been... pretty rough, in that amount of time? So just- y'know- checking in on you?

[ornamentals]

For a species with only a lifespan of a century, any amount of time would feel precious and fleeting.

[he's remembering why he prefers text on this thing now. hiding himself behind screens or tucked away in the hood of his cloak, everything is made easier when there isn't anyone who can percieve him. even if it's out of concern - especially when it's out of concern.]

It was hard. I had to make terrible decisions, but in the heat of the moment there isn't time to contemplate on what is or isn't the right choice.

[who he had to hurt, to kill, who he couldn't save and the choices he would make after that because of his own inadequecies.]

There's nothing to be done about it now.

[droptheious]

...Yes, exactly my point! It's a while. That's a half of a decade.

[Too bad, get loved, idiot. Varian listened, brow furrows as he listens to this friend. He knows a thing or two about making terrible decisions, sometimes only in hindsight realising just how bad a choice it truly was. ]

I get that. It's... hard. Knowing you might have made the wrong choice... made things worse, y'know? And even if you can't do anything to change the past or the world you came from... well, you can still do something. You just... learn from it- do better next time.

[ornamentals]

And if the choices I make here don't carry back with me? I didn't remember any of my time here during those years.

[he shakes his head, knowing where this conversation might go if he continued it. a lot of what-if's that would only further frustrate him. as much as he may understand, it doesn't quell the growing storm inside him, rumbling and furious. years in the making.]

When... If I am forced to return again, I'll be thrust back into walking the same path that I know now will only lead to ruination. It's cruel.

[droptheious]

That's a possibility. I've never gone back to Corona to experience it myself, but...yeah. It might be you won't remember it.

[ Which does mean that Kni would be stuck with returning to a life he wasn't living here. Going down an awful, destructive road, without the knowledge of the love and support he had here- the things he'd learned here, just... gone. ]

...I'm sorry, you're right. That's... it's really cruel. The only other option I've found around that was through the peaches, but that would bind you here for good. I don't think there's any more of those left, though. [Ironically, Vash took the only one he still knew of. ] Zhongli would know, maybe, if any of it was still around.

[ornamentals]

[it's a kind offer and kni can't help but feel a little touched at varian's suggestions. an attempt to help solve an unsolvable problem. compared to the humans back on noman's land and the fresh experiences he's had with them, it felt like going against the grain accepting anyone's help.]

Even if I were offered a permanent position in this world, I couldn't take it. There are still those I've left behind that need me. I can't abandon my family to a life of suffering while I enjoy... paradise in comparison.

[kni sighs, shaking his head.] If there are any of these... peaches around still, it's better they go to someone else instead of me.

[droptheious]

[That's... pretty noble, honestly. Kni would likely think otherwise, Varian believes, but he can see the nobility in it. Varian himself never had the choice, but he did have the choice to not experiment on the magical immortality peach so perhaps in that way he did. ]

...I can understand that, at least. I know a part of me will always regret that I can't go back to fix everything I'd done back in Corona. I'd made a good start, but-

[ He shrugs his shoulders.]

I've kind of made my peace in doing better here, instead. But that's... fair of you. Wanting to go back. [ Even if he won't remember. ]

If it does crop up, I'm sure someone would snatch it up.