[video] -> [text]

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[The camera picks up a deep red couch and stone for a moment. The couch is empty. For the moment. Someone walks in. Heavy footsteps. Sits down in front of the laptop. Dull eyed and empty. Wearing a priest's outfit. He peers into the laptop for a few moments. Not particularly long, but not a quick glance. He seems to be clicking something, or else checking it.

Ah. He's got it now. He shifts his gaze from the keyboard up to the red blinking camera light.]

I'll be right back.

[Voomp. The video closes. Not suspiciously quickly. Don't get any ideas. Just a hanging moment, as he finds the right key, and x's it out.

A few moments later, this text appears.]

Now then. What can you tell me?

(OOC: Two things!
1. if you haven't hit up Kirei's permission post, you might wanna do that!
2. This is a double intro! R's Gilgamesh (effulge) will be hopping around at will! You should fill out his permissions, too!)

Comments

( ACTION. )

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[He's shifted a little. Not quite hunched over. Just a bit more casual with the computer. He understands how it works much better now already. Again, he nearly clasps the laptop closed. Shakes his head. A cross between pity and amusement. It nags at him. Like an anchor, pulling him down. Really, who are they, to know him better? He barely knows why he has this mark on his hand, why he's playing this game. He's here to support the Tohsakas. That's all. As a favor to his Father.

That has to be all.] If only I knew for what.

( ACTION. ) Het/Zero TBH

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[It makes Archer glow. The whole room, too. Not like something sparkling, not like glitter. Like a gleam. The glint gold makes. Something bright, not quite blinding. There's something lazy about the way the glow hangs around. Like a summer afternoon. Not a cloud in the sky. And the sun's warm and bright and beautiful, so much it burns, so much you can't look it straight on.

The light doesn't work the same for Kirei. It makes everything seem colder. Like a sunny day in January. A sharpness to it. It doesn't suit him. He prefers the dark. The sort where the moon is new, and the stars are out, and the shadows lengthen all the same. While Archer seemed to carry sunlight with him wherever he went, Kirei carried the shadows with him, instead.

He lets out a sigh. Maybe a scoff. Something weighted. Heavy again. He can't let things roll off him the same way. He picks them up and examines them. But the brightness beckons, and he answers it, all the same.]

It seems I have quite a lot to live up to.

[His fingers dig into his palms. Frustrated. Everyone seems to know him so well. Even the shadows can't hide him.]

yes i did thank you

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[He needs to not be here. But the brand on his hand prevents him. Or maybe something else. Something lurking in the back of his head like a thief in an alley. It buzzes and blooms in equal measure. This humming in the blood. A sense of cold, despite the warmth. He might've shivered, or withdrawn, but if he did, he isn't quite aware of it.

He keeps his eyes on Archer. Tries to. And he doesn't know why he tries to. Partially because he must know, surely he must, that turning away would do no good. Would leave him imagining looks instead of seeing them. But there must be something else. A crow in his heart, yearning to breathe free. And all it needs is the right key in the lock, and it'd fly away.]

Not from this angle, exactly.

[He knows what's expected of him. What he must do. For his Father's sake. To live up to his name, to the cross that weighs so heavily upon him. For the sake of--

For the sake of a name he can't quite bring himself to name.

But all those things are past. Or present. They speak of the future, one so dark it wouldn't help if he wore shades.]

It's a bit hard to think in reverse.

[And was that a hint of a smirk? Must be a trick of the light.]

we need a million gay seals rn

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[He lets out a breath. He wasn't even quite sure he was holding it. Just an exhale. Nothing more, nothing less. Read into it what you will. His hand almost winds around his cross. Almost. A familiar sort of gesture. Done a million times. Some people have security blankets. Same concept. Different action. Although the lines stick into his palms sometimes, and the security provided has been a much more shaky sort than before.

He stops himself, all the same. Stops himself from squeezing, at least. He knows the prayers he used to say, the beads he wrapped around his hands, the repetition, the hope that someone would come from above and save him from himself.

It was close, once. But close isn't good enough. So, he stops himself, and that's that, because a cross is a cross and he'll carry it all the same, but it doesn't have to mean anything more than what someone once upon a time died on.

He steadies, slowly. Less rushed and frazzled around the edges. More solid. And he's grateful, in his way, for the hum of quiet. If it lasts long enough, he almost can hear answers in it.]

Re: we need an army lbr

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[Sometimes the only difference between nightmares and dreams is the person dreaming them. Which one works best for Kirei is, well, complicated. As usual. A dream shifting towards a nightmare, or a nightmare he wishes was a dream. Sometimes he spends so much time pushing down the dark inside him, it's hard to notice the dark around.

He sits up again. The laptop still closed for the moment, on the table. Eyes still empty. But there's meaning, even in empty things. Just depending on the look. It's guarded, but no more aversions. No more looking for darkness. And a question that sticks. That stays, after the humming and buzzing has passed.]

Do you think they'll be a problem?

[Somewhere not far away, where dreams become nightmares and then the reverse, he thinks this might be the first time he's asked Archer anything. Anything of value, maybe. Maybe the thought is wrong, or maybe the memory is, or maybe the wine has sloshed over the glass and he's become lost in the spill of it all.]

-_-*

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[Every time they talk, it always seems as if Archer already knows what he sees. He must, surely. It's the only way this makes sense. It's not just a simple matter of seeming to have a script, the way the Lancers do. A sort of predicting, only with Kirei filling in gaps as necessary. A sort of pushing, or maybe a sort of pulling, or maybe a sort of both.

He thinks that, maybe, perhaps, they were so focused on his shadow that they missed the giant walking with it. And that thought makes him smile a little. Not quite a smirk. But he knows things they don't know, and once they know them, it'd be too late. There's still a slump to his shoulders, and a feeling like his heart's been tied into a knot like a pretzel. But he meets Archer's gaze, all the same, and doesn't flinch the way he's sure he should.]

They seem to talk quite a lot.

icon twin powers activate

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[It is a strange feeling. Of being known. Not from reverse. Not when they already have the script. It scares him, deep down. Nobody else seems to. Maybe they haven't tried. Maybe he hasn't. It's the same, either way. A separation. A dividing line, between himself and the world. One that gets wider and wider every day. He must always be alone. He must.

It is strange, to have someone so willing to cross the line and drag him out. Kicking and screaming. The line is still there. Still sharp in his mind. But Archer plays jump rope with that line, and holds out his hand for him there.

And Kirei knows he can't take it.

Once he does, there is no going back.]

I suppose it's something of a gift.

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[A wall that he can't allow to fall. There are already bricks torn out of it. So many, you can see through to the other side. Chips away. The flaking of paint. Cracks in the brick. But it stays up, all the same. Propped up, if it must be. Once the wall starts breaking, it can't be repaired. Once the wall falls, it can't be replaced. So it stays up, as threadbare as it looks. It must. Even if it threatens to topple. Even if it threatens to crush.

He doesn't want what's on the other side. Even through the glimpses, even through the missing pieces, he fears what he sees. And there is a certain man with a sledgehammer, just waiting and pushing and knocking bricks out as he will.]

I don't see a reason they wouldn't.

[They despise him. Don't trust him. View him as an enemy. For crimes he hasn't committed yet. And then lord those crimes over his head, unwilling to take action against them. They're on the other side of the wall, looking in.

But they seem to not know that he's capable of looking out.]

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[He already carries so much weight on his shoulders. What's one more to him? And there is something in the way he bends to the pressure. The heft of it all. Not like a twig, crushed underfoot. Not like the straw on the back of the camel. Not like pieces of silver, clattered to the floor. The heaviness to him, that winds around him, inescapably. That tears asunder. That keeps the wall from falling entirely, just by puffs of oxygen, just by words that wind around, just by thoughts that constrict, that he holds and lets go, that he thinks and ignores.]

It'd be a shame, if all that effort went to waste.

[Like the legions of wine bottles, scattered throughout the room. But then, he reminds himself that he never intended to drink from them in the first place. So maybe it's good that someone is getting use from them.

If not so much for his collection. Or his wallet. Or the haziness of the room, that breaks and melts like gold.]

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[He knows the prayers by heart. By repetition. The same phrases. Of entreaty. Protection. Salvation. In Latin. In English. In Japanese. In the wordless panic of a heartless heart. The calling out, as an attempt to call down. To be delivered from evil. To walk through the shadow of the valley of death, and fear no evil. O Lord do not rebuke me, for I am weak.

And then words wind their way around him like ivy. The tilt of a wine glass that teeters but never falls. The eyes that gleam like rubies, with darkness spun in the center. A glitter, almost. Something sharp. That pierces him, that cuts through the quick like daggers in the night.]

They went through all this trouble. Didn't they?

[structuraldefect]

[There's an emptiness inside his heart that grows when they're around. The feeling of calling up, afraid and alone, and hearing nothing. Just the crickets in summer, and the wind in winter. The burning in his fingers, to the point they become numb. The silence that deafens. To the point he doubts. The doubts grow to keep pace with the hole in his heart. That he thought once could be filled.

And he was wrong.

He rests on the couch. Unspread open. Just a pause. A sense of quiet. And though his thoughts hum as always and burn as always, for a moment he is content to drown.]