( she'd never quite been sure if anyone ever really got one aspect of her home world. the frequency and viciousness with which people she'd trusted ended up betraying her, and she the same back to then. lexa leaving her at the side of mount weather versus falling into bed with and grieving her death. the way raven had looked at her after murdering finn versus the way she'd looked at her after they burst into becca's lab in hazmat suits on a mission to save her life. bellamy shouting in her face about abandonment and betrayal versus bellamy taking the pen out of her hand and writing down her name on the list of those who'd survive. bellamy after being sent into mount weather to die versus bellamy who squeezed her so tight at the end of the world that it'd practically reignited hope in her chest. the abby griffin who told her she'd never be able to wash the blood off her hands versus the abby griffin who'd cupped her sweaty cheeks and bid her go save us all... again.
but relationships are weird and complex, and at the end of the world — staring death and destruction in the mouth with every sunrise — they're really flexible. and the ones you want to fix can be mended without much thought, and a lot of compartmentalization. which natsuno yuuki is about to get a first hand account of.
it still takes a day. one whole day from having likely hit him in the face a few times for clarke to get it under control. fury and rage are tampered down, relief and the logical awareness that she'd been scared out of her mind more than angry settle in. and when they cross paths on the sports deck — way too close to the supply closet, with the understanding that anywhere on this fucking level of the ship is too close to the supply closet after what she'd seen in there — everything's mostly fine. like it always is. like she has to be.
approaching him is easy, and even when his eyes snap open and he stares up at her from the ground, clarke's stride doesn't stumble. she's neatly settling herself into a seated position beside him, and after a moment's consideration, reclining back on the sun-heated ground. looking up at the sky from this vantage point, one could almost imagine they were anywhere in the universe but here.
she doesn't have anything kind or good or constructive or angry or weepy to say anymore. not yet, at least, and so — silence reigns. )
[Natsuno didn't try to contact Clarke or seek her out after she stormed out of cabin 109, and he hadn't seen her on his tired trek from deck 2 to the promenade and the sports deck. Even a day without talking to her was enough to make his miss her, but... he didn't want to push.
He's relieved when he hears the familiar footsteps and opens his eyes to see his best friend standing over him, even more relieve when she takes the spot next to him. Things aren't comfortable yet, but Clarke's still reaching out. Natsuno closes his eyes, soaking in the fake sun. They lie in silence for a couple of minutes before he speaks up, eyes still close.]
Wonder when Mr. Smith will come to say we're "being a nuisance."
( sure, staring up in the general vicinity of the sun would have been excruciatingly painful after a few moments, even if they'd both been wearing sun glasses. but that's not the reason clarke eventually allows her eyes to close as well. some measure of trust got broken five days ago, some amount of resentment and frustration still simmers on the back burner of her heart. but let her pick one person to lay beside on a slowly crumbling death cruise and trust to have her back, and she'd still pick natsuno. he is one of, like, three people she's okay with not being constantly on edge around. and bitter about shiki powers or not, he'd still be the first to know if there was any threat to them around besides a sunburn.
and, really, isn't it always easier to talk to someone you're latently mad at when you don't have to look at them? instead the inside of her eyelids are painted a decadent shade of orange, and she can bemusedly continue — )
It'll be fine. Tell him it's either this, or traipsing around singing praise to Stede Bonnet as loudly as we can, and I bet he'll rework his definition of a "nuisance" real quick.
[Natsuno exhales a little louder, the closest thing to laughing he can muster in this circumstances. Anger and fractured trust lie between them, impossible to ignore, but the fact Clarke's still willing to pretend and joke back loosens some thorny knot inside him, just a bit.]
Like we will actually sing Bonnet's praise. [Clarke would grind her teeth to dust.] But so long as he doesn't call the bluff.
[It's tempting to stay like this, soak in the warm light and pretend the silence is comfortable and the jokes are innocent fun, but Natsuno can't ignore the elephant in the room - and another elephant, this one sitting directly on his chest. He kept it to himself as everyone chewed him out, and he wants to keep quiet now instead of burdening Clarke with it like everything is not his fault. But she's still his best friend, and the thing weighs heavier and heavier until he says apropos of nothing:]
( there are times and places when it's worth it to lose teeth in order to frustrate other parties. the place? the serena eterna. the time? whenever feels vindictively appropriate. the big question is, between the two of them, who has the energy to put that much effort into bullshitting right now. it's certainly not clarke, despite her echoing his snort of bemusement.
the air of careful joking and forced humor is sucked from them both eventually. i can't remember my parents, natsuno says in the lull, and for a moment clarke stops breathing. in times past she might have sat up and crowded into his personal space to ask for poignant specifics — what do you mean? what about them? tell me everything you do remember and we'll go from there — or at least prop herself up on her side and offer sympathies — i'm so sorry, natsuno. i get how that hurts, i can barely remember my what my dad looks like, i keep trying to draw him but i get the features wrong.
but right now all she can do is let the silence stretch and then crack her eyes against the light. slowly turn her head to look at him and dig the nail of her middle finger beneath that of her thumb. )
[His eyes are still closed, but he rests a forearm over them anyway, pressing it against his eyelids like the physical weight can overcome the tightness in his chest. His voice is eerily, carefully flat.]
Yesterday, after everyone left. I thought about how my dad felt when I came back to life.
[The undertakers already brought the coffin in. Natsuno barely had time to acknowledge his situation before he had to make excuses. "I'm very sorry you came all this way. There's a bad flu going around and many of our neighbors passed away. My father was just scared."]
I realized I can't remember his or mom's faces. Like someone burned a hole where the face should be. And when I try to remember their voice, all I hear is static.
( man, this is a whole new emotional sucker punch to the stomach, but clarke does her best to make the sucking inhale of distress as quiet as possible. looks sidelong at him for a while, watches the way he slides his arm over his face like any sort of protective shielding would make this horrible new reality a little easier to talk about; any easier to bear. )
That's so awful, Natsuno. I'm sorry it wasn't just a kidney.
( because that's what it had to be, right? because he'd died here. clarke still hasn't made the whole connection to culpable deaths, but knows well enough that the only time she woke up missing something was the time she'd died on board the ship, essentially at her own hand. a price to be paid for stupidity. and while they'd known since early last month that the captain could mess with memories — give new one, draw on their future selves' experiences, whatever — it didn't occur until now that he could take them away too. but it makes sense.
squirming against the ground, clarke finally drags her face back skyward. the sun burns at her retinas until she closes her eyes again, but reaches out blindly; bends her arm at the elbow and lightly thumps his chest with the back of her fingers. a tangible, tactile anchor in case grief threatens to drag him away. )
We'll figure it out, okay?
( how? as of yet undetermined. the most important part here was the we. )
[Actions have consequences and there's nothing Natsuno can do about it. He has no one but himself to blame, because the person who burned holes is a capricious monster and Natsuno should've known better than counting on his habits. The deteriorating ship is further proof of that.]
I wanted to get away from them anyway.
[He already abandoned his dad, came back to life only to walk out the door and into a burning mass grave three weeks later. It's an effort to keep his voice level; he feels physically sick, like someone reached inside him with a crushing grasp. The now too-familiar sensation of fresh, overwhelming grief, like when he stared down at Tohru's open coffin or Clarke's lifeless body in his blood soaked lap.
Her knuckles still brush lightly against him. Suddenly he reaches back to squeeze her hand.]
( she hadn't expected him to reach back for her. but that level of surprised ignorance is probably what also contributed to clarke not registering the twitch in natsuno's arms yesterday, and the way he'd almost melted into her when she hugged him. it's been a whole day, though, and a horrible, gut wrenching reveal. so he's welcome to squeeze her hand as hard as he like, even to the point of breaking if need be. but anything short of that — and she's twisting within his grasp until she can work her fingers between his and squeeze back just as tightly. )
You ever pull a stunt like this again, and I'll take your kidney.
( this is basically a joke. in the worst, darkest, most morbid sense of the word. if he dies, i'll kill him. but flat in it's delivery, too tired and sad to leave any real impact.
but more pressing is the matter at hand. for which clarke then tugs at their combined hands, urging natsuno to look over at her when she says: )
I don't think I can do anything about their voices. But Mizuki got pictures from the shop a while ago. Of his early life, with his parents. And if a single photo of you and yours exists out there, I'll find it for you. I'll make Friday give it to you. Just because you can't remember their faces now doesn't mean you won't learn to again. We will figure this out.
And in the meantime... All you have to do is look in the mirror. I'd bet you look a lot like your mom.
[He keeps clinging to her hand, squeezing even tighter when her fingers lock around his. Natsuno lets the other arm roll slowly off his eyes, but the look he gives Clarke is brief and tired. His eyes slide shut again as he turns his face back to the sun.]
A lot of these packages have a cruel twist.
[Maybe he'll get a picture of his parents with the faces burnt or cut off, maybe everyone will be able to see them except him.
He can look in the mirror, but the thought of trying to map out his feature own features makes him even more tired.]
...I was closer to dad. [Which isn't saying much, because he resented them both so much since they moved to Sotoba.] My legal last name is mom's, but I always used "Yuuki", after him.
( back at the sticker party, already elbow deep in schemes to upset the balance of the ship, clarke had glanced at his nametag and noticed something was amiss. had called it out, which do you prefer? yuuki's fine. and had assumed he meant as a surname, only to gradually find out that was how he introduced himself to everyone else around them. she always called him natsuno, though, and presumably there'd just never been a moment in their conversations for him to correct her. they were always so weighted...
always a lot like this one, actually, but this time at least their fingers are intertwined in a tangible, physical anchor. natsuno can squeeze as hard as he likes, clarke's not letting go before he does. )
[Natsuno narely knows anything about Clarke's father - discovered the Ark was dying, executed by his own wife for wanting to go public with the information. Clarke barely lingered on the topic when she told him her story, which was hardly surprising. Still, it's easy to guess she was closer with him.]
Did he pick your name? My dad picked mine.
[Stupid old fashioned name that he despised. His father probably never even considered how people would keep commenting on it, or maybe he did and liked the attention.]
I don't actually know. ( nor where it came from, and definitely not the fact she and a great deal of her friends were named after old world science fiction authors. it's funnier that way. )
I never thought to ask.
( and now, barring very specific circumstances, will never be able to. )
Is there a reason he picked "Natsuno"? Does it mean something specific?
Hmmm. There's nothing wrong with that, though. Hate the end result all you want, the intention behind naming you seemed pure.
( and guess what buddy, you are special to go along with that special name. even if clarke's only vested interest in the name "natsuno" is that it belongs to him. )
[Yes, the intention was pure. A young man barely out of his teen years, excited to have his first (and only) child. But knowing how it all ended, with Natsuno's own teenage resentment, it becomes the first of many well-intended but selfish and ultimately disastrous decisions.]
Yeah. [A soft exhale, barely a bitter laugh.] Always pure intentions. Maybe if he ever considered how his intentions aligned with reality, he'd still have a family.
[Natsuno hardly ever thought about his dad for the last eight months. Now he's filled with a mix of anger and grief and he hates it.
she doesn't offer a comforting squeeze on the tail end of that sentiment, but their fingers are still entangled and natsuno can no doubt feel how clarke's twitch. it hits too close to home. if jake griffin hadn't tried to go public with information about the life support systems failing, he never would have been floated and she'd never been imprisoned. but he'd still be chasing what he felt was right, and then didn't even get to see the end result that was earth.
they're not implicitly talking about mothers, but it's impossible for clarke's mind not to stray towards abby. and after a brief inhale that only sort of shudders in her throat, she says, )
That's parents, though. Isn't it? They always disappoint, then love us all the harder like that makes up for past mistakes.
[His father may now be a faceless, garble-voiced figure, but Natsuno still knows he was a shell of a man during those final weeks. He also knows that this broken man tried his best to protect his undead son - pathetic attempts, too little and too late, yet even they were fiercer than anything he'd done when Natsuno was still human.
He opens his eyes and turns to glance at Clarke, on his own this time.]
( her turn to not look at him immediately, though clarke doesn't go so far as to cover her eyes with the crook of her elbow. simply squints at the sun for a beat, until the light becomes too much and her vision is perpetually scorched with a stark outline of blinking black; then she'll glance his way, expression somber but convicted. )
But some day I'm sure he'll find peace with the past.
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come_sailaway2022-10-03 09:51 pm
double tap for the 5th
but relationships are weird and complex, and at the end of the world — staring death and destruction in the mouth with every sunrise — they're really flexible. and the ones you want to fix can be mended without much thought, and a lot of compartmentalization. which natsuno yuuki is about to get a first hand account of.
it still takes a day. one whole day from having likely hit him in the face a few times for clarke to get it under control. fury and rage are tampered down, relief and the logical awareness that she'd been scared out of her mind more than angry settle in. and when they cross paths on the sports deck — way too close to the supply closet, with the understanding that anywhere on this fucking level of the ship is too close to the supply closet after what she'd seen in there — everything's mostly fine. like it always is. like she has to be.
approaching him is easy, and even when his eyes snap open and he stares up at her from the ground, clarke's stride doesn't stumble. she's neatly settling herself into a seated position beside him, and after a moment's consideration, reclining back on the sun-heated ground. looking up at the sky from this vantage point, one could almost imagine they were anywhere in the universe but here.
she doesn't have anything kind or good or constructive or angry or weepy to say anymore. not yet, at least, and so — silence reigns. )
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He's relieved when he hears the familiar footsteps and opens his eyes to see his best friend standing over him, even more relieve when she takes the spot next to him. Things aren't comfortable yet, but Clarke's still reaching out. Natsuno closes his eyes, soaking in the fake sun. They lie in silence for a couple of minutes before he speaks up, eyes still close.]
Wonder when Mr. Smith will come to say we're "being a nuisance."
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( sure, staring up in the general vicinity of the sun would have been excruciatingly painful after a few moments, even if they'd both been wearing sun glasses. but that's not the reason clarke eventually allows her eyes to close as well. some measure of trust got broken five days ago, some amount of resentment and frustration still simmers on the back burner of her heart. but let her pick one person to lay beside on a slowly crumbling death cruise and trust to have her back, and she'd still pick natsuno. he is one of, like, three people she's okay with not being constantly on edge around. and bitter about shiki powers or not, he'd still be the first to know if there was any threat to them around besides a sunburn.
and, really, isn't it always easier to talk to someone you're latently mad at when you don't have to look at them? instead the inside of her eyelids are painted a decadent shade of orange, and she can bemusedly continue — )
It'll be fine. Tell him it's either this, or traipsing around singing praise to Stede Bonnet as loudly as we can, and I bet he'll rework his definition of a "nuisance" real quick.
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Like we will actually sing Bonnet's praise. [Clarke would grind her teeth to dust.] But so long as he doesn't call the bluff.
[It's tempting to stay like this, soak in the warm light and pretend the silence is comfortable and the jokes are innocent fun, but Natsuno can't ignore the elephant in the room - and another elephant, this one sitting directly on his chest. He kept it to himself as everyone chewed him out, and he wants to keep quiet now instead of burdening Clarke with it like everything is not his fault. But she's still his best friend, and the thing weighs heavier and heavier until he says apropos of nothing:]
I can't remember my parents.
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the air of careful joking and forced humor is sucked from them both eventually. i can't remember my parents, natsuno says in the lull, and for a moment clarke stops breathing. in times past she might have sat up and crowded into his personal space to ask for poignant specifics — what do you mean? what about them? tell me everything you do remember and we'll go from there — or at least prop herself up on her side and offer sympathies — i'm so sorry, natsuno. i get how that hurts, i can barely remember my what my dad looks like, i keep trying to draw him but i get the features wrong.
but right now all she can do is let the silence stretch and then crack her eyes against the light. slowly turn her head to look at him and dig the nail of her middle finger beneath that of her thumb. )
At all?
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[His eyes are still closed, but he rests a forearm over them anyway, pressing it against his eyelids like the physical weight can overcome the tightness in his chest. His voice is eerily, carefully flat.]
Yesterday, after everyone left. I thought about how my dad felt when I came back to life.
[The undertakers already brought the coffin in. Natsuno barely had time to acknowledge his situation before he had to make excuses. "I'm very sorry you came all this way. There's a bad flu going around and many of our neighbors passed away. My father was just scared."]
I realized I can't remember his or mom's faces. Like someone burned a hole where the face should be. And when I try to remember their voice, all I hear is static.
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That's so awful, Natsuno. I'm sorry it wasn't just a kidney.
( because that's what it had to be, right? because he'd died here. clarke still hasn't made the whole connection to culpable deaths, but knows well enough that the only time she woke up missing something was the time she'd died on board the ship, essentially at her own hand. a price to be paid for stupidity. and while they'd known since early last month that the captain could mess with memories — give new one, draw on their future selves' experiences, whatever — it didn't occur until now that he could take them away too. but it makes sense.
squirming against the ground, clarke finally drags her face back skyward. the sun burns at her retinas until she closes her eyes again, but reaches out blindly; bends her arm at the elbow and lightly thumps his chest with the back of her fingers. a tangible, tactile anchor in case grief threatens to drag him away. )
We'll figure it out, okay?
( how? as of yet undetermined. the most important part here was the we. )
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[Actions have consequences and there's nothing Natsuno can do about it. He has no one but himself to blame, because the person who burned holes is a capricious monster and Natsuno should've known better than counting on his habits. The deteriorating ship is further proof of that.]
I wanted to get away from them anyway.
[He already abandoned his dad, came back to life only to walk out the door and into a burning mass grave three weeks later. It's an effort to keep his voice level; he feels physically sick, like someone reached inside him with a crushing grasp. The now too-familiar sensation of fresh, overwhelming grief, like when he stared down at Tohru's open coffin or Clarke's lifeless body in his blood soaked lap.
Her knuckles still brush lightly against him. Suddenly he reaches back to squeeze her hand.]
I wish it was a kidney.
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You ever pull a stunt like this again, and I'll take your kidney.
( this is basically a joke. in the worst, darkest, most morbid sense of the word. if he dies, i'll kill him. but flat in it's delivery, too tired and sad to leave any real impact.
but more pressing is the matter at hand. for which clarke then tugs at their combined hands, urging natsuno to look over at her when she says: )
I don't think I can do anything about their voices. But Mizuki got pictures from the shop a while ago. Of his early life, with his parents. And if a single photo of you and yours exists out there, I'll find it for you. I'll make Friday give it to you. Just because you can't remember their faces now doesn't mean you won't learn to again. We will figure this out.
And in the meantime... All you have to do is look in the mirror. I'd bet you look a lot like your mom.
no subject
A lot of these packages have a cruel twist.
[Maybe he'll get a picture of his parents with the faces burnt or cut off, maybe everyone will be able to see them except him.
He can look in the mirror, but the thought of trying to map out his feature own features makes him even more tired.]
...I was closer to dad. [Which isn't saying much, because he resented them both so much since they moved to Sotoba.] My legal last name is mom's, but I always used "Yuuki", after him.
no subject
( back at the sticker party, already elbow deep in schemes to upset the balance of the ship, clarke had glanced at his nametag and noticed something was amiss. had called it out, which do you prefer? yuuki's fine. and had assumed he meant as a surname, only to gradually find out that was how he introduced himself to everyone else around them. she always called him natsuno, though, and presumably there'd just never been a moment in their conversations for him to correct her. they were always so weighted...
always a lot like this one, actually, but this time at least their fingers are intertwined in a tangible, physical anchor. natsuno can squeeze as hard as he likes, clarke's not letting go before he does. )
I was closer with my dad, too.
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Did he pick your name? My dad picked mine.
[Stupid old fashioned name that he despised. His father probably never even considered how people would keep commenting on it, or maybe he did and liked the attention.]
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I never thought to ask.
( and now, barring very specific circumstances, will never be able to. )
Is there a reason he picked "Natsuno"? Does it mean something specific?
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Dad's a big romanticist, so. [He says "romanticist" like most people say "idiot."] I guess he wanted to give his kid a special name.
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( and guess what buddy, you are special to go along with that special name. even if clarke's only vested interest in the name "natsuno" is that it belongs to him. )
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Yeah. [A soft exhale, barely a bitter laugh.] Always pure intentions. Maybe if he ever considered how his intentions aligned with reality, he'd still have a family.
[Natsuno hardly ever thought about his dad for the last eight months. Now he's filled with a mix of anger and grief and he hates it.
His dad was a hypocrite and a selfish idiot.
Natsuno still mourns the loss of memory.
He misses him.]
no subject
she doesn't offer a comforting squeeze on the tail end of that sentiment, but their fingers are still entangled and natsuno can no doubt feel how clarke's twitch. it hits too close to home. if jake griffin hadn't tried to go public with information about the life support systems failing, he never would have been floated and she'd never been imprisoned. but he'd still be chasing what he felt was right, and then didn't even get to see the end result that was earth.
they're not implicitly talking about mothers, but it's impossible for clarke's mind not to stray towards abby. and after a brief inhale that only sort of shudders in her throat, she says, )
That's parents, though. Isn't it? They always disappoint, then love us all the harder like that makes up for past mistakes.
no subject
[His father may now be a faceless, garble-voiced figure, but Natsuno still knows he was a shell of a man during those final weeks. He also knows that this broken man tried his best to protect his undead son - pathetic attempts, too little and too late, yet even they were fiercer than anything he'd done when Natsuno was still human.
He opens his eyes and turns to glance at Clarke, on his own this time.]
I hope he moved on.
no subject
( her turn to not look at him immediately, though clarke doesn't go so far as to cover her eyes with the crook of her elbow. simply squints at the sun for a beat, until the light becomes too much and her vision is perpetually scorched with a stark outline of blinking black; then she'll glance his way, expression somber but convicted. )
But some day I'm sure he'll find peace with the past.