soul_skirmish | Where Are They Now? (5 Year Edition)

Where Are They Now? (5 Year Edition)

This meme was done before in this game, right here, and that is where I am stealing it from. But instead of giving characters the option to return home in this hypothetical scenario, the war is still going on five years from the current date in-game, and BREW still needs everyone.

The question is, what has happened in those five years? The children have become adults, the adults are just a little older without being old, and goodness knows a lot can change in that amount of time. Maybe you're thriving, in your business or your partnership. Maybe not. Either way, with no end in sight, life goes on in the city named after Death.

INSTRUCTIONS

-Post with your characters(s)
-Write a short blurb about what has happened in five years. Love, heartbreak, sickness, wealth, what was in the cards for your Weapon or Meister, and what has it shaped them into? Set a scene for the present.
-Tag others in the scene they kindly set.
-Profit$$$$$$$$

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

L Lawliet had a legacy that would stretch any man thin. 1,000 cases in 16 years, ended with the harshly truncated Kira Investigation, had strained the limitations of his clarity and fortitude, but L had endured until the bitter end. It was impressive, actually, that anyone could make it so far without fraying, with those first loose threads only appearing in the last hours he'd had alive in his own world.

In Death City, he had played his part dutifully for four years after arriving, going on missions and reaching an uneasy peace with his long-time nemesis and bitter rival as he'd watched Mello and Near's relationship blossom and thrive. He'd progressed through his twenties, celebrated four birthdays, and been cautiously hopeful. But by the time he turned 30, he was no longer fraying, he was unraveling, and it wasn't temporary or reversible. Light Yagami was both necessary and devastating to his health and his sanity, and at the end of the day, devastation prevailed. Others had covered for him at first, and then feared for him, and then, when they were at a loss and out of options, he had been quietly shelved like an outdated textbook with flawed data.

There were whispers that he had lost his grasp because he was weak. But those who actually knew him in his prime were more sympathetic; L had been strong like ten men, and then he'd lost his grasp.

He had good days and bad days, and he wasn't yet sure about this day. He was fairly sure that he was L today, and not some demented, dissociative amalgam of L and Kira. That happened sometimes, the inability to recall that they were actually two separate people, and it was jarring and frightening to be tossed back and forth between those perceptions. The mirror showed him a pale, thin face that hadn't changed much in five years, but his gaze wasn't quite the same, trading clever, eager sharpness for uneasy fatigue. Part of that was the medication, but most of it was wilting boredom and an increasing disdain for his fellow humans, suddenly so soft-talking and condescending. The fact that he recognized this actually made it a good day, but he was careful about celebrating prematurely. It could change very quickly, he knew and dreaded from experience.

He sat by the window in his private room, staring at his frail-looking hands, reflecting on what it was like to be forgotten but not yet gone.

Edited 2013-02-04 07:19 (UTC)

Light made his way down a seemingly-endless hallway lined with countless doors, flanked by both a nurse and a security guard. It was a place he had assured himself he had no business in, and no desire to visit over the last span of months.

Unlike L, he was not the sort who felt the need to poke the hornet's nest after he had succeeded in knocking it from its branch. It had taken a great effort on his part to convince the right sort of people that, for his own safety, L needed to be taken into the custody of an assisted living facility, and once it had been finalized and the last paperwork had been signed, he had been eager to close the book on it and move on.

Though, it hadn't allowed itself to remain closed. Even in his isolation, the rumor mill had been able to reach him, and it whispered implications of L's decline being much more drastic and quicker than expected...a point that the nurse was currently explaining to him as they walked.

"We see a great number of cases come through here and, sometimes, it's just hard to tell. We can't expect everyone to operate at their full capacity every day, or we'd have a much clearer picture."

"Yeah, I can see that." Light muttered, readjusting his hold on the flat white box he carried and giving a wide berth to a patient standing near the wall, seeming fascinated with the paint job.

"All I can tell you is not to hold it against him if he doesn't speak to you....and also not to hold it against him if he does."

The three of them came to a stop in front of one door in particular as the guard fumbled his keys off of his belt to unlock it as the nurse rapped sharply.

"Ryuzaki...? You have a visitor today." she said gently, cracking the door open and motioning Light inside.

He shouldn't have cared...in many ways, he didn't care. But he had convinced himself that after all they had been through, L at least deserved a proper send-off.

Edited 2013-02-04 07:40 (UTC)

It was practically a grim guarantee that L's feelings were very different from Light's, on any matter or dilemma that presented itself. Being committed had started out that way; Light had been largely responsible for what appeared to be the correct decision, the compassionate and safe choice given the circumstances. It didn't matter that others had protected and helped him for as long as they could, and would have continued to even as it became more frustrating and difficult to deal with someone who was detaching rapidly from what everyone else called reality. It had been a beautifully subtle manipulation on Light's part; by that point, L largely considered Light an extension of himself. Part of it was the fact that their resonance was lethally good, sharp and brilliant and so complete that it took away a part of the Weapon every time they resonated. And time had ground on; L had long ago forgotten how to even turn into his Weapon form, sometimes forgetting that he was a Weapon entirely and being confused when he couldn't wield others. It had led to some close shaves on missions, but breaks from missions hadn't helped, because then broken mathematics presented as solutions had jeopardized vital matters on the home front. L had subsequently resigned from his job at the Watch, and from there, without purpose or focus, it was nothing but a discouraging downward slide. The detective who never forgot a face was suddenly forgetting many, slipping into dissociative fugues and responding fearfully or violently towards people who had his very best interests at heart.

Light had confirmed the believers' assertion that L was insane, he had swayed the soft-hearted doubters, and he had even convinced L himself to sign many of the required papers. It was no easy task, but even at the end of his life outside of the infuriatingly-named Sunny Graves, L had reluctantly agreed that, based on the evidence, it was the only logical course of action.

It had been easier to think that, then. Now, after six months in the center, L knew that the food was terrible and rarely ate it. He knew that things never changed in his wing, because those patients were fragile and couldn't cope with it. He knew that stability largely meant boredom, and that even when he got visitors, he couldn't help but be disappointed when they entered and were not Light.

Not that he had any real reason to expect Light. In over six months, he hadn't been to visit L once. Maybe he had never existed, L thought bitterly. Maybe that was the real reason he was here, because he kept talking about someone who wasn't real, and endangering himself based on his fictional account.

So, when the door opened, L did what he always did when people came to see him in one of his darker moods. He fixed his gaze straight ahead, unblinking and empty. The staff were used to it and had learned to consider it normal... maybe his "visitor" would learn quickly enough to intuit the most time-efficient method. The sooner he gave up, the sooner he would leave.

Light lingered near the door, even as it shut quietly behind him, studying L for a long moment from across the room. It was hard to say that the detective looked worse for wear as...well....he'd always been worse for wear. It was more accurate to say that something was missing. That sharp, merciless edge of cleverness that had haunted his awkward features and made him dangerous was gone now, dulled into apathy.

It was hard to look at him. And tempting to simply reach for the door handle and show himself out.

Instead, he made himself cross the room, stopping what he deemed a polite (safe) distance from the window.

"Ryuzaki." he said, waiting to see what sort of reaction he'd receive, if any, before deciding what his next move would be.

L's visitor didn't immediately approach him or announce himself, which was, in itself, a warning sign. The doctors and nurses, knowing his edgy temperament, always said who they were when they came in, and so did the visitors he typically had. They did in different ways, of course... and L had a better memory for voices than faces, these days, so it didn't particularly matter...

But no one was silent for so long. Silence was uncomfortable for most people, and there was an innate desire to fill it. And L, especially, was so unnerving to endure a silence with, and only one person seemed to believe that he was the exception and act accordingly.

They had been chained together for months, they could practically take the thoughts out of each other's heads. When they'd resonated, it was like they were one person, and when they'd shared a bed, the sex had been incredible, even if it had left both of them battered and scarred and their acquaintances furious and baffled.

It just wasn't what suspects and detectives did, and it definitely wasn't what they continued to do after both of them were 100% certain of Kira's identity.

So when Light addressed him by his fake name, the empty, common little moniker that he'd continued to use in Death City partly because he missed hearing Light say it so much, he blinked, suddenly aware, turning his gaze slowly toward the door.

He wasn't a zombie, anymore. Under the ice was a swift river and a vicious current. It stood to reason that the obsession that had put L in this hospital in the first place hadn't improved much since he'd been left alone with it, and when the subject of that obsession actually appeared, for the first time in six months...

The surge of emotion that accompanied the realization that Light was actually here was too much for L to handle in his state. Maybe it was more than he'd have been able to handle in any state, but the result was what amounted to a quick and abrupt shut-down.

Just like that, his fledgling good day became the very worst kind of bad day. Because it didn't manifest in obvious peril, flinging the flimsy plastic lawn furniture he'd been downgraded to after plywood had proven too dangerous or even attacking Light with his hands. He'd done both to previous visitors, but this bad day was a quieter one, with a subtler edge that contradicted Light's erroneous dismissal of L's remaining ability to be clever and dangerous.

He was medicated heavily, but using the same techniques he used to hide his eating habits from the staff, he didn't always swallow his drugs, and he didn't always throw them away after his spectators were satisfied.

"Good of you to show up," he said, tone glazed with black ice. "I wondered when you would. I've been getting progressively worse, after all, and I didn't think I'd be able to sustain the appearance of a drastic decline without being moved to a different ward."

A different ward invariably meant a worse one, with higher security and fewer privileges. And the few privileges L had, visitors being the most notable one, were constantly threatened by his violent fugues and fits, so he was walking a thin line by trying to manipulate Light into visiting him from afar.

Getting worse was hard when one was already in pretty rough shape.

Gamzee wasn't supposed to be there.

Well, this wasn't entirely true. He wasn't strictly banned from visiting, per se, but it was highly discouraged. It had been gently revealed to him that his presence made some of the other residents nervous, and he had been advised on more than one occasion to remove his face paint before even entering. He didn't, of course, and he knew that it wasn't the residents that were bothered the most, it was the staff. He represented instability, a negative influence on the man he wanted to visit.

That he was a rather demonic looking troll didn't help things either.

But this was his partner - remained his partner still as, despite the ability to use basically any other weapon that would give him the time of day, he had yet to pick anyone else to work with. L lived, and as long as this was the case he had the option of returning to the clown.

Indigo blooded trolls lived a long time. He had patience.

The troll was accompanied by two guards rather than a nurse, and if he cared he would have called out the bias. All he cared for at the moment, however, was getting this visit. Five years had given Gamzee a few extra inches, both in body and horns, but not enough that he really towered over anyone. The guards still kept up the appearance of a threat.

Though they weren't. Not really.

When they reached L's room finally, the troll gave a greeting that had become the norm for him by now. "Bro," he said quite seriously, "get the motherfuck out."

Edited 2013-02-04 09:59 (UTC)

Gamzee had every right to "be there," as far as L was concerned. In fact, when he had been committed, it had been largely conditional on the troll's ability to come see him, if he so desired. Not that L could truly hold it against him, if he didn't want to; though he and Gamzee had remained partners over the years, there were months when it had been in name only, weeks where he had spent more nights with Light than he had at home, and days when he had prioritized selfish, destructive things over missions. It was difficult, because there was no quadrant equivalent for his relationship with Gamzee. Light was his lethally seductive Kismesis, he had been something like an Auspistice to Mello and Near, and Bakura had been L's long-suffering Moirail. But Matesprit was an empty quadrant for the detective, hanging like a sleeve over an amputated limb, and attempts to fill it typically backfired spectacularly. That left "Partner" as the obvious next-best thing, the plain and available void that could be occupied, and Gamzee had remained even when L had seemed to falter and fade, first physically with his frequent absences and then mentally.

He glanced up when the troll was admitted; he had taken to feigning a catatonic state when someone came in that he didn't want to speak to. Mostly that comprised doctors and nurses, and he could always tell them because they approached quietly and talked to him like a child. But Gamzee's blunt, sad greeting was never one that he could bring himself to deliberately ignore, not even on his bad days when he was genuinely unreachable.

"I wish I could," he said, his tone lackluster and flat once he was sure that the door had closed and they were alone. "You know I wish I could, but it isn't up to me. The last decision I made was signing that paperwork, and anyone crazy enough to sign those papers definitely deserves to be here."

Edited 2013-02-04 16:12 (UTC)

"A motherfucker's got a right to be changing his mind. A motherfucker's got a right to a lot more things than what he's given himself." It's an old, tired argument. Still, Gamzee hasn't lost hope that some day a change of wording will hit just the right note with the man and bring back some of that old partner he was so fond of.

The troll slammed a bottle of Faygo down in front L. This too, was old habit. After all, he knew the man wouldn't be getting nearly enough of what he enjoyed here. Getting the bottle past security had been difficult at first, but by now they hardly batted an eye at it (though they considered his tastes questionable at best). If he could get his way, he would have brought a bag of sweets with him each time too. And by bag he basically meant pillowcase, as if he'd just done a round of trick-or-treating, which was probably why that action was frowned upon so much.

Gift delivered, he took a seat across from L, pulling his legs up in a manner resembling the way his partner did. "Cat won't eat," he added. Though if L would return for an ugly feline over him, he was doing something wrong.

Every person who had cause to visit L, whether frequently like Bakura, infrequently like Mello, or never, like Light, was difficult to some degree, and they were all difficult in their own ways. For most of them, it had to do with the fact that he was being semi-mourned... but Gamzee hadn't seemed to accept that there were consequences to the kinds of things L had been doing before being committed. His fugues were dangerous, and he had almost killed some of the people who had meant the most to him. His intentions had been the best in the world, and he had done it for all the right reasons, but the end result was the same. L had harmed Mello and Bakura, among others, too grievously to even consider continuing to live as he had been.

Please try to understand that this is for the best, Gamzee... it might just be for a little while, even. Take care of the cat while I'm gone, and when I'm back, it'll be just like before.

The soft words had served their purpose at the time, as L was hastily boxing up his life and preparing to relocate. But even if Gamzee had let him leave then, L hadn't been able to maintain that there was any truth in the words. And yet, even after six months, Gamzee kept coming back and asking him to come home. Gamzee, he knew, would be the one least likely to treat him differently, if he did. It would be like the last year had never happened, and that made it all the more tempting, and all the more difficult to say that he wouldn't be able to.

"There are privileges, here. Not rights. That was on one of the papers I signed," L said tiredly, startling slightly as Gamzee slammed the bottle of strawberry Faygo down in front of him on the table, which nearly broke under the sudden stress. His table, like most of the pieces in his room, was flimsy plastic lawn furniture. He braced, almost expecting it to split, with the fissure spreading to the floor and destroying the whole place, but it didn't happen, outside of his fractured thoughts.

He took a deep, shuddering breath. Even on the best of his good days, composing himself wasn't easy. He wasn't as able, these days, to be Gamzee's voice of reason.

"I thought the cat died," L said, inwardly consulting his mental calendar. Not that it was very reliable.

"I said it was liable to kick the wicked shit if you left me all in charge of it." He corrected patiently. "Not that it had yet. Not that it motherfuckin' will." After all, refusing to eat could always just be a sign of petulance, a good example of which sat before him as he spoke.

To Gamzee, issues such as the ones L had been having were nothing that couldn't be fixed. And even if they couldn't, everyone had their own little quirks. So the detective accidentally killed someone - they'd be back, usually. Failure to calm him could be blamed on a moirail who wasn't doing their job properly. Although he had a feeling that what worked for trolls didn't always work for humans in this case. Even still, in the clown's eyes L hadn't committed any sort of crime worth being locked up for.

And that's what this place was, no matter what anyone else said. It was a prison, plain and simple. If it was really for his partner's own good, then L would have been allowed far more freedoms than he currently was. This was just a place to stash him away and make sure he didn't cause any harm. A typical human thing, setting a problem aside as if it would just go away when ignored long enough. Sometimes Gamzee could see why L wasn't so fond of his own species.

"It misses a motherfucker." Though far less than he did, he was sure.

Just because Gamzee was frequently about as poetic as a horrorcore album meant to shock and offend didn't mean that his words couldn't be genuinely touching. Context, as well as the way he said his overly profane statements, often said more than the words themselves.

It was obvious that, whether or not the cat still clung vengefully to life, when Gamzee said that it felt things, the cat was not the cat. The cat was Gamzee.

It was a prison, though, and it was therefore easier to walk into it than it was to walk out. The challenge was largely in maintaining, when L could, that it was all for the best, even if it felt like dying in slow-motion to pretend that he was content when nothing could be further than the truth.

"Please help me, Gamzee," he murmured. "Don't talk about this like it's a fight I can still win. As difficult as it is to get used to this place... leaving it feels impossible. Because if I leave, someone is going to die, and if I am very, very lucky, it will be me. Don't make me happy about dying," he said, in a voice like string.

Edited 2013-02-06 18:53 (UTC)

L Lawliet

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