okitactless | catch-all

[SO HERE THEY ARE all aboard the nightmare train... honestly, this whole "needing to sleep" thing kind of sucks in general?? It was always a nice indulgence, but now that he needs to do it, it's no longer quite so fun.

To say nothing of dreams, another new experience for him. Memories, though, and nightmares... those are another story.

His rattling breaths have grown shallow. Yasusada hears them constantly now, even when Okita isn't in the room with him. In, then out, over and over, and despite how hard he's fighting, it's obvious he's losing strength by the day. Yasusada knows, intrinsically, that human bodies are fragile, and prone to breaking. He knows this, but he doesn't get it, not when Okita is a mortal god in his mind.

Okita's body is failing him. But Okita is meant to die in battle. These two things are facts, to a young sword enamored with his very first master. He doesn't understand.

Why won't Okita reach out for him anymore?

How, Yasusada wonders, can he fix this? How can make Okita's body as strong as his soul, so he can die a warrior's death?

...

In the end, Okita does reach out for him. He takes his sword in hand, stumbling into the garden, ready to slay the black cat that's been lurking nearby for days. But try as he might, Yasusada's spirit and Okita's soul simply aren't strong enough, even combined, to win out against illness. Nothing can stop him from collapsing, blood on his lips, deaf to the screams and pleas of the blade in his hand.

The cat watches until Okita grows cold.]

[ dreaming is a new experience to him..... not to mention the dreams he's getting are completely unfamiliar to him. ]

[ she's just stood up to her mother --- no, the woman who'd kidnapped her and tricked her and used her for her hair, and was chained and gagged. just as gothel's about to drag her away again - they hear a voice - his voice - calling on her to let down his hair. it's a trap, and she tries to warn him, but he can't hear her muffled screams. by the time he climbs up, it's too late --- gothel's stabbed him.

Just let me heal him, rapunzel pleads -- she'll do what gothel wants, she'll go with her, she promises (a word that equals meaningfully as rapunzel never ever breaks a promise) as long as she can heal the man she loves. gothel considers it, relents, while eugene begs for her not to do it.

i can't let you die, she tells him tearfully as she wraps her magic hair around his wound.

if you do this, you will die, he chokes back.

he pleads for her to wait, leans in for one last kiss --- but in reality, what he's doing is raising a broken piece of glass so he can slice off her hair. it turns completely brown, the magic evaporating --- gothel screams in the background, covering her rapidly aging face and stumbling backwards --- eugene's hand falls back down, on his very last moments of life, and as gothel trips out the window and to her death, rapunzel reaches for her automatically - -- a futile effort. she's losing both people she loves in the same span of five minutes, and there's nothing she can do, not anymore. ]

[ on the other hand.... nightmares are nothing new to rapunzel. she's been having them intermittently ever since her hair grew back. but the dreams always circled back to her hair, or the rocks, this is an entirely new situation for her. for once, she's not seeing it through her own eyes -- but someone else's entirely. what's happening is familiar though --- watching someone die while she (he?) is helpless to stop it. desperately wanting to fix it with her-- his --- own power, and it all being for nothing. death is inevitable. love can't stop it. ]

[ rapunzel wakes up gasping, her eyes wet with tears. ]

Okita --- no --- please, don't! Let me fix it, I have to fix....

[ it was so immersive it takes her a moment to realize she isn't a sword, and that she's now awake. pascal hugs her cheeks, patting her to try to get her to calm down. ]

[The dreams are unfamiliar, and dreadfully confusing. He's her, but he isn't, all at once. He sees what she saw, feels what she felt--but what is a family? What is this sort of love? It doesn't make any sense--and it hurts, on top of that.

Helplessness against loss, though... that much he intimately understands. But comprehension, it seems, doesn't make the pain any easier to bear. If anything, this strange form of love makes it even worse.

It's her voice that rouses him, and he jerks into consciousness without realizing his hand is already on his vessel. He sits up, and nearly overbalances, half-expecting the weight of all of that magical hair--he catches himself at the last moment, but he still looks a little disoriented when he looks at her.]

Eh-- Rapunzel-kun? What...?

Okita.....

[ she sobs, again, still stuck in the moment, grabbing the skewer yasusada gave her -- which is the closest thing that she physically has to a vessel (and yeah, it's near the bed. she has been taking it seriously after all. ]

He's gone, he wouldn't use me, and then he couldn't---

[ okay, now it finally dawns on her. ] Wait, I was.... dreaming? But that wasn't my.... that wasn't me.

Eh-- you dreamt about Okita-kun?

[Predictably, that's what his attention is drawn to first. Memories of his own--dream? Memory? What was that?--still swirl around inside his head, but even half-awake, his mind automatically focuses on his master.]

What did you see?

He was dying. I saw him dying. He was sick, and then...

[ a beat as she tries to get herself together. ]

Yasusada... you served him, didn't you? He was your master?

[Something in Yasusada's face seems to shift, at that--he looks away, covering his face under the guise of rubbing sleep out of his eyes.]

Yes... that's right.

Then.... did I....

[ was it a dream? memory? ] This is going to sound crazy, but.... I think I was seeing things through your eyes.

...Then that was...

[Finally, Yasusada forces himself to shift his focus, reviewing the strange things he'd seen in his own nightmare.

He certainly didn't recognize either of those people, though his emotions at the time had been so intense that he'd clearly dreamt otherwise. But try as he might, he can't concentrate on that--he needs to know what she saw.]

Wait, you... said you saw him dying?

Yes. He-- it was slow at first, because he was sick, and he wasn't --- he wasn't using you, and then..... he wanted to use you to ... kill a cat...

[ frankly, what the fuck. ]

And he didn't have any more strength left.

[ it's pretty late in the evening when rapunzel finally stumbles back into the room. by now she's been patched up and healed a little, but she's still covered in animal bites and scratches and her eyes are red and puffy. for once, she doesn't greet yasusada at all, instead, she collapses straight on her bed and doesn't say anything. ]

[ who did something stupid?? she did something stupid! pascal, a little scratched up himself, collapses similarly on the pillow. ]

[They don't often spend the day together, which isn't too surprising given how he tends to be on Okita's heels almost every waking moment. Still, he's definitely fond of her, and it's always nice to see or hear her around the castle, despite the circumstances they're in. He always tries to make a point of checking in with her at the end of the day, if nothing else.

So this arrival is definitely surprising, but more importantly, it's concerning. He looks at her in alarm, frozen with an oiled cloth in his hand for his nightly maintenance ritual.]

Eh-- Rapunzel-kun?! [He's careful to sheathe his vessel, but he drops the cloth carelessly, reaching out for her with oily hands before he thinks better of it. Still, he hovers in clear distress.] What happened? Are you alright?

[ this week the paranoia effect isn't as strong so she's not as inclined to stick to him -- but she does make it a point to see him every day. usually she's in earlier than this, so it probably is a shock to him that she's here. ]

I... did something stupid, Yasusada, I'm sorry.

[ she's clutching a golden petal in her hand and she's extremely pale, but she turns to look at him at least. ]

[Quickly, he shakes his head, pulling off his haori to wrap around her shoulders. "Something stupid" is definitely a cause for concern, but that can wait until he's sure she's alright. It's worrying to see her like this, but he hasn't the slightest idea how to help.]

What do you need? What can I do?

I... I'm fine. I just need time.

[ and painkillers??? but she clutches the haori a little tighter around her shoulders. ]

Just... don't go into the hedge maze, okay? No matter what you do.

[Alas, Yasusada doesn't know what painkillers are... and he's decided that oil hands are less important than comfort, so he sits down, carefully putting a gentle hand on her back.]

Can you tell me what happened?

[ neither does she.... ]

I went into hedge maze --- and I saw her. Gothel. [ yams can probably guess from context that gothel was the woman who'd kidnapped her and killed eugene. oops. I mean, not really her.... it was a Gothel made of plants. She attacked me.

... So did a lot of animals. I don't know why.

Attacked...

[Well... he can't say he's all that surprised, really. Not with what he saw in her memories. Thankfully, he isn't dumb enough to say that.]

Eh, but-- animals like you a lot, don't they? [Considering: Saizo and Pascal, y'know...]

[ well, listen, he wouldn't be wrong, she does have nightmares about gothel. ]

Normally, yes. But these ones--- they were savage. Even Pascal couldn't calm them down. I don't even know why or how--- maybe they were hurt before.

.... And then I found the petal. As soon as I touched it, I was teleported back at the entrance. It was... I don't know.

[Hurt before... somehow Yasusada doubts that's the case; he's more inclined to believe that it has to do with this castle than any sensible explanation like that, but he lets it go. That's not the most important thing here.]

Is this what you went in there to look for?

No, I--- I went to look for answers. I didn't expect to see this.

[ and it does noting: that's the twist. ]

Yasusada..... if I survive.....

[ what a way to start this off. ]

.... There's a way to save those on the other side. And I won't rest until I've done it.

[Well that

sure isn't

what he was expecting

partner????]

Eh? [He sure does look surprised WHY SO MANY SECRETS GOSH] What are you talking about?

It's called the Other Side -- where you go. Beauty and the Beast, the two from the story -- they're there too. And there's a way to save them, it involves.... ink.

[ it doesn't make too much sense, so. ] So, if I make it, I won't leave you behind.

[That sure is a bunch of confusing words he doesn't understand

He blinks a few times, then shakes his head slightly, as if to clear it.]

Wait-- how do you know all of this?

Varian. And, Dragon and Tiger, I've been trying to find out more about the Game and how it works.

Oh... [He looks surprisingly disappointed, but not at her.] I tried speaking to Tora-kun a few times, but she didn't tell me anything.

Yeah, it's tough. You have to ask exactly the right questions. And, um, someone sent Varian a letter? I thiiink, the Historians?

The Historians...

[He mumbles it back, his gaze turning distant with thought. Eventually, he smiles, though it's self-deprecating and a little sad.]

...I never knew about any of this. [Blotters, Historians, letters from the other side, he hadn't been able to dig up a single thing on his own. He hadn't managed to protect Hijikata, and Okita and Rapunzel aren't yet in the clear for this week either.] In the end, I couldn't help Okita-kun at all.

I only know because of Varian. [ she strokes his hair again, giving a similar self-deprecating smile. ] That's not true. You two have been giving each other strength this whole time.

I'm sure he'd say the same.

[Despite himself, Yasusada smiles too, although there's no real humor in it. He doesn't say what he knows to be true--that Okita wouldn't say that, because Okita blames himself for every part of this, no matter that not a single aspect of it had been his fault. He knows his master too well, has tried too hard for too long to emulate him in every way, to not be familiar with Okita's way of thinking in times of crisis.

But she doesn't need to know that. Not now, when he knows she's got to be hurting--when he's the reason her life is in danger, all because he never learned how to control himself like a human should.]

...will you take care of each other for me? [He asks instead, softly. He's counting on their survival--quite frankly, he doesn't care about the other partnerless at risk. The two of them are the only ones in danger that he's concerned about right now. If his death doesn't mean their survival, he'll... well. If she's right in that he won't be gone for good, he may very well die all over again.]

[ this thread is really awkward now since she's also dying. but okita, rapunzel, and yasusada, they're all blaming themselves. frankly, rapunzel's more angry and upset at them for voting yasusada out than worried for her own life. he was just desperate and scared. they should have realized. ]

Yasusada....

[ she doesn't know if she's going to survive, but the least she can do is offer him some comfort. ]

Of course I will. I promise.

[ lmao. ]

catch-all - Rapunzel

week 2 day 1

1/2

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week 2 day 2

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Week 3, Post-Trial

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