wakey wakey [ @all ]

[kenosnpcs]

This is a post where you'll find a header in the comments for Aetós, Agapitos Voreen, and Florence Deshayes respectively.

As a reminder from our course correction, your OOC understanding of their places in their factions should not influence IC reactions, especially to Agapitos and Florence. Aggressive threats and demands are likely to be ignored, because this would be very out of the blue to them! ( You can be mean to Aetós, though. They're a dick, and they just won't respond. )

Timewise, Agapitos and Florence's posts are shortly after Shard-Bearers awake after the repose (roughly a day to give people a chance to get their bearings/go get a haircut/etc), and Aetós's portion is later in the month.


Please note, new tag-ins will not be responded to after April 23rd. However, tagging each other throughout this post is welcome. Threadjack to your heart's content!

Comments

[kenosnpcs]

If you were sorry, you would prostrate yourself and allow us to take a pound of flesh for the crime you committed against us.

[ That bright heat feels more like an interrogator's too-bright light on Amos now. Like an angry flare of heat. ]

Apologies should be genuine, so I — we in Meridian — cannot accept the apology given. Not when it is for the gravest of crimes.

[baltimores]

[ Look, he didn't know what he'd been expecting, but yeah in hindsight this makes sense. Does the light have to be that bright though? A shudder ripples through Amos' being as he looks to draw on his own presence in communion, wrap himself in the cool, protective darkness of Zenith. ]

Yeah, so I think we both know I'm not going to be doing that. [ Still plainspoken, but there's the sensation of a glare now, too. Damn, where's a dimmer switch when you need one? ] Look, you can accept it or not. No skin off my nose. I said it; it's out there; ball's in your court. I don't really care what you do with it.

[ The way he sees it, he's done his part. He fucked up. He apologized for it. He doesn't have to go any further than that. ]

[kenosnpcs]

Balls in our court?

Do you treat every assassination you commit with such blasé disregard? Was it not enough to kill Cyrus, but then you insult us on top of it? If we wanted your apology, we would ask for it. What we want is retribution.

Short of that, you only offer insult.

[ Amos, your brain. I love it. Agapitos, however, doesn't. ]

[baltimores]

[ ... Well, he had treated every murder he's committed in the past with blasé disregard, yeah. Right up until he saw Cyrus' dead body before him, had felt a surge of something else, and tried to... stop being like that. Stop being like himself.

Apparently, he is still not doing a good enough of a job. It's frustrating — or would be, were it not for the way Voreen continues. There's the sensation of Amos watching him, both warily and with understanding dawning on his presence. Not just that what he had to offer wasn't enough, but wasn't so much as wanted.

So. ]

Didn't realize that'd be an insult. Alright, apology retracted.

[ Go fuck yourself instead, he wants to say, but with Voreen's agitation brushing up against him, not to mention that insufferable presence of Meridian, he figures there's a better way of getting that across.

Cyrus had been a good guy. This one? Kind of a dick (even if, you know, Agapitos has rights here). ]

You're welcome to try to take your retribution. [ A beat; a pause; something that is not quite a grin, but darkly amused all the same. ] Though I guess your own got themselves killed the last time they tried that, didn't they?

[ He'd seen a certain play. And maybe Meridian should not, in fact, seek retribution. ]

[kenosnpcs]

[ There is the sensation of a tightened jaw. ]

Ah, and you show your true colors. When apologies are not accepted, Zenith tries to insult the dead. Cetina was a dear friend of Cyrus, a childhood friend, in fact. You insult her for defending his honor? For striking out bravely on her own?

[ That sun is hot, and bright. Like a noon day, sitting on the beach where the sands radiate heat upward, and the sun radiates rays downward. Like being trapped with nowhere to escape. ]

Had I known she would strike out like that, I would have given her support. Next time, it will not be a lone warrior striking out in the dead of Highstorm's shadows. Next time we will not be so easily snuffed out.

[baltimores]

[ It's good to get a rise out of Voreen, he thinks, but he could really do without that burning force of Meridian behind it. Amos pulls the cooling shadow of Zenith tighter to himself, does his best to let it bring him some relief. The last time he'd felt Meridian strongly had been by Cyrus' last act, and it feels as though the scars he'd picked up along the way start to burn themselves.

Probably just psychosomatic. The sensation of an inclined chin in return, even as he bristles at the idea of insulting the dead. ]

Didn't know stating facts was considered an insult now. So she took off on her own to do... what? He was already dead. Wasn't any honour left to defend. Pointing out that someone got themselves killed on a fool's errand isn't insulting them, it's pointing out that they got themselves killed by being an idiot.

[ But for that bristling he's even-keeled, detached. Cetina meant nothing to him; he'd never so much as spoken to her.

But then there is a flash of teeth, a pointed glare. ]

You think there's gonna be a next time? Then I'll mourn those you send to their deaths.

[kenosnpcs]

I am not interested in debating her actions. They were not sanctioned, and her own choice.

That being said, we will avenge her death.

[ That brightness does not subside, it is still as hot as ever. It is a promise. ]

And we will not mourn your loss, when your time comes.

[baltimores]

Talk a big game for someone who's had more than a hundred years to avenge some deaths and still hasn't, huh.

[ Because on at least one of those counts, Amos is still here. He tries not to show it, but that Meridian presence wears on him, exhausting and uncomfortable to the point of pain. There's the sensation of him scratching at a scar, a play of nonchalance, but nope — it bothers him.

Still here, though. ]

You assume my time will come. It won't. [ He speaks with an almost earned sort of confidence, as if he knows this to be a fact. ] I know people in your position got a shelf life though, don't I.

[ okay now he's just being a dick — but he does want to see if he can actually goad Agapitos into anything, so it's very much on purpose ]

[kenosnpcs]

[ Agapitos' fury burns even hotter still. He cannot help it, because this is precisely what he has argued against, this is exactly what he was talking about over a century ago, when he had said over and over again what the crimes of the Zenites were.

This arrogance that it was to be accepted. That their way was right when there was another path. ]

You're right. I prioritized the safety and security of my people over petty revenge. Because of that, I'll have the backing of bearers.

You talk a rather large game for someone who even immediately after the act was dissipated by one of my allies. You may return from dissipation, but perhaps next time I'll make sure they capture your shard, like we did Yura.

[baltimores]

[ A pause. (Gritted teeth at that white hot fury, because there's only so much he can take. It's not real, Amos tries to tell himself, even though it very much feels like it.) ]

You see to keeping your people safe and we got no quarrel, [ said the Exalt. ]

But you even think of keeping me as just a rock, and you'll see what Zenith will do to you.

[ Spoken again with the conviction of someone who knows. He isn't one to play up his standing, but after what he's been through since completing his harmonization he has no doubts in his mind. Anything befalls him, and there will be absolute hell to pay.

An impression left, of pure, striking Zenith — because Cyrus should have shattered his shard. Would have, were it not for that intervening force of Zenith. Or maybe Yima herself; he doesn't know. But something out there refused to let him be hurt, and so a warning: Voreen can make all of the threats he wants but Amos is not Yura; is someone else entirely.

Arrogance, sure. But to him? Truth. ]

[kenosnpcs]

Hah. I would enjoy to see them try. They would have a difficult time.

[ This is said as a promise, even as that white-hot sun begins to wane, as if setting. ]

Watch your back, lest you get caught by us by surprise.

[baltimores]

[ And — he can't suppress that impression of him slumping as that sun begins to set. It was tiring, uncomfortable, and he is, in fact, weak to it.

But though Amos relents as Voreen lets him off the hook, his overall presence remains proud and defiant. ]

You know what? I'll do just that.

[ And along with it, two unspoken impressions: You should also watch yours, considering who he's talking to; and the much less dignified bitch. ]