daybreakacademy | (no subject)

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(no subject)

Who: flat and miach for now
What: two nihilist teenagers meet up in secret. what happens next will warm your heart
Where: the cross of life
When: November 20th
Warnings: talk of death, possibly injuries, will be added as needed

[ cross of life, 10 pm

a few days after the post, that’s what he sends miach at night. he does his best to encrypt it from prying eyes, but he knows that’s not perfect, as much as he’d like it to be.

still, he hopes that this encounter can stay between the two of them, and no one else. it’d be such a shame if they were disturbed. leaning against a tree that’s been left bare due to the incoming winter, flat looks onwards to the cross-shaped pond. what an ironic name, considering what they were planning to do—but that just makes it all the better.

so he closes his eyes, and waits. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ The only word Miach texts back is 'noted' because there isn't much more to say about it, really. Both of them know what this is supposed to be about already.

Truth be told, Miach is surprised to find Flat is serious. Nobody has ever indulged her about these things on more than a theoretical level. Anyone who would call up a stranger from online to consensually kill them couldn't be 'right' in the head. That immediately adds intrigue.

Miach also knows that she's being near equally insane by meeting a total stranger with the intent to murder. This could easily enough be turned on her. It's an unhealthy choice, and a thrill. She's having a great night.

She shows at the cross of life at exactly 10, a spell-book under one arm and a small corked bottle in another. If Flat hasn't changed his mind, she's at least prepared. ]

[ flat would never say that he was sane. nothing about this plan says sane and he is aware of it.

he's also aware that he doesn't care, which is why he was here in the first place. certainly, moriarty had told him and shown him what death was like, but there was still an itch to know himself-- to experience it on his own. he wonders if it'll be painful or if it won't. he wonders if miach will even show up at all.

when he feels her approaching, he feels overjoyed.

turning towards her, he flashes her a grin, definitely out of place for what would happen. however, there's something about her that doesn't seem right-- not the fact that she's approaching him with the intention of killing him, but...something else. something he can't put a finger on yet.

how interesting. thrilling, even. ]

Miss Miach! It's so good to meet you in person!

[ he moves, circling around her like a cat that's caught interest in prey. is she prey? he doesn't know yet. but he's interested. ]

I really liked your username. Did you know that Werther's book was the inspiration for the first known examples of copycat suicide?

[ Miach raises her eyebrows at the mere idea that she wouldn't have known, all while taking in Flat's appearance... which sort of leads to her spinning around on her feet, following his movement. The enthusiasm matches his texting habits, that's for sure.

She finds herself smiling back after only a moment. ]

Of course. As far as its story goes, Goethe's novel isn't all that interesting after all. It's a fairly typical love-story - or we can say so from today's perspective. For its time, the overwhelming emotions were considered unusual.

But what makes the novel stick out is definitely the Werther effect you mention. Goethe managed to describe a pain that had been so far-spread and yet completely silent and everyone who'd been quietly suffering the same way took it as a blueprint for themselves. Words have a lot of power. They're dangerous.

Isn’t it interesting? The pain that words can make you feel without even making you lose even a drop of blood.

[ monster. freak. abomination. all those, and more, had been used to describe flat in his previous schools—even his own name, fake as it is, was an insult from his parents from when he was a child. a flat expanse with scribbles on it. it’s comical, in the same way a tragicomedy would be.

he stops twirling around miach, but his eyes are still focused on her, through her and what she is. ]

But that’s why they ban them, right? People in power are so afraid of words—the Vatican, governments, even schools themselves will censor what their students want to know. Speak against it, and you’re a heretic. Isn’t that how it goes?

[ he laughs, like he’s telling a joke—and perhaps he is. ]

But there’s nothing wrong with that. Humans are tools, cogs that work together to make a system work. Rather inefficient, but it’s good enough at isolating those that don’t march to the same tune as them.

That's certainly how they'd like us to see it.

[ Miach hates the image of the world as one big oiled machinery, everyone in their little place. It's restricting, no, suffocating. A system that pretends to be built for the people and only instrumentalizes them. Nothing but an inspiration to make a cake of their own making. ]

I'm not a tool. Actually, I'm completely and utterly without use or function to anyone but myself. I'll declare it over and over if I have to: nothing about me has any merit for someone else and thus I am not obligated to anybody either. I'm not owned by anyone.

Nobody is a perfect cog to begin with - they're just led to believe that they can force themselves into the shape. Weak-willed, they play along to earn the nebulous benefits their system promises.

Of course you’re not a cog, miss Miach.

[ ah. he’s understanding now. with eyes like filled holes and a smile without any real substance, he approaches her. close, closer, and closer still, until they’re practically breathing the same air.

whatever she says falls on deaf ears. his senses are picking up something else, something beyond her philosophical chatter. the energy she has, her very essence...there’s no other explanation but—

he tilts his head to the side, staring right up at her. ]

You’re not even human to begin with.

[ Miach doesn't flinch away from the invasion of privacy. She doesn't respect the personal space of others and she won't be impressed by the reverse action, even if it is significantly more unpleasant when a boy is doing it.

And then there's a sharp end to any body language considerations anyway because.... huh?

From someone else, spoken in another tone, this might have been an insult. But this... something about it does feel intuitively true in a way she can't put to words. She hates not being able to put things into words. ]

...that's a tall claim. What makes you say so?

[ Though she tries to smooth over her surprise, her expression must have already made it obvious. ]

Your energy.

[ flat says matter of factly, pulling back from miach just a tad—still too close for a normal person’s comfort, though. ]

You’ve heard of the saying, “If it quacks like a duck, and it walks like a duck, then it’s a duck”, yes? Well, you look like a duck, and you quack like a duck... but the energy you have is of something different. It’s like someone forced you to become a duck in the first place—but your essence doesn’t lie.

[ does she think that she’s a human? that’s interesting. he wonders how she managed to convince herself of that— perhaps a reverse of what happened to him? that makes him laugh. ]

I wonder how far the similarities to a human go—oh on the outside you look so much like one, you really did almost trick me. But you tricked yourself too, didn’t you? Or was it your family—they wouldn’t be your real family, would they? I doubt it!

[ Flat has really got the advantage over her in this situation and Miach doesn't enjoy feeling overpowered.

Herself, that's the one thing she's above all always been the top authority on. Having someone else read her like this, reveal something to her... That's sickening. And it's funny. In a really sad and claustrophobic way. Miach laughs, because that's the best thing to do. ]

They're not my real family alright. As far as they know they adopted a poor little human girl from a war zone halfway across the world. Very concerned with letting me live a normal life as a regular Japanese girl, the Mihies. I'm not even Japanese.

But to think they'd have unwittingly taken a creature into their home....

[ She laughs again at that. It's a little easier to focus on the impact this could have on her adoptive parents. It's impersonal,.got nothing to do with her not yet. She can hold it at arm's length and examine it. ]

Now that's a twist.

Edited 2019-11-22 01:00 (UTC)

That’s so nice of them. It’s a shame they were also fooled. I wonder who started it?

[ he says it without any malice behind his words, his voice soft as he lets the girl have her existential crisis. he doesn’t really care about her parents or how they’d react to the facts that she is an inhuman creature, but miach...

he can’t understand her. but at the very least, he feels like he can enjoy her presence more than anyone else’s in this school. ]

I’ll tell you something too, to make us even.

[ he separates himself from her, his hands stuffed in his coat pockets as he looks to the pond. ]

Do you know the family of mages from Monaco that were wiped out a few years ago? Had a son that went missing? [ he pauses. and then— ] I’m that missing child.

The demon child.

[ Miach's always been good at recalling random knowledge at the drop of a head, so this clicks into place immediately. There's no malice or fear in the way she speaks those words either, she's just confirming her understanding out loud. ]

Make that one thing we have in common in some way - my birth family and everyone from our tribe has been completely eradicated as well. Which is a shame, because now I have a lot of questions.

[ Ah well... Miach does have some lingering resentment for the destruction of her home. She doesn't remember much from her early childhood, but she does remember being happy. It's a faint memory. She hasn't been truly happy ever since and her ability to reconstruct the feeling has paled over the years.

But speaking about her home's destruction now, you wouldn't really guess that Miach is upset. It's just another fact of life, an event that happened. ]

But you're human, aren't you? Even though people would readily believe otherwise.

The very same!

[ flat doesn't feel even the slightest bit insulted by the epithet, even laughing along with his own confirmation. many of them had considered his origins to be demonic, or at the very least cursed in some way-- no one could wrap it around their heads that flat was 100% human in soul and body.

even flat himself had a hard time accepting this fact. ]

I suppose I am. I'm not really sure myself, actually--it's not like I could just see into myself and make as good of an analysis as I did now. Self-reflection is never really that good, is it? [ like a lighthearted fact, flat admits this with a shrug. ] If that was the case, though, wouldn't that make me your opposite? And it all goes back to what we were just talking about--the power of words!

[ miach, who was labeled a human and has led such a life for years. flat, who was labeled a monster and treated as such. what a funny, fickle thing, those words are. ]

Very true.

[ Miach is adjusting quickly to this new revelation about herself. Now that it is funny in that stupid symmetrical way, it's gained a poetic quality. And that's just fine. Her whole existence is borderline satirical. She sees merit in that. ]

They were desperate to label me human when they gave me into the adoption system- a human girl into a nice home. Good deed performed, job done, time to go home and watch TV. All a matter of convenient.

Just like it's convenient to completely reject a child that you don't know how to care for.

[ And kind of disgusting. Even though Miach doesn't at all care for concepts of love and compassion, the pure cowardice of parents who cannot accept their children's diverting traits... there's nothing pleasurable about that thought either. ]

We've both been done a disservice.

Oh, don’t be mistaken. It all happened after I predicted their deaths—no one really does seem to like it when the harsh truth is laid bare.

[ despite flat’s smile, the way that he digs his heel into the ground is the only proof of that tinge of resentment he feels. towards who? his parents? his teachers? the world itself? yes—that last one sounds about right.

he laughs—it’s absolutely hollow. ]

One of the teachers here—Moriarty—said that sometimes it’s necessary to tell a lie in order to keep society at peace. But isn’t that so boring? So meaningless? My parents tried to do the same, but they died anyways. All that energy they put into pushing me away, all for naught—how inefficient, right?!

[ he shakes his head. ]

Humans are inefficient creatures, Miss Miach. That’s why I’m looking forward to Nightfall—there will be no better way to get rid of them, starting anew.

[ That's forward. Really forward. ]

My, aren't you eager...

[ She's smiling now, not faltering, even though she herself has yet to make up her mind on what she really wants to become of mankind as such. Society however... ]

I can't say I disagree though. This world of self-delusion needs to be torn apart at the seams. It won't happen without sacrifice, it certainly won't happen to simply sweet-talking. Rebuilding is a painful and violent process.

[ Miach raises her hand to her hair, idly playing with her braid as she often does when thinking. ]

The Outlands aren't much better though - that's my reservations. If they simply win, we'll replace one kind of hell for another.

So it doesn't matter who wins or loses, then. The World will remain a Hell, no matter what.

[ he thinks about it for a moment--or at least appears to do so. really, flat could care less about who wins and who loses. the future means all the same to him, no matter what. ]

That checks out, I guess. But if it's Hell, then I think that we should do as we please all the same. [ flat laughs softly, shrugging off such a dark thought. ] Tearing society apart would cause mass chaos...but that's alright, isn't it? People should be true to their natures, without caring for what the person next to them thinks. Although I guess that also depends on what you think a person's nature is, too. Are you more into Hobbes or into Rousseau?

Rousseau is very idealistic and theoretical in his approach. It would be nice if he was right, but we're far from ever experiencing such a state.

[ It's not that Miach doesn't want people to be happy - she just doesn't see a way towards it that isn't plastered with falsehoods. ]

Hobbes meanwhile holds with what we can quantifiably experience. His human nature shines through in every society we find world-wide, causing them to be ever-inefficient methods of solving a problem that is completely inherent to mankind.

He's also the one that says that a person's actions are always defined as a mediation between the fear and hope that is always present in them. It was the fear of death that pushed them towards peace in times of war, but now I think that we should add fear of rejection there as well.

[ flat pauses, thinking about it for a moment. considering that he's been standing for so long, he sits down on the cold grass and even lays down. ]

It's humanity's inefficiency and inability to learn from their mistakes that makes them interesting...kind of like watching a comedy film. Have you ever watched one, miss Miach? The classics are always the best of course, but I think Monty Python and The Holy Grail is my favorite movie.

[ how did he move from one topic to the other? does this even make sense to anyone that isn't him? ]

[ Yeah, what are they standing around for. Miach places her murder preparations on the ground without too much care - she's still down for killing Flat later on, but the night is young, and right now they have made some more interesting discoveries.

She herself sits down next him, leaning comfortably back onto her hands. ]

I prefer books to movies by a large margin, but older movies can be fun. I haven't seen that particular one though. Life of Brain is the only Monty Python work I'm familiar with. The religious outrage was fun to read about, so I had to see the source for myself.

If you say their other movies are any good, I should look them up.

[ She's known Flat for like 20 minutes but she trusts his taste in media more than anyone else's already. ]

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only