[ I thought you'd prefer it, is — to him — a great kindness. Ace is friendly, for sure, but even he can be worn down when things spiral rapidly out of his control. He doesn't know when he became such a good liar ( or worse yet, when people actually believed him when he said everything was good, he was okay, he wasn't anything but at the top of his game ), but it's not often anymore than he feels someone cut down to the core of what he's hiding. Law's a thoughtful person, he thinks, as he sits down on one of the backless, round-cushioned chairs that he can reach with his toes. And deflates, quieter and darker-eyed than ever — even if the pupils have begun to pale, oddly. ]
Actually, yeah. And I'm not really hiding anything, I just don't know what's going on.
[ A partial lie. He has an idea, and doesn't want to believe it.
He widens his knees, dropping his hands between them to hold the round edge of his seat to act as a brace as he spins back and forth in a shallow arc. Rocking, as if on a ship. There's no fight in him, even as Law advances with Kikoku in hand — as if he's already decided to trust everything to him. ( He has. ) ]
[ he would protest the thought if he knew it, of course — thoughtful isn't something most people would describe him as, at least those outside of his own crew, and he yelled at ikkaku about that once and they've never brought it up in his face since... but it isn't exactly wrong.
and so he watches ace sit there, quiet and somehow devoid of the life patho-gen have breathed back into him, and he thinks it is wrong, wrong, wrong — ]
Scan, [ he says, to distract himself. to focus on something else than the fact fire fist trusts him enough to not so much as tense up.
what his ability tells him freezes his blood in his veins. ]
That's... [ it is as if ace's body is decaying from the inside out, as if the shell of him is alive while his insides have realised they should be dead and are on the way there, rapidly, for absolutely no discernible reason law can see. ]
[ If someone can confirm "it", without frills or pity, he suspects it would be Law. It's not that Ace doesn't want for comfort ( he craves it, actually ), it's that right now — he would rather have something clinical, precise. Something he can hold onto that won't drop him into the sudden throb of dread-despair-doom that claws at his chest and up his throat. It's not in his head, it's real. It's real, and inescapable. Someone else can see it, see him. SEE HIM.
The temperature in the room drops, a few degrees. A cold chill beginning to rise, radiating from the epicenter where he's sitting — ramrod straight, still. His eyes aglow, suddenly and violently, as if something eerie is watching from the darkness. Observing, like a predator. His Natural Soul is rotting him from the inside out, and in the silence, where it usually lies quiet and subtle, it is clearly unhappy with being perceived. Ace's figure seems to fade slightly, eager to become nothing. His face, slowly melting into something formless, something threatening: a singular presence that ought to evoke the urge to flee, freeze, cower against a simmering, stomach-clenching dread aura.
His voice both rasps like a corpse, and sounds like his throat is full of blood. ]
[ there is a chill in the air. a part of law expects to see snow falling, his breath curling in tendrils of fog in front of him; but there is nothing, nothing but the otherworldly glow of fire fist's eyes, as if his eyes have themselves burst into flame.
as the edges of him fade and flicker, as all expression melts from his face until all is left but those fire-bright eyes, burning dots in the quiet room, law feels the cold seep into his bones, coil in the marrow until his breath freezes in his lungs, until his veins bleed the same kind of fear he'd felt every single day for thirteen years —
but he is an expert, in fear. in pushing through it. in feeling it, and speaking regardless. ]
You, [ he responds, his mouth tilting up into a smile, a sharp and cutting thing. ] How interesting. You're killing him — but I suppose you'd know that. [ you. something separate from what makes up the soul of portgas d. ace, the man he has never once heard anyone say anything bad about. ]
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countershocks) wrote2020-06-29 04:08 pm
no subject
Actually, yeah. And I'm not really hiding anything, I just don't know what's going on.
[ A partial lie. He has an idea, and doesn't want to believe it.
He widens his knees, dropping his hands between them to hold the round edge of his seat to act as a brace as he spins back and forth in a shallow arc. Rocking, as if on a ship. There's no fight in him, even as Law advances with Kikoku in hand — as if he's already decided to trust everything to him. ( He has. ) ]
no subject
and so he watches ace sit there, quiet and somehow devoid of the life patho-gen have breathed back into him, and he thinks it is wrong, wrong, wrong — ]
Scan, [ he says, to distract himself. to focus on something else than the fact fire fist trusts him enough to not so much as tense up.
what his ability tells him freezes his blood in his veins. ]
That's... [ it is as if ace's body is decaying from the inside out, as if the shell of him is alive while his insides have realised they should be dead and are on the way there, rapidly, for absolutely no discernible reason law can see. ]
no subject
The temperature in the room drops, a few degrees. A cold chill beginning to rise, radiating from the epicenter where he's sitting — ramrod straight, still. His eyes aglow, suddenly and violently, as if something eerie is watching from the darkness. Observing, like a predator. His Natural Soul is rotting him from the inside out, and in the silence, where it usually lies quiet and subtle, it is clearly unhappy with being perceived. Ace's figure seems to fade slightly, eager to become nothing. His face, slowly melting into something formless, something threatening: a singular presence that ought to evoke the urge to flee, freeze, cower against a simmering, stomach-clenching dread aura.
His voice both rasps like a corpse, and sounds like his throat is full of blood. ]
— yeah? What do you see, Trafalgar?
no subject
as the edges of him fade and flicker, as all expression melts from his face until all is left but those fire-bright eyes, burning dots in the quiet room, law feels the cold seep into his bones, coil in the marrow until his breath freezes in his lungs, until his veins bleed the same kind of fear he'd felt every single day for thirteen years —
but he is an expert, in fear. in pushing through it. in feeling it, and speaking regardless. ]
You, [ he responds, his mouth tilting up into a smile, a sharp and cutting thing. ] How interesting. You're killing him — but I suppose you'd know that. [ you. something separate from what makes up the soul of portgas d. ace, the man he has never once heard anyone say anything bad about. ]