voice; un: dunscaith

[scatmaam]

Name: Scathach
Date: Before the Dorchacht celebrations, late evening
Format: Voice

[ The voice is a solemn one, if familiar to some. The statement is kept simple, as little else needs to be said. If you know, you know, you know? ]

If you were friend or colleague to a girl by the name of Zelda, you should know that she is no longer within this world. Her scent has left the city, and is not even in the outskirts beyond.

[ It probably wasn't strictly necessary for her to say anything. Even a little trite. But she knew Zelda was connected to the community. It mattered. But that was all she had to say, in the end, too. ]

Comments

[scatmaam]

I will mourn as I always do.

[ A small shifting sound, another sigh. ]

Don't let anyone ever tell you that time or abundance makes such things easier.

[thirdbeauty]

[Does that mean eventually yes? Natsuru's not the best at reading into these things, but she thinks it's something like that.]

I guess it always hurts, no matter how strong you are...

[scatmaam]

The moment it stops hurting... you are no longer human.

[thirdbeauty]

[There's a soft, mildly humorless little chuckle on Natsuru's end. She's quick to continue, with an apologetic tone.]

Sorry. I just...

I know this isn't what you meant. It just kinda hit me... how neither of us is exactly human right now.

[scatmaam]

That's not how I measure humanity. [ Her words would have come off as cold in a lot of other situations, but here they mostly just seem... tired. ]

Humanity is in how you exist. It's is not the why, or the what.

[thirdbeauty]

[All as expected, honestly.]

Yeah. I know. Just a weird thought.

[A brief pause and then, she cautiously, curiously ventures...]

Did she ever tell you a lot about her world? Or what it's like there?

[She'd be fine with Scáthach shutting her down, honestly. She even hopes she will, if she's being at all annoying. But she'd want to have someone to talk about this sort of stuff with, if it were someone she'd been close to...]

[scatmaam]

She did...

[ a long pause. ]

Her anxieties, her fears. Her guilt. All of it.

[thirdbeauty]

[Was that why Zelda seemed so nostalgic? Natsuru had no idea she had so many feelings like that... but of course, she wouldn't have ever gotten to know her as well as her bonded.]

Did she... not want to go back, eventually?

[scatmaam]

... Before I answer, let me ask you something.

Do you think any amount of pain would keep her from her duty?

[thirdbeauty]

[There's a long pause before Natsuru answers. She didn't know Zelda very well, but this is one thing she has a pretty clear idea of.]

... No. I don't think so.

[scatmaam]

Exactly... [ A sigh. ]

To her, that duty existed above all, even if that attachment to it caused her to magnify all of her failures to the point of near debilitation... But that stalwart spirit, that which made her so much a warrior in her own right...

... that was the part of her I loved most of all.