R4 Viewing Party - no crying til the end (if you can help it)

[serrata]

I'm sure this is fine.

WELCOME TO THE R4 LIVEWATCH: AIRLOCKED REACH EDITION

Comments

[serrata]

[ People who probably should not be watching this: Yuuri Wakasa
People who are watching this, regardless: Take a wild guess, friends.

Not that Yuuri looks like she wants to be here, of course. She looks tense and unhappy and she's fidgeting with her clover necklace nonstop. But there's a grimness to the tight line of her lips that makes it clear she's not going to be talked out of this. She can't do anything else for Miki now but the least she can do is watch.

The first time Miki comes on screen though, her determination seems a little shaken. She sits up straighter and her fingers tighten around the charm so hard it must be hurting her fingers. Her eyes are fixed on the screen and there's a complicated mix of emotions on her face that's hard to read. ]

She looks... she looks so...

[ Young, she wants to say and she can't believe the word's even about to leave her mouth. She's only barely three years Miki's senior, only just a real adult herself but it's been so long since she's seen any of her friends in person -- almost half a year. Time's blurred her memories of their faces and she's sure that Miki Naoki's features had been sharper, rougher. But the girl on the screen now looks like a child. Had all of them, the whole School Living Club, seemed that young, once? ]

[scourgingstars]

[People who should also not be watching this: Ardyn Tenmyouji]
[People who are also watching this: who the fuck do you think]

[To his credit he was at least paying more attention to the others than to anything onscreen; he was sitting near Yuuri specifically, and reached out to lightly touch her shoulder. Better to focus on the people that were still alive than to think about how Prompto was ten years younger than he should have been, how he hadn't seen Lunafreya yet but it was just a matter of time-]

[...It was safer to concentrate on the present, rather than lose himself in the past.]

[serrata]

[ Yuuri jumps, evidently coming down to earth with a little bit of a bump. She'd almost forgotten she was surrounded by other people, focused so hard on the screen that the space station there feels more real than the familiar sitting room does now.

She squeezes hard on the chain around her neck, feeling the awkward shape of the charm sting an imprint into her hand as she reminds herself that she's here. With her family. She can do this. ]

...is it awful that I'd almost forgotten what her face looked like? It's almost been a few months but she looks so different to how I remembered her.

[scourgingstars]

I don't think that it is, no.

[serrata]

She's... been taking notes too. Inventory. Like I did, the first week.

[ Keeping track of the food. Survival tactics. ]

And when she woke up, she was asking after her "senpai". So she... she at least remembers meeting us.

[scourgingstars]

[come here you're getting a hug]

...Can you tell where she might be as far as her memories are concerned? I think I've placed Lunafreya, but I'm not sure about Prompto.

[serrata]

[ ah, a hug. even more deadly and inescapable than the patented lucian headpat(tm) ]

Not yet. She said she was "at school" and with "classmates" but that doesn't really tell me much. Miki-san was with us for a few months before we had to leave the school so it could be anywhere between then and when we found her.

[ Maybe with any luck once Miki comes out of her shell a bit more, she might get a better idea. For all the good it'll do. ]

What about Lunafreya-san?

[scourgingstars]

She mentioned Nyx Ulric--that rather solidly places her before the fall of Insomnia, which was essentially when this whole thing began ten years ago.

[this sure fucking sucks don't it]

[serrata]

[ SURE FUCKING DOES ]

So she still has all that to remember...

[ She draws in a long, slow breath. All that and worse if Ardyn's right about the point she comes from. ]

What about Prompto-san? What is it that's throwing you off?

[scourgingstars]

He hasn't said much in the way of specifics. It...sounds like he thinks he's from right after Altissia fell and Lunafreya died, but I can't figure out when he might actually have come here from. He's far younger than he should be for either myself or Noctis, so the absolute latest that could potentially place him to my knowledge would be after-

[...]

...after the sun stopped rising for a decade or so.

[serrata]

[ ... Shit. ]

So that's going to be the last thing he remembers. He's going to think that's where it all ends?

[ God. When they save them -- because that's a when and not an if she tells herself -- how are they ever going to explain all this? ]

Why take him from somewhere [ somewhen? ] like that instead of lining him up with you and Noctis?

[scourgingstars]

I don't know--he could be from slightly earlier than that, there's no way for me to tell like this.

[THIS IS FINE]

As for why, I can't begin to guess. But I also hardly claim to understand most things the network does.

[daughterofthemark]

[Arianna sits next to her, close enough for her to feel her warmth. Just reminding her that she isn't alone.

She'll be here if she's needed, but she wants to give Yuuri a chance to be strong. You can do it, Rii-san. She believes in you.]

[serrata]

[ She's quiet for a long while, too focused on the screen for anything else.

But then books go flying and would you believe it, Yuuri huffs out a tiny laugh, covering her mouth as she does so. But there's the slightest hint of a smile on her face under her fingers. ]

...She hasn't lost her edge at all.

[daughterofthemark]

[She did a laughter! A good happy laughter!]

Gracious!

[serrata]

Miki-san with her book and Kurumi with her shovel... they would've made quite a pair. I can't believe we never thought of teaming them up back home.

[daughterofthemark]

You did not? I had imagined that the four of you were always together.

[serrata]

We tried to be, when we could. But it wasn't always doable, especially back at school. It's funny -- for how small it was, you'd think we'd be in each other's pockets all the time but we were really only together for meals and heading to bed.

[ Her voice is distant and there's something in it that's a little like nostalgia. She can't believe she's at all nostalgic for any of that but looking back, something about it seems warm and curiously innocent. ]

We'd all have different things to do -- Kurumi was the one who always went on patrol and I'd be the one keeping track of our supplies or keeping the garden going on the roof. And Yuki-chan was... Yuki-chan was doing her best to keep living a fun school life, even with everything that was going on.

[daughterofthemark]

[It seems a little sad to Arianna, if she's being honest, which she is pretty much all the time. She'd been envisioning something like Guild Starlight, where they were essentially always together. But it was a different kind of situation, wasn't it? However superficially similar it might seem.

Ah, yes, Yuki, the one she still only knows by reputation.]

What sort of things did a "fun school life" involve?

[serrata]

... Things like... still going to class and doing her best to learn. Making sure we kept up with club activities. Whenever we were lost and we didn't know how to move forward, Yuki-chan always came up with something, somehow. Even if it was something silly like a test of courage or wanting to go on a field trip. Somehow, no matter what she did she always pointed us in the right direction. Like a light in the dark.

[ ah. that's familiar phrasing, isn't it? ]

[daughterofthemark]

[Sure is!

But... Arianna has other questions on her mind that don't actually relate to whether she's as good of a Yuki as actual Yuki.]

Rii-san, what is a "field trip," precisely?

[serrata]

Oh, hm. Did you not have those back in your world? Well, I suppose if your schools were different, you might not have...

[ She gives a thoughtful little hum, wondering how best to approach the explanation. ]

What was your school like?

[daughterofthemark]

I never attended a school. My education was handled by tutors who came to the palace.

[Yuuri did you forget your siste r was a princess]

[serrata]

[ NOCTIS LUCIS CAELUM WENT TO HIGH SCHOOL AND WORKED AT A SUSHI BAR ]

Ah, so you never would've had to sit in a classroom with other students, would you? Did your tutors ever take you anywhere for your lessons, though? Or were they just in the palace?

[daughterofthemark]

[DON'T TALK TO HER ABOUT LORD NOCTIS HE PROBABLY HAD A FREEZER AND A TOILET

She thinks for a moment.]

On occasion. The astrologers preferred to remain in their observatory, for instance, and it was deemed less disruptive for me to visit there than to call them away.