Are they in love with nothing? Did Shepard love the LV19 Chara that tried to kill her? What does anyone even see in... whatever they are? They've never been that great at recognizing any redeeming qualities within themself whatsoever, even at the best of times. Look at all the trouble they've been pouring out onto Frisk's shoulders! They're not that great at recognizing any qualities within themself. Everything's still mired in a white haze, obscuring the true shape of things, muddling things with its endless static.
It's time to sit up again. Lying on the ground in a public space, too, is childish petulance. They have no excuse to not act appropriately, not when Frisk is...
They ask Chara a question.
A cruel question to ask when neither of them is capable of anything but the raw truth, that one.
They bite the inside of their cheek. They can feel an answer in the pit of their stomach. Can't be sure whether it's the objectively right answer, or the objectively wrong one - the one that will just hurt Frisk, will just feed back into that poisonous idea that they had to vanish so a better Frisk could come take their place. Can't assume they'd have the luxury of an "I don't know what I think," given how rarely they land on that particular answer. Can't dodge a straight answer like Frisk can, but then... they were never the one that was best at dodging, right?
Silence is starting to burn. They'd rather burn than risk a truth that might hurt Frisk, but for all their determination, can they just ignore the iron band branding itself into their throat forever? Chara bites their lip. Chara ducks their head, hides behind the veil of their bangs. Just... they just have to reach for a truth that they can say. Try to move laterally.
"I," they begin, delicate, careful, deliberate, "was beginning to buy into the idea that things were different here." True. Toeing a line, but still not dangerous. They respond to the guidance that the world places before them. They always have. External forces are what define Chara - literally, ha ha! Name the fallen human!
"I... wanted to get better." Also true. What makes the idea of being doomed so scary? Hope. Lack of resignation. Even if they hadn't always known how to go about it or really always tried their utmost or completely believed it possible, they'd wanted it. A Chara who's allowed to admit they can taste chocolate. A clock that begins to move again. A Frisk and Asriel who can grow up happy, can move beyond this aching, unknit wound. A Chara who, greedily, starts wanting to be more than a cautionary tale, a sword of Damocles, a Jacob Marley. Someone who's certain that being caught yearning for things outside their role is weakness, but then actually lets themself start pining for stability, identity, the luxury of being certain they belong somewhere.
Always were a rank hypocrite at their core, huh?
"I think I still want to," they add, trying to keep pushing their answer along this tangent, away from the question. Their voice wavers, and that invisible band of iron clamps harder. Wonderland, perhaps, knows what they're trying to do.
Try again.
"You were never the problem. The truth would have made itself known eventually, one way or another. Not like I can - we can't really be positive what I would be doing right now, anyway! Any answer I give will just be baseless speculation." There! Found it! Took longer than they should have, blabbered out an utterly unnecessary number of words reaching for it, but it's a safe, solid truth. "We can't reset, so we don't know what we'd be doing if we'd tried things differently!"
no subject
It's time to sit up again. Lying on the ground in a public space, too, is childish petulance. They have no excuse to not act appropriately, not when Frisk is...
They ask Chara a question.
A cruel question to ask when neither of them is capable of anything but the raw truth, that one.
They bite the inside of their cheek. They can feel an answer in the pit of their stomach. Can't be sure whether it's the objectively right answer, or the objectively wrong one - the one that will just hurt Frisk, will just feed back into that poisonous idea that they had to vanish so a better Frisk could come take their place. Can't assume they'd have the luxury of an "I don't know what I think," given how rarely they land on that particular answer. Can't dodge a straight answer like Frisk can, but then... they were never the one that was best at dodging, right?
Silence is starting to burn. They'd rather burn than risk a truth that might hurt Frisk, but for all their determination, can they just ignore the iron band branding itself into their throat forever? Chara bites their lip. Chara ducks their head, hides behind the veil of their bangs. Just... they just have to reach for a truth that they can say. Try to move laterally.
"I," they begin, delicate, careful, deliberate, "was beginning to buy into the idea that things were different here." True. Toeing a line, but still not dangerous. They respond to the guidance that the world places before them. They always have. External forces are what define Chara - literally, ha ha! Name the fallen human!
"I... wanted to get better." Also true. What makes the idea of being doomed so scary? Hope. Lack of resignation. Even if they hadn't always known how to go about it or really always tried their utmost or completely believed it possible, they'd wanted it. A Chara who's allowed to admit they can taste chocolate. A clock that begins to move again. A Frisk and Asriel who can grow up happy, can move beyond this aching, unknit wound. A Chara who, greedily, starts wanting to be more than a cautionary tale, a sword of Damocles, a Jacob Marley. Someone who's certain that being caught yearning for things outside their role is weakness, but then actually lets themself start pining for stability, identity, the luxury of being certain they belong somewhere.
Always were a rank hypocrite at their core, huh?
"I think I still want to," they add, trying to keep pushing their answer along this tangent, away from the question. Their voice wavers, and that invisible band of iron clamps harder. Wonderland, perhaps, knows what they're trying to do.
Try again.
"You were never the problem. The truth would have made itself known eventually, one way or another. Not like I can - we can't really be positive what I would be doing right now, anyway! Any answer I give will just be baseless speculation." There! Found it! Took longer than they should have, blabbered out an utterly unnecessary number of words reaching for it, but it's a safe, solid truth. "We can't reset, so we don't know what we'd be doing if we'd tried things differently!"