Epilogue

[lesmodsalouette]

EPILOGUE

Your stopped time has restarted. Whether you were in the grassy field or fighting for your life on the castle grounds, you'll suddenly find yourself in an untouched area of the gardens. Ish is back, and so are the items, and the dead.

You return to Chateau Ambregris with the certain knowledge that come Monday, you will greet a new week, in a home of your own choosing. No longer will the chime of the clocks hunt you down, no longer will the oppressive scent of roses haunt your senses, no longer will you be forced to watch the death of those you've come to love and hate.

Parting is such a bittersweet sorrow, isn't it?

Make merry one last time, in this castle of illusions. Ironically, your memories of this stolen time that never existed are the one thing that will truly remain to you.

END NOTES

🔮 All dead are revived as tsukumogami! Congrats on your immortality(?)
🔮 Any other contracts made with Ish will be honored
🔮 Characters may choose to leave for any world they desire.
🔮 Time has not passed while you were stuck in this loop!
🔮 There will be no cross-dimensional world travel, except for on Samhain (Witches New Year October 31st/November 1st). On these dates, Ish will enable everyone to visit each other's world freely.
🔮 Universal Communication will be possible, courtesy of Manba and Ish. Everyone who wants one will be given a small fox that can communicate with other foxes through voice and video; the foxes can talk and are fairly simple creatures, enjoy them and give them fried tofu once in a while.
🔮 Powers are on for the finale, but Ish will step in and yeet anyone who gets too out of hand back to their homeworld, so play nice! (or relatively nice. )

[OOC: Welcome to your epilogue! The timeloop is ended, the evil has been defeated, and you have some time to catch your breath in the castle before the rest of your life begins! ]

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[antemeridian]

I have. Whether I intended to or not, I certainly have. [ returned evenly, with no hesitation. she won't lie to him; she dislikes mistruths so, after all, after the incubator. ] The fact that you hurt someone is not why I am asking what I am. What I am trying to understand is how you chose who you did.

You said you chose Sariel and G'raha Tia because they were dear to you, and you wanted to learn how to bear your grief. But you have also said, on multiple occasions, that you cared for us. Why them, then, and not any of us? Should I be concerned for the others, should you ever find yourself needing to renew the lesson?

[ not for herself, of course. that doesn't even rate. ]

[coldseep]

Thank you. I appreciate it.

( Genuinely.

His head rights itself as he seems to settle into a more contemplative posture. )

To put it crassly, it's about picking favorites.

( It's not his favorite term to use, but, dressed down... )

Say you stand between two people - this "her" you've made a promise to, and a friend you've made today. I think you would pick her, right?

( It's not like he knows For Sure, but one does not spend over a decade on a promise without gaining a little bit of priority. Especially from what he understands of timeloops - from Homura's explanation and otherwise. )

I could not choose. Were I in your position, between that "her" and a friend I've only just made, I would fail her every time. Yet, I didn't even have the strength or resolve to pick my friend, too. I have failed, every single time. I may as well have been the one to kill them, you know?

( His heart betrays them both.

Though his expression is hard to read, dragons being short on the same expressive muscles as humans, his tone seems to twinge with some pain. The loss is still great, regardless of his exercise. )

... So I'm learning to choose. That's all. ( He designated Primrose as his "her," in this situation. ) Primrose won't have cause to fear me. You shouldn't have things to protect from me.

( Though they can suspect him if they want to. He's made peace with that. )

[antemeridian]

Is that so?

[ 'shouldn't have'. not a certainty, is it?

she sighs, settling back into some semblance of her usual posture. her outfit might be sketched out in crisp lines, sharp greys, blacks, and whites, but perhaps it's not so different from a school uniform after all. ]

I suppose my suggestion that you should have chosen me is pointless, then. It would have been cleaner. Fewer would have mourned.

[ Primrose might not have forgiven the betrayal, but they already don't. ]

But perhaps the ... clean break, from many in the castle was the point.

[coldseep]

( Hwylryn makes a negative mm-mm sound. )

Of all those I care for, those who don't play well with others are dearest to my heart. My twin, my love . . . They were a lot like you. The only one to mourn them was me.

( So there was no way he could have chosen her - never mind anyone from Primrose. Even then, though: )

The purpose wasn't to break off from anyone, and it wasn't to make myself look better. If I wanted to do those things, I could have.

( If he wanted to kill someone he liked few would get angry with him over, he'd probably have killed Chara or Angelo. That wasn't the point. )

I did what I needed to force progress within me, because it seemed like I needed to try. It wasn't haphazard.

( He turns his gaze toward the sky, the air about him seeming to resign to the fact that there might not be anything he can say to make some sense to her. )

... But it's okay if you don't understand.

( He sounds a little sad about it, but he's long since made himself face the fact that what he'd do would isolate him from many. )

[antemeridian]

I thought the point was that you would mourn regardless.

And, rather than make yourself look better, I thought the opposite: that you might try to make yourself look worse, so that you might have fewer regrets to leave behind when you choose a certain handful over the rest.

[ fewer ties to split him every which way, when a number of them decide to sever their own ends first in the wake of what happened. that is logic that makes sense to Homura, roundabout as it is. ]

You're right, though. I don't believe I understand. To me it seems arbitrary. You liked them as much as you did any of us, I'm sure. And we have all known each other for the same amount of time. So how you somehow came to decide we were more important, that we were the ones you didn't want to lose, to grieve ... I can't follow it.

[ what does it mean, to become so important or dear to someone so quickly? if she can't understand the reasons for it, then it becomes that much more difficult to believe in how secure that importance may be.

the ocean and skies are tempestuous things, after all. ]

Just like how I won't know what happens if you ever have a reason to choose between Ish, Junior, and the rest of us.

[ she has a guess. one of two. but in the end guessing isn't knowing. ]

[coldseep]

( "That you might try to make yourself look worse, so that you might have fewer regrets to leave behind when you choose a certain handful over the rest."—

It's hard to read his expression, so instead Homura will have to make do with the laugh that seems to escape his maw - not laughing at her, but just at the idea of it. )

I'd have regrets regardless, but that would only make it worse. I don't like hurting the people I love.

( Doing it genuinely - explaining his intentions and motives truthfully - had already done enough harm. Now, imagine making it worse!

That's not a clean cut at all, to Hwylryn. That's a jagged wound - an arm ripped straight off.

As for her final sentiment, he smiles softly: )

... I'd like if that didn't have to happen.

( He thinks they both know the answer, so he isn't keen to say it. )

But I'd also like it if you never had to choose between your promised love and Primrose.

( Because he knows what Homura will choose. They are equal, in this way. )

I've known you all the same amount of time, but the paths of each connection is different.

( In other words - he does grow genuinely attached quickly, but how well he bonded with each person really depended on the person. )

... I think... for someone who lost the means to form these relationships within your home, it probably sounds strange to you. ( Homura, who views people in her timeloops as cogs - routines - simply obstacles and tools to work in her mission. ) And even then, I fall in love faster than most. With the people, the land, the stories...

To you, it's arbitrary. But, to me, it's something I've always been willing to die for. Maybe we're inverses, in this way.

( Homura, who loves one above all - and Hwylryn, who loves everyone before himself. )

But I thank you from the bottom of my heart for coming to care for Primrose, despite it all.

( Whether or not Homura excludes Hwylryn from that category now. )

[antemeridian]

You speak as if I would have gone out of my way to deny aid, or even general niceties, simply because I do not have the liberty of caring. I am not...

[ she has grown cold. she is distant and mechanical, all rote repetition and brisk, aloof mannerisms. over time, hers has grown to be a very efficient existence, all the excess carved away.

('you are very kind,' sariel will say.)

she is not needlessly cruel, is what little truth she will allow from that statement. (it's kind of sariel to think.) ]

... I haven't been human for a long time now, for me. [ but to him, it's more or less just an instant. ] Even so ... perhaps there's just something in us that's too greedy for those connections when they're offered, seemingly without conditions.

I do not know that I trust all of you. I do not need to trust you to be able to exist with and around you.

[ miki sayaka, tomoe mami, sakura kyoko. in the end, she's not so good at cutting people off, is she? ]

[coldseep]

( Homura's answer is met with faint surprise - perhaps because, in his heart, he had set her close to the likes of Gwawlyn and Balthazar: aloof, and apart from her own feelings. He had done a disservice to her, then - perhaps worse than divorcing her from some of the trust she may have had in him.

Though he has learned very much in his time spent fashioning himself as Gwawlyn's inverse, and much more in his time spent in Western's social cavorting, he's still a simple creature, in the end; still touched by the North, despite himself. )

... I can't think of much that'd make me happier.

( And it's true. Is there much greater privilege than being allowed the company of someone whose trust you've mistreated?

He dips his head a little lower, his length bunching up and bending to accommodate, meeting her eyes - in fact, maybe he's almost a little lower, just about looking up. )

I've always had people around me, but I've always felt so lonely. I think it's in the nature of feeling, to want to reach out. ( In the nature of having a heart. Ah, they'd had a conversation like this, hadn't they... And it makes him happy, that he and Homura share this flaw. ) ... Is it okay if I still call you my friend?

( What Homura calls them, he allows her judgment. But he'd like this indiscretion, if she doesn't mind it. )

[antemeridian]

[ How strange, to almost be looking down at a being so much bigger and greater than her. ]

Alone in a crowd. Surrounded by others, but none who can meet you halfway, much less understand.

Despite yourself, you are a very solitary creature, aren't you?

[ Frozen by the inability to choose between each and every new person he meets and grows attached to, and thus loses them all in time. How lucky for her that she'd learned how to trample over her own heart as efficiently as she does anyone else's. ]

... You may call me what you will. Do not expect me to reciprocate. [ ... ] It is not personal, that. I call few enough people friend as it is.