"Was that in like, chapter 3 or did I just miss some shit when I read through. I really don't think there was a section on...existing on all levels of reality." He frowns as he thinks about it, wondering if he'd sealed the thing first before he cast it, if it would have been fine and easy to erase. He really shouldn't be thinking about next times or what would have worked to begin with though, and he stands back, shoving his hands in his pockets as his head follows Vincent.
"I uh, had a little help from a staff I was given. Gives me a little boost on top of my regular shit, but it's been out of juice all week." Which is also why he's thinking he himself is tied to it as well and what that's going to mean when they get there. He'd been trying not to die the past week, seeing as he hadn't said anything to anyone about what he'd done, but now he's thinking it's just going to be an inevitability to pull the metaphorical plug.
"Can I help? You need me to grab anything? Or like, carry shit so you can-" he pauses, "Wait, seriously? Have you just been chill all week? Man... I really should have said something sooner."
"The book you took has to do purely with the ritual and esoteric aspects, the 'functional' instructions, which I thought you were going to use to explore the system itself on a purely academic level," he says as he starts looking through the shelves for a few things. He pulls one off and opens it up, flipping through until he finds what he needs before closing it again and putting it back. He does this a few more times.
Then he looks up.
"They didn't think to mention it, no doubt, for the same reason most instructional manuals don't mention getting up from your bed and getting dressed in the morning: the assumption being that anyone who would attempt such a ritual working would be fully prepared otherwise."
He picks up one more, but this one he's bringing with him. It's settled under his arm.
"First to the garden upstairs. Then to your room. We'll discuss how you can help in a moment." He looks over at Hanna. "And yes, you should have said something sooner if you're this distressed at the results of your work. Scholarship is best pursued with peer review, no?"
Hanna watches him, trying to keep still, but it really isn't working. He feels like his sense of urgency and Vincent's really isn't on the same level, but he's not going to rush him, he's the one that caused the problem in the first place, and at each little 'jab' at his lack of forethought, his mouth pulls a harsh line, pretty sure he deserved every single one of those.
"I mean, sometimes you just gotta add in the 'caution: contents hot' on the cup so idiots don't get burned." And in this example, he's the idiot.
And while he would think that yes, yes, next time, if there was a next time, which he hoped not, he should have said something sooner, but...peer review? Never even occurred to him. "Oh...I never had anyone to review with me. Not that I didn't think you were like, capable since it's all your books, but... studying has always just been me, myself and I." Even when he got a partner, he hadn't shared much. It just wasn't how he operated. If there was something he needed to know, it was usually said as he was needing to know it, which...in retrospect, probably isn't that helpful.
Like now. "It would probably be more fun that way, though." A pause, "I mean, if you're not like, restricting my access to your library." Which, he was totally expecting and kind of part of the reason why he hadn't said anything until now.
"If you'd done this intentionally, I certainly would have," he says with a small huff and a theatrical flutter of a hand, tossing the idea to the winds. "But as it was instead the spirit of inquiry that led to this situation, I can hardly fault you."
He walks around to grab another book and something from his desk that he shoves into his pocket.
"And in truth, this library was in my private chambers and before that, kept only for the most devout and accomplished among our order." He had enjoyed raiding their stores, like all the forbidden fruit he could ever want plucked at his own time and pace because he held the purse strings and rebuilt that which Dahlia's fanaticism had brought to ruin. "Hardly the sort of place one expects children to stick their fingers in the electrical sockets."
"The spirit of Inquiry really fucked everyone over, so I would say I'm still surprised you're not mad. Not like this is a 'oh we can just buy a new one' sitch after I broke a dish in the sink." And he has no idea what he's going to say once this is fixed. Was he going to say anything at all? Probably.
He swallows a little hard, squeezing his eyes shut as he tries not to think about the consequence as Vincent finishes up gathering his shit, blinking them open when he mentions electrical sockets, "And here I've been telling people I'm not a grand master of anything, and I'm suddenly given access to some high level shit. Don't tell anyone or they'll want magic lessons." He tries for a joke even if his heart isn't in it.
"So, uh...when this shit is over, I wasn't planning on letting anyone know where I got my info from, you can take the book back. Don't want us both getting shit because I fucked up."
"My warden will know," he says breezily enough. He knows what will be required here. And that means, he knows what will happen when he does it and what that will mean.
"You intend to take responsibility for this, then?"
"Hopefully they aren't a prick about it." Because he's not really sure who Vincent's warden is. He obviously hadn't been paying attention to announcements aside from the ones where he kept getting set up with teenagers.
"I mean, even if I could get away with it, I feel like I have to say something." He might be good at telling lies and skirting around the truth, but that's when it doesn't really matter. "Even if no one ever found out, I would know, and that's...that's kind of a lot to have to carry around by myself. I'm not really big on hurting people or putting them through psychological torture."
How lucky for you. He does not say. It doesn't even show on his face. Instead, he nods.
"Nonsense, you're hardly carrying it on your own, now, are you?" he says cheerfully before he sighs and moves to open the door. Oh, he can sense what's out there, like heavy steps on a metal floor. He knows the difference. It's just...
It is what it is. Such is life.
"Say whatever you need to say. And of course, if you care to give confession, you know my hours in the chapel."
That's very clearly a joke but also... sort of not. Sometimes, it's hard to tell with him.
"Uh, I guess so, but again, the psychological torture part is a big no no, and I should fess up in case someone sleuths it out instead. I have a hard enough time convincing people I'm not secretly some kind of murderer or what ever because I got pulled here in the first place, though I guess if I confess some people might not believe it was an accident...Fuck man, why does doing the right thing have to suck so much?"
Hanna follows after him, still a little unsure whether or not it really would be fine if he was walking with him. What was the radius on that anyways? Like, shoulder to shoulder? Or ten feet behind?
"I don't have to like, hold your hand or what ever to make sure I don't get sucked back in to hell do I?"
That phrase: 'why does doing the right thing have to suck so much'. It hits something in him, and a little crackle in the facade finally hits the surface. He pauses for a moment, and it's obvious that he's thinking of something, considering something, but it's not something for the moment. No, some of the haste has started to hit him.
"No, though we may travel through the Otherworld, nothing will give you trouble as long as you are with me. Consider me your faithful shepherd, hmm?"
"That's a relief..." He sucks in a breath, having tried not to think about it, but he doesn't know if David's body would still be down there. The shifting nature of the 'Otherworld' as he called it made it rather unclear.
"My friend helped me get out earlier. I couldn't exactly carry him out when the fuckin' things chasing me weren't going to stop just because he went down. They were pretty singularly focused..." Which was incredibly familiar and terrible and another thing he really didn't want to think about. All that curly red hair really wasn't subtle at all.
"You've seen a lot of people hurt around you, then?" He asks absently as they walk. "Been the reason why people got hurt despite your best intentions..."
The hallway is definitely a part of the Otherworld, but it does seem to be... empty. The sounds are dim.
For a moment Hanna worries that he's not just talking about the past week. It's...always kind of been like that. No matter how hard he tried, ever since the accident, like a fucking curse. The best intentions could kill someone, or try to.
"Something like that...and I can't exactly do much to help either. I have no offense, most of the shit that might help that I do have access to barely works. I don't even have my hammer, like...who takes away a guy's hammer? It's not even that dangerous, just like one of those little dinky ones." Complaining at least distracts him from the guilt, but barely. It's still spooky in here, but it's much better now that he can't hear screaming off in the distance.
"So, what's supposed to happen to the people who do survive the gauntlet of their own sin or what ever? What's God or the Order supposed to do for them?"
Oh, he was talking about in general. He knows how this place works. He'll let Hanna take the question how he wants, however. He's not going to be difficult right now.
He looks over to Hanna at the question, however.
"Do you want my answer or the 'traditional' answer?"
This place was a little too good at telling truths he never wanted to tell. Not wanting to really get into all that, he latches onto his subject change, "well, yours is more important to me. You have your head on straight." Or at least he feels like he does despite...everything.
Sticking around to keep a bunch of religious zealots from summoning this and what ever else is pretty great in his opinion. And if it could be summoned? Why wouldn't you believe in the existence of it? Most people didn't have the luxury of believing in a god they could actually see.
The elevator. He doesn't have any concerns about the safety of it. He hits the button.
"Those beings and powers exist. I believe in them, because I believe the evidence of my own eyes, and I know the power of them for the same reason. My worship is... for the same reason any reasonable person pays taxes. But I don't think there's any great wisdom to be found in pain. Pain is just pain. People do what they must to avoid it. Adding nobility to that suffering is a coping mechanism, a child's need for understanding in a confusing universe."
Hanna had definitely been avoiding the lift, but he trusts Vincent even if he doesn't know him all that well. He has no real reason not to, and really, what choices does he have for anything else right now?
He listens, and can't help but agree. If you could see it, it existed. Most people didn't see what he could, or pretended they didn't, and what good did that do them when they walk straight into danger they refuse to see? He didn't blame them for it, sometimes he didn't want to be in the know, and the moment he had been inducted into the supernatural bad been a turning point away from normal. He didn't want people to suffer like he had, so he tried to prevent it. "Mm. I think that's pretty reasonable. There are better ways to learn than pain, really. Especially if the lesson can kill you. What's the point?"
And when the door opens, Hanna doesn't even wait, slipping right into the small space, as unbothered as he can be with the weight of guilt and exhaustion. He'd already said he'd be fine, and Hanna is nothing if entirely too trusting when not doing so would earn him nothing at all.
He steps in and presses the buttons for the top floor before answering.
"You were asking how close you needed to be to avoid harm. I didn't want you thinking the elevator would just drop out from under you without me. It's not going to happen."
His eyes get wide a moment as he looks at the floor he's standing on, "Oh. Yeah, I guess I wasn't expecting the tower of terror, but maybe I should be more cautious." He laughs nervously before squinting at him when Vincent grins at him, "Okay, so either you're fucking with me for fun, which fair, I deserve it, I have proved I'm an idiot, or you're actually serious."
And in that case, he's going to stand awfully close because falling to his death right about now sounded like not the right course of action. "If I get sucked into a void or what ever I'm grabbing your arm whether you'd help pull me out of not." He returns, his own smile rather pathetic, what with the terrible guilt and the extended magic use taxing his whole everything. Kind of felt like standing on the edge of organ failure as his lungs labored to breathe.
That will earn him probably the first genuine laugh Hanna's heard from him.
"A joke, only. I wouldn't play games with your safety like that. Especially given how important you will be to getting this solved, which, I believe we all want, no?"
The elevator moves and up they're going. Like any normal elevator. Everything is behaving normally for him.
His smile falters a little at that, not that he didn't like making people laugh, but it was that next part. Magic like this shit usually had a cost. It's why he'd forced himself to run after David had died instead of trying to do something, anything to the parent trap that was following him in the Otherworld. He isn't going to pussy foot around the fact that he's pretty sure he's not going to be around until after Nico figures out he's dead. God...poor kid.
"Y-yeah, exactly. It's the end goal we all want and I'm here for it, every step of the way."
He waits until the doors are open and they've stepped out on deck before he looks to Hanna. There's a long, probing look made all the more unsettling by his mismatched eyes, before he lets out a soft huff and shakes his head.
"Of course. You know what will be required, don't you? I was going to wait to tell you but I should have realized: some things are fairly universal."
Hanna steps out, still fairly close as he rubs at one of his arms, nodding slowly.
"I kind of figured, yeah. That's why I came and got you, if it needed more than just the magic being severed, you could help out. You don't have to get your hands dirty though, really. I can...I can do it myself." If he did, then maybe he really could keep Vincent out of it, just say he'd fixed it all, and that'd be the end, he didn't have to get tangled in it.
"As loathe as I am to get my hands dirty," he says with a quick, tight grin at Hanna, and oh, Hanna has no idea how loathe he is to get his hands dirty, "now is not the time for experimentation." Now that the Otherworld has fully manifested, it won't get worse until this is undone. And who knows what else might rear it's ugly head if he lets it keep going?
He shakes his head. No. Heather has not conveniently shown up to do his dirty work again and while he could go get Jacob, he's not sure Hanna would agree as readily to another person in on their little 'clean up' job. And it hadn't exactly gone swimmingly the last time.
"I'll kill you when the time comes. Suicide can interact... strangely with this ritual. As you might expect."
His mouth draws a harsh line, uncomfortable with the idea that he is essentially making him do this. That...that didn't feel great. "I'll owe you big time for this. You need anything, I'm your man. Well, within reason. I wasn't joking when I said I try not to hurt people." This was entirely fucked up and he was to blame and it frustrated him knowing he was right, if Vincent knew how to stop it, messing with the algorithm that worked shouldn't be an option right now.
"I'll give you some tips, I'm...I've got some weak points, make sure it's not so messy. Though if you do get blood on your shirt, Ulla is super great about getting that out of clothes if you ask nicely." He tries for another smile, gently patting his arm, his nice suit definitely worth preserving instead of Hanna's own bloodied sweater, the dried blood he'd been coughing into his arm stiff and scratchy against his inner elbow, "Don't want to ruin your nice duds."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Re: Audio
"I uh, had a little help from a staff I was given. Gives me a little boost on top of my regular shit, but it's been out of juice all week." Which is also why he's thinking he himself is tied to it as well and what that's going to mean when they get there. He'd been trying not to die the past week, seeing as he hadn't said anything to anyone about what he'd done, but now he's thinking it's just going to be an inevitability to pull the metaphorical plug.
"Can I help? You need me to grab anything? Or like, carry shit so you can-" he pauses, "Wait, seriously? Have you just been chill all week? Man... I really should have said something sooner."
Re: Audio
Then he looks up.
"They didn't think to mention it, no doubt, for the same reason most instructional manuals don't mention getting up from your bed and getting dressed in the morning: the assumption being that anyone who would attempt such a ritual working would be fully prepared otherwise."
He picks up one more, but this one he's bringing with him. It's settled under his arm.
"First to the garden upstairs. Then to your room. We'll discuss how you can help in a moment." He looks over at Hanna. "And yes, you should have said something sooner if you're this distressed at the results of your work. Scholarship is best pursued with peer review, no?"
Re: Audio
"I mean, sometimes you just gotta add in the 'caution: contents hot' on the cup so idiots don't get burned." And in this example, he's the idiot.
And while he would think that yes, yes, next time, if there was a next time, which he hoped not, he should have said something sooner, but...peer review? Never even occurred to him. "Oh...I never had anyone to review with me. Not that I didn't think you were like, capable since it's all your books, but... studying has always just been me, myself and I." Even when he got a partner, he hadn't shared much. It just wasn't how he operated. If there was something he needed to know, it was usually said as he was needing to know it, which...in retrospect, probably isn't that helpful.
Like now. "It would probably be more fun that way, though." A pause, "I mean, if you're not like, restricting my access to your library." Which, he was totally expecting and kind of part of the reason why he hadn't said anything until now.
Re: Audio
He walks around to grab another book and something from his desk that he shoves into his pocket.
"And in truth, this library was in my private chambers and before that, kept only for the most devout and accomplished among our order." He had enjoyed raiding their stores, like all the forbidden fruit he could ever want plucked at his own time and pace because he held the purse strings and rebuilt that which Dahlia's fanaticism had brought to ruin. "Hardly the sort of place one expects children to stick their fingers in the electrical sockets."
Re: Audio
He swallows a little hard, squeezing his eyes shut as he tries not to think about the consequence as Vincent finishes up gathering his shit, blinking them open when he mentions electrical sockets, "And here I've been telling people I'm not a grand master of anything, and I'm suddenly given access to some high level shit. Don't tell anyone or they'll want magic lessons." He tries for a joke even if his heart isn't in it.
"So, uh...when this shit is over, I wasn't planning on letting anyone know where I got my info from, you can take the book back. Don't want us both getting shit because I fucked up."
Re: Audio
"You intend to take responsibility for this, then?"
Re: Audio
"I mean, even if I could get away with it, I feel like I have to say something." He might be good at telling lies and skirting around the truth, but that's when it doesn't really matter. "Even if no one ever found out, I would know, and that's...that's kind of a lot to have to carry around by myself. I'm not really big on hurting people or putting them through psychological torture."
Re: Audio
"Nonsense, you're hardly carrying it on your own, now, are you?" he says cheerfully before he sighs and moves to open the door. Oh, he can sense what's out there, like heavy steps on a metal floor. He knows the difference. It's just...
It is what it is. Such is life.
"Say whatever you need to say. And of course, if you care to give confession, you know my hours in the chapel."
That's very clearly a joke but also... sort of not. Sometimes, it's hard to tell with him.
Re: Audio
Hanna follows after him, still a little unsure whether or not it really would be fine if he was walking with him. What was the radius on that anyways? Like, shoulder to shoulder? Or ten feet behind?
"I don't have to like, hold your hand or what ever to make sure I don't get sucked back in to hell do I?"
Re: Audio
"No, though we may travel through the Otherworld, nothing will give you trouble as long as you are with me. Consider me your faithful shepherd, hmm?"
Re: Audio
"My friend helped me get out earlier. I couldn't exactly carry him out when the fuckin' things chasing me weren't going to stop just because he went down. They were pretty singularly focused..." Which was incredibly familiar and terrible and another thing he really didn't want to think about. All that curly red hair really wasn't subtle at all.
Re: Audio
The hallway is definitely a part of the Otherworld, but it does seem to be... empty. The sounds are dim.
Re: Audio
"Something like that...and I can't exactly do much to help either. I have no offense, most of the shit that might help that I do have access to barely works. I don't even have my hammer, like...who takes away a guy's hammer? It's not even that dangerous, just like one of those little dinky ones." Complaining at least distracts him from the guilt, but barely. It's still spooky in here, but it's much better now that he can't hear screaming off in the distance.
"So, what's supposed to happen to the people who do survive the gauntlet of their own sin or what ever? What's God or the Order supposed to do for them?"
Re: Audio
He looks over to Hanna at the question, however.
"Do you want my answer or the 'traditional' answer?"
Re: Audio
Sticking around to keep a bunch of religious zealots from summoning this and what ever else is pretty great in his opinion. And if it could be summoned? Why wouldn't you believe in the existence of it? Most people didn't have the luxury of believing in a god they could actually see.
Re: Audio
The elevator. He doesn't have any concerns about the safety of it. He hits the button.
"Those beings and powers exist. I believe in them, because I believe the evidence of my own eyes, and I know the power of them for the same reason. My worship is... for the same reason any reasonable person pays taxes. But I don't think there's any great wisdom to be found in pain. Pain is just pain. People do what they must to avoid it. Adding nobility to that suffering is a coping mechanism, a child's need for understanding in a confusing universe."
Ding!
"...I'll go in first, if only to reassure you."
Re: Audio
He listens, and can't help but agree. If you could see it, it existed. Most people didn't see what he could, or pretended they didn't, and what good did that do them when they walk straight into danger they refuse to see? He didn't blame them for it, sometimes he didn't want to be in the know, and the moment he had been inducted into the supernatural bad been a turning point away from normal. He didn't want people to suffer like he had, so he tried to prevent it. "Mm. I think that's pretty reasonable. There are better ways to learn than pain, really. Especially if the lesson can kill you. What's the point?"
And when the door opens, Hanna doesn't even wait, slipping right into the small space, as unbothered as he can be with the weight of guilt and exhaustion. He'd already said he'd be fine, and Hanna is nothing if entirely too trusting when not doing so would earn him nothing at all.
"Who said anything about needing reassurance?"
Re: Audio
"You were asking how close you needed to be to avoid harm. I didn't want you thinking the elevator would just drop out from under you without me. It's not going to happen."
Then he turns back with a terrible sort of grin.
"Probably."
He is 100% being an asshole right now.
Re: Audio
And in that case, he's going to stand awfully close because falling to his death right about now sounded like not the right course of action. "If I get sucked into a void or what ever I'm grabbing your arm whether you'd help pull me out of not." He returns, his own smile rather pathetic, what with the terrible guilt and the extended magic use taxing his whole everything. Kind of felt like standing on the edge of organ failure as his lungs labored to breathe.
Re: Audio
"A joke, only. I wouldn't play games with your safety like that. Especially given how important you will be to getting this solved, which, I believe we all want, no?"
The elevator moves and up they're going. Like any normal elevator. Everything is behaving normally for him.
Re: Audio
"Y-yeah, exactly. It's the end goal we all want and I'm here for it, every step of the way."
Re: Audio
"Of course. You know what will be required, don't you? I was going to wait to tell you but I should have realized: some things are fairly universal."
Re: Audio
"I kind of figured, yeah. That's why I came and got you, if it needed more than just the magic being severed, you could help out. You don't have to get your hands dirty though, really. I can...I can do it myself." If he did, then maybe he really could keep Vincent out of it, just say he'd fixed it all, and that'd be the end, he didn't have to get tangled in it.
cw mention of self harm
He shakes his head. No. Heather has not conveniently shown up to do his dirty work again and while he could go get Jacob, he's not sure Hanna would agree as readily to another person in on their little 'clean up' job. And it hadn't exactly gone swimmingly the last time.
"I'll kill you when the time comes. Suicide can interact... strangely with this ritual. As you might expect."
Re: cw mention of self harm
"I'll give you some tips, I'm...I've got some weak points, make sure it's not so messy. Though if you do get blood on your shirt, Ulla is super great about getting that out of clothes if you ask nicely." He tries for another smile, gently patting his arm, his nice suit definitely worth preserving instead of Hanna's own bloodied sweater, the dried blood he'd been coughing into his arm stiff and scratchy against his inner elbow, "Don't want to ruin your nice duds."
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