[PP-F4] Piercing Song in a Blanket of White

[Mari 1]

'Crunch'
    'Crunch'
            'Crunch'


The snow crunched beneath bare feet as a figure so ill dressed for the floor glided across the barren domain. Mari wore a black long sleeved dress that billowed in the frosty winds that danced around her form. She had the <<Survival>> Skill so received no damage, and the cold barely registered with her. If anything, the bitter chill that tore up her body with each careful step was like a slap in the face, waking her up. Reminding her that she was alive.

The last time she had come here it was to remember someone who had departed from this world. Someone Mari considered a former lover. She wanted to play him a soliloquy of sorrow through song, but she had been interrupted. By none other than the man she both loved and mourned. Alkor. He appeared like a silent whisper, back into her life - but the relief Mari felt was replaced with trepidation, worry, then heartbreak. The man she so irrevocably loved - who had held her close to his chest and offered whispers of comfort and love...who had quelled her mind as she struggled to keep her grip on sanity, it was all...fake.

No. Fake was simplifying his actions. Alkor meant no harm in them, but that night, That sullen Christmas Eve - he had told her everything. That it wasn't what he felt and he wasn't sure he was capable of feeling love. His words tore at the woman, more than any knife ever cold. They chilled her more than the frosty snow. Each step Mari took toward the center of the lake felt heavy, burdened. She was trying so hard to deal with this pain. To move on. But...was it so wrong for her to be upset? Was it really wrong for her to to want to cry and shout and hide away till she no longer felt like her chest was bleeding?

Once at the center, Mari lifted the Violin she was carrying. Breathe in. Her heart pounded in her ears, providing her with a steady background rhythm to which she could gently sway to.

Hold.  Her chest burned as it yearned for air.

Exhale. Steam rose from soft pink lips as her eyes closed, shutting away the icey blue irises away from the world.

The soft melody began to play, sounding discordant as it was alone. Without its piano accompaniment. It was all Mari could do to let out her emotions. She couldn't cry, she couldn't scream or lash out. Nor did she have anyone who she could confide in. Instead, her emotions came out in a soft voice - rising in a crescendo of despondent despair.

This was her way of dealing with her heartache.


@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

Trouting through the collapsing snow breaking the treeline with small white flakes Raidou approaches a small patch the same way he always does. Kneeling down with a soft *crunch* in the white powdered blanket surrounding him like a blank canvas. 

Quote

#134429 Failed, who cares

Tearing through the pile yields nothing, Raidou scoffs and begins to pick himself up from the chilled sand around him. Moving on to the next, like a piercing arrow through a soft window pane silence is broken by a stringing melody. Raidou collects himself, his mind becoming fogged with a person from his past "H-Haine...?"

*Crunch*

*Crunch*

*Crunch*

As the footfalls break the perfect coverage with each descending step toward the lake upon which he had once found joy in the company of another hoping to see a long lost friend but as the lake comes to focus nothing but a female with hair of fire that burns its way to sight amongst the solid white scenery. Steps slow until they are no more as Raidou stops to just take in the sound of the symphony that breaks the silence.

@Mari

 

Edited January 15, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

Mari stilled. Bow screeching to a halt as her breath hitched in her throat. Before her stood a long figure. Tall and stark, he was like a blazing fire amidst the glassy terrain. His eyes were hidden behind spectacles which sat beneath a mop of chocolate brown hair. His stance was that of mild shock, or trepidation. Mari couldn't quite pin it. She wasn't even sure how long he had been standing there.

The melody had ended. Once again her chance at letting her emotions go was taken from her, what cruel fate. It was like Aincrad was refusing the redheaded woman her reprieve. "You." Mari finally breathed as she lowered her hands, the violin disappearing in a flash as it was returned to her inventory. "How long?" Mari asked, her breath soft and weightless as she took two then three steps toward the stranger.

"How long?" Mari repeated, with more urgency to her tone. "How long were you standing there for!?" The question broke, as her voice hitched with a pain she had tried so hard to hide from others. She didn't want to have this stranger see her so vulnerable.

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

"I've b-been but a h-here moment..." Raidou remarks the words struggling to flow in an incoherent mess as his creeping fears began to surface. Memories milling in the melting pot behind the films of glass on his nose. Taking every ounce of courage he has, fighting against his own insecurity Raidou stammers fighting his words in gibberish at first before it solidifies to an actual sentence.

"I Haven't...D-dont... Stop p-please"

Raidou finally squeezes the words out in the silence.

Vision's of Blue Hair as it pirouettes across the ice in memory.

A bright smile painted on an angelic face from ear to ear.

The feeling of the wind through his hair as he traced a pattern on the surface of frozen glass.

With a stone lodged in his throat, gritting his teeth and pushing through each letter with everything he has.

"Don't stop."

Looking at Mari with determination as she approached, amber finding sapphire eyes with a struggle as tears begin to etch there way down a cheek red from the cold.

@Mari

Edited January 15, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

Mari took another step toward the stranger; but stopped when his shoulders began to rise and fall in quick succession. His voice, ever so soft began to stutter. He was begging her.  Mari turned her gaze away. Why? Did she come off as that harsh to him? Was it her orange crystal? Was he begging her not to come closer or not to kill him? Did it even matter? It was clear just her mere presence was a bother to him. "I have stopped." Mari replied to his continued stammers filled with a jittering panic.

"It's fine." Mari muttered bitterly. "I'll go. I know I'm not exactly a welcomed presence, far be it for me to ruin your day."

In a single motion Mari equipped her boots, so her feet were no longer red and bare in the snow - then turned on her heel to leave the stranger alone. IT was better this way. Mari wanted to open up to others, and had tried over and over to 'play nice' and make friends, but at best all she had were awkward encounters that were rife with uncertainty and apprehension. Mari hated it, but she really couldn't blame anyone but herself. The world expected her to turn into this nice and carefree person but she just couldn't. Not with everything that happened.

"Don't stop."

His words, now young - and firm - filled with more confidence than earlier made Mari pause in her tracks. She turned to glance over her shoulder at him. "Excuse me?" Her tone was reserved. She was trying to understand what exactly he was asking her. "Don't stop what?" Mari turned to fully face him now. She couldn't quite see his eyes, but his jaw looked like it was clenched - and his cheeks glistened with wetness.

Was he crying?

That's not fair.

She was the one who wanted to cry.

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

Raidou tried his best, holding his ground fighting his own demons but that small glimpse into a better past where this creature that rips away his ability to speak had fallen silent. Standing using every fiber of his strength to do so.

"Don't stop playing...."

The words fell almost aggressively from his tongue like fire, angry at himself for the difficulty. The tears begin to become cold to his face, the flowing had stopped ages ago so why now. Finding them laden on his skin, with a tap of the moisture Raidou looked to the tips of his fingers then back to the beacon of the past standing in a field of a white.

"It may seem selfish to you, and I don't know what it is to you..." as a fire begin to light within his stomach in response to help the words leave his mouth.

Raidou collapses as his strength begins to fail him from locking upright so long. Arms loose to his sides, dangling into the powder around him.

"Please just play..." Raidou pleads, looking to her as tears that couldn't flow have broken through a shield.

@Mari

Edited January 15, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

Why was she always thrust into this position? Somehow....amidst the vitterol and apprehension, she'd come across players like this. People who so desperately sought something they could cling onto. Be it a warm whisper, a memory, or in this man's case...a song. He was right. "It's ridiculously selfish." She said in an even tone.

Mari sighed as her footsteps bought her to where he sat entrenched in the snow. Reaching out slowly, so he knew she meant no harm Mari  rested a hand on his head. Her fingernails dug gently into his scalp as she ruffled his hair. "Okay." And with that short, simple word Mari removed her hand from his head and turned away from him.

She'd give him what he wanted.

With a flurry of her fingertips and the flash of the Cardinal system the violin was back in her hands, and this time, Mari began to play a different tune. Unlike the previous tune, this one had no words - after all, he didn't ask her to sing only to play.  It hurt her to play this again, but Mari didn't show it. She didn't show that she had wanted to play this with a man who may as well not have existed. The violin's tune was soft, lilting - but its melody was warm. Loving. Kind.  If you closed your eyes you could easily picture yourself in front of a fireplace beside a loved one - hands entwined in one another after a lifetime of memories. That was what this song was meant to be. A warm concord of love.

Mari lowered her violin as the melody finished. She wanted to bite back at him, ask him if he was satisfied. But instead, she just stared down at him with listless blue eyes in silence.

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

Raidou sat within the cold, exhausted pushing himself off every word from his lips. Each outward breath illuminated by a small puff of smoke

"It's Ridiculously selfish" the words cut into him, a dull knife pulled across the skin as they rung through his mind.

it's selfish I know Raidou thinks silently expecting her to leave him, powerless to the tones that broke the walls so carefully structured.

A hand, a touch comes to him

A feeling he hadn't felt in what seemed like a lifetime, dilating pupils but he keeps still NO DAMN IT, Stop! Raidou wages a war in his mind before a soft word breaks the silence.

 

"Okay"

 

The song was soft, drawing heat in a place with none. Raidou finds himself carried and pulled while she plays as in a pale reflection of the past he began to circle her on the ice.

*shuk* *shuk* *shuk*

Heels of boots begin to scratch the surface of the ice in rapid succession in a swaying rhythm following the tones. A spin and descent with the song's end nothing but his heavy breathing breaking the quiet snowfall. Raidou gaze meets Mari's "I-im s-sorry for being so selfish..." out of breath having the past for just one more minute.

@Mari

Edited January 15, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

Mari was only faintly aware of what he was doing, shimmers of red blurs sweeping past her vision as though he were flying amidst a field of white. Somewhere between crying on the floor, and when she had started playing, he had picked himself up and started to skate across the lake. Mari wasn't sure if she was impressed or annoyed. Did he just want her to play so he had something to skate to? Was she just some performing monkey?

Mari grit her teeth at the thought, but quickly tried to quell the turbulent emotions within her. No... no that wasn't right. He was crying, he was shaking. Whatever ailed him was more than just a jovial gait across a frozen lake. He finally stopped, and apologized for his selfish behavior.

"It's fine." Came her response, it didn't hold any of the ire her previous interactions with him had. She sounded...tired. "You got your respite, right?" Mari asked. "At least you have that. Cherish it."

It'd be better if she left now, right? Before he figured out who she was, before there was any more animosity between them. "I should leave you be now. I don't want to bother you."

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

"It's fine." the words danced between his ears, the interaction preying on him like wolves

but It happened, really happened

"Cherish it." Raidou looks to her a moment attempting to do just that acknowledge what Mari had done for him.

"I should leave you be now. I don't want to bother you."

Flame breaks out in his chest.

No you need to do this right

Thank her

Thank her

Thank her!

"y-your name..." Raidou stammered out struggling still but he wished to thank the maiden for the deed she had done despite if she had understood the gravity of it. Taking a small step forward with a light glide, the only real balance he had was while skating due to his strange walking patterns. "Don't l-leave just y-yet your..." Raidou manages to get out before his balance fails and he becomes one with the frost, grinding across the surface face-first he slides past Mari a few feet. Rolling over to he looked at her the chilling lake at his back and peered at her and for the first time in a while....

He laughed

@Mari

Edited January 15, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

Mari flinched when he had tried to ask for her name. She wanted to avoid this. She didn't want him to know who she was. Why couldn't she just have helped him with a bittersweet melody and move on? This wasn't fair.

But...

Since when had life ever been fair for the orange haired woman. Mari slowly turned around to meet his gaze, and it was then - she finally managed to catch a glimpse of his eyes. It was just the right angle, in just the right light - that allowed her to see clearly without the taint of reflection. Eyes like honey. The colour of a twilit sky. It was her favorite colour, although his eyes were no match for the one who had torn her heart asunder. They still tugged at her emotions, playing with the frayed strings of her emotions.

Mari opened her mouth to say her name but stopped as he stumbled then fell forward. He rolled over onto his back and started to laugh. The action seemed to break through the dreary veneer of their conversation and Mari couldn't help but have her lip quirk up in amusement at the accidental antic. Laughter was meant to be contagious after all.

Mari walked over to where he lay, and stood over him. "I'm Mari." She said. "Just Mari." As she reached out to help him stand. "You are?"

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

A flinch at the query of her name, the girl seemed reluctant to share it with him and Raidou noticed the small subtly as it shot through her body.

Raidou began to speculate from multiple angles.

Maybe she doesn't want to tell me, I am a little weird

Does she have issues similar to mine?

Did I offend her, I must apologize if I have...

Deposited prone on the slab of sleet peering at small slivers of ivory galavanting from the sky Raidou's face begins to lose its grin as false logic screeches tearing it away. The backdrop of billowing grey above becomes a face looking down at him.

"I'm Mari." the name meant everything to him, the contradictory reflections fall silent giving him back control of his thoughts. "Just Mari."

"r-Raidou..." replied with a muttered tone and an attempt at reaching for her grasp, his hand becomes unstable and he quarrels with unowned doubt. the man's face begins to reflect his trouble. Inch by inch, the quivering magnifies until his appendage finally reaches hers and it stops as if It had never existed...

@Mari

Edited January 16, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

The man's smile fell, as his eyes drifted listlessly away from her to stare at some unseen force around them. As though they were lost in some deep story, his mind doubting and straying from the present. They only refocused back on her as she had said his name. He replied with his own name, and it somehow...seemed familiar - but Mari couldn't pick where, how, or why.

He reached out to her with a shaking hand, and she wondered if he was scared of her. It wouldn't be surprising. Mari closed her eyes and was ready to pull away from him, to leave him to his own devices, and to leave her to her lonesome folly. But before she could retreat further his hand firmly grasped hers. The shivers that wracked his body had disappeared. As though they had never existed. 

"Why do you do that?" Mari asked as she pulled him to his feet. "You're shaking like a leaf, are you afraid?"

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

"Why do you do that?" The words break the silence and Raidou remains quiet.

"It-t wasn't on p-purpose" Raidou remarked with a chuckle scratching his scalp with a free hand "T-thanks..."

She must think you a fool

Why do I always do this...

You should just stay away and make this easier on yourself

Rising to his feet, Mari's hand in his Raidou looks down for just a moment and he begins to reel from the battle once again.

I did it

Warm...

The hand of another

Can I do this

Its really happening

A snap back to clarity with echoing words "Your shaking like a leaf, you afraid."

"I-its k-kind of f-fear, but n-not in the sense you'd think." Raidou started the words faded before they began to gain ground and become firm "People have never been my strong suit, a cruel world has robbed me of the ability to speak freely. Even now, I have to clash with myself for each word, but what kind of person would I be." Raidou's face contorts and he turns his heads closing his eyes and turning back to her with a glare "If I didn't thank you for what you've done for me, m-might I ask the p-pain from t-that song d-does it f-find its home in you?"

@Mari

Edited January 16, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

His hand lingered within hers, and her palm tingled with the soft warmth that leaked in from his hands. Was he just going to stand there and hold fast to her hand? Mari pulled her hand away from his. Raidou. He struggled with basic communication, it reminded her of Alkor. But where Alkor was strong and steadfast, and cold in his approach Raidou was...meek, and nervous - every time he spoke it seemed like it was a battle.

"If you ask me, it sounds like you're fighting yourself too much. Just do or say what you feel like, and stop second guessing sh*t."

Her words were 100% hypocritical, but he didn't need to know that.  He was suffering in his own little world and she wasn't  going to lump her crap onto someone else who could barely shoulder his own. He told her it was fear, but not in the sense she would think, Mari was tempted to snap at him tell him he didn't f**king know what she was thinking but again, she had to real herself in. This is why she was so very much disliked. "If the world is being cruel to you, maybe you should be cruel back." Her words were low, as though she spoke from experience. "The world isn't kind, nor is it fair. So why should you care about it?  This isn't a fairyland where our failings are forgiven. It's cold harsh reality."

His next words took her aback, literally. Mari took one step back and wrapped her arms around herself. "Does it really matter where it lies?" Her eyes shifted away from his amber gaze. "We all have our demons, Raidou. It doesn't matter where it came from."

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

"s-Second-guessing, it's n-not something I-I can c-control... I t-try I'm sure you can see."

you've done it now

leave her alone

but I can't I have to know

Raidou heard the words as they flowed through the air "If the world is being cruel to you, maybe you should be cruel back."

The world is cruel, you have seen it first hand

The world is cruel

is cruel

"The world isn't kind, nor is it fair." Raidou paused with each word from her, his shoulders slinking a bit as he began to recede and weaken.

Kind...

Is it fair?

"Once upon a t-time, I would h-have agreed with you...b-but if the world was so cruel or so unfair you wouldn't have continued the song."

Raidou's eyes, like fire with a glare he stared back to her finding conviction. "Mari please. It does..."

"It does, allow me the ability to be selfish one more time, where does that song you play lay to rest." Raidou stated with steadfast words, assailing against his torment. Reaching out with a glove with no fingers, the black grip outstretched one more time toward her.

@Mari

[Mari 1]

No, no she couldn't see. He just stammered more as he tried to work his way around things. Social Anxiety. That's what it looked like he had. Mari bit her lip, she really really couldn't hate him or belittle him for that. It was a legitimate condition, and being trapped in a game where you were forced to be social...it must be hell for him.

that must have been hell for Alkor too...

Mari shut her eyes and took another deep breath. He tried to tell her the world wasn't cruel or unfair, all because she played him a song on the violin. "Tch." Mari turned her head away, refusing to look at him. The hell did he know. He didn't have to deal with everything she once did. He didn't have his best friend try to murder him. He didn't fall in love with someone only to have them die - them miraculously reappear and tell him that those moments weren't exactly real.  He didn't have to watch children fight and bicker then murder each other. 

"One small act does not speak for the world." Mari said finally as she looked up at him only to take another step back. The hell was he asking? Why was he so close now? She could see the brilliance in his burning gaze. "The f**k are you talking about?" Mari snapped at him. She didn't exactly understand his words, but she could take a wild stab in the dark. "You have no right to know what the f**k I feel or where it comes from."  Her voice broke with a warbled pain, heartache. Sorrow. Lonliness. Things she'd never fully admit to, things she was never really allowed to feel.

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

"One small act does not speak for the world." Raidou begins to grit his teeth. The ice unstable under his feet he shifts and balances sliding his feet apart and anchoring like as if he were wielding a blade to keep himself stable. Latched to the surface a piercing glare in her direction hoping to keep her from leaving with a roar of accounts extrude from his body like a toxin "But a small act can change one's world." Losing his balance for a moment his training being absent but sliding his feet again underneath him.

"You have no right to know what the f**k I feel or where it comes from." The rebuke comes out aggressive and hostile and though Raidou maybe misunderstanding the hostility he's familiar with this door slamming shut, he's done it himself to others before. "I know I have no right, I know I'm selfish and weak and walking on thin ice but a debt lies unpaid." Small slivers of frost parading through the air around him as he struggles to keep himself up.

Continuing to try and stop her, his thoughts raze through options:

Approaching her makes her backlash

Give her distance and I'll a piece of S*** when she gets away.

Don't stammer, don't F*** stammer hold strong.

Words begin to fall from Raidou lips in emulation as just an attempt to reach out. "Life, but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. If the symphony of pain from silver strings finds its hearth in you, I understand pain although it may not the one you carry. Let me know what carries the tone..."

@Mari

Edited January 16, 2020 by Raidou

[Mari 1]

He stood tall and strong, albeit a tad slippery from the ice beneath his feet. Why the hell didn't he step onto the snow? thick brows furrowed into a glare. Yeh. That's the look she was used to seeing from others. It didn't take long for him to switch from a sniveling stuttering man curled up into the snow to a predator circling his prey with fancy words. Mari wasn't having any of it. "Well, I hope it changed your world then."  She said in response to his simple saying. It sure as hell seemed to change his attitude.  "There is no debt. Get over it." The last thing she needed was someone feeling indebted to her for doing little to nothing.

Raidou slipped slightly then righted himself, rolling his shoulders back to stand tall. Chin angled down to her. He then....started talking in words that didn't make a lot of sense to the woman, was he reciting poetry? Or some emo-core lyrics from a song she wouldn't know.

"Dude I don't need some poetic or lyrical bullsh*t." Mari muttered. "Seriously. Whatever is going on in...." Mari gestured to his head by circling it with her finger. "In there - I don't need to be a part of it. You don't want me to be a part of it."

Mari turned to leave, "I'll talk if you use actual English."

And the last thing she needed? Was allowing herself to get too close to others again. Not when each and every time it ended horribly.

@Raidou

[Raidou 1]

"There is no debt. Get over it."

The sound punched through reticence, an echo refracted by the surrounding trees.

Leave her alone

You don't owe anyone anything

yes...I do... what would she think of me if I didn't...

"Dude I don't need some poetic or lyrical bullsh*t." the words lashed him with a familiar sting but a determination matched each blow keeping it flowing. "It's j-just something I d-do when I have trouble s-speaking." Raidou says with an apology as his shoulders began to slink.

English

You can do this

Do it...

"I'll talk if you use actual English."

Straightening up and keeping the ball rolling, trying to alter the trajectory Raidou looks to her again. "Agreed then talk to me Mari... and I will do my best to listen, your pain is all too familiar to me. It may not be the same pain and we may never meet again but that melody you were playing reflects your need to release it." Removing the sheath from his back and placing the Black star on the ice, it cracks just a bit under the weight despite its thickness. "I don't want to seem threatening to you. Talk to me..."

Taking a step toward her now defenseless he begins to shuffle on the frost like a rabbit having lost a lot of his balance.

@Mari