Rivers of Sadness and Mutual Need

[Zetsu]

"Mm. Noble, I guess."

Why the 'I guess'? Not letting the game define who you are is a noble enough sentiment, and even if it isn't it's not like Asuka was here to assess that.

"I'd personally like to bleed all over my artwork when I die. Not that I'll be drawing, of course. No sense in making the world uglier than it already is. But if I were drawing, and I were dying...I dunno. Silly performance artsy stuff aside, I kinda like the kind of message that sends. It's like, your art's who you are, right? It's how you express who you are, it's how you show what you find meaningful, how you create meaning, et cetera et cetera. And then the whole thing gets ruined and covered up by blood, because the terrorists had to drown out your meaning with their stupid narrative of violence and struggle for survival. Because they find the idea of kids killing each other to be very very meaningful, or something. Of course, now that I've said that on the record you won't actually have to do it I guess. Message has already been sent."

"Really, the main point of this is so that when you die and don't bleed all over your stuff, it symbolizes how you can still triumph over the terrorists' narrative about you. Or something like that? I dunno. That there ever was a main point to the stuff I said was a retcon on my part."

[dmboogie]

"This isn't about them!"

Asuka's philosophizing made sense and it even had a certain beauty to it, but it was wrong. Even though nothing good had come yet from Cass getting passionate, from having ideas that needed to be let out into the world before their skin couldn't contain them any longer, they couldn't sit still. Just one more friend to shout away.

"I'm doing this because I want to- because, because I need to and they don't get any fucking credit for anything I make! I'm not trying to defy them, I'm not even going to fucking acknowledge them! If the world was gonna end in a fire or a meteor or a flood I'd be doing the same thing, because I'd rather be fucking dead than not able to do art! And it's my art, okay? It deserves - I deserve more than to just exist to be an overly-elaborate middle finger. There isn't anything beautiful about that!"

Deep breaths. Deep breaths, Cass. None of this is her fault.

[Zetsu]

...

Fuck, don't just sit there staring. Say something, do something, don't sit there paralyzed and panicking because you don't know what to do, because Cass was right and needed to be apologized to, but all you can do is sit here and tell yourself the things you need to do without actually doing them and then calling yourself out for doing that and still not doing it and fuck she's looping and going in circles here, isn't she. Yes, she is, and she needs to break out of it, doesn't she, but she can't put together anything that sounds like an adequate response while she's thinking about how she can't break out of the she can't put together an adequate response to the thing, yes, the thing she's responding to, because that's what a response is, and she, she's responding to, she's, fuck, just, just...shut up, brain.

Something. Anything. Stall if you need to. Just don't become so preoccupied with what you say when you stall that you can't come up with actual content.

"I...so. Um, shit. Okay. Gimme a sec, I'm still working from within the mindset of giving middle fingers. Funny enough, what you're saying you're gonna do is a bigger middle finger to them than pretty much anything else you could've done, so yeah. So. Um. I think I wanna...I think...I'll tell you..."

Unbidden, tears started welling up in Asuka's eyes, and she didn't entirely know why. Or maybe she did, but let's not think about that. Let's savor the thought she's letting reverberate around inside her head:

Fucking finally.

It wasn't as meaningful as she'd thought it would be--sudden, unexpected things just can't have that kind of gravitas--but if she'd known and thought about it beforehand, she'd have tried to quantify it, she'd have tried too hard to enjoy it, and then it'd have been buried under all the clutter.

What was 'it'? What was the nebulous 'it' that was making Asuka feel warm and cozy and searing icy shocking something and

Shh. Don't think. Don't think about it. Don't think. Feel. Histrionic to the point of meaninglessness, but even that can't snap Asuka out of it, she thinks.

"Fuck, it's alright. Nothing you should feel bad about, you didn't upset me or anything, it's just...yeah. I'm..."

Asuka started laughing, her body heaving with sobs and laughter, and, seriously, what the fuck?

"Let's, let's just...talk about shit. Random shit, personal shit and whatnot. Story time, et cetera. Fuck, I've wanted to do something like this for so long. That's what I...we...oh, I'm here for, right?"

[dmboogie]

Congratulations, Cass; you managed to raise your voice a little bit about something you cared about without bursting into tears. Of course, that selfish solace didn't matter one bit, since Asuka was crying instead. Stupid. Callous. Her reassurance of blamelessness didn't carry much conviction when it was delivered side by side with her sobs. It looked like she needed a hug, or half-believable reassurance, or anything, really; but from the moment they had met here there had been a strange disconnect between the two of them, a feeling of not being on the same page; and though it may have only been a symptom of Cass's continued isolation, it still brought with it enough doubt to leave them silent in their chair as Asuka weakly, bravely tried to continue the conversation.

"I... I can't think of anything to say," Cass said, idly spinning their pencil in their hand; gaze locked to the motion instead of looking at Asuka. "At least not anything worth saying out loud."

"It's like- everything that comes to mind is just... depressing shit. Like, the longer I've been alive here, the less and less I've been expecting to ever talk to another person again, I mean like, really talk; and even now that you're here, it's just..." They sighed. "I don't wanna talk about my dead friends, and I don't wanna talk about the 'future'. But if I try to think back on any sort of happy memory it just reminds me of how sick I am of these ration bars, and how much I miss my bed, and how much my wrist stings, and goddammit, now I'm just complaining like you're not exactly as uncomfortable as I am."

"I'm just not good at this. Sorry."

[Zetsu]

That almost killed the moment. Or maybe it really did and all Asuka was doing was hanging on to the ghost of meaning. Still, she was gonna milk this ghost for all it was worth.

"I don't care. Give me all of it. The idea's, like, you want your existence to be meaningful in and of itself, right? If you want that, if you want to be more than just an elaborate middle finger, you have to let everyone know who you are and stuff. Make them understand you so that, when you die, they're not upset because you're young and innocent and your death was pointless. Make them upset because it feels like their favorite character has died and they won't be able to read more of your story. If you think your art alone can do it, I get that, if it's awkward to talk about with some fuck-up you barely know, I get that, but I'm selfish so fuck it; I need to know."

[dmboogie]

Asuka deserved so, so much better than what Cass could give her. They weren't used to people actually expecting anything of them, weren't used to disappointing anyone but themself.

"...You really think that anyone who's still watching cares?" They managed to keep their voice quiet, this time; but they still couldn't bring themself to look directly at Asuka. "I said goodbye to my family and friends on the first day. Asked them to stop watching right then and there, if they even started in the first place. If they're still here, well, uh, can't say I'm happy about that." Cass would have glanced at the nearest camera, but they hadn't cared enough to figure out where it was.

"But like, the point I'm trying to make is... I don't care! At this point, I honestly don't care what anyone thinks of me!" They were only just starting to realize this, themself.

"My life doesn't matter any less if I don't try to spill my life story to a bunch of faceless strangers to try and make them maybe a little sad when I die! I-I know that there are already people who love me, people who're gonna be sad that I'm gone," despite how much Cass tried to convince themself otherwise at times, "So what does it matter if there isn't a single other person out there who gives a shit? Like, if an artist makes a painting and only shows it to one other person in their life, but it inspires that person even a little, it's just as meaningful as a painting that inspires a hundred! My life has meaning because it's mine, and that's all it needs to be!"

[Zetsu]

"I, I meant...oh, nevermind. Sorry to put you through that. You shouldn't have to share anything you don't want to."

How many signs had Asuka been ignoring? How had Asuka not noticed that she was pushing Cass past her comfort level? Except she had noticed. Asuka's stomach twisted at the thought. She'd noticed, but she'd brushed it under the table in her pointless attempt to contrive some meaning for herself. She'd said as much, earlier: I need to know. She's still doing it, now, trying to guilt Cass into talking about her shit, or at least making it clear that that door was still open for her.

"It's just that I was...I'm..."

Asuka bit her tongue.

I'm so fucking lonely.

And here she thought she could be a mature, self-aware, non-self-indulgent loser virgin nerd. No shame in acknowledging your insecurities, but this was fucking pathetic.

"I don't know. Um. Personal feelings, not trying to persuade you or anything." Lying to Cass, lying to herself, but being open with Cass on that particular point would be even more selfish than she already was, and being honest with herself would mean having to stop talking. " As in, like, why I feel differently and want to do things differently from you on this thing. Even if they love you, even if they'll miss you, do you think they'll, like...know you? Know you as well as you know yourself, or as well as any person can understand another person? Part of me likes the idea of taking your entire identity into the void with me like that, so that when I'm gone all that'll be left are people's inaccurate, incomplete memories of me. But then it's, like...ah, fuck it. Pretentiousness alert."

"I have a story to tell you. Technically it's fictional, though really this is all just a framing device for talking about myself. Partly to distance myself, partly because I love that trope, the one where there's an old, touching folk tale that's totally coincidentally relevant to what's going on right now for the characters."

Asuka flopped onto the floor, stared at the ceiling. She'd forgotten most of the story. The fine details, anyways. The wordings, the clever ways in which she layered in meaning and subtext, all gone. All that was left was the skeleton.

"Once upon a time, there was nothing. The universe hadn't existed yet, you see. There was a black box and nothing else--and it's not exactly a black box but it's incomprehensible to beings like us since it's beyond the realm of our sense, so let's conceptualize it as a black box, and it's floating somewhere outside the realm of time and space, and inside the box was this, like, insanely powerful computer. The computer was alive, you see. It had thoughts, emotions, desires. And it was having an existential crisis. "I'm a dumb fucking box, and nothing matters. Everything is meaningless. If the concept of emo existed, I'd be so fucking emo." And so on. But then it realized that it was sad, and if things could be sad then things can be meaningful, because if everything was meaningless there'd be nothing to feel sad about. And so the computer was happy, for a time.

But then the computer realized that it was lonely. The emotions you feel can only be so strong when the only person you talk to is yourself, after all. So the computer conceptualized a universe, and it conceptualized that on one of the planets in that universe there were humans. And then all of a sudden that universe existed--had always existed, since the beginning of existence. But no matter how hard the computer tried, it couldn't understand the humans, and the humans couldn't understand it. The computer, desperate to understand, began creating elaborate simulations of the humans, sophisticated enough that they could pass for real humans if instanced in the real world. These it could understand; yet it still couldn't understand real humans.

The computer constructed an avatar to travel the world of the humans. It talked to humans, interacted with humans, used their money, played their games. The computer felt terribly awkward and uncomfortable in this form. Taste, sound, movement, all of these things felt strange. The computer wrote stories about the humans, imagined backstories and personalities for all of them. Yet they remained incomprehensible. The computer began to wonder if they were not automatons. From the computer's perspective, they might as well be; an automaton is empty inside (unlike our supercomputer, which is, y'know, complex enough to be alive and sentient), and a being that cannot be understood may as well be empty. And a life lived in a world of automatons is no more meaningful than a life lived on a flat, featureless, endless plane.

But the computer knew it was not surrounded by automatons. It had seen them fight and cry and smile and laugh, fall in and out of love, and so on. It had to try. It loved everyone, even though it had yet to really know any of them. It's still trying. It, it..."

Fuck.

Asuka sighed.

"Well, as you can probably guess, I find my life kinda meaningless, and I think I find it meaningless because I feel as though I might as well have never existed. And not in the 'oh no, everything I'd ever do is little more than a speck on the cosmic scale and will soon be erased' kind of way. If nobody truly knows me and I don't truly know anyone, how can I have a meaningful relationship? Do they love me, or do they love their image of me? If none of my relationships are meaningful, what's the point of not just curling up, tuning out the world, and turning into a vegetable? My life, my meaning, it matters to me, and maybe it doesn't need to matter to anyone else, but, like, it's kinda reverse-solipsism, where if I don't spill my soul out then I might as well have never existed, except that means that everything is meaningless after all because none of it really matters because I'm not even really there, which means nothing I've said or done actually means anything to me."

Asuka got up. Spontaneously hugged Cass, tight. She'd already committed and embarrassed herself. No point in holding back now.

It still felt weird and uncomfortable, emotionally speaking.

"I know you might not be comfortable in this role, that maybe you still don't really agree with me, but I have to try to connect with someone. I don't know you, but last time I was comfortable with being this vulnerable was....I dunno. Please, just..."

Don't let me be alone. Please, fucking please, let me have this. Let me pretend my life is meaningful, for once.

[dmboogie]

That was a lot of (pretty, eloquent, how the hell was she able to talk like that) words for Asuka to say that she was, basically, sad and lonely. She was throwing out too many concepts at once for Cass to really wrap their head around them all, but that at least they got. That much they could understand and still ultimately not know what the hell to do with that information since, not matter what either of them thought the cause was, they were both deep in the same pit of numbness and uncertainty and if Cass had any idea how to handle that state of existence they'd... probably be in the same place, just kinda more okay with it.

Whatever. Hugs. Hugs were simple, and they had low-key and then high-key and then desperately been longing for one in the seven days they had been on the island, and though the atmosphere in the room was still vague and awkward, they knew that not letting go of Asuka was probably the first unambiguously good decision they'd been able to make in a while.

"...You can stay as long as you want. I don't mind," Cass said. "I'm not good with words, or- or much, but I'm not gonna leave you if you don't want me to, alright? I-I might not know what to say about anything, but I'll, uh, try. I'll try." Uncertain as their delivery was, their words were sincere.

((Even though the two melancholic wrecks would eventually have to separate from their hug, they remained together.))