voidtreckerexpress

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Who: Inigo, Tidus (aka the two shared braincells duo) and you!
Where: The standard coach
When: Horseshoe 17
What: Inigo and Tidus are handing out free stuff because Tidus is the train's official sugar daddy.
Warnings: Probably nothing, will edit if necessary.

---

Hey guys, forget about that public breakdown the other day. Today Inigo is on the ICP with a big smile, seeming as cheerful as ever. It's fine. It's cool.

"Good day, everyone! Tidus and I brought some things back with us from Irivar to share with everyone. So why not come over to the standard coach and see if there's anything you'd like to take with you, hm? We have quite the selection! Oh, and.. erm, Taiki, Roland, Bryn and Della.. If you could make sure to come see us, we'd appreciate it! Otherwise I might have to send Ti--"

Before Inigo can even finish the sentence, there's an offscreen obviously very Tidus-y voice calling out, "Inigo! Ask for Sakura too!"

Inigo huffs, turning his gaze to the off screen source. "I was getting to that!" (No he wasn't.) Apparently he accidentally pulled his ticket off the ICP as he starts moving away from it too, because the feed just cuts out. Just come get some sweet stuff.

---

Their set-up in the standard car is a simple, if messy, one. They have a few of their offered freebies on the same table they occupy, each guy facing the other, sat by the wall. From the immediate front, fragrant bags sit no bigger than a palm, a variety of scents better to tell when held to the nose. Whetstones sit stacked mostly on top of one another, and then a cluster of hair ribbons and circular hair ties behind them. Behind the bags are a few scent oils--basically, perfumes, if not very big. There's a few to choose from, but...

...not as many as there are the soaps, which take up a half of the table in their choice. It's like a lush shop here of choice, different colours and sizes.

And Inigo and Tidus? Sit there, either playing cards or fiddling through the paper craft book available from the art supplies where the old library used to be.

A chalkboard sits balanced, with the words 'FREE 2 TAKE' written in big letters. In case you missed the public announcement.

1:
Come up, and have a look. Ask about what they've got.

2:
Or while you're here, maybe you can help Tidus, who pipes up to ask-

"Hey, quick question. How long 'til you're comfortable hugging someone?"

(ooc: as a note, all threads on this will be threeways! please enjoy trying to handle both teens at once. you can't seperate them.)

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Tidus shakes his head, though it comes with a pause. To collect his thoughts, feelings--whatever they actually were. A conversation he knows he's been meaning to have, but there's no easy way to go about it. His heart isn't as heavy as it had been before. As raw, and as apprehensive.

"You were being a friend. You wanted to help. You didn't do anything wrong, I was... I was struggling. I didn't know what to do."

And it's strange to remember: how hard it had been that first week going into the mission. There's been hard days after, but being around his friends, having Gibbs around with him--it's given him some drive. A drive he forgot he had.

"I'm sorry I freaked out." He huffs, low and mirthless. "I really know how to pick my timing."

Like when they're surrounded by wolves after their blood.

"You don't have to apologise." He reached out to place a hand on top of Tidus' clasped ones. "Not at all... You were hurting and then you got injured, that's nothing to apologise for."

Taiki hadn't handled that situation very well either after all. If Lord Gyousou hadn't been there it would have gone very wrong indeed.

"I'm just glad we were able to help you." Taiki might have not been great at it but others... They had managed to help and though he knows that Tidus must still be hurting, he at least was brighter, more able to find happiness despite the sadness.

Skin touches him, and for a second, Tidus does nothing. But then he takes the hand into both of his, touching the fingers. They come into this position often, don't they? He's so used to the sight of Taiki's hands. The gentleness of Taiki's comfort. Soft and quiet.

"I...," he starts, but finds himself unable to go forward. Retracks, and speaks on a quieter note himself: "I wanted you to know... I... I didn't want to go. Not really. But... I accepted it." There's a resignation, bittersweet. The slip of a smile on his lips. A sad conversation, but there's a light with that rain. A cloudless, sunny sky after a storm.

"Spira is doing better. Sin hasn't been around for two years. …it's healing."

Taiki is glad when Tidus takes his hands, takes the comfort offered. It is different than the time in the cinema, Tidus isn't pushing him away, Taiki doesn't feel like he is forcing his presence on the other boy.

He is quiet, knowing that Tidus is struggling to find words and wanting to give him time to speak, to get his thoughts in order. He holds his hands and waits, bowing his head as he finally does.

"I am glad, that Spira is healing." After all, if Taiki had to disappear for Tai, he would not hesitate. Accepting something for a greater good was different than wanting something. "Though you had to disappear... It is good that healing came of it."

His eyes are sad, he wished that such a thing had not had to happen. But it had.

He huffs, a small cough of a laugh. A wry smile playing on his lips.

"It's dumb. I got so worked up, worried what you thought about me. Now it's..." ...well, this. Acceptance. Just a fact of life, of him. The way he would want it to be.

"Well, nothing's really different, right? I'm the same ol' Tidus."

"I would never think differently of you."

Unless he did something truly terrible. But Taiki can't imagine him doing anything like that at all. Tidus is a good person, Taiki feels that in his heart.

"Nothing has changed, I don't think anyone sees you differently at all. You are still Tidus."

It wasn't a fear Tidus has, had, ever thought to - Taiki's judgment. He withdraws his hands slowly, not with any force. Letting them wrap around the ends of his elbows, giving Taiki the freedom.

"Glad I'm not bringing the mood of your painting down too much." Hah. "...You know, it wasn't that long ago we were sitting in here like this talking about telling the train what for. Lot of good that did."

But for as far as that didn't go, Tidus grins at the end of it. That's the train for you, right?

Taiki let's Tidus take his hands back, he's not Inigo who will happily hold hands forever and Taiki tries to not smother him too much.

"It's not that long at all." He smiled softly, "Yet I feel like I have known you forever... It's like that sometimes."

There attempt at talking to the train had failed, as far as he knew no one had managed since. They were still here, still not knowing why.

He smiles softly, "If there is someone who can hear us, I am sure your words did not go unheard."

"Hah, well, I haven't given up! I'm just using the feedback post now to tell it what I want!"

There's some playfulness in that declaration, but it's not untrue. But then he reminds himself, a small 'oh' before-

"Heyhey, could I get a favour from ya? Or borrow your ticket for a sec? Just to leave a message! I won't spend anything."

"Of course." Taiki nods and reaches up to pull the lanyard that held his ticket from around his neck. He handed it over.

"I don't mind, if there's something you want."

Tidus probably had more points than him but Taiki was still happy for him to use his, it wasn't like there was much he ever bought.

"I just wanna leave the train a message!" Promise, no points spending! And with the ticket in hand, he starts to get up. "I'm running an experiment, seeing how many messages it takes 'til the train responds to being asked for info."

He waves the ticket. "I figured asking why people suddenly disappear's the safest place to start."

"Oh." He nodded and stood up as well, to follow Tidus, to see what happened. Probably nothing, he knew the train didn't do much in the way of responding.

"That's a really good idea, Tidus."

"If it works." Not that it'll stop him from being a brat to the train, buuuut- "But also, I wanna get a feel for the train too. How it reacts to us. Like, how we should be seeing it? It's a train, but we know there's something in there too.. but what's it holding back on purpose, or what doesn't it know we wanna know?"

How much should he really be huffing and puffing about the train??

Tidus puts the ticket in, and finds the feedback post easily. Begins typing away, with the message clear for Taiki to read:

Hello. I would like information on why passengers get called on by a conductor and then make a disappearance from the train, sometimes permanently. Any information that can be shared with the train as a whole, as you've done to tell us about the void sickness and void storm, would be appreciated.

He looks at Taiki.

"That okay? Orrr-" he skims it "--you want less nice, more demanding?"

He nodded, it was clear that the train was more than just a train but if there was a person who could hear them, who could understand them... Then Tidus was doing the right thing by trying to reach out.

He read the message as Tidus typed it and nodded.

"No. That's alright." It didn't sound too demanding... Maybe more so than he would write. But if there was a person and they got angry, he would rather they got angry at him than Tidus.

"Okay then!" Then-- submitted! And if Taiki thinks that's demanding, he should see what Tidus usually writes for feedback messages!!

But he takes the ticket back out once done, holds it out for Taiki to take.

"I hope it works... either we've got a dumb train trying its best, or we have a train keeping info back intentionally." ...well. "I think that's the case anyway, but." He shrugs. "Don't know unless you try, right?"

"I hope it works, I hope it is listening." A strange thing to say about a train, but Tidus is right. You don't know unless you try.

"I hope we get answers... For anything really."

Even if it wasn't the big things like where people went, or how to leave the train. Even small answers would be better than nothing.

"Sucks, huh? This is what we get for sleeping on the classes on what to do when you get whizzed away by a void-travelling train."

To add some humour to it. But he folds his arms, mouth twisted to a side.

"You'd think being some dream human would mean I could do something cool... like, go in--" and his hands already unfold, so he can wiggle them mid-air "--and get whatever's in the engine room to listen to me! Mess up their dreams by being annoying!"

He smiled softly, it was good to hear Tidus joke, good to see him smile.

He tilted his head at the suggestion. "Yes, it would be good if it gave you powers, like a character from a manga, do you have those?"

Tidus' world seemed some strange mix between things he had known on earth and more like his own world. So it was always difficult to know what he would understand.

"You mean stories with pictures? Sure! I used to read one about a fish playing blitzball and pretending to be a normal city-goer. It was dumb but funny; the fish was drawn like a kid's art, while everything else was super detailed!"

Tidus likes the gag comics, okay.

"That sounds fun." He smiled, it sounded exactly like the sort of story Tidus would like.

"There were all sorts of stories like that on earth, many were about people with magic or powers."

"Did no one have magic on earth? Or was it just a few people who had it, so it was fun to read about people getting them?"

Did Zanarkand have stories about that? He's trying to think as he listens to Taiki too, but...

""People didn't have it. At least... I don't think so. Some people claimed to but it was mostly disproved... But I don't know. Because I existed there, on earth."

Most people did not know about his world, they did not know how close and tangled the two worlds were. They did not know that creatures like Taiki could even exist.

"Hmm, you know... my Zanarkand never used any magic either - even though the city it was based on, it was a city all about it. Used to be famous for it."

He waves a hand. "That just shows how well you can hide magic, huh? Even with the city the way it was, we didn't know anything about magic! Well, far as I know." He shrugs, a small laugh. "I was always playing blitzball. I wouldn't know if there was an seafloor conspiracy about it."

He nodded, it was indeed easy to hide magic. Especially if you did not know about it at all. After all there were plenty of Taika, many who would not even ever know they were living in the wrong world.

"It must have been a shock to you when you left."

"Sure," he admits with a small laugh, "but I had good people around to help me! Did I tell you where I first showed up though? Out in the middle of nowhere, near a bunch of ruins? And fish fiends trying to eat me!"

He points to himself, adds the reassurance, "I'm okay though, 'course."

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