What you are is what you have been. [OPEN]

[its_dad_sanzo]

Who: Koumyou Sanzo and OPEN!
Where: All over the place!
When: Any time between the 3 questions event (Imagination 21) and the next mission.
What: A bunch of prompts and a wildcard, take your pick!
Warnings: Devero thread: some hot and heavy PDA toward the very end, and a minor reference to Dev's highly-abusive past relationship.


xxxxxWhat you'll be is what you do now.

( In all prompts, Koumyou is in his full Sanzo uniform, not train-issued clothes. )

xxxxx🌙 Cleaning and Singing

Blue team is supposed to clean, and so that's what Koumyou's doing. The priest has a broom and a dustpan, and... no plan! He can be found sweeping up the main walkways mostly, and doing an alright job of it.

And as he works, the priest is singing to himself. Quietly enough that one would have to actively listen to hear it clearly, but it's there. The chances are good that he's not even aware he's doing it. He has a lovely singing voice, even at a low volume.

xxxxx🌙 Meditating

Koumyou's found an out of the way corner somewhere, and has sat down on the floor in full lotus position, eyes closed and breathing slow and even. One could almost think he's asleep, except his back is far too rigid, and his head's not even drooping.

Is the light a little brighter, in this corner? A little colder, almost like... moonlight?

xxxxx🌙 Meditating Napping

It's been long enough since the mission on Nion that Koumyou is no longer sleeping in every random nook and cranny in the train to recover, but that doesn't mean he won't still occasionally nod off somewhere inconvenient.

Is he drooling on one of the tables in the dining car? Snoring quietly in the cinema car? Slumped over onto his side in a seat in the standard car?

Maybe someone should wake him up.

xxxxx🌙 Smoking

There's only a few places Koumyou Sanzo won't smoke. The cabin he shares with three kids, and the hospital car. He's nowhere near the walking chimney his son grows up to be, but at least once a day the priest will light up a single plain, filtered cigarette.

It takes the edge off, and no one wants Koumyou Sanzo to not take the edge off.

xxxxx🌙 Wildcard?

xxxxx(Wildcard.)

Comments

[flatteries]

Inigo leans in to read the words. It renders him quiet for a moment - first as he reads, then as he thinks, needing a moment to process the words on the page.

"Ah, that person.."

He moves back again, his gaze shifting towards Koumyou rather than the notebook.

"That's.. the one who died, right..? On the mission." He speaks slowly, like he wants to respect the dead. "Were you one of the people who found them..?"

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Correct on both counts," Koumyou tucks the notebook away again, back into the arms band situated up his sleeve. "I wanted to see if the train could verify her story, and possibly add to it."

And, well. It had at least confirmed the basics.

"My third question was a complete bust. We can't affect our home worlds from here."

[flatteries]

He nods. Both those answers actually give him quite a bit to think about. Though the answer to the third one is fairly depressing, and he feels like he'll just get sad and worried the longer he thinks about it.

So he quickly mentally returns to the second question. And he especially thinks of Roland. The way the other acted after that..

"What did you think? Um, about her, I mean, or her story.. Or everything that happened back there."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"We did our best to save her, and it wasn't enough," Koumyou shrugs slightly, folding his hands into his opposite sleeves. "That's nothing unusual."

Witnessing death is also nothing unusual, for a Sanzo priest.

[flatteries]

".. Yes, you're right," Inigo slowly replies after a momentary pause. He knows that it isn't as normal for everyone - not even normal for everyone on the train - but it's been a pretty common thing in his own life.

And Inigo knows he surely isn't the only one that counts for. This man seems to be the same.

"Though I can imagine some may have taken it harder. Not everyone is used to seeing death."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"I suppose that's probably true," Koumyou says slowly, thinking about it. "I didn't stick around for long after she died. There was barely anything left to fight and the others more than had it covered, so I went and found other things to do."

Simple as that. Some might call his actions cold, and Koumyou wouldn't argue... what is the moon, if not cold? Aloof? That's just how he is. Friendly, but distant.

[flatteries]

"You must've done this very often."

It's no accusation. He seems realise it could be taken that way, so after a moment the young man shakes his head, continues.

"I-- I just mean.. I've had to deal with that sort of thing often before too." Being there as people died. "After a while you just have to start being practical about it, because otherwise it's just going to drive you crazy." .. or it would have driven him crazy, anyway. Inigo's heart is too soft to have endured it otherwise.

"So I understand."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"I suppose that's also probably true," Koumyou agrees easily enough. Both to how often he's done this, and how detaching is just... something you've got to do, after a while.

"You didn't strike me as someone who's done the same. That must mean you've held onto yourself, and that's good."

[flatteries]

Inigo blinks, staring for a moment, but then the ends up his lips curl up into a small smile.

"Ah, really..?" He says, as if he isn't overthinking the way he tries to hide that every single moment of his life. Nope, clearly not. Obviously. All natural over here. Cough.

"Well, I wouldn't want to drag anyone down by having to think about that! I kind of see it as.. someone has to do it, so it may as well be me." Despite the serious - and kind of macabre - topic, he keeps smiling. "So other people don't have to suffer through it, or even think about it."

Because the person who is doing it is pretending that nothing's up.

[its_dad_sanzo]

Koumyou just sort of... blinks over at him for a moment, quiet.

Even one week ago, he would have just made a silly comment and let the moment pass by. Probably before this moment, in fact. But now...

"That's a lonely way to live."

[flatteries]

"You think so?"

There's less of a pause before he speaks, this time, but after he says that, his gaze does linger on the man for a while. Something about this feels different, if not just a tad. Usually the things Koumyou says are a bit.. lighter, Inigo thinks? More casual, at least.

Not that it stops him from smiling though, even as that thought is turning over in his head.

"I think it's a pretty satisfying one. As long as there are people out there I can keep happy that way, I'm happy too."

[its_dad_sanzo]

It's definitely a change, for sure.

"If you're certain it does that for you, then I suppose there's no harm in it."

Not that Koumyou has any say in the matter anyway, of course. But from his own experience...

It's just not a happy way to live.

"Ultimately, your life is your own to live as you see fit."

[flatteries]

Those words are the ones that make Inigo stop for a moment. Those last ones. Your life is your own to live as you see fit. Inigo knows it's not entirely untrue, he knows that when it comes down to it, it is how it works, but still..

.. but still. It'd be so easy to ignore those words. To smile, to move on, just like how he usually does. But they push into something he can't ignore, like a bruise being poked.

And though his throat feels dry, the words slip out before he's fully thought about whether he wants to say them or not.

"It's.. not always that simple."

[its_dad_sanzo]

The moon has a way of illuminating things otherwise kept in the dark.

Koumyou folds his hands into his opposite sleeves, and prompts, "...Isn't it?"

[flatteries]

It's hard. He's quiet for a moment. Inigo never likes talking about himself, especially not his past. On the other hand, he's already said too much to just play this all off in front of the guy, he thinks.

So when he speaks up, Inigo tries to find a middle road.

"Sometimes.. bad things happen. And you're one of the only people who can do something about it." Inigo makes no delusions that it isn't incredibly obvious he's talking about himself, but it feels easier to refer to it in this very general way.

"Then the only choice you have is turning a blind eye to it to live your own life and let everyone suffer for it, or to give yourself up to the task."

[its_dad_sanzo]

The priest gives that a moment of quiet thought, then sighs, "I suppose so."

He's done both, at different points in his life.

"But I think there must be a middle road between those extremes, don't you?" Koumyou hasn't found this middle road himself yet, but he's looking for it. "Even if it's as fine a line to walk as the edge of a razor..."

[flatteries]

"I fear that middle road may come with sacrifices."

Because if you do take time for yourself, then how can you be sure that won't be the exact time people will suffer or die, just because you turned your back for a moment? It's the whole reason Inigo adopted his overworking policy to begin with. As long as he keeps going, he can't blame his own slacking off (read: resting) for people suffering.

"And I don't wish to see that, milord. I've seen enough people suffer. The only thing I can do is put as much of a stop to that as I possibly can." Inigo sucks in a breath. "I am sure you understand that feeling as well."

Considering what Koumyou said earlier, about what he was used to. We did our best to save her, and it wasn't enough. Even when it fails, even when there are people you can't help, it's hard to stop trying entirely. It's hard to give up.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"But why should it only be up to you, to prevent suffering?"

If it could even be said to be prevented. 'Life is suffering' is a truth of the universe, after all.

"Aren't you just taking on the karma of everyone around you? That shouldn't be anyone's responsibility... that's turning yourself into a candle lit at both ends."

[flatteries]

Why him? It's a good question.

And while Inigo has an answer to that, it feels like it's soaked in a bit too much self-deprecation to just say it to someone he doesn't know that well. It'd feel like throwing too much of a burden at the other's feet. So after a moment of quiet thinking, Inigo doesn't answer that.

Instead he asks: "The karma of everyone around me?"

Sorry, Koumyou, but it's not as much of a concept where he comes from.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Life is suffering," Koumyou says it aloud, "taking someone else's suffering into yourself is like... like smoking a whole pack of cigarettes at one time. I don't know how you don't choke."

It's impressive... and horrifying.

[flatteries]

It's a good thing this place has taught him about smoking, or that metaphor would have gone way over his head. But as it is, he understands - or thinks he kind of understands, anyway, as he listens.

"I couldn't afford to. Everyone was counting on me."

Though the way Koumyou puts it does explain some things. The way his feelings are so easily bruised. Maybe it's all due to the years of dealing with everyone's suffering, like layers of sediment built up in his heart.

Inigo is still definitely a teenager, visibly so, but something about him looks so much older as he speaks now.

"I had to be invincible."

He wasn't allowed to choke.

[its_dad_sanzo]

But that's all past tense. Koumyou gazes at him calmly, just the moon observing the plight of others from afar, casting a cold light on everything.

"...Perhaps you did, before," he says, not ungently, "but now you're here."

The train is nothing, to Koumyou, if not a chance at a different life. Not wholly, of course -- he, for example, is still a Sanzo priest. He still has a sutra to guard. But in his own case, he's free to reclaim some of who he'd been before. Some of Houmei, buried under all the rubble and ash.

"Everyone I've met on this train has been perfectly capable of shouldering their own weight. I hope you're taking the opportunity to get to know what yours is by itself, now."

[flatteries]

Perfectly capable of shouldering their own weight, huh.. Well, that's something Inigo won't deny, at least not for the most part. Most people on this train are far more powerful than he could ever even imagine himself to be. They don't need his help, even though he instinctively can't help but offer it anyway.

He pauses a little, in thought, like there's something he wants to say to that, but isn't sure if he shouldn't. After a moment he does decide to go through with it. Maybe it's easier since he doesn't know Koumyou well, or because of the other's calm, passive attitude. It feels less like he's hurting someone by saying all of this then, by setting these facts about himself loose.

"But this train is only temporary. Once we leave here, we all go back home." Or so he hopes, anyway. He doesn't even want to think about where else everyone who walks off the platform could be. "We all return to our own situations. Everyone's purpose will still be the same as it was before."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"I suppose that's true for most," Koumyou, of course, is not in that category of people who will... go back home. "I forget this isn't all there is, for the rest of you."

He's a bit of an odd man out.

Being dead on his world, and all.

[flatteries]

Well.

That implication is pretty heavy in there. Even Inigo, who often only has a few braincells available in any given situation, instantly knows what the other means. Without him having to say it. For the rest of you.

"You're dead."

It's not unfeeling. There's some sympathy in his tone, and some surprise, too.