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]

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.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Resting in pieces, as they say!"

Koumyou that's not what they say.

And you know that.

But, let the guy who was literally torn apart have his fun with words.

"I do seem to be alive here, though." For what that's worth. Worth a lot more now than it was just a week ago...

[flatteries]

It's a good thing Inigo doesn't know about the torn apart thing, considering the morbid edge to that joke now goes straight over his head, for better or worse. Probably for the better, honestly.

Though it's still a sad topic in general, even though Koumyou seems to speak of it relatively easily.

"You didn't ask the train about the implications of that?" It doesn't sound like he's judging the other over it. After all, Inigo can also imagine rather not wanting to know the answer to that. But he can also imagine being curious about it - especially as to what it matters when it's time to leave the train and go home.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"What use would there be in asking about it? I assume when the train's done with me, I'll simply reincarnate."

That's how death works, after all.

[flatteries]

.. oh.

"People reincarnate where you come from?" He doesn't sound sceptical of the idea or anything. After all, people just revive exactly the way they were before they died on the train, so that idea sure is a heck of a lot weirder than the idea of reincarnation.

"Well, I.. I do suppose that gives you a lot less to worry about. Other than what kind of person you may end up becoming, I suppose.."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"A week ago, I'd have agreed. But now I'm inclined to stay myself, for the time being."

Someone actually likes him, and Koumyou would rather stick around until that changes.

[flatteries]

"Stay? Here on the train?"

It's not the first time Inigo has heard the sentiment, so he's not too surprised by it. Under different circumstances, he might have said the same.

"I.. hope you enjoy your time here on the train then, milord. Although I know it's often far from ideal."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"And stay as myself. Once I reincarnate, I won't be 'Koumyou Sanzo' anymore." None of his memories will go with, only his karma.

[flatteries]

"And you like it?"

He pauses, before adding: "Being the way you are now?"

Because that may be an upside about the whole idea of reincarnation, huh. Even if you don't like the present you, the you in a next life may be better. It's certainly a lot better than Inigo, who feels like he ruined his one shot at existence.

[its_dad_sanzo]

"I wouldn't say I like the me I am now, no."

That's honest, at least.

"But I like someone who does."

[flatteries]

Ah. Well, there's something understandable behind that - understandable for Inigo, apparently, since he just nods. Oh boy, does he ever understand having low self esteem, yet having other people think better of you than that.

He's not even sure if the other means it romantically or platonically (in Inigo's case said other people are very platonic, after all), but it's the same in the end, isn't it?

"I'd say there's definitely some things to like about yourself then. Unless you think that other person is delusional."

[its_dad_sanzo]

"Perhaps so."

Either way, Koumyou intends to stick around until he's not wanted anymore.