forgethertoo | [[half interlude/half open post + entropy manipulation: a fatalistic warning]]

FOR EVERYONE

Aornis is mildly irritated. For all everyone in this place talks about fresh starts and second chances, she doles out some measly nightmares and eradicates a few non-essential memories and all of a sudden, everyone is acting as though they've discovered a grand villainous conspiracy. It's irritating because she should feel flattered that she's caused this much trouble with so little action. After all, she can sense it. Every mention, every ping.

The problem is, the current situation doesn't feel evil enough. Would her brother Acheron be proud of her for what she's done so far? No. It's not quite as bad as her brother Styx's "evil deeds" but it all feels rather pathetic. She's well aware that she's the villain of this place, in terms of the narrative. That particular narrative intent is so strong, it's nearly hitting her over the head with it. Although she can't tell who the hero is supposed to be, it is perhaps time to fully step into that role. She is a Hades, after all.

At the moment, she's debating her options. She could just wipe everyone's memory and start fresh. That would be the easiest way to handle this situation. It's a distinct possibility. There's a slight issue with that plan... but she's taking care of it. Aornis is currently rolling over these issues with a Moscow mule somewhere public, if anybody would like to speak with her...

FOR SOMEONE IN PARTICULAR

It's a small coincidence. Very small in the grand scheme of things. In a hallway off to the side of the main area of the mansion, a sheet of paper sits on the floor, undiscovered and unnoticed up until now. Perhaps it was dropped by Susan and Lancelot when they were moving the boxes of papers inside. It's an application for a library card; very nondescript in nature. Name (William Jones), DOB (January 13th), Sex (M), City and State (Boston, MA). The rest is blank as if whoever started filling it out had been interrupted.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

Lan Wangji pins her with a measured glance, taking this in without any change of expression. Of course, he already knew this from Claudius, but it tells him something to hear it from Aornis herself. "What are your duties?"

"I'm able to enter and leave books and other literary texts, though clearly, not from here. If something diverges from what the text is supposed to be, I work together with my team to fix it."

What the text is supposed to be. Lan Wangji nods, thinking of Wei Ying, the crowded broad road and the single-plank bridge. He was supposed to die a villain, and history was supposed to remember him that way. That is not how it happened. "What does that work entail?"

"It's a lot of bureaucratic red tape and it isn't inherently rewarding. Finding and pinpointing inconsistencies. Speaking and providing testimony in trials. Trying to convince the character to not diverge. They're more like... actors," she says, after a pause. "They're self-aware that they're playing a role as the reader reads through their tale."

Lan Wangji allows a minuscule frown to crease his brow. What she describes is disturbing to imagine. If there truly is a novel, an undoubtedly inaccurate tale painting Wei Ying as a practitioner of mo dao and celebrating the fall of the Yiling Patriarch, he hates to think of some actor reliving it again and again. "Then those here would be outside the scope of your work."

"I agree," Aornis says.

Lan Wangji goes quiet as he considers what he has learned. It amounts to little, but not to nothing. "And yet you are here. Is there a book about you as well?"

"I wouldn't be surprised if there was somewhere," Aornis admits. "We all have our own narratives, don't we?"

"Any narrative can change." He studies Aornis' face, wondering about her and whether she truly believes that a story must be set in stone like a rule carved into a wall.

"It has before. There's a novel; Jane Eyre. The ending of it was changed to benefit the main character and give her a happy ending. The new ending was more popular with the readers than the old one."

The way that she says it makes him frown again. "Who changed it?"

"Thursday Next." She says that name with obvious distaste.

That is such an immediately obvious opening that Lan Wangji barely feels compelled to answer at all. If this were a conversation with Claudius, or his husband, he would simply wait for the relevant information to emerge without prompting. But here, he does ask: "Thursday Next?"

"A terrible woman. She murdered my brother."

Lan Wangji's eyes widen, only fractionally. His mouth thins. "Without cause?"

"There's always a cause for murder. At the root of it is premeditation," Aornis says, quite plainly. But then her guard drops slightly and genuine frustration shows in her expression. "She shot him. While he was making the changes within the novel that she eventually became a celebrity for."

That tiny frown makes a reappearance. Lan Wangji doesn't miss that she confirmed there was a cause for her brother's murder, but made no allusion to what that cause might have been. There is always something -- revenge, betrayal, personal gain, misplaced fear. He wonders what it was in this case. "That is not an easy loss to endure," he says, gaze level.

"I still miss him," she says, honestly. "He was branded as a criminal but he was only doing what he thought was right."

With some care, Lan Wangji controls his expression. "Understood," he says, a little more gently.

"Look," she says quite frankly, "I don't know what you've heard, but I can promise that I have nothing personally against anyone here. I think most of the rumors stem from what I do for a living." These are both technically not lies.

"I rarely heed rumors," Lan Wangji says, and that, too, is true. He doesn't consider information given directly to him by Claudius to constitute rumors.

"Even when they're personally damaging to you and yours?" Aornis asks.

Again, he frowns minutely. "No," he says, on the blunt side. "Public opinion is like the tide. It is always changing and it is impossible to influence."

"Hm." She says, not a strong reaction at all.¹

¹go girl, give us nothing

Lan Wangji looks at her for one calm, extended moment, his face -- as usual -- betraying nothing. After that pause, he gets to his feet and puts his hands together for another impeccably polite bow before he goes. She has given him a few things to turn over in his mind.

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forgethertoo - 2024-04-04 18:43 (UTC) - Expand