[action/text]

[othersdie]

[action]

[Justin, looking older and more worn than usual, is in the garden. If his rumpled appearance or the cigarettes don't indicate a cursed state, his complete inaction should. He's seldom idle, usually, and the police force has been keeping him occupied lately.

But right now, he's sitting under a tree. Smoking. Looking either bored or blank--it's difficult to tell. He's not going anywhere soon.]


[text]

This again. And again, and again, and again. The details change but the plot repeats itself. Not just one weekend a month or even here alone. Listen to the clock. Each tick is just like the one preceding it, like the one following it. Tedious second after tedious second. Identical seconds, adding up to minutes and hours and days and years that blur together into a single unremarkable life until, finally, we have the privilege of dying.

I wonder why we bother living through the tedium.

Why do we consider life so valuable when it ultimately comes to nothing?


[ooc: Cursed with The Years That Never Were. This is a Justin I've been working on for a while, so there's an explanation for the curious. Responses will come from the curse journal, mostly.]

Comments

video;

[oceantrauma]

Justin-san.... Are you feeling well? [He feels the short answer is no, but Ken still needs to ask. Politeness and all that. And certainty.]

video;

[ohcurses]

[He squints at the... girl?]

Who are you?

video;

[oceantrauma]

I'm sorry....

I'm Ken Ichijouji.

video;

[ohcurses]

Oh... sorry. You look different.

video;

[oceantrauma]

Ah, yes. I'm...in a girl's body.

But what about you? You look different, too.

video;

[ohcurses]

Strange.

[He takes a long draw on his cigarette.]

What do you mean?

video;

[oceantrauma]

You look older, not as tidy as you usually are.

video;

[hatedbyfanboys]

... Justin?

video;

[ohcurses]

[What's wrong with people today?]

Raiden.

video;

[hatedbyfanboys]

You don't seem... quite yourself today.

video;

[ohcurses]

How so?

[Hasn't he been a chain-smoking, self-destructive bum for the last eight months?]

video;

[hatedbyfanboys]

[RAIDEN ISN'T QUITE SURE.]

... Darker, I guess?

video;

[ohcurses]

[Well... he wasn't a chain-smoker or a bum, at least. Or twenty-seven. SMALL DETAILS.]

Darker. Than what?

» audio

[thenormalsquint]

[Angela picks up the devices to say something but puts it down without cutting off the feed. What can she say that won't be hypocritical at this point? Or a straight up lie?

It's strange that she finds parts where she now agrees with him and that scares her.]

» audio

[ohcurses]

[He hears the feed open and checks to see who it is. Angela. Angela warrants a response. She even gets what sounds like a tract of... fondness, maybe? Familiarity, at least.]

Angela? Are you there?

» audio

[thenormalsquint]

Yes.

[And it's all she says right now because otherwise she's at a loss for words.]

» audio

[ohcurses]

...Doing okay?

» audio

[thenormalsquint]

I'm tired. Sleepy. [Is it a lie if you leave out the most important parts?] I'm asking the same about you.

» audio

[ohcurses]

Why? [Yes, yes it is.

It takes Justin a few moments to formulate a response.]

Nothing's changed.

[iwasherefirst]

'Cause of all the things between the beginnin' and the end?

[ohcurses]

What if all of the things between are terrible?

[iwasherefirst]

You keep goin' 'til they get better 'cause they have to. They do. S'impossible for things to stay horrible all the time.

[ohcurses]

If you know that they won't...?

[iwasherefirst]

You can't know that. Life doesn't always stay on the projected path. Might look like it's goin' to but it veers off.

[othersdie]

How do you keep yourself believing that?