"Ah. Yeah..." he answers, fidgeting with his jacket sleeve. He's not sure how to feel about it -- this fierce loyalty borne from fake emotions. Tech's not used to loyalty to begin with, let alone of the familial sort.
"Well," he begins and words fail him for a moment. He stares at a pile of rubble, quiet for a moment before before he says. "Well, at least you're absolved of the responsibility now. No more going to great lengths and no more reason to protect me. I can protect myself. And I probably could have there too -- except I got spoiled and just started to expect you to fix my messes."
And it had worked, really. The bullies eventually stopped targeting Aindreas because they knew they would have to deal with Suzaku.
"You wanna go see our old house? I'm curious to see what actually survived the storm."
He has made Tech uncomfortable, he can tell that and his jaw tightened in embarrassment. Perhaps he should not have said anything. He bowed his head.
It didn't change his feelings, or his mind. But he would make sure not to be so obvious in future. Tech could protect himself, but that wouldn't prevent Suzaku wanting to make sure he was safe.
He knows himself that much.
"We can do so."
He's not sure how exactly he feels about that but he is curious, so he thinks he would like to see.
He looks at Suzaku momentarily with a frown -- noting the jaw tightening and the silence. Tech's not Aindreas, but he feels like him. And because he feels like him, he also feels like he knows Suzaku enough to know something is bothering him. He's not obvious about it. He never is. It's all subtle in his body language. And Aindreas would pretend not to see it, just to not bring his brother any embarrassment.
But.
Tech is not Aindreas.
He steps closer and dares to place his hand on Suzaku's shoulder with a sort of familiarity. "I don't want you to be disappointed when you don't find much of your brother in me, yanno? Er...his brother. Um. You know what I mean. I feel like we spent our whole lives trying not to disappoint one another or our parents, and now it's like....I can't shake this feeling you're absolutely gonna hate who I really am. I mean, fuck. Half the time I don't know who I am and that's even before this Hellburbia mess. At least Aindreas was sure of himself."
He blinks at him, surprised at the closeness yet also not surprised. He looks up at him steadily.
He doesn't expect Tech to be Aindreas. Not really. He knows he is different, they all are after all. "I won't be disappointed." He shook his head. "I know you are not him, I am not him either. You may hate who I really am."
After all Suzaku hates who Suzaku truly is so it would be normal for others to do likewise. "I do not have any expectations."
Or rather he does, but he knows them to be false and tries to put them out of mind.
"You'll find my tolerance for people is pretty fucking high," he flashes a confident grin. "And my moral compass is also pretty fucking flexible. So I don't think there's anything you could tell me that's going to make me love you any less."
Because it's a love. And there's no skirting around that. The love may have been fabricated within these walls, but it feels so real even now. He doesn't imagine that's the sort of thing that's going to fade either -- not when they shared a lifetime together in their memories.
Tech draws back, starting to walk the familiar path toward their former home. "All I'm trying to say is I just don't want you to feel you need to step in and fight my battles for me. Because I have a tendency to get myself into trouble and now I'd feel pretty shitty if that trouble bled over onto you." He flashes a faint smile.
Suzaku looked shocked, he was shocked. More than shocked honestly as he stared at him. It's not so much the declaration of love, because it was what he felt to. A brother, family, someone he loved even though they were feelings based on a foundation of lies.
But no one. Not ever in Suzaku's life had declared such a thing. That they would love him regardless. He is not sure he can believe it. After all Tech knows nothing about him. There's nothing to say Suzaku's actions would even make him regret that.
But it's... Almost overwhelming and if Tech was trying to make Suzaku not want to fight for him, it is the wrong tactic.
"Yeah, I bet. You got those fighting skills. Those aren't the sorts of things they just fabricate out of nothing in a fake life. I'm sure it's something innate -- just like me being the fucking nerdiest nerd around was all innate." He smiles, briefly.
"So. Tell me about you. What was your deal back home? What do you do here? How long have you been here, anyway? I'm coming up on almost a year. It'll be a year in..."
He ticks off his fingers, doing a silent count.
"April. Shit. We're just around the corner."
It's not a milestone he ever expected to reach. He thought he'd be out of here by now. Has he not been trying hard enough? Okay. New goal. Second year? Try to be more like Loki.
Tech was right, it wasn't the sort of thing that just manifested brainwashed or not. He had been sporty and capable of fighting in their fake life because he was capable in real life, just as Tech was clearly as intelligent and scholarly as Aindreas had been.
"A year is a long time. I've been here a year and... four months." Roughly. It felt much longer and also shorter all at the same time.
"I was a soldier back home, a knight. My world has been at war for a very long time."
Was it still? He wished he knew. Had he managed to plunge it further into turmoil by ruining Lelouch's plan with his untimely death?
"A knight? Shit, so you're all like....medieval times? That would explain you not knowing the fist bump." Tech ribs Suzaku with a small smile.
The smile fades off as he mulls over Suzaku being here for an entire year and counting -- arriving only a few months before him. And yet, they hadn't met until Hellburbia. Tech had kept pretty well to himself, though. And Suzaku, quiet and reserved as he is, probably did the same.
"Sorry..." he offers. "About you getting stuck in this place so long. I've been doing every fucking thing to try and get out of here, but...obviously I haven't found the solution yet. Because I think the whole thing about 'redeeming yourself' or whatever is bullshit. Not a single person can get out that way..."
"Oh. No." He shook his head. "It's not medieval. It's the year two thousand and eighteen." Which might not mean much to someone not of his world. "We are a long way from the medieval times, knights fight in large robots, called Knightmare Frames."
Rather than on horseback or whatever they did back in the past. "I've not heard of anyone who was redeemed, though people do seem to disappear, no one seems to know if that means they escaped though."
He has been doing... Not much to escape. He figures he deserves to be here and also he doesn't have the first clue about how to start trying to get people out. He's never done great working alone.
"So like, what? Is this some weird hybrid of the two? You guys evolved to have giant robots, but also still got stuck in the backwards way of kings and knights and shit? Well, I guess you didn't actually say there were kings and queens, I just assumed that part." If there are knights, though....it makes sense. Knights serve royalty. It's just such a bizarre combination in his mind. He can't picture anything in the 2000s being anything other than what his world is.
"Sounds weird, dude. And it sounds like the sort of place that makes adjusting to all of this harder than it should be." He gestures toward the world around them as a means of indicating hell. Because while hell could be backwards in many ways, it tended toward the modern world with modern amenities. "At least....being Suzaku Fitz for a bit probably made you understand things a little better."
"It's only really Britannia. They have an emperor, lots of princes and princesses and they rule... Ruled a lot of the world. Other countries are ruled differently. Before the war Japan had a prime minister, no knights or anything like that. Japan is where I am from."
This place was very weird, hell was strange and he struggled sometimes when many of the other people came from similar places to each other. Often their worlds were close but at the same time different to his own.
"It did help I think. Just the knowledge that was put in my head... It brought things into context."
If there was a prime minister before some war, then it stood to reason there's not one now. And that Japan had lost said war. Maybe they got absorbed into this empire or maybe they just forced their young and able men to fight for Britannia. Whatever the case, why is it always a war? No matter where you go, even in hell, there will always be someone vying for power.
"It's a long story." They are still walking, through the blood strewn streets of hellburbia. It's almost a fitting backdrop.
"Britannia invaded Japan eight years ago. When they conquered a territory they stripped it of its name, giving it a number instead. Japan became Area Eleven. The people were 'elevens'. There was a route to citizenship though, people could become 'Honoury' Britannians." It's weird explaining this. It's such a basic fact of life in his world that explaining this history was as weird as if he were trying to explain the concept of weather.
"One of the ways to do that was to join the army and I did that. It wasn't so much that I wanted citizenship but... I wanted to change things. Make them better. I thought I could do that, from the inside. If I worked my way through their system, rose through their ranks then they would..."
It hadn't worked, it had been stupid and he knows that now. But he had once held it so highly, that the end never justified the end, that to change things it had to be from within. "So it was my choice, to become a soldier. Being a knight... I was the first. The first eleven... Japanese person, the first number at all to become a Britannian Knight."
Something that had not been met with enthusiasm by the Britannian elite.
The way Suzaku trails off when speaking of his wants, of his dreams. It makes Tech think he didn't have that happy ending, and not necessarily because he wound up in hell. But he went in with the ideal to make things better, to maybe make the government or emperor listen. And something changed. Maybe the government shrugged him off or maybe the change happened within Suzaku himself.
Tech is quiet, but before he realizes it, he's placed his hand on his brother's -- no, not his brother's -- shoulder. Tech can't remember the beginnings of his life, but he does get this sense that he was once happy and enthusiastic to create -- to bring the latest technology to the world. And over the years, things got corrupted. More and more, he got jaded by the world and by the desires of people and by his boss Mr. World. So he can definitely relate to getting twisted by time and circumstances if that's what happened to Suzaku.
"So I see being an overachiever is just in your blood." He offers a teasing smile and gives him a little nudge. His expression becomes more serious, pensive. "You can still make it better, you know. I've maintained this thought that if they can drag us to a variety of different worlds, we can then go to whatever world we want. I don't plan on returning to my world. I'm going to find a different place to live with Ava and start a different life. You don't have to go back to being Suzaku the Knight. You can find someplace else, be the person you want to be in a world you want to live in."
He shakes his head. "The future's not set in stone. And as a god who very much represents the future, you should listen to me. I know what I'm talking about." He winks.
He looked at him when his shoulder was touched and then bowed his head. He's not quite smiling, he rarely does but his eyes lighten.
He's not sure he believes Tech. He wants to. But then again should he? If he was given a choice could he walk away from his world?
Be a person he wanted to be. But that was against everything he had promised. His hopes, his desires, sacrificed for the world. Forever. That was the deal.
A deal that had been interrupted by him being here. Who knew if they could even escape?
So he just nodded. "You sound like you know what you are talking about."
He did. And he didn't want to stomp on that enthusiasm, that lightness, that hope.
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no subject
"Well," he begins and words fail him for a moment. He stares at a pile of rubble, quiet for a moment before before he says. "Well, at least you're absolved of the responsibility now. No more going to great lengths and no more reason to protect me. I can protect myself. And I probably could have there too -- except I got spoiled and just started to expect you to fix my messes."
And it had worked, really. The bullies eventually stopped targeting Aindreas because they knew they would have to deal with Suzaku.
"You wanna go see our old house? I'm curious to see what actually survived the storm."
no subject
It didn't change his feelings, or his mind. But he would make sure not to be so obvious in future. Tech could protect himself, but that wouldn't prevent Suzaku wanting to make sure he was safe.
He knows himself that much.
"We can do so."
He's not sure how exactly he feels about that but he is curious, so he thinks he would like to see.
no subject
But.
Tech is not Aindreas.
He steps closer and dares to place his hand on Suzaku's shoulder with a sort of familiarity. "I don't want you to be disappointed when you don't find much of your brother in me, yanno? Er...his brother. Um. You know what I mean. I feel like we spent our whole lives trying not to disappoint one another or our parents, and now it's like....I can't shake this feeling you're absolutely gonna hate who I really am. I mean, fuck. Half the time I don't know who I am and that's even before this Hellburbia mess. At least Aindreas was sure of himself."
no subject
He doesn't expect Tech to be Aindreas. Not really. He knows he is different, they all are after all. "I won't be disappointed." He shook his head. "I know you are not him, I am not him either. You may hate who I really am."
After all Suzaku hates who Suzaku truly is so it would be normal for others to do likewise. "I do not have any expectations."
Or rather he does, but he knows them to be false and tries to put them out of mind.
no subject
Because it's a love. And there's no skirting around that. The love may have been fabricated within these walls, but it feels so real even now. He doesn't imagine that's the sort of thing that's going to fade either -- not when they shared a lifetime together in their memories.
Tech draws back, starting to walk the familiar path toward their former home. "All I'm trying to say is I just don't want you to feel you need to step in and fight my battles for me. Because I have a tendency to get myself into trouble and now I'd feel pretty shitty if that trouble bled over onto you." He flashes a faint smile.
no subject
But no one. Not ever in Suzaku's life had declared such a thing. That they would love him regardless. He is not sure he can believe it. After all Tech knows nothing about him. There's nothing to say Suzaku's actions would even make him regret that.
But it's... Almost overwhelming and if Tech was trying to make Suzaku not want to fight for him, it is the wrong tactic.
"I'm used to trouble."
no subject
"So. Tell me about you. What was your deal back home? What do you do here? How long have you been here, anyway? I'm coming up on almost a year. It'll be a year in..."
He ticks off his fingers, doing a silent count.
"April. Shit. We're just around the corner."
It's not a milestone he ever expected to reach. He thought he'd be out of here by now. Has he not been trying hard enough? Okay. New goal. Second year? Try to be more like Loki.
no subject
"A year is a long time. I've been here a year and... four months." Roughly. It felt much longer and also shorter all at the same time.
"I was a soldier back home, a knight. My world has been at war for a very long time."
Was it still? He wished he knew. Had he managed to plunge it further into turmoil by ruining Lelouch's plan with his untimely death?
no subject
The smile fades off as he mulls over Suzaku being here for an entire year and counting -- arriving only a few months before him. And yet, they hadn't met until Hellburbia. Tech had kept pretty well to himself, though. And Suzaku, quiet and reserved as he is, probably did the same.
"Sorry..." he offers. "About you getting stuck in this place so long. I've been doing every fucking thing to try and get out of here, but...obviously I haven't found the solution yet. Because I think the whole thing about 'redeeming yourself' or whatever is bullshit. Not a single person can get out that way..."
no subject
Rather than on horseback or whatever they did back in the past. "I've not heard of anyone who was redeemed, though people do seem to disappear, no one seems to know if that means they escaped though."
He has been doing... Not much to escape. He figures he deserves to be here and also he doesn't have the first clue about how to start trying to get people out. He's never done great working alone.
no subject
"Sounds weird, dude. And it sounds like the sort of place that makes adjusting to all of this harder than it should be." He gestures toward the world around them as a means of indicating hell. Because while hell could be backwards in many ways, it tended toward the modern world with modern amenities. "At least....being Suzaku Fitz for a bit probably made you understand things a little better."
no subject
This place was very weird, hell was strange and he struggled sometimes when many of the other people came from similar places to each other. Often their worlds were close but at the same time different to his own.
"It did help I think. Just the knowledge that was put in my head... It brought things into context."
no subject
If there was a prime minister before some war, then it stood to reason there's not one now. And that Japan had lost said war. Maybe they got absorbed into this empire or maybe they just forced their young and able men to fight for Britannia. Whatever the case, why is it always a war? No matter where you go, even in hell, there will always be someone vying for power.
"Was it ever something you had a choice in?"
no subject
"Britannia invaded Japan eight years ago. When they conquered a territory they stripped it of its name, giving it a number instead. Japan became Area Eleven. The people were 'elevens'. There was a route to citizenship though, people could become 'Honoury' Britannians." It's weird explaining this. It's such a basic fact of life in his world that explaining this history was as weird as if he were trying to explain the concept of weather.
"One of the ways to do that was to join the army and I did that. It wasn't so much that I wanted citizenship but... I wanted to change things. Make them better. I thought I could do that, from the inside. If I worked my way through their system, rose through their ranks then they would..."
It hadn't worked, it had been stupid and he knows that now. But he had once held it so highly, that the end never justified the end, that to change things it had to be from within. "So it was my choice, to become a soldier. Being a knight... I was the first. The first eleven... Japanese person, the first number at all to become a Britannian Knight."
Something that had not been met with enthusiasm by the Britannian elite.
no subject
Tech is quiet, but before he realizes it, he's placed his hand on his brother's -- no, not his brother's -- shoulder. Tech can't remember the beginnings of his life, but he does get this sense that he was once happy and enthusiastic to create -- to bring the latest technology to the world. And over the years, things got corrupted. More and more, he got jaded by the world and by the desires of people and by his boss Mr. World. So he can definitely relate to getting twisted by time and circumstances if that's what happened to Suzaku.
"So I see being an overachiever is just in your blood." He offers a teasing smile and gives him a little nudge. His expression becomes more serious, pensive. "You can still make it better, you know. I've maintained this thought that if they can drag us to a variety of different worlds, we can then go to whatever world we want. I don't plan on returning to my world. I'm going to find a different place to live with Ava and start a different life. You don't have to go back to being Suzaku the Knight. You can find someplace else, be the person you want to be in a world you want to live in."
He shakes his head. "The future's not set in stone. And as a god who very much represents the future, you should listen to me. I know what I'm talking about." He winks.
no subject
He's not sure he believes Tech. He wants to. But then again should he? If he was given a choice could he walk away from his world?
Be a person he wanted to be. But that was against everything he had promised. His hopes, his desires, sacrificed for the world. Forever. That was the deal.
A deal that had been interrupted by him being here. Who knew if they could even escape?
So he just nodded. "You sound like you know what you are talking about."
He did. And he didn't want to stomp on that enthusiasm, that lightness, that hope.