Laura exhaled with deep relief. Good, they could understand each other again. She was looking forward to a conversation she actually enjoyed, if one were possible, with Isidora.
Digits crossed!
She winced at Matthias' 'story',
“I’m… sorry that your life got so crappy to the point you sought a way outta it. That’s, huh, a terrible state of mind to be in.” He tapped his claws together, nervous and unsure whether his comment was helping. “But, um, it’s good that you… don’t feel that kinda destructive rage anymore?”
Matthias smiled kindly at Silver. There was a tinge of sadness to the expression.
"There are worse things than anger," he said, in a quiet voice. "But it's kind of you to say such a thing. May all who bear such inner turmoil find a warmer peace than that which I sought."
"At least you have a hold of yourself now," remarked Malachai, drily. He didn't sound
wholly contemptuous.
Matthias just nodded pleasantly at the little dragon.
"Well, I... don't know if I have anything fancy. I'm just a small time bear trying to make it into the big leagues. [...] I thought... I might never make it out, never see my mother again. It was the first time I'd felt that kind of finality. [...] I know that's stupid. A bear that can't even sniff his way through the woods. But, hey, that's me."
Laura tried to think of how to articulate something to the effect of
'well, you're clearly really human-socialised, it makes sense you'd be omn the back paw in that situation' without sounding patronising. She couldn't manage it before someone else started speaking.
She settled for a sympathetic nod his way.
“So why do I keep losing? What is it I still lack?”
“Then there was a flash. A thunderbolt, I believed, but no. It was Ordile. Staring down at me with his bright yellow eyes and his fangs glinting in the dim darkness…” Silver swallowed and rubbed his arms. Despite his thick fur, he felt cold. “Feraligatr are a proud species, so I… I assumed he wanted to lash out at me for failing him so many times. I braced myself for punishment…”
“…But it never came. Instead, Ordile, he… he pulled myself to him. Sheltered me from the storm with his own body. Growled words of reassurance. He had no reason to do any of that for me, to comfort me so that I didn’t feel lost and alone anymore, but he… did.”
Malachai looked away, wordlessly troubled by something. At length, when Silver was done, he spoke up.
"In the due course of things, you may well meet with many failures. Not because of your own shortcomings... but because you face insurmountable challenges. Do not think that every loss you suffer is yours to own. That... is a kind of arrogance."
He was addressing Silver, of course. But perhaps he was addressing someone else, too.
"Accept that you will fall down. That is
life. It is then that you must continue. You must
get back up."
Laura bit her lip. She'd heard this kind of thing from Mal before. Never what kind of thing
he'd got back up from, though.
"So that's, what, three 'truths' now?" Her eyes darted off to the side. "And there's seven of us. How many d'you think the dungeon's askin' for? Maybe there’s like, a threshold or somethin'."
Laura grinned in Isidora's direction.
"You trying to wriggle out of it?" she bantered. She glanced up. "I dunno, looks like the stars up there are at about... forty, forty-two percent brightness? Four more oughta do it, I bet."
"The girl is obviously reluctant," stated Malachai, ruining it. "As are you."
"H-hey, I'll go next!" protested Laura.
But Andre, pensive since the first tale, already had a story in mind.
I'd also done a lot of thinking regarding the field I was in - economics. I was never forced to choose it, but… you could say I was strongly nudged. [...] When it started getting more and more clear what I was getting myself into, the life I was about to lock myself into, I got pretty anxious. [...] Economics just wasn't for me. I wasn't a businessperson. I didn't want to optimise revenue or treat people like they're a bunch of numbers."
Laura's eyes widened.
Fuck, that was
exactly what she'd been through. Goddamn. A point of real connection with Andre. She could commiserate with that. Howls, she'd worry about sounding like she was ripping the guy off if she shared her version of this story.
She braced herself with a sympathetic grimace as he continued, talking about going to tell his parents that he was done. She knew that couldn't possibly have gone well, oh gods... Poor guy. Well, she sure could empathise with shitty fucking parents—
"They said they loved me and that if this was what I really needed to do, they'd support me." A small smile crossed Andre's face. "I can scarcely remember a bigger sense of relief in my life than that."
She was gonna be sick. His parents had accepted him and he could do what he wanted with their support and she was gonna be fucking
sick. Could jealousy actually fucking
kill a person?
She sure was finding out in real time! Verdict wasn't in yet, could go either way...
"I'm sure that was deeply cathartic," remarked Malachai. "Well, Laura? You said you'd go next."
Laura forced her jaw open, her temple pulsing sharply from how hard she'd grit her teeth.
"Sure," she said. The word tasted like bile.
"I didn't have a lot of friends growing up," she began, feeling the car crash coming well in advance, but not feeling any desire to stop it. "I was pretty lonely, really. The friends I
did have, well, they ended up going away on journeys. Pokémon league circuits, stuff like that. Now, me and my partner – a purrloin, Salem – we wanted that for us. Wanted it so,
so much. But, uh. My parents sent me away to study, as a condition of their supporting me financially and all that. Economics, finance, like Andre here – I liked it about as little as you did, actually. Anyway. They'd already moved the goalposts a dozen times already, what was one more time? So I went. Didn't have much choice. Couldn't even take Salem with me."
It was gonna be bad. It was gonna be
bad and she was gonna push them all away and everything fucking sucked but
wouldn't it be a relief to stop pretending like there was a chance things could get better?
"I kinda... dissociated my way through my first term there. Didn't make any new friends, barely looked after myself in student accomodation, was probably doomed to flunk the course. My parents could've expected as much, I did tell them it was a bad fit. Anyway. They, ah, said they'd look after Salem. So that kept me going. Came home for the winter hols, and would you believe it? They'd let Salem run off. No fucking clue where my only friend had gone.
Obviously fucking neglected her, should've expected as much from them, and they wouldn't even let me be fucking
mad about it, like it was childish, like I was
being hysterical."
Malachai was looking at her.
She felt like she had no skin and fur, like she was just naked flesh, stinging and burning in the air. Like his glare was gonna cook her like a piece of meat.
She swallowed, crossed her arms tightly, didn't look at Andre.
"So of course I realised I'd been a fucking idiot, and I never should've gone along with any of their shit to begin with. And I fucked off into the world and, y'know, made myself scarce. Figured I'd, like, look for Salem? Find her somehow, make everything okay. And 'cause I'm
stupid, I've been fucking around chasing leads that might piss off a corporation who could sue me shitless, or disappear me, or something. For my cat partner who might fucking
hate me now for all I know, for leaving her like that, because I'm a
coward. And of course I've been bumming curries off the wild area rangers to get by, because I'm
useless, and I need to rely on other people to survive, and I'm too proud or stubborn or whatever to rely on my
parents, I guess, and—"
She gulped air, cutting herself off. She imagined bursting into tears in front of everyone.
That'd fix everything, huh? Fucking
pathetic.
"—and I haven't got any idea what my future even looks like any more, if I even have one," she managed, ears flat against her head, tail thrashing like a disturbed snake, claws digging into her arms. "And y-you know,
hhnh, you know what? I wouldn't— I mean if I could go back— I wouldn't do a bloody thing differently. Howls, I'd have done it sooner. Because I'd rather starve and shiver and fuck up out there where I can do what I want, than slowly suffocate somewhere I never asked to be."
Malachai was still staring at her. She didn't meet his eyes. She had no idea what he was thinking, but it was probably something about her being a fucking
embarrassment. Well, she somehow got through that disaster without crying or sniffling, and she wouldn't give him the satisfaction of having a meltdown now. She straightened up, and looked into the middle distance, her ears hot with shame and anger.