Lᴏʀᴛᴇʟ Kᴇʜᴇʟʟᴀɴᴅ | Tʜᴇ Gᴏʟᴅᴇɴ Dᴀᴜɢʜᴛᴇʀ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
richesse) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
cultmirror2025-07-01 02:53 pm
richesse) wrote in cultmirror2025-07-01 02:53 pm
oo1 ✦ let’s begin.
[ There’s a whisper through the murmur, more a breath of feeling than a fully formed thought. It’s sweet, and warm, and laughing—though it is not gentle, nor kind.
A voice follows the whisper, chased by darkness and shadows, the very suggestion of a nightmare. ]
Do you think we’re still dreaming? Or is this a living nightmare?
[ a hum, and another brush of teasing laughter, there and gone like a brief burst of memory, the last moment of summer that you can taste on your tongue before it’s irretrievably gone. ]
You’ve changed, haven’t you? We all have. What are you thinking, right now…? Who are you?
What are you?
A voice follows the whisper, chased by darkness and shadows, the very suggestion of a nightmare. ]
Do you think we’re still dreaming? Or is this a living nightmare?
[ a hum, and another brush of teasing laughter, there and gone like a brief burst of memory, the last moment of summer that you can taste on your tongue before it’s irretrievably gone. ]
You’ve changed, haven’t you? We all have. What are you thinking, right now…? Who are you?
What are you?
no subject
[His own smile is all weapon. It seeks the seams in her armor, to dig in and twist.]
But that doesn't answer my question, now, does it. Perhaps you're not chasing anything, then, but running?
[For an instant, he seems less man than shadow, the monster under your bed, in your closet. The boogeyman lurking in the dark corners of your own mind, waiting for its opportunity to devour. Just an instant, before an ordinary man is there again, throat bared and waiting for those claws she speaks of.]
1/2
no subject
Me? Running? From what? Why would I even need to?
[ she tilts her head, lips tilting up. ]
Aren’t you cute. You’re not very scary.
[ it seems in this, and perhaps all things, she refuses to give him what he seeks. ]
no subject
[The smile doesn't waver. Probably the cruelest thing about it is that it looks kind. Like it belongs to an ordinary young man, having a casual chat with a friend.]
The devil himself could breathe down your neck, and it would be nothing compared to what you've already seen. Isn't that right?
no subject
I’m afraid you’re mistaken. You’ve got me all wrong if you think fear is what drives me. Then again, maybe you’ll take pity on a poor, scared, helpless girl, hm?
[ she couldn’t hide it from the murmur if she wanted to.
she is not afraid.
she is something else.
Lortel smiles, and the murmur is marked by the impression of her fangs. ]
I’ve already met the devil, you see. I’m sure you can guess who the winner was.
no subject
[Dazai hates to be bored. In the original timeline, it was his greatest struggle, the deep frustration at the root of the depression that clouded his gaze with apathy and drove his chase for oblivion. Too many things in the world were too predictable, and too mundane, and he couldn't connect with any of it.
Lortel has been anything but boring.]
Someone who spits in the eye of death, despite their heart nearly thundering free of their ribcage every day? That might stir something of the sort ... but you needn't worry about that, it seems~
[Or perhaps it's disappointing. She might be someone who would prefer to be underestimated.]
If you've so triumphantly emerged from the fires of hell, then, what is it that has you so staunchly repulsed by whimsy?
1/3??
no subject
no subject
Lortel presses a finger to her lips. ]
Just business.
cw: suicide reference
Revenge. A useless, unnecessary venture. The rage squeezes at his throat, chokes him, and for all the anticipation she'd felt earlier, the razor wire he awaited with bated breath only grazes dully, and cool disappointment seeps out, freezerburned.
A flash of an image, a dying boy burning himself down to the wick, as though the fire could produce more wax.
Foolish. So foolish. But then -- all the fire is gone, like it was never there. The magician disappeared with her flames, leaving behind the rabbit pulled out of a hat. He smiles, then. Good. A leashed, caged beast is infinitely more dangerous than one which is allowed to run wild and free.]
A friend of mine once brought me to an interesting take on a story, you know.
[A sudden left turn in conversation. A non-sequitur? Hard to tell. He keeps talking, all the same.]
That when Snow White ate the poison apple, she knew what she was doing. She ate the apple out of despair, the kind inherent to living. The weight of the world.
...It sounds extreme, but when you think about it, there are poisoned apples we bite into willingly all the time, aren't there? Choices we expect to regret, instant gratification over long-term satisfaction, spite and pettiness. Pursuit of meaning, fulfillment, peace. Poisons downed willingly as medicine.
no subject
the feeling that Lortel slams down on, strangles into eternal quietude,
is triumph.
she won.
and now, she has leverage. the rope of the noose he’ll hang himself with by her very own hands: his underestimation of her. let him think what he will. let him grow bored and disdainful. all the better for her to—well.
not that she’d ever draw tight the knot herself. let him choke himself if he wishes. until then… ]
Yes… yes. The poisoned apple that is Elte.
[ she does not elaborate on the term, but the murmur will do it for her:
immovable, shrewd, pragmatic, vicious, professional, disgusting, cold, fallible
… ]
I wonder if I’ll ever find an antidote.