video; @unchained

[hedonistic]

[There video opens to a beautiful scene of a sunset at the Fishing District, sky painted in magnificent pinks and oranges that reflect against the pristine ice. A few moments later, a young man's voice accompanies it, tinged with the telltale slurring of someone who's rather drunk.]

Hey, question.

[A pause hangs in the air for a minute, almost long enough that one might wonder if he's gotten distracted or forgotten.]

Did you like your life, before the Storm? [. . .] If the Natha gave you a chance to go back, would any of you stay here?

[Kagari doesn't miss Japan. He doesn't feel homesick. He misses his friends, sure, but he's had more in the past nine months than he did in the twenty-one years before it. But he's starting to feel like the only one.]

Comments

[kikoku]

[Hmm. He has to think about that. His crew is a bunch of oddballs, a good half of which technically owe him their lives one way or another.]
Some of them definitely have their own goals that they probably can't achieve here, but...

[He's glad, suddenly, that he's doing this over audio instead of in person. Because he has to pause a moment to grapple with the fact that he knows that this next thing is 100% true;]
I'm sure every one of them would give them up or change them as long as our crew could stay together.

[They're all so.... so much more earnest than he's ever felt like he deserved. Bepo, Shachi, and Penguin have been by his side for literally half of his life. He's just glad he was able to see them all again before getting dragged all the way across time and space.]

[hedonistic]

[He hadn't expected the certainty in Law's voice to hurt as much as it does. There's a temptation to be nasty, to call into question that certainty. He'd been so convinced that none of the other Enforcers could want to go back to that life, after all, and yet Masaoka hadn't been sure. Maybe this guy was wrong about his friends, too.

...

It's funny; when Kagari tries to lean into that pettiness, the urge to lash out to ease his own pain, the words don't come. He really is getting fucking soft, huh? How pathetic.]

Lucky you.

[It's not sarcastic. He's not happy for Law, either--Kagari's too selfish for that--but he does mean it. His voice carries that particular miserable note that suggests something like envy.]

[kikoku]

[At first, Law's just surprised, because lucky is the last thing he'd consider himself with Everything Else he's ever had to deal with. He does have a good, loyal crew. It's been so easy to forget that between having been away from them for a while at home, and then being here.

But then his pessimism kicks in, and he laughs sharply.]

Not much luck when I've been thrown across the universe with no way of knowing if they've been saved, too.
[The Natha may have promised him they'd be saved if he worked for them, but he doesn't have it in him to 100% believe it was a genuine promise.]

[hedonistic]

What, haven't you checked the Stasis Unit yet?

[Kagari, a prickly porcupine that generally prefers to pretend he does not feel feelings past the desire to have fun, has made (1) concession to sentimentality in his nine months here. He goes up to the station and visits his sleeping friends regularly--even talks to them a little if no one is around to hear.]

Did seriously nobody tell you that was a thing?

[kikoku]

No I-
[Wait no he has to clarify first and foremost that he's not an idiot who doesn't know things because god forbid.]

I know about the stasis units. There a lot of people in them, and I don't know how I'm supposed to find my crew among them without Bepo's vivre card.
[Which, he could have swore he had on him the last he remembered being home, but... Oh well.]

[hedonistic]

[Due to being Very Drunk, he's got even less of a filter than usual, which means tact, which very occasionally makes an effort at appearance, is straight up on vacation right now.]

You spend a bunch of time looking, like the rest of us without whatever that vivre bullshit is.

[kikoku]

[UGH. Like, really, he knew this. But the prospect of spending a lot of time searching only to potentially find nothing...]

I don't have time for things like that.
[This sounds legitimate enough, doesn't it?]

[hedonistic]

[He lets out a tch sound. On some level he probably realizes that this guy is just being tsun about his people, but also that type of attitude really pisses him off??]

Your planet imploded. You can't be that busy.

[kikoku]

.....
[God damnit, he's right.]

Well-
[QUICK, FIND AN EXCUSE. COME ON, LAW.]

It doesn't matter right now, anyway. We can't go to the station. --Also, I don't want to hear that judgemental tone from a guy drunkenly rambling at the entire network.

[hedonistic]

[Kagari makes a noise that could be described as the audio equivalent of a shrug.]

You're the one who decided to talk to the drunk guy rambling on the network.

[the judgment gonna continue, sorry bro]

[kikoku]

That-
[He'd thought it would work out fine. Drunk people usually don't have the wherewithal to judge his bad choices too heavily. Clearly he made a mistake but like hell is he going to admit that.]

That's not the point. I'm saying you're clearly not making better decisions than me.

[hedonistic]

[Unfortunately for Law, Kagari is an unusually contrary person, even when drunk.]

And yet, I know where my friends are and you don't.

[kikoku]

[Arguably there are worse kinds of drunk to be. This kind is pretty annoying, though.]
I have a general idea that's exactly as useful as yours is.
[Again, assuming that the Natha have them on the station.

WAIT, HOLD ON, WE NEED TO MAKE ONE THING CLEAR.]
Also, I said my crew. Not friends.

[hedonistic]

[Excuse Kagari, he's just going to laugh like an asshole.]

Keep on telling yourself that, buddy.

[kikoku]

[The one downside of a conversation over the network: he can't be properly threatening.]

I'm telling you because you clearly don't understand the difference between captaining a pirate crew and having friends.

Also, I'm not your buddy. My name is Law.
[There's a joke here about a pirate being named that, probably.]

[hedonistic]

[In fairness to Law, Kagari immediately picked a fight with the biggest and toughest member of his division on literally his first day there.]

Sure there is, buddy. One of those things doesn't make people want to throw their goals away for you, cool ironic pirate name or not.

[did he just squish a joke and a compliment into one. m a y b e.]

[kikoku]

[Nice job sticking to prison rules, Kagari. Anyway;]

I-
[Law has so many objections he doesn't know where to START.]
It's not ironic that's just what my name is. Being a pirate has nothing to do with it.
[Get the easy one out of the way.]

Secondly, you're misconstruing what I said. They're dedicated to the crew, not me specifically.
[Law, even you can't be deep enough in friend-denial to believe that.]

[hedonistic]

[Is he gonna asshole-laugh again? He's gonna asshole laugh again.]

Damn, that's some intense rules-lawyering [get it, LAWyering] you got goin' on there, dude.

But you're part of that crew, so the logic kinda falls apart pretty fast.