VIDEO | UN: Trafalgar

[kikoku]

[The video feed that opens up on Law has a bit of a jarring background of metal and glowing screens, a sight many will recognize as the stasis pods aboard Thesa Station. He's taken an excursion in the midst of everyone's weird forest adventure. He's sitting now on the floor of the chamber, back up against one of the control panels to the pods. It's an especially odd place to be, because if you squint you'll notice that there's a chair within view of where he's sat, yet he's still chosen to remain on the cold metal floor.

He doesn't actually speak right away, simply staring blankly at the feed as if he'd turned it on as an afterthought. When he does speak, it's with a heavy bitterness as if he's been wronged in some way. As far as he's concerned, he has been, but he's certainly not going to speak openly about that.]

Do you ever think maybe we're all dead and this is actually hell? I've been thinking about it and I think it explains a lot about our situation.

[Anyone who's met Law before knows that his resting state is looking vaguely tired. Today is different. This isn't even the sleep deprived tiredness he'd had when he was working overtime tending to the injured months ago in the aftermath of the dragon. No, this is something different, an emotional exhaustion, manifesting as a redness around the eyes rather than just his usual dark circles.

Comments

[thedarkbond]

why did you make it a video then... (・_・ヾ
there's no shame in being sad

[This just became kaomoji support group, somehow. It's even easier than usual for Ren to act cutesy over text.]

hmm...no (｡･~･｡)
purgatory is meant to be boring, right?
this place isn't boring (✿˘艸˘✿)

[kikoku]

It's meant to be a middle ground between heaven and hell, not "boring."

[Law has no idea what those clusters of characters are but he's not in the mood to invite further discussion by asking, at the moment.]

And I'm not "ashamed" of anything, I just don't want to talk about it.
[That's basically admitting he is sad, though.]

[thedarkbond]

（´-`）.｡oO(no, i'm pretty sure it's meant to be boring...)
it's kind of like a waiting room except bigger, right?

[Ren is actually a bit of a history buff, so he has some knowledge on the subject of purgatory and equivalents, and all of them sound kind of dull to him.]

but people are going to ask, you know, this seems pretty soul-searchy and like the kind of thing a sad person would ask (๑°⌓°๑)

[kikoku]

[For someone used to spending most of his time traveling, this does sort of seem like a glorified waiting room, but he won't get into that. He just stares at Ren's messages for a long moment, thinking about what's the correct response here.]

So what.
Are you going to do something about it?
[The implicit meaning here is of course that there's nothing to be done about it. Therefore, no point talking about it.]

[thedarkbond]

well, i won't know how much i can do about it without knowing what it is... (´•ω•`๑)
so you'd have to tell me first

[Clearly this is the best and most effective way of getting information out of someone. He doesn't quite know Law well enough to know how to properly manipulate him.]

[kikoku]

[He's not willing to talk about it without further direct badgering, so instead he's going to try to change the subject.]

Why do you keep adding a bunch of random characters at the ends of your messages.

[thedarkbond]

they're faces~
like this is a worried face （●´･△･｀）
for worrying about people who are clearly sad about something but won't talk about it

[He's just going to stick to the original topic there...]

[kikoku]

[NO Law refuses to let you go back on topic.]

If you wanted to make stupid faces at me why did you switch from video to text

[If he just refuses to acknowledge the redirect there's nothing Ren can do about it.]

[thedarkbond]

because these ones are more effective, right? (。「´-ω・)ﾝ？
i can coax you into telling me about why you're sad better this way ԅ( ˘ω˘ ԅ)

[Let the great redirect wars of 20-whatever-year-it-is-on-Nysa begin.]

[kikoku]

I can’t even tell what most of them are supposed to be
That’s hardly more effective.

And I’m not going to tell you why I’m sad.
[At least he’s no longer even trying to argue that he isn’t sad?]

[thedarkbond]

well, you won't learn by seeing less of them, right? ʅ(*´◡`)ʃ
and you even admitted you're sad now...
it seems kind of weird to hide why (一。一;;）

[kikoku]

Maybe I don't want to talk about it
especially not with some random stranger

[He's met Ren once but that really doesn't count as far as he's concerned.]

Seeing a lot of them doesn't help me figure them out when you don't even explain what they're supposed to be.

[thedarkbond]

if you can't tell what they are then you're not looking hard enough... (︶︹︶)

and i'm not a stranger
we've met each other before ●︿●

[kikoku]

Meeting once isn't enough to rule you out as a potential future enemy.

[Surely this is a healthy way to approach relationships with others.]

[thedarkbond]

that doesn't sound like a very fun way to live...（●´･△･｀）
is it that serious?

[kikoku]

Living isn't fun it's hard and we're all just slowly dying.

[He's become particularly nihilistic in his poor mood.]

[thedarkbond]

wow, you're really pessimistic... (๑•﹏•)
sounds like you need someone to talk to~