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[evocation]

@kyna.medina | ■ ▲ ◌ ▼

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[lifetothefullest]

What a coincidence, same answer.

[But that said--]

Have you been able to get any rest?

[evocation]

not really
but i've been trying, so you don't have to scold me

[That's teasing, and she hopes it translates over text.]

what about you?

[lifetothefullest]

When do I ever scold?

[He's also joking.]

There's a lot to do, especially with more people arriving all the time.

[So not really, but whatever.]

[evocation]

oh my god, lance
take a nap

[lifetothefullest]

I'll sleep when I'm dead.

Oh wait.

[evocation]

i don't think really bad jokes are a good coping mechanism

[lifetothefullest]

They're psychologist-approved.

[evocation]

have you hit your head recently?

[lifetothefullest]

Not that I remember, though I guess that doesn't mean much.

[But more seriously--]

I'm tired, so things are probably funnier to me than they should be.

[But he stands by the morbid joke. That was a good one.

But still, her not laughing is suspicious.]

Is there something going on besides, you know, the obvious thing?

[evocation]

it was funny
sorry
everyone's just being a huge asshole right now
i asked sam if he wanted to help out with the people coming back and he acted like i wanted him to kill a puppy

[lifetothefullest]

[Huh, that's not what he was expecting.]

What do you mean?

[evocation]

uh, let me see if i can quote him
"no one helped us, why should we help them?"
"i'm not here to cut trees down for orphans"
"i never said i was a saint"
"i didn't get these people killed and i'm not going to wander around new amsterdam cleaning up after them"
i've got more if you want

[lifetothefullest]

[...Weird. Lance doesn't know Sam super well, and although they get along intermittently it's not like they're really friends. But something still seems off about this to him, not that he thinks Kyna is lying or anything, but just that his intuition is going off that there's something underlying here.

Then again he really is very tired, so he may be totally wrong.]

That's really blatantly callous; he just said that to you? Was it just in response to the idea of helping out in general, or something more specific?

[evocation]

i thought maybe there was something else
like he was still fucked up from the aerie
but when i asked he just kept doubling down
no matter how much i tried to get it
and either way he was shitty about it

[lifetothefullest]

You're probably right; he probably is still messed up from the Aerie, and isn't willing to talk about it. I think that's the case for a lot of people, and the idea of trying to figure out how to deal with all of that while helping other people go through it is overwhelming to them.

Not that that excuses him being a jerk to you, but if I had to guess I think he was being purposefully blunt and combative to try to scare you off so he could avoid talking about the real issue.

[And maybe he's giving Sam too much benefit of the doubt here, but he's just very generally worried about Displaced--and the native citizens returning, too--feeling forced into helping with this crisis when they're victims of it themselves. It's a difficult position to be in.]

[evocation]

yeah, well
something tells me he's not going to apologize

[lifetothefullest]

He might not, but do you want this to be the thing that breaks up your friendship? After everything that just happened?

I'm not saying forgive him immediately or anything; we're all under a lot of stress and you have every right to be mad. Just that if I had to guess I'd say he probably didn't really mean any of it, if that makes a difference.

[evocation]

i don't know
i'm exhausted
and i'm sick of everything being so hard

[lifetothefullest]

Yeah. This whole thing is really difficult.

But at least we're here, right?

[evocation]

yeah
and we're okay, right?

[lifetothefullest]

We're okay.

There are things we should talk about, but they can wait.

[evocation]

okay

[Weirdly, that's kind of a relief. It isn't that she doesn't want to talk about it, just that she knows she's so wiped she'd stumble through it if they tried right now.]

i'm glad
i missed you

[lifetothefullest]

I missed you too.

[evocation]

[It's a little thing, but it makes her feel a thousand times better.]

are you gonna come home and sleep or do i have to knock you out?

[lifetothefullest]

Like you could reach high enough to knock me out.