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[evocation]

@kyna.medina | ■ ▲ ◌ ▼

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@nathan.lowell / backdated to, idk, the 4th?

[acheless]

Hey

[ That's it, that's the text. ]

[evocation]

[Has Kyna been avoiding reaching out to him? Yep. Does this message inspire a combination of relief and instant anxiety in her? Absolutely.]

hey
what's up?

[Perfect.]

[acheless]

How's your hand

[ Would it have been better or worse if he'd just said We need to talk? ]

[evocation]

it's okay
i've had worse
how's your arm?

[acheless]

Hurts less than yesterday, better tomorrow
You got a minute?

[evocation]

[Oh, God. Here it comes.]

yeah

[acheless]

Do you remember anything?
From when the slug took over

[evocation]

yeah
i remember all of it
why?

[acheless]

Been thinking about it some

[ Really clear and detailed responses here, folks. ]

You holding up ok?

[evocation]

[There's a pause before she replies.]

i don't know

[It's not a complete lie, but it is a bit of a dodge. She isn't sure how to tell him that she feels like shit, to be honest.]

[acheless]

Really don't know
Or you want me to drop it?

[ Hard to read tone through text. But he's not trying to... interrogate her, or anything. Not really why he reached out. ]

[evocation]

[Kyna wrestles with that for a moment. She could take the out. She really wants to take the out, but she doesn't want to lie to him again, and something about his straightforward bluntness always makes it harder to weasel out of these discussions.]

no, i'm
i don't know where to start, i guess
and i bet you've got enough to worry about, right?

[acheless]

Don't do that.

[ He'll be the judge of that, thanks. Truth is, worry's a lot easier to stomach than the alternative. ]

Start from the beginning
Always helps.

[evocation]

[Ughhh.]

you heard about the sim, right?

[acheless]

Yeah
Little bit

[evocation]

[He might be one of the few people who can get this, actually. How pathetic she feels without her magic, even if she's not ready to say that.]

it fucking sucked
and i couldn't do shit during it
i was just
you know
stuck
and i thought that maybe this whole thing would be better
because i deal with monsters at home all the time, right?
but it wasn't

[acheless]

Yeah.
I know the feeling.

That what you're worried about
Being dead weight?

[evocation]

yeah
i guess so

[It's partially that, and partially the constant loss of control, but she's still trying to work through that.]

[acheless]

Or you still twisted up from the sim?

[ Feels a little like that "guess so" should have a "but" or an "and" in here, is all. ]

[evocation]

both
i think

[acheless]

Could lie to you, if you want.
Say it gets easier going without
That you'll adjust.

[evocation]

[She doesn't want him to lie to her, but... Wait, what?]

has this happened to you before?

[acheless]

[ It's a while, a long one, before his reply comes through: ]

Yeah.
Not this. But close.

[evocation]

[Her mind scrambles to reassess—all the conversations she'd thought they were on the same page about and hadn't been. Not quite, anyway. He knows this loss even more intimately than she does.]

what happened?

[acheless]

You busy right now?

[ Nathan, suddenly and viscerally, fucking hates neural networks and screens. ]