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"Helloooo! You've reached Jaune Arc! If I'm not answering, it means I'm probably off somewhere fighting monsters or... doing something really awesome like saving a cat, or the president's son! You know how it is, a leader's schedule can be really hectic nowadays, ha ha! Just kidding, I'm probably in school, but I'd totally do those things if I ha-- [BEEP]"
[ TEXT | VOICE | VIDEO | ACTION ]
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This all makes him feel distinctly his age, younger than even, reverting back all of those years of training back to that wide-eyed and too-naive thirteen-year-old running away from home and more prone to tears than he'll ever say aloud.
He knows he should say something. He's trying to. But somehow, without having to put a face to anything, it's easier to disconnect. To push the important part off and pretend, just as it seems he's meant to.]
Yeah that's totally it.
Scary huh?
All that work and I end up stuck in a machi--
Wait no that's--
[Just as bad as being told he's turning into the monster he's always been so wary of. Scratch that, that idea's even worse.]
Can you even haunt somebody over text?
Sounds like a bad movie.
[
One he might have actually paid money for before now.]no subject
WHO IS THIS
YOURE NOT FUNNY
THAT PHONE BELONGS TO MY FRIEND
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[It's sweet, really. Too much so for Zack to keep up the tone of flippancy when it's overridden with guilt. It may be easier for Zack himself to process, but it's hurtful in a way he doesn't intend. He doesn't deserve this kind of devotion: he hasn't earned it, aside from dying in the kid's arms, and he's been there.
He'd be more than a little pissed off too. (All he can hope for is that nothing else here quite shares his face, to continue to rub salt into that wound that never closes. No one deserves that.)]
Look, I don't know how to explain it
OH WAIT
uh
promise me you won't have a heart attack though okay?
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are you a cyborg
[ This conversation needs an adult. ]
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A promise or nothing man
No heart attacks
1/2
Wait, let's focus on one thing at a time. ]
i promise!!
and an orc never goes back on his word
[ Now he's gonna have to think of another way to die when he's old, thanks Zack. ]
2/2
that was supposed to say arc
[ Way to ruin his catch phrase, autocorrect. ]
[VIDEO!!!]
Don't cry, Fair.]Okay, but first things first, what's an orc?
[PRIORITIES. But to be fair, it wouldn't have autocorrected if the device hadn't recognized it as a word.]
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[ Jaune fumbles and drops his CereVice the moment he registers the other guy's face, and when he comes back on the screen again, it shows Jaune on his knees as he screams into his device. Apparently there's no time to stand up again after picking it up, because this need to be addressed now! ]
Zack, I don't understand--!!
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[The smile is stiffer than it ought to be. It doesn't make any sense, but at least he's not the only one thinking so anymore, and Jaune is more than confirmation that what happened wasn't just a hallucination.
Someone else remembers.]
I'm--
["Okay"? "Fine"? Neither of those sound true, and he certainly doesn't feel fine, even in the context of a white lie. "Breathing" is technically accurate, but doesn't instill much in the way of confidence. And "I keep seeing it happen, over and over again" feels far too melodramatic, and isn't something he really wants to admit aloud, over a CEREVICE of all things, when CERES is at the root of his distrust.]
--here. I don't know how it works.
[Just that it shouldn't.
He pauses again before adding:] Are you doing okay?
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I've never seen anyone go out the way you did before, and I had nobody to talk about it 'cause there were so many other things going on. But... I'm glad you're okay now! [ Even if it doesn't make sense, they should count their blessings, really. ]
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Difference is, he's always had a shoulder to cry on, or at the very least, stutter at until he finds the way around the proper words with a twisted tongue.
Nothing about this, it seems, has been fair.]
You sure you don't need to talk it out? I hear that helps.
[Which as just as much a way of asking for himself as anything, but if he's the mentor figure here--and he seems to be--it won't do to break down easily when he's supposed to be the pillar or role model or...hero, really.
That is meant for quiet solitude, in a place that's harder for prying, overseeing eyes to find access.]
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[ It was a horrific image, one he had to push down in order to keep moving. Thankfully, it seems a little easier to think about it now, knowing this has a happy ending of sorts. ]
Did it... hurt?
S-Sorry, that was a stupid question...
this is old af i'm sorry
[It's a flimsy start and a terrible answer. He knows both of these things, and yet, finding a way to articulate it without sounding like he's either lobbying for pity or trying to brush it off entirely is difficult. His heart might as well be sewn out on his sleeve, sure enough, but tact is another thing entirely.]
Didn't feel anything after a while, if that makes it any better?
[Which is also a duh answer, considering the outcome of that whole catastrophe.]
Everyone else was--you were okay, right? Worth it, however it felt, if no one else had to deal with it.
[Even if nothing in that explains just how he's even having this conversation when he should be very, very not present. Still, he's starting to look about as worn as he sounds, and the optimistic sincerity that would usually make such a sentiment easier to swallow by virtue of how ridiculous it sounded has started to fade.]
no probs!