lostcarnival | just gotta ignite the light and let it shine

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just gotta ignite the light and let it shine

Who: Everyone who's stupid enough to show up for this, because legal drinking ages are for people from a different century/planet.
When: Afternoon/Evening, Day 30
Where: Lakeshore
What: Local Carnival workers get wasted and set off fireworks by the lake.
Warnings: Carnival shenanigans, ie. booze, drugs, and people getting set on fire probably. Put any tag-specific warnings in your headers!

So, Wismuth happened.

Lambert's pretty willing to bet a good chunk of the Carnival is pretty happy to act like Wismuth didn't happen, but he also doesn't really care about what sorrows people are drowning or not tonight: he knows he needed this drink, and after he'd slept off the immediate exhaustion that came with running around Wismuth for nearly two weeks with the power of Creation more or less constantly burning through him, he's ready to something, anything to feel like himself again.

Fast-forward to the lakeshore. There's a huge bonfire going, a box of assorted fireworks that's been 'liberated' from wherever the hell engineering keeps their supplies, and probably a crate of wine that's going to disappear sooner rather than later. Anything else, someone's going to have to bring themselves.

[ ooc: This is a mingle log! Bring your own entertainment, food, questionable substances etc. ]

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While Helvetica did get the point across, she wasn't always the best on details, which leaves Sans to fill in the blanks. It's tiring. Even after sleeping in an egg for days, he's still tired. That's the feeling it always ends up coming back to, more than fear or sorrow or anything else.

He rolls his shoulders, all four of them, and gingerly flexes his lower arms. It's going to take a while to get used to this. It's a lot to take in.

"Nah. Not the murdery stuff," Sans agrees, because it's not really what he, or Helvetica, meant. Being worried that Papyrus or Sistina would want to kill anyone is ridiculous. "It's just..."

Helvetica lands in one of his eye sockets, offering her physical support.

"The reasons you said... because of how much people were hurting all the time, and how it would be better if it stopped..." He exhales, slowly. "That's... a pretty crap way to feel."

If it weren't for still being a little bit drunk, a little bit stoned, and a goose, Papyrus would probably find that new set of arms more alarming. Even Sistina's alarmed enough, by the rest of all this, that it barely gives them a twinge of worry.

"...Oh," Papyrus realizes, slumping and looking to the ground. "That stuff." It would almost be easier to talk about the fratricide, or the hopelessness of brainwashing, or anything besides... the emotions he almost recognizes in himself, sometimes. Ones he always avoids acknowledging.

"It's... It is very crap," Sistina agrees, starting up the hand-wringing again as Papyrus goes silent, wilted at her side. "The worst kind of mercy... Giving up. And we hate... feeling like that. That's why we never stop! Always... doing something, hoping something will work out..."

Unlike their brother, for too long. Or some other monsters they met, during their time as king.

And that was the factor that had been changed, and it was enough that it made Papyrus's ethics almost unrecognizable. Giving up and stopping were two things that Papyrus didn't really do. That absence of hope had been hard to swallow.

Is that why he still feels so flat inside, despite knowing that this was more of a terrible accident than any personal betrayal?

"Yeah, I probably would have done the same thing, in your place," Sans says, more casually than it deserves. "It'd be more in character, anyway. I know I'm kinda..."

How does he say this without being an asshole about it? He doesn't meant to be, but its honestly just the truth, isn't it?

"...The stuff I ended up doing is pretty much everything you don't want to be, right?"

"Not, uh, everything..." But Sistina's expression betrays unhappy agreement, hands still fidgeting.

Between years of keeping secrets about their father and loss, to evading his brother's well-intentioned concerns with jokes, to his new - or increased - willingness to use silent violence in problem solving...

Sans is a lot of things Papyrus tries not to be.

"Mostly because I see how you feel about what you do," he says, slightly muffled from where he's burrowed face onto feathers. "And, what you don't do! So, I do differently."

Which isn't truly news. They've talked before about Sans' sadness, Papyrus' concerns. Plenty of scoldings through the years, some effective enough, most not so much. But maybe they haven't spoken quite this openly, or had the new context for it all.

"But, I never imagined... how much it could hurt, to choose good things. Or believe in things. If it's even a little bit like that, for you...

The disgust and pain had been overwhelming. It had seemed unthinkable, to go back to his old self. Maybe he could have believed, maybe. But it would have been an exhausting challenge.

It's what Sans wanted. Or, at least, he thought it was. He would be all these things so that Papyrus didn't have to - or so he explained it to himself. Things have changed over time, leaving him less and less sure about what he actually does want.

"Believing in stuff... it feels like this instinct or reflex. You can't think your way into believing. It's just something you do, or... you don't."

Sans has a more musing tone as he speaks, now, though there's still a heavy note of melancholy.

"I don't know how to be better at it. I lost it at some point, and... I don't think it's ever really gunna come back. Maybe that's fine. I dunno."

Maybe Papyrus has more practical experience with that feeling now than he ever did before.

More than he ever did before, certainly. That was the first time he wasn't able to force himself to some kind of real optimism. He just kept spiraling into greater frustration, so much more consistently than he did in any adolescent tantrums, until it was real anger and fear of himself. And then, well.

"I don't think that's true. I-I mean, maybe it's fine! It's not great, but, it is better than other things..."

Kind of like 'hoping' their father is dead rather than suffering and unrecoverable. It still seems pretty terrible to him, but 'better'... In a way that, now that he thinks about it, seems like the twisted mercy he was wishing for before. Which makes it especially unapalatable.

He shudders, feathers fluffing out, and clambers to stand up.

"But, it came back for me. It's not effortless... I think my way into it all the time, and practice a lot, and maybe it's easier for me... But I think you still have something, too. You didn't want to join me, then. You still..."

Fundamentally wanted to live, and hoped Papyrus could be saved. It was something.

Helvetica, for now, is silent. Maybe because Sans is saying everything that needs to be said, for once. Helvetica doesn't feel sad about things the same way he does, but it doesn't really matter. They're still the same soul.

"...I kinda hated how good it sounded, for a minute. If you hadn't been trying to drag everyone else into it... it'd be a hell of a lot harder to disagree."

He feels uncomfortable, admitting that. He doesn't want to make it sound like he's looking for attention, because he's not, but... not wanting attention going towards his issues has been a lot of what's kept him silent over the years.

"I think there's plenty to stick around for. The world isn't a hopeless place, there's just... some hopeless people, maybe." He can have hope for other people, just not himself. "I've always been kind of freaked out, that... that something would happen that would make you end up like me."

He's staring down at the ripples in the water.

"But it's never happened. Not now, and not in any of the stuff I remember."

"...Oh," Papyrus says, a little flat with trying not to emote at all. "It's... really is that much, sometimes, for you..."

It's just as well Sans isn't looking up at them. With him not wanting the attention, he probably really wouldn't want to see their dismayed faces staring at him. Not the slight tremble to jaw and beak as they try to put on brave fronts, nor the lasting worry to Sistina's expression.

They'd hoped they were wrong. That Papyrus' pointed comment back then was offtrack.

Sistina gulps and sits down, in range where she could whisper things, maybe keep them private. Helvetica going out of sight is almost out of mind, and it feels more like the skeletons should be talking to each other. Papyrus stands all the taller, for all he doesn't even manage three feet like this.

"W-Well! Let me first, just for reminding emphasis, say: please don't ever take me up on such an offer. No matter how exclusive it is! I would only ever offer... were something really, really wrong with me."

As Sans must know, with all those memories. Though the notion that Papyrus has never gotten like Sans, in any of them...

Maybe there really is something that different, that wrong, with Sans.

The feeling that there is something wrong with you in particular that makes things impossible while other people succeed is a common one, and Sans is self-aware enough to know that at least part of it has to be an illusion. He's not special.

So... by that same token, where does he get off feeling and acting like this while other people carry on? He raises one of his hands and rubs his face with it, trying to sort out his thoughts.

"I wouldn't... bro." His mind races trying to think of how to deny that. "I would never... do that to you. I don't even..."

His other three hands make vague grasping gestures at the air, like he's trying to pluck out the right words.

"I'm glad I'm still here. I'm glad... that I asked the RM to watch out for me. It was just... a lot to deal with. And when you were the one telling me I should quit..."

He's not yet sure how else to bridge the gap between the conflicting things Sans is saying. And they surely conflict. Sans wouldn't ever, but it was tempting. He's happy to be alive, hopeful for other people, but convinced he can't be well or happy. Something happened to make Sans this way, but none of the awful possibilities he remembers ever hurt Papyrus similarly...

Either Sans is wrong that he can't get better, or he's right that there's something wrong with him. It's easy enough to conclude the former and loudly proclaim it, but... Papyrus doesn't want to disbelieve his brother, when he's being this honest.

Plus, now the slight distraction of seeing those all those moving hands doesn't help him focus. Not with the haunting familiarity of multiple hands weaving words.

Papyrus shakes it off with a shake of his head.

"No, I get that! You were overwhelmed! It was a terrible change for me. And, at the time, I... wanted to, and thought it was best, for everyone. Who wouldn't be half-convinced! S-So..."

Wow, that's both too honest and not what he wants to focus on. He coughs a little honk of a sound to distract from it.

"I'm glad you didn't, too. I'm relieved. I just... want to think you're a little mistaken. About whether you can or can't... improve at that reflex. If what it's like for you is... so different than what it's like for me... Maybe somebody else's methods would work for you, better than mine."

Therein lies the rub. Sans's own thoughts are conflicting enough of the time, with his rational mind competing with the illness that haunts him. He's a person naturally attuned to facts, but knowing something isn't the same as knowing it.

See? Just like that. Maybe Papyrus is right. Maybe him settling on the idea that he's never going to get better is just another way of giving up.

He coughs out a little laugh.

"Sounds like a smart idea," he admits. He's still got that half-hearted tone, but he's clearly exerting an effort. Not everyone is going to have the same way of dealing with things, so not necessarily trying to follow Papyrus's direct route is just logical. "...I'm not trying to make things hard, honest."

His tail swishes through the water. Helvetica emerges from his eyesocket for a moment to speak.

"Sans is troubled by irrational thinking more often than he would like to admit," she says. "He's not always the best judge of what is possible and what isn't... the most productive response seems to be believing the way he feels while not necessarily believing those feelings are objective truth."

She hates to see Papyrus struggle with this as much as Sans does.

"I believe you," Sistina says - to Sans, first. But she nods at Helvetica. "We could ask around, for ideas. That way we can still help, and you can know that we are. Without any trouble with what you're feeling or what's true."

It's unanimous; they all hate seeing the others having trouble. No wonder the brothers' strategy, for years, was to too-frequently brush things off with irrelevancies and jokes.

But... Sans is here, listening to his brother's concerns and sharing his own. They're talking. Even if it's half-hearted, it's really something.

It's such an improvement over a couple of years ago that Papyrus wants to beam, and he hops in place.

"It's not a hardship, don't worry about that. I'm full of smart ideas! And asking for help, that's one of the smartest ideas there is." Obviously, since he had it.

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just gotta ignite the light and let it shine

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