All of a sudden, those stepping stones coalesce into a bridge of bright fire, lighting up the way to a conclusion he can't help but perceive, no matter how much he might wish he couldn't.]
You mean I didn't kill him.
[Your eyes! You got them fixed?]
I failed to kill him.
[He's certain, he's absolutely certain, that at the end of whatever confrontation they must have been escalating towards, only one of them would've walked away alive. And if he had won, then Ardyn would be dead.
It begs the question: would Ardyn have left him alive? Defeated, but alive?
The answer is all too easy to see here, too.
Of course he would've. Injured, defeated, failed, broken — and alive, to comprehend it.
You got them fixed?]
...Then that's it.
[Of course. It makes sense now. And thank goodness for years and years of learning how to school his emotions, how to set them aside and be cold and rational and emotionless in moments when he'd otherwise want to fall apart, because if this isn't one of them, then he hardly knows what is.]
no subject
All of a sudden, those stepping stones coalesce into a bridge of bright fire, lighting up the way to a conclusion he can't help but perceive, no matter how much he might wish he couldn't.]
You mean I didn't kill him.
[Your eyes! You got them fixed?]
I failed to kill him.
[He's certain, he's absolutely certain, that at the end of whatever confrontation they must have been escalating towards, only one of them would've walked away alive. And if he had won, then Ardyn would be dead.
It begs the question: would Ardyn have left him alive? Defeated, but alive?
The answer is all too easy to see here, too.
Of course he would've. Injured, defeated, failed, broken — and alive, to comprehend it.
You got them fixed?]
...Then that's it.
[Of course. It makes sense now. And thank goodness for years and years of learning how to school his emotions, how to set them aside and be cold and rational and emotionless in moments when he'd otherwise want to fall apart, because if this isn't one of them, then he hardly knows what is.]
You remember whatever it is he did to me, then.