shiftingwinds | [7rings] catchall for douman

...

[Why, indeed?]

Because even when I was trapped in my own body...I believed in your goodness. You seemed like someone...with a good heart.

...

[yeah, she hears that past tense]

I'm sorry to have disappointed you, then.

[They close their eyes, looking pained.]

Was it all a lie, Qingxuan? Was everything you shared with that man, that other version of myself...was it just you trying to gain sympathy?

[hurt flashes across her face, but - their eyes are closed! so they won't see it. she looks down.]

No, it wasn't.

...

[They open their eyes to look at her.]

I think I just realized...I don't know who you are, Qingxuan. You're someone who...murdered someone else. And then you had the gall to tell people about that power of yours, saying you'd switch yourself with someone else if you had to, and...

[A frown, and a pause.]

If you really wanted to use it, you would have. For your own sin. Instead of using it as a way to get sympathy from others who didn't know what you had done.

I'd already been told I couldn't use it to bring her back.

[surprise! she tried.]

...but aside from that, I didn't who would help most. I wasn't trying to get their sympathy. I had to say it publicly so that any of you on your side thought of someone who could help bring you all back by being here, I could make the switch. Otherwise, how would anyone have even known it was an option...?

Told?

[That's an interesting choice of word.]

Well, when we saw that, all we saw was...everyone rushing to comfort you and forbid you from using it. [And a sigh.] It didn't look like an opportunity to use. It just looked like...something terribly selfish and manipulative. Eleanor especially took it hard.

Told, yes. I asked the Avatar who gave me the power about how I could use it - I had wanted to make sure that if I used it, it wouldn't cause a trial.

[she trusts nothing about this godforsaken place. she would not at all put it past it to have any death, even one that's a swap for another person, be the reason a trial starts.]

...bringing her back wasn't an option because of the reason I was asked to kill her in the first place.

[...]

...that wasn't my intention, but if that's how it made her feel, then I messed up. I just didn't know how else to tell you the power was something that could even be used.

...Wait. The reason you were asked?

[This is new information. Their eyebrows furrowed.]

Even if that was your intention, we couldn't have reacted to it. Our letters only came in the last two weeks, and were obscured, anyways. And I'm sure that if we sent a letter saying "please send Qingxuan over", your friends here would have put a stop to that.

[she nods]

They told me that what had happened to Nathan was going to happen to her, too, and it was too late to prevent it by helping her indulge. And that it would be... extremely bad... for all of us as a whole if it happened again.

[eleanor was the one person on the track vs the five people on the other track in the trolley problem]

...I thought maybe someone would say so when Medb used the mirror. Or - I wasn't sure of the exact timing of your letters. Some came on different days... or maybe we just heard about them on different days?

If it had come to me, I would have used it. [...] But... that's only an "if," right? It didn't work out that way.

[so, she gets it - it's easy to say i would have done that, now that the time to have done it is past.]

...What?

[They know what happened to Nathan, but...]

[That makes them frown, expression troubled.]

Nathan was killed for not indulging. So even...indulging wouldn't have saved her? Who told you this?

[This makes everything all the more complicated.]

We didn't even know they came on different days...so you see, our communication was flawed from the start. [And a sigh.] And it didn't, no.

Envy did.

[she looks down.]

He said that she'd... fallen too far behind, too fast, and that it was making everyone else's count for less. [...] I heard from one of the others, later, that if I'd said no, they would have asked someone else to do it.

But I didn't say no. [she sighs] In the end, it's a choice I made, and it hurt her. I should take responsibility for that.

Envy...

[That actually makes them blink with surprise, before their expression shifts to sullen. Envy, indeed...]

That's... [A low sigh.] Yes. You should. You dodged it for long enough, Qingxuan. You have to repent. It may have...had good intentions, and was done to help others, but it...it still what it is.

Whatever the reason, murder is still murder.

[she agrees with them.]

...

Why didn't you confess it before, Qingxuan?

I couldn't.

[...]

I mean that literally. When I tried to, the words would not come out.

[Narrowing their eyes.]

What do you mean by that?

I mean that every time I tried to say something about it, I literally could not speak. I wasn't able to say a word of it until Eleanor came back today.

[DOESN'T KNOW IF THEY DOUBT THIS OR NOT]

How come the others could confess?

Maybe because they weren't asked by an Avatar to kill...?

[not being able to confess has been

frustrating

to say the least.]

...I'll ask Envy about it.

[Just to hear it from the man himself.]

Qingxuan...do you also know of what Ming Yi did?

[that's fair enough

but at the next question - she shakes her head]

I didn't know. [...] After we got the letter, I... asked, and he told me that he hadn't.

[and, stupidly, she believed him.]

...

[There's a hard look from Douman.]

Did you know that he's done that before?

After the week we saw each other's memories, I knew he was a ghost. [...] And in our world, ghosts can absorb the power of other ghosts by devouring them.

[she looks down on her hands]

I didn't consider that was something that might happen here, though.

[because 1. kaz isn't a ghost and 2. they're all depowered, so what would be the use in devouring him?]

...A ghost?

[Something worried settles in their expression.]

He's no longer of the living?

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