Open Post

[formidable]

MUSELIST This a post where I'll RP anything with you! Got a scenario in mind? I'LL DO IT. If you wanna chat IDEAS.GIF, contact me at maiscribbles or my Discord (Maiscribbles#6780). Have at it! ➢ Cool Mood Music No. 1 ➤ Cool Mood Music No. 2

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[emotive]

[Ai is heartened by his reply and she looks ahead instead of down at her feet.]

It's something I look forward too. With how I grew up, I'm so used to people's preconceptions and following disappointments with me.

[For all she was, she isn't enough. But she couldn't let that bind her.]

But there are people who won't see me like that even after they get to know me. I have to believe that much.

What about you? Is there anyone like that for you Sephiroth?

[supersoldier]

[The answer is no, so resoundingly simple that it would reveal much about himself, about the kind of life fashioned for him. But he’s fine with it, in a way — made to adapt, made to always be separate from the rest. Special, different.

And yet a weighted pause still settles between her question and his reply.]

...My situation is different than most. I was raised by a company, not a family. Even fellow comrades on the battlefield, they—

[They cannot relate to him. Not his childhood years, the laboratory days and nights, not what he can do now. He’s lauded as a hero, as untouchable, and perhaps that manifests itself as true with enough repetition.

...What is he saying? Too much. He parses it down.]

How they see me is how I am meant to be seen. In the end, it’s one and the same.

[emotive]

... Hm.

[They were beginning to sound very similar in some aspects. Although Ai would refer to some people in her commune as family members (her "sister" and "Grandmother"), it wasn't a family, blood relations aside.

She wants to ask, "Does that have to be true? Is that what you want?" The esper refrains from doing so, preferring to see where this journey through the thankless labyrinth takes them.]

Well, if it means anything, so far I think you're more approachable than I initially thought. It might just be because of... [She makes a hand gesture aimed at their surroundings.]

... All this. But! I trust myself with you. You helped me back there after all even if you're rather stoic. That's probably one of your good points!

[supersoldier]

How flattering.

[Lilted with his usual dry humor, buoying itself up before he buries it again.]

But good to know, given our circumstances. Keep a level head and maybe I’ll trust you to fight without having to look over my shoulder, too.

And by the way—

[Bluntly:] Stay behind me.