You asked if I knew about chevaliers, I said yes. We agreed that she'd said she didn't want to remember him when she thought he was dead. We disagreed about why she hadn't wanted to remember him, because we were told different things.
[ And then Yuri asked a couple of questions because he didn't want to accidentally tell Red something that Saya might have wanted him not to, because Saya was and is his priority over Red. Something he's very sure Red would agree with and understand. ]
The rest of this conversation has been about you insisting you were gonna find Haji with or without her consent, and with or without her knowledge.
[ When you weren't busy making assumptions about and insulting him, anyway. ]
You said, outright, him being dead or alive didn't matter for her not wanting to remember. That she didn't want her feelings for him to mess with her current relationships.
I had to convince you him being alive did matter. That it did change things.
That is a fundamental difference in our understandings of her and her Chevaliers.
And that difference has made us have two extremely different conversations.
So, not only do you think that's what I was saying, you think you managed to convince me otherwise. And you think the proof is that I "no longer" want you to lie to her.
Is that. What you're telling me right now?
[ because appaaaaarently the communication so far here has been a steady 0%, so now we have to triple check ]
I don't know, maybe some of the words I was actually saying?
[ Dragging a hand down his face. ]
Look. You wanted advice on how to tell her, I've already given it. You don't like that advice, fine: that's your right. You want to ask someone else? [ Dare he hope her husband. ] Go for it.
But when you tell him what I said, you'd better get it right. I told you to be honest with her about what you're doing before you make a move, and I told you to listen if — for whatever reason — she doesn't want you to go looking. That is the sum total of my advice.
[ If Red tries to interrupt here, Yuri will hold up a hand. ]
Is that unfair to him? Would it be cruel of her? Would it hurt both of them? Yeah. Maybe. To the version of him that's alone, anyway.
[ Because fuckin multiverses, how do they work. There's probably plenty of versions of her world where she never left it. And he has to believe that the Flynn he met in Imeeji isn't out there somewhere looking for him, or he'll go crazy. ]
But you have that conversation with her first. You convince her that this is what she needs to do. You get her on board for the reunion before you send out engraved invitations.
I don't know what all your powers can do. I've been assuming you can't hop dimensions right now. [ Surely you would've left Ellipsa as soon as you arrived! ] If all you want to do here is find some way to confirm he's still alive before you talk to her — go for it. That's not the kind of lie I've been arguing against.
[ And the thought that it might be all Red really wanted is exhausting. ]
But if you were planning on bringing him here and springing him on her without being three hundred percent sure she both wants and is ready for that — then I think you'd be setting them both up for the only pain worse than having part of your soul torn out.
[ It's one thing to have a hole inside where they used to be when you can at least tell yourself they'd be with you if they could. It's another thing to face the rejection. ]
In what world does 'she doesn't want to remember' translate to anything, but 'its a bad idea to tell her?' Because the last time she told me she doesn't want to know something, not telling her was the right option. She gave me a research journal and she has been quite happy with me not telling her a damn thing about what's in it.
But those variables never changed.
If you didn't mean for that to be don't tell her, whatever you were "actually saying" [Complete with air quotes] was as clear as the deepest park of the ocean. A clarity you have yet to provide, by the way.
That has been my point of conflict. Telling her isn't a matter of if. It's always been when.
Do I do it sooner, when I don't have a guaranteed answer? Do I bet that the evidence is as strong as I believe and I'm not simply being arrogant? Do I risk her heartbreak on my perception?
Or do I wait until I can offer a reunion, or at least closure? And hope this place doesn't drag out my suspicions before that.
[So be exhausted, Yuri, that is actually all he wanted.]
I'm not going to tell anyone I talked to you. Or tell her. Whatever consequences there are for this revelation, I'm not putting any blame for my decision on others. Unless it goes real swimmingly, I guess, and then you're the savior from my own neurosis, but doesn't seem likely.
But I suppose that misunderstanding is my fault, I was probably not clear. I didn't intend to physically spring Haji on her. Just know where I can take her to him before hand.
[ ....................yeah, that's. Wow. He's incredibly tired, and he does not enjoy being told, yet again, that he 'clearly' doesn't understand the stakes here. There was a lot of very sincere emotion in what he just said about having a part of your soul torn out, and it just. Pretty much sucks that Red breezed right past it. Way to prove that he was right to resist being more emotionally honest earlier in this conversation. ]
[ Why is he even bothering at all, when he's so clearly not being listened to. It's like Red Son just... decided this conversation wasn't going to be productive a long ways back, and the rest of it has been on autopilot. ]
[ Speaking of which, he's just. Going to repeat himself: ]
We both agreed she didn't want to remember. [ Remember that? Remember how you agreed she didn't want those memories back. ] We disagreed about why. And I already said my information might've been out of date. It's been a while since we last talked about this.
I've agreed with you that she probably won't take the news well, but I have consistently told you that you should tell her anyway.
[ Go ahead. Tell him how it's still not clear what he was saying somehow. ]
And for the record? I definitely just told you that you should check if you can. Dunno if it's the noise in here, or what, but I didn't say "don't check to see if he's alive".
Well, I'm not planning on pretending you didn't talk to me. [ A little bit of wry amusement, fleeting, in the midst of this — numbness. He really should've gotten a drink. ] So tell her whatever you want about me.
My vote's still to be honest as soon as possible. If you can't check in on her world without going there to look for him in person, then you should make sure she knows what you're doing. You say you care about his feelings, too. Would kind of suck for him if you told him she was coming any minute now, and then he had to wait a month because she wasn't ready to see her.
[ Does he sound kind of distant? Might Red confuse that for not caring? Maybe. It's not what it is at all, but we are kind of giving up on ever being understood here. ]
I'm not going to tell him I know where she is before she's ready to face him. Ideally, he won't even know I've found him, depends what I have to do to keep track of his location for her to have time to brace.
I have no intention of ripping out his soul either. [He's staring down at his glass.] I may have been a villain, but that is a level of pain I wouldn't wish on anyone. [He pays attention. He does, he just sometimes takes a bit to show he actually did.] Especially her Chevaliers. They took care of her for so long. They deserve respect and mindfulness.
[And there is a part of him that feels protective of them. Perhaps because the way Saya spoke of how others reacted to them. He knows how lonely it is to not have anyone want to show the care you do about people so important to you.]
Has your argument been this whole time that I shouldn't just spring Haji on her in person without warning?
[ He still thinks this sounds like a lot of — hoping people don't find out what you're doing, but... ]
Well — of course they do. They're people.
[ Any other feelings he might have... aren't really relevant. He'll have to at least meet the man, hear him talk about Saya, before he can even form a real opinion. He knows what he felt in that dream. He knows that even if there had been a way to sever that connection, he wouldn't have wanted it severed. At the same time, his memories of that dream... well. ]
But yeah. I think that's more or less where we are.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
[ Just. What. ]
You asked if I knew about chevaliers, I said yes. We agreed that she'd said she didn't want to remember him when she thought he was dead. We disagreed about why she hadn't wanted to remember him, because we were told different things.
[ And then Yuri asked a couple of questions because he didn't want to accidentally tell Red something that Saya might have wanted him not to, because Saya was and is his priority over Red. Something he's very sure Red would agree with and understand. ]
The rest of this conversation has been about you insisting you were gonna find Haji with or without her consent, and with or without her knowledge.
[ When you weren't busy making assumptions about and insulting him, anyway. ]
no subject
I had to convince you him being alive did matter. That it did change things.
That is a fundamental difference in our understandings of her and her Chevaliers.
And that difference has made us have two extremely different conversations.
no subject
Is that. What you're telling me right now?
[ because appaaaaarently the communication so far here has been a steady 0%, so now we have to triple check ]
no subject
Why else bring up multiple times she doesn't want to remember? What else could I possibly take from that except don't tell her?
1/3
[ Dragging a hand down his face. ]
Look. You wanted advice on how to tell her, I've already given it. You don't like that advice, fine: that's your right. You want to ask someone else? [ Dare he hope her husband. ] Go for it.
But when you tell him what I said, you'd better get it right. I told you to be honest with her about what you're doing before you make a move, and I told you to listen if — for whatever reason — she doesn't want you to go looking. That is the sum total of my advice.
2/3
Is that unfair to him? Would it be cruel of her? Would it hurt both of them? Yeah. Maybe. To the version of him that's alone, anyway.
[ Because fuckin multiverses, how do they work. There's probably plenty of versions of her world where she never left it. And he has to believe that the Flynn he met in Imeeji isn't out there somewhere looking for him, or he'll go crazy. ]
But you have that conversation with her first. You convince her that this is what she needs to do. You get her on board for the reunion before you send out engraved invitations.
no subject
I don't know what all your powers can do. I've been assuming you can't hop dimensions right now. [ Surely you would've left Ellipsa as soon as you arrived! ] If all you want to do here is find some way to confirm he's still alive before you talk to her — go for it. That's not the kind of lie I've been arguing against.
[ And the thought that it might be all Red really wanted is exhausting. ]
But if you were planning on bringing him here and springing him on her without being three hundred percent sure she both wants and is ready for that — then I think you'd be setting them both up for the only pain worse than having part of your soul torn out.
[ It's one thing to have a hole inside where they used to be when you can at least tell yourself they'd be with you if they could. It's another thing to face the rejection. ]
1/3
But those variables never changed.
If you didn't mean for that to be don't tell her, whatever you were "actually saying" [Complete with air quotes] was as clear as the deepest park of the ocean. A clarity you have yet to provide, by the way.
2/3
If you did, then you'd know checking if Haji is alive is simply not an option.
If I never even checked, and Saya found out, regardless of any of my other actions?
It would burn the bridge between us.
Instantly.
Not even curing her hibernation can stand in the face of it.
[Of that, he has no doubt.]
Maybe if she explicitly told me to not look, specifically not to look, it may save the bridge. Maybe.
But with what she knows of me, and what she's told me to do in the past, I even doubt that possibility. There would still be damage.
[She knows how thorough he is. More than that, she's told him when she's hurt, when she's afraid to lose, she runs. Isolates. Let's herself suffer.]
[And she told him to go after her anyway, no matter how much she tells him not to.]
no subject
That has been my point of conflict. Telling her isn't a matter of if. It's always been when.
Do I do it sooner, when I don't have a guaranteed answer? Do I bet that the evidence is as strong as I believe and I'm not simply being arrogant? Do I risk her heartbreak on my perception?
Or do I wait until I can offer a reunion, or at least closure? And hope this place doesn't drag out my suspicions before that.
[So be exhausted, Yuri, that is actually all he wanted.]
I'm not going to tell anyone I talked to you. Or tell her. Whatever consequences there are for this revelation, I'm not putting any blame for my decision on others. Unless it goes real swimmingly, I guess, and then you're the savior from my own neurosis, but doesn't seem likely.
But I suppose that misunderstanding is my fault, I was probably not clear. I didn't intend to physically spring Haji on her. Just know where I can take her to him before hand.
1/2
2/4 idk
3/4
We both agreed she didn't want to remember. [ Remember that? Remember how you agreed she didn't want those memories back. ] We disagreed about why. And I already said my information might've been out of date. It's been a while since we last talked about this.
I've agreed with you that she probably won't take the news well, but I have consistently told you that you should tell her anyway.
[ Go ahead. Tell him how it's still not clear what he was saying somehow. ]
4/5
no subject
My vote's still to be honest as soon as possible. If you can't check in on her world without going there to look for him in person, then you should make sure she knows what you're doing. You say you care about his feelings, too. Would kind of suck for him if you told him she was coming any minute now, and then he had to wait a month because she wasn't ready to see her.
[ Does he sound kind of distant? Might Red confuse that for not caring? Maybe. It's not what it is at all, but we are kind of giving up on ever being understood here. ]
no subject
I have no intention of ripping out his soul either. [He's staring down at his glass.] I may have been a villain, but that is a level of pain I wouldn't wish on anyone. [He pays attention. He does, he just sometimes takes a bit to show he actually did.] Especially her Chevaliers. They took care of her for so long. They deserve respect and mindfulness.
[And there is a part of him that feels protective of them. Perhaps because the way Saya spoke of how others reacted to them. He knows how lonely it is to not have anyone want to show the care you do about people so important to you.]
Has your argument been this whole time that I shouldn't just spring Haji on her in person without warning?
no subject
Well — of course they do. They're people.
[ Any other feelings he might have... aren't really relevant. He'll have to at least meet the man, hear him talk about Saya, before he can even form a real opinion. He knows what he felt in that dream. He knows that even if there had been a way to sever that connection, he wouldn't have wanted it severed. At the same time, his memories of that dream... well. ]
But yeah. I think that's more or less where we are.