[ what else would he ask, danny? also, this answer does not seem to make him any happier, but his anger's...not quite landing on danny himself. not yet, at least. the lack of impulse control is really at war in his brain but he's doing his best to be calm about this. ]
By who...? Did you get the same note Ace got? [ a pause. ] Please tell me the truth.
[ not that he thinks danny would automatically lie to him, but he's not interested in half-truths or anything less than the full story right now. ]
No, not that note. Ace got a separate one that if he didn't kill someone his world and all of the worlds of his teammates would be destroyed. That's why he had to follow through with it.
[ and now he's just...kind of concerned about this. for a multitude of reasons. he continues to stare at him though. ]
Can I ask why you can't say? [ are you in some kind of trouble...? ]
...it's not. [ particularly convincing, but...he just ponders on this for a moment as he seems to be entering his mind palace of bullshit.
"If there are those with a special role to play beyond what we see, then I would recommend that you don't seek them out. I know you may want to help them, but we have learned the hard way that there may be a very good reason things are kept secret. This isn't confirmation that such things exist, dear."
and it's been obvious there are other people playing roles in this stupid game, and he has suspicions he won't act on. so hearing this now...wow this sucks! ]
But I'll believe you for now if you can try to answer some other questions. [ ... ] Were you told to kill someone in general? Or was it Reigen specifically? What would have happened if you didn't?
Reigen specifically. I don't know why him. And I don't know for sure what would have happened if I didn't--other than "punishment."
[ he chews his lip hesitantly before he decides to be truly, fully honest. ]
I...honestly, I didn't ask too many questions. I thought it would help our team move up in the rankings at least a little. And frankly...killing people was a habit I thought I missed.
[ ...he's busy drawing his knees up to his chest, ignoring the way more dahlias blossom under the soles of his feet when he moves. he's propping his chin on his knees, still staring at danny and working through the static in his thoughts as he tries to sort everything out. ]
Given the way we've all been coerced into certain things so far, I am more inclined to believe that's also true. As I'm sure you know, Reigen was responsible for what happened with Yae Miko. Despite the fact it was a kill done out of self-defense. She went after him first. And then Adlet killed Whisper, and that still wasn't enough. I can only assume that perhaps someone asked you to remove him specifically because of those factors. [ this is a wrong assumption, but he doesn't have much to work off of. ] I can't think of any other reason otherwise why him and not someone else. Especially since Snake had just lost a team member the week before, unless it was simply because whoever it was knew how badly it'd impact people.
Strangely enough, doing it made you drop in ranking. [ his fingers pick at a hole in his jeans as he thinks on that last part though. ] ...do you still think that way? That it's a habit you miss.
[ he shrugs. ] I couldn't tell you. I think maybe something closer to the latter.
As for our ranking...I think us being down to just two had made it so that there was virtually nothing we could do but fall further. I don't know how many points a kill is worth, but in hindsight, I don't think we stood a chance in any regard.
[ he pauses over that last question ] ...I did. It's why I jumped at the chance to do it in the first place. But seeing how it affected you and Nimona and the others...it didn't feel good anymore. I don't know what changed. I don't...I don't know if I want to do that anymore.
Considering this whole time we've been turned against each other, yeah. That would make sense. [ frustrating all over again. he thinks the ranking thing is bullshit, and he thinks the excuse is also not great. it's visible now, the irritation in his features and the way he's really struggling to process what he's supposed to be saying, especially when danny admits that he had outright missed killing people.
how he'd jumped at the chance to kill reigen, and... you took away two of the people i needed the most.
his gaze finally drops to look elsewhere because he doesn't want to actually make himself readable right now. ]
Congratulations on learning how guilt works, Danny. [ ... ] So...what then. It felt good in the moment until we got to the trial? Or was it sometime after that? [ "what changed?" ]
...Reigen tried to talk to me. Tried to give advice to his murderer. I didn't like it. But it also made it hard to feel good about what I'd done. I thought it was just--the lack of a satisfying fight. But then on Friday when I saw how people responded to his death, I really started to...
...it felt like when I first killed my family. [ which is to say, awful. wretched. like he wanted to crawl back into that bed at vlad's and waste away into nothing. ]
...1000%. [ they had suspected that maybe reigen activated his power for his murderer, but hearing that really did happen kind of makes it harder. like being suckerpunched all over again. and he's trying really, really hard to see this from danny's perspective because he knows this is extremely fucked up.
but he keeps looping back to how he still went through with it, and then still sussed out ace, and still made people vote for ace. ace killed sigrun, yeah, but he had a note coercing him to do so. then again...danny was told to, but he still...and it...
...gods. ]
...by then it was too late. He was already gone, and then we had to go through with Saturday. [ there's a pause...and there's then kind of a bitter, awkward laugh. ] You really sat there and let me put his heart back together knowing what happened. And you really let me thank you for not being responsible. I'm...[ stopstopstop is the immediate bubble he brushes away as he rolls his eyes up to the ceiling to refocus. ] I'm trying to decide what I want to say to you right now.
[ because in the end he can see both halves of this. that's the problem. ]
[ he flinches at nico mentioning the piecing the heart back together, and he can't help the outburst-- ] That wasn't--that was never supposed to--I didn't want that for you! Or anyone. I never meant for it to get that gruesome.
...but I know that probably doesn't really mean much now.
[ not with reigen dead. not with danny having thrown ace under the bus. there's nothing else he can really say in his defense, and he knows it. not that he thinks he should have a defense in the first place, really.
there's a reason why i brought you to a room full of knives to say this. ]
[ okay well. his gaze immediately snaps back down and straight at danny, suddenly affronted with that thought. hold on. he will go back to literally everything else in a hot second because: ]
I'm sorry, did you bring me here because you thought I would stab you? [ he vaguely wonders actually if it was more so danny could stab him if things got ugly, but he's still giving him the benefit of the doubt, for some reason. (he knows the exact reason, he's just not going to think too much about it.) ]
Maybe I should for you being so stupid. [ annoyed. ] I'm...stabbing you isn't going to fix anything. It's not going to change that this happened, and it's not going to change that you took them away. [ easy to say now, considering he was hellbent on stabbing kogi yesterday for lillium but that is neither here or there. ]
I need you to explain to me what exactly happened. You...literally removed his heart and broke it to pieces. Actually, maybe the exact details don't matter so much since it already happened. It's the aftermath I'm trying to understand. And why you didn't tell us sooner. [ there's a pause though, and he loops back for a second. ] ...this is why you ran away from me Friday, isn't it?
[ he is staring resolutely at the ground as he talks. ]
...yes. You treating me like I could still be Danny Fenton, like I still had that kind of innate goodness in me...it was too much, knowing what I did last week.
With all the ire floating around for Reigen's killer, I knew that if I said anything, I'd be killed this week without question. And I...I've dealt with so much, just to get to a point where I could exist again, that I couldn't bring myself to take that risk. And I didn't want to hurt you or Nimona even more by telling you later.
I didn't want to tell anyone at all, but...some people kept pressuring me to do it. And the more time passed, the more it felt like there was no benefit to keeping it secret anymore. What does it matter if I get another extra week out of having friends or not, when the end result is just going to be the same? When I hate myself day in and day out for it anyway?
[ i'm sorry that he's being such a rambling drama queen right now, it's the inner vlad jumping out.
anyway he considers leaving it there, but then after a moment, hesitantly, as if he's not sure if this will help or hurt even more: ]
...and for the record, I didn't mean for his heart to...fall apart like that at all. Or even be found. I was trying to phase it into the floor, whole. Quick and clean for everybody involved. I didn't realize that I'd phased my hand through to the floor below and dropped it. ...that doesn't mean much, though, does it.
[ he hears all of that...and for the moment, his only response is burying his face in his knees.
maybe that was his own stupid fault for putting so much trust in someone, really, and that's sort of what he's thinking. that if he hadn't bothered trusting danny and hadn't bothered befriending him and hadn't bothered thinking he could be a changed person maybe it wouldn't be fucking him up so much.
he's trying to consider if it's better or worse to have trusted him in the first place. he's busy thinking this over, wondering if there were any signs...well. he did run into danny beating up a bunch of shit at tarkea. and he saw danny's memories. but at the same time there were other instances that didn't quite add up to what's going on. in a sense, he does feel like this is his fault for not pushing things a little further, for not questioning harder, for just believing that maybe he was wrong about this. it hadn't felt fair to accuse danny at the time when there wasn't complete, solid proof. it would've been like accusing nimona yesterday because of pink fur and an animal bite and knowing her history.
history doesn't always mean a person can't change. it's something he's felt very strong about for both nimona and danny, and maybe a little himself. he knows danny is right, that it's entirely possible someone would've gone after him for killing reigen. he can't entirely blame him for wanting to exist. for wanting to cling to the little bit he'd built for himself.
he can blame him for going about this stupidly, but that's his own private thought. he thinks about the conversation he could see with ace and danny, thinks about nimona telling him ace told her to avoid the treehouse, thinks about the horoscopes all over again and just--
--eventually there's another shuddery little sigh as he carefully speaks. ]
...tell me something. Were you just putting on an act for us then all those weeks where we were trying to be friends? Was that all just faking it, hoping it'd stick while knowing you would've jumped at any opportunity to hurt somebody else? [ a pause. ] Did you ever actually believe any of what I'd said to you, or were you blowing me off the whole time knowing it wouldn't stick?
I mean...at first, kind of. I only pretended to be Danny Fenton, the real one, in the first place because that's whose profile it was. And when I heard this was a place of heroes killing villains...I didn't want to make myself a target by straying from that mold.
But the quote on your profile always had me wondering. How much you could understand. If I could be honest with you. I was...yes, acting, pretending to be happier and nicer than I am, but I never lied to you. Everything I said to you was true of my life when I was still Danny. But I was scared to ever push further and risk ruining what I had.
[ with mounting horror, he realizes he's beginning to choke up, talking through building tears. he hasn't cried in years. he feels like a child. ] When you--when you saw that memory, of what happened to the Fentons, of what I did, I thought...this is it. This is the moment where he's been pushed too far and sees what a monster I am and leaves. But instead you...offered me somewhere to go. [ rubs at his eyes and sniffs ] It was the first time that my "second chance" really felt like one, rather than a last ditch effort to stay alive. Like maybe I could really become someone...instead of just the ruined, warped version of the person everyone actually cared for.
It...I can't tell you what that means to me, Nico.
...I wouldn't have killed if I hadn't been told to. I'd wanted to before, to just--up our chances of winning, take control of something here for once, but I was too worried of screwing things up to ever do it myself.
[ that's a plus... gently floats by. and he listens, and this feels weirdly remnant of a few different scenarios in his life where people did awful things and led awful lives but nico still tried to befriend them when they showed any signs of maybe wanting to change. he can understand keeping things under wraps to not make yourself a target. he can understand not actually explaining who you are to a bunch of strangers to blend in and not raise a flag.
that's literally what he did when he infiltrated camp jupiter. he was himself and just left out a few key details, knowing the roman army might've just killed him if he wasn't careful.
likewise he can understand being scared to push further and risk everything. that had been something nico himself feared time and time again any time he used his powers. he thinks about ghostifying bryce lawrence and the look of horror on reyna and hedge's faces before he promptly passed out. he thinks about apologizing for poisoning another friendship, thinking he ruined everything just because he let his control unravel and hurt someone. but reyna had forgiven him. there were other instances where things got out of hand, but nico had been forgiven and the entire purpose of his life now was trying to live a second time and get his own second chance for happiness.
so yeah. he gets it. he hears the way danny's voice chokes up and he listens to all of that and for a moment he continues keeping his face buried in his knees before he finally looks up. somehow danny crying is enough to snap him out of his own threat of tears, if only because he has to be the balance of the situation. ]
And then when the opportunity came, you took it and it didn't turn out the way you thought it would. Is that it? [ there's no ire to his tone, but there also isn't kindness yet. it's neutrality, mostly nico seeking to understand everything presented to him before making any judgments. ] ...I meant everything I said, too. I still think there is a possibility to make a second life better than your first so long as you work for it. As long as you're willing to change and try to do something better with it. That's...that's it. You can't have a second chance and not change how you lived the first time, and I'm sorry if telling you that the base components still being there made that harder to know how you wanted to live.
[ ...he frowns for a moment, trying to think how far he wants to take this. but he thinks, maybe, he can at least try this from a different angle. ]
Did I ever tell you about when Will accused me of being a murderer?
I...I guess so. I just...don't know how to be. [ outside of the murder and the destruction. who is he, really, if he lets himself be anything other than unstoppable? it's scary to not know. it's scary to not kill before he can be killed.
it's scary to become attached to people. people who can act unpredictably--die, betray you, reject you...be hurt by you.
that last bit breaks him out of the self-loathing cycle just enough though. the tears stop and he just looks up, utterly bewildered. ]
Usually, you don't try to do it by yourself. First bit of advice. [ it's dry, but it's true, and it's something he's also been working with nimona on. maybe this is just a thing about tigers. or maybe nico just understands kids who've been perceived and acted as violent monsters a little too much.
anyway yeah that's what he thought, you dumb ghost. it's maybe another experiment in the ever-evolving process of "nico letting people see parts of him he doesn't want to talk about in order to help them", but it seems to work enough to at least try to get danny to calm down. there's a point to this, too, but first...you know. a story. ]
Mmhm. It was, like, right before we got here and he felt bad about it afterwards but totally true. [ he pauses to that. ] ...we were in the Underworld, on the way to Tartarus to rescue a friend. Another world of advice: while boat rides can be romantic, maybe not on the River of Pain. But we had to take that route to get to Tartarus to begin with. The thing is that when you're traveling on a river like that, it...speaks to you. It tries to turn your memories against you, makes it hard to think outside of your own misery and...you know Will. He's a healer, and I'm very much not. And the river said... "You’ve killed so many, Nico di Angelo. You're a murderer. You've killed so many. What’s a couple more?"
He tried to argue that he'd killed people, too. People who'd died because he couldn't heal them, and I thought that's all he meant. Obviously that wasn't true. He argued that he let me kill someone, and even when I said he wasn't responsible for my actions, he argued that, too. How he shouldn't have allowed me to let it happen.
[ hm..."So cavalier with life. You take it away so easily. You distribute death like a badge of pride. Even when you tell your boyfriend you love him, you give him a ring in the shape of a skull." ]
And then he said... "You don’t even feel bad about killing him, do you?" And even though I knew I did, part of me still wondered if Will and the river were right anyway. That I hadn't changed at all, and that I deserved to be there. To be punished for what I'd done.
[ someday, child, we will teach you that you don't have to bare sensitive uncomfortable parts of yourself in order to help others, but it's not gonna be me bc i'm a hypocrite playing mr. 94 mental illnesses over here
danny listens, patient. ]
...I'm guessing you and Will both decided otherwise later?
[ looks at tsas where he's getting therapy from a wine god and sighs.
but anyway. a hand comes up and kind of rubs at some of the faint scarring on his cheek like he's considering the answer. ]
Something like that. Once we got out of the river things were a lot easier to think about, and we fought about other stuff instead. [ wry. ] But yeah, it turned out fine. It's...I mean I did do those things. I did send Octavian straight to his death in some weird kind of murder-suicide that I orchestrated. And there's all of the monsters I've killed. And there are the things Will doesn't actually really know because I've been too scared to tell him because I always figured if he saw how I was, he'd leave. We've talked about it since then and I know it's...a lot less likely now. But the point I was trying to make is that I kind of get it. You act, or you say things, and you always worry about what's going to be too much and what's going to push people away. Even when you're fighting against your own nature and you're trying to figure out who you want to be and what you really are.
It's easy to default to what you know and what you're used to. It's a lot harder to try something different when you're not sure of what the results will be. Which...sort of sounds like where you are. Or I'm projecting, I don't know.
[ more patient listening, where danny will look off to the side of the room. it sounds like nico's killed more than danny thought. ]
...it sounds right.
[ righter than he'd even be able to articulate himself: that need to be in control of something, to break things because at least the outcome of that is predictable and understandable and entirely your own. It's not something he'd know how to put into words, or even fully understand in the first place. ]
[ sometimes you are not a mass murderer but you have taken lives solely by being involved in three wars and other such things. he knows he probably shouldn't have just dropped all of this on him, but he feels like he had to explain so that danny understood why nico was saying what he was.
and now...they're here. ]
...I won't lie to you. It's very hard for me to know what I'm supposed to do about this. Your actions...hurt a lot of people. Including me. [ which normally he wouldn't acknowledge but considering danny saw how much he fell apart during reigen's trial there's no point pretending otherwise. ] And it was selfish to cover for this long because you were worried about losing the things you were building. Those were choices you still made.
But it's harder to be completely angry knowing you were asked to do this, and that saying no likely would've ended worse. Especially knowing that the moon wants us to murder each other and build up the distrust between ourselves and us and the public. It's not a fair position for anybody. And it's harder knowing...that. That you're in the position you're in of trying to learn and undo old habits.
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
no subject
By who...? Did you get the same note Ace got? [ a pause. ] Please tell me the truth.
[ not that he thinks danny would automatically lie to him, but he's not interested in half-truths or anything less than the full story right now. ]
no subject
But I...I can't say. I really can't.
no subject
[ and now he's just...kind of concerned about this. for a multitude of reasons. he continues to stare at him though. ]
Can I ask why you can't say? [ are you in some kind of trouble...? ]
no subject
It's...something that I'm sworn to secrecy for. I don't know what would happen if I explained it, but I get the sense that it would be bad.
I know that's not particularly convincing.
no subject
"If there are those with a special role to play beyond what we see, then I would recommend that you don't seek them out. I know you may want to help them, but we have learned the hard way that there may be a very good reason things are kept secret. This isn't confirmation that such things exist, dear."
and it's been obvious there are other people playing roles in this stupid game, and he has suspicions he won't act on. so hearing this now...wow this sucks! ]
But I'll believe you for now if you can try to answer some other questions. [ ... ] Were you told to kill someone in general? Or was it Reigen specifically? What would have happened if you didn't?
no subject
[ he chews his lip hesitantly before he decides to be truly, fully honest. ]
I...honestly, I didn't ask too many questions. I thought it would help our team move up in the rankings at least a little. And frankly...killing people was a habit I thought I missed.
no subject
Given the way we've all been coerced into certain things so far, I am more inclined to believe that's also true. As I'm sure you know, Reigen was responsible for what happened with Yae Miko. Despite the fact it was a kill done out of self-defense. She went after him first. And then Adlet killed Whisper, and that still wasn't enough. I can only assume that perhaps someone asked you to remove him specifically because of those factors. [ this is a wrong assumption, but he doesn't have much to work off of. ] I can't think of any other reason otherwise why him and not someone else. Especially since Snake had just lost a team member the week before, unless it was simply because whoever it was knew how badly it'd impact people.
Strangely enough, doing it made you drop in ranking. [ his fingers pick at a hole in his jeans as he thinks on that last part though. ] ...do you still think that way? That it's a habit you miss.
no subject
As for our ranking...I think us being down to just two had made it so that there was virtually nothing we could do but fall further. I don't know how many points a kill is worth, but in hindsight, I don't think we stood a chance in any regard.
[ he pauses over that last question ] ...I did. It's why I jumped at the chance to do it in the first place. But seeing how it affected you and Nimona and the others...it didn't feel good anymore. I don't know what changed. I don't...I don't know if I want to do that anymore.
no subject
how he'd jumped at the chance to kill reigen, and... you took away two of the people i needed the most.
his gaze finally drops to look elsewhere because he doesn't want to actually make himself readable right now. ]
Congratulations on learning how guilt works, Danny. [ ... ] So...what then. It felt good in the moment until we got to the trial? Or was it sometime after that? [ "what changed?" ]
no subject
...Reigen tried to talk to me. Tried to give advice to his murderer. I didn't like it. But it also made it hard to feel good about what I'd done. I thought it was just--the lack of a satisfying fight. But then on Friday when I saw how people responded to his death, I really started to...
...it felt like when I first killed my family. [ which is to say, awful. wretched. like he wanted to crawl back into that bed at vlad's and waste away into nothing. ]
no subject
but he keeps looping back to how he still went through with it, and then still sussed out ace, and still made people vote for ace. ace killed sigrun, yeah, but he had a note coercing him to do so. then again...danny was told to, but he still...and it...
...gods. ]
...by then it was too late. He was already gone, and then we had to go through with Saturday. [ there's a pause...and there's then kind of a bitter, awkward laugh. ] You really sat there and let me put his heart back together knowing what happened. And you really let me thank you for not being responsible. I'm...[ stopstopstop is the immediate bubble he brushes away as he rolls his eyes up to the ceiling to refocus. ] I'm trying to decide what I want to say to you right now.
[ because in the end he can see both halves of this. that's the problem. ]
no subject
...but I know that probably doesn't really mean much now.
[ not with reigen dead. not with danny having thrown ace under the bus. there's nothing else he can really say in his defense, and he knows it. not that he thinks he should have a defense in the first place, really.
there's a reason why i brought you to a room full of knives to say this. ]
no subject
I'm sorry, did you bring me here because you thought I would stab you? [ he vaguely wonders actually if it was more so danny could stab him if things got ugly, but he's still giving him the benefit of the doubt, for some reason. (he knows the exact reason, he's just not going to think too much about it.) ]
no subject
no subject
Maybe I should for you being so stupid. [ annoyed. ] I'm...stabbing you isn't going to fix anything. It's not going to change that this happened, and it's not going to change that you took them away. [ easy to say now, considering he was hellbent on stabbing kogi yesterday for lillium but that is neither here or there. ]
I need you to explain to me what exactly happened. You...literally removed his heart and broke it to pieces. Actually, maybe the exact details don't matter so much since it already happened. It's the aftermath I'm trying to understand. And why you didn't tell us sooner. [ there's a pause though, and he loops back for a second. ] ...this is why you ran away from me Friday, isn't it?
no subject
...yes. You treating me like I could still be Danny Fenton, like I still had that kind of innate goodness in me...it was too much, knowing what I did last week.
With all the ire floating around for Reigen's killer, I knew that if I said anything, I'd be killed this week without question. And I...I've dealt with so much, just to get to a point where I could exist again, that I couldn't bring myself to take that risk. And I didn't want to hurt you or Nimona even more by telling you later.
I didn't want to tell anyone at all, but...some people kept pressuring me to do it. And the more time passed, the more it felt like there was no benefit to keeping it secret anymore. What does it matter if I get another extra week out of having friends or not, when the end result is just going to be the same? When I hate myself day in and day out for it anyway?
[ i'm sorry that he's being such a rambling drama queen right now, it's the inner vlad jumping out.
anyway he considers leaving it there, but then after a moment, hesitantly, as if he's not sure if this will help or hurt even more: ]
...and for the record, I didn't mean for his heart to...fall apart like that at all. Or even be found. I was trying to phase it into the floor, whole. Quick and clean for everybody involved. I didn't realize that I'd phased my hand through to the floor below and dropped it. ...that doesn't mean much, though, does it.
no subject
maybe that was his own stupid fault for putting so much trust in someone, really, and that's sort of what he's thinking. that if he hadn't bothered trusting danny and hadn't bothered befriending him and hadn't bothered thinking he could be a changed person maybe it wouldn't be fucking him up so much.
he's trying to consider if it's better or worse to have trusted him in the first place. he's busy thinking this over, wondering if there were any signs...well. he did run into danny beating up a bunch of shit at tarkea. and he saw danny's memories. but at the same time there were other instances that didn't quite add up to what's going on. in a sense, he does feel like this is his fault for not pushing things a little further, for not questioning harder, for just believing that maybe he was wrong about this. it hadn't felt fair to accuse danny at the time when there wasn't complete, solid proof. it would've been like accusing nimona yesterday because of pink fur and an animal bite and knowing her history.
history doesn't always mean a person can't change. it's something he's felt very strong about for both nimona and danny, and maybe a little himself. he knows danny is right, that it's entirely possible someone would've gone after him for killing reigen. he can't entirely blame him for wanting to exist. for wanting to cling to the little bit he'd built for himself.
he can blame him for going about this stupidly, but that's his own private thought. he thinks about the conversation he could see with ace and danny, thinks about nimona telling him ace told her to avoid the treehouse, thinks about the horoscopes all over again and just--
--eventually there's another shuddery little sigh as he carefully speaks. ]
...tell me something. Were you just putting on an act for us then all those weeks where we were trying to be friends? Was that all just faking it, hoping it'd stick while knowing you would've jumped at any opportunity to hurt somebody else? [ a pause. ] Did you ever actually believe any of what I'd said to you, or were you blowing me off the whole time knowing it wouldn't stick?
no subject
I mean...at first, kind of. I only pretended to be Danny Fenton, the real one, in the first place because that's whose profile it was. And when I heard this was a place of heroes killing villains...I didn't want to make myself a target by straying from that mold.
But the quote on your profile always had me wondering. How much you could understand. If I could be honest with you. I was...yes, acting, pretending to be happier and nicer than I am, but I never lied to you. Everything I said to you was true of my life when I was still Danny. But I was scared to ever push further and risk ruining what I had.
[ with mounting horror, he realizes he's beginning to choke up, talking through building tears. he hasn't cried in years. he feels like a child. ] When you--when you saw that memory, of what happened to the Fentons, of what I did, I thought...this is it. This is the moment where he's been pushed too far and sees what a monster I am and leaves. But instead you...offered me somewhere to go. [ rubs at his eyes and sniffs ] It was the first time that my "second chance" really felt like one, rather than a last ditch effort to stay alive. Like maybe I could really become someone...instead of just the ruined, warped version of the person everyone actually cared for.
It...I can't tell you what that means to me, Nico.
...I wouldn't have killed if I hadn't been told to. I'd wanted to before, to just--up our chances of winning, take control of something here for once, but I was too worried of screwing things up to ever do it myself.
no subject
that's literally what he did when he infiltrated camp jupiter. he was himself and just left out a few key details, knowing the roman army might've just killed him if he wasn't careful.
likewise he can understand being scared to push further and risk everything. that had been something nico himself feared time and time again any time he used his powers. he thinks about ghostifying bryce lawrence and the look of horror on reyna and hedge's faces before he promptly passed out. he thinks about apologizing for poisoning another friendship, thinking he ruined everything just because he let his control unravel and hurt someone. but reyna had forgiven him. there were other instances where things got out of hand, but nico had been forgiven and the entire purpose of his life now was trying to live a second time and get his own second chance for happiness.
so yeah. he gets it. he hears the way danny's voice chokes up and he listens to all of that and for a moment he continues keeping his face buried in his knees before he finally looks up. somehow danny crying is enough to snap him out of his own threat of tears, if only because he has to be the balance of the situation. ]
And then when the opportunity came, you took it and it didn't turn out the way you thought it would. Is that it? [ there's no ire to his tone, but there also isn't kindness yet. it's neutrality, mostly nico seeking to understand everything presented to him before making any judgments. ] ...I meant everything I said, too. I still think there is a possibility to make a second life better than your first so long as you work for it. As long as you're willing to change and try to do something better with it. That's...that's it. You can't have a second chance and not change how you lived the first time, and I'm sorry if telling you that the base components still being there made that harder to know how you wanted to live.
[ ...he frowns for a moment, trying to think how far he wants to take this. but he thinks, maybe, he can at least try this from a different angle. ]
Did I ever tell you about when Will accused me of being a murderer?
no subject
it's scary to become attached to people. people who can act unpredictably--die, betray you, reject you...be hurt by you.
that last bit breaks him out of the self-loathing cycle just enough though. the tears stop and he just looks up, utterly bewildered. ]
He--what?
no subject
anyway yeah that's what he thought, you dumb ghost. it's maybe another experiment in the ever-evolving process of "nico letting people see parts of him he doesn't want to talk about in order to help them", but it seems to work enough to at least try to get danny to calm down. there's a point to this, too, but first...you know. a story. ]
Mmhm. It was, like, right before we got here and he felt bad about it afterwards but totally true. [ he pauses to that. ] ...we were in the Underworld, on the way to Tartarus to rescue a friend. Another world of advice: while boat rides can be romantic, maybe not on the River of Pain. But we had to take that route to get to Tartarus to begin with. The thing is that when you're traveling on a river like that, it...speaks to you. It tries to turn your memories against you, makes it hard to think outside of your own misery and...you know Will. He's a healer, and I'm very much not. And the river said... "You’ve killed so many, Nico di Angelo. You're a murderer. You've killed so many. What’s a couple more?"
He tried to argue that he'd killed people, too. People who'd died because he couldn't heal them, and I thought that's all he meant. Obviously that wasn't true. He argued that he let me kill someone, and even when I said he wasn't responsible for my actions, he argued that, too. How he shouldn't have allowed me to let it happen.
[ hm..."So cavalier with life. You take it away so easily. You distribute death like a badge of pride. Even when you tell your boyfriend you love him, you give him a ring in the shape of a skull." ]
And then he said... "You don’t even feel bad about killing him, do you?" And even though I knew I did, part of me still wondered if Will and the river were right anyway. That I hadn't changed at all, and that I deserved to be there. To be punished for what I'd done.
no subject
danny listens, patient. ]
...I'm guessing you and Will both decided otherwise later?
no subject
but anyway. a hand comes up and kind of rubs at some of the faint scarring on his cheek like he's considering the answer. ]
Something like that. Once we got out of the river things were a lot easier to think about, and we fought about other stuff instead. [ wry. ] But yeah, it turned out fine. It's...I mean I did do those things. I did send Octavian straight to his death in some weird kind of murder-suicide that I orchestrated. And there's all of the monsters I've killed. And there are the things Will doesn't actually really know because I've been too scared to tell him because I always figured if he saw how I was, he'd leave. We've talked about it since then and I know it's...a lot less likely now. But the point I was trying to make is that I kind of get it. You act, or you say things, and you always worry about what's going to be too much and what's going to push people away. Even when you're fighting against your own nature and you're trying to figure out who you want to be and what you really are.
It's easy to default to what you know and what you're used to. It's a lot harder to try something different when you're not sure of what the results will be. Which...sort of sounds like where you are. Or I'm projecting, I don't know.
no subject
...it sounds right.
[ righter than he'd even be able to articulate himself: that need to be in control of something, to break things because at least the outcome of that is predictable and understandable and entirely your own. It's not something he'd know how to put into words, or even fully understand in the first place. ]
no subject
and now...they're here. ]
...I won't lie to you. It's very hard for me to know what I'm supposed to do about this. Your actions...hurt a lot of people. Including me. [ which normally he wouldn't acknowledge but considering danny saw how much he fell apart during reigen's trial there's no point pretending otherwise. ] And it was selfish to cover for this long because you were worried about losing the things you were building. Those were choices you still made.
But it's harder to be completely angry knowing you were asked to do this, and that saying no likely would've ended worse. Especially knowing that the moon wants us to murder each other and build up the distrust between ourselves and us and the public. It's not a fair position for anybody. And it's harder knowing...that. That you're in the position you're in of trying to learn and undo old habits.
[ he scrubs both of his hands over his eyes. ]
...did you tell Nimona yet?
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)
(no subject)