TNDG Day 9

[keybroad]

Severe content warning: If you said no on the permissions post DO NOT READ THIS LOG. It's worse once I wrote it than the permissions post made it sound. Content warning for alcohol abuse, extremely explicit suicidal ideation, basically saying someone should die possibly through suicide, wrist trauma, domestic issues, a brief mention of abortion that did not happen, and of all things a moderately severe spoiler for Zero Time Dilemma. What follows is a summary for people who would like to be aware of what happened. If you do not want to see a summary before the content, please skip to the content by clicking here.

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Lotus brings a glass of absinthe into the sci-fi set, where Santa is recovering from his hangover. Though she is just setting up a shrine for Katou, Santa ties these actions into an overall pattern of recklessness. He gets Lotus to apologize for inviting him and Ene to the same place at the same time without proper warning.

Santa's awkward supportive pauses count: 1. (End of page 1.)

Lotus: Hey. Do you know if Clover and Snake feel the same way about the hotel as you do?
Santa: Probably not.
Lotus: Oh, that's really good news. Now maybe I can live.

Lotus goes into a lot of detail about the feasibility of this plan and the unlikeliness of her survival if anything else happens, but Santa zeroes in on that part about how she saw her own death as very likely. Santa offers to try and protect her life if she tries and protects "Corrin's chances of going to the final five". Lotus refuses because "Lotus does not die" is less difficult than that. Instead she offers the equivalent trade that Santa protects Rohan's chances of going to the final five. The contract is sealed.

Santa's awkward supportive pauses count: 2.

When Lotus lifts her wrists into the light, Santa finally asks her "Are you thinking, even a little bit, of doing something like Ene wants to do." Lotus equivocates by pointing out that "like Ene" means a lot of things. (End of page 2.) Santa shifts the goal posts to "like me", confiding that when he believed June was dead, he was ready to die of suicide, until he discovered she was still alive in this universe. Lotus is very distracted and has to learn that unlike herself being from the True End timeline where June is alive, Santa and June both come from a different timeline where she died. Lotus is more ready to believe that June remembers dying because of Ayato Naoi's testimony, which she had initially dismissed as psychotic. She admits this is derailing and finally admits she knows almost exactly how Santa felt.

This is the climax. Lotus explains that during the nine days her two daughters had been kidnapped, she seriously considered suicide, mainly hesitant because of worldly obligations and the possibility that they'd come back alive. When they had survived, Lotus had to not commit suicide and emotionally support her children. Therefore, when she wants to spend money and make herself feel better, instead of taking time away from her children, she buys herself gold jewelry.

Santa silently compares this to the way his own biological mother committed suicide, and he says Lotus is a good mom, making her cry. Lotus gets tsundere and redirects them to the game, where the number of lives to save is actually limited. Santa acknowledges that he shouldn't impose his pessimistic view of the hotel onto Lotus and comes to a shared conclusion of optimism about the plan of sending Snake and Clover to the hotel: "I'll choose to trust you that the hotel isn't death for them if you choose to trust me that death isn't the right choice for you." They shake hands and agree to support each other through the future, which will "not be pretty". Lotus will stop Santa from drinking. (End of page 3.)

Santa's awkward supportive pauses count: 3.

Lotus: You know... by protecting Rohan, you really made choosing life a lot easier.
Santa: Why is he so important to you, anyway?

Similar to Santa and Kyrie's relationship, Lotus admits that she sees Rohan as the son she never had. They talk about Rohan's good traits, like not murdering Okuyasu. (Santa silently wonders if this is why Lotus wants to send away Clover and Snake.) Lotus and Rohan just connected right away similar to Santa or Corrin, or Lotus and the Ushiromiyas, which leads Santa to question whether she's "into one of them". Lotus says no very loudly, because she thinks she is not.

Santa points out that it's for the best because romance in these games is ill-fated and ends up insinuating that Seven liked Lotus. (End of page 4.) This touches Lotus, and she shows him Rohan's tattoo of a seven-headed dragon, hiding her other tattoo of a rose because that would make Santa think she is into a specific Ushiromiya, which she thinks she is not. Santa confides how much the attempt at escaping hurt him due to his bond with Seven, and Lotus says, "I refuse to put Seven with us in the bad parent corner for unintentionally abandoning Aoi-kun". Santa admits that Lotus used to be his least favorite due to Seven's interest in her, but now she is not, so she can call him Aoi all she wants. (End of page 5.) "Someone finally gives Hacchan a little credit! Thank you!" They talk about the other "tai chi club members", and Lotus thinks about working with June.

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[Lotus wakes up in the morning, leaves the sci-fi set to take a shower, and still wearing a bathrobe while her hair is down, goes into the bar. She fills a brightly red-and-black checkered glass with absinthe and takes it back to her bedside table.]

Comments

[jinglebros]

I haven't said anything about allowing June go to the hotel, but I'll relax on most of the others.

[ He takes her left hand with his right. ]

You'll never get used to watching people die. It'll hurt like hell. But you can come to me every time.

[keybroad]

[Raising a finger.] That's why I said harm and not kill. In other words, if the size of the alliance is reduced, the chance that "Lotus cannot survive without betraying Santa and June in any way" is reduced.

[She firmly shakes the hand then.]

I'm warning you now, I'm really bad with all this violence. I still thought all these executions were almost stageable and then out of the blue Katou, who actually mattered to me and everything, is literally tentacled into nothing. [To be clear Gorix was important but his execution was... different. It's the combination of significance and creepiness.] I threw up afterwards. It's almost like watching whatever happened to Kubota.

[jinglebros]

I'm okay with violence, but not okay with important people dying. The first time someone I care about ends up on that stage, you might have to drag me away from the bottle. Want to do that?

[ If June dies, she'll have to drag him from something worse than a bottle, but that's unspoken and obvious.. ]

[keybroad]

...

[She thinks about both types of dragging.]

Am I allowed to just smash it. That's faster, and these babies are pretty heavy.

[jinglebros]

Sure, why not?

[ He laughs slightly. ]

Just do whatever you gotta to keep me from drinking. June objects.

[keybroad]

[She glances at the empty glass of absinthe.]

Well, if you put it that way, I can't have that in here. Next time I'll just put in a drop and then fill the rest with water.

[jinglebros]

[ Considering what's happening right now, he'd thank her for that, but he's not sure how to do that without tipping her off that there's something going on with his life. He think that might be Oversharing. ]

Good idea.

[keybroad]

[Lotus is fully aware that Santa drinking so much that June worries is probably bad. She just decides to care about that later. Even though the flowerbud of his importance to her has blossomed all at once, it is still a work in progress.]

You know... by protecting Rohan, you really made choosing life a lot easier. So, don't feel pressured to come up with more of these helpful ideas right away.

[jinglebros]

Why is he so important to you, anyway?

[ Santa pulls a bit at his scarf and twirls the end of it around his fingers. He's obviously uncomfortable with the asking of the question, but he feels it's necessary. ]

[keybroad]

You'll probably have a better time if you understand how important first.

[She indicates her right thigh.]

You were watching our performance and saw this under his skirt, right?
[That tattoo of a daimyo oak... the kashiwa tree!?] Yeah, you can't tell him my real surname, ever.

[jinglebros]

I wouldn't tell anyone your name. I already promised not to.

I keep promises, remember?

[keybroad]

I know you do. I trust you that much.

[Sigh...]

But it's not the same as the mutual trust between you and Kyrie-okaasan, right?

[jinglebros]

We've got something building up. Don't knock it by comparing it to someone else. We'll see where it goes, okay?

Unless that's you're way of asking me to explain why I care there, too.

[keybroad]

No! It's - it's neither of those things, I'm not asking you to care about me more than Kyrie, alright? Look, I'm saying it's the same for him and me! Rohan is like the son I never had!

[She's breathing heavily and then blinks hard - she's never said that out loud and she has to backpedal]

It's nothing compared to, like, the decades I have with my two baby girls, I just... I think... I think it's easier for people like us [a vague tilt of her wrist suggests that she means "similar to Lotus and Santa in this suicidal trait"] somehow.

[jinglebros]

Aha.

[ Santa smiles. He had a feeling she'd never said that out loud before. It was pretty damn obvious. ]

Is he aware of this?

[keybroad]

It's not... the same as it is with you and Kyrie where he uses that word or something... but I think he l... l... looks at me more fondly than anyone else in the game.

[Her frown hardens.]

Even Okuyasu. His only friend from home. Which is kind of sad.

[jinglebros]

Technically Junpei is my only 'friend' [ Santa makes big airquotes hahaha ] from home, but I look at a hell of a lot of people more fondly than him.

So I get it when it comes to that.

[ Of course, Rohan probably didn't make his friend by kidnapping him.... ]

[keybroad]

Okay, like, there's that, but Rohan doesn't have "family" or anything here either-- [She shakes her head] --he doesn't even like his family that's not here, but anyway. Okuyasu is the only guy who knows him and then pulls all this crap including but not limited to an entire song about how much he sucks dick except not even that because he never gets laid - that's not even true, anyway, he's got a nice thing going with our band's bassist Mac. [rolling her eyes really hard, she doesn't like repeating such foul language]

This song got the same score as our song that we worked really hard on, expressing a mutual sense of existential despair. Look, I didn't want to give Clover grief or anything, but I was with Rohan when they were playing, and I think it really, really hurt his feelings. Why wouldn't it? How would you feel if someone wrote that song about you?

[jinglebros]

[ He idly wonders if that's why she wants to send Clover to the hotel, but he doesn't ask. ]

I'd fucking bash some skulls is what I'd do. Gotta give him credit for not doing that. This Okuyasu guy sounds like an asshole.

[keybroad]

I am kind of frustrated. Okuyasu isn't all bad - but their alliance is over. I'm not sure the guy isn't digging his own grave there...

[She shakes her head.] Rohan is really practical. He was totally gentlemanly about letting you vote for me instead of doing it himself first round, wait for Kyrie to find us and vote for him so he could vote for me second round, things like that. [her lips quirk; a funny memory came to mind] Ever since we did icebreaker bingo together and he was so determined to do these tasks, even potentially embarrassing ones. It was sort of like that for you and Corrin, right? Did you have that feeling that you'd just get along?

[jinglebros]

[ Santa flushes at the mention of Corrin. ] I think that's a little different. That's not exactly a relationship between family members. But yeah, I did have that feeling. It was pretty great.

I think the icebreaker bingo was an establishing game for a lot of peoples' relationships.

[keybroad]

I know that difference very well!

[Sigh...] It's where I met all the Ushiromiyas, before I knew they were Ushiromiyas. And I liked all of them. I don't know what that means.

[jinglebros]

[ He squints at her. ]

What, you into one of them?

[ He wouldn't be surprised, actually. ]

[keybroad]

WHAT??????? NO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I MEANT LIKE THEM AS FRIENDS AND INTELLIGENT POTENTIAL ALLIES!!!! WHO WOULD EVER WANT TO GO ON A DATE WITH EVA? SHE'D HIT YOU WITH HER FAN!!!!

[LOTUS IS JUST ALSO BLUSHING EXTREMELY HARD BUT THAT'S JUST HEAT FROM HOW ANGRY SHE IS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OF COURSE!!!]

[jinglebros]

Who mentioned Eva? There's more than just Eva.

[ He keeps looking at her. ]