MASKTOURN

A somewhat ambiguous time after the Lifebringer's announcement, yet before he leaves for good, Kenji makes his way to the side of a familiar face. She's younger, somehow, but also too tired, though she's almost more recognizable this way. "Albanes," He calls in greeting as he approaches, wings reappearing jerkily as he walks to shield him from Eternity. "How are you?" It's a loaded question, he knows, but it's also the gentlest way he can ask everything combined into one. @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes stares blankly at ETERNITY, but glances towards Kenji as he approaches. "I'm... I'm alright. It's all over now." And then, quietly, "I'm sorry." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

Kenji shifts, Eternity prickling his skin uncomfortably. "It's..." It's okay is what lingers on his tongue, but...admitting that to her is difficult. It feels unconvincing. "It'll be okay," he settles for instead. There's a certain strangeness to him, now; one even Albanes would be unfamiliar with. "Eventually. We've kept going before." @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes was silent for a while. "Where will you go? I mean- when you leave this place." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

"I..." Kenji's resolve cracks ever so slightly, that someone who knew him less might have missed it. "Jax and I need to talk," he says quietly. "This--" His wings twitch and creak, his glowing eyes downcast. "--saved my life, or what's left of it, but it forced my hand too. It wasn't supposed to happen this early. I never wanted him to see me like this." @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes made a soft- understanding sound, and looked to Kenji with a gaze so old, so weathered and aged it looked out of place on her young body. But it's still her- the same tired, sad Albanes, forever stuck in a perpetual mourning period. "I'm sorry." She repeats. "I didn't want it to come to this. I was just trying to keep you safe, to keep everyone safe. I promise." A pause. "... I hope Jax understands. I... think he will." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

Kenji looks back with eons-old eyes that are no longer his own, something ancient and unnamed drowning them out. "...I know you were," he sighs. "I believe you, Albanes, I really do. You weren't the one who killed her--Amara, I mean." He doesn't seem like he agrees with her last sentence, but he doesn't try to argue it. Instead, he asks, "What about you? Are you leaving?" @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes looked back to ETERNITY. "Yes. I am." She said plainly, vacantly. "Not to what you are returning to, though." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes looked back to ETERNITY. "Yes. I am." She said plainly, vacantly. "Not to what you are returning to, though." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

@em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

He seems an odd mix of relieved and concerned, at that. "I hope wherever you're going is kinder to you than this," Kenji says quietly. After a moment, he adds, "I don't know if I'll see you again after. Or at least the version of you that's left behind. I'd check but.." A thin smile spreads across his face alongside a faint, sardonic chuckle. "If we're going back in time slightly, maybe I should turn around and leave before I end up getting looped back here again somehow." @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

"... I can only hope death will be kind to me. After I have cheated it so." Albanes said with a heavy sigh, confirming the unsaid. She keeps her eyes on Eternity, but sighs lightly. "I... think it'd be best if you steer clear of me, yeah." A pause. "I'll be fine. We... can say our goodbyes here." She frowned. "I hate goodbyes." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

Kenji's expression shifts, minutely, as his wings flutter and he seems to almost study her for a second as she looks away. Maybe he's looking through her. "I can't grant you peaceful. That doesn't belong to me. But Death isn't angry with you," he says, a sense of surety, finality, to it, before adding with a shrug, "Despite what Amara might've said at some point--she left a handful of memories behind." "Mmm. I do too. But I suppose I'd better get used to them now." It's a resigned, sobering mess of a melancholic thought. He looks down, slowly flipping one pale hand back and forth as if expecting it to change in front of him. @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes's expression settles into somewhat of a sad, resigned resolve. "They never get easier." She admitted. "At least, they never did for me." She looked away from Eternity. "It's ironic, really. To expect something like... like Eternity to ever be sated in human form. How can are you supposed to stay the same forever, when everything around you changes?" She sighed. "The Lifebringer was a walking contradiction. Maybe it's for the best it's gone now." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

"...Maybe," Kenji says quietly, though there's more of a thoughtfulness on his face now. "I think that's just how godhood works, though. A contradiction. Eternity can't change. Death can't live." He shrugs, scratching against the base of one of his curled horns briefly with a flickered half-wince of a glance towards Eternity. "Yet here we are, y'know?" A moment passes before his expression saddens, and he lets out a slow, controlled breath--no longer necessary, but still a habit. "I don't think either of us wants another goodbye on our minds. Let's just call it a good luck." @innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes faced Eternity entirely, and did not look back to Kenji. "Mhm. Good luck. Good luck with... whatever your future might hold, now." She nodded. "I hope you can find rest." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

innsjo | kyrie🪶+ darcy🖋+npcs

Albanes faced Eternity entirely, and did not look back to Kenji. "Mhm. Good luck. Good luck with... whatever your future might hold, now." She nodded. "I hope you can find rest." @em || enya 💥 + kenji 🌫

"Thank you," Kenji says, and finds he really means it. "Good luck, Albanes. You've earned it." There's nothing else more to say, really. Not that he can put into words. He turns, and he's gone.

Albanes lingered there, for a moment longer, before walking calmly to that which she hoped to lay by in her grave.

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