date posted: 2024-05-10
summary: For now, though, as she has to keep reminding herself, she is who she is in the present, and she can only change if she works towards it.
word count: 1,187 words
notes: spoilers for gotchard post episode 27. i wanted to write about cassettes and ended up writing about forgiveness instead. unfortunately, they do not actually play a cassette in this one
She doesn't deserve to be shown this kindness, Lachesis knows. The fact that Kudo Rinne, of all people, is giving her this, the kind of vulnerability she would've found disgusting up until recently, even disturbing, is a testament to how far she's fallen.
But she's trying. Kudo is trying, too. Lachesis, as wretched as she is, in her fear, is willing to try to change. The least she can do is begin.
Lachesis looks down towards the hand outstretched to her, the item contained in Kudo's palm, and, with her head tilted downward, she shifts her eyes up, meets Kudo's gaze.
"What is this?" Lachesis asks, then leans back, having unwittingly moved forward, too close, at the sight of the translucent object, the sight of Kudo's hand outstretched to her: an olive branch.
Kudo averts her eyes, briefly, but wrenches her gaze back towards Lachesis. "A cassette tape," she says, then, with her other hand, she turns it over, and Lachesis hears a brief rattling noise, light and fleeting.
"Tape?" Lachesis wonders out loud. Kudo shakes her head.
"Not like that," Kudo says, then pauses. "I think, at least. I don't really know how they work. Just how to play them," she says.
Lachesis, at that, has more questions than answers, but she settles on one, for now: "What do you mean by play?" she asks, quirking her head to the side, slightly. Her eyes slide down to the object again, the cassette, and while the name sounds familiar, she cannot recall its function in the slightest.
It frustrates her, these little things. Before, she was satisfied in not knowing, with her life only residing in the mission bestowed upon them by Master Geryon.
Her life had meaning, then. But, with hindsight, with distance, with the aid of that woman, Edami Kyoka, who insists in helping her, as much as Lachesis resists it, internally, she realizes now several things: that this is her life now, one of discovery, learning. That part, she was taught by Edami.
The other realization she came upon herself: that her life now, outside the learning, the clumsy traipsing through the meaning of humanity, is one of fear.
Master Geryon's all-encompassing power and terror led her down this path of treachery. The fear of Master Geryon led her here, down the road of forgiveness by those who should refuse the sight of her at their doorstep.
Instead, they let her in, and now, Kudo Rinne, the girl she had brought her blade to, wrenched in a chokehold, cuts and slashes and pure anguish all over her, then, as her body trembled in Lachesis' hold—
Regrettably, Lachesis pauses her spiral, as Edami has been teaching her. "How 'bout ya don't dwell on the past, Lacchi?" Edami had said, insisting upon the nickname she had chosen for Lachesis, the one that had made her stomach churn at first but only now makes her feel oddly warm, and with that warmth, Lachesis understands that Edami is right, that dwelling will only lead her down worse paths than the one she is now. That she might as well accept the hand that is feeding her, instead of biting as she once did.
She looks up, having shut her eyes, briefly, and sees Kudo with her hand slightly withdrawn, quiet, waiting. Lachesis notes her patience, the kind that she still doesn't deserve, but still, she moves forward.
Kudo nods her head, as if knowing that Lachesis is ready for her to speak now.
"It contains music," she starts, turning over the tape in her hand, looking down at it with a warm familiarity. "You play it on a dedicated player, and you can record music onto some of them," she says.
Lachesis slowly nods, but knows her confusion is visible. Kudo seems to take that as her cue to continue.
"This tape, my father made for me," Kudo says, and a slight smile lifts the corners of her lips, soft and fond.
At that, Lachesis feels a pang in her chest, one of guilt, even though she knows the role she played in the death of Kudo's father was minimal. Still, she knows her association, relation, as disgusting as it is to her now, to Master Geryon, remains a part of the bridge between them, the one that Kudo and the others are slowly trying to build with her.
Master Geryon. Even now, Lachesis cannot shake the title in her head. It's too ingrained in her, too close to her heart, as much as it disturbs her, as fearful as she is of his greed, his power.
Edami reminds her that soon, she will hold her own power, and learn to utilize it, the power that Edami is creating for her, so hastily, but in earnest, with trust and belief in Lachesis, the kind she doesn't deserve, but receives anyway. Soon, she will no longer regard him as that.
For now, though, as she has to keep reminding herself, she is who she is in the present, and she can only change if she works towards it.
Silence stretches between them, and Lachesis realizes, in Kudo's home, how the floorboards creeked beneath their footsteps, upon her entry, upon Kudo's unlocking of the door and the squeak of its hinges echoing across the estate.
Despite this, despite the haunting of Kudo's past, held in the girl's hand, the translucent rectangle and its rattles a kind of haunting in and of itself, the house is lived in, warm. Despite loss, despite everything, Kudo has made this house a home, like Lachesis assumes it once was, before the actions of herself and her sisters and Master Geryon cursed Kudo Rinne to her life of solitude, the one that her oldest sister loves most to taunt the girl for.
Her sisters. The thought of them shakes her, now, shameful and bittersweet and cold and warm, all at once. She longs for them, longs for their familiarity, their shared violence that she had lived for, but now, she knows she is estranged from them now, despite Clotho's own olive branch.
Her eldest sister, deceptively short, deceptively youthful, is disgusted at the sight of her, now. Her middle sister looks at her with a sneer, after her several failed attempts to get through to Lachesis. That, coupled with the fear of Master Geryon, leaves her here, in Kudo Rinne's house made a home, another olive branch offered to her that Lachesis, this time, is willing to accept.
"Ok," Lachesis says, shakily, but sincere, "show me how it works."
Kudo, at that, smiles, brighter than Lachesis remembers seeing on her; more common was a solemn, lonely look, or that of fear; both of which Lachesis once embraced, took advantage of and twisted and wrenched until Kudo was stuck within her grasp.
Kudo's other hand lifts, then, in front of Lachesis, and Lachesis realizes she is asking for her hand, this way.
Quietly, slowly, Lachesis lifts her own hand, and puts it in Kudo's.
Kudo regards her with a smile, and in return, Lachesis, though unsteady, right now, returns it, offers her own, soft and vulnerable.