driftfleet | Just Keeping Swimming

Just Keeping Swimming | March Planet Mingle

Who: Everyone!
Broadcast: If you want!
Action: Anywhere on Mafik
When: The month of March

[Welcome to Mafik, the water world! Hope you brought your best swimming gear and don't have a paralyzing fear of water, because that's all that's here! So get out those wet suits and enjoy life under the sea!

In other words, it's a mingle! ]

> System Information

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

What? You want me to go around killin' everything I see?

[Because well]

I can? But most humans and mortals tend to get really uppity about that.

I'm just pointing out that referring to yourself as a tool isn't exactly empowering. It sounds like you are perfectly capable of making your own decisions and taking your own actions.

[ Kai has a lot of very strong feelings about this that may or may not directly relate to the matter at hand.]

...

[Doudanuki lets that be for a good long moment and then he lets out a long sigh.]

You're not gettin' it. I'm a literal sword. You see this?

[He flips on his video and holds up his sword.]

You see me with this everywhere on the ship, right? It's because this is my body.

This? [He points to the human body.]

It's only two years old.

You have a literal sword.

[ Kai's seen a lot of weird things, but he's not at all sure he can go with the flow on this one. ]

I'm sorry if I'm confused, but I'm not sure I'm following you.

Alright, this is starting to wear on me, but where are you on the ship? I'll come show you.

The kitchen.

You don't need to show me anything you don't want to.

It's the only way I've found to make people believe me.

[A few minutes later, Kai will see and hear a sword come sliding across the floor to him in the kitchen. It sits in the middle of the floor for a moment and he'll hear someone call from the hallway.]

Can you see it?

Yes, that's a sword.

[ Kai knows what a sword is. Is the other man trying to tell him that he is the sword? Doudanuki is clearly just still in the hallway.

Kai is the wrong person to deal with this kind of thing. ]

Alright, watch it.

[There's a burst of light from the hallway and it goes silent. But the sword rattles once despite having no one touch it.

A moment later there's another flash and a burst of cherry blossom petals and Doudanuki is standing there, holding the sword over his shoulder, dressed in his usual armor. He blinks a few times and then brushes a cherry blossom off his shoulder guard.]

Hey.

[ Kai blinks at him, but it's honestly more in the manner of someone who knows he's supposed to be impressed but isn't than anything else. ]

So you really think of yourself as a sword?

[ It doesn't really matter if Kai understands or not, but he does get that this is important to the other man, and hell, it may even actually be the case. ]

I don't think of myself as one.

[Doudanuki sighs, running a hand through his hair. This is so frustrating that people don't believe him. It's like someone denying his existence as a sword and that...well, it bothers him. More than he thought anything ever would.

And even after using his one and only trick he can think of that--

Oh, well. There's one more, but that would be a bit, uh...bad.]

I am one. If you don't believe me, I got one more thing I can show you, but I might need your help afterward.

[ Now Kai is staring at Doudanuki for an entirely different reason. He couldn't imagine caring so much what other people thought of him. ]

Don't let it bother you if I believe you or not. If you're right, then it doesn't matter what I think.

[ Who knew swords were so sensitive? ]

[He groans and runs a hand over his face.]

Would you like it if I said you weren't what you are?

[It's just rude and Doudanuki is getting really tired of it from everyone he meets. It's one thing to be told once or twice. It's another to be told constantly that he's wrong about what he is.]

[ Kai considers it, and there's a half-smirk on his face. ]

I'd probably prefer that, as it happens.

[ His expression goes serious. ]

I've spent a lot of time trying to not be what I am.

Edited 2017-04-09 16:43 (UTC)

[Infuriating.

Doudanuki moves over and clunks down opposite Kai at the table, setting both his red helmet and his sword down in front of him.]

Why's that? Somethin' so bad with bein' what you are?

I think most elfin are happy enough with what they are. But I was raised better by humans than I ever was by my father's family.

[ More than that, Kai may or may not be up for telling. He will move his head a little, showing one ear with a scar an inch or so below the pointed tip. ]

I tried to cut it off, a long time ago.

Edited 2017-04-10 02:12 (UTC)

[Holy crap. He recoils a little at the sight of the scar by instinct at the thought of what it must have taken to cut his own ear almost off. Then he leans forward, studying it.]

You hated 'em that much huh? What'd they do?

[ Kai snorts a little, and decides if he's telling anything more he's getting himself a drink first. He considers the bottle and glass, then leaves the bottle on the counter out in case Doudanuki wants some. He drinks down a swallow before he speaks again. ]

I was more experiment and resource than child. The human I wound up with rescued me from that.

Hn, no wonder you hated 'em.

[He still resents some of his former masters in a small way. The ones who broke him for fun or the ones who melted him down the moment they needed some cash. But he was just an object to them, so why would they care, right?]

Still kinda extreme to go cuttin' your ear off though.

I was trying to make what I saw in the mirror match what I thought of myself. So other people would stop treating me like another damn cat bastard.

[ So his advice comes from a place of...partial understanding, at least. ]

[Partial understanding...

And Doudanuki looks at Kai and sighs.]

Well think of it like that then. Everyone's been callin' me a human like they called you elfin, but I ain't one. I'm a sword.

[And it's annoying and important to him that people understand that he's not human because they treat him differently as a human. He's a tool and he wants to be used, not protected or kept away from danger.]

[ That is where the analogy doesn't work out, since Kai couldn't cut the tips off his ears, or keep iron from burning him. He's roughly as elfin as they come.

After a moment, though, he lets out a slow sigh.]

Then a sword you are.

[He somehow thinks that Kai is only humoring him, but whatever, he'll take it.]

Good.

I wasn't really lookin' forward to cutting off my hand so you'd believe me.

Nemain.

[ Kai breathed it out slowly, the name serving the same general function as a muttered 'Christ'. ]

Yeah, look, don't do shit like that.

Why? It's not like it won't come back.

[Probably. He hopes.

He figures it should because it isn't damage to his blade, right?]

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