COLLAPSE THE WAVE MEME

[rampantfantasy]

Collapse the Waveform Meme

A meme for characters CRAU'd to heck and back.



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How many times now have you used that journal? How many places have you played that character?

How many friends, lovers, families have they found?

Well, here's some headache-inducing news: Ultimately, they're all the same person.

And now, the wave form has collapsed, and they actually are the same person. All of those memories, plus any new abilities and scars, smashing down into a single soul, a single incarnation.

On the bright side, at least whatever universe this is, you're not alone in it. On the less bright side, good luck navigating your relationships now.

Any CRAU character can respond to this meme, though of course, it's more interesting for characters who have been to at least two games. Meet your old friends, your new friends... Your friends' friends? Whatever. Consider noting down not only what games your characters have been to, but if you're open to three-people threads, for extra juggling-of-memories fun!

Comments

Ardyn [static noise] | ota | airlocked/lifeaftr/psls

[burninglight]

[Ardyn is just a bit different; tall and thin as ever, with a patch of heavy scarring over a permanently closed left eye and a very tired and distant look on his face.]

[That's probably fine.]

I'm assuming this is sometime after running into Ignis idefk what's continuity

[bloodyashes]

[Hey you didn't ask for the eye scars club but that's who we are, that's what we are today.

But the first sign Ardyn gets of Asch is probably not visual. It's a ping, like some kind of magical sonar, a brief humming sensation over his skin. Nothing harmful, just a blip of Seventh Fonon going hi, hello, what are you?

Soon after that, the familiar red hair comes into view - Asch, at least this version, has left his bangs grow to fall kind of in his face, and the length of it is pinned up with a carved comb behind his head. And indeed, Ardyn isn't the only one with some horrific burn scars across his face - in Asch's case, around both eyes.

Miraculously, however, as damaged as the skin around them is, his actual eyes a just fine, though the irises are no longer pure green but instead flecked with a reflective, almost flamelike gold.

And when he catches sight of Ardyn, Asch blinks hard and sends out another one of those little fonon pings, because the feedback he's getting seems off. If the Scourge is there, it should be... more than that, right?]

...Are you okay?

[Yeah just. going to check on him verbally instead this is fine.]

time is fake

[burninglight]

[Ardyn blinked his good eye at Asch in faint confusion, as if he was trying to process just who he was and what this sensation brought with him might be. He was more than used to having his thoughts and memories in all kinds of chaos, but this was...different. Worse, in that there were too many separate lines to untangle, sanity and madness and things in between all knotted together like a thousand crossed wires in an engine built by an amateur.]

Ah-....I don't quite know, actually.

[bloodyashes]

[...Well he's not pissed off so that's a good sign.]

Need a checklist?

[Ever helpful! He will come over at least but stand just a little out of touching range.]

Though if it's anything like when I woke up here, the disorientation is... probably the worst.

[Hi yeah we're just jumping straight into that no brakes.]

[burninglight]

You're...it's Asch, right?

[Ardyn pressed a hand to his head briefly before raking it through his hair; registering vaguely that it was just a little too long. Wasn't it?]

Where's- [leonard, ignis, yuuri, muffet-] ...what do you want?

[Odd, how it felt easy and yet wrong to slip into the slightest traces of cold bitterness first.]

[bloodyashes]

Yeah, that's at least consistent.

[Last name... Mostly Fabre, but with Ardyn here, he remembers the taste of bitterness about what exactly his family did after his death and -

But at least there aren't any 'Lukes' that he can tell crammed in there.]

And I'm worried about you because I said as many times as it takes and I've never seen you this vague-looking even then. Or ever.

[Auldrant to Ardyn, come in Ardyn.]

[burninglight]

I'm...sorry. [He answered with a vague smile and hesitant laugh that wouldn't have even fit the brief glimpse of an old healer Asch would have recognized; it was something else, between 'selfless savior' and 'ageless monster'.]

[Something very, very tired.]

I'm afraid I'm having a bit of trouble keeping focus right now.

proceeds to almost reply to my own comment

[founderinglight]

[HERE'S A FAMILIAR FACE.

Not a happy one, mind, but a familiar one. Like looking in a mirror.

...Except the tattoos, those don't match, but might well be familiar. Depending on the universe. Other than that, though, it seems that Izunia doesn't much change.

There's a hesitation, though, and why wouldn't there be?

There is no universe where Ardyn and Izunia get to live happily.

... Or wait no Clarita exists that's technically a thing.]

...Ardyn?

[STILL. HESITANT.]

[burninglight]

[If there was one near universal constant, one single anchor point in too many parallel lifetimes to focus on, it was that which grounded Ardyn in reality. A hatred of his brother that fluctuated wildly between bitter acceptance, cold fury, and monstrous shrieking rage, in nearly every iteration where there had been an 'Ardyn Izunia' for even an instant.]

You.

[founderinglight]

[Hands, held up in front of him, in the universal 'not doing shit' posture.

Other than that? He looks unsurprised, and as tired as Ardyn feels.]

Yes, me. How many times have we done this, now?

[burninglight]

[Too many. Enough to make his head hurt. The rage briefly overtook all other emotions, and Ardyn drew the sword at his belt to point at his brother-]

[...only to blink at the weapon in his hand as if he didn't recognize it to begin with.]

[founderinglight]

[...Yeah that one's. New. And also weird that Ardyn would go for a sword worn at his belt - that he would even wear one like a normal person - rather than going for the Armiger.

Izunia just looks down at it with a faint expression of 'that's a thing.']

...I don't think the roses suit you.

[burninglight]

Sh...shut up. I don't want to hear a single word of criticism from you of all people.

[serrata]

[ There's not a lot of things Yuuri feels comfortable calling constants, with how much is packed into her head. But Ardyn's a common enough reoccurance that she feels a jump of relief in her chest when she spots him. And then almost immediately, her heart sinks when she registers that in none of the histories she remembers them having together has that ever happened to

(?which name is the right one again?)

him. ]

What-- [ IT IS MOST DEFINITELY NOT FINE ] What happened to your eye?!

[burninglight]

Huh? Yu--no, Clari-?

[...what was this girl's name again? The sentiment behind it was more or less the same, he was certain--but some of the details felt conflicted or nearly lost.]

...I'm alright. I-...there was something I had to fix.

[serrata]

It's not alright!

[ That indignance, anger born of worry, comes in stereo both from Clarita and Yuuri and the fact that at least part of her is thinking and feeling in unison now makes the dull pounding in her head start to settle down some. ]

I don't... th--this didn't happen in anything that I remember. Was it something that happened after I--?

[ The question hangs but she doesn't really need to finish it. If they both remember InterGal 7 then both of them know what she means. ]

[burninglight]

No, it's...it's nothing to do with you.

[Ardyn held out his hand, a little unsteadily. Right...somewhere, at some point, this girl he cared about was-]

Come here?

[serrata]

[ And there's enough histories in her head where this is a recurrence that Yuuri doesn't hesitate to take his hand and squeeze it tight. ]

I'm sorry. I'm so sorry. If I'd known any better, I could've-- I never wouldn't been--

[ She makes herself stop, because there's no point in would have or could haves. Taking a shaky breath, she makes to take a step closer but then hesitates. ]

Is it okay if I...?

[ Is this girl good to hug her dad, sir ]

[burninglight]

[consider: what if dad hugs her first]

[because that is what's happening.]

You should have come to me first. There is almost no iteration of any reality where I would have refused to help you.

[andthenyoudie]

Oh.

[That's all she says at first, just oh, as she looms a little bit out of the way and regards him thoughtfully, her stance poised and at the ready like an autumn leaf clinging to its tree by its last threads — trembling on the wind, blown by the breeze, ready to embark on something new.

She looks at him for a long time, seeming to size him up, and then walks a little closer. Her way of walking like she's floating is vaguely reminiscent of an Astral, in its way — light, like her feet barely need to touch the ground to take her forward.]

You're the one he mentioned. I know you.

[burninglight]

[There was something very distantly familiar about that presence, as if the memory of one like it was somewhere buried in a few too many timelines. Gentiana? No--she'd actually spoken to him, for one thing. For another, Shiva had never take a form like this as far as Ardyn knew.]

I can't say I'm familiar.

[andthenyoudie]

That's all right. You know me, even if you don't recognize me.

[She tips her head a little to the side, ambling a little closer.]

I guess you could say you and I go way back, really.

[IMMORTAL HUMOR.]

You're remembering a lot of things all at once, I think. Things that make sense, and things that don't. But do you remember meeting a man on a rainy night? One who looked like someone you know, but wasn't?

[burninglight]

[He thought for a moment or two, scanning through fragmented memories of the rain of Altissia before finding some result in another city entirely; a recollection of someone who was and wasn't Noctis, and a cryptic conversation only those party to it would understand.]

I think that I might, yes.

[andthenyoudie]

He told me about you. So I thought I should stop by; I think you've earned the right to cross paths with me by now.

[She smiles faintly, tucking her hands behind her back.]

I think you loved me, once. But now I'm pretty sure you hate me.

[burninglight]

...Should you be what I presume, I suspect the answer to that varies rather wildly.

[Along with everything else.]