[He still doesn't know what color he should be feeling yet.
He takes in what she says, measuring it in the quiet silence that follows until her words bleed over into a pool of everything else he's heard within the past not-even hour. He still has to sort everything out—accept the surreality that comes with suddenly being told you're alive when you had just come to terms with being dead. To submit to the new truths that surrounded everything he and the others had fought for while Tartarus still existed, to acknowledge that it had all been a lie, and all that he had done during that timespan either had no bearing, or was one of the hands that moved the clock one step closer to the demise of the world.
He also has to accept that by the time he wakes up, he likely won't really remember much of anything at all, least of all her (but he will eventually, and when he does he'll run until his lungs catch fire), and that by the time he fulfills the promise he made (once he makes it up all those steps and onto the sun-bathed roof and finds her), he won't be there to say hello. He will be there to say goodbye, and to let her know how glad he was to have met her as he watches her mortal life draw to a close. And then from that day forward, he will have to learn to live with the fact that she won't be there anymore, and yet he still will be, against the odds. That's the part he's having trouble accepting, the one part of his extended future that he will probably never be ready for, even when that promised day comes.
It's a lot to take in at one time. He didn't get to live out the months or the final hours like the others had. He just gets to live it vicariously through the condensed words of someone else, knowing there's nothing he can do to change that reality. Because there is no other way, and he'll be too busy fighting to wake up.
But that time is not yet, and for once he hopes it doesn't come too quickly.
Right now they're still in his little apartment, in this strange alternate world that can bring people's souls back from the dead, and right now she's willing to take him in for a second time. So he guesses he can give in to her again (be weak-willed, a little scared, and (soon enough) happier than he currently feels), and make sure that by the time their existence here is finished, she won't have any lasting regrets to take with her into that other, far-away world.
So if she's sure—]
Then so am I.
[He doesn't let go of her quite yet, eyes sweeping the table, but he loosens his hold. His voice still feels raw, but it's growing stronger, like he's learning how to use talk again.]
no subject
He takes in what she says, measuring it in the quiet silence that follows until her words bleed over into a pool of everything else he's heard within the past not-even hour. He still has to sort everything out—accept the surreality that comes with suddenly being told you're alive when you had just come to terms with being dead. To submit to the new truths that surrounded everything he and the others had fought for while Tartarus still existed, to acknowledge that it had all been a lie, and all that he had done during that timespan either had no bearing, or was one of the hands that moved the clock one step closer to the demise of the world.
He also has to accept that by the time he wakes up, he likely won't really remember much of anything at all, least of all her (but he will eventually, and when he does he'll run until his lungs catch fire), and that by the time he fulfills the promise he made (once he makes it up all those steps and onto the sun-bathed roof and finds her), he won't be there to say hello. He will be there to say goodbye, and to let her know how glad he was to have met her as he watches her mortal life draw to a close. And then from that day forward, he will have to learn to live with the fact that she won't be there anymore, and yet he still will be, against the odds. That's the part he's having trouble accepting, the one part of his extended future that he will probably never be ready for, even when that promised day comes.
It's a lot to take in at one time. He didn't get to live out the months or the final hours like the others had. He just gets to live it vicariously through the condensed words of someone else, knowing there's nothing he can do to change that reality. Because there is no other way, and he'll be too busy fighting to wake up.
But that time is not yet, and for once he hopes it doesn't come too quickly.
Right now they're still in his little apartment, in this strange alternate world that can bring people's souls back from the dead, and right now she's willing to take him in for a second time. So he guesses he can give in to her again (be weak-willed, a little scared, and (soon enough) happier than he currently feels), and make sure that by the time their existence here is finished, she won't have any lasting regrets to take with her into that other, far-away world.
So if she's sure—]
Then so am I.
[He doesn't let go of her quite yet, eyes sweeping the table, but he loosens his hold. His voice still feels raw, but it's growing stronger, like he's learning how to use talk again.]
Food's going cold, you know.
[Not that he's all that hungry anymore.]