I can't believe, [he manages, once he can get his mouth to work properly,] we're not even-- I'm not anything to you and you want to try to find a way to take me to your home. By the Void, Thancred, what do you do with people you've been sleeping with for longer than a couple of weeks?
[this is the only way he can actually manage to talk about it, but his tone isn't really teasing. there's still that edge of near-panic in it, because for someone who's terrified of the thought of change, who doesn't look at his own reflection for how changed it is, the proposition is enormous. intimidating.]
Even if you don't mean it just for yourself, I-- how do you propose something like that so easily?
[as if he hardly has to think about it, as if it's not this likely-insurmountable sort of obstacle in the first place.]
Would it make you feel better or worse to hear that I'd offer it regardless of whether we'd engaged in our intimacies at all? You asked me what would happen, should this all turn out the best we can hope for. Were it up to me, I would have you someplace safe, where you could be happy.
[But he quiets, feeling as much as seeing the way Ryn's all but vibrating out of his skin with the way this topic of conversation has turned.]
What harm is there in wondering if it could be done?
[it's as scary, either way. one relies on less connection, but that doesn't necessarily make it better, easier. he's just as unsure of what to do with someone caring about him, in whichever form.]
...but I don't generally make a habit of-- wondering these things. I liked my life. I liked the way it was, before we studied the Void, before they exiled us from our home for it-- I'd just gotten used to life as it was after.
Spend enough time around Y'shtola, and the notion of tackling the impossible simply for the sake of proving it can be done becomes commonplace. I suppose I'm simply used to it.
[before they exiled us from our home for it, Ryn remarks offhandedly, and Thancred quietly files that painful revelation away for some other time.]
Then answer for me your own question, from before. How do you see it all playing out, should we both earn a second chance at life?
[surprise! he's just packed full of fun new little traumas like that.]
I suppose... I'd return to mine, and to the rest of the ren'dorei. Hope that what happened to me when I died doesn't stick and I don't just come back as a pawn of the void lords. You'd return to yours and the people you care for, either find a way to treat your ailing heart or just live whatever life you have left.
And if we could still reach each other, in some way, I imagine we might still speak, up until we didn't. Until you were gone again. I'd give it a handful of years if you don't take care of what killed you, maybe less.
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[this is the only way he can actually manage to talk about it, but his tone isn't really teasing. there's still that edge of near-panic in it, because for someone who's terrified of the thought of change, who doesn't look at his own reflection for how changed it is, the proposition is enormous. intimidating.]
Even if you don't mean it just for yourself, I-- how do you propose something like that so easily?
[as if he hardly has to think about it, as if it's not this likely-insurmountable sort of obstacle in the first place.]
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[But he quiets, feeling as much as seeing the way Ryn's all but vibrating out of his skin with the way this topic of conversation has turned.]
What harm is there in wondering if it could be done?
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[it's as scary, either way. one relies on less connection, but that doesn't necessarily make it better, easier. he's just as unsure of what to do with someone caring about him, in whichever form.]
...but I don't generally make a habit of-- wondering these things. I liked my life. I liked the way it was, before we studied the Void, before they exiled us from our home for it-- I'd just gotten used to life as it was after.
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[before they exiled us from our home for it, Ryn remarks offhandedly, and Thancred quietly files that painful revelation away for some other time.]
Then answer for me your own question, from before. How do you see it all playing out, should we both earn a second chance at life?
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I suppose... I'd return to mine, and to the rest of the ren'dorei. Hope that what happened to me when I died doesn't stick and I don't just come back as a pawn of the void lords. You'd return to yours and the people you care for, either find a way to treat your ailing heart or just live whatever life you have left.
And if we could still reach each other, in some way, I imagine we might still speak, up until we didn't. Until you were gone again. I'd give it a handful of years if you don't take care of what killed you, maybe less.
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[He'll get back to the other stuff in a minute, but.]
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[he's not mentioning the self sacrificial tendency, even.]