clussy: Ιͺᴄᴏɴ ʙʏ Ιͺᴄᴏɴsκœ°α΄Κ€Κ™Ιͺα΄›α΄„Κœα΄‡s (α΄›α΄œα΄Κ™ΚŸΚ€) (πš πš‘πšŠπš πš’πšœ πšπš‘πš’πšœ πš–πšŽπš–πš˜πš›πš’)
eddie kaspbrak ([personal profile] clussy) wrote in [community profile] quietplace2018-02-22 11:56 pm

un: klapbak

(Eddie had debated on whether or not to share this piece of information. But what the natives had said weighed on him heavily, and he felt like if he didn't and something were to happen...

He wasn't so sure he could live with that guilt.)


I asked one of the natives if bad things from our homes could come to this place. They said it was possible.

maybe some of you will think I'm crazy. Or the adults won't believe it. The adults in our town didn't believe anything and they didn't want to pay attention to what was happening. they didn't care about all the missing kids. I don't care if you believe it or not. some stuff exists whether or not people want to believe it does. me and my friends took care of it before and we'll do it again if we have to. we made that promise.

our town had this fucked up evil in it. and im not talking hellfire church-evil stuff either. I'm talking like...fear. real fear. maybe even the thing that made Fear

IT knew what you were afraid of. no, not your 'kind of' fears like thinking spiders are gross. i mean the kind of fears you dont even tell your best bud about. the kind of fears you don't even tell YOURSELF about cause the shame's so bad. IT knew you and IT fed off those fears. i guess it liked how kids tasted best when they died in terror

IT ate them too. im not saying it like sucked out their soul. no. IT would


(Eddie has to stop here. To breathe. To focus. He touches his own arm, closes his eyes, and counts.)

i cant explain how you'll know when you'll see IT
you'll feel
like you have to go towards something real bad, real scary
you'll know you shouldn't but you HAVE to...and maybe you'll be lucky like we were
like i was. and be able to get away when the fear gets bad enough.

IT takes the shape of a clown the most when ITS just existing normally. IT only changes when its hunting. IT can come through pictures or sinks or anything. i dont know what ITs limits even were

sometimes IT called ITself Pennywise the Dancing Clown. IT told me its name was Bob Gray when IT talked to me. And sometimes you could hear that carnival sorta music.Sometimes it'd lure you in with the smell of popcorn. IT sometimes had balloons. A lot of balloons. I don't know. It lived in the sewers and

I want to say we beat IT for good but we didn't. i'm not sure if IT can BE beaten.

I dont know if IT'll ever show up here
but don't trust things to be what they seem. don't.

and maybe realize the monsters you know might come here too. please be careful.
justbeingknife: (tired)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-02-23 10:30 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Perhaps Eddie would have been reassured by the fact that Majima himself didn't even really have clear-cut mental roles for the both of them to fill. Someone had asked him once if he liked children, and the answer had been that it didn't matter: they take one look at me and start bawlin'. Majima looked like a thug -- the exact kind that any mother would want to keep their charges away from.

So he stayed away.

It was only that when he saw a kid in danger or distress, it was hard to simply leave them alone. Especially when he realized he actually liked them. Eddie was a card, and age difference or no, he could recognize when he had no real prior framework for dealing with whatever IT was.

He stepped over to the bedroom wall and knelt down to read. Most of the names were those he didn't recognize, but as he brushed his fingers over the names at the bottom, he looked up. ]


That thing took all these people, and no one fuckin' did anything about it?
Edited 2018-02-23 22:32 (UTC)
justbeingknife: (a prison)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-02-24 07:03 am (UTC)(link)
[ Majima looked up from his device.

There was some strange, dark expression on his face – that of someone searching for the words that would describe how fundamentally wrong this story had struck him. In lieu of this, he put out a hand to touch Eddie’s shoulder.

The gesture wasn’t a practiced one; men in his line of work weren’t encouraged to touch strangers unless it was in anger. Better to bloody your fists teaching someone respect than try to comfort anyone, even a child.

But it was there. ]


Dunno what it’s like in the States, but there’s all kindsa vile shit goin’ down when you’re an adult. You get used to hearing about it, too, and if ya pay enough attention, you get to thinkin’ that everything’s tainted. Reporters, cops, politicians… these days, you can even buy off the yakuza.

But if anything like this had happened in Kamurocho, the town would've been up in arms. Headlines screaming for action, parents callin’ committees. Goes without sayin’ that the streets would’ve been swarming with cops.

What you’re describing, though… I can’t belive you fuckin’ made it outta there alive. I can't believe your Bill didn't lose his goddamn mind.
justbeingknife: (makoto no)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-02-25 04:56 am (UTC)(link)
No, I think you're right.

Whatever the world's supposed to be like, it ain't that. I'm glad ya had each other. And he had you.

[ Majima settled back on the floor, sitting crosslegged with his elbows braced loosely against his knees. It was an unconscious action, folding himself a little smaller in the way that Eddie himself now seemed smaller. ]

Listen, about what happens if IT ever comes back -- you said the adults in Derry ain't believe you, right? For whatever reason, when it came to actually tryin' to deal with those kids that died, they got leadfooted.

So is there anything that we would be able to do? Like that ritual ya wrote about on that wall. What's that about?


[ Majima could be as stubborn as anyone, sure. But it was Eddie and his friends who had beat IT back before; it was their town that the monster had terrorized. Their peers it had taken.

Thus it was also their advice that needed to be followed in any talk of countermeasures. His job here was to listen. ]
justbeingknife: (looking up)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-02-25 06:04 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Majima considered this new information for a moment or two. ]

Nah, it does make some kinda crazy sense. If it feeds on fear, then if yer not afraid, you're not givin' it anything to work with.

[ He thought back to when he was younger, when he believed all kinds of whackadoodle things because to a kid, the lines of reality were not so solid, not so absolute. If dinosaurs could be real, then why not dragons? Maybe if you threw your old belongings away, they really would come to resent you.

And there were charms, too. Rituals, things that adults knew didn't do a damn thing, but kids believed fervently could ward off danger and the dark. ]


And I always felt like I was invincible when I was with my brother. Maybe that's part of it, too. Like if it's all about belief, then you're stronger if you're with someone ya really love.

Anyway. That means normal shit like shotguns wouldn't be any good against it, right? Not if ya don't believe it'd work.


[ He shook his head. ]

Dunno how well I'd do against somethin' like that. I haven't felt afraid since before I got here.

[ Which was more of an admission than it might seem. Majima had never considered himself a coward, but he'd respected that sense of danger, realized that it had protected him on more than one occasion. But now it was as though the feeling had been jarred loose, somehow. Deadened. Maybe some other emotions as well, he'd never actually taken inventory. ]
justbeingknife: (smizes)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-02-26 09:06 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Majima smiled warmly at Eddie -- at the honesty with which he spoke about the people dearest to him. It softened his expression, chased away some of the shadows of fatigue and suffering. But there was sadness right there alongside. ]

Yeah. I know what ya mean.

[ So you're really gonna spend your life waiting for a brother who can't possibly come back to you?

His handler had thought it baffling, that devotion -- excessive, even for sworn brothers. But for all Majima knew, Sagawa and Shimano had taken the oath for political reasons. Omi and Tojo, east and west. Another arrangement to keep the watchful peace.

As he read the last of Eddie's message, he found himself recalling that year in the darkness -- no idea if Taiga was dead or alive. Forgetting what fear felt like, forgetting that there was anything besides the next coming of the firelight. Was despair a kind of fear? ]


What do you believe in now?

[ He asked. It was what seemed to matter the most right now. ]

Your friends from back home, they can't all be with ya right now. So what can you believe in?
justbeingknife: (....!)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-02-28 07:45 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Majima's gaze turned faraway, like he was remembering something that had happened a lifetime ago. Maybe two. What did he believe in? In the old days, he would have had plenty of answers -- his Family, maybe. Himself. The idea that even those who had been rejected and cast aside by society could find meaning and belonging in the oaths they'd taken. ]

That's a tough question. Feel like that list used to be a lot longer.

[ He turned to lean up against a blank section of the wall, tilting his head upwards with a soundless sigh. Right now more than anything, his fingers itched for a cigarette. ]

The past couple years, they feel kinda like a fever dream. Like everyone's gone nuts. I think it's 'cause of all the cash pouring into Japan -- no one knows where it came from or when it's gonna end, but they've forgotten it was ever different. And it's changed everybody.

Used to think that that the world made sense. Like there were rules. But now...


[ He seemed to come to some decision. When Majima looked back up at Eddie, his gaze was clear. ]

Duty. Honor. The people I care about.

[ Even now, with all that had happened, there were the things he wouldn't compromise on. Even if no one else felt the same. ]
justbeingknife: (makoto no)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-03-01 07:35 am (UTC)(link)
[ Majima shook his head: no. ]

I never cared about that. But as for what changed... hell, everything.

[ He thought it over for a few moments, trying to figure out how to explain when it seemed like even three years wouldn't be enough time to truly convey what it had been like. ]

There was a real estate deal -- city redevelopment, some shit like that. Doesn't matter. Point is, somehow the most powerful groups in and out of Tokyo ended up knifing each other in the back to snap up one piece of land. Ten million for a vacant lot the size of a one bedroom apartment.

Seeing that complete shitshow, meeting all those crazy bastards... seeing decent people get their lives ruined over a spit of dirt. Yeah, I guess you could say that helped change my mind.


[ His smile was tinged with bitterness, but this faded when he read Eddie's next message. ]

So I should give it to ya straight, huh?

You're right. One of these days, I gotta meet your bro. Bound to run into each other sometime.
justbeingknife: (looking up)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-03-02 03:17 am (UTC)(link)
[ Majima's response to Eddie's first message was a kind of conflict that could not have been more visible in his expression. Did he even deserve the chance to start over? Was that what he wanted?

After a moment's thought, he replied: ]


I don't know if that's what I want.

[ Then, almost as an afterthought: ]

When I have to be quiet, I can't be myself.

[ How was that for honesty? ]

When you're talkin' about real serious stuff, you mean like bein' sick? Why'd they lie to ya about that?
justbeingknife: (this city's)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-03-02 05:36 am (UTC)(link)
[ team more generous with others than yourself!! Majima smiled. ]

Yeah, I got a taste of that already. That kid's got a mouth on him, even when he ain't actually talkin'.

[ While modern psychological terms were a little outside of Majima's time period, he did recognize some of what Eddie was telling him. Love could be a powerful force, both positively and negatively -- if it became twisted, it could strangle as surely as an actual noose. ]

I think you're right. Some moms, they ain't know how to let go of their kids. Just makes everyone worse off in the end, though. I ain't know anyone whose old lady told 'em they were sick, exactly, but there're plenty of guys whose folks told 'em they weren't worth anything.

Even if they know it ain't true, you look into their eyes and it's like deep down they still believe it.

I think you're stronger and smarter than ya think, though. You're what, not even a teenager yet? But ya already know yourself better than most adults.
justbeingknife: (smoking shadow)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-03-05 05:51 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Eddie really wasn't pulling any punches with his assessment of his mother, that was for sure. It sounded like a stifling environment -- the opposite of the one Majima had come up in, where no one could really be counted to look after him but himself; he'd had to toughen up fast, or he never would have survived.

It was a positive thing, wanting to improve yourself, but -- ]


Well, what if we helped you with that? Changin' yourself, I mean?

[ Eddie's next question was a bit more nuanced. ]

A lot do... but a lot don't. In my line of work, anyway.

When ya live like a normal person, it's easier to give yourself reasons why you gotta do or say something you'd rather not. You got responsibilities, or you just wanna get through the day without gettin' into a huge hassle. Society runs on lies and appearances, anyway, so it's like doing what you gotta to survive.

But it ain't as though there's some big split once ya hit 20 or anything. I figure that if you're old enough to talk, you're about old enough to start lyin' -- even if your reasons start out easier to understand.

At first it's to cover for yourself, maybe a couple other people. Then you're really in for it.
justbeingknife: (straight face)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-03-06 03:36 am (UTC)(link)
Your inhaler? So it's psychosomatic?

[ Wow, what were the odds. Maybe that was another reason Majima found himself oddly identifying with Eddie. ]

I get what ya mean. But now that I'm thinkin' about it, that's just one reason to lie. There's plenty more. To impress someone, to get something ya want, to get outta trouble, like ya said...

[ Huh. ]

That's probably not real reassuring. But...

I've met people who lie, but who I wouldn't consider dishonest, either. They're more like animals. They don't lie just to dick you over, but to get somethin' they want.


[ Apparently there was a difference? Majima probably wasn't explaining it too well. ]

I'd rather deal with someone like that.
justbeingknife: (what god hands)

[personal profile] justbeingknife 2018-03-06 04:30 am (UTC)(link)
'Cause you're desperate?

Lots of guys lie to impress girls. Or other guys. Never really saw the point, but I guess they want to be liked.

[ Majima shrugged; it was his general opinion that this kind of dissembling was doomed to failure. Either it didn't work, or it did and people liked you for being someone you weren't, really. ]

They're honest with themselves. They might lie sometimes, but you know where ya stand. And you know why they're doing what they do.

It ain't personal.

good place to end?

[personal profile] justbeingknife - 2018-03-06 04:55 (UTC) - Expand