demainvient | 𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒏.

[Maman painted Verso with so much love and emotion. Maelle is nowhere near as skilled, but she practices. Lune and Sciel, in retrospect, were easy. Their chroma wanted to be again, and Verso had helped guide her hand. The expeditioners took less care, less thought, because all Maelle knew about them was that they were willing to fight to defend their home. The finer details could come later.

Lumiere is where she allows herself to be creative and she tries to emulate what she thinks came before her parents inflicted so much damage upon Verso's canvas. The sun shines brighter, and people are happy. The harbor is full of laughter and festivities every day and every night, and Maelle practices more and more. Families. Large ones. There are grandparents and parents and children and grandchildren and no one is a sad, lonely orphan.

No one, except for her. There's a loneliness that creeps into her chest when she doesn't expect it. It's not Papa or Maman that she misses. She'll see them again, eventually.

It's Gustave. But she can't be impatient. She must do this to the best of her ability.

She loses track of time until one day, she feels ready. She's made everything perfect. Their home is as it was, but the sun shines brighter through the windows of Gustave's bedroom. The nerves Maelle feels gives her the last push of encouragement--oh, she's missed him, but it's that longing that will bring him back to her. Through two sets of memories, he's always been vibrant and clear. The brother she needed when she had lost hers. The father she needed when hers wasn't there. Gustave gave her a family she could have only ever dreamed of, and for that, she wants to give him everything he could have ever wanted.

That begins with life.

It takes longer than she'd like, and the concentration threatens to make her temples pound, but she paints him. Slowly but surely, he returns to their painted world, expedition uniform clean and intact despite her memory of blood, so much blood on the fabric and her face and the warmth and the scent of it. By the end, the finishing touches take the last of her energy, and she stops both because she's done and because her eyes are tired. Her palms press into them for a moment before she drops her hands and looks at her masterpiece, heart rabbiting against her ribs.]

[ Everything is been so crystal clear, there at the very end. He almost wants to tell Lune about it, that the apparent secret to perfect clarity is simply this: to look your death in the face and know that it cannot be escaped.

It slows down; all of it. The sounds of the waves crashing against the implacable black rock of the cliffs. The sound of his own breath, harsh in his damaged lungs. The pounding of his heart as it limped its way onward, stubbornly beating despite the terrible damage it had sustained. The warmth of his own blood as it wells from the hole in his breast, soaking his uniform, the uniform Sophie and his apprentices had gifted him. This, too, is your legacy, she'd murmured, and he hears her voice so clearly that he could almost imagine her here next to him, lending him her quiet strength, her belief. Even now his sleeves don't fall from their secure rolls at his elbows. The boys had done such a superlative job fixing them. He knows they'll do the same with every project they undertake. They'll keep Lumière safe.

That, too, is his legacy. Engineers to fix and rebuild, using the skills he taught them. He never had children, but something of him will carry on even after he's gone all the same.

All this is so clear, and something else, too: Maelle, there behind him. She sobs and begs, fists pounding ineffectually on the barrier between them, and he could tell her it won't work, that if she even could break free she would need to run and leave him behind, but there's no time. All he can do is turn to her with all the love he's ever felt for her there in his eyes, the tiniest soft tug at the corner of his mouth. He's not afraid, when he looks at her. He wants her to see the truth, the bedrock of him, how he would do anything for her, even this. How he would always have done this, if it was what was needed so she could live.

For those who come after. For Maelle.

The fear creeps back in as he turns to face the white-haired man, as he realizes, again and again and over again, that he is going to die here, that his life will be snuffed out. But he still has to try. A flick of his hand; the familiar grip of his sword materializing in his palm. He lifts his arm, his sword flashing. He pushes himself forward into a run.

He dies.

Unexpectedly, some time later, he breathes, lips parting soft and sudden, his chest lifting with the first breath after an infinite, extended pause. His eyes flutter and open, blinking, bewildered, in the sunlight. He's...

Alive? ]

Edited 2025-05-28 02:02 (UTC)

[Gustave is spared from the sunlight as Maelle approaches the bedside, leaning over him with worried eyes. The same pale blue, but they seem to be robbed of color when beside her hair, white as snow. She's got it pulled up in that familiar ponytail. Something familiar, for him. It falls over her shoulder as she takes in the sight of him, eyes wandering over his hair, his face, his uniform.

Some of the worry leaves her expression as she's reassured that she did this right: this is her Gustave. She just knows it.]

Gustave.

[She says his name with a smile. There. Now everything is as it should be.]

Hi.

[ His lashes flutter as he blinks, rapid and unsure. There's no cold damp rock beneath him; instead, he's lying back on something soft and yielding. The dimness of the caves, the stormy gray clouds he remembers scudding over the waves, the sharp scent of salt water; all of it's gone, replaced by softly diffused sunlight and the scents of lavender, fresh linen... something else he can't name but which places him more surely than the evidence of his own eyes. Home.

There's movement, and he glances up at the shifting body that leans over him, eyes widening for a heartbeat before he's pushing up onto his left hand (how, some quiet, ignored part of his mind asks; how can he lean on his left hand, he'd lost the hand, the arm, it had fallen to the ground, spent, destroyed) and reaching for her with his right arm, clutching to her as his heart jerks into a sprint in his chest. He buries his face against the side of her head, another quiet part of him noting the change in her hair, the largest part of him unable to see anything but her. Alive and smiling and here. Alive. ]

Maelle.

[Maelle was so fortunate despite her unfortunate beginnings. It's why it feels so good to be her, and she laughs as Gustave pulls her off balance. She falls onto him, nuzzling her head against his face, laughter light and full of joy. This is what she's been having dreams of as of late. No more nightmares of fires or strangers she doesn't know. It's only been of Gustave, and the day they would be together again.

He was worth waiting for. Like Verso, he'll never be taken from her because no one is strong enough to do it. As long as she's here, they're safe.]

You're okay. It's okay, Gustave.

[They will always be okay. She hugs him tighter, for both their sakes. This is real. He has his second chance, and it won't be full of heartache and struggle. He'll never lose another drop of blood. He'll never shed a tear unless it's of happiness. He'll never need to fight unless he wants to lose a duel with her.]

I've missed you so much.

[ Maelle's laughing, joyful, but he's shaking and his arms are too tight around her, just like that moment back in the abandoned manor when he realized it was true, she was alive, she was safe. ]

I don't understand.

[ His voice judders in his chest; it feels weirdly rusty, but that might be only to be expected for a man recently come back from the dead.

Because he had died. He knows he had. He'd felt the chroma spear through him and he'd seen the blizzard of petals and ash. But Maelle is cheery, delighted, saying she'd missed him and he doesn't understand, not any of it, not how he's here in what he realizes, pulling back from her with his hands on her shoulders, is his own bedroom back in Lumière; not how he's breathing and speaking. And not—

He frowns, looking harder at her. ]

Maelle, your hair... what...

[ Still can't finish your sentences? teases Sophie in his mind. ]

I don't, I... are we really...? But, how—

[No embrace from Gustave could be too much. She closes her eyes and enjoys the fact that he's alive to squeeze the air from her lungs. Her eyes open when he pulls back, letting him take her in. She can't stop smiling, regarding him with fond relief. No tears, but only just barely, and she wipes at her cheek to make sure nothing's escaped. She nods, blinking rapidly to keep the tears at bay.]

Yeah. Yeah, we're home. [This is home. Their modest home was so much kinder to her than the sprawling manor.] It's a long story.

[They have all the time in the world for details. Maelle lifts a hand to rest on his forearm, giving it a reassuring rub.]

There's nothing to be afraid of anymore.

[Not even death.]

[ Home. He releases her with one hand so he can turn and look around the familiar room with bewildered eyes. Everything is just as he remembered from that last day in Lumiere, when he'd dressed in his best suit and stared at himself in the mirror — that mirror, there by the door — for too long, trying to decide what he should do. What he should say.

But the room is brighter now than it was then, sunlight flooding through the open window along with a light, playful breeze that slips through the curls of his hair, lifting them from his forehead. He can smell flowers, grass, other green growing things; he can hear the lifted, laughing voices of children. Somewhere past all that, music drifts through the city, someone playing a harp, accompanied by a flute.

He looks back at Maelle, and everything he's feeling is shunted aside in a moment when he sees the way her eyes shine. I missed you, she'd said, and he doesn't know what that means, how any of this happened, but he's never been able to bear making her sad, even if she's smiling now.

Gently, he lifts his right hand to her face, thumb running over the delicate arch of her cheek as he studies her, his own eyes so full of feeling, sympathy and love and regret. ]

Maelle. I'm sorry I made you cry.

It's okay. Everything is okay, now.

[No more expeditions. No more gommage. Maelle turns her face into his touch, cheeks round from the size of her smile.]

We get to live this life together. There's nothing to be sad about. It's okay.

[She knows him. He'll always worry about her regardless of what's happened to him. Finally, she can repay him for all the consideration and love he's given her when no one else would. He's been her world, and now she can give him one, too. She's so excited to do so, but she knows she has to take it slow. He's in shock.

She covers his hand at her cheek with her own.]

You don't need to apologize for anything, Gustave.

[ Her eyes are shining, he sees, but now he realizes it's not just from tears held at bay. Her smile is... enormous, delighted. He can't remember the last time she looked at him this way, so pleased with herself. There's nothing to be sad about.

How can that be true? This world, this life, it's full of grief. She knows that as well as he does. His brows flicker toward each other, a divot appearing for a moment between them, and he slides his hand out from under hers so he can get up, testing his legs, pacing across the little room he'd once known so well. ] How is that possible?

[ How is he here?

His hands lift, palms up, an unconscious gesture of bewilderment as he tries to force his shocked brain into working, into thinking. ]

I remember... I remember the cliffs. The white-haired man. [ He turns to her, the frown still digging between his brows as he tries to wrench memories from somewhere beneath the muffling veil of shock. ]

We, we fought. You were there. [ Her voice, horrified and screaming. Gustave! ]

But now we're... we're here, and I don't... [ A hand lifts, gestures at the side of his head, moving in and then out again with his fingers expanding. ] None of it makes any sense—

[ He turns back to her, hand lowering halfway back down to his side, still suspended in the air. ] Maelle... what happened? What do you mean, everything's okay?

Edited 2025-05-28 21:38 (UTC)

[He's so clever. Gustave's brain sometimes works faster than his mouth, and she finds it funny that she found herself attached to a man of science when she longed for her brother that loved music with his whole heart. It's hard not to compare and contrast the two brothers she loves, especially when she thinks of Verso in this situation. Entirely different people, but at their core, perhaps not so much.

Verso's been unhappy, but she knows he just needs time. Gustave will be grateful once he has answers for his many questions.]

Do you want to pace around for this or sit? It's... a lot. [She says with a small laugh. One day, he'll look back and find this silly, too.] I don't really know where to start.

[The beginning? Even that's confusing. She remains where she sits, looking to the window, as if the sunlight might give her an answer.]

[ She's so calm, so... serene in a way that he has never before associated with Maelle, as quick with her words as she was with her rapier, fleet and light-footed and irreverent. He studies her for another long moment, then lets his hand drop as he comes to sit beside her on the bed. Both hands come to rest on his knees; he looks at the left one, gleaming and perfect, and then over to her. ]

I died.

[ His voice is gentle, but firm. He can feel too many words bubbling up again, threatening to choke themselves off in his mouth, and takes a deep breath, licks his lips, pauses until he's sure he knows what he's going to say. ]

You should probably start there.

[Her gaze trails after his. The memory of clutching his fabricated arm to her chest before putting him to rest is still sharp. Her heart had shattered, and while it's better now, the scar remains. It's enough for her to need to look away and take a steadying breath. They suffered for too long. I died, he says, and she looks to him without a smile and nods.

She reaches out to put her hand over his, slender and pale against his warm skin. A reminder to herself: he's here.

(In a way his death was so much worse than Verso's. The ash and smoke and pain blinded her, the flames took her eye along with her skin, leaving only his screams to burn her ears. She didn't see the life leave his body, his corpse, she didn't kneel beside it and--)

Maelle purses her lips together for a long moment.]

You died. That man was Renoir, and... he. He was trying to protect his family.

[Despite that flawed portrait, that was true between Renoir and her father. He just wanted to protect what was his. Gustave had been a threat. Verso saw him as one, too, but in a different manner.]

He's gone. There's no more Paintress. No Gommage. It wasn't what anyone thought. But... we're safe. We'll never need to send another expedition and no one will ever need to die for another.

[She smiles a little, hoping to see some sort of relief on Gustave's face.]

[ Two words, and the last flicker of hope he had that maybe, somehow, he'd simply... been incapacitated, perhaps in a coma, that they'd managed to save him after all is snuffed out as simply and completely as a candle. His lashes flutter as he blinks, rapid, his fingers beneath Maelle's warm hand rubbing against one another where they're set on his thigh, and he lifts his left hand — in perfect condition, gliding as easily as the first day he attached it — to that spot at his ribs where it had rested before, as if he might somehow have been able to halt the flow of his own blood through a cage of metal fingers.

But there's no wound there, and his uniform is as perfect as the arm. His breath comes quicker, a little too fast, and he feels it again, like he had when he first woke by that waterfall what feels like a lifetime ago: his heart fluttering, unable to pick up its normal rhythm. He died.

Through the low hum of burgeoning panic — he died, how can he panic about dying again? but he can feel it just like he's back on that cliff looking at the man who killed him, cold terror gripping his heart and making it stumble and skip and forget how it's supposed to beat — he hears her go on, telling him that they succeeded, that the man — Renoir — is gone. The Paintress is gone.

He breathes, fast and too light, through his nose, and tries to find something to hang onto. ]

It's over?

Edited 2025-05-29 14:22 (UTC)

It's over. We're okay. We... we only made it because of you.

[Because of his Lumina Converter, and how much she loved him and wanted to save the people he loved. That's all still true. Not the whole truth, but... one thing at a time.

Maelle watches him with concern, but warmth. She wanted him to know everything. She could have removed the memory of the expedition, left it out of her draft, but he wouldn't feel right. She wanted Gustave as he was, even if that meant some uncomfortable conversations.]

It's okay, Gustave. [As if she could sense the erratic beat of his heart, she puts her hand over it. A hand that can paint life, now.] We get to grow old together, now. I mean, you'll always be older.

[She gives him an encouraging smile.]

[ Her hand is light and comforting against his chest, but even his distress and uncertainty has to take a step back as what she says finally filters through, lands. It's over.

He lifts his hand to cover hers, hard, and turns toward her with his eyes and limping, stumbling heart so full he doesn't know how he'll be able to stand it. ]

It's over. No more Gommage, no more... you're safe.

[ She's safe, she gets a chance to live after all, his dearest wish granted, and he can't stop the disbelieving smile that takes over, a smile that looks almost like he could burst into tears at any moment. He can't tell if he's happy, it's too big and too overwhelming a feeling for happiness, but there's relief, too, the same way there was when he came through that door and found her sitting alone in the manor room. ]

You're safe. You'll... you have a future.

[ Lumiere will have a future, but in the end, his goal had simply been to find a way for Maelle to live. And now she will.

He reaches again to put his arm around her, his left hand covering the one she has on his chest, and pulls her against him, lowering his head to press a kiss to her hair, letting this aching relief wash through him. ]

You're safe.

[Better. This is better. This is what she's imagined, bringing him back.]

We will have a future.

[He was always her beacon, her anchor. And now he will live a full, long life. He'll create because he wants to, not because he's trying to save them. He'll no longer have the weight of Lumiere upon his shoulders.

He hugs her and she wraps her arms around him as tightly as she's able. The kiss to her hair is a balm she didn't realize she needed--it makes that serene surface crack, a stifled sob escaping on an exhale. Oh, she's missed him terribly. No matter what new memories she has, he's still a part of her. All the parts she loves most feel like they exist because of his care.

She's so happy, and doesn't want him to worry, and so she shifts to hook her chin over his shoulder. After a moment she presses a kiss to his cheek, over the scruff that would tickle hers when he scooped her up in his arms. He's okay and no one will take him away from her again.]

It's okay. It's all okay, now. It's okay.

[ A choked little sound escapes her and she's clinging to him in the next moment, and whatever else he is, whatever else he doesn't understand, he always understands this: Maelle, and what she needs from him. What she needs now is comfort, to hold onto him, so he draws her close and lets her hold him as tightly as she needs, smiling a little at the brush of her lips over his cheek, the same sweet, innocent kiss he remembers from so many bedtimes and long chats and thanks given.

He leans his head against hers and just lets himself linger there for a long moment, everything he'd ever wanted suddenly here in his arms, suddenly real, before his voice comes again in a murmur, rumbling low in his chest. ]

But I don't understand how I'm... How am I back? How am I.... alive?

[ Destroying death was never going to bring back all the people they've lost, all those Expeditioners they passed on their long trek through the continent. And if he really had died, and not simply been gone, unreachable but still clinging to life, then how can he be here now, feeling Maelle in his arms, feeling the air as he pulls it into his lungs?

And where had he been in all the time in between? ]

[Inevitable questions that have no simple answer. Maelle squeezes him once more before reluctantly drawing back, though she keeps her hands on his arms, her attempt to anchor him. She looks into his eyes, perhaps the most familiar ones she knows, and smiles.

No way forward but through.]

I brought you back. I can bring back everyone. [She'll get around to it, eventually. She thinks she could even bring his parents back, if he so desires. Wouldn't that be nice? An extended family for them all. No need to get ahead of herself, though.] This world was painted. The Fracture occurred when there was a fight over it, and that's when everything became... so cruel, so unforgiving.

I can't fix everything that happened to this Canvas, but I can fix the rest. Our home. The people we love.

[Like him.]

[ He hadn't known what he expected her to say, but it surely.... wasn't this. ]

Painted?

[ Maybe he's still in shock. Probably he's still in shock. It doesn't stop his mind from turning her words over and over, trying to find sense in them. ]

You mean... by the Paintress?

[ But then how could Maelle... she's his sister, a sixteen year old girl who always said she was never good at anything but swords and running across the city. He studies her, uncertain, wondering if maybe this is some sort of joke. It would be in poor taste even for Maelle, though. ]

How can you fix it? How can... how can you bring people back?

I'm a paintress. The Paintress was my mother. Well... is my mother, but she's no longer here.

[Maelle's brow creases, more at the fact that she doesn't like how there's no easy way to explain this without sounding absolutely insane to Gustave. She gives no thought to her mother and what she might be doing in this very moment. She's not here. She doesn't concern her. Everything is fine as long as she herself remains in this canvas.]

I was never very good at it, but Maman taught me enough. And I've been practicing. I made sure I was ready before I brought you back, Gustave, because... I wanted you to be just as I remembered. And you are.

[So everything else that's left should be easy. She gives Gustave a hopeful smile, but there's a reluctance to it.]

I know it sounds mad, but it's the truth. Maman wasn't the one behind the Gommage. It was Papa, trying to get her to leave. Trying to destroy this place. But everything is okay now. That will never happen.

[ It doesn't just sound mad, it sounds impossible. Maelle, a paintress? A... Paintress? ]

But... your mother....

[ He shakes his head like a dog with water in its ear, agitated. ]

No... no. That's not right. Your mother and father were here, in Lumière. I know you don't remember them, but plenty of other people do... did... even now.

Why are you saying this?

[ It's some kind of story, it has to be, because how could it be the truth? But then... if it isn't the truth, how is he here?

Gustave looks away from her, around the room, his glance more intent and critical, looking for any small flaws, any changes to the familiar setting. This... it must be some illusion, or the afterlife, maybe. It can't possibly be real. ]

[Maelle waits, patiently, for him to ramble. To try and wrestle with what she's saying. It's difficult. She knows. It hurts to see him so unsettled, but after they get through this, everything will be beautiful again.]

They were. It's... very complicated. I can show it to you, some day. What life beyond here looks like, where I'm really from. [She owes it to Lune, too.] There's the life I lived here, and the life I lived there.

[She smiles, a little sad.]

The one here is so much better. [She can breathe. Speak. See, with both her eyes. She can run and laugh and live and no one recoils in horror and no one blames her anything and no one dies anymore.] So much of that is because of you. You were... everything I could ever want in a father, in a brother. I had so much love.

[How could anyone expect her to leave this all behind? And for what? A life of cruelty and suffering.]

[ It's too much information, too alien an idea; even if he weren't already trying to claw his way out of muffling shock it would be almost impossible to wrap his head around. Maelle is telling him she's a Paintress, that she brought him back to life, that she's from some other world— what does that mean for this one? For Lumière?

Something does cut through the clinging, claustrophobic blanket of confusion, though: the tinge of sorrow to her smile, the things she's saying. She wasn't... happy, in this other life, and he doesn't understand any of that but he understands Maelle.

(Doesn't he? Does he still?) ]

Maelle, I...

[ His glance lifts to that familiar ponytail, the way the loose strands frame her face: now pure white instead of red. But she's still familiar. ]

I wanted you to have everything you could ever need. Whatever... whatever else is true, you're my family. You're still my family.

[ His mouth opens, but he doesn't say what rises to the tip of his tongue: it would only hurt her. Aren't you?

He swallows it, finds some tiny smile for her instead, wanting to shake that sadness off the corners of her own. ]

At least, I think the paperwork would still agree.

Edited 2025-06-08 13:48 (UTC)

[There he is. He grounds himself, through her, and Maelle's smile comes easier.]

I am. You raised me.

[Just as much as Maman or Papa. Maybe even more, now that she thinks of it. He never pushed her to be anything she wasn't. He encouraged her to be herself, whatever that may be. He loved her fully, and she knows he'll love her fully know, even if he doesn't quite understand. Maelle and Alicia's memories run parallel, two childhoods, two families, but she finds herself favoring one over the other. Gustave is so small part of why.]

Nothing will change between us. Not ever.

[The paperwork doesn't matter at all.]

And now we have forever. You won't be going anywhere. [No Gommage. No death.] You can live whatever life you want, Gustave.

𝒐𝒑𝒆𝒏.

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now I can unleash this journal with icons

I HAVE REGRETS

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