folkmeme | Truth Meme

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truth meme

Truth Meme

Somehow, there is kirin on you.

Most likely, it is the fur of the kirin that was caught in the environment of wherever you’ve been; there is a stray hair on you because one was on the seat you sat on upon the train or because it blew onto the brim of your hat in the wind.

Or it may be because you met the kirin—a playful ungulate moose-sized spirit who prefers not to speak—and engaged with him and gave him a pat, or a scratch behind an ear. Maybe the kirin nosed or licked your hand because you made him laugh (it’s an adorable ‘keh keh keh’ sound).

Unfortunately for both you and the kirin (who had not meant to trouble your day like this, truly), this exposure to his dander has only one reaction, and it happens to 100% of Star Children: you are compelled to tell the entire truth. About what is less specific; you are compelled simply to announce things about yourself—your life, experiences, thoughts, opinions, feelings. No matter if it’s something silly and inconsequential, deep or secretive, life-altering or commonplace. Some may choose to do this by employing Foxi and their relic; others by finding people to exchange truth with to face to face.

When you have met the kirin’s subconscious desire for four hours, you will be free from the truth telling and the recipient of 24 hours of good luck. The good luck will be sometime in the next year rather than in the next day, and you may have no idea where it came from, but you’ll know a lucky day when you have it!

This meme is game canon unless marked otherwise at the start of threads! Threads can be used for spoons and application samples.
Assume all characters involved on this meme are affected.
Characters will compulsively state truths about themselves/their feelings on the network or in-person. Top-levels may include either/both options.
Please include prompts in your top level.
All questions will be answered with complete and total honesty. No special abilities, half-truths, or omissions can avoid sharing all of the truth.
Meme is open until the next truth meme!
After one month, you may use the kirin mechanic generally in game. It can be one-sided! All truth-telling characters must consent.

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Zack. [This time Cloud reaches for Zack's hand, holding it between his own and pulling it into his lap.] What's this about?

[Zack exhales quietly, twisting their fingers to twine together, curling tightly around Cloud's. The grip is almost painful, just a hair away from too much.

It's okay. He's okay. It's not that bad.]

Had a fight with Sharon. She's mad I don't wanna beat up the fox. Or, uh. Maybe. She's mad I'm not mad.

[Sharon being mad that someone else isn't mad enough is so damn Sharon that Cloud almost sighs and laughs at the same time. Why does she have to be so damn abrasive about it, though...?] She got to you with that one, I guess. [Cloud looks over at the smashed Relic over on the floor, brushing his thumb against the side of Zack's hand and easily ignoring the threat of pain from his grip.]

Mm. [He lifts his free hand, rubbing it against his face.] She doesn't like my truth, I don't like hers.

[Shouldn't be surprising. They're very different people, this isn't the first time they've clashed, nor will it be the last. Something about this one, though.]

Shoulda asked me when the truth thing worked. Words not comin' so easy now. [He's only half-joking.] ...Said I was tired. Of being angry. I was pissed off for so long... five years pissed is so long... 'm tired, man. I'm dead. Can't a dead guy just be tired and happy for a while?

[That I'm dead acknowledgement has Cloud drawing in a breath, now holding Zack's hand back almost just as tightly, but he doesn't interrupt. You're not dead. You're here with me. If you're dead then I'm dead, and we'll be that way together. Now isn't the time.]

...yeah, [Cloud finally manages, after unclenching his jaw. He keeps Zack's hand between his own, on his lap, still rubbing his thumb along the side.] He can. But also sounds like this guy [not saying 'dead guy'] got pretty angry about not being angry. [So...maybe Zack wants to not be angry, but he still is kind of and Sharon pulling at that particular thread just reminded him of the fact? Cloud's crash course in unearthing buried feelings is even more muddled given he was barely in the driver's seat for most of it.]

[Can't help noticing that harsh little intake, or the tight squeeze of his hand, so Zack shifts sideways to rest his head against Cloud's. Sorry, he's sorry.]

I don't like it. Being reminded of how angry I was, or... how angry I should be, I guess. Makes me think about what made me mad in the first place. If I let myself think about those days all the time...

[He'd drown. He would absolutely drown. He came out of the lab with his sanity in check and managed to stay kind, stay himself, but hell if some days afterwards he hadn't been hanging on by a single thread.]

...I dunno, man. The other Firsts let Shinra push them into gettin' so pissed off they turned into monsters, hurt people. Kinda scared it'll make me a monster someday, too.

[Nudges Zack's temple with his own. It's okay.]

You prob'ly already know this, [Cloud murmurs, as they slowly get closer and closer to cuddling (again) the more Zack talks,] but you're different from the other Firsts. You're not gonna be a monster. [It's not about the cells, about whatever strange immunity Zack seems to have to mako poisoning and Jenova, it's about character. It's about Cloud's faith in the strength of Zack's spirit. Zack simply isn't capable of being a monster like the rest of them, he isn't.] It's not in you.

[Not in him... Zack doesn't know, one-hundred-percent, if that's true. He hasn't been tested the same way as the rest have- winged and full of voices, raised by horrible scientists, subject to experimentation all their lives. He's had a rough decade or so, but it started out great: he was living his dream. He doesn't want to let himself drown in the stress of what-if, though, either. That's definitely not in him.

Is that all they're allowed to be? Monsters, or heroes? They did kind of sign up for that.]

...'m being stupid. Shouldn't let this get to me.

[It's just a few little comments. Someone else's opinion. What does it matter? He knows who he is, what he wants. And he's doing great.

(Except: why is the truth so damn painful sometimes?)]

Hey, no, [Cloud answers immediately, and knocks his head against Zack's gently (for a SOLDIER, at least).] Nobody said any of that.

[Zack tilts into it again, letting out a soft, brief chuckle.]

Sorry, sorry. Don't mean that. Sometimes I'm jealous of you, though.

[Cloud tips his chin up, arm coming up behind Zack to tug him into the curve of his shoulder. Get small and cuddled]

Jealous of me, huh? Why's that. [Not exactly doubting, but the idea of Zack being jealous of him has never occurred to him.]

[Well. Now that he's said it, he kind of regrets, but... this is a day for honesty, apparently. And Cloud respected his free will enough to let him decide how much to share. That's worth a hell of a lot.]

There's... days I wish I could forget, too.

[It isn't regret, exactly. He doesn't envy everything Cloud got in exchange for those lost memories- the mind fuckery, the poison, the broken identity, everything he knows and likely some of what he doesn't.

Still. Just- maybe it'd be nice, once in a while. For it not to be so damn vivid. Comparatively.]

[Oh.

...there's really no need to point out the trade-offs for that. Zack saw (cared for) the price for not remembering the labs for an entire year. What came after wasn't exactly fun either, but if it was between that and remembering four years of horrific torture...even the brief flashes he gets are enough to knock him flat on his ass.

So. Yeah. He gets it.

Cloud presses his chin a little harder against the top of Zack's head, before falling back onto the bed and bringing Zack down with him, pulling him up against him to cuddle. You're little spoon now, dude.] Maybe we'll figure out some of the weirdass magic here. Find a 'forget the shitty stuff' spell.

[Oh, he's being spooned? Yeah, actually, he's cool with this. Zack makes a quiet noise, a weird mix between content and uncertain, enjoying the experience of being hugged and pampered but wary of the offer. If that kind of magic exists...]

Dunno if I could do it for real. Even if it was a choice... still kind of a big part of me, y'know?

[He can wish for it sometimes, but not want it gone entirely, right? Nibelheim changed the both of them in different ways. He came out the other side still himself, just a version that stepped sideways. Less naive about everything. More of a survivor than before (which he recognizes is ironic). He couldn't be quite so reckless, with the lives of other people on the line. It's not bad, right? Aerith still loves him. Cloud still loves him. He's still Zack.

...He was tired, though. Nibelheim and everything that came after made him so very tired.]

So we figure it out just to have it. Hey. [Pushes himself up onto an elbow to hover over Zack a little, lips pursed in concern as he reaches down to hold Zack's cheek for a moment, checking his expression.] Nobody's gonna make you do anything you don't wanna do. [Zack doesn't need to use that magic bullet just because they look for it, but it's always like this with him. He expresses something that hurts, or something he hates, and then immediately walks it back using whatever tool or excuse he's got available to him.

If it's more of that, Cloud doesn't need to hear it. It's a smokescreen for some other shit he's noticed Zack doing; self-sacrificing, in much more subtle ways, putting all his own hurts and hangups on the back burner, maybe entirely by habit at this point. Cloud has a bad day and Zack is there immediately with a glass of water, but every time they start to encroach on what upsets Zack he follows it up with a smile and a wave, always to be dealt with at some indeterminable 'later' date.

So if Cloud's stare is a little stern, hopefully it's interpreted to mean that he's not going to let Zack's discomfort go unnoticed, not anymore.]

[Zack peers back up at Cloud, at first in surprise by the scrutiny, and then his brows furrow as the unspoken message sinks in (alongside the very obvious spoken one). Nobody's gonna make him, huh.

He should know better. Since coming here, he's had plenty of choices, plenty of free will. Maybe not during trials, but they don't last forever, and the in-between can be pretty great. Hasn't had to kill any friends or fight things he shouldn't have to or die for people who deserve better. Maybe his perspective's too screwed up, maybe in that aspect, Sharon's right. He should be pissed. He should hate Thirteen.

But she can't make him. No one can. Even Thirteen can't do it, besides the temporary shifts in certain trials here or there.]

You can't make me do this, either, [he says back with a soft tease in his tone, lips curving into a smile that- oh.

Wait, he's doing it right now. He can tell by the shift in Cloud's expression, the scrutinizing look and the narrowed eyes.] ...Not gonna let me get away with that this time, are you.

[Cloud lifts a hand to Zack's face, holding it there and brushing his thumb over the swell his cheek, gazing down at him.] You don't gotta be angry, [he says softly, thumb stroking rhythmically, their voices in the room almost muffled as if the setting sunlight casting slanting shadows is pressing a blanket over their words. The room feels simultaneously too small and too big, in a good way. It's just them in here. It's only them in here.] But you gotta be here.

['Here.' Alive again, in whatever manner that means in a place like this. Building a life, in whatever capacity is available to them. Years and years of the both of them, drifting from place to place, going where ordered, belongings stuffed into canvas bags or abandoned. Cloud didn't bother decorating his room until just a couple months ago, and of all the things Zack's collected over the years, the only object he'd never leave behind is the Buster. Opposite ends of the spectrum but to the same purpose.

It's the same with feelings. Cloud, letting himself be shackled, the weight of his pain and emotions sometimes so great he can't barely get out of bed, can't hardly drag himself through the days until he makes it back up to the surface where the sunlight is. Zack, pushing every painful thing as far beneath him as he can manage, launching himself up into the sky to float above it. Beautiful, maybe even inspiring, but even birds get tired of flying. Eventually he'll come back down and all the shit he tried to soar above will be right there, ready and eager to put its claws back into him.

Zack doesn't have to be angry. But he has to be here. And everything he's been pushing beneath him is right here too, whether or not he wants it to be.

Cloud blinks slowly, watching Zack's face in the stretching shadows as he revels in the feeling of warm skin. In a memory he's resolutely ignoring for right now Zack's skin is cold, and wet, and the breaths at his lips bubble red but right here and now, Zack's tired and warm and his chest rises strong enough to lift Cloud a little bit with each sigh.

He leans down to kiss him. Pulls back.] Love you, [Cloud murmurs, still stroking Zack's face.]

[Does Cloud have any idea how healing he is to be around? He probably doesn't. Probably doesn't get told enough. Mental note to work on that.

He thinks on those words. Gotta be here. He sure tries to be. Physically, he's moved in, has been for months and months. (The other house is collecting dust. His smoker's in the yard. Why did he ever think any of them would need space?) He loves seeing them every single day, bumping into them as they cross paths in the hall, catching quick lazy kisses in the kitchen while someone's cleaning or cooking, stealing bites of each others' foods or picking up a towel to dry while someone washes. The sunny smiles and warm looks when eyes meet. He loves it. He loves it.

Mentally, emotionally, he never wants to leave their sides for long. Nothing gives him as much joy as waking up with them, hearing their voices throughout the house, the little hum Aerith utters when she gardens or the huff of Cloud's breath when he trains nearby. The way they each look at him in turn. The way he is loved, every single day, and he can see it, he can feel it.

Cloud's hands on him are warm, the arms around him are so protective and all-encompassing. The sound of his voice as he says those words is so beautiful.]

I love you, [He whispers back. How can he not? How could he ever not?] I'm here. I'll be here. I promise.

[He may be dead, but he's alive. Sharon can be mad if she wants, but he can be grateful for this.]

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Truth Meme

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