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vrdantwind
"Hey, this is Claude! Pretty sure I'm doing this correctly. You can leave me a message here, and I'll get to it as soon as I can. Talk to you soon~."
vrdantwind"Hey, this is Claude! Pretty sure I'm doing this correctly. You can leave me a message here, and I'll get to it as soon as I can. Talk to you soon~."
cw: mention of suicidal ideation
Date: 2021-03-11 03:57 am (UTC)"You're making a lot of assumptions. Our jobs after the war will be harder, not easier. At least while we're fighting, Sylvain and I are...we see each other every day. War is simple. Everything is clear. When it's over, I'll be in over my head, hundreds of miles from both of them with a territory to rebuild and angry nobles to appease and--there's no way in hell I'll have a spare moment to think about any of this. To...to feel anything. ...I won't want to."
And isn't that the real reason he never said anything to Sylvain? It wasn't fear of rejection, not really. It was the same reason he used to keep everyone at a distance back at the academy; the same reason he always convinced himself that love and romance were distractions he couldn't afford. Getting shoved into his father's role to take care of the post-war mess of a suddenly united continent isn't going to make that better.
"And Sylvain...he told me himself, Claude. That if he had to go back to Gautier, he would..." His voice and his breath both catch in his throat and he sets the Gear down to lean it against the lamp the second he feels his hands start to tremble. Goddess, he wishes Claude were here in person, and he feels pathetic for needing that just to have a damn conversation. He forces the words out in a rough almost-whisper, without looking the other man in the eye. "He would find an excuse to fall to a Srengi blade. I've seen that look in his eye before on the battlefield. The closer we get to the end of the war, the more often I see it."
He clenches both hands into fists in his lap. Claude makes it all sound so easy, but he knows, he knows it never is. Felix shouldn't be telling him these things, shouldn't be slicing himself open and bleeding his feelings out like this. Not because he doesn't trust Claude with them, but because they're not all his to tell, and Claude hardly needs more to worry about than he already has. But he can't just pretend to accept a reassurance he doesn't believe in.
"Being forced to treat with you at some diplomatic function I can't stand isn't going to help, either."
Felix digs his fingers into his hair, trying to breathe in deeply and making a low, frustrated noise on the exhale. "Obviously, you're right. Living for the present is the only thing that makes sense. But...I don't know what Sylvain said to you when you told him all this, but he's barely spoken to me all day. He's...thinking too much. It feels like he's going to take off again any minute and--I don't know what to do or say to help him. And don't tell me to just 'be there for him' or 'give him time' or some other useless nonsense. Sylvain...if I can't keep my promise to fight for us and I leave him to his thoughts, he'll drown in them."
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Date: 2021-03-11 04:18 am (UTC)Felix sounds too much like the defeatist voice in his own head that he long ago realized wasn't worth listening to, unless he was just going to accept laying down and dying the way his own people wished he would. Claude accepted years ago that voice never has anything helpful to say, and hearing its words in Felix's voice don't make it suddenly more compelling. It just makes him ache for Felix, knowing his lover is currently low enough to listen to it.
"Don't you think that's exactly the time when you would say something to Sylvain, though?" he points out gently. "When you realize you're about to be dragged away from him by post-war business for who knows how long, and he's going back to a place that makes him miserable? That seems like a do-or-die moment, sunshine. A prospect you wouldn't be able to accept. You'd do something before you let that happen, Felix. In fact, I think you'd do almost anything before you let it happen. I'm pretty sure you'd explode if you didn't. Like I said - the person I've come to love here is the same Felix from back home. And I can't even begin to see any Felix I've ever known standing back and letting that happen."
He leans back a little in his chair. "And that's another thing - you act as though you're the person Sylvain's fate lives or dies on. Does no one else who cares about him have any responsibility to him? Can no one else do anything for him? You're not the only one who loves him, Felix, and you're not the only one who's trying to keep his head above water. This isn't something you have to do alone, or are doing alone. We're here, too."
He rests his hands on the edge of the desk. "As for what Sylvain said to me...he said I was right. And he smiled, in a way that reached his eyes. There's still plenty for us all to be worried about, him most of all, but...I don't think he's as close to drowning as you think. And you're not the only one who's promised him a life worth living for."
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Date: 2021-03-11 04:55 am (UTC)Just like he failed Dimitri for all those years. Just like he failed to reconcile with his father until it was too late. If he's the only one who can't help Sylvain, what kind of a husband will he make?
"It's not--I'm not so arrogant as to think that I'm the only one who could do anything. Far from it. I just...I just have to do something. If I can't, then what am I even doing here?"
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Date: 2021-03-12 02:11 pm (UTC)He sighs. "I suppose the question is, what do you want to do for him exactly?"
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Date: 2021-03-12 11:36 pm (UTC)Wait--
"--fuck, no, I didn't mean that. It's not you, you're...ugh. I just...need to make things better instead of worse. I don't know how. Not with this kind of thing."
For a few short weeks, Felix could wake up every morning and see something that's been rare for most of their lives: a genuinely happy smile from Sylvain. If those few weeks were it, if that time is over, Felix doesn't want it to be because he's taking his own unhappiness out on Sylvain. The way he's always done, to everyone.
"I'd rather say nothing than drag him down further."
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Date: 2021-03-18 06:02 am (UTC)He crosses his arms over his chest. "Also, honestly...I really don't think you can make Sylvain feel better about all of this as long as you're convinced that everything will genuinely turn out terrible unless you accomplish something impossible. Because when you get right down to it, Felix - you don't really have any hope for the situation, do you? The best you've come up with for yourself is something to take your mind off of it. Something to convince yourself is productive activity just so you don't go crazy with agony over the idea of there being no actual solutions or hope. How is someone with no hope themselves supposed to make Sylvain believe things will be better than his own darkest fears?
"The best thing you can do for both yourself and Sylvain is to stop calling your pessimism practicality, and your displacement activity as a solution. I don't think even you believe, deep down, that you can find Arceus and make him do what you want. I don't think you even believe you could beg him into it. I'm not even sure how fully you believe in a pokémon god, or his power to grant wishes. So do you think you can make Sylvain believe in something you don't?" He shakes his head. "Sylvain's smart. The smartest man in Fodlan, someone once told me. He knows what you're doing, and why you're doing it. Your love for him and your desperation and willingness to do anything it takes for him - for all of us - means a lot to him, I'm sure of that, but I think that's what really lent weight to this promise you've made him. Not any belief in either of you that you could fulfill this one."
He sighs. "I wish you were here, so I could make you look at me. So just listen to me with all your ears when I say this, sunshine: what you really need to do, what you really need to go looking for, is hope. Hope and faith. Not in anything invisible or unobtainable, but in all of us - and especially yourself. We all need to accept that we could go home at any time, which is hard to swallow...but none of us can or should believe that going home will be the end of the world. For one thing - going back home to our homes, our friends and loved ones, the people who count on us? We're supposed to look on that with dread? We're supposed to be so selfish that we should focus on what we've gained here, and treat everything and everyone we left behind as less important? We've found peace here, so who cares if Almyra or Fodlan ever know the peace we set out to bring them?" He shakes his head. "I can't accept that. I won't accept that."
He fixes Felix with a look. "But more than that - it's not just about others, or duty. I refuse to believe that we're all - or even some of us - going back to misery. At worst, it'll be temporary. I said you wouldn't leave Sylvain alone or let him just go back and be miserable with his family, knowing what you do and being who you are, and I still believe that. I believe all of us - even me with the rest of you - have at least a passing chance, if not better, of coming together again back home the way we did here. What happened to bring us here, and bring us together, has all been unbelievably improbable and miraculous as it is, so the idea that there couldn't possibly be further unexpectedness or miracles - that things that have already happened could never happen again - isn't one I can believe in. And the possibilities I've laid out for you and Sylvain aren't even particularly far-fetched ones. They don't need miracles to happen. Those things are considerably less unlikely than how all of us wound up together in the first place, so don't bother telling me you can't believe they'll happen."
He rests his hands flat on the desk. "And on top of all of that...we have right here, and right now. We don't know how long it'll last. It could end tomorrow, or it could end sixty years from now. We've spent all our lives living with a mortality that isn't any different than that. What answer to that is there - what other answer has there ever been - than to just make the most of the time we have at the sides of the people we're with? To enjoy what we have while we have it? We need to believe that going home will be bittersweet and not just bitter, so that we can feel more than just dread at the thought, the same way one hopes to die a peaceful death after a life well lived to take away some of that fear, but we also need to not be fixating on the unknown moment when what we have will end. It'll only poison what we have now. And for what? Some wild chase after a god you can't possibly compel so you can make selfish demands of it? A chase that'll take you away from Sylvain, the man you're supposedly doing this in order to be with? Who you want to be there for?"
He leans forward. "You and Sylvain both need something to believe in, and hope for the future to look forward to. The reason you haven't been able to help him is because you're just as hollowed out by the thought of the future as he is still, so you don't have anything to offer him except for a promise you both know you can't keep - one that's honestly more for you than for him. But the thing is that there is hope. There are real things you can believe in. There's the present, right here and now. And there's all the possibilities of the future if and when we go home, which aren't nearly as bleak as you think they are. All of these things are worlds more likely than finding Arceus, and you know it, sunshine." His voice softens. "But believing isn't some physical activity you can do, so it doesn't burn off all that nervous energy you've got. And it's terrifying, because hope can fall through - and life has been anything but kind to any of you. Trusting that things can go well is so much harder for you than saying 'I'll make things happen the way I want', right?
"But isn't it kind of ironic you'd try to do that by chasing a pokémon, rather than by making Sylvain's present as incredible as you can? And instead of promising him that you'll save him from his misery when we go home? Sure, maybe you won't remember the promise, but so what? You know how you felt about him back home. You know you wouldn't just leave him to suffer if you could prevent it. So tell him that. Believe, like I believe, that the you back home can't possibly stay silent and stupid for long. Make Sylvain feel like, memories or no memories, here or at home, he'll have a future he doesn't have to dread, and he can trust you to provide it. If you want to take control of the future because you don't trust what it'll hold, then take that responsibility yourself. Don't shove it on Arceus to make it happen. Do it yourself."
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Date: 2021-03-18 08:31 am (UTC)He is tempted to interrupt once, when Claude tells him to think before he speaks and consider better ways to say things. That's easy for Claude to say, when he can read people like books and somehow predict their reactions. Felix can't even figure out why people are saying the things they're already saying, let alone things they haven't said yet. How the hell is he supposed to know what the right thing is to say to the right person?
But he puts that thought aside for now as Claude goes on. And finally, finally things start to become clearer. There's a part of him that wants to protest, to argue against the assertion that he's not up to the task of finding god and making it submit to his will, but the more rational part of his mind agrees that of course the plan is ridiculous and Sylvain definitely knows it.
The word 'faith' gets Felix scowling, though he still doesn't interrupt. Faith. What good has faith ever done? Besides leave him defenseless when his world fell apart over and over again, knocking him off his feet every single time because he dared to believe. He believed that Glenn was the strongest person he knew and could overcome any foe. He believed that Dimitri would be the same person when he came back from Duscur as he was when he left. He believed that his father, for all his flaws, was a great warrior who would live to be a pain in Felix's ass until he was old and gray. He even believed in the Goddess' will, once upon a time, until it became obvious to him that the Goddess didn't give two shits about any of them. When enough beliefs were shattered, he had to rely on what seemed realistic instead if he didn't want to shatter with them.
And Claude acknowledges that faith is difficult, that hope is terrifying, but how many times does he think Felix can take watching his hopes disintegrate in the Eternal Flames?
Felix is silent for a little while after Claude is finished. True to his lover's expectations, he hasn't looked up to meet his eyes once this whole time, and he still doesn't yet. So Claude's solution really does boil down to having faith in himself, huh? He's been fighting his whole life for enough strength to protect those he loves, but he's never known how to do it this way. He's forced to admit to himself that his heart is as weak as his sword arm is strong. Why else would he try so hard for so long to push the very people he wants to protect away from him? Tactically unsound at best, just as Seteth said. His defenses may once have been sufficient to keep that weak heart from breaking completely, but they've been wearing thin ever since--no, even before he arrived in Johto.
They've been wearing thin ever since Dimitri found himself again in Fhirdiad.
Eventually, Felix raises his head to look at Claude. "You're right," he says quietly, "about almost everything. You compared our situation here to the fear of mortality at home. And you say I need to have faith in myself not to stay a coward forever. But I don't. Because the way I avoided that fear then was to let myself feel as little as possible. Keep everyone at a distance and focus on what was in front of me. Training. Studies. The war. As long as there was another battle to fight, another technique to learn, then I could put my emotions aside for the sake of progress."
That's as long as he can take meeting Claude's gaze; his own shifts a little to focus on the air just beside his Gear. "And I don't think I was wrong to do so. Not while the Empire still stood. Emotions have no place on the battlefield or in the war room. They'll have no place in governance, either. Here, with all of you, I've...let my guard down. I don't regret it. And I want to believe I could do it again, I just...don't know how to train my heart to be strong enough for that belief. And until I do believe it, I won't give Sylvain empty words."
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Date: 2021-03-23 04:13 am (UTC)This isn't the end of the conversation, however. Quiet footsteps are heard outside of Felix's door just a few moments later, and then Claude is letting himself into the room. He shuts the door behind him before moving directly over to Felix, reaching out to stroke a hand through his hair and then down his cheek to cup his face.
Now, Felix can see Claude's slight smile. "I think you're right not to say things to Sylvain that you don't yet believe," he murmurs. "It wouldn't help him, because I think he'd feel that the words were hollow. And you do need to have more faith in yourself and the people around you, sunshine...but it doesn't need to be blind faith. I was never asking you to have faith in something you've got no reason to believe in.
"I want you to have faith in yourself because you've already shown that it's justified. Like you said, you've started to open up here. You've given Sylvain a good life and a future full of happiness and promise here. You've changed here, haven't you? If you needed to close yourself off during the war to keep going, that's understandable, and that very well could be the reason why the you back home hasn't made the developments you have yet. But you've seen in yourself, here, how much not having a war on your plate can let you change. Now that the war in Sylvain's time back home is over...can't you trust that the Felix there can make the same changes? Can open up the same way, given the same sort of opportunity? He might have more responsibilities there, I'll grant you, but his priorities won't be any different. And Sylvain is one of Felix Fraldarius' very highest priorities."
He strokes his thumb over Felix's cheek. "So this faith...it isn't blind faith. It isn't hoping for something you have no proof could ever happen. I'm asking you to trust that the same person will make the same sorts of choices you already know he's made before, when given a chance. That's barely even faith. It's more like trusting you to believe in the balance of probability, when you already know what's probable because it's already happened once. You can do that, can't you?"
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Date: 2021-03-23 07:49 am (UTC)You've changed here, haven't you? Felix supposes that letting his guard down could constitute change. Certainly, something has to have changed to allow him to accept Dimitri as he is without feeling like he's going to boil over with conflicting feelings. Or to let Claude as close as he did so quickly. Or...to propose marriage to Sylvain at all.
And Claude is right--Sylvain is and always has been one of his highest priorities, even if he didn't always acknowledge or like it. As for trusting himself to make the same choices...
He nods. "I can. When you put it like that, I...if we can hold onto our first promise through a decade of hell, there's no reason we can't keep it afterward. I may not be very good at faith, but I know I keep my promises."
Felix sighs and shifts to wrap his arms around Claude and rest his head on the other man's shoulder. "...thank you," he mutters quietly.
no subject
Date: 2021-03-23 10:26 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2021-03-23 10:53 am (UTC)He'd like to say that if he did somehow lose them, if he had to go back to living alone in Castle Fraldarius for the foreseeable future, he'd be fine. A bit sad, a bit lonely, but fine.
He'd like to say that, but at this point he's really not sure if it's true, and that's a scary thought.
But he pushes it aside so he can focus on Claude's warm hand in his hair and the steady rhythm of his breathing and the way he smells--he always smells good. It doesn't take too long before Felix starts to doze.