Back From The Future - OTA

[skyward_eyes]

WHO: Nida
WHERE: South Village Fountain, Around South Village, North Village Bakery
WHEN: March 18 through end of March
OPEN TO: Some OTAs, Closed threads for Iron Bull,
WARNINGS: Discussion of death and suicidal ideation

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Not So Triumphant Return | Fountain | Closed to Iron Bull


Not for the first time, Nida comes awake underwater. Some small part of his brain says this is familiar, the way awareness sneaks in even as the weight of the stuff presses down. The way his body aches to strain toward the surface, his legs want to kick out, kick up, seek a surface and the sweetness of air in his lungs. It’s happened before, something in his mind tells him, even though he also knows he’s never experienced such a thing back home before.

Back home. The words carry an odd sort of weight in his brain as pieces settle together and, in spite of himself, his legs kick out for the surface. What did his brain mean by that? What was it pulling at, what was this thread it wanted and tugged at like it mattered? That didn’t make sense, at all. Being in the water didn’t make sense either.

What he remembered last was his room back in Balamb. What he remembered was putting his fist through the mirror in the bathroom because he couldn’t stand to see himself reflected in it. What he remembered was the pain in his hand from where the glass had cut, and how good it had felt to just feel something after Elijah. How the weight of the glass had felt in his hand. How…

Oh. Right. That. The very line of thought finds Nida stopping his progress toward the surface. Does he really want to find that breath? Does he want to keep going? He’ll leave it to fate, he decides. Surely if he’s meant to keep going there will be some sort of sign, right?


Going Home Again | South Village | Closed to Seifer

He’d asked for a sign and it had come for him, which he supposed was saying more than he really should have expected. Fine. If these Observers wanted him to keep going, if Bull was right about all he’d said, then Nida wasn’t going to fight it. He was going to try. And of course the first thing he had to try was seeing if he really could be accepted, contrary to his fears. Of course the question was how he was supposed to go about it. For a few minutes he plays with the green band at his wrist, a burden restored, but the chance for communication back. It had only been a few days. How had a year and a half, give or take, only taken days? The very question hurt in ways he couldn’t explain, but he could still feel the powers he now remembered buying, the winds still danced at his call, so clearly he hadn’t been gone long. Which meant reaching out for the next step wasn’t easy.

A simple message sent to those he remembered worked the forge. People who might be around Seifer right now. Surely one of them could pass on his summons, asking Seifer to come get him and walk him home.

Because right now, he didn’t want to be alone. He wanted that connection he hadn’t had back in their world, the brotherhood he dared not seek out there. He needed someone who would might understand just how badly he was hurting.


Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow? | House 58 | Closed to Billy

And here was the worst part of coming back. It had taken some time to work up the courage to do this. Granted he knew he couldn’t put it off past this, his first day back. As much as he wanted to push the rest of the small world the villages represented aside for a while, there were those few people he couldn’t avoid. There was his family, two brothers he had chosen while he was here and Rinoa. He might be able to put off Jason until tomorrow unless Seifer found the guy and brought him home. But this? He had to know today. If he was going to hurt, if he was going to hurt over this, he wanted it over and done with soon, when all the rest of the pain was still fresh. Get it all out at once.

Yet here he was, scared as he stood outside of Billy’s door. What if he wasn’t home? What if Billy said no? What if he… No. He wouldn’t borrow trouble. It would come soon enough.

Heart in his throat, Nida finally raised his fist and knocked on the door. Moment of reckoning he supposed.


Bunny Bread for the Soul | North Village Bakery | Closed to Malik

Routine didn’t really suit him on his first few days back, to be honest. His memories were still finding ways to slot around one another, some way to rectify the months he’d spent here and all the time that had passed back home. It sort of made it different, trying to find his stride once more. It was like he’d stumbled when running a track, only to find that he’d lost a single shoe upon getting back up. How were you supposed to keep a regular pace when your entire gait was off? It led to long mornings conscious but not wanting to move when he woke in a bed that wasn’t at Garden. It meant sitting at the table in the kitchen longer than he normally did, settling in there after he took care of cleaning the dishes if his housemates allowed him. It meant not making his previously self-appointed rounds at the dojo, helping people learn to be better able to protect themselves.

And now it had led to something else entirely. Slipping out from under the watchful gaze of his keepers. As much as he appreciated his family for keeping such careful eyes out for him after what he’d alluded or rarely even admitted to those people who cared about him, that didn’t mean he could handle them always there, watching over him. What he needed was something else. Somewhere he could think, somewhere he didn’t have to see the pity or pain or understanding. Somewhere… somewhere that he might get treated like little to nothing had changed. And he knew where to go for that.

North village was a long walk, and Nida let himself get a good bit of the way before sending a message back to those who would worry that he was off to get fresh bread. Which of course meant a hike to the Northern Bakery, because that was where the guy who knew how to make bread was. And when he finally arrived and pushed into the warm smells of the building, he almost smiled. Almost. Hyne, was there a better scent than this?

Still, time to make his presence known. And in this case he did it in the only way that seemed reasonable to him.

“Dragons,” he announced from the doorway when he didn’t immediately see Malik, “totally count.”


Home Is Where The Bed Is | House 16 | OTA


Stealing was wrong. That much Nida was absolutely certain of, and for once he’d actually gone in person to request paper from the guy that was apparently rolling in it. There must have been something truly pathetic about his face because that Reeve guy let him go with a surprising number of sheets. But there had to be a way to get this all to sort out in his mind, right? A way to get things straight in his brain. Which is why he’s there on the steps leading down from his porch now, leaning heavily against the railing on one side. He doesn’t want to keep Seifer or Rinoa from coming or going at their own pace, and since he’s pretty much forbidden from roofs at the moment, there’s not much he can do but sit there and draw.

He draws anything and everything that comes to mind. Remembered moments from time here, like the grand ballroom from the New Year’s Eve party. He draws monsters from his world in the middle of battles against people he knows. He draws people from the village going about their lives. He draws a body crumpled on a black and white checkered floor, a sword discarded at its side.

Nida hisses when he sees the way his hands have betrayed him, crumpling up the paper in question and hurling it away from him. And he really didn’t mean to hit someone with the paper as they passed.


Guess Who’s Back? | Around South Village | OTA

How do you fit back into a life that is both a few days and yet a year and a half behind you? It’s an adjustment that Nida is having trouble with. Still, there has to be some semblance of order to his life, and he tries to follow it as well as he can. But everything seems to get off to a slower start. His patrols around the village come later in the day and only ever when he’s signed up with someone else with the watch what, clearly he doesn’t trust himself to be alone and away from people. Frequently Nida shows up at the inn for lunch and stays throughout the full of the rush, just to people watch. And of course there is the dojo which is is still responsible for. More and more of his free time there is spent on pummelling things with his basic staff or tanbo, rather than trying to improve the place. Clearly an adjustment period is needed. But those who are really lucky will find Nida sitting on a bench in the fountain park, considering the water and held back from it by the weight of a cat in his lap that clearly just needs pet.

Comments

[morphogenia]

"Ah!" Kamala pulls back enough to look at him. She didn't even realize he might be hurt. She'd been too happy to hear he hadn't been lost to them for good. "Okay! I'll be super gentle, I promise." She pats his arm softly to demonstrate. "What happened? Was someone mean to you? Do you need me to beat them up? Because I can if they're here!" She knows they can't be or else a mob would be forming. She still says it because the thought does count.

[skyward_eyes]

"They're dead," Nida says, unable to keep the fatigue out of his voice. But then he pulls back and smiles, reaching up to muss her hair. "Doesn't matter. I'm back, Billy has promised to take me back to his Earth some day, and I have badass new facial hair."

What, having somewhere else to go makes him happy. And being missed by Kam makes him happy too. He won't admit it, but she's a comfort to him. A lot.