ZERO.

no , no , no , no , no ! ! ! why couldnt takumi understand this was bad ? ? ? assumptions his ass , he knows what he saw . he's grabbing takumi at this point and raising his index finger to look over out at the wall of flames. ❝ i swear ! i know half of the time im putting my foot into my mouth with all of this , but i swear i could have seen whatever the hell that was ! ❞

that was the question WHAT did he see ? was it the commander ? something else in the flames ? something that no one else knew that was watching them ? well whatever the hell it was really sent gaku into a frenzy of freaking out . who knows how everyone else would react if they saw him freaking out ? ? ?

why wasn't he understanding that takumi was trying to stop him from scaring everyone else who was still sleeping . and frankly why was gaku even out at this time of night to begin with ? sure there is no more of a curfew for them to go by , but still . . .

❝ just believe me on this ! i know what i saw ! ❞ this is what he gets for going out to see the stars wasn't it ? man , why does the bad shit always happen to him ? he can never be lucky can he ? why ? why does it ALWAYS have to happen to him ? its not fair . its not fair ! ❝ its not FAIR ! ❞

even though he hasn't even told him in concrete terms what he saw outside...

“ why were you even outside the wall at night in the first place? ” he grumbles, scratching the back of his head. “ you know, if you did see what you think you saw, you would've been dead if it saw you, right? ”

though... if gaku's really this inconsolable about it, it must be something concerning, right?

“ okay, okay, i believe you! so just... calm down. ” he reaches out to pat him on the shoulder, attempting to be comforting. “ look, i don't think this is something to wake everyone up about. today's defensive battle was really tough, and a lot of us need the rest to recover... ”

“ would you actually like that? you can take the one in mine if you really want to. actually, i insist. ”

first rule of holes: keep digging

poem of the end, marina tsvetaeva / have you been long enough at the table, leslie sainz / @inneskeeper / the charismatic church asks me how i have sinned, janelle tan / blud, rachel mckibbens / leslie feinberg / @aforlorngazeintoyesterday / nonbeliever, lucy dacus / the cow, ariana reines / the wee free men, terry pratchett

[Image Description: Ten images of text on white backgrounds.

1: “Either love is / -A shrine? / or else a scar.” Or else a scar is highlighted in a pale yellow colour.

2: “can you stomach it? / Anyway, you eat it. You eat it anyway.”

3: “ Oh sunk cost fallacy, we’re really in it now. We are in fact so really in it that if we quit now then everything we did would have all been for nothing and so we have to keep going in”

4: “let me fail myself. let me call / love an unanswered prayer. let me be / the very tip of the knife / that touches grace.”

5: “Obedience in the wrong house is a kind of plague,

survivor’s guilt a slight of hand. No outrunning / your blood’s calamity, so you gather your teeth

& dig your trenches, tell your stories but never come clean.”

6: “Did I survive? I guess I did. But only because I knew I might get home to you.” The whole line is written in italics.

7: “doomed by the narrative but not to death. doomed to survive. doomed to stay alive inside the story. doomed to never escape the narrative, not even through death. you are allowed no exit. there is no way out for you and never was. you couldn’t die if you wanted to. the narrative has a hold on you and it won’t let go. death is too sweet a doom for you. the story has something much worse in mind. there is no way out.”

8: “You deal an unspoken debt / No kindness without wanting something back / What do I owe you? What did I forget? / Are we even after all of that?”

9: “There is no sacrifice. You have got to want to live. You have got to force yourself to want to.”

10: “All witches are selfish, the Queen had said. But Tiffany’s Third Thoughts said: Then turn selfishness into a weapon! Make all things yours! Make other lives and dreams and hopes yours! Protect them! Save them! Bring them into the sheepfold! Walk the gale for them! Keep away the wolf! My dreams! My brother! My family! My land! My world! How dare you try to take these things, because they are mine!