catchall mineo

[alteracion]

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[alteracion]

... Thanks. [ she shakes her head a little ] I thought about-- leaving a note. When I woke up.

[ murder note that does not say brb brekky for once ]

[sengokus]

[ . . . . . ]

... what would it have said?

[he's hesitant because - he doesn't want to pry. but he also thinks that if grace is bringing it up herself, maybe she just wants to process it with another person.

so he'll sit with it and respect it, if she trusts him with it]

[alteracion]

I don't know. I couldn't think of anything.

[ she looks down ]

I just knew I didn't want to die. Not here. Not like that.

[sengokus]

[ . . . . he'll just try to rub soothing circles at her back]

.... of course not. Even if you're face to face with the chance of your own death... how can you accept it?

[alteracion]

I would've fought back. If she'd done anything.

[ she knows that! she is very sure of it ]

But she... didn't.

[sengokus]

.... were you awake the entire time after? Or...

[alteracion]

[ she shakes her head a little ]

Sometime after she left, I fell back asleep. In that... weird way we do the first time. I don't know how long I was awake for.

[sengokus]

... but you still had to sit there, knowing she'd walked in, for however long.

[softly]

... the not knowing is almost harder, isn't it?

[alteracion]

... I only knew for sure why she'd been awake when I woke up and didn't see her name as a victim.

[sengokus]

.... and you had to know that she'd come to see you, and be stuck with her in a room for nine hours.

[alteracion]

I wasn't scared of her. [ a little defensive? ] But I didn't know... what else we'd find.

[sengokus]

[ . . . he nods.]

You don't want to throw an accusation out without anything else. I get that too.

[alteracion]

"I know because I was awake too and I saw her" isn't exactly a great alibi, either.

[sengokus]

[ . . . . ]

You really didn't think we'd believe you, huh.

[alteracion]

Gu Yun tested me on her word alone, after we'd already found tons of evidence against her.

[sengokus]

.... Gu-san has his biases. I also think it's... well, not a bad idea to clear people when we can.

[ . . . ]

And I have my own biases too, you know. Not even counting Takeru.

[alteracion]

Yeah, well. I didn't want to risk it.

[ is she not getting which biases he means. maybe. ]

[sengokus]

[ . . . . ]

You can risk it - with me.

[he can't speak for anyone else but]

I would've chosen you. And I'm sorry that you had room to doubt that - I'll do better.

[alteracion]

[ oh. ]

... Really? You would've?

[sengokus]

[a nod, firm and certain]

Yeah. I don't want to say 'of course' because I guess I didn't make it obvious enough—

[but to him, it feels like something that's such a given that it'd warrant an 'of course']

I care about you. I don't think you'd lead me astray just to use me. I trust you.

[and he says it because - to mineo, trust is the real difficult currency to get with him. he can have friends, he can have allies, but trust is something that he's hesitant to just hand out]

... don't forget that now that I've made it clear, okay?

[alteracion]

[ well!

well.

someone's getting another hug if the first ever stopped ]

... I won't. I promise. Thank you, Mineo. [ she leans back, a little ] It's not that I didn't trust you. But I didn't know if you trusted me the same way.

[sengokus]

[i have no idea if the first one ever stopped but it's fine - he's just going to hug her back easily]

.... that's okay. [a little huff, gentle] .... I trust less than people think, so it's actually probably a fair call.

[he can count the people he really, truly trusts here on one hand]

... but I don't think you'll make me regret it. So believe in me a little more, okay? Now that we know we trust each other.

[alteracion]

I do. Really. [ this is just hug o'clock forever now, but at least she seems calmer? ] ... But hopefully this never happens again.

[ she would rather not be targeted for murder again thank ]

[sengokus]

[nodding easily in that]

Sleep soundly every Thursday moving forward, okay? I don't want you to ever deal with this again, Grace-sa—

[ . . . well.]

Grace.

[alteracion]

You finally dropped it. [ she grins a little lighter ] What does it even mean, anyway?