You > Sleep schedule, your nagging doesnāt work here.
But donāt degrade yourself like that, Iām not better than you. This is your life, the same way itās mine. Is that all youā e been dreaming about?
... I always hate being this honest, but if I can't tell you, can I cling to calling you family? Even if I sleep, I inevitably wake up from nightmares. Four... either kills or runs away from being killed or she's just... herself. It unsettles me that if I sleep, I'll dream more of her or my subconscious will remind me of what I've already seen. Or however dreams work.
Four chases a fleeing fleet of elves. They only fight back because Four is after them. She hunts them all down and sinks all their ships with a dragon. The dragon protests, calls what they're ding cruel, and names it manslaughter.
Four laughs. How can it be manslaughter if elves aren't men?
She kills them all until all that's left is ash in a hazy sky.
She looks down on the elves and considers them subhuman. She relishes in their death. She calls them all evil pirates, and that's why she's in the right. If she didn't kill them, they'd rise up to do evil.
She didn't really care about that. It was only a flimsy excuse to justify wanton murder.
She's terrible, Eren. She's atrocious, reprehensible, and abhorrent, and sometimes, I wonder how far away am I from that?
Clover . . . I donāt want to sound like I want to justify any of that, but let me just tell you that Iām not the best person to judge morality anymore.
[ which is to say: he has nothing āawfulā to say about it, as awful as it was. senseless murder or murder with purpose was still murder, and all come with an origin. a reason. he was quick to judge what was right and wrong when he was younger, as young as one year back, caused by the loss of their father and sharpened to an intense sense of justice. that has gone far away the longer heās had the app and the more heās lived in the shoes of his past self. ]
Youāre not telling me you feel that way about yourself, are you?
You should condemn her. She deserves it. I don't want to sink into thinking like her.
I wouldn't be so scared of Four, of becoming like her, if I thought it were impossible.
[ What origin there is, Clover only has a faint idea, but even without Four, her own sense of what's right or wrong or justice is broken. She'd throw away what she knows is morally right in the face of her loyalties. ]
What if you understood her instead? Is that too far fetched? If you knew why she was like that, then maybe you wouldnāt be so worried of being just like her.
... You can judge both. Self-awareness makes a difference, Eren. We aren't perfect people, and we will never be perfect people, but it's fine to point out what you know is wrong even if it's something you've done. Isn't that growth?
I know both, but I donāt want to preach something I know Iād still do if the situation called for it. Killing out of jealousy or spite is wrong. Mass killing is wrong. Killing in general is wrong. But Iād still kill, and I wouldnāt feel remorse. Iāve done it already out of hate, out of anger, and out of necessity. I donāt know if accepting that is walking backwards or being self aware, but thatās how I see it.
You arenāt wrong in condemning her and not wanting to be like her, Clover. I wouldnāt want you to. And given our circumstances, I donāt think you ever will.
I shouldn't feel as touched as I do. I don't know if it's a good thing that we're similar in this, but I don't care either.
I love you, Eren.
[ In some ways, they really are brother and sister, and that's why those messages and those dreams hurt so much. She wants to be able to reject them easily, but doubt grows as fast as weeds in her mind. ]
[ She doesn't think it'll help her now, but she'll try it. Maybe knowing Eren's near will take her back to a time before all of Retrospec and she can sleep like she used to. ]
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But donāt degrade yourself like that, Iām not better than you. This is your life, the same way itās mine. Is that all youā e been dreaming about?
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It's not the only thing I've been dreaming about. There are other reasons why I'm always up this late.
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Always? [ š ] Why else?
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[ Clover takes a while to write the next part. ]
... I always hate being this honest, but if I can't tell you, can I cling to calling you family? Even if I sleep, I inevitably wake up from nightmares. Four... either kills or runs away from being killed or she's just... herself. It unsettles me that if I sleep, I'll dream more of her or my subconscious will remind me of what I've already seen. Or however dreams work.
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Can you tell me one of them?
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Four laughs. How can it be manslaughter if elves aren't men?
She kills them all until all that's left is ash in a hazy sky.
She looks down on the elves and considers them subhuman. She relishes in their death. She calls them all evil pirates, and that's why she's in the right. If she didn't kill them, they'd rise up to do evil.
She didn't really care about that. It was only a flimsy excuse to justify wanton murder.
She's terrible, Eren. She's atrocious, reprehensible, and abhorrent, and sometimes, I wonder how far away am I from that?
no subject
[ which is to say: he has nothing āawfulā to say about it, as awful as it was. senseless murder or murder with purpose was still murder, and all come with an origin. a reason. he was quick to judge what was right and wrong when he was younger, as young as one year back, caused by the loss of their father and sharpened to an intense sense of justice. that has gone far away the longer heās had the app and the more heās lived in the shoes of his past self. ]
Youāre not telling me you feel that way about yourself, are you?
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I wouldn't be so scared of Four, of becoming like her, if I thought it were impossible.
[ What origin there is, Clover only has a faint idea, but even without Four, her own sense of what's right or wrong or justice is broken. She'd throw away what she knows is morally right in the face of her loyalties. ]
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What if you understood her instead? Is that too far fetched?
If you knew why she was like that, then maybe you wouldnāt be so worried of being just like her.
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I don't want to understand someone who says she'd rip off all her sister's skin and tear it to pieces in a fit of jealousy.
[ The problem is she understands Four's thinking. What got her to be that way, she doesn't know, but she can understand how deep her envy can go. ]
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So you do know why sheās like that.
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That's why I want to condemn her.
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I know both, but I donāt want to preach something I know Iād still do if the situation called for it. Killing out of jealousy or spite is wrong. Mass killing is wrong. Killing in general is wrong. But Iād still kill, and I wouldnāt feel remorse. Iāve done it already out of hate, out of anger, and out of necessity. I donāt know if accepting that is walking backwards or being self aware, but thatās how I see it.
You arenāt wrong in condemning her and not wanting to be like her, Clover. I wouldnāt want you to. And given our circumstances, I donāt think you ever will.
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No one would be able to convince me it would be wrong. No one would be able to convince me it wasn't right.
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Even in that, we make a pair.
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I love you, Eren.
[ In some ways, they really are brother and sister, and that's why those messages and those dreams hurt so much. She wants to be able to reject them easily, but doubt grows as fast as weeds in her mind. ]
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Love you too, Clover. You know you can always come and take over the guest bed. Iāll make momās sleepy tea.
[ the special tea they probably always had served by mom when anxiety plagued the sleep schedule. the power of herbs. ]
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I'll take you up on it tomorrow.
[ She doesn't think it'll help her now, but she'll try it. Maybe knowing Eren's near will take her back to a time before all of Retrospec and she can sleep like she used to. ]