[He's good at loss. Koby thinks about rowing away from a burning ship, about standing on a dock, in a deserted street, in a tangerine grove. He thinks about the home he'd had, however briefly, and then he puts it out of his mind, a jagged-edged thing he refuses to let himself dwell on any further. There's a comforting numbness in the act of that, of pulling on the skin, the Changeling, the animal who thinks about nothing but here and now.
Unfortunately Koby isn't an animal, not at his heart. He's a person, a person who has somehow ended up caring very, very much about the people in this house. The potential of their loss -- all at once, which would somehow be more bearable than one at a time, two left here alone, delirious with loss, missing the third like a limb -- hangs over Koby constantly, keeping him tethered to humanity like an anchor. He feels it now, watching to make sure Zoro finishes the plate, leaves only a smear of blood on the smooth surface.
There's a huff of a laugh at the flat summary of his actions, a nudge of the glasses back up Koby's nose.] I don't feel the cold. I'm less...scrawny as a seal. [He's fairly cylindrical, actually. Aerodynamic.
The pelt pools in his lap, satiny between Koby's fingers as he finally loosens his grip. There aren't any wrinkles, the fur smoothing out immediately, pink-spotted and luxurious.] It wants to be taken, I think? Something like that, I've been doing some reading on legends and things, and the whole point of a skin is to be taken and held by someone else. It's like a curse? You get to transform, but you're always being hunted and always at risk of being controlled. [The pelt slips over his knee again, thick-furred and gleaming in the lamplight.]
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Date: 2024-04-24 01:35 am (UTC)Unfortunately Koby isn't an animal, not at his heart. He's a person, a person who has somehow ended up caring very, very much about the people in this house. The potential of their loss -- all at once, which would somehow be more bearable than one at a time, two left here alone, delirious with loss, missing the third like a limb -- hangs over Koby constantly, keeping him tethered to humanity like an anchor. He feels it now, watching to make sure Zoro finishes the plate, leaves only a smear of blood on the smooth surface.
There's a huff of a laugh at the flat summary of his actions, a nudge of the glasses back up Koby's nose.] I don't feel the cold. I'm less...scrawny as a seal. [He's fairly cylindrical, actually. Aerodynamic.
The pelt pools in his lap, satiny between Koby's fingers as he finally loosens his grip. There aren't any wrinkles, the fur smoothing out immediately, pink-spotted and luxurious.] It wants to be taken, I think? Something like that, I've been doing some reading on legends and things, and the whole point of a skin is to be taken and held by someone else. It's like a curse? You get to transform, but you're always being hunted and always at risk of being controlled. [The pelt slips over his knee again, thick-furred and gleaming in the lamplight.]