[ Dropping his face back into his hands now because he doesn't know what to say, doesn't know if he actually has the words to coherently express the utter mess of emotions that is crashing down on and all around him.
But he tries. Because that's always been Joshua Lee Brennan's personal philosophy where it concerns living: Trying, even if there doesn't seem like there's a point to anything. The simple act of trying -- because that is something everyone is capable of doing. ]
Why me?
[ The words come out in a half-croak, and he's thinking back to the seven of them seated out there on that couch and how easily the words Don't make it me had left his mouth, with an accompanying reason that Hikaru Goddamn Shinta went ahead to dispute, by systematically pointing out why the others would not work.
Why the hell him? He wasn't a veteran hunter like Yulia with prior experience with a top blade, he didn't have Kaz's family legacy nor the ties that came as a supplement of that. He never spent five hundred years in Arcadia, found himself picked up by Tala Vega, "The Key", a member of Wolf's Choice, nor is he the one mentored by the Kaiser herself. He's not a promethean with a hundred years' worth of experience on the battlefield, nor is he like Stan, who had, by Josh's estimation, only been held back from greatness by the traumatizing possibility of what that greatness could achieve if wielded by the wrong hands.
He's just the kid who wandered around lost for so long. His first mentor ( and he cares for Rethe like a brother ) wasn't quite the right fit and at the beginning, it seemed like the people who could be wanted nothing to do with him. He hadn't even wanted to join Netsach in the first place, but then the reasons and the justifications came in the form of his sister and his dad and so had the unexpected news of his mother's connection to TFV, which had led to him want something more than a position as a novice.
He isn't used to wanting things, people, due recognition anymore. He isn't used to it because he'd taught himself for six, long years that wanting got you nowhere but hurt. Because wanting makes you feel so terribly small, especially when you thought you had it handled only to realize that you don't have it handled at all; when you're almost there only to have it snatched out of reach.
He's hugging his knees now, mind moving faster than his own emotions can catch up because working under and around people who challenged him and twigged that he was more than just a jock had felt something like the day he'd walked into the Blue Coffin asking if they would take a kid with some kitchen knowhow who needed the work. He'd meant what he'd said: Rhiannon was now like home, the people there as much family to him than his own blade or his friends in Netsach or even his own flesh and blood. They were like his second chance at being someone more than just the kid who ran, someone named Joshua LaRue, that kid that was good enough to catch Gabriel Marlowe's attention, the Sin-Eater affiliated first with and now leading the War Hounds, trusted enough by two ( maybe three? he wasn't sure ) Malice Kings to be called a friend. ]
Why me? [ He's not twenty-eight years old as he looks at you, Makoto -- he's that twenty-one year old kid who's just figuring out that he'd chosen to let Time stop, metaphorically, because he'd given up growing up every, single year in favor of wandering like a lonely ghost in Vancouver. Because that -- that was easier. That helped him deal with losing what little he'd already had. ]
i apologize that his introspection is so tldr;
But he tries. Because that's always been Joshua Lee Brennan's personal philosophy where it concerns living: Trying, even if there doesn't seem like there's a point to anything. The simple act of trying -- because that is something everyone is capable of doing. ]
Why me?
[ The words come out in a half-croak, and he's thinking back to the seven of them seated out there on that couch and how easily the words Don't make it me had left his mouth, with an accompanying reason that Hikaru Goddamn Shinta went ahead to dispute, by systematically pointing out why the others would not work.
Why the hell him? He wasn't a veteran hunter like Yulia with prior experience with a top blade, he didn't have Kaz's family legacy nor the ties that came as a supplement of that. He never spent five hundred years in Arcadia, found himself picked up by Tala Vega, "The Key", a member of Wolf's Choice, nor is he the one mentored by the Kaiser herself. He's not a promethean with a hundred years' worth of experience on the battlefield, nor is he like Stan, who had, by Josh's estimation, only been held back from greatness by the traumatizing possibility of what that greatness could achieve if wielded by the wrong hands.
He's just the kid who wandered around lost for so long. His first mentor ( and he cares for Rethe like a brother ) wasn't quite the right fit and at the beginning, it seemed like the people who could be wanted nothing to do with him. He hadn't even wanted to join Netsach in the first place, but then the reasons and the justifications came in the form of his sister and his dad and so had the unexpected news of his mother's connection to TFV, which had led to him want something more than a position as a novice.
He isn't used to wanting things, people, due recognition anymore. He isn't used to it because he'd taught himself for six, long years that wanting got you nowhere but hurt. Because wanting makes you feel so terribly small, especially when you thought you had it handled only to realize that you don't have it handled at all; when you're almost there only to have it snatched out of reach.
He's hugging his knees now, mind moving faster than his own emotions can catch up because working under and around people who challenged him and twigged that he was more than just a jock had felt something like the day he'd walked into the Blue Coffin asking if they would take a kid with some kitchen knowhow who needed the work. He'd meant what he'd said: Rhiannon was now like home, the people there as much family to him than his own blade or his friends in Netsach or even his own flesh and blood. They were like his second chance at being someone more than just the kid who ran, someone named Joshua LaRue, that kid that was good enough to catch Gabriel Marlowe's attention, the Sin-Eater affiliated first with and now leading the War Hounds, trusted enough by two ( maybe three? he wasn't sure ) Malice Kings to be called a friend. ]
Why me? [ He's not twenty-eight years old as he looks at you, Makoto -- he's that twenty-one year old kid who's just figuring out that he'd chosen to let Time stop, metaphorically, because he'd given up growing up every, single year in favor of wandering like a lonely ghost in Vancouver. Because that -- that was easier. That helped him deal with losing what little he'd already had. ]