[It's only natural to bristle at the laughter, at least in the first few moments, because Fuji is Fuji (no matter how much Yagyuu can draw parallels to Niou, no matter how much one one he can project onto the other) and he simply can't read the fine nuances of Seigaku's genius the way he instinctively does with his partner. It doesn't occur to him at first that there might be a difference there, a shift in intent and tone, that means he's elicited something new from Fuji Shuusuke once again. It's simply laughter, and Yagyuu doesn't like to be laughed at--and yet it sinks in a few moments later that he's not, that this is something else, and he catches himself wondering just how far Fuji's depths go beneath the surface he lets the world see.
I've never tamed--and never will. And for a moment, Yagyuu thinks of simply answering, and whose fault is that? He wasn't the one who made the topic of taming out to be something ideal over the course of this conversation. And in every way they've spoken about it, Fuji has always spoken of it as something desirable, something worth wanting. But the ambition for it was never there, replaced by the whimsicality of someone who already believes something is only a fantasy, unattainable from the start.
And that does separate them a minute, driving that mental wedge between Fuji and Niou, because Niou has never let the unattainable go unpursued, and when he wants something, he finds a way to get it. It's the drive that's missing from one to the other, the way that Niou's attentions can focus down to a razor's edge and cut with such deadly precision, while Fuji seems more content to surround himself in cushions of ambiguity. That's not Niou's habit, to sink back and hold back and deprive himself of the things he really wants.
...No, that habit is Yagyuu's.
Or it was, before Niou, before their game began and persisted up to the present day, before they were tamed through learning to cut loose and tie themselves up in each other. Yagyuu may not have been the one to create his own way out, but he'd at least had the wherewithal to take the opportunity when it came. Would Fuji even do that, he wonders, if the chance arose? Or is he so set in his own resignation that he won't act in exchange?
But perhaps he already knows the answer to that. There's only one fox at his feet at the moment, after all.]
Is responsibility that abhorrent to you?
[He picks his words deliberately, borrowing them from the very quote Fuji had given him earlier, turning them around and sending them back to see what he'll make of them next.]
no subject
I've never tamed--and never will. And for a moment, Yagyuu thinks of simply answering, and whose fault is that? He wasn't the one who made the topic of taming out to be something ideal over the course of this conversation. And in every way they've spoken about it, Fuji has always spoken of it as something desirable, something worth wanting. But the ambition for it was never there, replaced by the whimsicality of someone who already believes something is only a fantasy, unattainable from the start.
And that does separate them a minute, driving that mental wedge between Fuji and Niou, because Niou has never let the unattainable go unpursued, and when he wants something, he finds a way to get it. It's the drive that's missing from one to the other, the way that Niou's attentions can focus down to a razor's edge and cut with such deadly precision, while Fuji seems more content to surround himself in cushions of ambiguity. That's not Niou's habit, to sink back and hold back and deprive himself of the things he really wants.
...No, that habit is Yagyuu's.
Or it was, before Niou, before their game began and persisted up to the present day, before they were tamed through learning to cut loose and tie themselves up in each other. Yagyuu may not have been the one to create his own way out, but he'd at least had the wherewithal to take the opportunity when it came. Would Fuji even do that, he wonders, if the chance arose? Or is he so set in his own resignation that he won't act in exchange?
But perhaps he already knows the answer to that. There's only one fox at his feet at the moment, after all.]
Is responsibility that abhorrent to you?
[He picks his words deliberately, borrowing them from the very quote Fuji had given him earlier, turning them around and sending them back to see what he'll make of them next.]
Or is it the prospect of 'forever'?