Sollux listens as the Initiate explains it out, but he gets to frowning for it. It's not the preaching, or at least not that alone, particularly when it's acknowledged plain at the start that he's a nonbeliever. Is it... praise? Honor? It's some kind of awe and reverence still for his position, but this time it doesn't bring about the self-conscious feel the bow gave. His thumbs fiddle together, but he waits his turn to speak. The Initiate gets his respect enough for that, and his confusion isn't the snap to irritation that would get him bursting out.
And Karkat... there's too many unknowns there. The Initiate tells him a little, but he wasn't there, and can't imagine a lot of it. He knows little enough of his ancestor to figure how he and Karkat might get on. Even with similarities, there are sure enough differences that it could have turned things different than they ever went with him. He shifts his jaw and settles with saying, "KK'th a terminal athhole even to the people he liketh. But I don't really want to talk too much about him right now."
It's a sore spot, and his eyebrows flinch in to think too much on it. Seeing him die, learning he's gone, and in the way he did... He's still sore about the Signless's attitude on it. He rubs the bridge of his nose, then sets his shades straight as he looks back.
"I wathn't chothen and I don't want to be treated like I wath," he says now, face setting to sternness. "The only reathon it had to be me wath becauthe of temporal predethtination. The time loopth were already thet in plathe, and if I didn't do it I wouldn't have ekthithted to do it in the firtht plathe." And it's not out of bitterness that he says that, not to his own fate. Doom is what he's used to, and in a sense that's what it is: unavoidable fate.
"But you're treating it like I did thome grand thing when I fucked uth all over, too. I thtarted putting the code together becauthe I'd theen visionth of the end of the world and wanted to thave it, but I didn't learn until it had already thtarted that it would be the trigger. I'm rethponthible," he insists. "Even if time bee-ethh thayth I had to I thtill made the game that ended the world, and made uth go nektht-to-ekthtinct. That'th not thomething to be praithing your Methhiath about. Alternia'th a bunch of dutht now and the Vatht Glub killed everyone elthe."
He holds back from outright insulting his religion, and it's in that act that he shows respect for him. But the rest he can't agree with, even a little. He's not some chosen hero; he's a grand fuckup forced by time, and he doesn't have to be a Megido to know it.
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And Karkat... there's too many unknowns there. The Initiate tells him a little, but he wasn't there, and can't imagine a lot of it. He knows little enough of his ancestor to figure how he and Karkat might get on. Even with similarities, there are sure enough differences that it could have turned things different than they ever went with him. He shifts his jaw and settles with saying, "KK'th a terminal athhole even to the people he liketh. But I don't really want to talk too much about him right now."
It's a sore spot, and his eyebrows flinch in to think too much on it. Seeing him die, learning he's gone, and in the way he did... He's still sore about the Signless's attitude on it. He rubs the bridge of his nose, then sets his shades straight as he looks back.
"I wathn't chothen and I don't want to be treated like I wath," he says now, face setting to sternness. "The only reathon it had to be me wath becauthe of temporal predethtination. The time loopth were already thet in plathe, and if I didn't do it I wouldn't have ekthithted to do it in the firtht plathe." And it's not out of bitterness that he says that, not to his own fate. Doom is what he's used to, and in a sense that's what it is: unavoidable fate.
"But you're treating it like I did thome grand thing when I fucked uth all over, too. I thtarted putting the code together becauthe I'd theen visionth of the end of the world and wanted to thave it, but I didn't learn until it had already thtarted that it would be the trigger. I'm rethponthible," he insists. "Even if time bee-ethh thayth I had to I thtill made the game that ended the world, and made uth go nektht-to-ekthtinct. That'th not thomething to be praithing your Methhiath about. Alternia'th a bunch of dutht now and the Vatht Glub killed everyone elthe."
He holds back from outright insulting his religion, and it's in that act that he shows respect for him. But the rest he can't agree with, even a little. He's not some chosen hero; he's a grand fuckup forced by time, and he doesn't have to be a Megido to know it.