On being considered for lastvoyages

[pickthebottleup]

There is no good death. The idea is a fiction, written by those who'd have men go to die for them. Dulce et decorum etc, you've read your histories, you know it too. The only decent oblivion comes from drink, to put you in such a state that when life leaves you, it might creep away without your notice.

That's how I meant to go, at least.

But-- and do not mistake this for my holding one death as good and the other bad, or for my saying that I'd rather go this way than that way, but I must say, that whatever the death itself, as far as last moments go... or as any moments go at all, I doubt that I could ever surpass those.

So look elsewhere. I'd not make much of a reformer, and I don't want another spin at the wheel. Not for god, nor the devil, nor for no naval emperor, nor heaven, hell, humanity, or France.

[Nor for him?]

[Yeah obviously that's where this is going.]

[There's literally nowhere else to go with you.]

...For him.

Comments

[patheticvillain]

I can already tell you're a one-note kind of guy.

[pickthebottleup]

Au Contraire! I am a great thinker and philosopher, but neither to excess.

[patheticvillain]

So you don't think much at all?

[pickthebottleup]

I abstain where I can. I once thought myself into despair, ruin, and drink, and now I forsake it wherever possible.

[virilite]

A life is not something to waste, and it is certainly not something to waste away drinking.

[patheticvillain]

But not the drink, I guess.

[pickthebottleup]

Then be assured that every moment I remember of it, I cherish.

[pickthebottleup]

No, not the drink. For what damage thought has done to me, I find it the sole elixir.

[junks]

You would not take a second chance?

[virilite]

You realize that is little reassurance to me.

[pickthebottleup]

To put your heart at ease would be a rare wonder. What I mean, is that I don't feel a life spent in pursuit of pleasure was a waste.

[pickthebottleup]

A second chance at what? A second unruly life, to be spent much like the first? Or in the service of a different master, to help some poor lost soul pursue a goal I find ludicrous?

No, I don't know that I would take it...

[junks]

Under a different set of rules and regulations, wouldn't something differ in this life, from the last?

I do wonder, though, why you would still help someone in a cause you do not believe in.

[virilite]

Yet you live not to pursue pleasure, but to pursue nothing at all. Perhaps pleasure I could understand, but I think that is not the case with you. Your life clearly has no direction or purpose.

[pickthebottleup]

The same wench in a new dress. Rules made by man don't re-shape the clay of the world.

And this cause or that is another dress worn. In some cases, I might answer to the wench herself.

[pickthebottleup]

Perhaps, I'll grant you, the pursuit of pleasure is a little beyond my ambitions. If I'm not to spend my life in constant pleasure though, I find the absence of pain to be an acceptable solace.

[junks]

[ Anna lifts her brows in half-amusement, half-surprise. ]

You compare the world to a scarlet woman? An interesting analogy.

[makeadealwithme]

So will you make a deal with me and become a warden?

[did_i_say_percy]

For him?

You speak with great conviction, monsieur.

[pickthebottleup]

[Grantaire just gives an expressive shrug in answer.]

There's pleasure enough to be found in her, but love at your peril; for she'll never return it.

[pickthebottleup]

So forward, Monsieur.

[pickthebottleup]

Such accusation. Conviction is best saved for the guilty, I am merely inclined.

[did_i_say_percy]

What an odd fellow you are then.

Why are you so afraid of it?

[pickthebottleup]

Who's afraid? I'm only direct about that which I lack. Inclination? Indeed. Devotion? Perhaps. Conviction? Not a bit of it.

[virilite]

And you do not think a life dedicated to avoidance of the inevitable is a waste? A life such as that is spent doing nothing but running and without confrontation or even change, it cannot be considered a life.

[makeadealwithme]

You'll get a miracle in exchange! Anything you want.

[junks]

And what of this poor, lost soul you mentioned?

[pickthebottleup]

I would think a life dedicated to avoidance of the inevitable is merely a life, like all lives spent keeping a step away from death. Though I know you'd feel there's much to be said for rushing to meet it.

[pickthebottleup]

I don't know that I believe in miracles, Monsieur.

[pickthebottleup]

I doubt it's to be anyone I know personally.

[junks]

Even so. A life is not wasted if you have tried to help someone along the way, whether you were aware of it or not.

[virilite]

To live in that way, though, makes your life no different from your death. While it may be called a life by some, it cannot be considered living.

[makeadealwithme]

How will you know for sure if you don't try?

[did_i_say_percy]

If you're so full of ideas, why do you retreat from passion?

[patheticvillain]

So you'd call yourself a functional alcoholic?

[pickthebottleup]

No monsieur, I call myself R in the capital. Your words fit too though, I'd say.

[pickthebottleup]

If death is painless that may be no bad thing. There's no blood shed by a man with a bottle.

[pickthebottleup]

Ah, that assumes that you've succeeded. What about a life spent in the tireless efforts in service of somebody who was not to ever be saved? When you die, and they still linger as they were, and your whole life you could've spent otherwise, is that not waste?

[pickthebottleup]

I pick over the philosophy. With action there is risk.

[pickthebottleup]

I do no such thing. Passion long ago retreated from me.

[makeadealwithme]

Isn't that true of anything you attempt?

[junks]

Well, I suppose that just brings into question how one feels about living life for another person. Is that a life fulfilled?

[virilite]

Yet many lives could be saved by a single man, if he were to make himself useful. To waste that opportunity is to waste not only one life, but a number that cannot be imagined.

[did_i_say_percy]

Was it afraid of you?