Is it a Gift or is it a Curse?

[lethechained]

Characters:  Naminé (lethechained) and open.
Setting: Floor Twenty
Format: Starting this way, will match.
Summary: Naminé is not sure what to make of her 'reward' for participating in the experiment.
Warnings: Contemplation, mentions of being trapped in a castle full of heartless people. TL;DR, as is unfortunately often the case I'msosorry.

Comments

[lethechained]

A guardian angel? Naminé continued to regard the doll, hardly noticing her own head tilt. It was true, the doll did have wings. They could have been meant to represent a caged bird, or maybe an angel. The meaning might have varied widely depending on which side one chose, but... the fact remained that the choice still belonged to the beholder. It seemed odd that the people who ran the tower might give her something to try to instill hope, and yet-- once again, she thought that that was a much better way to put it. It was true that the doll had been her companion, although it had served more the purpose of a mirror. But... just as Naminé had broken free from what had defined her then, the doll could be released from her former meaning, too, couldn't she?

The comment is made quitely and after a few moments of silence; "Maybe. I guess... it doesn't matter how they meant it, or if they really meant anything at all. She doesn't have to mean the same thing to anyone else." Or to Naminé. "But I think that that's a good way to think of her. She was there for me for all that time."

[prayerless]

Aqua gave a light-hearted chuckle. "Then you can come up with a new meaning for her, can't you?" She shifted to let her legs dangle off of the edge of the tower, and absently swung a foot out to feel how gravity pulled down on it. The mage briefly pondered on if an Aero spell would keep her afloat outside the confines of the building.

"There's no reason to find other things to be upset about while we're here," the blue-haired woman went on kindly, leaning back on her hands. "She's yours now. No one else's. You're the one who gets to decide what she is and what you're going to do with her now." A nostalgic smile touched on her lips. Similar tokens came to her mind: the flowers Kairi gave her, Ven's wooden Keyblade. The Wayfinders.

"You'd be surprised at what little things can become important to you."

[lethechained]

"Mm. I can...!" Naminé watched the motion, and although she'd seen plenty of memories of dangling one's legs off the side of high platforms, she made no move to mimic it. It would probably have been at least a little exhilerating, but she wasn't so sure she wanted to try that for the first time in a place proven to be as dangerous as the tower. Still, she was tempted, if only because it was an experience she'd previously been denied.

Her head turned so she could watch Aqua's face instead when she spoke again. Blinking at the first part, Naminé lowered her head, briefly distracted by a wave of shame; she should have known better than to complain like that. However, she was quickly distracted by another thought that she unintentionally echoed. "No one... else's...?" That, in and of itself, was a rather jarring thought. Her drawings, her creations, had never even seemed like they fully belonged entirely to her - so frequently they were drawings of memories that didn't belong to her, or of people she'd met but of course had no claim to. They were her drawings, yes, and in a way they were an attempt to leave something behind, but it was still hard for her to think of things as 'hers'. Startled out of those thoughts by that last comment, she faltered for a moment, then laced her fingers together tightly.

"...I think I can imagine." And she could. She knew all too well about what even little trinkets could mean to a person.