insomnia

[forfun]

the i n s o m n i a meme

It happens to everyone - sometimes, you have nights where you just can't fall asleep, no matter what you do. It could be for a number of reasons, or no reason at all. And this is what's happened now: you've been laying in bed for what feels like hours, just tossing and turning, and nothing seems to help. So what's left to do? Get out of bed and go wake someone else up, of course. If you're not getting any sleep, then why should they? i n s t r u c t i o n s • Post with your character (note the name and fandom in the subject). • Other people reply to you by generating a number from 1 to 10. • Have fun! o p t i o n s 01 • FEAR. Maybe you're hearing strange, indeterminable noises; maybe there's a severe storm happening outside; maybe you watched a scary movie before bed? Whatever the reason, you're terrified and it's keeping you awake. You just want to wake someone else up so they can protect you from the monster in your closet. 02 • HUNGER. Your stomach is growling and it just won't stop. Or perhaps your throat is so dry you could cough up a tumbleweed? Well, you've gone to the kitchen to remedy this and hey, that was a pan that just dropped on the floor. It was loud enough to wake the dead! Oops. 03 • PAIN. Your body is completely worn out, be it from exercise, battle, sickness, or what have you. Either way you're in enough pain to keep you from sleeping, so maybe someone else has a home remedy or something, or can at least help you take your mind off of it. 04 • SOLITUDE. For some reason, your bed just feels so empty at the moment. You're feeling terribly lonely and really just want someone to keep you company for a while. Maybe it'd be easier to fall asleep if you're with them... 05 • DISCOMFORT. Your room is an oven. Either that or a freezer. Or maybe this bed is just really uncomfortable? Who knows why you can't get to sleep, it feels like it could be anything. Why even bother trying? Maybe someone else can preoccupy you until you feel tired enough to ignore your discomfort. 06 • PENSIVE. Something's on your mind, and no matter how hard you try to focus elsewhere, it's just not going to work. Your body may be tired, but your mind is incredibly busy and it's virtually impossible to get to sleep. Surely, talking it out with someone else will help? 07 • SADNESS. Something terrible has happened that day, perhaps; or you could just be severely depressed. Either way you're trying your hardest not to cry yourself to sleep, and it's not working at all. Better find a way to get it out of your system somehow; you need a shoulder to cry on. 08 • ANGER. You are just... fuming. Who knows why - that annoying dog is barking again, or maybe the people next door are getting busy and keeping you awake. Whatever the reason for your ire is, you'd better put an end to it so you can get some damn rest already! Go wake up a friend so you can complain to them. 09 • RESTLESS. You're far too energetic to sleep right now. Maybe you're just trying to do so out of necessity - you have to be up early tomorrow! But you just don't think you'll be able to fall asleep for a while now, so why waste the time trying to sleep when you could be doing something else? Namely bothering someone else - you're totally jealous because they're getting more sleep than you. 10 • WILDCARD. Choose one of the options above, or make up your own scenario.

Comments

[asoulatpeace]

"It was only water." Although Hanzo would have scolded him if he had and he would have argued and then he might have jumped into a water hazard on purpose later just because he could. There was precious little common ground they could agree on back then, and their memories of that time still influenced Hanzo's view of him.

But there wasn't much they could talk about of the present either. Genji lowered his head a little, though he still kept his brother in his field of view as he flipped open the plate on his right fore-arm that concealed two-dozen shuriken and the mechanism that would rapidly supply them to him to be thrown. Genji took very good care of his mechanical parts, and had already checked everything earlier, but there was no harm in checking again.

[with_honor]

Hanzo hesitated before his next shot. The sound of Genji's mechanical parts always reminded him of the damage he had done to his own brother in his rage and frustration. Hanzo had created this version of his brother as surely as the doctors and engineers that made the body had. He was the destruction, the death that caused the rebirth and it did not, never had, sat easily in him.

"Can you go in water now?" It was rare that Hanzo asked about Genji's condition. The guilt made his fingers tremble slightly on the bow string and his shot was an inch wide when he released, the only real outward sign that underneath the surface his emotions were rolling like a summer storm.

It would be his emotions that would lead to trouble between them. It usually was.

[asoulatpeace]

The question was progress, as far as Genji was concerned. He accepted and embraced what he was. It would help Hanzo to do so as well, he thought. "Yes. It would be quite a hindering weakness if a little water was all it took to stop me. I sink a little, but it is not a problem." The alloys that comprised the armor and the structural parts of his cybernetic limbs and suit were light. There was more open space than not in his right arm in particular. The varying buoyancy made being in water an unusual experience if he wished to remain upright. It was not pleasant, being submerged while he was armored, but stripped of the outer layer and with only the limbs and vital pieces attached it was not too bad.

The process of drying himself out fully, particularly the right arm, was tedious. It was one of the few times he had been accepting of assistance before he'd come to terms with being a cyborg.

[with_honor]

Hanzo truly wanted to know just how much of Genji's body he had destroyed but knowing the answer would only make him feel guiltier. There had to be enough for the dragon to recognize him as Shimada and answer the call yet all he saw was robotics. He could not deal with more guilt at this point, not when there was so much for him to work through. Of course, he wasn't really working through it very quickly. He continued to refuse help dealing with it.

"It would have been short sighted of Overwatch to make a human anchor," he said dryly as he launched the last arrow at the target. He swung his bow over his shoulder and walked to the target to remove his arrows and inspect them one by one. "Some of their goals are short sighted but they are not complete fools."

He gestured to his brother. "You may have a turn if you wish."

[asoulatpeace]

"I would be a most attractive anchor, but I do not believe the fish would appreciate me," Genji said, rising from his seated position and closing the covering on his right fore-arm. He was not sure his brother's choice of word, human, rather than cyborg, was a positive sign or not. Genji wanted to help him accept this, but it was not something he could force or rush. Much of it was on Hanzo's end.

Genji waited for Hanzo to clear their make-shift target range before he began. A quick movement of his wrist and the mechanical components of his arm placed three shuriken between his fingers. Picking a spot just above where Hanzo had been aiming he launched all three faster than a human hand and wrist could have possibly moved, landing them in a neat row one above the other barely millimeters apart. Another flick of his wrist supplied him with more.

He did not really wish to have a turn at target practice, and would have rather continued to watch. But it was important that he do so.

[with_honor]

Hanzo crossed his arms over his chest and watched his brother. It seemed like Genji did not have to make any sort of effort at all in the action. His aim seemed better and the arm he used to throw seemed to work more like a gun reloading than anything human. It bothered him. Genji had always been talented. He shouldn't need such things to help him.

Then again, he used specialized arrows. He could hardly throw stones about technological enhancements.

"You're still worried about that?" he asked, raising an eyebrow. "Whether women find you pretty or not?"

Genji had a string of girlfriends and one night stands when he was younger. He had assumed as a cyborg that Genji would no longer care about those sorts of things. Omnics could love according to them. Perhaps he assumed too much when it came to the changes in Genji.

[asoulatpeace]

Another volley of three landed right beside the first with inhuman precision, adding another neat row. "I meant it as a joke," Genji admitted, turning his head to look at his brother even as he launched a third volley, just as precise as the first two. After that one he paused, the three shuriken resting easily between his fingers. "But perhaps it was in poor taste. Relationships based on the superficial no longer interest me."

When he'd been recently made a cyborg he could not have imagined allowing anyone to see the mix of scarred flesh and cybernetics that was his body. After, he was no longer interested in such shallow flings.

[with_honor]

He was mildly surprised Genji was interested in relationships at all but he approved of the change. It would be a very... different sort of person who would have a one night stand with someone in Genji's condition. If his brother had accepted what he was, he needed someone who could equally accept him.

"Good. It is about time you matured." Neither of them would provide the Shimada Clan with children to take over anymore. Genji would never be allowed to return to the Clan and Hanzo had forsaken it from guilt. Relationships did not matter like they once had but Hanzo was still careful and closed off to others.

"Perhaps we need a better challenge, brother," he said. His brother looked bored with simple target practice. "This is too easy. We can both hit a target that does not move."

[asoulatpeace]

The remark about his maturity was allowed to pass without comment from Genji. All it would do is serve to remind how much he had changed in Hanzo's absence, and away from the Clan. But then Hanzo suggested a challenge and it was his turn to be concerned. There was no doubt that they could challenge one another, and that immobile targets were more for reinforcing their already acquired skills than keeping them entertained. Genji retrieved his shuriken, feeling he had failed to conceal the fact that he wasn't interested in practicing himself.

"We are meant to be calming down and preparing for sleep, not challenging ourselves," Genji said. He wasn't necessarily against the idea, but he didn't want a night that had been going so well to take a turn for the worse.

[with_honor]

Hanzo snorted. "Did you truly believe we would be able to rest tonight?" Because Hanzo didn't. He recognized when sleep was not going to come and this was one of those nights. He was not going to fool himself or Genji with promises of rest and relaxation. There would be another time for rest and sleep.

"It is harder to hit a moving target, isn't it?" He readied an arrow and nodded to his brother. "Throw your shuriken and I will try to shoot them down. It will test my skills as an archer and yours to challenge me."

It was still target practice just slightly more advanced and more cooperative. He didn't want to start a fight between them. That would certainly not lead to rest and relaxation.

[asoulatpeace]

"I had hoped," Genji admitted. In that, he was more optimistic than his brother. But if Hanzo was not going to sleep, Genji would keep him company. At least as long as they weren't fighting. The challenge proposed wasn't as bad an idea as Genji feared.

"I can throw many more shuriken than you can shoot arrows, but if you wish a target, I shall give you one." The force and speed with which he threw shuriken was not something a human could have accomplished, as evidenced by the range he achieved with them. He waited, allowing the moment to stretch out before he threw a single shuriken at the upper left corner of the crate rather than where he had been throwing before.

[with_honor]

Hope was something much better left to Genji. Bitterness was still too strong within Hanzo to be hopeful. He appreciated his brother's attempt but it was foolish at this point. He wouldn't be getting any real restful sleep tonight.

Robotics made Genji stronger and faster but Hanzo had years of training and paranoia born of assassins trying to kill him on his side. When his brother finally threw the shuriken he tracked it for a moment then let the arrow fly. The arrow tip tinked against the metal as it hit the edge and knocked the weapon off course.

It wasn't a perfect shot through the center, that might be impossible with Genji's speed but it was a better shot than anyone else could make. "Again."

When Hanzo was training he was a tad obsessive.

[asoulatpeace]

With the way Hanzo said 'again', Genji wondered if he would even agree to stop before he was satisfied with his progress attempting to shoot a shuriken out of the air. The angle made it difficult, even with Hanzo off to the side. The room was too short to offer much time to track and then the arrow had to catch up.

Genji nodded and threw another at the same spot rather than try to trip Hanzo up by putting it on a different path.

[with_honor]

Hanzo was never truly satisfied with his skill. He always pushed himself farther, to be better than he was. He traveled the world learning more skills, more talents and practicing his own over and over obsessively. He would not be satisfied with his skill until many, many years later.

His second shot was better, much better. It helped that Genji did the same path which meant he didn't need to track quite as extensively as before.

Yet, he was partially here to talk with Genji, not ignore him. "You must be happy to travel with your Master again." Hanzo was making an effort.

[asoulatpeace]

"I am. It is always good to be around him," Genji said. There was a lot more he could say, but didn't really want to around Hanzo. It was likely to start an argument or stir up bad feelings, even if Hanzo wouldn't necessarily show them. Genji flicked his wrist and reloaded, and threw two shuriken this time.

"I was as unwilling to listen at first as you are now." It had taken a lot of persistence on Zenyatta's part to get through to him, and for that as much as anything else Genji was grateful. It would have been easy to leave him when he refused help, as he did for so long.

[with_honor]

While he did not miss the second only the edge of the arrow hit the edge of the shuriken. Hanzo snorted with disgust at himself. That was not good enough for him. He nodded sharply to Genji for him to do it again. This time he was ready to draw a second arrow.

"Our past is between us," he said simply. "I do not feel your Master has a place in solving it for us."

While he did not feel peace was possible between the two factions he had no problems with Zenyatta besides his constant attempts to mentor Hanzo as well.

[asoulatpeace]

Genji readied enough shuriken again and tossed two, this time aiming each at a different edge of the crate. "The past is not something that needs to be solved, but I do believe he could help you come to peace with yourself." It had taken a long time for Genji to come to terms with everything that happened, to accept the past and move on from it. Hanzo was still a prisoner of his own actions.

But no one could force Hanzo to do anything, all they could do was show him the paths that were open to him.

[with_honor]

The paths were there. He could clearly see them but Hanzo didn't want to take them, not yet. He still fully believed the differences between him and Genji could be solved without anyone lecturing him. His own problems, the guilt and anger he carried, were not something he would deal with. The face them was to admit weakness.

"Our differences come from our past," he said firmly as he continued to shoot arrows at the shurikens. It was easier, simpler to focus on the shots than any implication of what he still refused to face. "So things must be solved."

It was difficult for him to admit it to anyone other than his brother that he hoped they could be at least friendly with each other again. He was trying and that was more than he would've done years ago when their conflict was at its peak. However, it was not the best he could do.

[asoulatpeace]

"You and I are very different people, who value different things," Genji said. True, the things that were important to him now were very different from what they were back then, but he doubted he and his brother would ever have the same views. But he wanted to be able to get along with his brother, as different as they were and with all the things would would disagree on in the future.

"And we will have disagreements and arguments. I would like for us to be able to do so without it coming to violence." Genji did not pull out more Shuriken this time, instead lowering his hand and turning to face his brother.

[with_honor]

They had always valued different things. At the time he killed his brother Hanzo only really valued the Clan's honor and making sure that it continued to be respected and feared. He had been raised to take over for their father, meaning he had to be better, stronger, and smarter than anyone else. His inability to bring his brother back into the Clan and make him behave had hurt his pride, made him furious and so he had lashed out.

His fingers flexed hard on his bow when he remembered the horrible realization of what he had done because he had loved his brother dearly and his death would always weigh on him. If he forgot the guilt then he could so easily make the same mistake as before.

"We have not fought in some time," he said as he slung his bow over his shoulder. "It may not be the progress others want for us but we are not dictated by their desires."