Prompt: "Jalter and co brainstorm ideas for their next manga during the Servant Summer Festival after another failed loop." — Quality
Jeanne Alter curled her fingers into a fist and then uncurled them. Sitting on the railing of their balcony was calming... but not helpful. Every time something went right, ten things went wrong. She was still so inexperienced. Still not good enough.
Never good enough.
"What's wrong?"
She turned aside to see Robin chewing on a toothpick.
"Who the fuck still does that?" she scoffed and looked out at the beach again.
He shrugged. "I'm used to chewing on grain stalks. Sue me."
"Hmph."
The sunset was stupidly beautiful. Red streaks painted on the sea and the sky. Jeanne Alter thought about trying to capture that on the cover... and instead found only a pit of doubt inside. She wanted to pound it into dust, burn it into ashes, and scatter it on the four winds.
"Y'know, whenever I look out at this..." Robin started.
"If you say something sappy like 'it makes me so happy to be alive' or some bullshit like that—"
"I question whether we're allowed to," he finished, and Jeanne Alter shut her mouth. "I think about the Incineration of Humanity, how close we came to meeting it, and whether it's okay for us to just... relax like this. I know we still have some time before the Mages Association comes to shut everything down..."
She turned and grabbed him by the scruff of his collar.
"Listen to me," she said firmly, and he turned his viridian eyes on her. "I... I didn't stay up for three nights researching this place just so you could feel sorry for yourself about this."
"I'm not," he insisted. "I feel guilty. How can you not?"
"Don't you remember?" she said with a sardonic grin. "I was on the other side for a little while."
That got him quiet.
"Yeah. So." She let him go and sighed. "I was there, wanting it all to die. And some part of me still wants to see it. But another part of me wants to..."
She clenched her fist.
"…I want to be happy," she said under her breath. "And whether I deserve that or not… I want to try anyway."