I've seen angels fall from blinding heights, but you yourself are nothing so divine
They really don't get it.
Witnessing the furor around him in council, Enzan retreated inside himself, gathering information and witnessing silently. Mortals, so blind...
You're rather young to be thinking that, yourself.
He sighed internally, though that was now where all his communication was happening. Enzan was aware that this being who claimed to be his conscience was able to freeze his perception of time or at least speed it up so much he wouldn't miss anything while talking to it.
"Yes, maybe." He acknowledged. "Call it practice?"
The Hope Monolith was there in the black world covered with ground fog, as was his mirror image in royal clothing. He was leaning on a sword. Enzan, to his surprise, found himself in his old mercenary clothes rather than ANBU robes.
"I suppose," he lifted the sword, which looked a great deal like Enzan's own tsurugi, "you're rather mad right now, out there."
"Very, though I'm trying to detach myself," was the agreement. "They're infuriating."
His double shrugged. "That's politics."
He was disgusted. "I don't want a part in it."
"You don't have a choice," the smile was sad, rather than an evil grin. "You're here to fill in for Saito. The worlds are already dangerously out of balance and you resigning from this would only make it worse."
"Then crack down on them!" he waved a hand around vaguely. "Tell them!"
"In this world, what do you think people would think if a ghostly apparition of you appeared in their minds and told them they were endangering the very existence of their universe?" The double's tone was laced with bitter irony, as if he'd already considered it.
"That...it were a genjutsu," Enzan sighed. "Or a trick, or they were going crazy."
"Exactly," he shrugged. "You have to convince them yourself. You're also not going to get far arguing with Hira."
"I hate him," Enzan pointed out. "He's a weasel. He's stubborn. All he's trying to do is cover himself. He's practically convinced he can do no wrong just because he thinks he's been through hardship. Everyone goes through hardship and he just doesn't get that being wronged doesn't make you infallible."
"He does seem to be deluding himself," the conscience agreed idly. "But what would you do in his position? If he were in yours and trying to demote you the same way you're doing to him."
"I'd take a graceful way out and try to prove myself," he scowled. "Even more so if he were being rude to me! Because I'd just end up proving him wrong. But I'd never be so self-delusional."
"Mmm," it slightly irritated him to be studied in such a fashion. "Would you? No, I think you're right, you would. Then again, you actually think ahead sometimes. Not often, of course, but when you feel cornered enough..."
"That's not what he's doing."
"No." There was no humour in the tone. "All right. What would Blues do?"
Enzan was silent. Here, he could recall Blues, and due to the separation of worlds between them it was easier to remember the positive. However, Blues got vicious when he was attacked verbally, and was more stubborn than he by far, not to mention unwilling to look ahead in any sort of positive light. When he was furious he seemed as calm as the arctic, but he was really only seconds away from putting you through the wall. Yet his arguments were always rooted in logic no matter how many times he seemed to contradict himself. Here he knew Blues almost as well as himself, and without that memory he was incapable of handling someone like that.
"He'd keep arguing the longer I insisted," he said after a pause to consider, "no matter how many chances I gave him to back out. He would never step down of his own will. Not unless there was absolutely no other option or he trusted the person to go through with--ew! Hira isn't Blues's alternate, is he?" This particular bit of information was a bit hard to digest and more than slightly nauseating.
"No," his double chuckled. "There are more stubborn people than Blues in existence. Keep going. How would you get Blues to back down?"
"I'd..." he searched his mind. The immediate thought was that this was a fruitless effort, yet his instinct hinted that it could be done, if he could just find a way to assuage the other's pride so it wasn't wounded. And that wasn't a sign of compromise or a damage to his authority, because his will would be still be imposed, just in a way easier for the prideful to stomach. "I'd give him an honest chance, and make it sound like it was the better option to step down than continue fighting."
"Exactly."
His double seemed satisfied with this answer, but it only frustrated Enzan further. "That doesn't help! I don't have another option to give him than a fight, which I don't want to come about. And he seems perfectly content to steep himself in obnoxious politics until we all die of dehydration."
"There's always another option." The double was pacific. "Think. What really bothers him about this?"
"Losing his power," Enzan said immediately. It wasn't a hard answer. It was blatantly obvious, in fact.
"Mm." He rolled the blade between his hands. "What else?"
"That...it's me who's getting this? That he doesn't trust me?" Purple eyes shut in concentration briefly. "That he doesn't trust my word. My capabilities. My intentions."
"What can counterbalance that?"
"Knowing I speak the truth." Enzan frowned. "Truth Serum doesn't work on me."
"It can if you don't attempt to resist it and in fact work to accept it, and with his eyes he will see it working on you." The double was smiling now. "Do you understand? You must offer him your full and honest word that your intentions are only pure in such a way that no one could deny it."
"Yes..." he paused. "Would that do it?"
"I think it may." Already the double's voice was fading. "You know what to do."
"Yes...I do."