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 Posted: Fri Jan 20, 2012 4:52 am
He'd held his breath at first. Until the force of the first branch they hit made him outwardly gasp with the violence of it. Only one of many, until the ending crash that ripped all of the air from his lungs and left him too dazed to move for several long moments.
The pain caught up all too quickly. He grimaced, groaning weakly. His own breath came in deep, ragged pulls. Even breathing hurt, but somehow he was still alive, let alone still conscious. If cats really did have nine lives, he probably had several less from that fall alone.
Ears pressed against his skull firmly, he almost didn't hear the ghoul on top of him when she finally spoke. His own eyes remained shut tightly, both in agony and in belief that somehow maybe this wouldn't be so terrible if he didn't let himself make eye contact.
Finally managing to get enough breath, he answered her in a whisper. "Ye...yeah..."
He realized that he still had hold of her, and his strong grip around her shoulders relaxed and he let his arms fall to the ground at his sides. Relaxing his muscles only seemed to let the ache seep deeper into them.
"The cat... Fredrick. Was me."
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Posted: Fri Jan 20, 2012 6:44 am
It was an interesting thing to watch. The conformation was like a match to the hundreds of oil barrels labeled thoughts. Once it was dropped, the fire spread throughout her mind.
The second Deacon let her go, the ghoul practically leapt back and hit her back against the tree with a thud. No, it didn't hurt. Her body wasn't accepting pain right now. Not the physical kind at least.
He had done it.
While everyone else worked on breaking her outer concrete barrier with careful chiseling as not to damage the inner core, he had just slipped through a crack and entered unnoticed. Spied on her, stolen memories from her. Practically violated her. It was a daily ritual...
But it hit her all at once in that very instant. Everything she kept secret and held sacred, only daring to say when she was sure there was nobody to listen, it had been right there out in the open, like a waterfall of words he could bathe in.
"Y-you must think-" Riyo finally spoke, curling into herself as if it was a last defense to keep him out of her insides. "T-that I'm some kind of idiot. To just... Let you walk right in... And accept you with open arms."
Mad? Angry? Furious? For once, Riyo couldn't bring herself to be any of those things. She had tried. She wanted to be angry, but she simply couldn't muster the composure to be any of those things. He had effectively cut her open and stirred everything around to where she couldn't find a Jack damn thing.
It felt like the temperature was dropping.
"Well you're right." Shaking hands slipped up over her head. She was so ashamed. So embarrassed. "You're ******** right. I'm an idiot. An asylum-bound idiot who digs an inch in her grave every morning and every night. I put on a ruse in the hopes that the public at large won't notice how much of a child I r-really am on the inside."
It was a slow process, watching the hope drain from her eyes. "Now you know my mother's insane and my father left because he didn't w-want me. I'm a b*****d kid parading around in expensive clothing."
Then something strange happened. Her eyes started leaking.
"So are you happy now?" Her lip quivered as she spoke. "Does this make you joyful? You've finally figured it out. You know everything I've been hiding. Gonna tell all your friends about the b***h with the crazy mom?" A few times her sentences were reduced to a whisper. The ghoul was trying so hard not to choke up. "Did you get to see me naked? It was disappointing, wasn't it? Did you do it just for that? Because you wanted to see what I was hiding? Surprise! I've got nothing."
She felt like a prisoner in there. In her own body. Riyo wished she could dematerialize in that very spot and leave everything behind. "You finally did it Deacon. Y-you won. Was it everything you dreamed it would be?" The ghoul finally looked up at him with tears flowing down her cheeks. "Was it worth it? Is there anything else you wanted to take from me before I dissolve into a sobbing heap?"
After that, she really couldn't hold it in anymore. For the first time since she was a child, Riyo wept. She wept and sobbed like she never knew she could. "Is this enough of a reward for you? Me sobbing like a child?"
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Posted: Sat Jan 21, 2012 8:31 am
She hadn't weighed much to him, not really. The discomfort and pain he was feeling hadn't had anything to do with the fact that her weight was still over him, as far as Deacon was concerned. Though, when she practically flew away from him, when he'd practically broken his back to keep her from harm... It hurt in a different way.
He almost would have preferred that she stomp him into the ground, rather than recoil in terror of what he had done.
When this all started, he would have never guessed that there was even a side of her like this, let alone one he would ever see. Had he wanted to crush her? Maybe, out of spite at first. But, her red-faced anger and startled speechlessness was funny to him in the past. This? This was worlds different from that.
As she spoke, it might have seemed that he wasn't listening. He carefully worked on sitting up, slouching over with a pained grimace, panting as his joints and muscles throbbed and ached. Tunneling a hand into his hair, he smoothed back an ear and brought his hand back to inspect it. There wasn't any blood, but he was pretty sure that there would be a goodly sized lump there soon.
He didn't know what to say, so he didn't say anything while she spoke. A woman that he would have never imagined so fragile was breaking down in front of him. Him; one of the people that she had always seemed so bound and determined to never show an ounce of weakness.
There was no satisfaction, which in the beginning probably should have confused him. But, more so, he was ashamed to have reduced her to it. A cruel, seemingly harmless prank born of spite and boredom had done this. He had done this, all by himself.
Ears drooping back still, it was when her voice really began to shake and waver that he looked up. He met her wet gaze, a worried frown creasing his brow. With everything she said, maybe it wouldn't have been worse for her to simply beat him bloody.
He adverted his gaze, still obnoxiously silent. He seemed to be thinking, or at least taking the rare moment to test the words in his mind before he let them pass his lips.
"This... This isn't what I wanted to happen."
There was a softness to his voice that was abnormal for him, quiet and carefully unoffensive. He managed to look back at her again, if only in hopes that by keeping his eyes locked on hers, she might believe him.
"I'm sorry, Riyo."
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Posted: Sat Jan 21, 2012 9:09 am
Wasn't what he wanted?
This wasn't what he wanted to happen.
THIS WASN'T WHAT HE WANTED TO HAPPEN?
"What in the name of Jack... Did you think would happen?" She asked, a hiccup for air stopping her mid-sentence. The ghoul had never cried this much... And her eyes were starting to hurt. "What, did you think... If you set up that fall and saved me at the last minute... I'd just say 'oh my hero' and fall into your arms?" Yes, she was certain now that he had planned that. ********, he'd already deceived her numerous times. What was one more pebble on the mountain of lies? "You've been watching me all this time... And you still don't understand."
Riyo's hands left her head to wrap around her knees. "This body. This stupid ******** body. It heals. If I die, it reforms. The physical pain... It'll dull and eventually disappear."
She had experienced death. While yes, it was excruciatingly unpleasant.. It was nothing more than an inconvenience compared to mental damage.
"I can't just pick up the p-p-pieces of my broken mind and put it back together the same... Way it was before. I can't just... Feel safe again."
No... She didn't feel safe anywhere now. Riyo had lost her sanctuary. She'd lost her trust in the one thing she thought would never betray her. Nowhere was sacred anymore... And for once, she truly just wanted to be alone.
Sorry. He was sorry? Yeah. Sorry. 'Sorry about taking that wrecking ball to your brain. Didn't mean to' or 'Sorry I just worsened your paranoia. It was an accident.' There were some situations where sorry didn't work.
Everything he said seemed to make the hollow feeling in her chest worse. "You're sorry, huh?" The sobbing was starting to silence, but the shakiness and erratic breathing remained. "Are you apologizing because you m-made me feel awful? Or because you think it'll make you feel less awful about what you did?"
The feline looked tired now, but not once did her vision back down from his face. She wanted him to know. She wanted him to feel terrible. To take it in and taste her sorrow. To be overcome with the poison that numbed the heart and emptied the emotions. She wanted him to suffer too.
Misery loves company, after all.
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Posted: Thu Jan 26, 2012 4:13 am
"I don't know," he'd began, before falling silent as she continued. Silent, if only for a moment. When she suggested that he'd set up that broken branch, his eyes snapped up with a look of nothing less than shock.
"What?! I didn't... I had no idea that was going to happen!"
He realized he was shouting at her, and literally bit his tongue to keep from continuing. He didn't look happy about it, though. Was she crazy? Sure, he'd plotted some less than friendly things in the past, but did she really believe he'd risk injuring her?
Apparently so.
He shifted his gaze away again, his feline ears drooped back. Whether in annoyance, humiliation or pain was hard to tell. Especially with her throwing his apology right back in his face. He would have figured that that little two word phrase was very rare in his vocabulary.
He could feel her eyes on him, despite how much he tried not to meet her gaze. It made him uncomfortable, but it would be like her to want that. "Maybe I didn't think about the long-term, alright?" It wasn't alright, he knew, and he was certain that she'd remind him.
"I figured the only way you'd ever give me the time of day... Was if I was... Well, Fredrick. It worked, didn't it? We were both happy, for a while. You didn't know it was me, sure, but it wasn't so bad was it? I've got no intentions of telling anyone anything about you." Who was there that would listen, anyway? Nuk? Somehow, he doubted that even Nuk would appreciate this ordeal. "You might not be the only one who wants a little companionship, but has no jacking clue as to how to pursue it. Did you ever think of that?"
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Posted: Thu Jan 26, 2012 6:37 am
His lament of the accident was convincing, but the ghoul still wasn't sure she could trust him. Who could really blame her? Though, it was his turn to talk now. Riyo didn't particularly want to hear anything he said... But she did. Deacon really was an idiot, wasn't he? Did he really just do ALL THIS for attention?
Happy? Yeah. She had been happy. For a short time, she thought the little furball was really listening to her because he found her interesting. But it didn't really compare to how bad she felt now. Oh, and now he was going to use the fact that she secretly yearned for companionship against her?
"No, don't you dare use that information against me." She hissed, her tail prickling out from the very idea. "You stole that information. I won't allow you to try and reason with something that doesn't rightfully belong to you." Weakly, the feline stood, unsure whether to stare daggers or look hurt.
"Well I know that being a d**k won't get you anywhere!" Oh Jack, not again. She didn't want to cry again. She could feel the tears, but she couldn't bring herself to tarnish her reputation anymore. "Men say lewd things to me all the time because they know it's not what I want to hear. Did you ever think that maybe a compliment would do some good? Maybe I WOULD give you the time of day if you said something nice?"
With a cringe, she held back her tears and tried to stuff them back under the anger. "Even if it's not true..." Nobody ever told her she was pretty, or that she was interesting, or that they'd like to know her better because of that. They were pitiful compliments, but in a sea of insults, a little boat of good-natured words might be enough to pull her out.
"Then again, I suppose I don't deserve that, do I?" No... No, she supposed that was too much to ask. She WAS a b***h. She WAS a c**t.
Finally, she broke her glance from Deacon. Riyo didn't want to be out in the open anymore. She felt... Naked. "If you're sorry... Prove it."
It was the last thing she had to say before wrapping her arms around herself and marching back towards the demon dorms. Jack she hoped nobody she knew would see her... Or speak to her. Right now... She just couldn't handle it.
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