|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
 Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2014 9:33 am
It was only once the blanket had been wrapped upon her form, covering her head almost like a hood, and the rest of her body like a robe, that the eternal senshi was finally able to ease up on the strain of maintaining her henshin.
To any who were able to sense auras, it became quite obvious what had happened as the power signature simply vanished from the eternal senshi.
Psyche would be able to complete her task. The unconscious one had full faith is such as she was taken away.
[Iris exit]
|
 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2014 3:57 pm
There was furious motion around Iris even as the disappointment settled into heavy shreds of filth about them all as much as the light of the princess fuku turned up no more substantial than a rainbow and clouds before wind. Going already? Running so soon? I wonder if it is an expectation of an influx of every Youma and agent awake in the city? Maybe everyone else already knows what to expect. That its just, 'sorry, didn't work. see you later.' By all means go. You are not needed for the end, Iris. You need not see this, Irene.
Quenton carefully, slowly, stepped one foot before another to approach the fallen form. He kept his hands out, palms visible as he did so, in case any of the gathered senshi or knights decided he must be a threat to Iris or one of themselves. No, they were no concern of his. The Mars knight was near, but that was equally no burden.
Knelt slowly near, Quenton gently shifted to gather Alois up as he would were they at home. It might hurt, but everything would if it did. What was endurance of more pain to settling to what was comfort? Wings to be spread to either side, Alois' back to his chest as though Quenton were settling to read. Heart rate, platelet count, depth of sever and arterial constriction will all be factors in time. Brachial, at least 5. Femoral at least 5. Axillary at least 5, difficult to treat. Inguinal at least 5, not the angle for that. Aorta, at least 1. Popliteal, easy to treat. Inferior Vena Cava, at least 15, but deep. Carotid, at least 2. Jugular, at least 15. Subclavian artery, at least two and nearly impossible to treat...difficult to reach. Vein at least 15 minutes.
Subclavian Vein, Brachial, the Jugular are the most accessible from here.
"So starts the final task, does it not, my love?"
" Was there lack, somewhere, or is the answer dearth of strength enough on the vaunted Power of their Royalty. "
Even the greatest hope of light cannot salvage from the dark? What use is Princess or Prince against a Queen. Against a Power. What point of seeds compared to the Root and Tree. If there be a greater Power for Order, they are so removed, so indifferent, to the final battle lines. To the last trenches on the last planet. There is no White Moon Court. There is no Court of any sort. Cannot lift a single soul from mire, even if it be to death, and leave him here to stare at the traitorous stars. Lying in the gutter, but pointless, useless stars. Did you want it enough, Alois? Did you accept it enough? If you did, and there was no strength here, what is the use of it. Dark will be that tower to climb the top of. My mind circles, asks of self the same as he.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2014 6:01 pm
"As far as I know no one has ever tried this with a half-youma before." Kairatos growled, moving as though to intercept Quenton's apparently nigh suicidal gesture. "And as he was told a couple times, outside of this being a first... you gotta want it. Everyone on that side needs it, I should know, but rules are rules, and Iris didn't set them. He said he doesn't want it, he needs it. Or did you miss that line?"
He wondered what the final task was, and what kind love allowed knowing that at some level, your partner didn't want to give up being a murderer. He eyed Quenton with narrowed eyes, sizing him up, searching futility for any indication of hidden powers.
"You love him... you talk to him. He's hooked on poison and it's only going to make him be more of what he's already turning into, because he keeps going this road and there's not going to be anything left to love you back. Chaos doesn't have room for things it can't use."
It was dangerous to focus on Quenton maybe, but he was a bit angry, even if he could sort of guess where the dismissive commentary about the royals was coming from. Hard to appreciate how much someone had just expended on your cause when it failed. Easier to blame a stranger for the fault in someone you loved than blame them.
Anyway he was pretty sure he'd grasped what "dearth" and "vaunted" meant from the context.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2014 6:20 pm
This was wrong. Irene could sense it even before the light began to fade. Before, the light had driven the darkness away. This time, it seemed to provoke a counterattack instead. She found herself leaning back, as if trying to avoid the Chaos that she continued to feel in front of her. And then the light faded, and both Iris and the man called Alois collapsed. Nothing had changed. Nothing was better.
From the beginning, Iris had been clear about her uncertainty. There was no way to tell if this was going to work. Knowing that, she had elected to try it anyway, which was a decision that Irene had wholeheartedly supported. Everyone had the right to freedom, from pain and sadness and an oppressive regime. It was their job to help people who sought their freedom attain it. If they all wanted it enough, it would work. It had to.
But it didn't, and Irene wasn't sure what to believe in anymore. Why hadn't it worked? What did it mean? What else could they try? There had to be a way to fix things, somehow. Just because she couldn't think of one, and the strongest person she knew couldn't do it, didn't mean it wasn't possible. Nothing was truly impossible.
But it did mean that this attempt was a failure, and that fact was devastating. She didn't even know this person, or most of his friends, but the thought of the things he must have suffered, and the pain he must be feeling, made her start to cry, quietly, not wanting to cause a scene. He probably felt trapped now, maybe even abandoned or tricked. And still, she couldn't think of a way to help him.
She was dimly aware of Psyche carrying Iris away, as they had agreed. Her job was to stay and make sure that nobody followed them. With physical force, if necessary. Though at that moment, the last thing she wanted to do was fight. What she wanted to do was tell them that everything was going to be okay, that they would sort it out. But for the first time since she had been awakened, Irene was not confident that they would. And that terrified her.
"I'm sorry," she whispered, not really speaking to anyone in particular. She dabbed her eyes with her gloved fingertips and watched as the one normal person in their group went to check on Mister Alois. As long as he didn't go after Iris, she had no business with him. When he spoke, questioning Iris' power, she was tempted to jump to her captain's defense, but Kairatos beat her to it. Just as well, since her heart wouldn't have been in it. Every one of them was suffering, though none so much as Mister Alois. This wasn't the time to be sniping at each other. They needed to regroup and go back to the drawing board.
And then?
Irene swallowed. She had no idea how to proceed from here. With her faith shaken, she did the only thing she could, clinging to her instructions. Watch. Wait. Make sure that no one follows. And try not to think about what might come next.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Thu Jul 24, 2014 7:02 pm
The orchid eternal had watched with widening eyes as Iris became a princess in a wash of light and color, then brought out the crystal that would hopefully cleanse Alois of his corruption. A breath was drawn in and held as the light grew, then flashed brightly... and she could feel the power that gathered here, focused... and then melted away as the light faded.
Ida gasped for air as the moment passed and left behind... a scene unchanged. Disappointment was a crushing weight as the young woman felt her shoulders sag, the hands that had clutched her compact loosening their death grip. It didn't work... I knew it wouldn't, but I had hoped so much... Now what do we do? We can't... leave him like this...
"I doubt the failure was for lack of wanting it." Ida said in a thick, flat voice, stepping forward finally. "There was something else... something we all missed. Bisch.... Alois would not have attempted this if he had not wanted to be free of chaos. Why would you have come here, among all of your enemies, still clinging to it? Unless you had a death wish, knowing when it failed we may be moved to destroy you instead."
Not that any of them would, or so she believed. That sort of thinking was possible in Alois' mind though. In Bischofite's mind.
"There is a missing piece, but now is perhaps not the time to stand around discussing it... our auras are going to draw attention soon enough. Its not a good idea to have a general in the middle of a group of senshi."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 12:25 am
When you stir your rice pudding, Septimus, the spoonful of jam spreads itself round making red trails like the picture of a meteor in my astronomical atlas. But if you stir backwards, the jam will not come together again. Indeed, the pudding does not notice and continues to turn pink just as before. Do you think this is odd?
The stage of the collapsed theater where Hvergelmir usually took shelter to lick her wounds after a battle was still set with the unassuming table and chairs of Stoppard's Arcadia, just as it had been for the past year. It was Arcadia she'd been reading when she'd first met Bischofite, when he'd first come to her in the park to ask her if purification could undo what corruption had done. It was Arcadia she thought of now, in the aftermath of its failure.
The slowing of all things. The heat death of the universe.
She'd suspected it, then. They'd all suspected it all along: this might not work. It might just as soon kill him.
Corruption was easy. Corruption was breaking something apart, and in the process, energy was lost. Purification was harder -- it wanted not only its own energy to work, its own energy to be lost in the process (a pulse of great light, a resonant aura, the shaking of the ground beneath their feet), but also all the extra that had been spent in the original equation. It cost more to rebuild something back to new -- every change had a new expense. Whatever Alois's lover suspected, whatever he feared, there was nothing lacking in the strength of Order's royalty. Purification was the stronger magic, pound for pound. It necessarily had to be.
But this was not corruption. It wasn't a cancerous tumor easily cut away. It was a metastasized infection, one that had spread through him head to foot, and it had had too much time to build, too many layers of growth. That was what they said about youma, wasn't it? It was why they couldn't be purified -- it's spread too far. The most powerful magic they possessed did not actually turn back time.
They'd always known there would be limits. But they'd hoped -- without knowing what they were -- for the highest bounds they could get.
If this was to be a dead end -- if all Bischofite would ever come to was a glorified youma wearing half a human face -- he was terribly young, at no more than twenty, to have come to such an end. Miserably, brutally young. Each for their own reasons, they'd all hoped for the best.
Now it didn't matter. Whether they liked the answer or not, they had it.
(She blinked back tears. Twenty years old. Tops. Twenty.)
Iris was safely away. That left only one other person to worry about, one other person to see safely away.
Alois.
If the hooded senshi's suppositions were correct, Hvergelmir's fears about the situation were all the more likely. With so many people there, was it really possible that they'd all manage to keep their heads enough to walk away like she needed them to? Would they really all understand how important it was that he leave here unharmed, no matter what he might do after that?
Could she trust in her comrades' better natures?
"No one's destroying anyone," she said with more than her usual amount of conviction when dealing with this many people. Hvergelmir pivoted to face Kairatos and the two senshi, her distaff falling into her hands at a thought. The implication was obvious: you go through me to get to him. "Not here. If you believe anyone else is ever worth saving, you have to let him walk away. We can't break our truce here."
Her mind wasn't on the scene behind her: it was on these three people, and making sure they were all in agreement. If they failed here -- if they let the banner of their side's honor fall -- it would cost more than one life.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 12:46 am
The Mars knight loomed, and a guttural, ragged growl emanated from the back of the creature's throat. The pain boiled in his chest, jaunting his breath and reducing all movement to shuddered spasms between pulses of of paralyzing agony. As the knight progressed, drew closer, Bischofite used what adrenaline stemmed from the attempt to procure hot tar from every pore on his hands, until both warped appendages bore gloves hot and sticky. Afterward he swiped toward the knight, nails poised to catch flesh, and a few flecks of tar leapt from the speed of the defensive assault.
The words spoken by Kairatos simmered in a stew of hurt.
It's going to be a long road, but you'll be happy with the results.
She's not alive anymore. That creature is lost in you, lost in each and every fiber where there hums a brilliance you've been blind to all this time. You know your world as black because your eyes never adjusted beyond it. But she knew - she tasted it, and agreed to your servitude for a time. Tried to claim it as her own.
Now she is yours, and all bounty she but had. Know her world and yours, for there is nothing else left.
That ache will fade, and there is nothing else left.
Pull him through time, Alois. Bischofite. Pull him through time and darkness.
Reclining into Quenton's touch, groan-stained wings flattened between chest and back, one hand found the full of Quenton's thigh and squeezed blackened tar into the last tatters of his pants. Between shades of pain he knew the depth of the sculptor's words. "It does," he replied, resting the back of his head against the blonde's shoulder. The gesture felt so foreign and exposed, so absurd around the flecks of stars lingering on. One winked out. He knew not which.
He only knew the darkness around the edges, where meager light found no strength to tread.
"We'll never know the answer." His voice came in whisper rasped, traced with worn groans buried between feathers. "It's moments like zese zat render war zones, zat tuck ze buds of distrust into ze dirt beneas' our feet, trodden and stamped and nourished by ze heaviness of our tread. It grows into our feet, twines around ankles and seeps into bone so soroughly zat we will know its stalks no different zan marrow. And once ze sprouts take, once each sick branch feeds off ze last vibrance of our hearts, we will know our true condition - zat we never walked ze ground, zat we knew all your life in shades of blood, zat we now hang upside-down wis' only our bountiful tree of doubt to suspend us by its roots."
The want of darkness grew troublesome when you knew those trifling splashes of dishwater hanging in the sky. When you knew the absolution of their kind.
Now, be a dear and die, will you?
"Do it while I still know zis incarnation of me." And let it all fade to darkness.
Perhaps Kairatos is right. Perhaps you'll never know want enough. You know facsimiles, pinpricks compared to the overwhelming spire of hurt suffered by some - suffered by him. And you tried to compare. Oh, how you tried.
And Ida, who even now sinks her head into the sand. How she knows every modicum of glass, dirt, grain spread across the sea of sand. She knows the desert for its terra cotta hues, its sun-trodden granules lay piled atop one another like corpses. There is a missing piece: half your humanity.
And now Hvergelmir, steeped in her absurdities, her backwards logic led through handholds and stammered conviction, comes to defy you. To support you. To solidify some vapid acceptance that all must leave alive - always so literal, always so blind to the long death suffered by the mind in its many iterations. She'll know the black staircase someday.
And Iris, and her bodyguards, they shimmer and wink and glitter through their clever little shows. But what good is it now? What good is light played out when it knows only the surface of all things? Shining the flashlight down your throat never illuminated the very guts of you.
It was endearing, how long you lasted.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 5:01 am
"I don't care for your tone." Kairatos's growl had an animal edge to it comparable to Bishophites as he shot Ida a look of rage and... disgust?
"Don't be ******** stupid. I'm here to make sure no one goes after the Princess, not to pull some X-files horse crap and clean up for the PR department. Treat it like the drug it is, and stop bitching because the cure hurts, or piss off. Speaking of... KNOCK IT OFF DICKWEED!" He whipped an angry look at Alois, if only because the flecks of tar that splattered on bare skin and the claws that raked on the exposed skin of his good arm hurt like hot needles.
His words didn't say it but the tone did. How dare she. Assumptive little beast. How dare she paint the exhaustive effort in such a callous light? Sour grapes at her own lack of ability he figured. She'd only stood there for most of it, he couldn't figure her right to speak, though to Hver he gave more credit, if partially from Mistral.
"I came to make sure no one died tonight if I could, Sparkles. I was Chaos tainted too once."
He thought of it as reminding her, only thinking afterward she might not know.
"I'm not here to kill anyone tonight, Alois." He doggedly clung to the name they'd been told to use earlier. "Come at me again another night and it might be different, but not tonight." He was trying to wipe off the tar with the back of his gauntlet, but it wasn't helping much.
"But everyone's right, we just dropped a bomb here and something's bound to sit up and pay attention. Get out of here and lick your... or... yeah maybe just get a goddamn bandaid you jackass."
******** tar hurt and was sticky as ********. He did not recommend licking wounds in any form with that around.
He could hear echos of that long pit of despair, but he wasn't ready to cut the rope instead of waiting to see if it might yet be climbed out of. Experiments failed sometimes.
"Sparkles maybe you can help me find a water fountain in your grand quest to keep me from.... I don't know what I'm supposed to be doing here. Beating him to death with my forehead?"
He wanted to find a way to tell Alois not to give up, but he suspected it would be communicated best in dusty quotes he couldn't easily bring to mind... though he'd try anyway.
"Don't give up on me, you sticky b*****d. I've yet to meet someone else stubborn enough to go through with this, and obviously people care about you for some reason." He rolled his eyes dramatically, though he forced a smile, trying to bring a modicum of humor to the moment before he moved to depart.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 8:43 am
The manx cat had been okay taking up a seat on the ground level, until she heard the sniffling from Irene. Lifting her haunches, she made her way to the girl's ankles, rubbing up against them in silent permission to get picked up.
The whole scenario was truly disappointing, but ********* was rather good at keeping a pleasant face on, despite any sort of negative feelings. Perhaps it was what made her a decent Guardian, since it would come across she was able to keep a clear head despite emotions bursting within her little Mauvian heart.
"Iris was uncertain that this would work. We all were uncertain, but Iris must have still thought that there was some sort of chance to make this all work. Otherwise, she wouldn't have offered herself for this attempt. A crystal is no easy thing to wield. The ability to control such a powerful object comes with a cost... Iris knows this since it is the same cost every time she has used this crystal in such a manner."
Ellie should have been in a hospital for the levels of exhaustion she would suffer from, but would instead just let the course flow for about a week or longer to regain her energy. The crystal was all or nothing. It would take everything and either leave you with the purification, or it would leave you with nothing to show for the energy expended.
If Psyche were here, the manx would be attempting to keep her in check in this situation. Irene was not as much of a loose cannon, keeping herself in check (though ********* heart was still slightly broken from how Irene was taking the ordeal). That made the only other loose cannon at the moment the one adorned with symbols of Mars.
"Kairatos... would you be up for some delivery service? I know someone who could use some Taco King after all this!"
It might have sounded like she was referencing Iris, but she was actually talking about herself.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 9:28 am
Kairatos snorted loudly, which given the decoration on his armor might have been slightly funnier if circumstances ran less to sounding as though Iris stood accused of not trying hard enough.
"Tacos." He agreed, with a tone that would have better served picking up a hit-contract. "Fine."
********* had made the point better than he could, and he knew it was probably her tummy rumbling. Iris wouldn't be even thinking of food for... a while. He wanted to stop and give the chubby little cat a rub behind the ears to feel better, but that could wait until he cooled off.
"I'll get something to eat, you guys can catch up to me afterward. Someplace else."
Not here. Not near Ida and Quenton, who he hoped would clear out as suggested.
[exit Kairatos unless someone addresses or stops him.]
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 9:30 am
There was a surge of confusion when the Cosmos Squire's weapon appeared in her hands, her face set in determined lines. Did... did she really think Ida was going to act on her words? The thought was so completely absurd... but it said something of the Squire, about her convictions and willingness to defend them. Strong heart... I was like that once, before I shattered. I wish I could be that again.
Ida's eyes strayed to where Alois settled himself back into Quenton's arms, an ache spreading through her chest at the sight. He spoke something, but it made little sense to her. She wished there were some way... but she wasn't welcome here, not as Ida. She wasn't even sure why she had come, save for the most selfish of reasons... even if he'd asked her to.
The sudden growl took the eternal aback and had this been another, earlier time, she might have even wilted at it... but all it got the irate knight was a wide-eyed look of frustration and a thinning of her lips. My tone? What on earth did I say to earn that level of ire? Apparently, defending a half-youma monster is not to be tolerated. If the Mars Knight was looking to intimidate her, Ida was not impressed... she'd faced worse.
Torn between wanting to go to Alois and knowing she couldn't, Ida turned her back on the scene and wandered away restlessly, her fingers twisted together as she circled the bench the beer bottle had come to rest on. Bending, she retrieved the bag and wondered what the Squire meant to Alois, that she'd come here tonight bringing this. Another of his 'lovers', as Quenton would have put it? Was that what they all were, or was there some other reason he'd chosen these people to be here? She knew it was time to go, the group was fast dwindling in number, but reluctance kept her feet rooted to the ground. Would it even help anything, to talk to him now? Or would it be better to just leave him in Quenton's arms, let his lover console him while she retreated somewhere to mourn alone?
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 12:12 pm
He didn't flinch when the hot tar sizzled against his jeans, through them to the skin beneath. It would peel off with the top layers of skin later, probably, but at least cauterized what it wounded and kept out pathogens. Tar was used plenty in old medicine. As you are now. In control of your faculties, if washed in despair. Not maddened by it yet.
There was some instinct to argue with all of them- there was no second chance, even if this was an experiment. It could have been, should have been. The attempt left its marks, though- and not all the Negaverse were children who wouldn't read the signs. What then? Worse than death or some other punishment. So much time between another attempt could even be tried. Time in which, even if wool could be pulled over, there would be expectations on Bischofite of energy, theft, starseeds, more. Alois was not safe without being taken away from it all. There was no haven to take him to. Senshi worlds and Knight Wonders would need supply, and only one senshi person could ferry food and water to their world. One person who was limited in the trips they could make. A week in space was just stalling, unless someone was going to hunt down all the remaining royals to try together. Another Experiment.
Not likely. Quenton had nothing to add to their yelling, no arguments to present them. They were not showing proponents of euthanasia. He wasn't sure he was in all aspects- what was 'dignified' death? Death was death. The difference was speed and ease of pain. Choice. Alois' reach back opened up option. Quenton shifted, turning face to press his lips against the sweat-flattened feathers of black hair at Alois' temple. Quenton reached back, hand retrieving the new switchblade from its holster at the back of his belt to bring forward with a soft, but distinct clink.
"The answer is the journey, the end is always the same."
Then the short motion to bring it forward, if unhindered, to the Axillary artery, accessible via the armpit and front of the shoulder joint to bury it through anatomy.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 5:56 pm
Hvergelmir had no honed battle instincts -- she never had. It was the constant, recurring lament of her self-defense instructor, going through motions that were designed to be simple enough to train into instincts: React. React, Laney, you think panic's going to be your friend, but it won't. Rote memory's going to be your friend. If you can memorize all those dictionary words and all your poems, you can memorize a prickle elbow or a side dodge. Do it again. Again.Susan wasn't here. Susan would've known what to do when Bischofite's companion started speaking again, his words making her blood run slightly cold. She would've done more than just turn with what felt like agonizing slowness, would've recognized the click sooner, would've thought more than just no --. But Susan would never have missed something so obvious in the first place -- Hvergelmir had been so focused on the bright power signatures all around her, she'd never even thought to question the young man Bischofite had brought with him. Susan had the gift of fear. She would've noticed something. Her reaction would've been better. As it was, Hvergelmir reached for the only thing, the only plan, she'd already had to hand. Her magic was new, raw, and she'd had so little time to practice it -- so when she brought it to life, there was no finesse to the spell whatsoever, just speed and a desperate urgency. The air split with a percussive crack and the smell of ozone, light racing up her thread and through her hands like a filament thrown to electricity. He'd have to get a little distance, she knew, to build up enough pressure to drive a knife home through flesh, so if he couldn't see, maybe he'd hesitate, or miss -- but the fact was, at that range, cradled body to body, even completely blind it was almost impossible for him to miss enough for it to make a difference. Quote: Spell - Hvergelmir spins out thread from her distaff onto her spindle; light sparks up from the thread of her weapon and begins to cover her, illuminating her like a small, bright star. Normally potentially 45 seconds of blinding light -- in this case, though, new and panicked and unfocused, only a few short seconds duration.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 7:35 pm
Everything seemed to slow down when Ida turned back with the bottle in her hands, blinking to see the Cosmos Squire starting to glow. She had a moment, less than an instant, to look past her and see a knife and then the eternal was in motion, instincts and desperation pushing her to the limits of her speed.
You said you were the reason Alois told me he was going to die... I should have guessed. I should have known... how stupid I am, how short sighted and dense...
Why had it never occurred to her that, if this method failed, Quenton would seek another path? Because I assume the best of people. Because I never think that, just maybe, someone else would think different than I do. I should have known better by now.
Somewhere behind her, the bottle hit the ground and cracked with a sharp sound, spilling beer into its bag.
The light flashed and Ida stumbled in her flight, blinded entirely by the whiteness of a small star less than five feet away. The move was clever, trying to distract the blonde, but detrimental to the one trying to actually do something. Brown hands flailed in the whiteness where she remembered the two men sitting on the ground, where the image of the knife was blistered into her memory, and the moment she felt skin, she closed her hand firmly around it, tugging it away with as much gentled strength as she could manage.
"Quenton! Please... don't." She gasped out, blinking tearing eyes as she waited for her vision to clear of the afterimage of white. She could feel her whole body trembling with adrenaline and fear, the after effects of her sudden terrified dash. "This isn't the way."
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted: Sun Jul 27, 2014 8:32 am
The stars sought to sear his eyes soon after the fateful click, and Bischofite knew no more the vision to follow the voice of Ida. Only her afterimage remained, half-seared by light, to guide his aim. A tarred, taloned hand swept out toward where Ida may yet linger, where Ida tried to stymie the inevitable, and he sought every shred of fuku he might seize in his sticky, viscous grip. If only a minor wound, he suspected the recoil alone from the act may buy enough time for Quenton's success.
"Get out!" The creature nearly screamed, fully backdropped by groans and wails denoting mixed distress and dismay, as if the wings supported him in dishwater conviction while eking out their own incessant mourning over their now stunted lifespan. "Get out!" He repeated, gaze still blind by the stars, but voice ever sharp toward the two of them. The stragglers. The ones who thought something better might come of the rotten afterbirth of some scheme to lift the monster from his bones.
A practiced hand mitigated some of the discomfort, as Quenton either hesitated nor tempered his strike with doubt. Alois' features stiffened into a grimace while a keen strike of pain temporarily immobilized him, sourcing from beneath his arm and half-numb from overload. He knows conviction like the taste of lightning during the storm, how it rends the blackened sky in a brilliant crack before discharging thick ozone from such power. He knows more of my lot than them - those two who shudder and gape and cry out against a better murder than standing trial at the forefront of the Negaverse. Metallia... I wonder if she can feel me, know my deeds? I wonder if she snarls at the very thought of what transpired here, if she demands my blood spilled from the highest spires of the cathedral.
Now it will never come to pass.
His breathing quickened under the burden of pain, casting out quick breaths to maintain some meager replenishment of air without vocalizing its duress. Instinctively, a hand sought to cover the wound, to press fingers bone-white into the flesh surrounding the wound - the incision - and stop the pain due to his banal attempt at assuaging it. "Ze Negaverse owns fates worse zan deas' - to know zis is a mercy you will never understand, Ida. Zere is no better way." Even if it pains me so keenly to know no further discourse with Quenton, no further late night philosophical chats with Hvergelmire, no further chances to torment Ida.
Soon his body embarked on mourning its own misfortune, tears neither wanted or needed welling into his gaze. In a turn of his head, lips heated by breath found intimate distance from his lover's ear. "Don't linger - dying is such a personal affair. And should one of my kind find you here, wis' me..." He knew imagination afforded more impetus than explanation.
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Reply
