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 Posted: Thu Nov 14, 2013 10:03 am
Fear of the Dark Alistair was getting really, really fed up with feeling weak. Wasn’t being a Senshi supposed to give him strength? And yet in his first battles, he had been all but useless. He had flailed helplessly while Damocles dealt with his shade. It had been Disneya’s magic that allowed them to finish hers. In the battle against their Queen, he had nearly died and barely damaged her at all.
And the battle against his shade still stuck with him. Every night, it seemed, he felt those cold hands wrapping around his neck and woke up in a panic. He often found him wishing that Lance was there, because he could trust in the comfort of strong, warm arms - but of course they’d only been dating for a month, sharing a bed was basically out of the question at this point. There was definitely such a thing as moving too fast - no matter how happy he would have been to wake up to that face every morning and go to sleep curled in his arms at night.
He knew his restlessness was beginning to disturb the sleep of everyone else in the house. Never mind that it was absolutely affecting his schoolwork. He had nearly drifted off in class several times, the kiss of death when he was taking introductory theater courses and trying to clear the damn general education requirements so he could just get to his major things. Passing those basic classes was critical and it was in them that he felt like he could see his grades slipping.
He knew that he had to be worrying Lance, with his habit of getting smacked around in battle, and that was upsetting too, because his boyfriend needed to be taking care of himself and not worrying about Alistair flailing around helplessly and trying not to die.
Plus, Lance wasn’t always going to be there. He knew that well enough, given how many times he had patrolled without his boyfriend at his side, and he had to be able to handle himself when he was alone. Not every White Moon Senshi would be like Avior, halfway to Chaos already, or Disneya, sweet and innocent and willing to be charmed by a smile and a warm scarf, or Ida, who had accepted his help in dealing with her shade, technically enemies or no. Some of them would hate him just for being Chaos, would attack him for no more than the color of his uniform.
Those were the ones he was afraid of. The Shade Queen might be sealed, her armies gone, but there were Senshi on the other side, and perhaps even officers with a less than positive disposition towards the Court, who would still be out for his blood. He needed to be able to handle himself, because he couldn’t expect to call Lance every time he needed a rescue.
Perhaps he should get training? Lance knew martial arts, surely he could pass on some of the basics…and surely knowing that he had a chance to fight would assuage the awful, awful dreams that came every night.
Even if it didn’t, he would wake up knowing that wasn’t how it had to be.
[WC: 538 words]
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Posted: Thu Nov 14, 2013 10:07 am
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Posted: Thu Nov 14, 2013 10:55 pm
 The Basics
Tantalus gets a lesson in basic fighting techniques from Damocles.
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Posted: Mon Feb 17, 2014 7:43 pm
Please Take Warning Amytis fell through her bedroom mirror, coughing. She fumbled weakly for her communicator, sobbing softly as she did. Her entire body was shaking, and all she could think was that she was glad that insane Senshi b***h hadn’t gone for her chest because at least she didn’t have to worry about coughing up her lungs. Plus, she could talk, and call Tantalus - Tantalus!
She fumbled for her compact, flipping it open.
“Tantalus! Tantalus, are you there?” She called, her voice faint. Her body was shaking, and she was whimpering in pain.
Tantalus, for his part, was out on patrol, and he was surprised to hear Amytis’s voice over his compact - never mind that she sounded absolutely awful.
“Amytis?” He asked, his voice soft, leaning against a nearby tree. “Are you alright?”
“Tantalus,” Amytis gasped, joy bubbling inside her. Good, that b***h hadn’t found him yet! “Tantalus, you have to stay away from the big park, okay, please, just don’t go there tonight.”
“Why not? I’m on my way right now, actually, just to see what I can -” Tantalus begain, but he was cut off by a sobbing wail.
“Don’t go! You can’t go!” She said, her voice sharp. “There’s - there’s this Order senshi, and she - god, Tantalus, I’m so sorry, but she was crazy and she broke my fingers and my arm and my leg and she wanted to know who Damocles’s partner was and where he was and I told her about you but I lied and told her you were in the park all night and Tantalus you can’t go there.”
“What?” Tantalus felt cold fury sink into him - not at Amytis, never at poor terrified Amytis who clearly just wanted to survive an encounter with a psycho - but at whoever had done this to her. “Do you know her name? Or what she looks like?” He asked icily.
“She - she has long red hair, and she wears this, like, Xena the Warrior Princess fuku, all leather and metal and she’s tiny but she’s <******** crazy and really strong and Tantalus, please, you can’t go after her, she wants you and I think she wants to do worse to you than she did to me.” Amytis sobbed brokenly, her eyes wide and her entire body shaking. She knew Tantalus couldn’t see, but she was breaking down with fear, and all she could think about was all the awful things that could happen if that Senshi got to him. “I didn’t catch her name, though,” she confessed quietly. “She didn’t tell me, and I didn’t - I didn’t tell her mine.”
“Amytis, it’s okay, I can handle whoever this is.” Tantlaus said. “Call for an ambulance, so you can get to a hospital, and then get better.”
Amytis whined pathetically, audible over the line. “Just - just be really careful, okay, because I think she wanted Damocles too.”
“All the more reason for me to stand and fight.” Tantalus said. “Be safe, Amytis.” Then, he closed his communicator.
He had a crazy b***h to find.
Back at her apartment, Amytis let out another choked sob and finally powered down, curling into a ball. She didn’t even want to bother with her cell phone, and definitely not with dragging herself over to the actual phone. It hurt way, way too much for her to even consider that.
God, she hated herself so much. At least Tantalus knew what he was getting into, but there was clearly no stopping him from getting into it.
“Please, be safe yourself,” Ava murmured, even though she knew he couldn’t hear. “Don’t die…”
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Posted: Mon Feb 17, 2014 8:30 pm
Apples and Blades Tantalus paced back and forth through the park, reaching up and fiddling with his scarf. It had become a genuine nervous habit, ever since he’d nearly been strangled to death, and he couldn’t help but worry that it would happen again. He refused to admit how frightened he was, not when this enemy was coming after Damocles and had already hurt Amytis. This was someone who was completely psychotic and a threat to everyone in the Court.
Maybe he would strangle her, turn his scarf into a weapon to save everyone he knew. That was a dark thought.
An Order aura drew his attention, and he jerked his head up. This must be who Amytis had described - tiny, long red hair, Xena-like outfit...yep.
“I’ve been expecting you.” Tantalus said, his voice cold as ice.
Penthesilea threw back her head and laughed. She laughed like she had never laughed before. “Oh, Tantalus, you cannot possibly have expected me,” she said, grinning viciously. She walked forward, and then she ran, and Tantalus found that he could still be surprised by the amount someone weighed, because her mass seemed rather disproportionate to her height.
He fell to the ground, and she was on top of him, smirking viciously. She had such a perfect idea, right then - she’d already choked one person, she was pretty sure she could knock him out long enough to get him to where she needed him to be. That would be all she needed.
So while he kicked and struggled and fought underneath her, she leaned her weight on his chest and felt the air leave his lungs, and then she gripped the scarf...and pulled.
It was only a few seconds before he was unconscious and she released her grip, checking for a pulse. Heart still beating, still breathing - exactly like she wanted him. She needed him alive so that she could ensure that she presented Damocles with the best gift she could think of.
A beaten, bloody, broken partner.
Before she packed everything up to leave, however, she unwound the scarf from Tantalus’s neck. As soon as Amytis had told her about it, a plan had formed, and so she pulled out the large nail she’d brought and the note she’d written, stabbing it and the scarf into a tree to leave a sign for Damocles.
Damocles -
I have your boyfriend. Meet me in the warehouse district. The appropriate building will have blood over the door. It may well be his.
-Penthesilea
She’d signed it as elegantly as she could, all written in red fountain pen. Such an elegant effect, or at least she thought.
She walked over to the unconscious black-and-red-clad body, and hefted him up. He was light, so even though he was taller than her, it really was no issue to carry him to where she needed to be and tie him up so he wasn’t going anywhere.
After that, it was a waiting game for him to open his eyes.
It wasn’t long, once they were there, and as soon as he made a groggy wakeful noise, Pen sprang up and slammed her boot into his chest, making him yell in pain.
“G’mornin, sunshine,” she said, a wicked grin on her face. His eyes widened with fear. “It’s time t’have a little fun.”
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Posted: Fri Feb 21, 2014 5:48 am
Warpath
Though he spends most of their fight unconscious, Tantalus is relieved to wake up and find Damocles, not Penthesilea, standing over him.
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Posted: Fri Feb 21, 2014 5:50 am
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Posted: Fri Apr 11, 2014 9:11 am
The Best-Laid Plans
Damocles and Tantalus are lured into a trap by the Negaverse, and Damocles ends up taking the fall to keep Tantalus safe.
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Posted: Fri Apr 11, 2014 9:12 am
White Phoenix Rising
Tantalus calls for help, and does a rather good job leading the Dark Mirror into a trap, in order to save his boyfriend.
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Posted: Fri Apr 11, 2014 9:12 pm
Shatter Alistair had slipped from Lance’s arms in the night, once he was sure his boyfriend was well and asleep, and he stood in front of their bathroom mirror, staring at himself and despising what he saw.
A part of him was relieved simply because he and Lance had escaped that awful Negaverse ambush alive. No, not just Negaverse - there had been Order Senshi and Knights there too, all of them descending upon the Dark Mirror Court with intent to kill.
They had almost succeeded. And it was, in the end, all his fault. The Court was led into an ambush. Leto’s starseed had been taken - fortunately returned, but if Persephone - a Negaverse senshi - had not been so quick, it might have been too late. Lance was beaten and broken, Jaysen revealed not only as a Negaverse Senshi but as willing to let her own brother die. And, quite simply, if he himself weren’t so frankly useless, none of it would have mattered. If he had thought to use his magic, he could have had two of their attackers chasing apples and handled the third in any number of other ways, gotten Jaysen, and left. It never would have escalated to the General with the rose-red hair grabbing him. Lance wouldn’t have needed to make a trade for his life.
None of it would have happened, except he was a useless burden on the Court and one he was sure they would prefer to simply be rid of. So he was going to remove himself from the equation - or at least, remove Tantalus.
He picked up the heavy candlestick he’d dug out of one of the display cabinets in their living room, and slammed the butt end into the mirror, which immediately cracked. A few more hits, and it shattered off the wall, a rain of glass that cut into the arm he’d thrown up to protect his face.
It had been louder than he expected, which meant he had to be quick, because undoubtedly Lance would be waking up and he did not need to be interrupted.
The next mirror was the one in the living room, tucked in a corner and mostly present so they didn’t always come home into the bedroom. A couple of heavy, solid strikes brought that one shattering to pieces, too. By the time he’d broken the second mirror, he was grinning almost crazily. There was something gratifying in the trail of broken glass, even if his arms and hands were bleeding from thin slices and he was pretty sure he had glass in his feet and continuing to walk was only making that worse.
Two more to go - one in the spare bedroom, one in their own. He knew that if he hadn’t woken Lance up yet, that last mirror would do it, so he would have to be quick in finishing his plan - in bringing the candlestick down on his henshin pen so he could never become Sailor Tantalus again.
It wasn’t well thought out. It wasn’t even particularly like him, but between being nearly murdered by his shade, nearly murdered again by Penthesilea, and nearly getting his Princess killed...well.
With all that, it seemed a perfectly reasonable reaction.
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Posted: Mon Apr 14, 2014 6:49 pm
Repair
Lance stops Alistair from making a very, very bad decision.
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Posted: Wed May 28, 2014 1:34 pm
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Posted: Sat Jun 13, 2015 12:07 am
Ends There were a few people Rhys felt he owed personal goodbyes to. People who would notice he was missing, but who as far as he knew weren’t Order,and who did not know his identity - who wouldn’t become suspicious that he’d said goodbye and just a few hours later was corrupted.
And there was one person to whom, as far as he was concerned, he owed the full and entire truth. At least, in this.
Alistair had been his best friend since they were children - they had grown up together. He had been Alistair’s first call after Lance had proposed. They talked nearly every day, and if he owed anyone the truth, he owed it to him. Never mind that he had loved Alistair for as long as he knew what love was, but he had given up on that long ago. They weren’t meant to be anything but friends.
He’d texted ahead, to ask if Lance was home - having this conversation in front of his best friend’s fiance did not sound at all pleasant. Fortunately, he wasn’t, and so for the moment Rhys had Alistair’s attention to himself.
They were seated in the living room, on opposite ends of the couch, and Rhys nervously fiddled with his signet ring.
“Alistair, I have something to tell you,” he began. “No. Something to show you.”
“Alright?” Alistair prompted. The brunet would admit to nerves - Rhys had never seemed this serious, and it worried him, in a lot of ways. Rhys was a mess, he knew that, had taken plenty of late-night calls of his best friend freaking out. This was unusual, though.
Rhys stood up and took a breath, and reached into the ether for his delicate pomegranate wand. In a moment, he was replaced by Ploutonion Squire of Saturn, in black and white and purple. Alistair inhaled sharply, and unconsciously called his pen to his hand.
“Rhys -” he began.
“Hear me out,” Ploutonion said, gesturing for him to be silent. “I’m Ploutonion Squire of Saturn, and I’ve been doing this since late March. I almost died my first night as a Knight.”
“Rhys,” Alistair tried again, but the blue-haired man kept talking.
“All of the gang violence in this city is because of people like me. Magical people, who are throwing a war right under everyone’s noses. People are dying and it’s all bullshit, Alistair, and I don’t want to do this anymore. I can’t stay on this side, and if I go over, I’ll be safer, but I’m going to lose myself in the process, and I thought you deserved...”
By that point, Alistair had given up cutting him off. Instead, he pushed himself off the couch.
“Tantalus asteroid power, make up,” he said, and in a flash of lights and ribbons and apple blossoms, Alistair became Tantalus.
“Rhys, I know,” he said, but he was walking forward, reaching for his best friend’s hand, as the Squire fell silent and stared, in something like awe, at his friend remade into a Dark Mirror Senshi. “I’ve been fighting the same war for two years, on...the other side, sort of.” He took a breath. “I’m Super Sailor Tantalus, of the Dark Mirror - and Rhys, you can’t.” He wrapped both his hands around one of Ploutonion’s, squeezing and staring up at him. “The Negaverse is terrible. We used to be their allies, but they turned on us - they make terrible people of good men, they’ll take everything good in you and bury it under so much chaos you can barely breathe. Rhys, please, reconsider.”
Under pleading from Alistair, Rhys’s resolve wavered. But no - he couldn’t do this, he couldn’t stay, not even knowing Alistair wasn’t happy.
“I can’t, Ali, I’ve tried - I tried to be Order, and it nearly killed me more times than I can count. I have to do this, I’ll be better - happier, as an officer.” He stared at the ground, and swallowed. “It’s safer. And we can fight together - someday we would have been on opposite sides, and you know it.”
“I don’t know that, and neither do you,” Alistair protested. “Maybe if you stay, things will change, you’ll get stronger and you won’t need the Negaverse.”
“And maybe if I stay the Negaverse will take me anyway. I’ve seen what happens to the ones who resist. It’s not pretty.” He remembered Quartz, broken and angry and practically pleading with him not to corrupt, to stay away from the Negaverse - exactly the same way Alistair was. “Besides, you’re Chaos too.”
“Not the same Chaos!” Alistair protested fiercely. “I’m not like them, I’m not broken like their Senshi are. I’m a Dark Mirror, and they turned on us first. They kidnapped one of ours not too long ago, because her girlfriend was going up against them. After everything they’ve done to us, it’s a hell of a thing that there’s even what little alliance we do have. I almost died at the hands of one of their Senshi, once. We’re not the same.”
That gave Rhys pause. The idea of Alistair, deadatan agent’s hand because of the bizarre state of the alliance between the Negaverse and the Mirror, made him angry.
“Then I’ll protect you. When I’m one of them, I’ll have authority - I can keep you, and anyone you care about, safe.” He said.
The offer, Alistair had to admit, was tempting. An ally in the Negaverse he could rely on. Someone he would never have to fear would betray him, because Rhys was Rhys, there was no way…
“Is there nothing I can do to talk you out of this?” He asked. “Nothing I can say?” Alistair’s voice was pleading, pathetically so. Rhys broke eye contact, and slid his hand away, and turned.
Yes, there was one thing, but… “The only thing I want from you, you can’t give. And it would be wrong of me to ask.” Not when Alistair was engaged and happy. He couldn’t ruin that with his own selfish wants.
“What is it? Rhys, please,” Alistair begged.
Rhys grit his teeth and spun back around, placing his hands on either side of Alistair’s face. He drew the shorter man in for a long, passionate kiss, the type of kiss he dreamed about. Or it would have been, if Alistair hadn’t been frozen the entire time. Rhys puleld back and turned, and started for the door.
“Wait!” Alistar said, and he paused, for a moment. “How long?”
“Longer than you want to know,” Rhys said, and then he shut the door, and he was gone.
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Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2015 7:37 pm
Taken [Backdated to prior to R’lyeh]
Tantalus was starting to remember why he used to not patrol alone, because being surrounded by three very large very strange automaton-like figures was exactly the sort of moment for which he very, very much wanted Damocles. He hated fighting on his own - he hated fighting against massive odds even more.
He had been out on his own, out for a casual walk because he had been lucky for months, and not run into anything even slightly dangerous. Order was chatty, the Negaverse hadn’t attacked him, and generally he was pretty well off all around. So he’d gotten bolder, more confident - went more places on his own, but never without his mirror communicator so he could call for help if necessary. He was confident, but not reckless. Safety in numbers was important for someone like him, who had solely support-oriented magic. Really, it was entirely realism to think that he was going to need help, and need help often.
The three things had seemed to just appear out of thin air, and that was terrifying, because the only people he knew who could do that were the Negaverse, and God he hated the idea of being ambushed by the Negaverse again. But they didn’t look like officers, not at all. And they were definitely trying to surround him.
Shiiiit.
When pressed, he could fight, and Damocles had been training him - so at worst, he figured he could throw a few punches if he got cornered. But his first instinct was always, always going to be flight. He called up his magic, a shot of his Super and one of his basic to send the three surrounding him in different directions, and then he bolted. Usually that would be well and enough - few people continued to chase him once they were sent running, because he usually had enough time to get to a mirror.
He had not accounted for two things: number one, that there might be four of them - he discovered that by running nearly face first into the fourth - and number two, that they were apparently very determined. The fourth automaton thing swung a fist, and it struck him firmly in the stomach, driving the air from his lungs and preventing him, for a moment, from calling another shot of his attack to send it running.
And that was enough time for the other three to catch up. That was about when he started to panic, because he no longer had enough magic to make all of them flee. He started running again, but he wasn’t fast enough to get anywhere, and two of them caught his arms from behind. He pulled out his compact, ready to call for help - but a hand clamped over his mouth, and the compact slipped from his hand, and all he could manage was a muffled scream.
And then he was gone, a broken compact the only thing left to show he had been there at all.
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Posted: Thu Sep 24, 2015 9:10 pm
Returned Being home again was strange, but pleasant. The townhouse hadn't really had time to start feeling like home before he had been kidnapped, and in some ways he missed their old apartment, but that wasn't the end of the world. Besides, it was a beautiful place, and with Lance and Lady - and, it seemed, Avacyn, and he didn't begrudge her needing a place to stay, given that everywhere else had to be full of memories of Chariklo - as company, he felt he was settling in fairly well.
His family had been all too happy to find him home -- he had been evasive about where he had gone for a week, and he knew they were still concerned, but at least he had come home. Unlike Rhys, who he and Lance had been far too late to save. The Negaverse had him now, Alistair was sure, and he felt horribly guilty - especially since after his best friend's disappearance, his own must have been far more traumatizing.
And the events at R'lyeh haunted him. He could still see the blood spattered across the viewing window, those poor people eviscerated by monsters - it had been awful. It wasn't the first time he'd seen death, this war rarely let you get away clean, but it was the first time he'd seen so much for no purpose at all. Whatever revenge the Mad King wanted, he had failed to achieve it, and all he HAD achieved was bloodshed. But maybe that was what he wanted.
It all just felt like such a waste. And it haunted him. Constantly. He was regularly startled awake mid-nightmare with a strangled panicked scream, and he found himself waking Lance up far more than he would have liked to. He was evasive even with his fiancé, far too shaken by what he had seen to even think of making idle conversation about it. But Lance was always there regardless, letting him curl up close and wait out his panic and fear in quiet, warm, protected peace.
He found himself slipping into Mirrorspace often. It had always been a safe, comforting space to him, but now it was even more than ever - and he wondered, sometimes, if he might be worrying Lance, but he tried to give his fiancé as much attention as possible when they were together. He hoped that Lance understood that his distance was through no fault of Lance's - he was just dealing, in his own way, with what had happened. Mirrorspace was the easiest place for him to do that.
He loved it - for its shifting, ever-changing mystery, for its quiet, for the fact that he could move through its depths and never see a soul. For how it made him feel comforted and safe, the same way Lance's presence did. Because no one could touch him here - none but his Court could access it unless brought, and he was sure that if he were ever attacked here, it would defend him.
And so for hours at a time, he wandered Mirrorspace in silence, or just sat and let its lantern work its magic to calm him. This was the safest place for him to be, without a doubt. Well - the safest except for when he returned home, to Lance'a warm embrace.
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