The whipcracks in the air startled the youma, and they each retreated for a second. Even Headache broke rank, dissolving into a cloud of fireflies that pulled away from the strange whip sprung off the senshi's body. That left Faustite as the closest and only target of note, for which the lash sprung.
The assault on its General spurred Headache back into the fray. It collected around Albite's feet as a shimmering imitation of fire, roiling and seething, bubbling up into a column to cow him. And if he would not cede, it may yet obfuscate his line of sight to Headache's fellow youma. Youma that, in seeing that they were no longer in danger of being dusted by senshi magic, returned to the fray.
If Faustite had a retort for his boy, it was cut off by the whip cinched around his neck. It jerked him to and fro, as if he were something light, and he tore at it with too-long nails that oft pricked his neck beneath the manacle. Short fits and chokes came from him, tainted with an anger that unfailingly stirred in his gut.
Still, he stayed it, even as stars collected at the corners of his vision. Even as he grasped at the length of tattoo and tried to sever it by tearing it in twain.
His core instinct was to light the place up, but he entrusted that fight to the remaining youma. Better that he didn't barbecue his boy before dressing him up for a barbecue. Not that he could explain that, at the moment.
shiningamisgirl
Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2022 11:07 pm
And now he knew, bore his teeth at Headache proper — less cow, more malicious bull dreaming of broken chinaware — even as the swarm reformed into an eruption of heatless flames at his feet; their blaring overcast obscuring his view of the rest. Whether he could track them or not — could track Faustite — he refused to budge an inch more.
Giving ground felt like putting his back closer to a wall, like dying, and doing so in a layout so damningly unfamiliar. *He couldn’t*. Wouldn’t. Stayed right where he was, even as everything encroached upon dejavu levels of familiar — All the ways it felt so reminiscent of before - that first time on a rooftop; except there he’d known the rules of the game, and now?! He lacked any free starseeds to offer up, save his own.
And if Faustite wanted that? <********, headache!” distracted snarl for the continued flare that rose between them. He wanted to tell the youma to quit its antics - couldn’t blame the vicious little swath of specks behaving properly (for once). There was more surprise for Faustites risk of his mimic, not that he could end the things existence with any permanency, but still?
Was it recklessness or tactics? Was it…
*Panic* as he felt his magic give. Threading away on shreds, the prize on the other end too large and deadly a beast to snare and keep properly tethered. *Panic* for the sharpness at his back where the metal one tore around again in his periphery, stole pain and flesh from a blind spot; bled warmth in droplets he didn’t yet feel—
“Enough!” Faustites voiced brush with agony was background noise, elicited far more thought than it did sympathy from Albites unique perspective. Started this. Deserved what he got. If he thought it loudly enough? Then it was as true as the urge to attack anew — he trembled on the heels of it, for the feel of one bind rending and another rising up like a viper to strike - *raw*. It didn’t feel like it bought him time so much as it did clarity; some oddness that came with being worn down over precarious seconds.
Something to do with the lightheadedness that just wouldn’t cease. No manner of spitting more black back up eased that acrid taste. No more than it made him think less of the fact that Eion’d mentioned the countertops just before all hell broke loose... Had he missed something? Misremembered that time?
Dead and come back with a vengeance, craving creature comforts — the sort made of flesh, defiance of the rules in the face of living — no — of surviving . Eion taught him to make tea, but that wasn’t the point, was it? He’d missed something important then too…something more than his shitty etiquette regarding the handling of stems, bags, and all the ******** ways his boy gave him whiplash then.
Put him on his back-foot for misreading those wants as false….
How badly he’d pay for being indecisive, every single time, superimposing his own views of a situation over the reality of others. Albite felt himself stall while the second attack ran its course over his form..
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Super Sailor Scout Attack B: Lash of Retribution! Albite’s tattoos appear to tear from his form, lightning quick, and lash out at his nearest opponent like mindless rabid animals. The magical bindings crack loudly through the air, creating a startling warning noise, just before they coil and yank across the opponent like an angry living whip. The player feels as though they've received a mild rope burn (pick body part) for up to thirty seconds, though no physical or lasting damage is done; only the very uncomfortable mental sensation of such, unless the target’s player wants to sustain any lasting damage. The whipcrack loud noise prior to the attack striking serves as warning so the attack can be dodged. Effect: Instantaneous Range: 6ft Duration: 30 Seconds Usage: 3x Times - 2x - 1 Targets: 1
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Posted: Sun Jun 12, 2022 11:22 pm
A part of him wanted to burn his boy to the ground. Cremate him, end this mess. It was that part of him that glowed most brightly, that gathered heat around his core at such startling temperatures that it warped the air around him. But it was precisely that part of him that Faustite tamped down, consciously kept secure behind his grate.
Once one lash gave way, another struck up just as quickly, While he tried to give his hand to this one, purchase with which he could offset his boy, the lash only wrapped about it and continued seeking its original target, He felt it — a tangle around his neck, pulled taut like a tension wire.
He hadn't caught his breath yet. Stars still traced the edges of his vision, and he was back to fighting another lash for a chance to donkey punch his stupid, stubborn boy in the back of the head and end this nonsense.
Oxygen debt stalked him by way of shuttering his vision. He clung to the thing, dug into it with sharp fingernails, but his muscles felt wearied, weakened.
One of the youma — the ball of teeth — saw Albite's distraction as the opening it was. Tactically, Faustite knew it to be a sound choice. Better to strike a mortal blow on the enemy, even if it cost an ally more discomfort and damage. In battle, they were all expendable.
But this wasn't a battle. A hand left the lash to close in front of the youma, Then it was gone — banished from the twilit realm of the Sunken City.
shiningamisgirl
Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2022 12:53 am
*What the Actual ******** missed something dearly, drastically, caught the crush of creature vanishing from before his eyes while he looked on forlornly at the flash of Faustite he could glean - Albite was so completely stricken with confusion, mid-fray.
There weren’t even words.
Faustites actions were so like a brick upside the head made of pure ‘<********>’; until that became the only look he could convey. Honest *question* on broad, billboard length display, all over his face. His heart beat marathon in his chest, but his magic died in the aftermath of those moments; hissed cold, loose, gone - in a flaking of velvet shimmer from where it’d tried to hang — “Eion” a weak rasp that did little to convey how quickly the switch in his head flipped from ‘fight or die’ and into a dead stop.
Into powering down by main force.
His body was unhappy with it, by staggeringly breathless degrees, but he wasn’t going to — he couldn’t — and if Faustite wasn’t trying to—to what, exactly? Kill him? Have a taste of him as some youmaized minion? It seemed ******** insane if he considered it for more than half a tick of the clocks hands - didn’t make any more sense than any other thing that’d just happend had.
And now Waru wasn’t even sure about what he’d thought Faustite was trying to *do*; so much as he’d just reacted badly to the rougher than usual handling. His boys fire never caught him off guard the way his physicality did. Like those heatwaves he could see, broiling hot, while barely contained, and seeming for all the world like they were going to burst free of their grate and take the whole place out in a blaze - magical interstellar gift-shop mojo be damned. If the cincher’d still been on? Would it have held that back — if Faustite were really trying? Would he have held himself back at all the second the thing was off!
Faustite was ******** fire, once he ran Albites magic dry, what then? What the hell were they doing? What the ******** had he done!?
And Waru accepted whatever defeat was going to come. Yielded to being a person, in that moment - for this lifetime, born to a hard working mother with a few too many mouths to feed, but who valued personal freedom and laughter over everything; warm sun and simplicity. He could be Praxidike — Albite — a full meal of a Senshi, some other time, because in that moment? It wasn’t doing him ******** all of any good to be one.
“Ei?”
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Posted: Mon Jun 13, 2022 6:51 am
Magic slipped from about his neck and Faustite coughed terribly. Doubled over, braced his hands against his knees, and hacked with such strength that he retched a thin, viscous rivulet of spit. He felt Waru's henshin dissipate with the evaporation of his aura — a terrible risk to take with two youma yet bussing about. With a sweep of his hand, they, too, were banished back to the Rift.
Then it was Waru, the dilapidated house, and a General who could not stop coughing. With each inhale came another rasping, choking cough, and finally, he laid down on the cool floor. Even on his side, his body still convulsed with each hack as it forced air through a damaged trachea.
Once he'd coughed up enough spit that his vision nearly blacked, the fits finally slowed. He could suck in a breath, sometimes two, between fits. Not enough to speak around, yet, but that failed to stop him from muttering an exasperated "********" when he could breathe enough to form the word. It took a count of minutes for him to come back from the mess enough that he could trust himself to speak again, and even at that, his sentences were fragmented by irrepressible coughs.
"Didn't have to," he paused, coughed, "make it a production. Brash boy," he finished, with another deep pull of air.
shiningamisgirl
Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2022 4:22 am
Waru went beats after the youma vanished without answering, what felt to him like oceans of time ebbing away, even if it was only the span of Faustite not dying — but speaking - speaking was good — was a living persons thing, that, *speaking.*
And once he was sure Faustite was alive? He wondered, did he start at: *I think you gave me black lung, you b*****d*, or skip straight into —
“You okay?” winced for burn of swallowing enough to make words, and again for the sound of his own voice; like he’d just stepped out of a smoke house thirty years overcooked. He winced too, utterly empathetic for Eions own ruined tenor — ********** — sounded wrecked in the worst way, and Waru hadn’t even gotten anything nice outta it.
It was, he recognized, a stupid ask. Of course Eion wasn’t okay. Equally stupid was his approach. What human sort of hubris possessed him to step upto a full on furnace - but moths to a flame and such. He was sure Eions throat would be a mess of bruises; twitched for every withering hack and string of coal laced spittle…
*All that damage, his doing.*
Never mind all the ways he’d paid for it; took stock of his self as he took steps close, close, closer. Close enough to kneel heavy round that halo of curled flames n his boys splayed form. He took up the sort of w shaped sit that spared his knees, his thighs, his — oh and that was his own blood he was seeing creep up under — yep, fine! It didn’t matter just yet, because Faustite was doing the crushed mouse whisper thing with words again and —-
Production? What?? Was this a play, playing, playfulness? Waru couldn’t even pull on any of his go-to humor to smooth that concept into understandability, the very idea of saying something about being a ‘hard catch’ got murdered by the small bit of sense that resided in his brain.
“Was this - *<********>* - playing, for you?” said as if his bewilderment could’ve grown legs and mouths and screamed *‘but why’* in some horrific lovecraftian fashion. Never mind, he was going to throttle Eion, doubly, smother him with a chain mail pillow in his sleep! But maybe he’d ******** him first? No! Maybe he’d get ******** first and then - *mid ********>* - the smothering would occur!
“Give a guy a little warning, ******** hell, Ei..” and he absolutely had to touch, to hover enough that he could bleed on Faustite a little while he did that touching; ******** - carefully!! But his boy had a face and hair and it had to be fine if he touched those places that didn’t look injured; even if what he truly wanted was to strip that damned metal collar n cloak free at speed.
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Posted: Tue Jun 14, 2022 4:54 pm
Faustite sat up shortly thereafter. He cleared his throat, and a couple coughs chased out of him, but he was able to speak his usual clipped sentences without many interruptions. Still, speaking hurt, and he sounded far different to himself than his usual smooth, boyish tones.
"Fine," he decided, and he waved off any further concern. Waru worried in the worst ways, sometimes; though Faustite couldn't fault him, considering all that Waru went through with him, he still had little patience for doting. Besides, he was bleeding on Faustite, which drew a look of disgust, and —
Faustite gave him a brief once-over. "You look like hell," he asserted, and coughed. Outlines of injury cropped up in the form of smearing blood under his clothes, and the rest were plain to see as they dripped red from the carved holes in his skin. There were gouges, too — likely from the one that had ice magic. Waru ended up looking much more needy for an infirmary than he had initially intended.
And much more pissed, too.
Faustite peered over the wounds while he spoke. "In intention, not in action," he explained to Waru's question concerning play. "Just wanted to knock you out, get you dressed up for dinner, but your magic made a mess of it. Thought it better to try again with youma as a distraction, but." He shot Waru a lidded glare. "You saw how that went. Now hold still."
Nothing exposed looked like an immediate need to cauterize, but there were still wounds under the shirt. Faustite poked holes in it from the underside, finally grateful for his long nails, then tore it open. The tattered, useless thing was then discarded like an old rag.
shiningamisgirl
Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2022 9:46 am
Waru didn't bother to wipe at his face, to touch anything else, wouldn't do to rub infection into something cut clean while leaving smears like children's finger-paints if he tried. Instead he sat back and let Faustite do his thing, palms flat and eyes up-cast into the gloom. Little clacking of beaded braids while he rolled his neck slow and listened --- soaked up his fireboys scattering of words -- he shouldn't've been mad. No, he wasn't mad *now* - not anymore - felt damn near sheepish that he'd even considered what felt like every single worst case scenario, rapid fire. Shameful. The fact that Faustite blamed his 'magic' for getting in the way? Cute.
The smile for that sat in his eyes, even as he heaved a fresh breath at the sound of cloth tearing -- watched now -- while he was divested of penny's n dimes worth of shirts; cheaply bought bulk things, because he was, as ever, an absolute mess most of the time. If this saved him a trip to the hospital? Fine, let it all be shreds n tatters, especially if it left less in the way to sit sticky against what would eventually scab n peel as it dried. He hated it when a wound reopened after sitting too long against cloth...suchanannoyance....
"Like hell, huh." waru reached to find the tease that lived like a faultline beneath all his chaos, caught Faustites glare, and leveled a half-moon smile his way; just before bracing himself for what was to come. Words ever his guard against reality, he continued speaking, "You? Sound like you swallowed a firehose, poorly." because he wanted that turnaround. To skip straight back into what'd been before -- now that he knew the intent? Now that the ruffled thing in his chest was soothed by having an explanation to cling to? He could certainly watch Faustites face, take some ease in that careful scrutiny of his wounds, simplest thing to do while he waited for that first touch --
"It can go better, next time." he had to say, quickly, because there would be a next time. There would be ten-thousand 'next times', testing limits and setting lines, and feeling each other out for the differences between -- one intent and the next. Finding moods and the temperature ranges between feast, famine, an everything in-between. Learning that Faustite hated 'coddling' and 'attaboys', like he hated feeling trapped or easily dismissed. Faustite being a Youma and he a Senshi, meant sometimes? There was that inevitable *clash*, he felt it like a living thing. The same way he was sure Faustite felt hungry whenever Albite teased him the wrong way - with his assets all out on display, an easy meal screaming 'come-and-get-me'.
No one blamed the scorpion for stinging the fox while going over the river -- couldn't piss on natures best sorts of designs. Especially not when Faustite had one hell of a design. His favorite design. Meant that getting mad and staying mad were two completely separate ordeals. Meant that -- "That is, *it will*, go better next time. M'glad I didn't read the leadup wrong at least, s**t..."
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2022 1:58 pm
Faustite rolled his eyes. "Piss off. You know I don't swallow firehoses poorly." He tried not to think about the comment as he assessed the damage to his boy. Took his time determining that it would be more than a couple cauterizations and some makeshift wrappings out of his shirt to solve these fresh problems. Still, he had to add a sulky addendum. "Didn't turn on, either."
Faustite sighed, then coughed, then finished the sigh. Waru tried — he understood as much. Tried hard to understand someone often considered incomprehensible, who was secrets heaped on secrets, with a lost identity beneath it all. Someone who wasn't fully human, but wasn't fully youma, either. Faustite had to assume that he was much to any given person, and to Waru, especially — the boy had a rush of air between his ears, with hardly a pebble to rattle back and forth.
And he wanted to try that little stunt again. The one he'd just complained about, the one that nearly got him shredded by Faustite's youma.
Faustite let Waru's comments go unanswered. There would be time, after seeing to him, to banter about next steps and better communication. Discussion was a privilege for the living, and if Waru bled everywhere… Faustite suffered another few coughs, then shook his head at the boy.
A thought brought forth the cincher that he so hastily discarded earlier, and he once again wrapped it about his core. Then he held a hand out to his boy, expectant that Waru take it up.
"Back to the office. You need first aid."
shiningamisgirl
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Posted: Wed Jun 15, 2022 5:16 pm
"Oh, ******** you, I'm never not turned on," took that hand as expected and hoisted himself up, tone challenge and correction in one. Waru might as well have worn a pin that said 'try-me', right where his starseed would've been. "Especially with the amount of time you spend patching me up, personally? Makes me feel all warm n fuzzy." was it wrong to hope Faustite used his tongue?
Maybe...probably, but also?
Definitely not wrong at all. He was a faulty wire ever fritzing on and off mid-use, ******** could say what he'd light up for at any given moment. Faustites tongue was just one of those things, like Axinites baked goods, or the sound of Hina mid battle, getting extra snarky with her chat banter and striking keys like ballpein hammers.
Thought occurred for that, a wisp of one, dangerous little thing that involved adding more pageantry to Faustites future productions -
"You know what? I should so buy you a sexy nurse outfit. No. Hot-Goth-nurse; giant syringe, liquid mascara in colors..." if he had to be the shirtless maid, Faustite could certainly stalk around in stockings that looked like they'd survived armageddon. It was a complete vision and only vaguely ridiculous in the details. He wasn't the sort to plot out matching nail colors, or grim choker choices and how they'd look wrapped round pale throats...
Waru smirked, even as he squeezed the hand in his own, unwilling to shy from the banked heat and fever pitch. Laughing mostly at himself for how punch-drunk and in-over-his-head he must've seemed at all times. He couldn't help himself...he loved what he loved, and what was true love without a little work put into it? Just rose colored s**t and foggy glasses. He was far happier with something real - that lived n bled n burned - learned from it all without self-destructing.
