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 Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 10:55 am
He needed to get away. He needed to escape from everything -- for an hour, a day, forever -- until things settled back to normal and life stopped spiraling out of control. Then he thought, when had anything ever been normal? When would it ever be normal again? And he knew he was stuck, trapped, with no way out, except to run again, as far as he could, far, far away where nothing and no one could reach him.
It was under such circumstances that Ganymede found himself on his homeworld with Valhalla, hand clasped around the page's wrist as they appeared in the ruins of the castle he had explored the last time he'd pressed the center button of his phone.
"I thought we could switch things up tonight instead of patrolling," he explained, somewhat apologetically. He hadn't said much before grabbing Val and taking them here. He hadn't known what to say. All he knew was that he couldn't go about things as usual tonight. He needed the distraction, the welcoming but haunting embrace of his desolate and empty moon.
"Welcome to Ganymede," he said with a feeble attempt at a smile, finally releasing Val's wrist in order to sweep his arm around in a gesture that indicated the room they now found themselves in. "You wanted to see what it was like, didn't you? There's not really all that much here, but..."
They'd appeared in the hall he'd visited last time. One wall was set with tall windows all the way down the length of it, some broken and others more or less whole; the opposite wall was comprised of mirrors in similar states. Small, dust covered gilded statues had been erected between them, holding candelabras, and crystal chandeliers hung from above, or else rested in shattered heaps on the rotted wood floor.
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 12:43 pm
When he'd mentioned wanting to visit Ganymede sometime, he hadn't imagined it would be anything like this. He wasn't really sure what he had been expecting to see, but it wasn't this.
Valhalla nearly stumbled backwards, his eyes wide with shock and awe, and a bit scared. They were really on another world, other than Earth. They were standing in what seemed to have been a grand palace of sorts, windows angled so that he could see where Jupiter hung, gigantic in the sky above. He could breathe, just like on Earth... in fact, everything seemed like it was always meant for humans to wander around on other planets' moons. Why hadn't telescopes been able to pick up traces of ruins on these places before? And was there really something beneath all the storms and gassy atmosphere of the largest known planet in the solar system...? A place called Valhalla where he'd find ruins just like this?
He stood speechless for a few long moments, staring up into space, before looking around at the hall they were standing in. It was then that his surprised expression faded to one more subdued, more sad than anything. People used to live here...? What happened...? Why were they all on Earth now? He knew very little of the story behind the senshi and the Negaverse... He didn't know why they were fighting each other, or what they hoped on obtaining from fighting. It was depressing and frustrating and he didn't know where to begin.
Turning slowly, he faced Ganymede, unsure of how he felt about this place, or how he was supposed to feel.
"It's... kind of depressing..." he said, as a gentle breeze wafted in from somewhere — whether it was from outside or from another hall, he didn't know. "Kind of spooky..."
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 12:56 pm
Ganymede let out a small, though mostly humorless, laugh. "My thoughts exactly," he said, approaching one of the mirrors that bore less damage.
He looked at himself, much as he had that last time he'd been on the moon's surface, taking the opportunity to check the changes in his appearance. He hadn't had the chance to since the cat had placed its paws upon his chest and aided him in becoming what he was now. He wasn't necessarily displeased by what he saw, but the thought that he was invariably getting himself deeper into this mess was sobering. And he still knew so little...
"Not bad," he said to himself, twisting a bit to look at his new outfit from all angles. It seemed simpler than before, easier to fight in without anything getting in the way, he thought. Classy in a way his last form hadn't been, though it still retained a bit of that seductive flair he should have expected given his power source.
"Did you want to look around a bit?" he asked once he was done, turning back to Valhalla before glancing down the hall. "I did a bit of exploring last time, but I didn't find much, and I don't think I managed to see everything. This place is huge. I first appeared in a sort of town in that direction," he said. He didn't point out the windows, but toward the mirrors, trying to remember where everything had been in relation to where they were now. "I saw this place and decided it looked as if it had potential."
He didn't wait for Valhalla to answer him, and began to slowly make his way down the hall, peering out a few of the windows before stopping at a corner and gazing into another hallway. After a few moments, he thought he could hear it again, the music he'd heard last time, but it was distant, struggling to be heard through time and space.
"I'm assuming you can't here that," he guessed.
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 3:43 pm
Valhalla continued to stare around him, before noticing himself in the mirrors. "You know... I never really took the time to look at what I've been wearing..." he admitted, turning around so he could see himself in different angles, not really surprised by what he saw. Looking down at himself was pretty much the same effect, but now he could actually see himself fully decked out. "Wow, I really do look like a viking..." Not that there was anything wrong with that, right...?
He took a few steps away from the mirrors, following Ganymede towards another hall, although looking curiously at him when he asked about hearing something. "Huh...? Hear what...?" There was something he could hear? Valhalla paused to strain his ears, before shaking his head. "Maybe it's the wind...?" he certainly couldn't hear anything that might made him question what it was. Which was funny to even think about because he was apparently on a moon, far far away from Earth.
"So," he said softly, not knowing what to really talk about now that they were there. "There's nothing here, is there...? I mean, sure there's what's left of this, but... Nothing living...?" He was kind of curious to see what grew on a moon out in space, wondering if it was completely different than Earth. What kind of animals did they have??
"My little brother would love to see the place..." he said out loud, before explaining. "Uh, I can't remember if I told you... I have a younger brother who's fascinated with space... I know he'd be thrilled to see a place like this." As much as Peter annoyed him he knew what would make him happy, and he was sure that he'd be thrilled to be... we... off Earth.
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 4:41 pm
Ganymede wasn't at all surprised when Valhalla revealed that he could not hear the faint sounds of music drifting to him from somewhere down the hall, as he hadn't seen or heard anything out of the ordinary on Europa and assumed it would be the same with Val here. In some ways, it made things all the more intriguing, that he could see and hear things others couldn't on his own moon, as if it were something special for his eyes and ears only; in other ways, it was almost dismaying, and if it weren't for the fact that Europa had mentioned such things before, he would have started to wonder if he were going crazy.
"Nothing living, no, at least not that I've seen," he said, deciding to begin making his way down the next hall, heading in the direction the music seemed to be coming from. He wondered how much he should reveal to Valhalla, before deciding it wasn't anything to keep secret. If Val ever went to wherever he came from, it was likely that he would experience similar things. Logic seemed to dictate that warning him ahead of time would help him better prepare for the trip.
"But I do see things," he shared with him, pausing when they came to an intersection of hallways, cocking his head as he attempted to decipher which would be the appropriate one to take in order to draw closer to the music. "Faint images, sort of. Like ghosts. Last time I came here, I saw things in the mirrors back there. I heard things, too, like... chatter and music. I can hear music now."
He finally decided on the hall on the right. Sure enough, the music seemed to be drawing a bit closer. He listened as Val spoke, nodding every once in a while to make sure he knew he wasn't ignoring him, but he was a bit focused on the here and now at the moment -- or, rather, what he was beginning to suspect was the past -- and had little interest in discussing anything that waited for them back home, especially after the anxiety that had filled his day earlier that afternoon.
The music peaked once they came to a closed set of large, tall doors, then died out completely.
"You won't be able to see or hear anything, I don't think," he continued. "Not here, at least. I didn't while I was on Europa, but I figured I'd ask anyway. I don't know how much is different for you knights and how much is the same."
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 6:12 pm
"Things...?" Valhalla repeated, a bit startled when Ganymede spoke up to inform him of the things he couldn't see and hear. Could Ganymede really see things that he couldn't...? It was kind of creepy, but it was more sad than frightening. The way Ganymede had explained it, with there being music and chattering, it made things even more haunting. He almost wished he could hear and see what Ganymede could, but on the other hand, he felt like he would be prying into something very special and private only meant for him.
He followed behind Ganymede, watching him as he did so, curious as to why he picked which hall to take after a few moments to decide. He stopped behind him when he came to the huge doors, glancing up in awe for a few moments, before looking back at the senshi.
"It's okay... I don't need to see or hear anything," he told him, hoping to put him a little more at ease. "Maybe you can tell me what you see and hear, instead...?" Valhalla suggested, taking another step forward, reaching out to place his hand on the door. He didn't know what was making Ganymede hesitate, but curiosity had taken hold of him. He looked up to make sure there wasn't anything that looked suspicious, or would cause them harm if the doors were opened. He glanced down at the senshi, offering him a small smile of encouragement.
"Ready...?" he asked, reaching down to take hold of the handle and carefully pushing the doors open and into the room beyond.
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 6:43 pm
He'd wondered if the music would come back once the doors were open, but that was not to be. Silence met them, as still and desolate as the rest of the building, except for the loud creaking of the aged hinges as Valhalla opened the door, sending haunting echoes down the length of the hall and through the room beyond.
It was a large chamber, the largest he'd been in so far, like the ballroom he'd seen on Europa -- perhaps larger, perhaps smaller, he really couldn't tell. Windows lined two of the walls. He and Valhalla entered on a staircase, which led down to a sort of dais. Opposite them was another staircase, and another set of doors leading in and out. From the dais was a third staircase, wide and grand -- though parts of the wooden railings had rotted away or splintered and broken off, and the carpets beneath their feet, brown with age, looked to be saturated with dust. The third staircase led to the expanse of wooden flooring below. There were more crystal chandeliers in here, hanging from a ceiling that looked to have been painted like many others throughout the palace, though it was too high and too old for Ganymede to make out any of the images.
"Looks like a ballroom," he observed, slowly making his way down the stairs, one of his hands trailing lightly over the railing, though he was careful not to get it snagged on any of the broken pieces.
He made it halfway down before looking over his shoulder at Val, having passed him along the way. "I don't see anything yet, but the music I heard was coming from here," he said, considering things for a moment before going up a few stairs to grab onto Val's hand and pull him with him. "Come on. Maybe we can go all Anastasia up in this place and dance the ghosts out."
He laughed at the thought, but the laughter was a bit strained, his spirits still a bit damped even this far away from Earth. He led Valhalla out into the middle of the dancefloor, never letting go of his hand. "Would it be wrong of me to assume that you don't know how to dance?"
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 9:25 pm
It looked like a ballroom? It definitely was a ballroom. Or at least he had no idea what else it could possibly be. He scanned the room again for any sign of immediate danger, before nearly stumbling down the stairs when Ganymede took hold of his hand. "I haven't seen that movie since I was little," he admitted with a sheepish grin. He didn't own it, but his cousins did and they'd have sleepovers. He was pretty sure he'd watched it with Zia at some point, too.
He smiled as Ganymede laughed and made their way to the center of the ballroom. Just like the night before, something seemed off, but this time there was something completely different tonight than last night. The night before, Paris had seemed almost ready to accept anything, while tonight... tonight he seemed distant, as if he was locking himself away from everything. Why else would they be on Ganymede instead of patrolling as they'd originally planned?
"Ah, that depends on if you consider basic waltz steps and the fox trot as, uh, not dancing," he said with a grin, before shaking his head. "I haven't danced in years... But I'm willing to learn if you're offering to teach?" Him? Dancing? Sure, why not? His girlfriend danced, so it would only be a matter of time before he needed to know how to dance or something like that. She might want to go out somewhere with dancing and if he didn't know how... wow, he'd made a total fool of himself for sure.
Valhalla lifted his left hand to offer to Ganymede, hoping he wouldn't mind him taking the, uh, male side of the dance. If he wanted to switch, he supposed he could learn the other roll as well. It didn't matter to him, really.
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 9:52 pm
"A waltz is more or less what I was expecting," he said, placing his right hand in the one being offered to him. "Nothing complicated. Something simple and easy. There'd be no use in trying to teach you too much too fast. You'd probably end up tripping over your feet."
He set his left hand on Val's right shoulder and waited for the page to take his waist. He hummed a little tune, the same waltz he'd hummed from Sleeping Beauty on Europa, before deciding there were better songs to fit the situation, given what he'd just said as they'd descended the stairs.
"Someone holds me safe and warm~" he sang, though he didn't do so very seriously, and he was smiling again, still not very big, but enough to show that he was amused with himself. "Too easy?" he wondered, following Val's lead. He wasn't too bad. He just lacked a bit of confidence was all. If he worked on that, he'd be golden, at least as far as the waltz was concerned.
"I could do better. What about like this? Je me souviens, il me semble, des jeux qu'on inventait ensemble. Je retrouve dans un sourire la flamme de mes souvenirs~"
Unsurprisingly -- predictably, even -- figures began to take shape around the ballroom, fading in one at a time. A balding man with a walking stick over there. A bejeweled lady fluttering a feathered fan in front of her face over there. One by one until the periphery off the of the ballroom was filled with translucent images to the point of being crowded, their opaque forms slowly becoming more solid, until it was as if they could have been standing there today, whole and alive, watching him dance, their eyes following his every move as they whispered between one another.
Compulsively, he kept singing, but a real, true smile had finally crossed his face at the sight of them. This was what he'd come for. This escape, this momentary jaunt into the past, was what he wanted, to forget his own life for a time and exist somewhere else entirely. "Et au loin, un écho comme une braise sous le cendre. Un murmure à mi-mot que mon cœur veut comprendre. Une ancienne ritournelle~..."
And then, directly behind Valhalla, he saw another figure come to life, dancing as they were, with long, pale hair and a confident gleam in his eyes, and something inside Ganymede recognized that person. Something inside said, "That's me."
"I can see things," he stopped singing and told Valhalla breathlessly, not daring to tear his eyes away lest it should all disappear. "Right now. Around the room."
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 10:20 pm
Valhalla took hold of the hand placed in his, reaching out to place his right hand lightly on his waist. It was a little strange, dancing like another guy like this, but he supposed there wasn't really anything different than dancing with a woman. And Ganymede didn't seem to mind that he was taking the lead, so he just... wouldn't let it affect him.
His dancing was a bit rusty, though, but he was soon slowly but surely leading Ganymede around the room as he focused on the one, two, three, one, two, three count in his head. His singing helped keep count at least, and after a minute or so making sure that he wouldn't step on the senshi's feet, he looked up to see him smiling.
Ganymede was smiling...? And not any forced smile either it seemed. He almost stopped dancing to ask what was up, but kept going. Valhalla knew that Ganymede could see things before he said it out loud. His singing was hauntingly beautiful in such a deserted place like this. It echoed in the large room, and not being able to understand the words to the French version he was singing made it even more mysterious. Valhalla could see it in his eyes — the wonder and enchantment of things that... must have once existed. Unlike his dancing partner, he couldn't see anything, but he could imagine seeing what Ganymede was seeing in the reflection of his eyes.
"Describe it to me," he requested softly, wanting to know what he was seeing so he could hopefully relate to the senshi on the subject at a later time. If he needed the companionship, that is...
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Posted: Mon Aug 15, 2011 11:05 pm
Ganymede was at first too mesmerized by what he was seeing to answer. It was both a thrilling as well as a disturbing experience to see himself as he must have been so many years ago. He looked closely, drinking in the sight, and inevitably comparing the vision of the past to himself at present. He didn't look much older here, perhaps a little taller, and his face was still quite pretty. Europa had said he was a looker -- handsome, even -- and he thought he could sort of see what she meant beginning to take shape in the youth's face. Not very masculine, surely, but... elegant, almost striking, with just the barest trace of sharpness to his features to make him look notably male, but still soft -- not frail or fragile by any means, but with a hint of delicateness in the long, thin fingers of his hands, the narrowness of his shoulders, and the softened angles of his face.
It was almost a strange mix, but still very appealing, as he could clearly tell by the fact that all the eyes of the phantom figures were glued to his every move.
"There are people around the room," he finally said, speaking quietly, as if he would make it all disappear by talking too loudly. "Along the edges. Lots of them. It's obviously a party. They're all dressed very nice. And they're whispering. You know, like people do at parties, gossiping and such. I can't really make out anything..."
And just as he said it, he heard the haunting whispers from his last visit, "Ganymede... Ganymede..."
"I can hear people whispering my name," he corrected himself, though as soon as he said it the words faded back into unintelligible babbling. "And behind you, there's... someone else. It's... it's hard to describe it, but... I know that was me... before..."
He looked at the figure again, watching as he changed partners, smiling brightly and laughing with so much energy and life, the exact opposite of how Paris now, but the eyes, he noticed, the eyes were different. He doubted very many of the people would see it, the mask was so perfectly placed, only someone who knew, who looked closely, would be able to tell. Paris saw because he knew that feeling. He'd seen it before, in one of the mirrors.
The smile didn't reach his eyes.
"I don't... see anyone else I recognize," he said slowly, though he didn't look around, gaze fastened over Val's shoulder. "Europa said she saw me before, when she was on her world. Or, she saw him," he clarified, jerking his chin in the appropriate direction, though Valhalla wouldn't be able to see who he was motioning to.
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Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2011 11:12 am
For him, everything was still silent as the grave. There were no ghosts or images that appeared for him. Nor any sounds from the conversations of a party. It gave Valhalla chills to hear what Ganymede was telling him, knowing that the senshi could see and hear things that he couldn't. It kind of scared him a little, but he was more curious than frightened.
Ganymede could see himself... his past self. What would he see if he went to visit Valhalla...? Would it be the same thing? Or would there be nothing there? Did Valhalla even exist...? No, he knew it existed. He even knew how to get there. It was all wired into his subconscious. He could go whenever he felt like it. He just... hadn't felt like it yet.
Valhalla listened as Ganymede explained what he was seeing, wishing he could see as well, if only to prove to himself that everything the senshi was saying was really happening. But Ganymede's eyes were the eyes of someone lying. At least not then. He seemed much too enthralled by everything he was witnessing to fabricate some lie. After all, why come all this way only to play him for a fool...?
"Why did you kiss me last night...?" he asked softly. He wasn't trying to sound accusatory or even as if he was angry about it. It had surprised him and made him feel guilty since... yeah, he was in a relationship. Even though their steps had stopped, he continued swaying back and forth a little. After all, Ganymede still seemed too distracted to focus much on dancing.
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Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2011 11:27 am
He almost missed Val's question, too busy watching the things around him, before the inquiry registered in his brain and he realized he should answer. His eyes flicked back to Val's, and when they did the figures around them vanished as if they'd never been. Ganymede was momentarily disappointed, having just seen himself and wanting to observe more, but he knew, at some point, the... visions?... would come back.
"Oh," he said, taking a few more moments to process what Valhalla had asked him before answering. In his haste to get away from Earth, to forget all that he dealt with there, he hadn't immediately remembered the night before. "Oh, it was... impulse..."
He'd wanted to do it before, plenty of times, but then he was so used to kissing Chris at this point -- for whatever reason -- that it didn't seem right holding himself back when it came to Val, knowing who he really was. He'd always stopped himself before he could, knowing it would only serve to confuse the page, given that Val had no idea he and Paris were the same person. The previous night, he hadn't been thinking straight, and hadn't prevented himself from doing what he knew he shouldn't. Part of him had wondered if it would even matter. He could always pass it off as a sudden compulsion that didn't mean anything.
"Sorry, I know you're dating someone," he said, and forced another small smile. He swayed with the page for a little bit longer before stopping, but didn't let go of Val's hand or take his hand off Val's shoulder. "That's just sort of how I am, I guess. Affectionate to the people I actually like." He tried to laugh, but it sounded brittle.
He was doing a poor job of pretending, but his emotions had been so shot today it wasn't surprising.
"Don't worry about it. I won't do it again."
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Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2011 12:29 pm
He could tell that everything around them vanished for Ganymede by the way his eyes focused back onto him. Valhalla felt bad for making him loose his concentration, but he'd been wanting to ask him since the night before. Watching him curiously, Valhalla sighed lightly and gave Ganymede's hand what he hoped to be a comforting little squeeze.
"It's fine. It wasn't hurting anyone," he said with a small shrug. No, he didn't like the idea of cheating on his girlfriend, but it wasn't as though Paris had poked out his eyes or tried to kill him. There were a lot worse things he could have done. The kiss was nothing, just unexpected.
Valhalla stood still for a few more moments, before releasing the hand he was holding, and pulling his other away from the senshi's waist, glancing around them once more. "Maybe there will be more secrets you'll find if we keep going," he suggested, not knowing what to look for, but if just singing and dancing could draw out ghosts from the past for Ganymede, then maybe there were other places around the palace. It intrigued him, knowing that there were these things that only Ganymede could see. It was sad, but made him curious.
Maybe it was a bit cruel for him to want Ganymede to see more and tell him about it. After all, these people were all long gone by now. Hopefully before the palace fell into ruin.
"Why do you think we're all on Earth now...?" he asked out loud, turing to lead to one of the doors on the other side of the ballroom, although he made sure Ganymede was following. "I mean, people obviously lived here in the past... so why converge everyone to Earth...?" It wasn't like they were having trouble breathing or anything like that. Maybe there was just no water...? "Have you seen any water here...?" Might as well ask...
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Posted: Tue Aug 16, 2011 12:50 pm
He was sure it wasn't the singing and the dancing that had drawn out the ghosts, it had just conveniently happened while he'd been doing so. They most likely would have appeared at some point anyway. He assumed there was just a lot of... memories or something... in specific places.
Ganymede was pleased when Valhalla didn't make a big deal about the kiss, finally letting go of his hand and shoulder once Val pulled away from him. He wasn't too terribly worried about things being awkward between them now. If that was the case, he would have felt some sign of it before then. Val seemed more confused than disturbed, which was alright by Ganymede. He hadn't thought it at the time, but that kiss could have very easily been a big mistake. He would have to make sure he was more careful with what he allowed himself to do from now on.
"I have no idea," he said, following Val to another door. They exited out into another hallway and began to walk slowly, glancing around and taking it all in. "I haven't seen any water, or any plants, for that matter. Everything seems dead, and it looks like it's been that way for a long time. This is probably the best preserved building around. The others I saw in the town were just piles of rubble."
He paused to peer into another room but didn't see anything interesting and continued on. "I suppose there's a reason we're all on Earth, I just don't really know what it is. I don't really care, to be honest. That's where I was born, that's where I've grown up. I don't care where I came from in a life before. In this one I come from Earth, and that's where I want to be. I mean, all this is interesting," he said, motioning around to the dilapidated building around them, "and I want to see more, but not because I want to live here. I just... want to find out more about what I am, is all."
Yes, he wanted to get away sometimes, especially on a night like tonight, when everything at home was cracking and threatening to fall apart, but he had every intention of going back. He always would, no matter what he had to deal with. It was home.
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