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 Posted: Sun Aug 23, 2015 10:29 pm
Ashanite teleported into the living room of the apartment he shared with Shale, and immediately dropped back to his regular form. Part of him had expected that the blood would vanish, too, but he could still feel it where it had splattered. He looked down at his arm, to make sure it was really there and not in his head - and as far as he could tell, it was, but he wasn't entirely sure he could trust his own perceptions. It seemed uncomfortably possible that his brain was playing tricks on him, that his guilt was turning him into Lady Macbeth.
"Out, damned spot," he murmured, almost thoughtlessly, and then he pulled off his shirt and started trying to wipe it off. Some of it was dried and caked onto his skin, and he grimaced. That was unpleasant. It was probably in his hair, too, but that would be for later.
He had all but forgotten the beating the Senshi had handed him - it wasn't like the man had died without a fight, but Damian had been ignoring how much he was hurting in favor of how badly he was breaking down. It was like his brain registered it all at once, and with a sharp, loud breath, he collapsed. This wasn't anywhere close to the first time he had been badly beaten around, and in fact he was convinced he was spending more time injured than healthy in this little adventure as an officer. It was still bad, though, and he was definitely not fully healed from what the strange Eternal with the bizarre aura had done to him.
He let out a sharp breath, leaning against the back of the couch, and ran his fingers over the fish-scale pattern of the strange necklace he'd had ever since he woke up as Damian for the first time, in the depths of Negaspace. He had no idea where the odd little thing came from, but it was was his and had been his for as long as he could remember, never mind that it was clearly hand-worked and had, he guessed, been important to whoever he was before, or why else had he been wearing it - and so it was easy and comforting, and the intricate texture carved in bone was something to focus on besides pain or panic.
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Posted: Fri Aug 28, 2015 2:39 am
Shale very nearly completed refinishing his arrow saw to more efficient use when he ran out of screws. And while he could use the different sizes belonging to the same compartment in his laughably small toolbox, Shale far preferred the uniform look and performance of the screws he used previously. Otherwise, not only did the arrow saw look shoddier and regrettably homemade, but its propensity to crack in those areas grew as he layered on the stress.
So when Shale rose from his bedroom project and retreated to the communal portion of the apartment, he fully expected to retreat to one of the unopened packages of screws and return to his work unhindered by Damian. In fact, he quite expected that the captain would continue his patrolling throughout the night and drag his feet on his energy quota for the week. Furthermore, he expected the apartment would look exactly as he left it, with the neutral shag rug beneath the neutral dark grey couch and the neutral beechwood table set would house the screws atop its neutral glass tabletop. However, when Shale trod from hallway to living room area, he found (much to his chagrin) large splotches of deep red staining both the floor and the rug and the couch. The culprit himself stood with his back to Shale, who breathed a very low, very quiet sigh.
Tell me he's bleeding to death. Shale refrained from voicing his thought when he approached Damian. He kept quiet of all judgments as he rounded the couch, as he skirted an endtable to get a better view of what had happened to the man.
And what he found was somewhat surprising.
Foremost he noticed a very familiar vial necklace strung about his neck, bearing Shale's very pattern. This raised a flourish of questions regarding where he would've come across such an item, if he knew the significance, and who he stole it from. Secondly, most of the blood adorning the man was not his own. He looked injured, certainly, but sported no deep gashes that would foretell such a liberal coating of flaking ichor.
The necklace would wait.
"I'm going to assume the owner of this blood is dead," he started, gesturing toward most of the other man. A hand shot out to catch Damian's forearm as he started toward the bathroom with him in tow. "No one loses that much blood and survives." How many times had he seen it now? A count of thrice since embarking on his hunting days, and a handful more after becoming a Negaverse agent. He flipped on the bathroom light to its overbearing burst, glaring down on the blackened blood clinging so desperately to the other man.
"Get in the bath. I'll throw out your clothes. You can clean the couch and carpet later."Noir Songbird such compassion, much love, wow
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Posted: Sat Aug 29, 2015 7:46 pm
Damian flinched as soon as he realized he wasn't alone. He hadn't intended to deal with Shale - in fact he'd hoped to avoid his roommate entirely, because he was almost entirely certain the other man was not going to be anything even approaching sympathetic. He would have preferred to process alone, but apparently he wasn't going to get that.
He didn't resist when Shale grabbed his arm and started pulling him towards the bathroom.
"Yes. He's dead." It came out tonally blank. At some point he had managed to mentally box up his tangle of emotions - he wasn't sure when - and without energy or purpose to act, he wasn't bothering. Shale didn't care how he was feeling, so he might as well not show any feelings at all. "I killed him." As if that wasn't entirely obvious from the sheer amount of blood spatter on him (and dripped on the carpet, and probably staining the s**t out of his shirt, so Shale's insistence on discarding his clothes was probably a wise one.)
His shirt was already discarded somewhere in the living room, and he wasn't particularly concerned about modesty right then - shoes were deposited in the corner of the bathroom, and then socks began a pile that was followed by pants and boxers.
It was unfortunate. He'd liked those pants.
There was enough blood in his hair that it would be worth it to take it out of its braid - and so he pulled it over, tugging out the tie and then working his hands through to unbraid it. Even loose, there was a slight wave - his habit was to braid it while wet, when it was significantly more manageable. However one made that much hair "manageable."
The necklace was carefully set on the sink, along with the one he had strung his signet ring onto.
"There's really not much that can prepare you for accidentally cutting someone's carotid artery open, but you would really think the Negaverse would at least try, since apparently we're supposed to murder people and not care."
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Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2015 2:50 am
Shale's gaze drew more readily to the necklace set aside than the naked man standing nearby. He knew it as his own, but the puzzle of how Damian managed to obtain it eluded him entirely. The other necklace harbored nothing of interest to the hunter, though - so the presence of that necklace was the only clue he had.
Who were you before. Where did you get this. Only one ever left my ownership, and that one went to Rhys. Did he sell it? I can't imagine that he would, but...
Shale started on running the shower, and kept fingers under the water until he determined a warm temperature that wouldn't boil the blood into sticky globs. At that temperature, though, it should dislodge the coagulated portions that clung to and flaked off Damian's skin. "Get in," he finished with a nod. "It's going to get everywhere - there's nothing you can do about that. And sit down; I need to see if you're injured."
Obtaining a wash cloth was no issue - but he wasn't terribly keen on ruining any of them. Nevertheless, preserving the life of a Negaverse officer superseded the cost of new rags. After absconding with the bar soap left on the sink, he wetted the rag and worked it to a lather against the bar. "While it's beneficial to institute mandatory murder for desensitization, that would condition you to hate the Negaverse." First he applied the washcloth to the bluenette's head. He scrubbed vigorously, but lacking the force to rub the skin raw. Blood came away in thin sheets that then dissolved in the shower to a mottled red tint. "You can't change the fact that killing someone will always pain you - unless you're a sociopath."
The running shower eradicated much of the blood without needed to scrub much of Damian, but certain smears received gentle wipes until he wicked away the majority of the clotting. Luckily most areas cleaned revealed no wounds, and what was sustained looked like blunt force trauma more than actual cuts. Damian's throat retained some bruising, which he pressed against lightly enough to sample body temperature in that area. Even with the shower, it felt hot - inflammation set in already. Good, his body heals quickly.
Shale paused once, as if debating with himself, before he spoke again. "When I learned to hunt, I was started on desensitization like you described. I did not need to kill a man - I was told to kill a pig - but it still affected me. Indifference to murder is a long and difficult path - and you don't get to keep the rest of your emotions in the process." He wrung out the rag in a froth of reddened foam. "There's more emphasis on corrupt over kill - probably in part for that reason.
"You'll find that it will get easier or it won't. There's nothing anyone can say that will make it easier on you. But you are alive, and he isn't - that's all that matters."
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Posted: Fri Sep 04, 2015 11:06 pm
Damian was only peripherally aware of the scrutiny Shale was applying to his necklace - he might have asked, but he couldn't make himself worry about it. Maybe some other time.
He climbed in and sank down under the running water, reaching up to start dislodging dried blood from his hair. That it would get everywhere seemed obvious - it already felt like it was everywhere. He would probably need to scrub the shower down, in the morning. At least the likelihood of law enforcement investigation was low, unless he was incredibly unlucky.
...He did not trust his luck, but that seemed a stretch even for how badly things had gone for him.
"Bruising across the torso, and probably my back, too. I don't think there was internal damage, but I could be wrong, being slammed into a wall with force is unpleasant." To put it mildly, but he was in the mood for sarcastic understatement. Which was probably unfair, because Shale was actually being remarkably helpful, moreso than he could have expected.
So he relaxed, some, continuing with the process of de-blooding his admittedly ridiculous curtain of hair. Shale's point stood - had a superior ordered him to commit that murder, he would have resisted, but forced to do it on his own... Well, he wasn't sure he'd be quite as horrified if he had to do it a second time. Or maybe he would just be more efficient.
The gentleness was a surprise, but then, it probably meant no more than a simple desire to keep from further damage that might leave him unable to perform his duties. Even if Shale believed him to be a reluctant body in service to the Negaverse, he was still a body in service, and it wasn't exactly hard to deduce where his roommate's loyalties lay.
"So...what, it doesn't bother you anymore?" He had never seen Umber kill a human with his bare hands, but pulling a starseed was the same thing, just with less mess. (Did that make a difference? Would he be less shaken if he wasn't covered in Tuchanka's blood? Probably.)
But Shale was right. He was alive. His attacker wasn't. If he had been a Squire, with only that idiotic wand to defend himself, he would have died i that alley. "I survived," he exhaled heavily. "Which means I get a chance for there to be a next time. God, I don't want there to be a next time."
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 12:57 am
The summation of injuries was well received, and Shale offered no comment in return. With the injuries known, it was easy to extrapolate that they either proved easy to treat with rest and and diet or the injuries, if internal, were severe enough to remain outside Shale's limited medical abilities. If the latter occurred, Shale assumed that Damian would present severe abdominal pain as a harbinger to worse injury.
Ultimately, their exchange now boiled down to cleaning the blood off of Ashanite and keeping his body temperature up, as he looked to be in shock.
Now that he needn't tiptoe so gingerly around prospective wounds, Shale scrubbed harder to remove great tracts of the blood. It came off in wet swaths and sheets where the coagulated material soon broke up near the drain. Chunks of it clung to the plug for the tub that sat poised above the opening. "Killing someone doesn't bother me." Umber swapped to his roommate's back to remove the flecks that sprayed onto him. "I don't expect it to ay any point. That makes me an efficient soldier. I lack, as you have known, in convincing our enemy to corrupt. That would better serve our cause as an officer." He didn't expect Damian to recognize the difference in what he was saying - the shock of it all wore plainly in his face, and Shale imagined he would not recover for some time.
And if he did - when he did - there would undoubtedly be an emotional response.
Again, he wrung the rag out. Again, blood swirled and collected near the drain. "What I'm saying is... If you don't want there to be a next time, then convince the enemy to corrupt."
Murdering them is a waste in comparison to corruption. It's a numbers game. Why simply subtract from their side when we can add to ours. And if I cannot persuade them to corrupt... Then I need to hone my tactical skill until I can pin my enemy to the ground and hold them for a General-Sovereign's hand. It's happened twice, thrice already. I can do better.
There's always room for improvement.
Shale continued to scrub in silence, waiting for his stricken roommate to object.
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 2:03 am
Damian wasn't aware of it, really, but his breathing was shallower than normal. He probably wouldn't have thought much of it if he was - he was distantly concerned about cracked or broken ribs, but the pain wasn't nearly bad enough for that. He thought. It wasn't as if he really had a point of comparison.
God, how did one person even have this much blood? This almost felt comical, except it definitely wasn't. Without the aid of a washcloth, he started rubbing at flakes still insistently stuck to his skin, which turned to use of nails to pick them off without much actual thought. And if he scratched the skin underneath, what did it matter, it wasn't like that was going to take him out of commission.
It did take a long moment for what Shale was suggesting to sink in. No, he wasn't exactly suited for combat, that was blatantly obvious - but corruption? Given everything that Shale ought to believe about him, the suggestion ought to be ludicrous. Enough so that he had to stop himself from hysterical laughter.
(Not a good sign.)
(And Shale was better at convincing than he knew.)
"You're suggesting I try to convince people to corrupt. If it were anyone but you, I'd be asking if that was a joke, but no, you're dead serious." He shook his head. "Yes, certainly, I'll preach the word of Metallia, that will go fantastically. Give up half your memory at least and your entire normal life for an organization that at minimum will ask you to surrender your morals, and at maximum will ask you to surrender your life." Sarcasm was thick in his voice. "Though I suppose it is a trade up from dying for an empty cathedral on another planet."
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 2:21 am
Shale prepared to respond appropriately, and intended to point out that if Damian wanted to continue living then finding a proper purpose for himself that suited the Negaverse proved a highly effective idea, but his peer barreled on with dry wit far beyond Shale's meager patience. The wash cloth hit the side of the tub with an unimpressive smack and Shale did not wait for further castigation to pour from his peer before he acted on instinct. The hand that once held the washcloth now seized the back of Damian's neck, his opposite hand crowning the boy's head, and Shale forced him down against the bottom of the tub with what strength he could muster.
The few dregs of remaining blood tinted the water that flowed around Damian's face, and Shale hoped he ingested some of it. "Were you listening when I said that killing someone doesn't bother me? If I find you're more useful to the Negaverse as a corpse, then I'll kill you myself and take any punishment for acting on my own decisions. You need to come to terms with your life and memories. You need to shape up as an officer." Shale did not release his grip.
"You are my peer. Do you understand what that means? You have the same rights as I do to command lieutenants, to take charge of altercations, and more. Yet you have shown me no appreciable leadership skills, no thankfulness for the fact that you survived your corruption encounter, and no understanding that your life is no longer yours to throw away. The Negaverse depends on you as you do on it. Do not throw away the trust that Laurelite promised to you in this set of abilities by whining to me about how much you lost. It's gone. Move on."
His heart raced, and his anger urged him to snap the captain's neck and be done with cohabitation. It would be simple enough from that position, and he doubted that Damian would fight him on it. But self-control ultimately reengaged, and Shale relinquished his grip with gritted teeth.
He still wanted Damian to chew porcelain for weeks.
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 11:30 am
Damian had just enough time to register that he had probably ******** up before his head was being driven into the bottom of the tub. The slightly awkward starting angle meant that the force wasn't as hard as he suspected Shale could have otherwise managed, but it still hurt, both his head and the already strained muscles of his back.
It was a strain to hold his breath, but that seemed better than risking inhaling water-thinned blood, especially when he already tasted copper on his tongue. He'd probably bitten it somewhere on the way down. Damn it.
It wasn't like Shale was wrong - he may not have literally signed his life away when he met Laurelite in that park, but he might as well have. He'd given up whoever he had been before - and it must not have been that good, because he could recall having no hesitations about losing it.
Part of him rankled to just tell Shale the whole damn sordid story, to drop any pretense of the act because it was exhausting and obviously not getting him very far here at all - but ultimately that risked sending the whole fragile thing crashing down. He doubted Umber would reveal the plan to anyone Order-side, but when "Ploutonion's" entire espionage scheme rested on a fragile house of cards he was loathe to risk knocking it over just to prove a point to his roommate.
So when he pulled himself off the floor of the tub, he leaned back and took slow, deep breaths (without pain - good, that meant there wasn't likely internal injury). "My being a Captain was an accident of circumstance, and you know it, not some kind of proof of merit. I'd been a Squire for less than a week. If I'd still been a Page I'd have become a Lieutenant in an even more ridiculous uniform, with some idiotic useless weapon, and I'd be dead. Which would probably bother you exactly not at all."
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 12:59 pm
"When did I ask you for excuses?" Shale seethed back. "I don't care if you standing rank was accident or otherwise. It's not your job to justify yourself to me." The one who judges holds your power, Ashanite. Are you aware of this?
Shale stood abruptly and forced the shower curtain shut on his roommate. "You're right, Damian. Your death wouldn't bother me because you've done nothing to prove that you're worth caring about." Shock, he knew, could prove deadly in a matter of hours. Despite this, Shale found very little reason to continue babysitting an ungrateful captain through a long shower and potentially life-threatening condition. If Laurelite expected this man to serve well in the Negaverse, Shale considered her sorely mistaken. Every ounce of effort poured into assisting Ashanite has since been an utter, regrettable waste.
Much like his corruption.
So when Shale started toward the door, when he slammed it so hard that the frame rattled with the force, he found no reason within himself to regret his behaviors. When his fist struck the top of the kitchen counter as he walked by, he found no more remorse for that than the distant pain humming in the heel of his hand. When he left the apartment altogether, he sensed no great concern within himself to return to the space in a matter of minutes to ensure that Damian hadn't died of shock or drowned himself in the tub.
But the night would prove a better greeter - he expected that if he immersed himself in the cooling air, then the breath away from his maddening roommate might clear his head enough to finish with the man's precarious condition.
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Posted: Sat Sep 05, 2015 3:51 pm
Damian tensed, ready for another physical strike - but apparently Shale was done with that. Damian almost would have preferred further physical violence. At least he was rapidly becoming used to that. Another bruise was another bruise, but the verbal assault wore him thinner than he was willing to admit.
As Shale stormed out of the house, he remained where he was, sitting under the water and trying to get the image of the corpse in the alley out of his head.
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