RE: QUIETUS [S!5] [Round 2: Krei'kii'kelriz]
11-16-2015, 01:09 AM
She arrived, green-clad like a goddess of spring, heir-slayer of winter, tradition alone acquiescing her to eventually cede her deathless dominion.
Robin liked winter, was the pity.
She doesn't look back, she knows how these stories go, glance off the path to the waiting dark and you'll waste fruitless away trying to avenge Death for its twice-thievery from you, demi-divinity-
She's Prometheus, Persephone; she's Orpheus and grace, she's Miss United States
"You wanted to talk, Sonora?"
The darkness leaked from the walls, forcing its way through worn joinery, pooling about Robin's feet. It licked at her boots, keeping bowstring-taut distance, all frosty-morn air sharp and smooth and prickling against her tongue. "To me, to me, it's a change of pace, I guess. A moment, magpie, daresay it, I could've asked for worse-"
"-That Rachel, she's not big on idle chatter." Robin cut across the mutterings, trying not to express surprise that the muttering stopped to listen. Confidence. Confidence was key. "I'm not as opposed to it, but I'd agree with her there's a time and a place, y'know? Kind of makes me feel bad I left her with Anila."
Ah, summer. Comes right on back before you even noticed it was gone.
"Weird as I must sound if you don't actually have a consciousness like mine, I'm going to keep talking to you. Anything else just... seems rude. Worst case scenario, it's still not like anybody's going to hear me."
"Or, I suppose, famous last words for future fools like me - imagine! Wh-who'da thought, huh? Something scarier than her. Don't be scared, sweetpea, everyone's waiting on the other side - you think you're the first with that bright idea?"
"Heh. I'm not? Thank god for that. Well. Any Sonorologists in there. Introduce yourselves, would you?"
Sonora curled and swirled in a manner almost coy. It was pretty, Robin thought, the way predators could be with fresh blood on their teeth and fur.
"... that'd be telling. Let's start at the very beginning?"
"Well. This is me asking, Sonora. For, uh... a very good place to start?"
"Barking as those goddamn Hyleoroi, you be... Entry first."
The darkness tensed, echoes of a million breaths bated. Testing the waters. With nowhere else she had to be, Robin simply waited.
"Ex-pe-dition... of one, Caille, Rice... to Black Creek Gorge. Saw linger-pools... on the way in. Birds... singing. at. weird... times."
Robin blinked. Would it really be this easy? "Caille? Ok, Caille. Hi. Can you please state your location and nature of your phylactery?"
"Entry... nine. Creek... definitely. knows, what, I'm, talking... about. Se-ve-ral... voices." Dissolve into birdsong.
Robin reached out into what had been the wall of a nondescript corridor, her stolen gloves retracting to the knuckles. Something dragged at her fingers, giggling, the current cold and unfathomably deep. "Stay with me, Caille. Anything post-corporeal from you would be huge right now." The merry little laughs bubbled together into something discordant and barely-rhythmic, until all bar one tuned out with a snap.
"Stick in the mud, stuck in the mire. Girls, they wanna have fun. Haaa-ha-ha. Now who's the crazy one!? Shut the fuck up before it hears you- I was right, I was fucking right-"
"You're smart," it hissed, "it's smart," it hissed, "hoo fucking rah, go jerk your intellectual equal off for all I fucking care right now-"
Robin's arm felt numb, she couldn't tell from teeth or frostbite. "Sapiosexual sentient darkness." Robin groaned with a slight grin. "You're really not selling me on staying off my 'afterlives needing urgent restructuring' redlist."
"Hey hey hey hey now
I'm a sucker for a song! Sing for me a moment!!! Sonora! What else are you good for?" it wailed.
"Hang on-"
"I can't wait a minute more!"
Joyous laughter, stones and shoes skittering down a hill, growing louder drawing closer-
palm-lights barely glowing enough to render pulsing black and it was upon her
indistinct shapes in a featureless mass
swept her off her feet, launched her adrift, Robin sharply dissociating from the clamour across eons of hordes running; revellers in their Sunday best wading into the river, stampeding hooves, rushing water, rushed hushed roaring voices
Robin's limbs felt cold and distant, because she was dead-
"Marvellous," someone said, breathless. "Simply marvellous. And quite the conundrum, too."
-and when sapiosexual sentient darkness is gnawing on exposed flesh it's easier to just ignore your pain centres.
"Cut open my sternum! And pull, my little ribs around you, medic! Medic! we've gotta gotta get gotta get this blood POUNDING! all the mortal things and their mortal songs, we'll be miles apart, Be still freeze stop my beating heart it's all I know! If only! It's all I had! I fucking know- a heaaaaaaaaaaaaart"
Singing and hysterics again. Robin would've complained, but even a grimace was enough to rasp darkness against her numb face. She should be dead by now, by rights, what sway over Sonora had she that the Sun itself did not? What but a sun could hold its own against the emptiness of space? As it turned out, she only had to wait, offer the detached curiosity you'd give to ants marching who-cares-where. The darkness receded, in places.
"Gods, man. Robin Pearson. You look like death. I'm so sorry. I wish I could help. Hold a candle. Hold a hundred candles all I care. I'm no match to it. I'll be damned." A wet chuckle.
Robin laughed at that, laughed until her lungs burned and she drew something sharp and cold and alien on the inhale. Her arms still didn't really exist below the elbow, but she set her heart into motion again and felt something lingering where her wrists should've been. Faster than Robin thought possible, it all retreated, enough that Robin could see and feel and be herself again in a lightless, liquid gloom.
"Rude mechanical, automaiden beat to the beat of the drums. Well whaddaya know, that ain't human, man. Ain't seen nothing like it. Foul beast. FORGERY!" it screamed. "SMOKE! MIRRORS! WITCHCRAFT!"
"Yeah, I'm weird," Robin tried to deadpan, but instead she nearly choked on stray Sonora and had to spit it out. "You, eugh- can actually taste the difference from an organic heartbeat?"
"Not the least on your list of your misdemeanours, private. Stupid kid. Don't eat anythin' in these woods you didn't kill yourself. You haven't changed in years! Dead men tell no tales, but. It's no fun, no fun, no fun, when they won't even scream. How? H-how is she standing there, so calm, when that- that thing"
"I'm a man on a mission, is why." Shit. Right. She'd gone and vowed to scrub this beguiling besmirchment off the face of existence. The crime? Existing as a carnivorous parrot outside of mandated solidity parameters.
"Scares the hell out me, it does."
Huh. Robin's expression softened, though as far from involtunarily as an action could be done. She looked up; Sonora had, however temporarily, fallen dead silent. "You don't want to die."
Crackling fire - the noise rises like someone turned the volume dial. "Cause folks like me-"
That voice. "Cai-"
No.
Robin smiled mechanically, worring her eyes would betray her (until she remembered Sonora only had ears). "Sorry. Sonora, you can finish what you were saying."
"-like those others you- you tell me about - Morris. Quirm. That mumbly guy." Unhurried footsteps, sounds of foraging on the off beats. "We came trying to explain the truth of your matter, but, oof-" the thump of a log, faint scuttling- "our 'truth' is just another kind of story to you, Creek, isn't it?"
You just love hearing people talk about you, don't you?"
---
Two thousand light years away
a star explodes, in a congregation that should be regarded as a small miracle in this entropic world of ours-
and darkness, winter, knows this dance, and melts begrudgingly away
to an invincible summer.
Spring realises at last, she'd been staring back into winter this whole time, and finally turns forward to face Rachel.
Sonora had mostly backed away to where Robin eclipsed Rachel's sun. Residue still clung to the ceiling, tracing lacy paths in the air as it fitfully danced around loops and waves of plasma.
Robin's skin prickled, her nervous system detachedly reported it as searing heat. Keep pain centres offline, at least until the pins and needles finish doing their thing.
"Satisfied?"
Well, no, (and no) but,
"Yeah. Thanks."
Robin liked winter, was the pity.
She doesn't look back, she knows how these stories go, glance off the path to the waiting dark and you'll waste fruitless away trying to avenge Death for its twice-thievery from you, demi-divinity-
She's Prometheus, Persephone; she's Orpheus and grace, she's Miss United States
"You wanted to talk, Sonora?"
The darkness leaked from the walls, forcing its way through worn joinery, pooling about Robin's feet. It licked at her boots, keeping bowstring-taut distance, all frosty-morn air sharp and smooth and prickling against her tongue. "To me, to me, it's a change of pace, I guess. A moment, magpie, daresay it, I could've asked for worse-"
"-That Rachel, she's not big on idle chatter." Robin cut across the mutterings, trying not to express surprise that the muttering stopped to listen. Confidence. Confidence was key. "I'm not as opposed to it, but I'd agree with her there's a time and a place, y'know? Kind of makes me feel bad I left her with Anila."
Ah, summer. Comes right on back before you even noticed it was gone.
"Weird as I must sound if you don't actually have a consciousness like mine, I'm going to keep talking to you. Anything else just... seems rude. Worst case scenario, it's still not like anybody's going to hear me."
"Or, I suppose, famous last words for future fools like me - imagine! Wh-who'da thought, huh? Something scarier than her. Don't be scared, sweetpea, everyone's waiting on the other side - you think you're the first with that bright idea?"
"Heh. I'm not? Thank god for that. Well. Any Sonorologists in there. Introduce yourselves, would you?"
Sonora curled and swirled in a manner almost coy. It was pretty, Robin thought, the way predators could be with fresh blood on their teeth and fur.
"... that'd be telling. Let's start at the very beginning?"
"Well. This is me asking, Sonora. For, uh... a very good place to start?"
"Barking as those goddamn Hyleoroi, you be... Entry first."
The darkness tensed, echoes of a million breaths bated. Testing the waters. With nowhere else she had to be, Robin simply waited.
"Ex-pe-dition... of one, Caille, Rice... to Black Creek Gorge. Saw linger-pools... on the way in. Birds... singing. at. weird... times."
Robin blinked. Would it really be this easy? "Caille? Ok, Caille. Hi. Can you please state your location and nature of your phylactery?"
"Entry... nine. Creek... definitely. knows, what, I'm, talking... about. Se-ve-ral... voices." Dissolve into birdsong.
Robin reached out into what had been the wall of a nondescript corridor, her stolen gloves retracting to the knuckles. Something dragged at her fingers, giggling, the current cold and unfathomably deep. "Stay with me, Caille. Anything post-corporeal from you would be huge right now." The merry little laughs bubbled together into something discordant and barely-rhythmic, until all bar one tuned out with a snap.
"Stick in the mud, stuck in the mire. Girls, they wanna have fun. Haaa-ha-ha. Now who's the crazy one!? Shut the fuck up before it hears you- I was right, I was fucking right-"
"You're smart," it hissed, "it's smart," it hissed, "hoo fucking rah, go jerk your intellectual equal off for all I fucking care right now-"
Robin's arm felt numb, she couldn't tell from teeth or frostbite. "Sapiosexual sentient darkness." Robin groaned with a slight grin. "You're really not selling me on staying off my 'afterlives needing urgent restructuring' redlist."
"Hey hey hey hey now
I'm a sucker for a song! Sing for me a moment!!! Sonora! What else are you good for?" it wailed.
"Hang on-"
"I can't wait a minute more!"
Joyous laughter, stones and shoes skittering down a hill, growing louder drawing closer-
palm-lights barely glowing enough to render pulsing black and it was upon her
indistinct shapes in a featureless mass
swept her off her feet, launched her adrift, Robin sharply dissociating from the clamour across eons of hordes running; revellers in their Sunday best wading into the river, stampeding hooves, rushing water, rushed hushed roaring voices
Robin's limbs felt cold and distant, because she was dead-
"Marvellous," someone said, breathless. "Simply marvellous. And quite the conundrum, too."
-and when sapiosexual sentient darkness is gnawing on exposed flesh it's easier to just ignore your pain centres.
"Cut open my sternum! And pull, my little ribs around you, medic! Medic! we've gotta gotta get gotta get this blood POUNDING! all the mortal things and their mortal songs, we'll be miles apart, Be still freeze stop my beating heart it's all I know! If only! It's all I had! I fucking know- a heaaaaaaaaaaaaart"
Singing and hysterics again. Robin would've complained, but even a grimace was enough to rasp darkness against her numb face. She should be dead by now, by rights, what sway over Sonora had she that the Sun itself did not? What but a sun could hold its own against the emptiness of space? As it turned out, she only had to wait, offer the detached curiosity you'd give to ants marching who-cares-where. The darkness receded, in places.
"Gods, man. Robin Pearson. You look like death. I'm so sorry. I wish I could help. Hold a candle. Hold a hundred candles all I care. I'm no match to it. I'll be damned." A wet chuckle.
Robin laughed at that, laughed until her lungs burned and she drew something sharp and cold and alien on the inhale. Her arms still didn't really exist below the elbow, but she set her heart into motion again and felt something lingering where her wrists should've been. Faster than Robin thought possible, it all retreated, enough that Robin could see and feel and be herself again in a lightless, liquid gloom.
"Rude mechanical, automaiden beat to the beat of the drums. Well whaddaya know, that ain't human, man. Ain't seen nothing like it. Foul beast. FORGERY!" it screamed. "SMOKE! MIRRORS! WITCHCRAFT!"
"Yeah, I'm weird," Robin tried to deadpan, but instead she nearly choked on stray Sonora and had to spit it out. "You, eugh- can actually taste the difference from an organic heartbeat?"
"Not the least on your list of your misdemeanours, private. Stupid kid. Don't eat anythin' in these woods you didn't kill yourself. You haven't changed in years! Dead men tell no tales, but. It's no fun, no fun, no fun, when they won't even scream. How? H-how is she standing there, so calm, when that- that thing"
"I'm a man on a mission, is why." Shit. Right. She'd gone and vowed to scrub this beguiling besmirchment off the face of existence. The crime? Existing as a carnivorous parrot outside of mandated solidity parameters.
"Scares the hell out me, it does."
Huh. Robin's expression softened, though as far from involtunarily as an action could be done. She looked up; Sonora had, however temporarily, fallen dead silent. "You don't want to die."
Crackling fire - the noise rises like someone turned the volume dial. "Cause folks like me-"
That voice. "Cai-"
No.
Robin smiled mechanically, worring her eyes would betray her (until she remembered Sonora only had ears). "Sorry. Sonora, you can finish what you were saying."
"-like those others you- you tell me about - Morris. Quirm. That mumbly guy." Unhurried footsteps, sounds of foraging on the off beats. "We came trying to explain the truth of your matter, but, oof-" the thump of a log, faint scuttling- "our 'truth' is just another kind of story to you, Creek, isn't it?"
You just love hearing people talk about you, don't you?"
---
Two thousand light years away
a star explodes, in a congregation that should be regarded as a small miracle in this entropic world of ours-
and darkness, winter, knows this dance, and melts begrudgingly away
to an invincible summer.
Spring realises at last, she'd been staring back into winter this whole time, and finally turns forward to face Rachel.
Sonora had mostly backed away to where Robin eclipsed Rachel's sun. Residue still clung to the ceiling, tracing lacy paths in the air as it fitfully danced around loops and waves of plasma.
Robin's skin prickled, her nervous system detachedly reported it as searing heat. Keep pain centres offline, at least until the pins and needles finish doing their thing.
"Satisfied?"
Well, no, (and no) but,
"Yeah. Thanks."
Spoiler
peace to the unsung peace to the martyrs | i'm johnny rotten appleseed
clouds is shaky love | broke as hell but i got a bunch of ringtones
eyes blood red bruise aubergine | Sue took something now Sue doesn't sleep | saint average, day in the life of
woke up in the noon smelling doom and death | out the house, great outdoors
staying warm in arctic blizzard | that's my battle 'til I get inanimate | still up in the same clothes living like a gameshow
clouds is shaky love | broke as hell but i got a bunch of ringtones
eyes blood red bruise aubergine | Sue took something now Sue doesn't sleep | saint average, day in the life of
woke up in the noon smelling doom and death | out the house, great outdoors
staying warm in arctic blizzard | that's my battle 'til I get inanimate | still up in the same clothes living like a gameshow