OUTER SPACE > Open Space

Point of No Return [Crew of The Loveless]

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Draconian:
Aesir ran.

There was something inside him that made him move. Something old and primal and urgent and he needed to be there and everything was whispering to him. Every tree and leaf and blade of grass had a story to tell and they were all being told at the same time and it made his head hurt and his fingers itch and Aesir didn't even realize he'd moved until his hair was in his eyes and his fingers were digging into the dirt.

Tears pricked his eyes when the urgency didn't fade. When the whispers got worse and pounding in his head. Aesir squeezed his eyes shut and held his breath for a moment. There was so much pressure. Too much and... His eyes popped open when he remembered what he'd pilfered from under Kirkley's bed. The gloves were wrong, too. Everything was wrong and he needed to just close his eyes and fix it. Quickly, Aesir unzipped the void suit to the waist, peeling his arms out of it and pushed it down far enough to get to his pocket.

A sigh of relief before he shifted to tuck his feet under himself and sit back on his heels.  Aesir looked up at the tree tops, everything a little blurry and messy but familiar. Comfortable. He watched more than participated when he took the pointy edge of the... Shell? Knife? Rock? It dug into his palm like butter and he sighed in relief when the blood welled up around it, slowly dripping down his wrist to hit the ground below. Each drop fed the ground and the grass shuddered. The next palm.

Aesir discarded the make-shift blade and looked down at his bleeding hands.

"I need to..." He shook his head, not really knowing what he needed to do.

The land was so thirsty though and Aesir slowly pressed the side of his face to the spot in front of the right gravestone. "It's here," he said more to himself than anything. Something to get words out and make his throat move.  He was confused and his heart was thumping and he had no fucking idea what was going on but he knew he needed to do this. Now that it was his flesh and he could feed the earth.

Drops of blood had set it in motion but there was no true relief until Aesir dug his hands into the earth. The forest shuddered. A sigh. A breath. A drink. The forest was starving and all it had had to sip was a thimble of whatever power remained here in the ground. Still, giving the ground his blood was a relief and he sighed, let his head fall forward when the pressure from the whispers went away.

"Kirkley," Aesir panted, pulling his hands up out of the ground, covered in bloody mud. Fingers trembling. He'd only had his hands in the ground for a few seconds but it'd felt like an eternity. It wasn't enough though. The ground was still thirsty and it wasn't afraid to get what it wanted. It was like the earth came alive, tendrils with rocks and shards of bone and thorns. They curled around Aesir's wrists in an instant, climbing up his arms and digging in to get more of the power. More of the blood. They dragged him down to the grave and he cried out at them digging into his flesh.

"Kirkley!" His voice picked up in panic, pain laced in his voice. They were so hungry. So thirsty. The daze went away and all that was left over was panic and pain. "Otto!" He didn't want to be eaten alive by vines and he looked over his shoulder, pain on his face. He knew this was all wrong but he didn't know what to do about it.

nephero:
   It was hard, dealing with all of this. Otto could sympathize, genuinely, especially when Wolf sounded so damn miserable. He didn’t want to be there, and he’d made that abundantly clear. It had been hard going, and while Otto had his own motivations for seeing all of this through, well.

   He couldn’t exactly blame Wolf for not wanting to be dragged through this. It was terrifying, the unknown, and this was a whole lot of unknown. Even more so now that they were actually through the weird goldfish portal and somehow magically on solid earth. Otto was sure it was solid earth. It pulled on his bones the way solid earth liked to do, and he was sure by the time they got back to the Loveless he’d have some seriously creaky knees.

   Especially once they started moving. Holding still was one thing, but gravity did not favor moving, and after some distance it was all Otto could do to pay attention. There was still the unnatural quiet of the place, at least— it kept the boarders from getting excited and making his already strained attention span from becoming more so. Still, no manner of aches and pains could have him miss the ruins, fixating on this latest newness instantly, the difference between the natural and the made almost painfully stark in the overgrowth of everything else.

   Something in the way Kirkley spoke made Otto consider that wasn’t the only thing painful here. He chewed at his lip a bit, meeting the taller man’s gaze before taking a deep breath and turning to the rest of the crew, trying for something close to an assuring smile.

   “Well. Lookout it is…”

   
   It was, of course, easier said than done. Aesir had shot off like a bolt and there was the sudden, violent instinct to go running after him. But Kirkley had wanted them to stay put, and despite even the boarders hissing in Otto’s ear, he stayed perfectly put. They had a job to do, all of them, they were the lookouts. As concerning as it was that such a “peaceful” place needed someone sitting on lookout in the first place. As concerning as it was that Kirkley had thought they’d needed to sit on lookout in the first place.

   Otto chewed at his lip and tried to focus. Kept his nose to the breeze and his ears open. Felt the presence of the rest of the crew at his back and the quiet void of the greenery ahead of him. Nothing but dirt, and moss, and green, and some sweet smelling flower somewhere beyond the brush. That was nice— like something Margad would grow, though certainly nothing Otto had ever smelled before. It’d been a while since he’d been to that dome, certainly. Years and years ago, well before he got really good at picking out different scents. But the perfume was similarly soothing. The boarders certainly liked it, no doubt some similar holdover from their own genetic past before they became the hellish parasites they had once been.

   Hell, maybe they’d even started in a place like this. Otto didn’t know, and it wasn’t like they were telling him their life story. Still, it was enough to lower his guard even by that much, the breeze calming in a way that Otto hadn’t realized he’d missed his entire life. The natural air. Not pumped and recycled and refiltered between panes of glass and ventilation systems. But real air. It was enough to make you feel whole, in some prime animal kind of way.

   Or at least, it did. Because Otto’s skin chose that moment to crawl, something on the breeze catching his attention as his head snapped up, fixed on the stone ruins where Kirkley and Aesir had run off into, and the hairs on the back of Otto’s neck stood straight on end even as he heard it. The distinct sound of yelling, fearful yelling, and then the sound of Otto’s own name mixed in.

   It didn’t even register to him that he was moving, he just moved. His boots thudded over exposed stone and tree root as he bolted toward the sound of Aesir’s voice. It didn’t matter that Otto was woefully unarmed. It didn’t even matter that he had no idea what he was running into. All that mattered was that Aesir sounded scared, and in an instant the scenery changed.

   Metal halls instead of tree trunks. Hissing pipes instead of vines. The clank of grated metal beneath his feet instead of soft, fragrant earth. But the sound was the same, the sound of fear, the sound of terror in the face of something new and awful, and for one sharp panicked moment Otto very nearly expected to turn the corner and find Aesir swarmed by hideous stinging insects.

   Not that the reality was much better than the memory, Otto’s eyes widening to saucers at the sight of vines dragging Aesir into the dirt, and he didn’t even consider anything else before he was running forward. What could he even do? The vines were wrapped so tight, were dug in so deep in so many places, but the idea of standing back and doing nothing very nearly made Otto sick.

GoblinFae:
Hesperus dropped his gaze, shivering slightly at the rough quality of Kirkely's voice. He hated so much about this entire situation. He hated how he didn't know what was going on. He hated the dread that sunk in beneath his skin, spreading its poison through his entire system until he was tense and on high alert. He hated that Kirkley was one of two people who could simultaneously obligate him into obedience while also quelling some of that wildfire fear. He hated all of this.

No one asked him how he felt on the matter though. No one ever did nor would they ever. It didn't matter though. He'd voiced his opinion anyway. They all were going to die someday. Who was Kirkley to say that it wouldn't be today? That it wouldn't be right here, right now?

Yet, deep down despite the fear and disgruntlement, Hesperus trusted him. The Old Sky Dog may have gotten the demon into galaxies of trouble in the past but he always got them back out in the end. If you couldn't trust Kirkley, then who could you trust?

"No one," he gritted out under his breath. A roll of his shoulders, a glance to Otto and the others, and Hesperus shook his head in frustration. Lookout. Fine. He could do that, wouldn't be the first time he'd been made to watch their backs. His arms crossed tightly over his chest, shoulders hunched, ready and poised should he need to become the weapon he was not permitted to bring.  He just hoped it wouldn't come to that.

Aesir was off like a shot from a gun and Hesperus found himself looking to Kirkley again. He knew that boy was not his but he could not help have the knee-jerk reaction to want to be close to him, to hold him, and to protect him. He shook his head harshly though. Aesir was not his to feel such over. Kirkley could deal with his wayward green-haired bea-boy.

Instead of dealing with his wandering thoughts, the demon dug his nails into the arm of his flightsuit and tried to ground himself. He cast gold eyes out along the green around him and tried to keep focused for even the faintest hint of movement from potential shadows. The demon completely missed what Aesir was doing until his screams reached his sensitive ears.

Horned head snapping to the side, he didn't even have a heartbeat to process the horror before them before Otto was bolting off. Hesperus shouted for him, lunging and missing his arm as the human ran faster than the demon would have guessed possible for him.

Rather than take chase though, Hesperus turned to the others and held out a warning hand. "Don't move! Kirkley said to stay put. He's got this under control," he ordered of the others even as he moved to stand in front of Wolf and Dez as the perceived weakest. Kirkley's shouting in a language he did not understand did nothing to put the demon at ease though.

"Damn it, Kirkley you said no one would get hurt!" he found himself shouting out in frustration. Every muscle in his body burned with the coiled fire of anticipation. It would take one signal from his lifetime captain and Hesperus would be at his side. The call to action was singing in his blood, demanding complete attention. There was no time in his mind for more of his quips.

But gods damn what he hated most of all was being right.

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