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@undamned       i remain here because you have not dismissed me.   [he did not react to her tone. he simply watched her,   eyes bright and glassy in the half-light,   like mirrored stones reflecting her impatience back at her. when he spoke,   the words unfurled with a strange calm—  soft,   even,   a little too measured.  there was no accusation in it—  just fact,   spoken gently]    what i do?   i am made to aid.   i lift,  obey,  i learn whatever is placed in my hands.   my maker said i was meant for..   more.  but i do not know yet what  /more/  is.   do you?

——  what is it that you do?

@VALHALKYRIE      [he halts immediately,   every movement inside him going utterly still—  as though someone had cut the string that allowed him to breathe. his head lifted a fraction,   but the rest of him remained perfectly motionless,   the way a portrait seems to hold a person mid-thought.  a slow blink broke the stillness. he regarded her not with offense,   but with a strange kind of reverence,   as if her wariness were something precious he needed to handle with care]    i will remain here.    your fear is..   clean.   i won’t cross your boundary.   [he murmured,   voice low and even,   almost too calm as his gaze softened,   or seemed to—  light catching on the glassy surface of his eyes.  then,   after a moment—  spoken with a gentle bewilderment,   like he was trying to understand her world and his place in it]    i did not mean to trouble you.

@rockabite     i know what a cigarette is,   i’m not an idiot.    but sure,   if you’re offering.

@falsecreate “yes, excellent—thank you” [despite her earnest dismissal her limbs did not align with her need to go.  she began to smell and when she began to smell, she began to think,  and when she began to think——] (oh for the love of the living God) “wait—!” [her boots did move that time—forward, his way. of course it did. she cursed at herself for being so caring and careful and aware of the dangers ahead left for others. yet once the scent was acknowledged by her brain,  she just can’t seem to pry it out.   it was that little speck of humanity within her that still had empathy for the good in the world.  this creature seemed to be all of that good wrapped in one.   hand wrap around a long and large forearm,  pulling him back into the direction he was before——same as hers. the correct path. she doesn’t proceed to tell him why she had a change of mind.  not the scent of wolves and the less unfortunate up ahead who had no weapons to defend themselves,  not their blood that she was repulsed by—whereas her kind would drool at it] “not that way, boring things that way—you wouldn’t like it—come with me” [she’ll pull him along.  with no idea of how long he was to join her nor where to peacefully leave him be. Martha, without meaning to, had stuck herself to him]  

@undamned     [joseph’s fingers closed around the coins and the red button with deliberate care,   turning them over as if cataloging each shape,   each weight. he did not look at the woman,   but he felt the curl of her fingers guiding his hand,   the pat of her palm,   the direction she impressed upon him. each motion he registered,   committing it to memory as though it were a lesson in some intricate,   silent language]   thank you.. (?)   for this,   and the..  luck.   [he lingered for a moment,   letting the warmth of her touch press into him through the metal and button,   noting the faint residue of her movement in the air.   there was no hurry in his motions,   only the quiet,   precise observation of something new and unfamiliar. curiosity flickered faintly behind his pale,   glassy eyes,   a subtle awareness that her intention mattered even if he did not need it.    then,   as she stepped back and thrust her arms outward,   he raised his hands,   holding the coins lightly,   almost reverently,   as though they were not money at all but something fragile,   almost sacred]    i will go now.   as you wish.   [he murmured,   slow,   measured,   almost melodic in its cadence.   he turned eastward,   stepping carefully,   each motion exact,   but with a faint hesitation——less from uncertainty than from fascination.   he had never been directed this way before,   and the direction itself seemed to hum with the quiet intimacy of a small human ritual,   now entrusted to him]

@falsecreate [light are the footfalls of a woman who feels as if she is running out of time.  though she is dead,  her body runs uncomfortably hot beneath her clothes—heavy and fit for winter.  she hardy hears him aside from what she assumes he wants ‘money’]  “oh for——yes, yes——fine,  here.  (damn)”   [it’s his hand she briefly inspects, turning it over and digging deep within her pocket to find two——no, three silver coins.   and a red button for good luck.   she curls his fingers inward for him,  (pat, pat).  and guides it eastward—away from where she is going—north.] “there you are, all tj money i can find.  now—”   [a step back, arms thrusting forward]  “—off you go”

@fearyear    [the silence that followed tomas’s words was long and deliberate——so long it almost ceased to be silence at all,   becoming instead the sound of breathing,   of grief settling heavy between them like dust on a crypt floor.    yet joseph stood unmoving within it,   as though the stillness itself were a language he understood better than speech itself.   and his eyes——those wide,   polished things,   reflected tomas’s sorrow back at him in perfect,   wordless imitation.   when he opts to speak once more,   it was with a voice that carried both calm and ruin]    perhaps..  it was never meant to be fixed.   [his tone was not unkind,   but there was a sudden oldness in it——a quiet echo of something said to him once,   long before he knew the meaning. he glanced down at his hands,  long fingers turning in the dim,  pale against the lamplight like marble given breath]   my..  maker told me once,   that some things are broken by design——so that light can pass through the cracks. not all fractures call for mending.    you breathe,  still.   you bleed,   you ache——then you are not lost.  [the sentence lingered,   fragile as candle smoke,   words almost reverent.   he seemed to ponder it himself,   lips parting slightly as if to taste the air between them]    what lives,   even in ruin,   has not failed its purpose.    perhaps that is what being human means.

@falsecreate [the silence that followed was long and heavy.  the snake of grief that had wrapped itself around his neck was tight enough to make his throat hurt.  there comes a thin sheet of water that glosses his eyes before its forced away with a blink,  melting before it could fall.  Tomas shakes his head.   he does not laugh, but there is something close to it——a broken piece of it.  it wasn’t fine.   far from it.   it was all wrong, in fact.   all so damn wrong.  and he had no amount of power to fix it]    i don’t know if it can be.  [he confesses,  unsure of how it felt so easy to say in his presence.  he often spoke little of the war in his head.  no priest, no elder—not even God (he hoped) could get that out of him. yet this stranger did——so easily, too.]   i—don’t often fix things.  and the only person that i know who can..   can not, anymore—so,    take that whichever way your… poetic self will. 

@fearyear    fine.   [he echoed,   as if testing the word for cracks.   his voice was steady,   but there was something tentative in it,   the sound of someone who had learned speech through patience, not instinct.  he watches the man drink,   his head tilting slightly,  the lamplight catching in his eyes——those wide,   glassy eyes that seemed always on the verge of understanding something terrible]     when you say fine,   your hand trembles.     it doesn’t sound strange;    your talking.   your drinking.  none of it sounds strange——it sounds..  lonely.   [there was no reproach in his tone,   only a kind of innocent sadness,   as though he were describing the weather.   he looked down at his hands then,   turning them palm-up,   as though the answer to something might be written there]    i do not know if everything is fine,   but you sound like someone who wants it to be.  

THE THING UPON THE TABLE HAD CEASED TO BE A THING.
            
            A TREMOR RAN THROUGH ITS FINGERS——THE FAINTEST QUIVER,    DELICATE AS THE FLUTTER OF A MOTH’S WING——AND GIDEON FELT THE BREATH CATCH IN HIS THROAT.   FOR A HEARTBEAT THE AIR ITSELF SEEMED TO RECOIL,   UNCERTAIN WHETHER TO SANCTIFY OR CONDEMN WHAT HAD JUST OCCURRED. THEN CAME THE SOUND:    A GASP,   SHALLOW AND RAW,    DRAWN FROM LUNGS THAT HAD NEVER KNOWN AIR.   HE STOOD TRANSFIXED. THE BODY HE HAD CARVED FROM RUIN AND REFUSE NOW REGARDED HIM WITH EYES LIKE CLOUDED GLASS,    DIMLY ALIGHT FROM WITHIN. NO DIVINITY HAD INTERVENED;   NO MIRACLE HAD BEEN BEGGED.  IT WAS HIS DOING——HIS HAND THAT HAD COMMANDED THE SPARK,   HIS WILL THAT HAD SUMMONED MOTION INTO STILLNESS.
            
            “CAN YOU HEAR ME?” HE WHISPERED,    SCARCELY TRUSTING HIS OWN VOICE.   THE CREATURE BLINKED ONCE,   TWICE——SLOW, DELIBERATE——AND THE FAINTEST CURVE OF COMPREHENSION GHOSTED ACROSS ITS LIPS. IT WAS NEITHER BEAUTIFUL NOR MONSTROUS;   MERELY POSSIBLE. AND IN THAT POSSIBILITY GIDEON BEHELD THE ENORMITY OF WHAT HE HAD DONE:   THE TRESPASS AGAINST DEATH,   THE MOCKERY OF THE SOUL. YET AWE,   NOT GUILT, CONSUMED HIM.
            
            HE THOUGHT,   WITH TERRIBLE CLARITY,   “I HAVE MADE A MAN.”

@falsewyrm      you should’ve thrown it out.  [she lolled her head to the side, inspecting  the shadow blood from safe distance,  the liquid lapped at its confinement——a parasite wanting to be free]        heretic..  

@valhalkyrie      no clue,   honestly.   i found it in the greenhouse,   and decided to hold onto it for..   safe keeping

@heirology      says who?   you don’t know my life..    anyways,   i don’t need anything from you that i can’t get myself.   consider me turning over a new leaf..   and whatnot!

@falsewyrm     shut up.         i’m your /only/ brother in law.   and you’re only nice when you want something ..       so go on,     spit it out  

@heirology      worry about yourself and what goes on with you and your..    baby bear.    am i not allowed to say hi to my  /favorite/   brother in law..   once in a blue moon?

@martyrem   simple,  bruise him back.