Lt. Carter Blake (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
lieutenantantichrist) wrote2014-06-23 05:22 am
lieutenantantichrist) wrote2014-06-23 05:22 am
[17] [Text/Action for Mahogany] - "Whenever You Get Involved, Someone Gets Hurt."
[ACTION]
[In a low-rent corner of Mahogany, there's a real gym. No mazes, no boss trying to fight you in exchange for something they call a badge, no lackeys, just weight machines and a floor covered with rubber mats, the way it should be. Open twenty-four hours, and this late there's no human in this room but Blake. He's in a sweatsuit, gray in contrast to the brown of the Hitmonlee holding pads for him in its upraised paws. The only sound is his harsh breaths and the thump of his fists on the canvas. His shoulders are hunched like a boxer's. His eyes look straight ahead. Judging from the sweat darkening the back of his shirt, he's been here a while.
On the other side of the room, a Snubbull is sitting on the floor, looking at a Gear that's resting on the mats. A Musharna floats beside her. Fifteen minutes of frustration proved that claws are no good for texting with, but she wants to talk to someone. She really wants to.
She snubs softly, so as not to make her trainer angry. The Musharna's eyes show no reaction, but the buttons on the Gear depress. The text that Steve watches appear seems to be accurate, more or less. The transcription might come strange through the dreaming creature. It's close enough for what she needs.]
[TEXT]
Hello lo low hello
Please talk to me.
I want to talk.
I will tell you my favorite story.
He told it to me when I couldn't sleep. His eyes were closed for some of it but I shook his knee and got to hear the end. Without the end it isn't a story.
Once
upon a time there was a girl. She was poor and alone because her parents were dead, and child services didn't exist then, so she had to go to live with her wicked stepmother and do work for her. Hard work, the kind that nearly killed her, but in time she got used to it.
Then one day she heard the prince was giving a big ball. She asked to go, but her stepmother wouldn't let her. So she tried to run off and get a ride to the castle from a knight, but her wicked stepmother had tailled her, and she found her and dragged her off the horse. While she was going, the wicked stepmother threw the knight a gold coin. He held onto it, and he kept looking at it all the time. He kept thinking about the girl.
He wanted to help her, but he couldn't.
The knight went to the ball, and he was going to kill the prince, but there were too many guards around watching him, so he ran away.
Then the knight went to find the girl and save her. The wicked stepmother grazed him in the neck with an evil spell, but he killed her and all the other guys too, even though he got hurt bad. At first the girl was scared, but then she was free and she was okay. She got to go back home to her real parents. The knight was a hero. All the papers said so.
And everyone lived happily ever after.
..........
..........
..........
Tell me your favorite story.
Voice or video if you can.
The words alone are lonely.
Tell me please.
[In a low-rent corner of Mahogany, there's a real gym. No mazes, no boss trying to fight you in exchange for something they call a badge, no lackeys, just weight machines and a floor covered with rubber mats, the way it should be. Open twenty-four hours, and this late there's no human in this room but Blake. He's in a sweatsuit, gray in contrast to the brown of the Hitmonlee holding pads for him in its upraised paws. The only sound is his harsh breaths and the thump of his fists on the canvas. His shoulders are hunched like a boxer's. His eyes look straight ahead. Judging from the sweat darkening the back of his shirt, he's been here a while.
On the other side of the room, a Snubbull is sitting on the floor, looking at a Gear that's resting on the mats. A Musharna floats beside her. Fifteen minutes of frustration proved that claws are no good for texting with, but she wants to talk to someone. She really wants to.
She snubs softly, so as not to make her trainer angry. The Musharna's eyes show no reaction, but the buttons on the Gear depress. The text that Steve watches appear seems to be accurate, more or less. The transcription might come strange through the dreaming creature. It's close enough for what she needs.]
[TEXT]
Hello lo low hello
Please talk to me.
I want to talk.
I will tell you my favorite story.
He told it to me when I couldn't sleep. His eyes were closed for some of it but I shook his knee and got to hear the end. Without the end it isn't a story.
Once
upon a time there was a girl. She was poor and alone because her parents were dead, and child services didn't exist then, so she had to go to live with her wicked stepmother and do work for her. Hard work, the kind that nearly killed her, but in time she got used to it.
Then one day she heard the prince was giving a big ball. She asked to go, but her stepmother wouldn't let her. So she tried to run off and get a ride to the castle from a knight, but her wicked stepmother had tailled her, and she found her and dragged her off the horse. While she was going, the wicked stepmother threw the knight a gold coin. He held onto it, and he kept looking at it all the time. He kept thinking about the girl.
He wanted to help her, but he couldn't.
The knight went to the ball, and he was going to kill the prince, but there were too many guards around watching him, so he ran away.
Then the knight went to find the girl and save her. The wicked stepmother grazed him in the neck with an evil spell, but he killed her and all the other guys too, even though he got hurt bad. At first the girl was scared, but then she was free and she was okay. She got to go back home to her real parents. The knight was a hero. All the papers said so.
And everyone lived happily ever after.
..........
..........
..........
Tell me your favorite story.
Voice or video if you can.
The words alone are lonely.
Tell me please.
[video]
Favorite story, huh...? Most of what I got are pretty miserable ones.
[video/text]
[She's silent for a moment. Then she snubs quietly a few more times, and more text appears.]
Your hair is pretty.
no subject
Huh? Oh, uh...thanks? [He did make a point of taking care of it.]
Well, what kind of story are you lookin' for? I've got a bunch of different ones.
no subject
no subject
Once upon a time, there was a woman who lived in a distant country, almost unreachable by mortals. She was a legendarily difficult teacher, who burned through students at a ridiculous rate. It was said that being taken as one of her disciples was the same as a death sentence.
One day, a kid came asking to be taught by her--the father of the girl he loved demanded that kid get the woman's training before marrying his daughter. Since he never once turned down a challenge, the kid went straight to the woman's country and was accepted as a student.
It turned out he was one of the most skilled of those she had ever seen; every challenge she gave was something he accomplished no matter how difficult. So at the end of his training, she passed down to him her most valuable and powerful weapon.
But ultimately...he couldn't do the one thing she really desired most of all. It turned out the woman's country was separating from the world itself; as a human that came too close to the power of a god, the woman's divine punishment was for her to linger in the shadows between the living world and the world of the dead. In the end...she wanted that student to kill her before she was exiled to that.
He wished that he could have done what she wanted, and cursed his own weakness in failing to go through with it. But there was really nothing to be done about it; once he left her country, there was no way to find his way back.
no subject
Wow, you mean people who studied with her died? That's a hard class...
But that's not fair. She was being punished just for being strong? So she was just left between worlds like that?
[Steve's paws knit tightly together. She looks deeply disturbed by the idea.]
That can't really happen. Someone left out alone where they don't belong, trapped forever.
Can it?
no subject
Sure it can. Anything can happen, especially if the gods are as jealous and spiteful as mortals.
no subject
What if we're the shadow world?
no subject
I really don't think that's anythin' to worry about. This world is strange and probably its own separate thing, but I wouldn't call it exile. Besides, this place doesn't really feel like her Land of Shadows did. Whatever this world is, it ain't the same thing.
no subject
Wait, feel like...? You went there?
[Curiosity absorbs her attention and keeps her from noticing the shadow looming above her.
She jolts hard when a voice from above her says, low and dangerous,]
What do you think you're doing?
no subject
Oh hey, it's you. Got a clever little team, y'know that?
no subject
[He reaches down. For a moment, the screen is dark as it's covered by his palm.
When it clears, it shows his face, sweaty and sunk-eyed, strangely pale.]
I heard you telling her about other worlds. Shadow worlds.
[At the bottom of the screen, the Musharna's mist is barely visible as it floats up. Blake can feel it rising around him.]
That wasn't a smart thing to ask about.
no subject
Hm? Why not, you got some experience with 'em?
no subject
[He doesn't look at the mist to see the shapes that appear there, projected like from an old movie camera. Dark forms on a rooftop, waiting. Rain.]
Say there's a shadow of you. Say he did something you didn't.
But you could have.
no subject
Okay, sure, let's say that happened. What of it?
no subject
This shadow you. Say he did something wrong. He made a bad mistake. The kind you don't come back from.
[Blake's eyes look dark and haunted.]
Is that on you?
no subject
Course not.
[Lancer shrugged, answering almost immediately.]
I mean sure, people that knew the other you could try to blame you for it. But you can't hold that shit over your own head--we're ourselves, not some other alternate world duplicates.
no subject
[The Musharna's mists rise higher.]
What if you'd've done the same thing in his place?
[In the mists, below the rooftops, a dark doorway. Two forms emerge. The mists blur. One form emerges.]
What if the only difference - the only reason it wasn't you - was luck?
[A dozen muzzle flashes light up the rain.]
no subject
Hm...that's a bit of a trickier thing, ain't it? I'm not one to talk matters of luck--mine's goddamn awful. But I guess if you didn't do it, you didn't do it. I don't usually care for the black-and-white approach, but there's not a whole lot of other ways to approach that.
no subject
[Blake is quiet for a while. His breath comes in and out.]
You know what the funny thing is?
[His hands open and close, making his knuckles sting.]
If it was the real me who did it, it wouldn't be so bad. Then I'd know for sure why I made the call.
[He'd know if it was a moment of judgment that there was a real danger, or if it was one of those times when it's been too damn long and you're too damn tired to care about right or wrong anymore, and you just think, you know what? Fuck it. Shoot him.]
Hey. This shadow world you were in. You said that lady was there cause God was pissed off at her.
Is that what happens to everybody God doesn't like, where you're from?
no subject
Stuff like that's probably harder to say when it wasn't you, strictly speaking. Might just be down to a matter of trusting your own judgment.
[Lancer shrugged, draping an arm over the back of his chair.]
The gods of my homeland were tough to deal with. Even I pissed one or two off in my lifetime. In Scathach's case, I think they were angry someone came so close to their level--that ain't something just anybody can do. When it came to dealing with them, your average mortal stayed the fuck outta the way.
no subject
[Blake looks down at his hands. They ache, like the tired ache deep in his muscles, but it's not enough to make his head shut up.
This guy, he talks like God is a real thing. Something personal.]
You believe in that? God, and judgment?
[The words feel strange coming out of his mouth.]
no subject
It's tough not to, when one's your father and another's actively trying to sleep with you.
[...it's complicated.]
But here? Fuck no, I don't.
no subject
What?
no subject
...Man, that probably coulda used some context, huh?
(no subject)