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Entry tags:
Aftermath: open
Who: Prior Walter (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
priorly) & OPEN
What: Event Aftermath: Small angry woodland creature refuses to Sit Down.
When: 24th+
Where: Sanctuary & around
Warning(s): language, mentions of torture/death, TBA
Notes: OPEN - tag in, wildcard, or get me at![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
shewokeup or shewokeup#4794 to plot anything.
Sanct.
[Prior wakes at the sanctuary with bare arms and a voice in his head. of course, of course it's screaming.
Somehow the heavy metal bracelets all the captives in his camp had been accessorized with had done the one thing he'd thought impossible and cut off communications with the firmament. His head had felt heavy and strange and silent the whole way through, the one bar of relief in a symphony of terror and pain.
But, as promised, she only stopped down the road and waited for him. Now she's back and and announcing herself. For a moment, the recovery room fills with the sound of beating wings. Prior throws himself out of the bed and, when his leg immediately folds under him, against a wall for support.]
No. No, I will not- [Hand thrown up in a universal 'talk to this' gesture, he grabs the back of a chair and starts using it to clatter across the room.] I have been through too much shit for this shit. Fuck off.
[Find him exiting the room in this makeshift style, skin bruised and rainbow-scarred, the hollows under his eyes deep enough to have hosted excavations. Or catch up a little later, when he's acquired a wooden cane from who knows where and is still roaming the hallways in defiance of orders of bed rest and his body's own aching demands. He will not lie back in white sheets and stare at the ceiling. He'll die there.]
City Visits.
[Later on, he even manages to bully someone into getting him clothes. Black pants, black t-shirt, uncommonly plain and stark enough to make him look like a specter haunting the hallways. He's slowly piecing together what happened, who it happened to. Even the details of his own little cluster of captives got lost amid the chaos of the rescue. And the more he finds out the more his skin roils with a fury it's getting hard to tamp back down.
But first. There are visits to be made. Rooms in the sanctuary (they held people here, he hears, he can't imagine why this is considered a place for healing anymore). Apartments in the city. He waits for news from Thesa station, not going up there himself - not yet.
Catch him in a room, or making his way between them, learning to use the cane to navigate the shitty cakewalk that counts for a sidewalk. Just don't expect him to slow down.
He'll be in Byerly's room often, pacing by the window or catching the only sleep he allows himself in the chair or bed beside him.]
Solitude.
[The problem with playing host to an angelic prophecy that has for longer than it likes been denied access to its best vessel, is that once it has hold of him again he finds his prophecies going haywire. Talk about overcompensating. The world shifts around him, possible futures playing out superimposed over the mundanities of the present.
Life goes on as normal, in ways that shouldn't be allowed when his own life and so many others have been upended and emptied out everywhere. And that's hard enough to cope with, but it's a new degree of impossible when the same shopping street erupts into blue flame one minute, and sweeps through with a flood the next, before reverting to reality: old women buying their baguettes and looking askance at the man clutching a streetlight in an effort not to be swept away to drowning death.
It happens with people, too. Asking after him. He's always hated that, and he hates it more now that the thin line between past and future keeps breaking and he can barely tell the two apart.
After snapping at more than one friend, and a stranger in the street (I was just trying to say I'm sorry for what happened. / Well I'm sorry your husband screwed your sister but I'm not trying to console you for that.) Prior seeks out places he can be alone. Parks, back offices at Shades, even dark corner tables in little cafes. Find him there, but don't expect him to approach.]
priorly) & OPENWhat: Event Aftermath: Small angry woodland creature refuses to Sit Down.
When: 24th+
Where: Sanctuary & around
Warning(s): language, mentions of torture/death, TBA
Notes: OPEN - tag in, wildcard, or get me at
Sanct.
[Prior wakes at the sanctuary with bare arms and a voice in his head. of course, of course it's screaming.
Somehow the heavy metal bracelets all the captives in his camp had been accessorized with had done the one thing he'd thought impossible and cut off communications with the firmament. His head had felt heavy and strange and silent the whole way through, the one bar of relief in a symphony of terror and pain.
But, as promised, she only stopped down the road and waited for him. Now she's back and and announcing herself. For a moment, the recovery room fills with the sound of beating wings. Prior throws himself out of the bed and, when his leg immediately folds under him, against a wall for support.]
No. No, I will not- [Hand thrown up in a universal 'talk to this' gesture, he grabs the back of a chair and starts using it to clatter across the room.] I have been through too much shit for this shit. Fuck off.
[Find him exiting the room in this makeshift style, skin bruised and rainbow-scarred, the hollows under his eyes deep enough to have hosted excavations. Or catch up a little later, when he's acquired a wooden cane from who knows where and is still roaming the hallways in defiance of orders of bed rest and his body's own aching demands. He will not lie back in white sheets and stare at the ceiling. He'll die there.]
City Visits.
[Later on, he even manages to bully someone into getting him clothes. Black pants, black t-shirt, uncommonly plain and stark enough to make him look like a specter haunting the hallways. He's slowly piecing together what happened, who it happened to. Even the details of his own little cluster of captives got lost amid the chaos of the rescue. And the more he finds out the more his skin roils with a fury it's getting hard to tamp back down.
But first. There are visits to be made. Rooms in the sanctuary (they held people here, he hears, he can't imagine why this is considered a place for healing anymore). Apartments in the city. He waits for news from Thesa station, not going up there himself - not yet.
Catch him in a room, or making his way between them, learning to use the cane to navigate the shitty cakewalk that counts for a sidewalk. Just don't expect him to slow down.
He'll be in Byerly's room often, pacing by the window or catching the only sleep he allows himself in the chair or bed beside him.]
Solitude.
[The problem with playing host to an angelic prophecy that has for longer than it likes been denied access to its best vessel, is that once it has hold of him again he finds his prophecies going haywire. Talk about overcompensating. The world shifts around him, possible futures playing out superimposed over the mundanities of the present.
Life goes on as normal, in ways that shouldn't be allowed when his own life and so many others have been upended and emptied out everywhere. And that's hard enough to cope with, but it's a new degree of impossible when the same shopping street erupts into blue flame one minute, and sweeps through with a flood the next, before reverting to reality: old women buying their baguettes and looking askance at the man clutching a streetlight in an effort not to be swept away to drowning death.
It happens with people, too. Asking after him. He's always hated that, and he hates it more now that the thin line between past and future keeps breaking and he can barely tell the two apart.
After snapping at more than one friend, and a stranger in the street (I was just trying to say I'm sorry for what happened. / Well I'm sorry your husband screwed your sister but I'm not trying to console you for that.) Prior seeks out places he can be alone. Parks, back offices at Shades, even dark corner tables in little cafes. Find him there, but don't expect him to approach.]
no subject
Yes, yes, responsible's a big word to use for a man who would have come, anyway, a man who would have gone, anyway. Prior's not the one who made them what they are, but somehow to have had the advantage of it adds guilt to the fraught little tangle of emotions he's already preoccupied by not dealing with.
Oh.]
They're pretty.
[And whether it's unexpected kindness or just things catching up to him now he's stayed still too long, suddenly Prior's turning his head, a palm pushed up over his face in a not-subtle attempt to stop the emotion that's showing there. He's not let himself cry yet and at some point it will get too hard to blink away what keeps welling up, but he just about manages now.]
I - I don't have a room.
[Thank you is what he wants to say, but it seems too little and too much.]
no subject
[ He makes a gesture with his free hand, something between a shrug and a circling of his fingers. ]
So put them in your hair.
[ Admittedly, he didn't know what to do with flowers. There was the gesture, brightly colored and sweetly scented. Nash liked the gesture. But then they'd live their strange half life on a desk or a bureau, drinking water from a glass like something civilized, sunlight filtered through windows, until they'd die in a few days, maybe a week. Maybe they'd be thrown out before then.
So, maybe this wasn't his best thought out plan.
When the emotion comes catching on Prior's face, he blinks. ]
I know, I'm the total package.
[ He says the last two words in the same way as you would say certifiably insane. ]
no subject
Just in case that's not a story Nash would believe, Prior looks back at him from between the splayed gaps in his fingertips.]
The wrapping could be better, but shining armour's gaudy anyway. You do.
[Flowers in his hair would hardly go with the current outfit, but he might wind up with some stray petals there anyway as he ducks under the makeshift bouquet. Meanwhile Nash is going to end up with Prior's arms and, well, most of him really, wrapped tight round him. It's sudden, and warm, and as honest as he can be.]
no subject
He would never judge someone for crying. Which, of course, Prior isn't. ]
I could never. I spend too much time standing still, looking at things. [ That was what his wife said, anyway. ] I'd rust.
[ It takes him a second, but he returns the embrace. ]
no subject
Prior's not using his shoulder to cry on at all. But he doesn't let go quickly. He shakes his head, a motion felt more than seen, somewhere against the curve of Nash's throat.]
Mm-no. You wouldn't rust - too much heart for that.
[Okay. Okay. A breath and he stiffens his own spine, pulling away with a slowness that speaks both of reluctance and the ache inherent in moving. He resets the cane to a position good enough to steady him.]
I don't know what to do. I've known people - too many people - who've died, but I've never seen people die that way before. And Byerly - and every room in this place has someone who went through something terrible and there's nothing-
[Breathe, Prior.]
I can't do nothing, after this.
no subject
But the rest of it, he knows. He's has seen people die, maybe not exactly like this, but in similarly deliberate ways. That was how he'd found the hostages. And how he knew to keep his face still and his voice level even when there's noxious gas stinging his eyes. Even when there's someone he's grown fond of shaking on his shoulder.
When Prior stands up, Nash leans against a nearby wall, not quite sighing. ]
Yeah. I was afraid you were gonna say something like that.
no subject
[Prior doesn't take a spot along the same wall, not out of pride but some kind of stubbornness. Whatever's in him that's trying to run can be placated by other unnecessary physical feats.]
We should have had some help, we should have had some... [His free hand swipes the thought away as words falter.] We were brought here by people who rescued us from an intergalactic storm, and they left us in dark little rooms to die.
no subject
And sometimes when you come in from the rain, you still spill tea while you pour it.
[ He turns his head, looking at some middle distance, or really, nothing at all. Then Nash looks back at Prior. ]
I came here to make sure you weren't taking responsibility for anything that happened to me.
no subject
[His free hand touches his face where the mask sat, half-consciously. There's no assumption that Nash's skin being clean means he's healed, just like the rumors coming from Thesa station don't mean those people didn't die.
The rescue itself is a hazy blur but even at the time he knows seeing Nash was a mix of relief and fear for him.]
I'm grateful, and I'm angry, but I'm not angry with the lack of efficiency. I'm angry for what happened to you, and me and - I'm angry for everyone.
no subject
Okay. But what are you angry at? [ Nash had been angry before. He knew sometimes it was hard to find anything to hang on to, in that rising tide. ]
no subject
Everything else?
[He's still too worked up to take his own place at the wall. If he lets something support him now he'll never get back up.]
Do you think it was random, that we're the ones who woke first? Or do you think we were chosen for a reason?
no subject
[ And the term chosen is so vague, even in the legends about the Stars of Destiny. ]
no subject
no subject
[ It would be wrong to say Nash believes in fate, but he is from a place where fate is something apparent, heavy, like old proverbs, or chains around the neck.
At the rest of it, he tilts his head. ]
A conspiracy.
no subject
[Prior says it simply, but he drops his head into his hand, rubbing at his temples before going on.]
And I still don't know why or how that makes sense, but it didn't feel like this. If we are important to their plan, they should be showing it. They'd be screaming in our heads. But they're not. Even when we're taken, and tortured, and worse - not one word.
no subject
[ After he'd failed, really. He knows this is a different kind of chosen than what Prior means, but that's the point: they can't reasonably expect their experiences here to match up with the ones they had back home. But that's an easier thing to point out than to practice.
The Temple teachings say that suffering is a proof of guilt, that providence will shield the righteous from the arrows of truth. But Nash didn't learn about torture in the Temple. ]
And what if we aren't important to their plan?