deercountry | September & October Catch-All

What?

[ Should that make Mako laugh harder, even as he's scrambling to his feet and trying to to get the sand off himself at the same time. ]

You have water in your—I gotta stop asking you those questions, why would I want you to be slippery?

Well, eels are slippery. And you said I wasn't bending anymore. Buuuut if I used the water in my gills to make my body slippery, then I could've been the one that got away!

[Why you laughing, Mako? Vyng is being 100 percent serious here.]

This is fun, though. [He grins, glad his friend seems to be taking a load off for once.] Thanks for training with me, pal.

[More like dicking around, but shhh.]

[ Mako is trying so, so hard to follow that logic. Eels are slippery, and Vyng would... get away... and win somehow because, what, Mako couldn't keep... hold of him?

He blinks up at Vyng, landing on that conclusion, and finally just grins. ]

Man, it's a good thing you were never on a pro-bending team. You would've gotten disqualified immediately. Bet you're terrible with rules.

Just when they suck. Or I don't want to follow them.

[With a crooked grin, Vyng finally draws himself to his full height. No reason to keep crouching, if they're taking a break from ~~horseplay~~ training.]

Back during my pro-racer days, I never cheated on the track.

[There are definitely stories about shit he pulled off the track, though.]

You were a pro-racer?

[ That is way more interesting than teasing Vyng about not following the rules. Mako drops out of his defensive stance entirely. ]

What does that mean?

[He doesn't expect Mako to know what he means. One benefit of talking to someone who lacks that context, though? His friend just asks, instead of trying to guess based on Vyng's appearance. It's more refreshing than he expects.]

I was an ice racer. You pilot a ship outfitted with blades across the tundra and try not to die.

Also, everyone shoots frozen food at each other.

[ Mako's face really says it all. Why does this happen so much with Vyng? Mako has sand in his hair and also everywhere else and they were in the middle of sparring and he doesn't care about any of that because Vyng is talking about frozen food races and Mako's burning need to know what the fuck that's about has eclipsed literally every other thought. ]

What a waste. You had me until the food thing.

[It's not the first time he's gotten this reaction from a friend. Ice racing, his year-long stint as a circus elephant, some of the gnarly shit he found while working as a janitor for 10 years...there's a wild tale for almost any occasion, though Vyng rarely tells them.

Of course, he's more inclined to share those snippets into his past lives with other Sleepers. He'd be lying if he said it wasn't fun. Mako's what-the-actual-fuck expression is pure gold, and Vyng can't help but quietly laugh.]

Yeahhhh, that was a big-leagues thing. You actually needed money to compete in those. And if you didn't have money, you used what you could find.

[A beat, before proudly adding:]

My arsenal came from compost.

[Meanwhile, other ships were hurling rib-eyes at their opponents. And while Vyng could rag on rich elven families, he imagines that simple detail would be enough for a former ragamuffin like Mako to understand the kind of inequality he grew up around.]

Smaller races had less shooting. And lower fatality rates.

[As he speaks, Vyng crouches beside his suede bag and starts rifling around for some water.]

They had fatality rates?

[ Vyng why.

Mako's what-the-fuck expression certainly hasn't gone away even as he shifts just to sit cross-legged there on the sand. ]

From the food? How hard were people flinging this stuff? What a way to go.

Nah, food just knocked people off their game and damaged their ships. Crashing into the shitty flash-frozen waves is what usually killed people.

[He casually holds out a waterskin for Mako before adding:]

And if it was mating season, you had stampedes of pissed and horny ice rhinos to worry about too.

...Vyng.

No offense?

But your world is... weirder than mine, sometimes.

[ After a moment, Mako accepts it, hefting the thing in his hand for a second. ]

D'you miss it?

[Vyng plops onto the sand, and he tucks his lanky limbs beneath himself.]

Me? Miss it?

[To be honest, he'd been too busy grieving Billie to consider whether he missed the world itself. Vyng's first instinct is to downplay the question, to bluff by claiming he's moved on and has zero interest in looking back. But his words would likely ring hollow. None of those things are true.

After a moment, he carefully admits:]

I miss certain things about it, I guess. But not everything.

[He can't walk through the Spirit World like he used to. He'll never lay eyes on Cerulean Depths Seen From Great Heights, nor the family he was deprived from knowing for much of his life. Resonances from relationships he painstakingly cultivated still remain, of course, allowing him to move through Trench in much the same way as before. At the same time, he will never be able to replicate those exact connections here. He will never get a chance to repair that ones that were lost or damaged.

As his mind briefly wanders down that morose path, Vyng's gaze toward the ocean horizon becomes unfocused. Thankfully, he catches himself before he goes too far. Rolling his shoulders to snap himself out of it, he turns to look at Mako.]

What about you?

[ What was that?

Mako wonders, but he doesn't ask: it looked a little bit like Korra meditating, with that hazy distance in Vyng's face like he was somewhere else. It's only fair. Mako asked about his home, sent his thoughts along that path in the first place.

He shifts a little too, trying to get comfortable on the sand. It isn't the sand, though. It's discomfort in his own skin, too-cold, strange. He hasn't felt right since waking up here.

And he can be honest with Vyng. There's a raw edge to his voice. ]

Yeah. I do.

It's—

[ He huffs and turns to look at the same horizon, squinting at the shapes of high, distant birds. ]

I get pretty sick of people telling me how weird our animals are, you know?

What, koalaotters and turtleducks? Weird? Pfft, they're the weird ones. That's normal shit where I'm from.

[Cabbage skunks. Polar bees. Hybrid animals emerge from the Spirit World all the time. Vyng didn't miss a beat during their earlier exercise, because each creature was well within the bounds of his own imagination.]

I can see why it makes you tired, though. It's like..."Yeah? And? Thanks, asshole, you're the fifth person who's said that".

Yeah! That's—

Yeah.

[ Not the coolest finish, but then Mako hadn't meant to burst out in strong agreement like that, and now his nose and his cheeks are flushed pale blue. ]

It just, I don't know. Don't need to be reminded that I'm never gonna see home again and that literally nothing I think is normal is actually normal to anyone but... you, I guess. It's a stupid thing to get annoyed by. I know that.

To be fair, a weirdo like me going "yeah, that's normal" can't be much of a consolation prize.

[There's a hint of laughter in Vyng's voice, mainly directed at himself. And okay, maybe he's a little bit amused by how strongly Mako agreed with him. But that's because he's been there too, in a variety of ways.

Vyng shifts in the sand, so he's more clearly facing Mako.]

What makes you think it's a stupid thing to get annoyed by?

[ Vyng and his insightful questions. Mako shifts a little, curling his fingers into cool sand just to feel it before letting the grains drop bit by bit into a small pile. ]

I should be used to it by now. I've been... not at home, for food, for more than a year now.

It does help, though. You. Your world. People talk so much about earth. There are so many people from it. They have all these... references and phrases and idioms. Curses. Stuff like that.

Okay, but for real, though. Who is Jesus? And why is he fucking Christ?

[Please tell Vyng he's not the only one wondering this, Mako.]

[ Oh Vyng you're speaking his language, Mako sits up straight all at once, his eyes wide. ] I have no idea! I hear that one all the time!

Same here! What is up with that?

[This Jesus-fucking thing is going to bother him for the rest of his afternoon. Unless...]

You think Shiro would know?

[ ...

There is a long pause in which Mako contemplates this. Shiro does know a lot of things. And he's been here, or in the dream, for a while, which means it's likely he's encountered a lot of different worlds.

But... ]

He's from space.

Space Jesus. Maybe there's somebody like that where he's from. We don't know.

[ Mako squints at him.

He really

He wants Vyng to be wrong but on the other hand, he really doesn't know that Shiro doesn't... have someone like that. ]

I... guess we could ask him.

Hey, it can't hurt.

[It absolutely could hurt Shiro's brain, but what Vyng doesn't know can't possibly hurt him until later.]

Do you wanna do it? Or should I?

You do it—I mean, he's probably too busy to answer, and it doesn't really matter.

[ Buuut Mako is just scooting a little closer on the sand so he can hear Shiro's answer. Thank you, Vyng, now he really wants to know. ]

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hello, a missed notif!!! sry about that!!

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