Xerxes Break (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
payingfordeliverance) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
deercountry2021-12-05 09:55 pm
payingfordeliverance) wrote in deercountry2021-12-05 09:55 pm
Entry tags:
002: Regrets collect like old friends, here to relive your darkest moments
Who: Xerxes Break and you
What: A catchall, including event threads! Open prompts in the post, closed ones in the comments. As usual the open prompts are very "here's where to find him, make something up," so if you'd like to plot out something more specific feel free to PM me here or at![[plurk.com profile]](https://plurk.com/favicon.ico)
blithering
When: November and December!
Where: All over the place
Content Warnings: Consuming magic mushrooms for great mental health justice in prompt one, loads of anxiety and references to verbal child abuse in prompt three. Other warnings added into threads as necessary!
Mid-November Mushroom Funtimes
Probably the least surprising habit Break acquires as he learns to cook is eating whatever he's working on at every stage from start to finish. He has no idea what half the spices he's squirreled into the house even are and can't tell the difference between a great many of these onions and things either, and makes dinner happen mostly by having some idea of what should be in this or that and tossing things in and deciding on the fly whether that was a poor decision or not. It's fine, he's only poisoned someone once and it turned out to be an annoying vileblood fluke. We won't worry about it.
Anyway, that's how he comes to be chewing idly on a weeper mushroom Black Alice found and abruptly acquires mental health.
This is not to say he turns into a sparkly pastel version of himself and goes trotting about like a horrid pretty pony or anything, a fate he will conveniently avoid in a couple weeks. No, he still misses his home and his people terribly, still worries about the ones he's met here and this "farm" thing he keeps hearing about, frets about his kids and frets about winter's swift approach. It's just that these things don't feel like such a burden anymore, and he has no trouble convincing himself to get out of bed or leave the house or speak to other people. Things don't set him off into fits as they usually do, and the challenges he knows are coming don't feel insurmountable, as though the slightest oversight on his part will bring some horrid disaster down on the lot of them.
And, most importantly, for some reason his eyesight restores itself. His morning cough vanishes and his usual aches and pains recede, and Xerxes Break honestly feels better than he has in a year or three. He feels almost young.
Given how annoying Trench is, he doesn't really question it. Magic mushrooms. Sure, why not. The next few days are a flurry of productivity, as he tracks down people to help seal the windows and various drafty places in their ramshackle old house, ousts whatever "the hissing thing" is from the root cellar and gets it all spruced up, dutifully allows White Alice to haul him all over town, badgers the other kids pretty much every time he runs across one, and perhaps even beats up a blood zealot or two. He's easy to cross paths with as he's out and about most every day, and while he sometimes pretends he is still blind just to mess with people, it's pretty obvious given the way he slows down to stare at everything from the canals to the architecture to the ocean itself during one of his walks on the beach that Break can see. With no idea how long it will last, he needs to commit as much of the place as he can to memory.
Late November Boat Loot
The eventual permanent restoration of Break's sight brings with it the likewise permanent feeling that he ought to be doing more, somehow, and his restlessness only worsens when people he knows -- Lysithea among them -- turn up with injuries. The arrival of the eery frozen boats gives him an outlet for this. The boats have supplies, and both his household and the bakery always need supplies. So, clearly, slithering around in these things with no one on hand beyond his omen to save his bum if things go sideways is a fantastic idea, and he will not run into any trouble at all.
Break has managed to swallow several lessons from the last bits of his life back home. Unfortunately it seems that asking for help rather than doing whatever the hell he wants on account of being invincible was not one of them.
December Misfortunes
Break has no idea what a Blessed Day is and therefore no idea that he has one on December 21st. From his perspective, a rabbit's foot keychain turns up in his house one day for absolutely no reason, and Break panics and stuffs it into his coat pocket before the kids see it because half of them either love or were rabbits at some point and most of them are experiencing darkblood stressbasketry and really just no one needs to be dealing with a disembodied rabbit's foot lying around in this family.
He then forgets about it in favor of various other things that have him anxious and paranoid, and goes about his business.
What follows is multiple days of bad luck following Break around everywhere he goes, ranging from minor annoyances like slipping on ice all the way up to the stove in a favorite restaurant bursting into flame the second he walks in the door. It takes him a while to catch on, given that these unlucky things are happening to the people around him, rather than Break himself. But a fun fact about Break is that in his own world, his red eyes mark him as something called a "Child of Misfortune", and while he spent the bulk of his life dismissing it as nothing but a superstition, being told repeatedly that you cause bad luck simply by existing tends to mess a kid up.
In Break, this has manifested in a habit of blaming himself for things he is only barely connected to. Already feeling weirdly guilty about not getting abducted to the Sleeper Farm where he absolutely would have saved people he likes from being tortured which obviously means their injuries are his fault for having...not been around at the time...it does eventually cross his mind that the same darkblood powers that were giving him health problems have now turned outwards instead, and he is the source of all this bad luck.
This does not help his anxiety.
After a few days he will rediscover the rabbit's foot and notice the bad luck magically clears up when he hides it somewhere else. In the meantime, regardless of where one encounters him, he can be found skittish and hypervigilant, ready to jump into other people's bouts of bad luck almost before they have even realized it's happening. After all, if these things are his fault somehow, it's his responsibility to fix things until he can get things under control again.
What: A catchall, including event threads! Open prompts in the post, closed ones in the comments. As usual the open prompts are very "here's where to find him, make something up," so if you'd like to plot out something more specific feel free to PM me here or at
When: November and December!
Where: All over the place
Content Warnings: Consuming magic mushrooms for great mental health justice in prompt one, loads of anxiety and references to verbal child abuse in prompt three. Other warnings added into threads as necessary!
Mid-November Mushroom Funtimes
Probably the least surprising habit Break acquires as he learns to cook is eating whatever he's working on at every stage from start to finish. He has no idea what half the spices he's squirreled into the house even are and can't tell the difference between a great many of these onions and things either, and makes dinner happen mostly by having some idea of what should be in this or that and tossing things in and deciding on the fly whether that was a poor decision or not. It's fine, he's only poisoned someone once and it turned out to be an annoying vileblood fluke. We won't worry about it.
Anyway, that's how he comes to be chewing idly on a weeper mushroom Black Alice found and abruptly acquires mental health.
This is not to say he turns into a sparkly pastel version of himself and goes trotting about like a horrid pretty pony or anything, a fate he will conveniently avoid in a couple weeks. No, he still misses his home and his people terribly, still worries about the ones he's met here and this "farm" thing he keeps hearing about, frets about his kids and frets about winter's swift approach. It's just that these things don't feel like such a burden anymore, and he has no trouble convincing himself to get out of bed or leave the house or speak to other people. Things don't set him off into fits as they usually do, and the challenges he knows are coming don't feel insurmountable, as though the slightest oversight on his part will bring some horrid disaster down on the lot of them.
And, most importantly, for some reason his eyesight restores itself. His morning cough vanishes and his usual aches and pains recede, and Xerxes Break honestly feels better than he has in a year or three. He feels almost young.
Given how annoying Trench is, he doesn't really question it. Magic mushrooms. Sure, why not. The next few days are a flurry of productivity, as he tracks down people to help seal the windows and various drafty places in their ramshackle old house, ousts whatever "the hissing thing" is from the root cellar and gets it all spruced up, dutifully allows White Alice to haul him all over town, badgers the other kids pretty much every time he runs across one, and perhaps even beats up a blood zealot or two. He's easy to cross paths with as he's out and about most every day, and while he sometimes pretends he is still blind just to mess with people, it's pretty obvious given the way he slows down to stare at everything from the canals to the architecture to the ocean itself during one of his walks on the beach that Break can see. With no idea how long it will last, he needs to commit as much of the place as he can to memory.
Late November Boat Loot
The eventual permanent restoration of Break's sight brings with it the likewise permanent feeling that he ought to be doing more, somehow, and his restlessness only worsens when people he knows -- Lysithea among them -- turn up with injuries. The arrival of the eery frozen boats gives him an outlet for this. The boats have supplies, and both his household and the bakery always need supplies. So, clearly, slithering around in these things with no one on hand beyond his omen to save his bum if things go sideways is a fantastic idea, and he will not run into any trouble at all.
Break has managed to swallow several lessons from the last bits of his life back home. Unfortunately it seems that asking for help rather than doing whatever the hell he wants on account of being invincible was not one of them.
December Misfortunes
Break has no idea what a Blessed Day is and therefore no idea that he has one on December 21st. From his perspective, a rabbit's foot keychain turns up in his house one day for absolutely no reason, and Break panics and stuffs it into his coat pocket before the kids see it because half of them either love or were rabbits at some point and most of them are experiencing darkblood stressbasketry and really just no one needs to be dealing with a disembodied rabbit's foot lying around in this family.
He then forgets about it in favor of various other things that have him anxious and paranoid, and goes about his business.
What follows is multiple days of bad luck following Break around everywhere he goes, ranging from minor annoyances like slipping on ice all the way up to the stove in a favorite restaurant bursting into flame the second he walks in the door. It takes him a while to catch on, given that these unlucky things are happening to the people around him, rather than Break himself. But a fun fact about Break is that in his own world, his red eyes mark him as something called a "Child of Misfortune", and while he spent the bulk of his life dismissing it as nothing but a superstition, being told repeatedly that you cause bad luck simply by existing tends to mess a kid up.
In Break, this has manifested in a habit of blaming himself for things he is only barely connected to. Already feeling weirdly guilty about not getting abducted to the Sleeper Farm where he absolutely would have saved people he likes from being tortured which obviously means their injuries are his fault for having...not been around at the time...it does eventually cross his mind that the same darkblood powers that were giving him health problems have now turned outwards instead, and he is the source of all this bad luck.
This does not help his anxiety.
After a few days he will rediscover the rabbit's foot and notice the bad luck magically clears up when he hides it somewhere else. In the meantime, regardless of where one encounters him, he can be found skittish and hypervigilant, ready to jump into other people's bouts of bad luck almost before they have even realized it's happening. After all, if these things are his fault somehow, it's his responsibility to fix things until he can get things under control again.
Mid-November (cw: mention of ritualistic sacrifice things, cultists, & demons, always... & a snake)
Its various horrors. November has brought more of those horrors to light, in ways that are both fresh and.... familiar, a paradoxical blend of the two. Peter's afraid to be outside of the house right now, afraid of what could be lurking in the streets, waiting to snare him. He's brought right back to those people who stalked him from the shadows before all of this, before Trench and Deerington, back in Utah. Those strangers watched him from the corners of his own home: infiltrating, invading. Smiling wide smiles β affectionate towards him, hungry. Now he knows what he hadn't known back then: they were cultists dedicated to the demon, and they'd waited Peter's entire lifetime for the rebirth of their king.
....He doesn't like to leave the house, but unfortunately, things like food don't just magically appear on the dinner table. Even more unfortunate is the fact that Peter doesn't have the ability to turn invisible anymore. So he's bartering for food and picking up a few extra things for the household with the additional discomfort of being perceived.
Still.... it is nice out here, despite Peter's perpetual anxieties. The crisp chill in the air, the trees almost barren of leaves by this point... the damp wet of the ground. The walk back home from Willful Machine is admittedly a pleasant one on that surface level β assuming no cultist.....zealot things try to kidnap him again. Peter does have company this time, at least, in the form of his Omen. The snake is wrapped around Peter's waist, most of his slender, lengthy body hidden underneath the boy's jacket, with only his neck and head peeking out of the front.
With a few bags in his hands, Peter's walking slowly when he spots a familiar figure facing the canals. The man certainly stands out with his shock of light hair that covers half of his face, and the teen freezes, staring over at him. He..... distinctly looks like he's watching the canals, gazing down below at them, but that can't be right, can it? This is the man who had helped an invisible Peter finagle his way through vendors for some foodstuffs, and he'd most certainly been blind.
The teen slowly approaches, hesitant. Break may recognise the voice that speaks up β at nineteen it's more man than boy, but somehow still so soft that it sounds like he might break if someone's too loud in his presence. Despite that, it's concern that leaks through his tone, and he keeps a bit of a distance, like he doesn't want to risk scaring the guy by suddenly popping up too close. ....He's accidentally scared plenty of people who do have their sight, and it's never a good feeling to be reminded that he's become the type of spooky thing that sometimes glides more than walks, that blends into the edges of shadow too well.
"Excuse me. Sorry to bother you, but are you uh... are you okay?"
And the image to go along with the previously invisible boy will reveal... six foot tall and thin, hair a mess of tangled curls, eyes dark and rimmed in circles like he hasn't slept in too long. ....Scuffed Converse sneakers; Peter hasn't exactly assimilated to Trench fashion yet.
Poking out from his torso, Susurrus flicks his tongue curiously at the man.
This is the wildest subject line I have ever received, thank you for this
There's a certain nagging familiarity about this voice, but having only met the boy once and hearing just the one sentence now, it isn't quite clicking yet. Break even tilts his head a little at him, as though he can guide the marble that is his thoughts into the proper hole in his brain for clearing up this mystery, but no. Nope, he will need a few more minutes.
"I'm quite fine," he says amiably, leaning over the wall of the canal. "Hey, hey, look here. Do you suppose this thing is a turtle or a crocodile? We can't figure it out."
He points down at the lump in the canal which has caught both his and his omen's attention -- Baltus is likewise staring at it, standing on his hind legs with his front ones draped over the wall at Break's side. The creature in question is about the size of a cat, enjoying what little sun it can get on a nice flat rock at the water's edge. It seems to have a shell, like a turtle. But it also seems to have a crocodile snoot, and rather too many horns all over regardless. Some sort of nasty corrupted beastie thing, perhaps, but if it started out as something else before it became what it is, what was it, exactly?
This is a very refreshing problem to be having in Trench.
fkgslld the fact it's now eternalised in my subject autofill.... this is my legacy
Magical altering items... curses.... some sort of possession. There's a variety pack of options, here, and it's not like Peter knows enough about the man he'd met one single time to be able to properly gauge anything other than the one fact he has to go on. Which is that he was blind then and is able to see again now, something that becomes more evident as the other continues to speak, and gestures downwards.
Peter blinks stupidly again (it's very helpful, really) and with an almost comical obedience, adjusts the bags in his arms and slowly leans forwards to peer down at what the man's referring to. Immediately he gasps, a soft but audible sound, spooked.
"What theβ Is that some kind of demon?!"
...Not everything weird is a demon, Peter. He can't help having them almost constantly on the mind, however, and flinches back from the wall. Mouth tipped open, looking both parts confused and hesitant, he asks:
"Waitβ so you really can see that thing? I uh... I thought you couldn't... see."
Peter Graham winces, looking pained. In the process of trying not to make it awkward, he's made it extremely awkward.
no subject
And it was a good very strange mushroom, if his current mood is anything to go by. His previous meeting with Peter was perfectly fine and friendly too, but there was a distinct exhaustion about him then, both before and after his interaction with the vendor on Peter's behalf. That weariness doesn't seem to be present in him now, and while that's really the only difference -- he certainly doesn't seem impaired by whatever he's gotten into -- it's a palpable change.
He continues observing the turtle thing, considering beasts and demons and things, until another thought crosses his mind and he whips his head up suddenly.
"-- ah, hang on. We've met, then, haven't we? My apologies." He takes a good proper look at Peter at last -- why do all the brats end up being taller than he is? Rude -- but his appearance really isn't ringing any bells. "Just the once, I should think, if I can't place your voice. Baltus, you didn't tell me."
His omen, called to task, leans around Break with a curious, "broo?" Dropping to all fours, he trots over to greet Peter properly, but Baltus is confused, too. With Break of a mind to be looking at things today, Peter's appearance is the first thing Baltus takes in, too, and of course he couldn't see the boy last time either.
no subject
He's studying the man carefully, worriedly, but there doesn't seem to be any sign of... well, impending death in him. If anything, he seems... to be doing pretty well. Is this really okay....?
"Ohβ I was uh. I was kind of invisible? You helped me buy some food and stuff." Eyes drop down to the dog-that-isn't-really-a-dog, and he gently offers his hand like he had before. His own Omen blinks down at his fellow where he's still coiled around Peter's waist, offering a curious flick of his forked tongue.
"Are you sure you're okay? One of my friends ate some of those things and..... it made her really sick."
Of course, Clarisse's reaction was immediate, so if this man hasn't had anything adverse happen yet, then he's probably okay.... Cue Peter still looking very worried about it, though.
no subject
The reaction is immediate. Break and his omen both perk up in unison, though of course it's far more obvious on a dog -- Baltus's ears emerge from where they usually lay against his fur, pricking upwards in a way that makes him look decidedly like a horse, and his tail swings up and begins to swish. For Break's part, he turns away from the wall entirely, abandoning the issue of the strange beastie.
"It's sweet of you to worry, but there's no need. We did run across a few of the wicked ones, but this one makes sure I don't get into anything I shouldn't." He is referring to Baltus, of course, and pats his omen's bum in emphasis. Even if he were still blind he would be able to tell where it was, on account of Baltus is smacking him repeatedly with his tail as he sniffs daintily at Peter's hand and his snake friend in turn. "Your friend is doing alright, I hope?"
Finally getting to backtags, apologies for the delay!! No worries if you prefer to let this go!
....All that aside, the title amuses him in his shy way, and there's another little trace of a smile β a ghost of one. Like he's not sure it's okay to fully let any emotion come through a certain barrier.
"Oh man, I'm glad to hear that. It was pretty rough." Which is... a severe understatement; Clarisse would have died a very horrific death, and the experience itself was still quite horrible even if she'd, fortunately, survived. Peter hasn't been able to shake it since it happened; it lives within him, and he revisits the details over and over and over again.
There's a careful attempt to pat the dog's head as Peter looks up to its companion. "She is, thankfully. It uh... it was really scary for her, but she's okay now." Another pause, as he looks the man over carefully again.
"So it... made you able to see again? Or... see for the first time?" Had he always been blind, Peter wonders. It's a personal question and he's a little hesitant asking, but if the man is seeing for the first time in his life, that must be..... quite the thing. He might need help in other ways, and Peter is happy to provide.
no subject
It doesn't bother him to talk about it. After all, while he doesn't actively broadcast his handicap and indeed masks it so well it's easy for others to forget it, he no longer tries to keep it a secret, either. It's more trouble than it's worth when he gets along just fine, and the emotional aspects of his lack of eyesight are astronomically worse to him than the practical ones. On top of that the very same mushroom that has solved this problem has him in a fine mood, and a Break in a fine mood is often chatty.
"Baltus here is able to show me what he's seeing, but we don't use it much. Trying to match up where he's looking with where I'm looking is simply too troublesome." Amused, he adds, "For instance, if he were to let me use his eyes just now, all I would see is your snake friend."
The omen likes to make friends with other omens. Baltus likes being an omen. He's very important, so the others must be, too.