deercountry | let me look at the sun

[The points of two knives sprout from the gazelle's chest like new spring shoots, then vanish with a sucking, wet tug. The body is pushed sideways, toppling to lay beside Haru's prone form, the box cutter falling to land on her chest with no guiding violence behind it.

Paul stands over her with knives held in a hand of gold and a hand of flesh, with blood smeared around his mouth to match the deep-bitten marks beneath his bare knuckles he made when he heard a voice cry out and chose to answer, and where fear was, now is fury. His eyes are still blown wide with silver, but the rest of his face is twisted in rage too awful to call anything as merciful as protective.

Don't you dare touch her, he did not say. No warnings for this, not now.]

I must not fear. Fear is the mind-killer.

[Paul doesn't bend to help her rise. He turns his back on her instead, facing out towards the sea between her and the waterline, which recedes away from him as if fleeing. He does not see the carnage revealed by its passing. He only sees the distant, rising line on the horizon, hears the long breathing in of the ocean.]

Fear is the little death that brings obliteration. [His voice is his own again, but only in the way his face is his own: a rage too great to do anything but scream or speak softly with, and he speaks softly, softly.] I will face my fear and I will permit it to pass over me and through me.

[there's blood on her face, her neck, her chest as the masked gazelle is impaled, and when the body falls and hits the ground (with a laugh, he laughs...happily) it's only her hands that hold the blade at her chest. she looks up at Paul, black eyes wide, scared despite being the one to have put herself in this situation, because it's only when she's near-death does she feel alive.

she rolls over onto her stomach, sand clinging to wet fur, wet clothes, wet from the sea and from the blood. and as he walks forward, towards the retreating ocean, she calls back out to him, an echo of an old voice:]

You don't know what it feels like, to be an animal in constant danger. [standing up, she walks towards him, the sea breeze blowing past sounding more like a train passing by. and with long strides, she does her best to catch up to him, feeling angry all of a sudden, because he's just another person staying out of reach, affecting the world around him while she's the one effected. someone above her.

she grabs at him, to hold onto his wrist of flesh and blood with a hand so small it barely wraps around. her anger subsides to something smaller, sadder, even though her grip remains as strong as it can be (which isn't...strong at all.)]

You're just a boy.

[it's her in the present who says this. not a memory, not the future. but her. ]

And it's normal...to be afraid.

[The terrible, staring eyes are unchanged when they turn on Haru again, at the touch of her gentle, encircling hand, but the rest of his face crumples like paper around them. In that moment, he is just a boy, and he's afraid.

He's always afraid. But he sees that she is, too, and the knife melts from that hand. Unselfconsciously, Paul twists his fingers to weave through hers, blood oozing from his unfelt wound to stain her beautiful fur. It's a gesture of comfort, of solidarity. He keeps his lamp-light gaze on her, as the sea begins to rush towards them.]

And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.

[His grip tightens, anchoring her to him, and thin silver threads flow from his shining blood to weave around their clasped hands.]

Where the fear has gone there will be nothing.

[Somehow, the wave already towers over them. Paul keeps his face turned away as his voice goes on, the rasping echoed other fading from it.]

Only I will remain.

[The wave falls. Paul lets his fear crash down on him with the force of mountains, and he does not let go.

It is cold, and then it is not. The beach is only a beach again, the boy only a boy, dressed in dripping sleeping-clothes, the horrors of it washed away as if they were never there. Paul smiles at Haru once, briefly - and falls to his knees with an exhale almost like a sigh. Their hands are no longer bound, but Paul will hold on until Haru finds her way free, as if he's forgotten how to let go.]

Edited 2022-01-12 20:30 (UTC)

[she responds in kind, holding his hand regardless of how much blood comes from his wounds to stain her pure-white fur. it doesn't matter, she's used to blood, used to the colour...the smell too, though it still makes her stomach clench and has her wanting to run. she's always afraid too, so much so that she's gotten used to it, powering through it, but not in the way this boy speaks of getting rid of it.

it's a part of her. it always will be.

her hand tightens on reflex as the wave behind Paul rises, casting a long and terrible shadow over them, and she screws her eyes shut the moment it falls, water beating over her, knocking the air from her, but still she holds on to him, not wanting to let go and not wanting to be lost in the middle of another vision or memory.

it's not until everything recedes do her eyes open, and she sees Paul at eye level as he drops down. instead of letting go, Haru keeps holding his hand.

it takes her a bit to gather her wits, staring at him and not sure whether they're stuck here or free to return to reality and out of this memory (assuming...they're still in his memory; she honestly can't tell).

asking him if he's okay feels stupid, but she feels like she has to say something. but what can you say after everything that's happened?]

...Haru. [her name. simple enough.] My name is Haru.

[The air shimmers with flecks of bronze carried in by a desert wind: the dream, still, but the dream calmed, returned to a semblance of true memory instead of the violent disruption of the not-yet.

Paul looks at Haru as if he's surprised she can speak. For a symbolic figment, she's persistent, and if his mind wasn't a neurotransmitter-drained static blur he would be drawing different inferences, but for now, he looks at her and wonders what else she's here for.]

Paul. [It's redundant; as part of his vision, she must know.] I didn't let you drown.

[Another foolish thing to say, but he feels as if he really is dreaming. Even though his hand dwarfs hers, holding it makes him feel younger again, as if he's back on the beaches of his childhood and not stranded on this foreign shore. He should stand up, but this a dream, and he doesn't have to, yet.]

[Haru offers a small smile in return. And after a few moments, holding his hand goes from reassuring and awkward, but still she doesn't move to remove it. Not yet, because she's worried that something will happen if she does let go.]

Thank you for that. But... [She flaps one ear, a subconscious motion, still trying to process everything that's happened. She's seen a lot, heard a lot, and she's wondering why fragments of her own memories and people she knows had shown up in the mind of someone else.] I'm not sure if I could die in someone else's dream.

It felt like I could.

[That does get Paul to let go, tentatively, unraveling their hands with caution just in case. Nothing happens. She is still here, and she called it someone else's dream.]

You're real?

[It's an inane question, but as he blinks at her it's the first he can think to ask. Saving a figment of his own fears is one thing, but the idea she is real, that this was a real person in harm's way because of his misfiring mind - it's a lot to think about, as he shivers slightly in the cold wind.]

I think you could have.

[He...didn't think she was real...?

She flexes her hand as he lets go, very much still here and very much real. Confusion is clearly legible in her eyes as she looks back at him.]

I'm...yes? [Her smile wavers, the awkward feeling expanding slightly. Here she is, shivering in the cold, her wet Cherryton uniform (what remains of it, at least) clinging to her uncomfortably, patches of red streaked across her white fur, white dress...alive...

And he thought she was a part of his dream. There's some existential dread that seeps in at that thought, and she kind of wants to pinch herself for good measure.

He thinks she could have died. Which-- she laughs, short and reactionary.]

Oh...well, then that's nothing new. I'm glad I didn't.

[Paul draws himself back up to his feet through more force of will than anything else, flexing his hand on the way up. He didn't think she was real and he still bit down to bone; he doesn't know how to reconcile that, doesn't try.]

So am I. [He's off-balance, and it makes him hesitant, his voice very careful when he continues.] I'm sorry I scared you.

[An understatement if he's ever said one. Standing up, she's tiny next to him, and he thinks about what he saw of himself, of what he saw of her, and a feeling as dark and pulling as a riptide reaches out for him. Guilt, he realizes, after a moment.]

[She steps back as he stands, not out of fear but more to have an easier time looking up at him (and for him to look down at her). He sounds careful, when he doesn't need to be.]

You don't have to apologize, it's not your fault. [She rubs her forearm, feeling self-conscious now.] This has happened to me too...other people showing up in my memories.

[Like the memories he say of hers, and what seemed to be potential futures too. That was new.

Nevermind the fact that this seemed more nightmare than memory. She wonders why.]

I know you didn't mean to hurt anyone.

[It's a funny thing for Haru to say, after he put two knives through a body hanging over her, and it catches at something in Paul's throat. He tears at his sleeve and wraps cloth around his hand instead of looking at her.]

People still get hurt. [Said quietly, and more than he meant to say.] I didn't expect that to happen.

[Or for anyone to see that he has visions. What they're of. The way that this place has tilted and distorted an already broken thing. He knows he's not the only paleblood in the city who dreams of the future, it's just - he knows his must be worse.]

Are you all right?

[Another pointless question. He's on a streak.]

[She shrugs her shoulders, not being dismissive but more signaling it's water under the bridge.]

We don't expect a lot of things to happen, but it can't be helped when they do.

[Where Haru is now, as a person and what she's been through...all have been through unexpected and random circumstances. Being at the wrong place at the wrong time. Accidents.

It's something she's learned to live with, shaping herself through the cards she's been dealt on the daily.]

I'm alright. Just cold. [And she crosses her arms beneath her chest at that. It is a bit of a pointless question, but since he asked her, it would feel rude to not return the acknowledgement of...everything that just happened.

What this boy had gone through.]

Are you okay?

[Paul half-opens his mouth to protest before he answers - something like, I know you aren't all right or How can you say that? - but her matter-of-fact acceptance stops him. She's fragile looking, but there's more to her than that. She walked through a nightmare to get close enough for him to hear.

So instead, he says:] I am. Thank you.

[In a final fit of idiocy, he reaches for the lapels of a coat he isn't wearing to offer it to her, then drops them. He's about to go on, when he sees a familiar antlered shape approaching from behind her. With some urgency, he looks down again.]

I don't - [he hesitates] - this isn't something I want people to know. It's a bad dream I have, sometimes, but it's - private.

[She recognizes his failed gesture, and despite everything she laughs, rubbing her cheek with the back of her hand before bending down to instead wring out the hem of her skirt. It runs a light pink into the sand, from blood left over.

When she looks back up, Paul looks serious, and in a very animal-like gesture, she tilts her head at his sudden urgency.

Ah. Well, he doesn't have to worry. She's been at the mercy of gossip, hates it. And she understands vulnerable people needing to protect their most vulnerable moments from others.]

I promise I won't tell. You'll find that I'm pretty good at keeping secrets.

[Paul can't read Haru the way he would be able to read most people. The intersection of humanoid and lapine traits make her a near-mystery. He should therefore have no grounds to believe her, no evidence to base it on. All the same, he does. It's a gut feeling, or some lingering trace of prescient sense, or both, but he does.

He smiles at her, shakily relieved, and then nods at the approaching stag.]

You should go. Get warm. [A pause, then:] I promise I won't say anything either.

[He doesn't know who he might say it to, or, truthfully, what he saw. But it was hers, a sight he wasn't meant to see, and that's reason enough.]

[It's not as though she understood half of what she saw anyway.

She smiles back, turning her head to look behind at Paul's gesture and pausing at the sight of the familiar animal. Before she touches the creature, to go in its direction and out of this memory, she looks back to Paul.]

You should go too. [A suggestion, knowing the dangers of being left alone with your thoughts for too long.

But she won't press the issue further than that; placing her hand against the stag's flank, she finally turns and disappears back into the physical world.]

let me look at the sun | open

no worries at all! i'm very happy to see this

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