Running With My Roots Pulled Up [L Lawliet, OTA]

[hearthebell]

Who: Lazarus Sauveterre (L Lawliet) and open to old and new CR alike
What: Catchall for January! Come see the worst Night Walker in Trench before he gets fired. Watch him publicly shed into a version of himself so hot he could only exist in fan art. Dream with the newly articulated Adonis at the bloodstone in Cassandra, huddle with the handsome hunk at the Snake Den, and aid the temporarily chiseled Chad in fending off Unsnakely. Wildcard option available for those who received all of this, yet still somehow desire more!
When: Flexibly throughout January. Prompt A occurs prior to his shedding, everything else occurs following it (wildcard may occur whenever.)
Where: Respectively, in order of prompts: Cellar Door, Lumenwood, Cassandra, the Snake Den, the Canals in the Willful Machine.

Content Warnings: Most of these are in PROMPT B, aka the Shedding prompt. Skin peeling off, a seizure, blood, bones breaking, vomiting. For PROMPT D at the Snake Den, be aware of some alcohol use and slight intoxication. If anything comes up in tags later I will update these warnings!




A. Working Fingers to the Bone [Cellar Door]

[There was a sort of gentle simplicity in knowing what one would be doing for his entire life from the age of five. It wasn't predetermined, perhaps, but it was preset. A bargain and a promise that he would be protected, and never bored, and therefore that he wouldn't ever want for anything.

He eventually became bored. Chasing it meant he was no longer protected, and at twenty-five years old, that life was no longer his. His new one begs for a source of dopamine that collecting shiny rocks and trading them cannot provide, a lever he can press for the reward of stimulation and a sense of success. The only problem is that none of the primary jobs available to Sleepers are anything he's remotely experienced in. None of them translate to his absolutely unique resume. There was nothing for it but to pick a direction and forge ahead. He was a Paleblood, good at reading people, interested in what they reveal about themselves, a highly intelligent puzzle and problem-solver. Knowing in his heart that he would never truly be anything but a detective, he opted for the title that promised, at least, a never-ending source of intel from the citizens of Trench and other Sleepers, alike. A jackpot, to a man who tended to think about how his service could benefit his whims and appetites, foremost.

You may be at this establishment in Cellar Door to drop off a delivery, or fix something, or to see a Night Walker yourself. Maybe you work here already, or you're job hunting; maybe it's something else entirely. Behind one of the closed doors down the hallway extending from a gently-lit lobby, the atmosphere of tranquil, edifying peace and healing is disrupted by a raised voice, shouting indistinct but very colorful insults. Something smashes and breaks and the door is flung open by a furious middle-aged Trenchie woman. She storms past you on stout legs.

"Never coming back here," she spits at the glum and drooping receptionist on the way out. "I came to see a Night Walker, not a beast!" Trembling, she sniffles, stridently wipes her damp and angry eyes with the sleeve of her dress, and slams the door on her way out.

"Not to worry," the young man behind the receptionist's desk sighs, addressing you. "This is normal. Now. Uh, how can I help you?"]

B. Somebody That Reminded Them of Me [Lumenwood] [CW: Skin peeling off, seizure, bones breaking, vomiting, blood]

[Given his general apathy towards taking care of himself, L seldom comes to Lumenwood, though it would probably benefit him to at least inquire about a vitamin poultice or a sleeping draught. Anyone seeing him today probably understands at a glance why he's finally shown his face in this district; his dry, flaky, peeling face that he has practically scratched raw. Hollow-eyed and haggard, he's at an apothecary shop, scratching at the back of a similarly alarming hand with his uneven, chewed-down nails, speaking in a hurried mumble about how he has incense to trade, he just needs something to keep his skin from drying out further. His omen, an orca whale shrunken to the size of a golden retriever, seems equally agitated, wriggling back and forth beside him before zipping around the room as though trying to shake off parasites making her itch. The suggestion of lotion gets a chuff of frustrated disbelief from her Sleeper, so miserable he hardly believes that it was a serious offer instead of something stronger, medicated or magical. He's halfway through trying to speak a little louder while staying calm, slow and tempered, to ask if anything else at all can be done for his condition, when right in front of you, his back breaks.

His spine is noticeably curved when he stands, taking inches off his height and bending his posture forward. Now, the vertebrae are in pieces under his skin and clothes, and with nothing to support his spinal cord, he's on the ground in seconds, collapsed and seizing. The apothecary shrieks and unties her apron, hurrying out from behind the counter to stuff the corner in his mouth, but the jerking limbs and sickening crunch of bones cracking and sliding around audibly has her clapping a hand to her mouth and sprinting to the shop's washroom past his flailing and thrashing omen to vomit.

The transformation is violent enough that L's shed husk comes away in crepey pieces, trapped under his clothes along with no small amount of sweat and blood. His unconsciousness is a mercy for him, but probably not for you; his torso twists with such force that his shirt tears along the seam in back, and it's possible to see that the bones are aligning and piecing back together, fusing straight and strong. The shirt doesn't actually fit him anymore, too small to button around a toned and well-muscled upper body.; it hangs in tatters, along with pants that are somewhat less useless, now that they actually fit instead of hanging precariously low on his hips. When all those bones were popping and sliding, it happened in his face, too; his jaw is strong and chiseled where it was delicate and childish before, his nose is stately and straight, his undereyes no longer carry the bags of thousands of sleepless nights. When he finally comes to rest in the sticky, stringy mess made by his shedding, panting in torn and bloody garments and spent from the transformation, he is still recognizable as the man who came into this shop... just as if he had won the genetic lottery, instead of lost it.

He wakes blearily and sits, the movement seeming graceful and aristocratic in spite of what just happened while he was unconscious and the discomfort of the bits of husk and grime clinging to his beautiful bone structure and smooth, porcelain skin. "You won't be needing that lotion now, love," the apothecary says, hoarse from her stomach's unheaval but gentle as she unhooks a mop and bucket.

When L speaks, he sounds stunned as the orca omen drifts over, settles her overtaxed head into his lap.]

I don't need anything... nothing hurts.

[He's overcome, drawing his arms closer towards a solid and unfamiliar chest. He doesn't remember the last time that was true.

He startles when he sees you.]

How long have you been here? What happened?

C. Building Castles Out of Snow [Cassandra]

[After he'd gotten cleaned up and acquired some fresh garments that fit his new body well, L had spent hours relearning it, staring at it in the mirror, trying to make it feel as though it wasn't a stranger. He'd gotten his fill, but ultimately failed; it still feels like a stranger, and now, he actually avoids mirrors, looking instead at the sleek and powerful orca omen at his side that has not changed. It stands to reason, therefore, that he hasn't, either, in any real way.

His grooming has not improved, but the habits that pared him to bone, dulled his skin and bent his back take some time to do that level of damage. They're effectively starting over on something strong and healthy; even his fingernails, he'd noticed, were resilient and smooth for possibly the first time ever, and he fumbles as he handles things, at first, as a result. But the most astonishing and drastic change is, no contest, the way he's regarded by women and men alike. He's used to slipping by as a presence that people would rather not engage with, because he is an uncomfortable presence, a cause for pity or distrust or concern. If he's poor, he might want money. If he's crazy, he might try to hurt me. If he's sick, I might catch it. Now he's approached, offered samples from market carts, and smiled at by children who are not immediately yanked away by their mothers.

This, he realizes, must be what it's like for Light Yagami to live his life, every day. Maybe that's the real reason he has been avoiding mirrors.

He's in Cassandra today looking for something real, and true, deeper than the flesh that has turned him into a stranger to himself. He descends the stairs below the Pale Sanctuary, shaggy head bent to hide his features and avoid more attention, his orca omen shrunken to the size of a bracelet so she can swim tiny, tight circles around his wrist. A strong sleeping draught is in his backpack, because he struggles to sleep on demand, but he's here to do just that.

He notices you. Maybe you're acquainted; it'll be easier if you are. If you're not, he relies on the halo effect of his much prettier face, thinking of it as a mask.]

I'm here to dream. Do you know... will a sleeping potion spoil or taint the results?

D. Lowercase Society [Snake Den] [CW: Alcohol use]

[Many factors have contributed to L's appearance at the Snake Den tonight. He'd touched the poster; he has a suit to wear that is somehow as plain and as comfortable as he likes his clothes while still being avant-garde stylish. For the first time in his life he is handsome, and he'd surprised himself by actually wanting to come.

As he's started to get used to his new physique, he's grown to accept it by treating it like a costume. He was born unattractive, and always known and resigned himself to it. He'd heard "ugly" as a child enough times. He hadn't pursued men or women romantically because it would be selfish and irresponsible... but also, maybe just a bit, because a part of him knew he'd be called gross and creepy. He hadn't brushed his hair, or eaten healthily, or slept when he should have, because no one saw him; no one spoke to him in person or called him anything, except for an old man who was already as impressed as he needed to be. What would the point have been?

The tables are crowded. He sits across from you at one of them, drinking something that looks like it's more chocolate than booze. Assuredly, it contains both, because there's an overbright chemical cheer to the way he addresses you.]

Hi!

[Very overbright and chemical. Not a habitual drinker, L is still something of a lightweight even after gaining thirty or so healthy pounds. His omen, a female orca whale, floats beside his chair, turning upside down with a sort of playful laziness.]

Are you enjoying the show? I thought about competing... but no one wants to see someone tie a knot in a cherry stem onstage with their tongue.

[A pause.]

Do you? Want to see it, I mean. You're close enough to see.

[He plucks a pair of maraschino cherries, attached at the stems, out of his drink. He's serious.]

E. Dragging My Roots Through the Snow [Canals, The Willful Machine]

[It's getting exhausting, but handsome as he is now and not as immediately recognizable as himself, L persists in continuing his staggered pattern of moving house every few days to a pre-scouted location. Usually it's an abandoned house or apartment; sometimes, on nights he wants a warm meal and a hot bath prepared by someone else, a hotel. In an attempt to gain at least a tourist's familiarity with all of the districts, he's rotating them right along with his residences, and with his meager belongings in his lap and his orca omen swimming behind him at her full size, he's shivering in the back of a boat that is ferrying him along a canal to his new, and very temporary, accommodations in The Willful Machine.

"Mean ice chunks we get this time of year," comments the boatman, as one of the floats bumps against the small craft's hull.]

Oh...

[L nods, awkward, the small talk coming unnaturally to him.]

Is it ever dangerous?

["The incense helps ward beasties," the boatman says, gnawing the end of his cigar. "Otherwise the current breaks the ice floats up well enough, only thing dangerous is the bloody water if you fill your cup up and drink." He looks over his shoulder to offer L a tobacco-stained grin, but his face quickly drains from rosy to blanched white.

L turns, beginning to stand instinctively when he sees what's spooked the boatman so. He sits again, quickly, when the balance shifts and the boat rocks wildly and his omen breaches and keens a warning. The boatman has leapt out of the craft, desperately swimming through the filthy water in an attempt to escape.

It's clear, at least, why this part of the canal system is not frozen when some of the water splashes overboard. It's actually warm, an effect of the waves of heat rolling off the large Unsnakely leering from the ledge above the boat.]

F. I'm Rootless (WILDCARD)

[I worked so hard on these prompts! My poor tippy-tapping typing fingers...! But your happiness matters more. Throw me a prompt of your own!]

Comments

[terriblepurpose]

You can't be here.

[Paul is not all right, not at all. He isn't angry. Anger might be more comprehensible than the panic with which he lurches unsteadily to his feet, his gaze turned out to the ocean, and the storm.

(Far away, the figure on the sand might seem to turn as well, but there is a building fog on this shoreline that obscures it.)]

What were you thinking? [Paul whirls on Lazarus and nearly falls over, his balance spun out and away from him.] Why would you - it doesn't matter, go, go back to the room, where is it?

[Paul cannot see a door, or a building, when he looks down the beach to trace Lazarus' footsteps. The mysteries that would intrigue him - Lazarus' return to form, the echo of the dream, and the majesty of Lazarus' glorious omen next to his wizened self - are so much salt on the wind, which begins to pick up with the storm, the waves growing more troubled.

It smells like cinnamon, and Paul curses in a language he doesn't know, a fluid fall of ancient syllables.]

[hearthebell]

[Lycka's form seems to lighten, her outline more smokey than solid as she levitates, looping back, agitated and efficient as she surveys the waves and their ever-increasing violence.]

That's not how it works.

[His voice stretches patience until it breaks, becoming terse and tetchy.]

There's the door into the dream, and the door to leave. They're not the same... the door to leave is hidden, always.

[A man needs a purpose, and some challenge or chaos to rise to. In the absence of those things, it won't be long before he creates his own.

Pity the wretch who ends up in one of L's dreams.]

Pull yourself together... what kind of ruler can't work under pressure? I always find the door, and this time won't be any different.

[terriblepurpose]

[Pull yourself together may as well be a hard slap, the way Paul recoils and then draws himself up in outrage as his head whips towards Lazarus, his chin lifted and nostrils flared over a grimly pressed mouth. But, for all that, he doesn't blink. He hasn't blinked once since he opened his eyes, and forced tears are beginning to collect along his lower eyelashes.

He nearly lashes out in reflex, though he hasn't chosen the method before he stops himself. What kind of ruler, indeed?]

Then start looking.

[An order, not a request. If he wants the Atreides heir, that's who he'll get, and in all the rippling chaos of his mind there is a fragile part of Paul that is furiously, brokenly grateful for that.

He looks back towards the sea, and the sand at his feet stirs and rises to fold into armor, the hilts of knives assembling themselves in his palms before their blades flow into existence. The helmet does not close over his face when it curves around the back of his skull, even that mercy denied him.]

If the wave hits, stay with him.

[That he directs to the circling orca, as if she's his to tell what to do.]

[hearthebell]

[Though L seems, in his everyday life and mundane dealings, affected and fragile, a crisis brings out the steel in him. He doesn't budge in the face of Paul's emotional reaction, his expression as sharp as his tone.]

I have been looking.

[Lycka, hovering and searching above the water, stops abruptly and plunges straight down into the choppy waves. She emerges, rushing back to shore and dropping a corked bottle in her Sleeper's waiting hand.

He uncorks it with his teeth, a slender finger fitting easily inside the narrow bottle neck and removing the rolled up piece of paper within.

Lycka, whether or not she's inclined to obey Paul, remains close as L's eyes scan the paper.]

Usually...

[He raises his voice to be heard over the wind, a roll of thunder that threatens to drown him out.]

They're words that can have multiple common associations. "Smoke" could refer to fire, or a pipe. In this case...

[In this case, clearly, it's not the case. He hands the slip to Paul, crouching in the sand to consider what he's memorized as though there isn't something terrible coming in gusts and waves.]

Valiant, he, native Hal.
Inhale vat. Halt! Naive, vain, lathe.

[terriblepurpose]

[The knife in his hand twists, hooks on a niche in the armor designed for just that purpose, and Paul accepts the slip of paper. The words are blurred by salt-water, and when he tries to disassemble and analyze the letters they dig into him like broken shells.

He looks at Lazarus instead, then his omen, and Paul sees the connections between them as clearly as if they were written on the air. A mind like an apex predator, solving puzzles in a room. The paper drifts from his fingers, cut into memory, and falls back into the surf. Or where the surf was, as the wave begins to ebb.]

I think that's for you, not for me. If we go under, you'll think you can't breathe, but you climb the steps, you carry the crown -

[Another curse, another language, and perhaps Lazarus will recognize ancient Greek spoken with an accent not Paul's own.]

You can breathe. I don't know what happens, with you here. I don't know what changes.

[hearthebell]

[L hugs his knees tighter, staring at the clouds as though hoping to read some further clue or answer there. For him, nothing is clearly written in the air. He turns his face back towards Paul.]

Tell me more about the steps and the crown!

[Shouting, not out of anger or with the intent to intimidate, but because the gale force winds are competing with his generally soft and resonant baritone.

He recognizes the Greek. His eyes are alight with comprehension as he uses his finger to gouge letters into the wet sand with rough, slicing motions.

A T H E N A

N A V A L

V I T A E ]

Why do you think I'll be able to breathe underwater?

[In his experience, so far, breaking the laws of physics while lucid dreaming is a feat of absurd self-deception. He's not yet managed it, though he has heard it's possible.

The waves are coming closer to shore now. He inches back when it washes away his letters, frowning, writing more.

A V I A T E

H A V E N

EVIL]

[terriblepurpose]

[Paul's hand still gripping a knife clenches as Lazarus calls to him about the the steps and the crown. The storm howls, and even Paul's soaked hair whips in his wind, lashing across his bare face.]

It's not water.

[He needs to do better than that, but the words already come like he's hauling them dripping from the deep, his voice fiercely controlled. Tears are streaming from the corners of his eyes as they burn with the burden of relentless sight.]

This is the future.

[Paul has always dreamed it as the sea, even before he came here. The waves, the rocks, the storms, the depths. The scent of cinnamon gives way to the scent of sea-brined lime. Paul takes another breath, his lips part to speak again, and the storm arcs with a thousand bolts of lightning over the sea, a blinding, tumultuous flash.

When the thunder comes, it comes like a blow. Paul falls to his knees on the sand under its weight.]

The king heard the call, and his heart cried out in answer. The people heard the cry, and did not understand, and their voices rose up and they asked, oh king, what has made you cry out?

[There are two voices layered over each other. One is Paul's, despairing, furious, and the other is his, but as if he grew up speaking this language, learned it with river mud under his nails as a sphinx rose new and gleaming in the stretching sands of the Old Kingdom.]

[hearthebell]

[He's listening, even as he claws into the wet sand to give some kind of visual and tactile element to his thought process. Perhaps it's the desperation of a man to feel as though there is something tangible to show for his efforts, the knowledge that thought alone does not look urgent or productive to those around him.

The spectacle of many keyboards and monitors and television screens is an impressive one, he knows from experience. Technology is godlike to those who don't understand it; it's a show of power not unlike the pyramids of old.

He buckles at first under the thunder, but it's merely loud to him, not physically heavy. He redoubles his efforts, shouting to Paul to be heard.]

That's good!

[Encouraging the mysterious, double-toned discourse even as he's working out how to understand and incorporate it. It's easier to reduce than it is to extrapolate, as a general rule; too much information, mostly irrelevant, is better than not enough, if there's even a grain of truth to it that's possible to isolate from the noise.

He doubts very much that any of it is as irrelevant as it may first appear, if only because his gut tells him to listen like their lives depends on it, and not tune it out so that he can concentrate more fully on his puzzle. There's a bleak sort of logic to it; if there are two people here, wouldn't there be two puzzles, or at least two interlocking components?]

What has made you cry out!

[His last word sounds stifled and muted, if only because a realization has struck him. Two of them. He mutters the words in the message by pairs, discovering, in dismay, that they are all the same.

L E V I A

His finger curls in the sand.

OK.... ok. Lycka, at his side, is silent and still, staring at the body of water.

Athena is "wisdom," naval is "ocean," vitae is "life." Aviate is "sky," haven is "safety," evil is "danger."

Alphabetically?

Danger. Life. Ocean. Safety. Sky. Wisdom.]

Here's what I think!

[He stands, letting the water smudge out the beginning of that long word. Repeated five times, it blared like a warning klaxon, didn't it?]

This starts with danger and ends with wisdom. There's a life form in the ocean... and that's where we'll find the key. There's a door in the sky, and... that's our way to safety. I'm guessing...

[He laughs mirthlessly. There's an ugliness to it, an unfairness.]

If keys have teeth... I think that teeth, also, have keys.

[terriblepurpose]

[Teeth, and the ocean that is not an ocean surges at the word. Paul cries out, like a gull, and prophecy spills forth in that long-dead desert language:]

An open eye, opening, opening the inside of you and the king called out to the people, be not afraid, I have seen the throne, I have seen the steps, I have seen the crown and the people did not understand, they could not hear the throne, and they whispered to themselves, but the king did not hear as he looked past the horizon and he raised his hand -

[The mist-wreathed distant end of the beach stirs as if moved by the breath of some immense thing, and the waves pull back, and pull back, baring the shallows of these shores to open air.]

And even the sea bowed. [Both voices say, young, exhausted, so softly that it shouldn't be possible to hear it over the wind.] Come and get me, then.

[The tidal wave comes like fate falling across a doomed city, a wall of concussive water that, if it were real, would surely crush them both, shatter their bodies like so much flotsam (or are they jetsam, after all) before they even had the chance to drown.

Paul opens his arms to it, his chin raised, as the sky is swallowed by the sea, and the shadow of the yet-to-be. In the next moment, the wave will fall, and he sees the black deep that they will be swept into, as he has again, and again, and again.

There is no way to know it is the deepest trench in this formless sea, except that he knows it.]

[hearthebell]

[Lycka moves nimbly, for something weighing multiple tons. It helps that she's not truly beached, just as she is not a true whale, but she still instinctively moves to shield her narrow-boned Sleeper from the crush of the churning waves. He moves backwards on his hands and feet, crablike, his heart pounding in his chest from the exhilaration of solving a puzzle, the fear of the unknown turning into a very rational fear of the known.

Further back from the waves, and incidentally closer to Paul, he can hear the prophecy more clearly. Mighty in proportion, seeming biblical in nature. He finds his feet, standing, pale in the greying light of the storm. Because he can interpret what happens here and decode what it means, but he can't control the nature of the ride that snatches him up when he slips into a dream any more than one can control their tea leaves or the tarot cards they draw.

Paul can't control this either, he realizes. Only predict, and if dreams can pose a danger to a Sleeper, surely that monstrous wave would do the job. Lycka turns herself into a dam for his benefit, but he knows how many tons of water will come crashing down on their heads, how futile it will ultimately be in the end.

Unlike Paul, he doesn't open his arms to it, rather crosses his ankles in front of him and folds his hands in his lap. The sand under his fingernails, a conch in his peripheral vision.

Lycka is there when he opens his eyes. He senses it, even as he cannot see in this black pit of pressing leagues. Paul might be very close, or extremely far from him. Lycka's percussive pops and clicks check the area through echolocation.

Meanwhile, L holds out as long as he can until his lungs burn and reflexively fill themselves; it turns out, in the end, that he can breathe after all.]

[terriblepurpose]

[There is a body in the water with them, a hundred meters away. It floats inverted in the pressure that should crush them both, the freezing sea that ought to sap the warmth of life from them. One leg is drawn up, like a dancer's, and the arms are stretched towards the depths.

And there is another body underneath it, dreaming and vast, a body that cannot be described in one set of words. Every pulse of sound reveals a shifting boundary, a new form, the myriad creatures of the sea manifesting and disappearing in roiling nightmare.

This is where it ends. This is where it always ends. Paul will wake gasping and hollowed, and he will get up, wake Lazarus, bypass this talk of keys and doors and teeth, and he will never step foot in Cassandra again.

Above the nightmare, a pair of eyes open, and it's as if the moon devoured the sun's light whole and cast it from itself. The black depths tremble around them like a beating heart as they are flooded with luminous, unnatural light, and then -

- they are in the shallow surf of the black stone shore of a tiny island. The sea is still black and lightless, even as it gently laps the land, and the sky above them is shifting to strangeness as the moon slowly eats the sun in eclipse.

There is mist in front of them, clustered only around whatever must fill the center of this jutting patch of land, the black stone of the shore giving way to a glowing pearlescence as it approaches the fog: a promontory of paleblood stone, just like that of the Sanctuary where their bodies still sleep.

Paul kneels in the surf in all black, from his boots to his high, closed collar and stares, disbelieving, with eyes still unbearably open.]

What is this?

[The cradle-language of civilization, the language of the first laws and first kings, spoken by a boy born uncounted millennia after their monuments fell back into the earth from which they were raised.

In front of L, there is a key, underneath the waves, glowing paleblood clear through the black water. A key that changes shape as soon as it's perceived, shifting back and forth: a key, long-handled; a tooth, short and serrated; a key, shaped as a dagger; a tooth, razor-sharp and thin. If he touches it, if he dares to, the mist will begin to recede over the steps carved into the sloping stone.

Here they are, at last.]

[hearthebell]

[L remembers the outline of this from reaching into Paul's mind, back when he was wholly new to even realizing his blood type, much less the power it held. He remembers the fear, the pressure, the slugs and worms on his face that turned out to be a manifestation of his own psychic injury. Much like reaching blithely into the hollow trunk of a tree only to find a hornet nest, he had been greedy for knowledge then.

Strange, how one with that predilection never really learns. Lycka nudges his shoulder roughly as she passes, the spirit of the sea life surrounding her spooking what should have no predators, what should be fully confident and fearless even among leopard seals and sharks.

Kicking his legs, he starts to propel himself toward the silhouette in the water against the terrible light in the deep, the water reverberating around him, and Lycka returns to his side, teeth close around his arm this time, razor sharp and slicing in spite of her attempt to be gentle with him. His last awareness in the depths is being pulled away from the folly of his curiosity like a rag doll, as swiftly as Lycka can manage without dislocating his shoulder, and even then...

He feels the wind again, more of a breeze than a buffeting gust. The black water licks the blood from Lycka's teeth away- he knows she's sorry, he knows she had to- and he uses his uninjured arm to push himself to a crouch, and then rise, standing. He sways, his center of balance off, before making his way toward the softly questioning Paul's kneeling, black-clad figure.

A glint catches his eye. Left arm, it is, because the fingers of his right don't open and close reliably at the moment. He bends, closes a hand around the key. Whatever shape it takes, he thinks, it has one purpose that matters more than any other.]

Something real...?

[It would have to be. The breeze carries off the mist, and Lycka floats alongside him once more.]

cw: human remains, dead animals (non-graphic)

[terriblepurpose]

[There is no doubt what the steps will lead to even before the last shreds of mist drift clear. There is no mystery revealed when a rough-cut seat emerges at the top of the steep climb, an ugly imposition over what once was a gracefully rising marvel, the delicate lines of the spire ruined by its angular mutilation.

It is what is on the steps that is the mystery.

An ornate, illuminated sword tossed down without its sheath. A tiny, sodden falcon, curled with its back to the sea. A grinning human skull wearing aviator glasses, wound in a length of chain that ripples from devotional to murderous to confining, on a bed of golden roses. A crumpled, colorful poster. A beautiful cream-colored rabbit, splayed out long and still. A shining apple missing a single bite made by inhuman teeth. A perfectly articulated skeletal human hand, spread protectively over a stack of letters written on a substance as thin as breath.

On the throne, lightly steaming, a simple, perfect teacup and saucer.

But these are not the things that Paul's eyes fix to. What he stares at is the back of a distant figure no longer distant, standing on the first step, twin knives held lightly in their hands. They are sheathed in a form-fitting armor, textured as shark skin is, an armor that is so closely molded to them that it shifts and expands with their breathing. A cowl of gauzy silver hoods their head and drapes over their slim shoulders.

The knife in one hand is a knife. The knife in the other hand is an idea of a knife, a flickering nothingness fixed to a black stone handle.]

No. [Paul stands, doubled voice lashing out like a chain, like the weight of command.] No, this isn't real.

[As if hearing them for the first time, the figure half-turns their head, revealing the slightest sliver of yet more armor curved over their jaw. They pause there, as still as marble.]

Do you see me?

[The figure asks, in a rasping, lilting, maddened chorus. It raises a foot, and Paul lurches from the sea, stricken by a wordless, incomprehensible horror -

- the delicate fingerbones snap underneath it, and Paul throws himself at the figure as swift and silent as murder, twin knives blooming again from his hands. The figure turns to meet him, and they set at once to the earnest work of trying to kill each other, a violence so all-consuming it leaves no room for anything else.

L is free to do as he will. They aren't going anywhere, as the moon slides over the sun, a total eclipse.]

[hearthebell]

[L falls into step behind Paul, silent, cradling his injured arm to prevent it from dripping blood on the steps. Each one gets special notice, because each symbol seems, in some way, significant.

Skyward. The eclipse wouldn't be the door, he surmises, mind unceasing in its deductive process even as they approach, finally, the figure that had evaded him on the beach in his attempts to approach it. In all of his dreams, the door might be difficult to find or difficult to reach, but it is never impossible. The dream, in some unspoken agreement, does not cheat that way.

Sword, falcon, skull, poster, rabbit, apple, hand, teacup. Eight, so eight letters... but nothing that makes any sense that can use all of them. Synonyms or associations then... but it's a pain, because now, they have another problem.

Paul is fighting his doppelganger, and both of them seem to be going for the kill. He turns to Lycka, eyes wide and exasperated, the edges of his dream burning bright as the engine of his mind hits the throttle, burns through some store that is not as important as figuring this out right now.]

Falcon... birds, ornithology.

[The knives clash against each other, their metallic ring jarring his thoughts. He closes his eyes, squeezing the key in his left hand.]

Sword. Teacup. Rabbit.

[Those are all fine, he reasons, all serviceable.]

Hand... hand. Palamedes. Poster... Image... skull... death... expiry?

[Lycka nudges him. He's missing one, and the reason is because he didn't account for himself. That apple is his; he thinks to the implication of cyanide on the ship, Illarion's sly smile.]

...Poison.

[Lycka keens a high whistle, and he nods frantically.]

That's all of them?

[O S T R P I E P]

...top spire. Get me up there...

[He uses his mouth for the key, his left arm for holding onto his omen's back as she carries him. The key hole isn't visible; he has to probe with his left fingers to find it. Paul and his armored twin continue to fight, below, as he slots the key (no, tooth, no key) where it was made to fit.

The door, huge and high behind the throne, begins to open.]

cw: violence, impalement

[terriblepurpose]

[L might be surprised (or he might not, by now) to know that on the steps, Paul is also solving a puzzle.

The fight is a silent one except for their footfalls and the glancing of knife against knife. There's no spare breath to waste as they clash in a quicksilver and black near-blur. They might seem indistinguishable to an outsider, at first, but inside the lightning storm Paul begins to find the measure of what he's dealing with.

Paul fights with killing precision, as he was trained, and the collapsing star fury in him pushes his perceptions and reactions to their most crystalline, vicious edge. He learned his lesson about shields, and every strike he makes is aimed to maim or kill, his knives moving nearly as fast as his impulses can fire.

The other figure flows sinuously around them as if they knows where he'll be. They bat away Paul's strikes with a knife-that-is-not and then, languidly, contemptuously, find a place to cut him with the other. They know where Paul will be before he's there, and for an eternity of seconds they are locked in place at the foot of the steps where the figure leapt to greet him as Paul's blood rises in silver lines across his face, seeps through shallow slits in his clothing. He's being toyed with.

The star collapses. Gravity shifts. Paul opens his open eyes, and he stops thinking about what he'll do before he does it.

The figure is pushed, one step at a time, up the stairs, and all Paul needs is a mistake, one mistake, to force them into an error and then it will be over, and they will go, and Paul will never set foot in Cassandra again.

The hooded figure stumbles. They fall back, the real knife falling from their hand, the unreal one flickering, and Paul falls on them like death itself.

Or he tries to. He is caught, as if a hand was placed firmly under his sternum, and he doesn't understand what has happened until the figure sits up and pulls back on the shimmering barbed fishing spear that has extended from their hand. He doesn't scream, he can't, as his knives fall from nerveless fingers and the figure reaches out with an open hand -

- and pulls Paul in close, like a friend, like a brother, weaving sharkskin fingers into his hair as they rest Paul's head against their shoulder and cradle him there, Paul twitching on his knees and wet around the mouth with unvoiced agony.]

Look at you. Playing with knives. Playing games. Playing pretend. [The chorus is a husky, gentle lullaby as they whisper into the curve of Paul's ear.] You're trying so hard. It's too much, and you're not enough. Little Paul Atreides, all by himself. I know you're afraid. But you're going to hurt yourself. You're going to hurt everyone.

You shouldn't have to do this alone. You can't. Let me help you. Let me keep them safe for you.

[The spear retracts, and the figure stands above Paul, looking down on him clutching at the hole pierced through his center. They look without eyes, their hood fallen back over the seamless caul that obscures their face. They turn. They climb, one bloody footstep at a time, up steps that have become empty of any sign of the objects once strewn over them. They pay no attention to L or to Lycka, as if they are not there, until they stand in front of the throne, where a single teacup still steams as if only now poured.

They face out towards the sea and kneel on the left side of the throne, dripping hands on their knees, and they are silent and still.

Halfway up the stairs, Paul lies on his back and stares at an eclipse, silver blood trickling down the steps as he wills himself to get up, to get on hands and knees and crawl if he has to, but his body betrays him as much as his mind has. As much as he has.]

[hearthebell]

[Steel-on-steel and well-matched footwork are the constant background noise as L grinds away at his process, is delivered to the keyhole, unlocks the door. Tall and sharp, The doorway is geometric and angular, ending in a point like the highest point on the tower-like structure, and though it's opening slowly, the progress is steady; soon there will be enough space for a slender humanoid or a charm bracelet orca whale to easily maneuver through.

The door leaves with L, however. Waking up means leaving everything here, perhaps indefinitely. When Lycka lets him gently down, he sees the copy kneeling just yards away next to the throne, but ignoring him. There's silver blood on the floor and trailing to the steps; most of it is not from L's wounded arm.]

Lycka...

[In an undertone; the shark-skinned adversary doesn't seem to react to him, but should he decide to engage the scrawny detective in battle, knowing a few practical capoeira maneuvers probably won't be enough. He waits, wedging himself in the doorway to ensure that it remains open, watching anxiously for his omen to reappear.

For the second time in this dream, Lycka nudges up against Paul. This time she doesn't have the buoyancy of water to aid her in carrying dead weight; her contact is insistent, asking for him to help by holding on.

If he can't, she'll take hold of the loosest part of his clothing she can with her razor sharp teeth, carrying him to the door and pushing him through before L follows, sitting bolt upright on his bedroll.

Eyes still heavy-lidded from the sleeping potion, he recognizes immediately that the harm visited on him in the dream remains. His arm looks like an orca whale's jaws dragged him to safety by it. He turns his eyes to Paul, reasoning that it's better to face this result sooner rather than putting off what might be unpleasant.]

[terriblepurpose]

[Lycka lifts Paul by the front of his jacket, and this time, he's awake enough to dreamily wonder at her. She's beautiful, and if she's the last thing he sees, he wouldn't mind. He does his best to help her, but that amounts to very little.

She's not the last thing Paul sees. When Lazarus turns to look, Paul looks back, his eyes wide and fixed. They're green again, he can tell, because he can close them, and he does. His hand rests below his sternum, where there is no hole, only the jagged marks of an orca's teeth in the robe Paul was not wearing when she tugged him back to the waking world. The cuts are vanished too, as if they were not there, and Paul finds enough coherent hate left in him to be offended by another inconsistent rule.

A passing native Disciple pauses, looking in on the pair, and upon seeing Lazarus' injuries claps a hand over their mouth and says, through their fingers: "Oh! I will fetch -"]

Get away from us. ["Brother Paul, I really don't -] Get away from us.

[Paul's eyes snap open again as he snarls, guttural and ugly, pushing up on one hand to glare at the interloper with his other hand still pressed to his unharmed chest. He looks like he could kill them, and for a moment, he wildly thinks he might. They turn on their heels and flee, likely to fetch someone.

He spits, leaving his mouth tasting no more or less like the sea, and lowers his eyes to the stones beneath him. He curls his hand against them, fingernails catching on a seam, and breathes in. He breathes out.]

Did you get what you wanted?

[Bitter as lime.]

[hearthebell]

[Somehow, Paul actually looks like he's uninjured and whole... at least, physically. Understandably, the boy's shaken, and having had other dreams to compare this experience to, L fully understands why.

Every dream is immersive; some are dangerous. There are rules he can always rely on so long as they occur within his own mind. Everything was sharper, harsher, and more difficult, and that's not even addressing the apparent gravitational pull the dream possessed. Paul's not the type to fall asleep on the job- anyone who's met him even briefly would recognize that- and yet, until he'd pulled Paul ashore with Lycka, L had thought it was the only way for two people to exist alongside one another in the same dream.

As Paul snaps at the Disciple, L's broader, more muscular shoulders shrink and curl inward; if his strength and resolve are a matter of checks and balances, this ordeal has overdrawn him significantly. His injury is the least of it; his mind isn't even much of a refuge, considering the hell it just pushed them both through.

He starts to consider whether or not he owes an apology, prioritizing intent first and then the result, and somewhere, the train of thought fizzles out like a small meteor skating on the surface of the sea and sinking. He pulls his knees close, staring straight ahead, a ringing in his ears that's cut sharply when Paul asks his question in a biting tone.

He stares back, wary and troubled, as though Paul is speaking the same strange, ancient language in the dream, and this time, he can't understand.

He does, of course, but the answer has the same disconnect as the apology he might or might not owe. Lycka, the size of a human infant, cleaves to his chest, pressing herself as close as she can to her Sleeper.]

[terriblepurpose]

[Paul catches the flicker of motion, the silence in lieu of answer and raises his head only to watch Lazarus draw in on himself. He sucks in air between his clenched teeth, bitter rage dissolving into hollowness, into an ache deeper than the phantom pain of tearing barbs.

Look at you.]

I didn't mean that. [Subdued, empty, quiet.] I didn't...

[He can decide what else he didn't after he does what he's supposed to. Paul steels himself, then pushes to his feet, moving slowly and gingerly as he pushes aside stacked blankets and retrieves a Trench-fitted first aid kit. He'd been being responsible. It had almost been a joke.

He sinks back to his knees to approach Lazarus, still careful, deliberate. He thinks of the difference between the Lazarus of the dream, his commanding brilliance and the inexorable driving force of his mind barely contained in his bent-stick body, and this Lazarus, hale and cowed into silence.

Look at you.]

I'm not angry with you. Let me see.

[hearthebell]

[He blinks, letting his eyes remain closed a little longer. While he's in darkness, he sees the edges of a padded room around a door. The keypad's giving him problems; he's locked in, and when he opens his eyes again, they look hunted and lost.

He holds his injured arm out like it's not a part of him, his left cradling Lycka, whose tail thrashes in frustration. He pulls from a final reserve, remembers the code, and frees himself. Lycka looks up, seems to sigh her relief.]

Anger would be a reasonable... natural reaction. I don't take it personally, but I... don't...

[He shakes his head; the motion is over-vigorous, lacking in subtle control.]

I didn't think it was possible. Your arrival, I mean. I didn't know that could happen.

[terriblepurpose]

I know. I believe you.

[Paul fishes the fabric scissors from the kit first and notices his hands are shaking. His hands don't shake. But they do, and it takes too long to make them stop. Once they are still, he cuts away the sleeve of Lazarus' shirt and pulls back the fabric.

The teeth marks of a predator, however gently meant, are ugly things. Paul soaks gauze in green-tinged antiseptic and begins to clean the wounds, his eyes lowered to the task. He's as careful as he knows how to be. (Not enough.)]

That wasn't your fault. It was mine. These aren't so bad. You'll be all right.

[hearthebell]

[L's dark grey eyes follow the trembling of the scissors, but they don't seem to make him any more trepidatious. The arm around which Paul's cutting, after all, hasn't felt like his since he shed, and what's one more clean cut if they happen to slip?

It's OK, he wants to reassure, my soul turns on me sometimes and causes damage, but only when it has to, only when it's really worth the price.

Instead, he holds Lycka, watching Paul's hands tremble, watching them steady, all with the detachment of a student observing a surgery.]

Why is it your fault?

[Genuine question, practically motivated. Blame isn't productive, but an ounce of prevention, and all of that.]

It was real...

[A dream, obviously, it was a dream, but that does not mean it was fake. L came here for something true, after all, and in that way, he did get what he wanted.]

Will you be alright?

[He asks with the hesitant caution of a skeptic, a disbeliever.]

[terriblepurpose]

[Paul doesn't answer right away. He finishes cleaning the wounds, then dabs on a thick, floral-scented paste derived from vileblood. The bleeding begins to slow, and he assesses whether or not any of these will need stitching.]

I said I wouldn't let anything happen to you.

[And here, the evidence of how thoroughly and completely he failed to do so. The way Lazarus holds Lycka so tightly to himself, like an anchor, like a ward, is indescribable. Or maybe Paul doesn't want to describe it to himself.]

I should have known better. [He's surprised at the even keel of his voice.] I'm all right. Is there anything else that's hurt?

[Since he didn't look. He barely noticed the other man there except to be frustrated by him, Lazarus' presence like the grit in an oyster that has spit this perfect, bloody pearl of knowing. While Lazarus fought to find a way out of the dream, Paul abandoned him.

Of course he's all right, as he moves with the smooth precision of a machine. He's always all right. He's always left standing unharmed in the middle of devastation. Why would it ever change?]

[hearthebell]

[He shakes his head again, the same strangely violent and exaggerated motion, as though all the tension and energy in his body has congregated in his neck and found an outlet there.]

No one's ever been able to make that promise to me and keep it.

[It's meant to absolve Paul of his guilt, perhaps, but there's no way to say it that doesn't sound terribly sad, is there.

He ignores the question about other injuries; he suspects there's something else, but it's deeper than flesh, the kind that can only be cured by solitude, rest, small and repetitive palliative practices that can put him right, affecting the approximation of balance for someone who wasn't born with it and failed to cultivate that baseline.

His is a pattern of spectacularly clever voyages and nearly catatonic salvage missions. The middle ground is an hazy and uncertain place that he can never inhabit for long, because he will always swing to an extreme that will beget its opposite.

He swallows, adjusting his emphasis, because the point of prophecy is that it hasn't yet occurred.]

Will you be alright? The vision stalking you is real, so... what will you do?

[terriblepurpose]

[A better person would react differently. Sympathy, perhaps, condolences. Some kind of reassurance, or at the very least, an apology for being part of a long line of failures.

Paul glances up with darkened eyes and a set jaw, then looks down once more to start bandaging the wounds. The salve has done its work stemming blood flow, and the shared vigor of all Sleeper blood will do the rest. (It might scar, Paul thinks, and there's the feeling of needing knives in his hands.)]

The things I see... [This is as much reassurance as he knows how to give, in this tight, quiet tone.] They don't always happen the way I see them. They don't always mean what they seem like they mean.

I'll have to think about it. [He secures the bandage with a tucked end and a piece of adhesive, sits back on his heels.] What are you going to do?

[Now that he's seen whatever that was. Paul casts his mind back to the steps, to the things on them. A handful he could make suppositions about, but the sound of finger bones snapping - his hands clench and he doesn't know why, a tendon in his neck twitching.]