grice: (pic#14509852)
don’t make me go wumbo ([personal profile] grice) wrote in [community profile] deercountry2022-03-02 12:48 am

like, zoinks

who: falco grice and you!
what: a march catchall! a couple general open prompts are available along with some closed, perhaps open event prompts will be added in later! please refer to falco’s corruption page for a rundown; he’ll be experiencing low to mid levels of corruption throughout the month! if you choose to have your character injured in the trenchwood prompt, falco will be healing them with his blood!
when: throughout march!
where: throughout trench!

content warnings: child soldiers, possible gun violence, self harm (for healing purposes), possession, parasitism, slime, corruption, will add more as they come!


ʜᴀᴜɴᴛᴇᴅ ᴛʀᴇɴᴄʜᴡᴏᴏᴅ
[ helping with general beach cleaning once he’d retrieved the injured, dead, or pieces of them after the leviathan’s passing was what falco had busied himself with for most of the first few days after the surfacing. he’d managed to get enough rest to function, though just as any his spirits weren’t quite high. plans to shadow more blood ministers were put on hold when falco began to exhibit a mild flu— just the spring season rolling its way in, perhaps, even though the boy had never had allergies in his short life. one can find him trekking through trenchwood for new herbs, roots and leaves that could be used for oils, mixes and healing agents.

any approach made toward falco will be heard eventually, whether by his own ears or the alarming shriek of his pygmy falcon omen from farther off. he’s usually quite the tame boy to approach, but on this day— the words that press into his thoughts and influence his actions are a slithery: yoͦuͧ can’t ǝʌᴉʌɹns if you don’t вⷡiͥᴛⷮeͤ.

he doesn’t hesitate to lift and aim his rifle at the direction of his approacher, and in worst-case scenarios— he fires and reloads with alarming precision, not counting the shot, which either hits or misses by the push of the breeze. he hasn’t learned that overnight— he’s always known during his stays across the universe, now in trench, learned since he was eight, when the weapon barely fit in his arms and he’d still be forced to carry it across bumpy terrain, mud and rainfall with a backpack and helmet in tow. his place as a warrior candidate was not earned without merit. despite not using most of his capabilities, he was a trained child. training is all it takes to make a dent.

the startling contrast, of course, was that falco would never shoot first, if one knew him well. with the way his heart bleeds for other’s, it’s easy enough to assume he would never shoot at all. he’d never want to enough to take initiative, at the very least. here, for a split second and then more, the look in his eyes is sharp and as at the ready as a dog baring its teeth. it doesn't last; what comes over him after realization snaps his attention in two is utter terror. ]


Oh . . . Oh, no.

ʜᴀᴜɴᴛᴇᴅ ʙᴇᴀᴄʜ ᴇᴘɪsᴏᴅᴇ
[ alternatively, one may find him at the bare coast of a beach that was once a battlefield, now a graveyard for beastblood remains. it's hard not to step onto the black sand and realize the floor is not naturally smoothed from the ocean's winds. there're man-made lines there, and there, and everywhere for a wide stretch of distance, circumference. look closely, and there are words— words upon words upon words, upside down, right sided, sideways, sometimes even overlapping:

ᴛʜᴇ sɪʟᴇɴᴄᴇ ᴛⷮhͪeͤ s͛iͥleͤncͨeͤ ᴛʜᴇ
ǝɔuǝʅᴉs ǝɥʇ ǝɔuǝʅᴉs ǝɥʇ ǝɔuǝʅᴉs ǝɥʇ s̶i̶l̶e̶n̶c̶e̶ ᴛʜᴇ sɪʟᴇɴᴄᴇ ᴛʜᴇ sɪʟᴇɴᴄᴇ ᴛʜᴇ ǝɔuǝʅᴉs ǝɥʇ ǝɔuǝʅᴉs ǝɥʇ ǝɔuǝʅᴉs ǝɥʇ
ᴛʜᴇ sɪʟᴇɴᴄᴇ ᴛⷮhͪeͤ s͛iͥleͤncͨeͤ ᴛʜᴇ sɪʟᴇɴᴄᴇ


the young teen with sandy blond hair and his black hood blown back has a stick in hand, focused on this activity and he’s writing it all with an unfit, too casual swing to his aura. those with a certain predisposition to recognize the energy of an entity would feel it like a flash: fear. it makes your gut drop the more you read and repeat the words. it gains strength the more you give it attention. falco himself seems to be oddly himself, at least, sniffy through his stuffy red nose and lifting his head to greet those who approach him. he’s a little . . . twitchy, pale and flaking, perhaps even slightly thinner, but he does seem happy for the visit. his purple tinted eyes (that’s wrong) say so— ]


Ah— Hello, [ sir or ma’am (or nothing, if you’re around his age). ].

[ a bow of his head, a soft, shying smile— he thinks you’re regarding his drawing, what he knows is a rendition of perle, but something isn’t right. starting with the fact that he didn’t draw perle at all. ]
possessum: (𝟎𝟒𝟔)

[personal profile] possessum 2022-04-20 09:47 pm (UTC)(link)
( There's a tension that lingers, but for those few initial moments, there's some chance it might be okay.

—And then Falco's reflection is wrong. Staring where it shouldn't be. Peter realises it weirdly belatedly, a second or two after the fact, almost too stunned to react. In those moments, Falco's seeing.... what horrible, horrible thing he's seeing, and the older boy sits beside him, feels those signs of the boy's personal terror, the little sound of fright. Falco, he starts to say in response, worried about whatever he might be glimpsing, but then Falco's speaking to him instead.

Or rather, the thing wearing him, the reflection of him. Peter stares, eyes wide and round, at the sound of his name so wrong. That voice isn't Falco's, it's... something Else's, and he wants to pull away from it. From the impossible mixture of sharp and warm, of pain and longing. But he doesn't, stays where he is, locked into place.

Something in him opens its golden eyes, alarmed and curious all in the same vein. Seen, maybe.

Peter flinches abruptly and snaps his eyes shut. Whatever's in there is much more direct than Paimon's ever been, speaking to him like this. And if it's speaking to him, what's it doing to Falco....? )


What do you want?!

( He answers it aloud, voice a little higher in its upset. Unsure if it'll even respond to him or not, and perhaps it's not best to engage with the... thing, but... Falco's clearly facing the brunt of the terror, here. He won't just abandon him. )
possessum: (𝟎𝟒𝟒)

[personal profile] possessum 2022-04-28 02:45 pm (UTC)(link)
( Peter's eyes are still squeezed shut, almost like a little boy hiding from what's under the bed or in the darkness of the closet. He's shuddering, feeling overwhelmed and dangerously close to panic — breathing too tight, too constricted.

Then it speaks again (Trench; it wants Trench). Is it a hushed whisper or a shrill scream? It's not like Paimon, whose spirit feels like too many lights and too many colours, like a hellish kaleidoscope, dazing. This is... darkness, oozing and wet and cold, and Peter's stricken with an almost primal fear, something that feels instinctive. This is something that crawls, seeps, consumes, and his entire soul wants to flinch from it, scramble and claw away.

His eyes fly open just seconds before Falco throws the mirror. In that brief flash, he sees it there in the reflection — its true face, but nothing that could be called a face. Something impossible to understand. It hurts to look at (or does it? Does he instead want to stare into that abysmal mess of nothing and everything? Until there's nothing left of him, only it?), and Peter wants to scream, but then the mirror's shattering into countless pieces of glass.

He's pushing himself backwards, scrambling against the floor, eyes wide and not entirely Peter's, because his own Inner Thing has risen up towards the surface in the throes of all of this. Eyes half-swollen with black, full and shimmering, Paimon swirls within him, both ready to meet a potential threat with force, but also... curious. So curious. The thing called out to him. The thing, the thing, the thing, what is the thing? )


Falco— ( Peter gasps with a whimper into the silence. The younger boy's not saying, doing, anything. Peter realises he's scrambled a few feet back from him and sits up, shaking uncontrollably, but then Paimon seeps into his voice and changes it: a soft and emotionless hiss that calls out to Falco, gently. )

Child. The Beast... wants Trench? Wants everything?
possessum: (𝟎𝟔𝟑)

[personal profile] possessum 2022-05-04 04:16 pm (UTC)(link)
( Peter — not-Peter — stiffens. It isn't the boy who answers him, but The Thing. He's so curious of it, but there's a wariness, too. A need to protect his own vessel, and to protect Luna from what this entity can potentially do.

Those voices whisper (or scream) for what they want — sadness, pain, fear, hate, hungry. Certainly, the demon king has known those things, not so long ago. When he was ripped from one host and during the time he was waiting to be given his next. The host's young body and mind had to be made vulnerable in order for his spirit to be able to occupy it. It had to be eroded down, torn away, piece by piece. Peter had to be made empty. And there had been so much sadness, pain, fear, hate. Peter's family had crumbled to pieces. Paimon had torn them apart, one by one, by one.

....But that wasn't his decision, at the root of it. It was the cult, guiding him, manipulating him... He's learned, since then. Learned how they'd used him, sought his abilities to provide great knowledge and treasures. Learned how permanently occupying a host isn't something he's meant to do at all. Learned how he's been trapped here.

...But this Thing. This Thing ripples with the urge to consume, to destroy, and Paimon flinches as the memory of what it is to do those things ripples up in him, too. It moves, it twitches and crawls towards him; the boy it occupies cries. Paimon draws up like a spider, limbs taut and crouching, baring his teeth at it in warning. He isn't afraid of it, but wary of what it's stirring in him, and some aching part of him pities it— )


You will not feed here. ( He warns, staying where he is. He'll meet it head-on. ) Not on my witch. Not on my vessel.

( He lifts his head enough so that his chin is jutted, swollen eyes staring down at the Thing, studying with an intensity. What he says next is a different kind of warning, because the boy seems ready to split at the seams. )

You are going to rip apart your container. You are hurting it too much.
possessum: (and break the golden bowl)

[personal profile] possessum 2022-05-25 02:02 am (UTC)(link)
( Paimon doesn't remember how ancient his own spirit is. He's seen it, in the books Luna's found about him over time in her research. An entity that predates many of humanity's religions: something to be found in the most ancient spaces, something iridescent that shines through desert sands. A lost treasure.

But he doesn't remember being so old, so ancient, so great. He remembers— being in Peter, and little before that. There was another, perhaps another before that, perhaps another before that. Some days this body feels too big and he thinks he should have the hands of a child. Other days this body is too small and he's aware of that, yearns to escape, to be freed of its confines.

....While he doesn't have much concept of his own age, if such a term could even be applied to such an entity as he, he remembers.... when he'd first been joined with Peter, and how fitfully he resisted him. Tearing, smashing, breaking; those early months in Deerington were especially bloody. This Thing reminds him of that now. How it claws at itself. Wants to hurt its body, the boy. Some days, Paimon gets like that again, fingernails digging into Peter's throat, gasping—

—but not today. Today, he reaches both hands up to catch the other's wrists. Stopping it from pulling at Falco's wet cheeks. This flailing, wet thing inside the boy. It is lost. He catches it, for a moment. )


This is your home. If you break it, you will be—

( But the demon's words are abruptly cut off with a loud, pained gasp. With eyes rolling back, black flooded with brown again. Peter emerges at the physical touch to Falco's hands (at human touch meeting human touch), scrambles to pull himself out. )

Stop it! Stop it!! Stop!! ( He's shouting — at the demon? At the thing in Falco? Either, both, everything, stop. His hands let go of those wrists and move to Falco's cheeks instead, cupping his face, eyes wide and horrified and searching. Desperate. He has to save him from this awful thing with its impossible hunger. Pull him back out. )

Falco! Falco, come back! Falco!!

( ...Peter that's rude, the Spooky Otherworldly Entities were trying to converse. )
possessum: (𝟎𝟑𝟐)

[personal profile] possessum 2022-05-30 01:52 am (UTC)(link)
( It's— angry with him. Or displeased, or annoyed, or a variety of emotions that Peter can't quite identify, only knows that Falco would never look at him that way; it twists the younger boy's features into something that Peter wants to flinch away from again, but doesn't. He stays there, holding onto him, desperate — and then those eyes are changing. Back to... not normal, not that, but better than the purple.

Peter's staring widely down at him, still cupping his face, not daring to breathe. He still knows so little about how this works, how to handle Falco when this kind of thing happens. It's... Peter's first time coming face to face with the thing inside him.

Then he's asking for the bathroom, and he looks sick, and Peter lets go of his face to nod quickly, gesturing to the doorframe, wide eyes never leaving Falco's face. )


It's just— down the hall—

( He can sense the feeling of urgency, moves out of the way, but when Falco is on the move again, Peter will actually be only a few feet behind him, to come to a halt outside the bathroom door. )

Falco, do you... do you need help?