deercountry | like, zoinks

Entry tags:

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. ]

Threaded | Flat

[ something had been off the more time had ruminated the flu that wasn't a flu at all, and when falco's fear of feeling combative, of writing things he didn’t know he was writing and then looking at his reflection gave motive, he bolted from the beach, in his await for paul. he bolted straight for peter and luna to spend some nights and days with them— let them know, of course, that something was wrong.

they'd welcome not a warm, serene boy with bright eyes, but a boy that fidgeted, jumped too much at any sound or touch he hadn't expected and would jolt even more when done in silence. silence. that's this thing's name. and that’s the thing he’s so frightened about.

occasionally, small smudges of indigo slime can be found around the residence, a putrid smell of sulfur tagged to it with the same energy you would regard a dangerous animal with— it’s not something worth touching, intuition tells. it’s on falco’s hands, building down his neck like sweat, soaking parts of his clothes or dropping in puddling little globs when he tries to wipe it off. he takes to corners of rooms rather than fabric or mattresses, then eventually to the restrooms, so he’d worry less about the mess he’d leave behind (of course, a dried stain here and there tells a story of him trying to clean up). he can be found usually with his back to a wall but facing the doorway, knees to his chest, towel to soak his slime in one hand while a stuffed falcon is gripped in the other. all possible surfaces that produce reflections are face down or let gently onto the floor. peter’s birthday gift, a pair of matte black headphones, are snug over his ears and play tunes he enjoys, subtly heard through the quiet of the room itself. he may jump at the first sight of movement, eyes wide and frightened and struggling to keep the sudden rise in his gut down— and just as immediately, his shoulders and gaze relax. but not his heart, or his breathing.

or, what perhaps draws either of them to check on him is a sudden, panicked shriek past the corridors. ]

Edited 2022-03-02 04:05 (UTC)

[Michael is, perhaps, a little overconfident. Even in the split-second that he sees the gun come up, he doesn't exactly try to leap out of the way. Call it an immortal's natural lack of fear - by the time he realizes that this may be a problem, it's too late.

The bullet catches him in the shoulder, knocking him backwards off his feet. He hits the ground hard. Holy shit, is that what getting shot feels like?]

Son of a bench!

[Glittering darkblood is flowing heavily from the wound, forming a sparkly cloud in the air between him and his attacker. Like involuntary inking - it's a little funny. He immediately puts a hand wreathed in blue flame to the hole, trying to seal it over - or, wait, should you take the bullet out first? Shit.]

[I'd come back for you.

Steady hands pull on a hooded coat, set tinted glasses over blue-on-blue radiance; they fill a thermos with floral tea, another with precious milk, fold sugar into a wax paper packet. They write a note and set it under the edge of a geode, tuck blankets closer around a slight, sleeping form. Light feet step out into the world, and open eyes trace a path past the pale shoots of new caps, through the dark and formless waves of the yet-to-be, until a body stands once more on black sand.

Paul doesn't have to look at what Falco has traced in the sand, because he's already seen it, traced over and over on the wet, folded flesh inside his skull.

(I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.)

He pushes back his hood. He opens his mouth, and a hushed, subdued echo asks:]

Falco?

Edited 2022-03-02 18:00 (UTC)

[ .. well.

This sure is a scene, isn't it.

It's not quite what Ange expects to find on the beach in the middle of a walk - but on the other hand, maybe this is exactly the sort of thing she should expect while wandering around this place. Just something that seems both extremely odd and extremely omnious, all at the same time. The way those words repeat all over the place almost seems like a cliche, she thinks.

But it would have been easy to ignore them and just move on. Easy, that is, if it wasn't for the fact that she spots someone sitting there actually writing the words.

When he greets her, Ange faintly frowns. ]

.. Hey.

[ She recognizes him. It's been a while, but.. she's spoken with him before, hasn't she?

Did he look so weirdly pale back then? ]

What are you doing out here? [ Indulging in some really, really weird hobby? ]

[There's another boy out on the beach. He's standing at the edge of the shore with his feet in the water. Or more, accurately, with his feet on the water. As the tide ebs and flows, the water seems to move under him, as though he stands on it as easily as the sand. He stands there, watching, as if waiting for something.

Eventually, he turns his gaze back towards the land and something catches his ~~eyes~~ eye... words carved into the sand, twisted and unaligned like scars on skin. Reading them makes the hair on the back of his neck raise, a chill like he's fallen into cold water and, in his state, there's something oddly delightful in that sort of reaction.

He follows the words across the beach to a boy. ...Yes, he does know this boy. They're similar in ways most others aren't. Kaworu cocks his head, a smile on his face that's small and yet deeply unsettling at the same time.]

What are you doing?

Luz could have kicked herself. Do her stupid STUPID corruption, she'd missed that whole Leviathan debacle! Now she knew a handful of her friends were in trouble or no doubt stressed and out of their minds right now!

So Luz listened to Ruby and flew down to see if she could check up on any of the people in that fight, and sure enough, she was only flying for several minutes before she came upon Falco, who she recalled had been involved in the fight.

She had unfortunately not gotten as good a look as she should have though, because as she was descending down to talk, he suddenly moved like lightning and before Luz could quite register her immediate reaction to duck down, she felt the explosion at her shoulder, and for a moment she could only stare in horror before falling to the floor, engulfed in a pain that had come quick and unexpected.

"AUGH!"

[Thankfully, grass getting shot doesn't have the same impact or injury compared to a fleshy human. The bullet actually goes straight through Fern's arm, sending a spray of glitter and shredded plant matter into the air, and embeds itself in the tree behind Fern. It isn't great, but he doesn't have the same kind of pain receptors as a normal person, so his yelp is more out of shock than it is pain.

Falco's a good kid. What's he doing out here in the woods with a gun, and why is he so willing to fire? He could chalk this up to an overabundance of nervous cautiousness, what with the woods being dangerous and full of monsters, but it's still weird to him. He, of course, had been out there to get some excess energy out of his system, to pummel some monsters lurking too close to the farmlands like he usually did when frustrated about something. He wasn't expecting this.]

What the flip, dude??

[A few thorns are rising defensively up on his hands and arms under his coat and he's automatically moving into a more defensive stance, though he fights the urge to form a grass sword. Probably a good mood, since a split second later he's getting a whole wave of negative emotions from the tree behind him, the one that got hit by the bullet. Making a stressed noise, he puts a palm to his forehead and tries to block the invasive feelings out.]

What was that for?!

[Man, a lot sure happened last month. He'd stayed out of the Leviathan fight, for the most part. Dipper could fight ghosts and even giant robots, but that thing? He'd actually listened to his family for once and kept his nose out of it. He spent his time developing magic and working on anti-corruption methods. Both he and his sister had been hard at work at that for some time.]

[Once the Leviathan's felled, he makes a point to go and check on some people. He wasn't actually looking for Falco just now, but seeing him on the shore draws Dipper in his direction.]

Falco! Hey, man. How've-

[And there's a pause as he looks down at the sand. Something grabs his attention. Maybe he gets that single pulse of fear, but now there is apprehension and concern, too.]

...What are you up to?

[For someone so unused to guns -they're an extremely uncommon weapon in the Seven Kingdoms, only just coming into style thanks to overseas invention. But Cassandra never cared for them herself. They were clunky, noisy, and smelled of burning smoke once their limited use was made up. Give her a sword any day, and she'd show you just what close-quarters combat could do that a firearm couldn't.

Of course, that bravado isn't going to stop a bullet all on its own, but... that's what armor of unbreakable rock is for.]

Oof!

[The bullet hits dead on, right in the center of her ribcage. It doesn't break through her armor, no, but it leaves a distinct crack where it hands where something else might leave a dent. The force of it brings Cassandra to stumble, but she doesn't fall, no mater how shocked she is at the sudden forcing of all the air from her chest.]

Wha... what? [...] Falco?

Threaded | Flat

ғᴏʀ ᴘᴇᴛᴇʀ & ʟᴜɴᴀ

worst-case scenario

haunted beach episode

beach episode

beach episode

Haunted Trenchwood