logs | — villainy wears many masks

Entry tags:

— villainy wears many masks

WHO: aristaeus & others
WHERE: around the netherworld
WHEN: month of october
WHAT: catch-all
WARNINGS: will update as needed!

NOTES: Starters will be in the comments. Feel free to hit me up at

resurrectionist or at the event planning comment for plotting.

WILDCARD OPTIONS

CR: OPEN TO ALL; GEN-FAVOURED OFFERING:

KNOCK ON WOOD - General woodland encounters; he'll be escorting/teaming up with Johanna (exilire) but the woods are tricksy so it'll be easy to run into people. BONUS: Monster encounters
GO BIG OR GOURD HOME - Feast and Harvest Hunt meet-cutes. For the Feast, I'm interested in: grablenuts, will-o-the-whiskey and elysium particularly. For the Hunt, he'll probably be the hunter.
PARADE - No solid plans. He'd be really pressed about body-swapping.
WAYWARD SUN - Quite probably going to try to fight the Horseman to be honest.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

You want payback?

[ she reaches out to press her hand against the maze wall. her palm fits between stalks of corn. the leaves and husks are coarse on her skin, but for as tightly packed as it is, there's room there. room enough to hide, if it's thick enough.

she looks over her shoulder, both ways, then slips inside the wall. ]

( a moment of quiet, but one that feels heavy and weighted; he hasn't thought that far ahead. he's been defaulting to programming and, where that fails, sheer instinct.

and she's a target. dying hasn't changed that. )

It won't bring them back. ( and there's a lilt of something to it that tries so hard to be casual and composed, but fails utterly. this is a fresh wound, one that's going to take time to scab over. )

Then what do you want?

[ there's a sense of probing as she presses up against his presence there in her mind, where he punctures her like a thorn. no. more like where his skin still surrounds the bur of herself that she'd stuck in him, right? this was her doing.

it doesn't feel like it, she thinks, just before she sneezes from the irritants of the crops and dust in the thick of the wall. ]

( it's strangely intimate, how she maps out the contours of his thoughts, trying to learn what drives him — she's careful about it, too. the delicacy is perhaps the strangest thing about it given how the last time she'd dug around in his mind had ended. )

Relief.

( to not be here, is what he means. can she understand what it means to know that he has to rely on her, of all people, for his stability? )

Like I said.

[ waste of time.

she has no relief to give him. no friends to return. no peace to give, either through her death or his. they've already tried that, it would seem, and they're still running around just the same.

she wedges her way back towards what she thinks is the entrance. more people. more minds. she could get lost in them, blot his presence out. she picks up her pace, ignoring the mounting nausea that climbs up from her gut to her chest, like bile is not just crawling up her throat but filling her lungs. ]

Then I guess we're both fucked.

( what's that old saying about misery loving company?

besides, there's no getting around a fixation this ingrained. few as they've been, aristaeus knows the patterns well enough by now. knows she's going to itch and itch and itch at him until he finds some way to scratch it. it only makes sense, therefore, to find her. to hold onto her until he can figure out the rest. )

I wouldn't. ( it's said, catching the tail end of her thought. diving into a crowd might muddy the trail a little, but that just gives him an excuse to get excessive.

does she want that on her conscience? because he doesn't mind ensuring this harvest festival is extra memorable. )

All the more reason.

[ she wants nothing in common with him. whatever he chooses to do out there, that's on him. she knows what it means to carry other people's debts — she had been spared it, but other kuruko had not been so lucky. she won't carry his. she has no reason for it.

there's another reason to select the entrance. maybe if it wreaks havoc on her senses, being around all these people, then it will do the same for him. just as she had tasted the blood in his mouth in the ruin. just as she can feel the sweat on the back of his neck, now.

so even though it feels like emerging from a dark cavern to noontime light, she breaks the boundary of the corn maze for the entrance.

'hey!' someone shouts at her, but it's immediately washed away in the din of inner voices. a boy who wonders if he can tell his best friend that they're in love. a pickpocket trying to snatch a wallet. ]

Shit.

( what did i tell you about running your mouth? an edge on the voice now, the disapproval sharp enough to draw blood.

it brings him right back to the training yard. )

Not helping. ( muttered, head shaking as if to clear it. the voice — pallas who isn't pallas because pallas can't possibly be here — just laughs. it laughs and laughs and laughs.

well. fuck it, then.

trying to beat mavis out of the maze the usual way isn't going to work. even if he could cross that kind of distance.

he tests the corn — not solid enough to carry his weight and for all his skill, he'd never managed that kind of sustained weightlessness that would help him get around that. which leaves only one option: going through it. )

[ there is laughter all around her.

someone jumps out of the corn maze to spook passerby. their fear spikes her heart rate. mavis stumbles into a drunken reveler who is a singing a tune that she doesn't recognize, whether because he's slurring it or because there it shares nothing in common with the songs of the wilds.

the lights are too bright and seem to flash everywhere she looks. bodies, bodies, bodies bump her around. she can feel the sweat on the back of their necks because they wear thick jackets against the chill that leave them stuffy and overheated in the crowd.

and there, in the back of her mind, why are you fleeing? he should be running. you could kill him. you could kill all of them. she picks up to a run, back into the streets of mirth, away from the edge of the neighborhood where the maze was built. if she stays, she will hurt someone. ]

( he crashes through the wall of corn, snapping stalks as he goes. it presses in at him on all sides, thick and smothering. it would disturb him, perhaps, if he weren't so fucking furious.

there's a vague awareness of sound around him: laughter, the high-pitched shrieks of noise that could be delight or terror (likely both, considering). moving between the maze, his awareness is compressed to these snapshot impressions.

he doesn't slow. knows better than to allow himself to be distracted, even as things pluck at him from all sides. instead, he lets his instinct drive him.

eventually, he bursts from the maze, stumbling uncertainly as he tries to reclaim his bearings. the park is much louder than he remembered it being. mavis' disorientation overlays his senses.

(she'd never learned to filter out the white noise. it's a shame he'd never thought to use this against her.)

someone brave draws closer, their voice pitched in the soft and careful tones of concern. he must look at least as bad as he feels. )

Get the fuck away from me, ( he snaps, a flash of perfect white teeth to drive home the point.

he doesn't want anyone's help, he just wants them to get out of his way. )

Edited 2022-10-13 22:45 (UTC)

[ no one touches her.

it's his arm that someone touches, trying to help stabilize him. but mavis has broken through the crowd into an emptier alley. yet it feels like her arm.

and that's enough. something inside of her tips.

then explodes. a flare of energy that turns combustive, the flare catching onto a nearby garbage can. sparks pop off, scaring off a group of five adolescents who are laughing and kicking rocks past the alley where mavis collapses to her knees, nauseated and numb and terrified. ]

( panic burns through him, and it's dizzying how intense it is. hers, he rationalizes. he knows the shape of his own feelings, such as they are to know that this ratcheting fear can't possibly be his. )

Fuck.

( the crowd moves around him like a river. he casts around, searching for her. )

Tell me where you are.

( he doesn't expect her to answer him — not with words, anyway. but she's open, and exposed. perhaps he can catch something?

finding her has stopped being about a want and become an immediate need. not just for his sake, now, but for hers. )

[ where she is? where is she?

she tries to orient herself, to feel out at what's around her, to get a look at her surroundings. they don't make sense. if anything, it disorients her more because there is fire and there are scared strangers who don't know that it was her fault and there is a rat, something wet dripping down the wall, there is —

corn husks. sweat. people holding onto her. the neon sign of the corn maze's opening, the smell of popcorn and frying oil that turns her stomach. these are not the same place, they are not the alley she is in, but they both feel real to her.

her skin hums. vibrates. like she's going to explode out of it — again? — and she reaches out for the various corns and the stink of oil and for him, for him, because if she is going to set anything on fire, gods, let it be him. she tries to hold him firm in her mind. like following a trail, or chasing the end of a thread to untangle a knot.

she doesn't say anything. she's not telling him anything, not if she can help it, but it's not so noble of her. no, she's not telling him anything because if she opens her mouth, she will absolutely vomit, and she cannot straighten out the chaos of her thoughts into tidy rows to think anything like 'go fuck yourself' in his general direction coherently either. ]

( the information hits him in lightbulb flashes: abrupt, disorientating. hard to pin down anything useful, but at least she's stopped running at least — that's progress.

despite this, the park is large, and there are plenty of places for her to hide.

— but, no. she'd be looking for somewhere quiet. that cuts the options down somewhat. with this in mind, he moves toward the park's exit. )

One of these days, we're having a long talk about filtering.

[ she tries to get to her feet. holds onto the cold stone of the wall, but it feels sticky under her hand. no, that's his shoes, on the pavement. it all blurs into one sensation.

he could help you, something whispers. he could teach you. you stupid bitch, you don't have to be attacking people.

she has suffered worse than this, she tells herself. dehydration in the desert. broken bones that she had set herself. how many pains has she staggered through, and emerged fine? she won't let this defeat her.

that's what she tells herself, right before she stumbles back to the alley floor. something soaks her pants. she looks down to see a puddle of rain gathered in a place where the concrete dips. seeing her reflection in it, outlined by the light of the fire she'd set, she smacks her hand down in the middle of it. ]

( while mavis has her existential crisis, aristaeus has made it to the park's exit.

irritation makes her presence flare. it saves him the effort of trying to hunt for her, at least, but it's a small comfort. in the back of his mind he can feel the churn of storm clouds gathering, can practically taste the sting of ozone on his tongue. )

Hold on.

( a threat and a promise. hold on, i'm coming. it's unlikely to be much of a comfort to her — this is bigger than both of them. )

[ everything is too bright and too painful. it turns to noise. it feels like her brain is melting, like it'll drip out her ears any moment now. the thoughts and feelings of passerby, and the closer-still sensations that leak through across the tether she'd made between herself and aristaeus, feel more real than the cold water against her palm. the latter fades away into the snow and static of the former.

breathing through her mouth, she tips her head back too-hard on the stone wall. closes her eyes. tries to push any of it away. it is a little quieter, when her eyes aren't also trying to process something. she pulls her hand out of the water, curls her knees up towards herself, tries to perceive less whatever that means.

she's still sitting curled up like this when he finds her, if only because it is taking everything she can to let the thoughts wash over her instead of overwhelm her. she couldn't get to her feet like this. that would require acknowledging her physical existence again and all the sensations that come with it, which have proven far too much for her. ]

( all the same, he's cautious as he approaches — partly out of habit and partly because he knows mavis well enough now to know how she reacts when she's cornered. )

You don't look so good.

( it's said as he stops in front of her. pauses to survey the damage before his attention shifts invariably back to her.

it's a pathetic sight. worst of all, he can't seem to find any pleasure in her discomfort, despite it being fully earned.)

Ask me. ( and then again, as if she needed the clarification: ) Ask me to make it stop.

[ his voice is so close. but then, it always has been. and there have always been footsteps. she could be imagining him — in another place, and here. like everything else.

she presses her palms to her closed eyes. grits her teeth. tries to push herself through it. she does not want his help. she does not want anything to do with that traitor. she had taken his help once and regretted it. doing it again feels like damning herself.

but her head is swimming and her chest is tight and it is not getting any better.

you hurt those people. you're going to hurt more because you're selfish and stupid and stubborn. so what if he betrays you again? the jarl was right. you're a monster, a danger to those around you. you deserve all that and more.

the memory surges to the surface. she is a child again, all too-thin limbs and skinned knees, in the jarl's tent. four adults loom around her, tears run down her face as he tells her that she has to leave the camp.

'and go where?' she asks, but he can't tell her. they can't help her. no one in the wilds can. her fingernails dig into her forehead. there is snot on her upper lip, and tears gather in her eyelashes, smeared by her palms. ]

Make it stop.

( it's precisely what he wants to hear, delivered in the least satisfying way imaginable. aristaeus' gaze slips to the side, as if considering whether or not he shouldn't just leave her here.

but then he hears it — or, rather, the echo of it. a voice more prominent than the others. a voice that is hers but not hers. )

It's right, you know. ( dropping slowly into a crouch in front of her. extending a hand, fingers curling as they tuck underneath her jaw.

her pulse is thundering. )

You are a danger. ( inhale, exhale. inhale, exhale. matching her breathing to his. drawing that racing heart into something less fraught. ) But you can't help that.

[ she chokes, at first, but she can feel her lungs expand and draw a deeper breath without her say-so, can feel her heart slow. her hands fall from her face, her shoulders loosening, her eyes opening.

yet beside the somatic relief, each sentence slips between her ribs like a fresh knife. he is only confirming what she already knows. yet somehow, hearing it said aloud deepens the wound. that grief feels far away though. it doesn't settle in her throat or in her cheeks. it is as any other thought. so is the panic induced by that realization. it exists somewhere outside of her body, and even the wrongness of that cannot fully settle.

because he is throttling it. she cannot help but slow her breathing, but slow her heart. he is killing her, she thinks. he is killing her and she cannot even raise an alarm.

she reaches up, grabs at his wrist, tries to shove it away from her face. she does not think of how the voices of the people around them have started to draw into more orderly rows, trickling over her more like a brook than a monsoon. ]

Good girl.

( it's the tone you'd use for a beloved pet. one that's performed a difficult trick for the first time. the expectations had been low — and yet.

his fingers remain pressed against her skin. the contact is necessary to maintain the effect, but the truth is that he's just reluctant not to touch her now that he can. )

Isn't that better?

( as if to say "look, it needn't be unpleasant all the time". it's a lie, of course, but a pleasant one. )

[ her mouth trembles, as if she wants to contradict him, but the feeling isn't there. instead, her body feels loose and relaxed. her hand closes around his wrist as if she still means to remove it, but she doesn't.

why would she? there's nothing to worry about anymore. with the stress of panic, whatever anger she might have directed towards him drains out of her. so instead, with an almost dreamlike slowness, she nods. ]

How are you doing this? [ it's not that she can't hear the voices. they run through her mind in tidy lines. he didn't suppress her ability to hear them — but her thinking is more ordered, relaxed. the noise doesn't bother her. ]

Come back with me, and I'll show you.

( it's unlikely that she'll be able to master it on the first try. it's not an advanced technique, as such, but it requires a level of knowledge of yourself that's difficult for a lay person to master.

even someone as talented as she is. )

Where?

[ she shouldn't be considering it. not really. but soothed as she is, she cannot rouse the self-protective urge to avoid the obvious danger. ]

— villainy wears many masks

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we're going to pretend the icon is basically from that one gif

which one and why haven't i iconned it yet

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