♦♦ 31st CONTRACT - ACTION

[mortemscintilla]

[ Forest: The onyx saplings rise like thin knives from the misty forest floor. At first the only sound is that of the monster's breath, rough and slow as he lopes between the trees. His clawed feet are bare, but the loamy grass feels like cotton wool -- not cold at all -- even as each puff of steamy breath tells him otherwise. There are drops of water, dripping from the tree branches and hitting the ground. Each one is like a glass bell struck, a pure high tone.

Eyes slipping shut, he perches on a tree-stump, breathing in the air, a hundred sensorial messages conveyed to him with every draught. The forest is beautiful and endless, and he knows many have died here, thinking they owned it.

He isn't interested in that. He's drawn to the heat, the heartbeats, saturating the air. Nearby, there are people.

And he is hungry. ]

[ Seaside: He is out by the starry sea again, drawn there with an inarticulate, feral longing, the wind stirring the loose hair over his forehead, his body a strung bow. Perched on the gravel at the edge of the highway, he looks out beyond the curved guardrail to the water glittering below in the moonlight. Takes a deep scenting breath, holds it for a long time, eyes narrowing, as if he is sifting every component of the wind.

Then he lets it out -- and smiles.

There.

Something sweet. Something to feed on. ]

[ Everywhere Else: The darkest shadows. The dreariest corners. He doesn't lurk in wait. There's no need. The City is a stewpot brimming with life. Overflowing and sloshing at the edges. All he has to do is catch the spills in his cupped palms. Open his mouth -- and swallow. ]

(( ooc: Forward dated to the 19th. And the Moon Shall Turn to Blood: For the curse, Hei has been transformed into a creature of the monstrous persuasion. He'll be gravitating to victims who fall into any one of the following categories - Warmth: Because monsters are drawn to hot beating hearts. Light: A radiant aura; a glowing life - how can anything dark stay away? Softness: A gentle soul; a clean conscience. Any tender surface to sink his teeth into. ))

(( If you'd like your character stalked or attacked, feel free. Just specify the extent of damage, if anything, you'd prefer done to them. Backtagging friendly, and so very open to threadjacking!!<3 ))

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[sleepingstar]

[Pai gently strokes the top of his head, a soothing gesture.]

It's almost midnight.

[Reassurance, for the part of her brother that isn't a monster, that this nightmare will end soon for him. (In a way, it would be better for him if it didn't. She doesn't know the specifics of what he's done today, but she knows that when he's human again, he will feel pain over what he did while cursed.)]

[mortemscintilla]

[ He doesn't understand her words. They hit his ears like broken, undifferentiated droplets of water. He's reassured, only, by the warm fingers creeping into his hair to cradle his head. The tones of her voice fill him with a strange tenderness; his glowing eyes droop shut, a low purl bubbling from his throat. In that brief moment, petted like a cat, he's no massive force of chaos and ripping fangs. He's just a creature, brought to heel by the surreal atmosphere of Family and Home. Around them, the air stirs. Enchanted things scuttle across the grass, rasping as they go. He doesn't pay them attention. They're just monsters of a lesser order, slithering back into the crevices. ]

[ The red moon cycles across the sky. The digits of time melt away. When midnight strikes, there's no audible crack, no banshee scream, no unexplained agony, no feeling of being wrenched in two. The monster has seeped to Hei's surface with the curse. But he's always been a part of who he is. A doppelganger, that the Black Reaper has taken great efforts to control and conceal. ]

[ The effect is immediate. For one eyeblink, Hei gushes color like a tourmaline -- a radiation of blue and red and green. Then he goes limp, and the terrible monster's skin sloughs off like a peeled fruit, giving way to human. He mutters something even he can't understand, his arms opening out in a weird grasping motion. ]

[ And then he falls half-stunned to the floor. ]

[sleepingstar]

[Pai doesn't try to catch him -- she's not strong enough and she knows it -- but she manages to soften his fall. She sinks to her knees and continues to stroke his hair.]

Hei? [Are you aware again?]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Everything hurts. In every dimension. His eyes open, only to show him about twenty Pais -- where has she come from? -- juggling around and around in a whirl that makes him sick. His ears are filled with some kind of grotesque scrabbling noise. He tosses his head, trying to see what it is, where it's coming from. Tries to spring up, but his limbs are jelly. Beyond Pai, there is a choking darkness. Memories flood in where no sight is possible: the curse, the kills, the blood, the victims, his wound, how his hunger drained him of everything. All rationale, all thought. ]

[ Disgust sets his body in motion. At first he feels fixed like an insect set in tar, but slowly his determination propels him jerkily upright, scrubbing grimy hands across his face. Soil, sandy and cold. Insects keening around him -- but they're not the source of the scrabbling. That's in his head, the susurrations of the curse. A bowlful of magic, slowly funneling away. The coppery smell of death is in his nostrils, the taste in his mouth, gritty and sour. ]

[ Blood. So much blood. ]

[ Pai is hovering over him, her pale faces resolving down to ten, five, two, and finally one as he blinks and blinks. ] I -- [ His voice is raspy, as if filled with dirt and metal bits. ] I-I'm fine. [ He's not fine. He's disoriented, in shock, nauseated. But those words are his default mode. ]

[sleepingstar]

Don't lie to me. [The words aren't angry -- just a reminder. She holds him down so that he doesn't try to get up too soon. He needs to rest himself before he stands.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Against his clammy skin, Pai's hand is a dry and warm anchor. His body is a piebald pelt of pale and dark -- shirtless, smudged with dirt and crusted with blood, clad in just a pair of grungy jeans with ragged edges. The clothes he'd been wearing, before the curse struck. Nausea grips him; his head feels at once huge and lighter than air. He tries, again, to get up. Rolls, and falls. Thud. He gags, forcing his gorge down, forcing himself to sit up, head cradled in his hands. Sick. He's fucking going to puke. ]

[ I am a trained professional. ]

[ We do not puke. ]

[ He keeps his will firmly fixed on that reminder. And, let's face it, on the toilet -- nice white clean porcelain toilet into which he'll vomit, in privacy, at his flat or a safehouse, because like hell is he going to hurl right here at Pai's feet, no way no how, even though he really really really needs to. The air is hard to breathe; he has to drag at it, it seems so dry, unnourishing. He manages as best as he can, lifting his eyes to Pai's calm face, fixing them there like a roadmark in a foreign country. ]

I'm fine. [ Not a lie this time. Dizzy, on the verge of spewing blood from his old kills everywhere. But otherwise, sane and in-control. Reaching out, he presses her hand tightly. ] Just ... get me somewhere with a bathroom.

[sleepingstar]

Nnn. [She stands up and helps tug him to his feet as she quickly determines which is the closest safehouse.] If you need to, go behind a bush. [She doesn't understand why he's being so uptight about it.]

[mortemscintilla]

[ Ordinarily, going behind the bushes wouldn't bother him. It was the norm in Heaven's War. But he has a premonition that if he succumbs to this cramping grip of nausea, he's going to pass out. The idea of Pai hauling him indoors in such circumstances ... Not likely. ]

[ He doesn't say that. The back of his throat feels coated in slime. Instead he tightens his grip on her shoulder. Navigates, on shaky legs, out of the forest. Everything seems hazy at the corners, a muted edge to the world and it's -- a strange feeling. Unnerving. Hei is used to anything but this, movement in place of stillness and always pushing past whatever's stopping him. Pain is nothing and fear is nothing. But the practicalities of the body are another story. He can't get indoors fast enough. ]

[ (A part of him is glad, that it's Pai who's with him, instead of some bystander or an untrustworthy element.) ]

[sleepingstar]

[They walk as quickly as they can without further upsetting Hei's stomach. She keys in the code to get them into the safehouse, and he can ask her later how she knows the location & the code. She leads him to the bathroom.]

Do you need help?

[mortemscintilla]

[ He won't ask. Not because he lacks the wherewithal, but because Pai is always better with secrets than him. Both at keeping them, and at cracking them apart like a safecode. Hei had only polished his own skills after Heaven's War -- part of necessity, not nature. ]

[ He shakes his head, tight and terse. Gives her shoulder one last squeeze -- before staggering alone to the bathroom. Bile rushes up his throat on cue. He knows he's going to puke even before the boiling red stuff splatters into the sink. Blood. So much fucking blood. Hiccupping, still heaving, he ignores the pink dots marching before his eyes. Lets his filthy clothes drop on the tiles, deliberately trodding over them, and staggers under the hot shower jet. Steam fills the narrow room, fogging the glass, fogging his mind. He's glad he can't see himself in any mirrors; in his imagination, his eyes are still two black holes, his face the grey of old bones. ]

[ Toiletries and things are in the narrow cabinet -- swaying, unbalanced, his mind wrung out like a dirty dishrag, he brushes his teeth, dries and dresses, breathing deep steady breaths. He's going to be okay. Anything else is unacceptable. The sour whirlpool of regrets ... they're congealed, half-stoppered right now. Ignorable. Clattering out of the bathroom, he crawls into the unmade futon -- cool and hard as a table. If Pai is there, she will see him looking at her in the gloom. Will probably recognize his unvoiced request. ]

[ Come here? ]

[sleepingstar]

[While Hei is busy barfing & showering, Pai borrows one of his large t-shirts for a nightgown and has put together a small plate of plain crackers & a glass of milk to cleanse his palette. She kneels beside the futon and places the plate & glass on the floor.]

Eat these before you sleep.

[mortemscintilla]

[ Had the snack been delivered seriously, or grandly, or with any kind of solemnity, it would've been impossible not to find it ridiculous. Instead, Pai is treating the whole matter with a matter-of-fact practicality, in the face of which Hei's amusement can only shrink back. He's not hungry -- something that's telling, in and of itself. But he forces himself to eat. The crackers stick to the back of his mouth like paste; the milk is tasteless as he washes everything down. Half-stoned, half-asleep, he reaches out, almost coaxing, and gathers Pai in. He cozies her head into that good place, against the column of his neck. But he's not the one offering comfort here, and is acutely aware of it. ]

[ Doesn't matter. Snuggled against Pai, his focus dulls and he loses grasp of his own threadbare thoughts. Eyes slipping shut, putting his fingers through Pai's hair, he kisses the top of her head -- gratitude, affection, uncertainty -- and is out. ]