Lucifer, the Morningstar (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
wentdowntogeorgia) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
bigapplesauce2014-09-06 09:20 pm
wentdowntogeorgia) wrote in bigapplesauce2014-09-06 09:20 pm
Entry tags:
I Thought of Angels, Choking On Their Halos [open]
Lucifer falls.
This is old news for everyone involved. He fell from Grace, he fell from Heaven, and after the so long awaited confrontation in Stull Cemetery, he and his once-beloved brother and the promise of violence, he fell back into the Cage in the body of Sam Winchester.
Now, when he falls, he feels a shift around him like the universe cracking open at the seams; there is the smell of ozone and a lightning-snap that’s louder than even Sam’s fearful internal monologue, louder than the terror that pounds his frantic mortal heart at the sight of Perdition yawning wide beneath him. He is yanked sideways, sudden lateral movement that would be dizzying if he had a center of balance to upset, a rip-tide pulling him in and down and through the rabbit-hole, shadow-thin and darkling deep.
The body that is supposed to be his—that has had his name written over and across and around every fiber of its being since its conception—is suddenly far away, and he is wrapped in the old, familiar skin of a vessel he’d left dying in Detroit, flesh given freely rather than claimed by divine right. And then he is a streak in the sky that hits water and sinks like a stone.
Under the water, cold and getting colder from the seed crystal that is his freezing Grace in its mortal house, he can feel the vast emptiness where Heaven should be above him and isn’t; the universe is silent and it is deafening, a tinnitus ring where there should be angels’ voices. Lucifer grabs two fistfuls of space-time and pulls, moving himself from under the water to standing in the shallows at the bank, and behind him the lake’s surface is already frozen over thick like it’s the dead of winter. The water around his feet is sluggish and barely liquid, filmed over top with a thin frozen layer that breaks and flows around his ankles.
Someone approaches him with a towel, and there is no Hell below him and above him only sky, and he makes no reply; he banishes the water from his clothes with a thought before he puts his fist right through the man’s chest.
[[ooc: So this is going to be the hottest of messes; see mod comment for post instructions and fun stuff like that.]]
[[TW: gore, major character death.]]
This is old news for everyone involved. He fell from Grace, he fell from Heaven, and after the so long awaited confrontation in Stull Cemetery, he and his once-beloved brother and the promise of violence, he fell back into the Cage in the body of Sam Winchester.
Now, when he falls, he feels a shift around him like the universe cracking open at the seams; there is the smell of ozone and a lightning-snap that’s louder than even Sam’s fearful internal monologue, louder than the terror that pounds his frantic mortal heart at the sight of Perdition yawning wide beneath him. He is yanked sideways, sudden lateral movement that would be dizzying if he had a center of balance to upset, a rip-tide pulling him in and down and through the rabbit-hole, shadow-thin and darkling deep.
The body that is supposed to be his—that has had his name written over and across and around every fiber of its being since its conception—is suddenly far away, and he is wrapped in the old, familiar skin of a vessel he’d left dying in Detroit, flesh given freely rather than claimed by divine right. And then he is a streak in the sky that hits water and sinks like a stone.
Under the water, cold and getting colder from the seed crystal that is his freezing Grace in its mortal house, he can feel the vast emptiness where Heaven should be above him and isn’t; the universe is silent and it is deafening, a tinnitus ring where there should be angels’ voices. Lucifer grabs two fistfuls of space-time and pulls, moving himself from under the water to standing in the shallows at the bank, and behind him the lake’s surface is already frozen over thick like it’s the dead of winter. The water around his feet is sluggish and barely liquid, filmed over top with a thin frozen layer that breaks and flows around his ankles.
Someone approaches him with a towel, and there is no Hell below him and above him only sky, and he makes no reply; he banishes the water from his clothes with a thought before he puts his fist right through the man’s chest.
[[ooc: So this is going to be the hottest of messes; see mod comment for post instructions and fun stuff like that.]]
[[TW: gore, major character death.]]
no subject
And then she sees the monster bearing down on them both, and he is much, much closer.
Almondine! Daine gathers herself to leap forward, ears back and hackles raised, for all that she knows that there's no way she could close the distance between them quickly enough - that thing will be on them, first. Get away from him! she orders. He's dangerous!
no subject
Daine tenses, and Peeta quickly puts the pieces together. Whatever the thing is that's killing people, it's found Edgar and Almondine. And if it was enough to have Daine and the People clear everyone out of its path, it's too much for Daine to take alone. It's too much for both of them together. And if it's as deadly as it seems, they're too far away anyway.
Peeta recognizes an animal gathering for a jump when he sees one, so he knows what Daine is planning to do. Hating what it means, ignoring the sharp pain in his chest, he lunges forward and grabs Daine - one arm looped over a shoulder, the other under a foreleg, hands clasped against her chest - and begins dragging her away.
"We can't help them," he says, hating himself for saying the words as much as he hates the truth of them. "Daine, we need to go. We can't-- we shouldn't--" He can't bring himself to say we shouldn't watch. And at any rate, he can't make himself look away.
no subject
/What's wrong? What are you doing?/
She backs away from him a few steps, stiffly, as if being pulled away by some force. /What's wrong?/ he asks again, but she barely looks at him, eyes on some distant point.
As he turns to see what she's staring at, movement at the corner of his eye draws his gaze. He finds himself face to face with a man. Or what looks like a man. Even Edgar - ordinary Edgar - can sense something not right about the man in the split second between first seeing him and really seeing him.
There's blood on the man's hands, on his clothes, and the look in his eyes makes Edgar's blood run cold and then flash hot.
Edgar begins to back away, slowly, not taking his eyes off the man's, the way he would with a rabid dog. No sudden movements, no looking away, no signs of weakness. He steps on a twig, and the crack it makes sounds like gunfire, even over the pounding of his heart.
tw: major character death
He reaches forward with one bloody hand and hooks gentle fingers around the boy's smooth jaw, leaving streaks of red standing out starkly against his skin. He holds still there for several long moments, his touch tender like benediction, like blessing. Then he lets his hand drop and seizes him hard by his young throat, feels the blood surge in the carotid artery so close to the surface of his skin, and squeezes. He squeezes until he can hear cartilage break, until he can feel the windpipe collapsing underneath the crushing force of his hand, until the thump thump thump of his heart is thready and weak and then... gone.
Re: tw: major character death
When the thing grabs her boy's throat, it takes her longer to react than it should, still wanting to go and wanting to stay at the same time. They have moved away from her, the thing and her boy, and by the time she is able to make her legs obey her again, her boy is no longer there.
She is confused, and wants to search for him, but the thing is her first priority. She jumps even as her boy's body drops, a growl deep in her chest pushing its way past a pain she cannot name.
tw: major character death
It was not a large dog; all of forty pounds, maybe, if even that. The strength of his arm is far greater than what's needed to knock it aside, and he does not care to pull his punches; when he strikes, it is with full force and fury.
everything is terrible
NO! she snarls, struggling against Peeta's hold as the thing approaches Edgar. Edgar, who isn't running. Why isn't he running? Why are they both just standing there?! As the monster closes his hand around Edgar's throat, Daine shifts, tiger shape, heavy enough to pitch them both forward and get all of her paws on the ground again. But Peeta's not letting go of her, and she can't drag him into this fight, she can't...
Frustrated, terrified, she changes again and again in an effort to shake Peeta's hold on her. Hyena. Terrier. The thing's grip on Edgar tightens, and Almondine, sweet Almondine is frozen in place. NO! Her choices become wilder, more desperate: a heavy, strangling snake, a hawk almost crushed beneath Peeta's weight, whose eyes are good enough to see Edgar's body drop to the ground with horrible clarity.
"NO!!" For a moment, Daine is a two-legger again, her grief and rage overwhelming her ability to hold any other shape but her own. She screams, and the People respond, birds rising from the trees in a great, dark cloud, every animal in the park echoing her cry.
But there's still Almondine. She can still save Almondine, if Peeta would just let her go. Daine takes badger shape, digging her paws into the earth and dragging herself forward. ALMONDINE! she cries, COME HERE!
She's not listening. She's not listening, and when she lunges for the beast, he strikes her with such force that Daine is struck down, too, pain flaring in her mind as that dear copper spark of light is brutally snuffed out.
The sound Daine makes isn't human, but it isn't animal, either; it lands somewhere between the howl of her wolf shape and a scream. Even the insects add their voices to the cacophony, rising from the grass like a sudden mist as Daine scrabbles her paws uselessly against the dirt, sides heaving. She remembers, with a sudden hope, that an animal's need can be enough to pull her magic out of her, to heal even at the brink of death, but there is no sudden, merciful loss of consciousness, no miraculous recovery. There's only a distraught wolf struggling against the boy who somehow hasn't lost his hold on her.
Re: everything is terrible
He holds on, and watches a boy wearing his face die.
With the distance, Edgar's death seems calm and quiet, almost gentle. In many ways, the lack of blood, or struggle, or noise makes it much less horrifying than anything Peeta saw in the Games. But the fact that Edgar looks like him, the fact that only his grip is keeping Daine from running toward death, the fact that they still don't know what this thing is or what it wants - all those things make it so very much worse.
Daine - in hawk form - lets out a sharp cry so close to Peeta's ear that he is surprised it doesn't deafen him. When Edgar's body hits the ground, Daine suddenly changes back to human form, her avian cry shifting into a scream, pitch warping like an instrument being tuned. The People around them react in kind, and for a moment Peeta loses Daine voice in theirs, one great cry ringing across the island. He adjusts his grip on Daine, pulling her closer to him to compensate for the slickness of her skin, damp with sweat from her exertions.
Even as he does so she changes again, into a small but strong animal. He can feel the strain as she digs her claws into the ground in an attempt to drag both of them forward. In response, he shifts his grip and digs in his feet to hold them back, heart sick and mind numb.
As far away as they are, and even with Daine's continued sounds of distress and struggle, Peeta still hears the yelp that the thing's strike drives from Almondine's body. The impact is so shocking, so disturbing, that Peeta almost lets go of Daine. Only her increased struggles prevent him from doing so, as he instinctively tightens his hold.
tw: violent imagery
Diane shifts into snow leopard shape and twists in Peeta's grasp until she's facing him, until she can brace her paws against his body and shove. LET ME GO! she snarls, keeping her claws sheathed only through an enormous effort of will.
no subject
"No. Daine, stop. Please. Whatever that man is, you won't be able to stop him. You probably won't even be able to hurt him. He'll kill you, he'll kill you just like--" His voice cracks and he cuts off abruptly, unable to say their names. Unable - now that he has looked away - to look back at their still forms. "Daine, please."
In this form, Daine is too much for him to drag or carry. So he simply adds his legs to the mix, rolling to his side and wrapping his legs around her as well, holding on to her for dear life with his whole body.
no subject
She twists around again, angry and heartsick and unable to look at him any longer. With his legs wrapped around her, all she can manage is an awkward half-rotation, but it's enough for her to look back across the lawn.
The monster is gone.
Daine wrests a paw free and digs her claws into the dirt, straining for a glimpse of him, but there's no sign. It's as if he's vanished into thin air, leaving only two sorry little forms crumpled on the grass. Trembling, she lets out a cry that could almost pass for a 'no,' but it doesn't summon back the monster, and it doesn't stop Peeta. He just won't let go of her, not even when she roars her protest again, and again, too weary to lash out at him and too angry to stop fighting entirely.
no subject
The man - the thing - is gone. Peeta quickly pulls his gaze away from the small, distant forms on the ground where he was and makes a quick survey of the surrounding area. Finding it clear, he finally lets go of Daine.
Even as he pushes himself to his feet, arms shaking slightly from the effort of holding Daine, his eyes swing back to Edgar and Almondine's bodies.
no subject
But she can still do right by her friends. There's no threat of stormwings, here, but she won't… she can't just leave them out here for someone else to find. She'll bring them
homeback. She has strength enough for that.It's without any feline grace that she approaches the bodies, her movements stiff and sore. She can't bear to do more than glance at Almondine as she slowly walks past - Almondine who was so clever, and so good, and who Daine failed so completely. When she reaches Edgar, she sits down heavily by his side. This close, it's clear that there was nothing gentle about his death, however it looked from a distance. Reaching out a paw, she carefully wipes away the blood streaking his jaw, where the thing had grabbed him.
no subject
He stops by Almondine, a few paces away from Daine and Edgar. Edgar is on his back, eyes open, staring blankly up at the sky. For the space of a heartbeat, Peeta sees other eyes, other faces, memories imposing themselves on the scene. But the horror of his own empty eyes, his own pale face - younger and so achingly still - cuts through all of that. He has a moment where he feels untethered, as if his insides aren't lining up correctly with the outside of his body.
The signs of violence that were hidden by distance are now startlingly clear, and Peeta looks away from the marks on Edgar's neck. Daine isn't meeting his eyes, but he focuses on her anyway.
"We should take them to the base," he says, voice barely above a whisper. They shouldn't have to lie out here any longer, and the thing could always come back.
no subject
Can she get Edgar without help? Despite her lingering anger toward Peeta, she'd as soon spare him the grim task of carrying the body of someone who could be his twin. If she can just get under him, and then change her shape very carefully… as if he's just asleep, and she doesn't want to wake him…
We will help you, wing-sister. Daine lifts her head and blinks. A hawk has landed on the grass a few feet away from her. A moment later, a familiar raccoon waddles over, and he's soon joined by a few of the larger stray dogs she's been tending. All of us will help you, one of the dogs agrees as another hawk and an osprey alight on the lawn.
Thank you, Daine says gratefully, thinking to herself that it's just as well that leopards can't cry.
It takes a few minutes for her to get Edgar arranged on her back, her friends gently tugging at sleeves and cuffs to keep him from falling off as she slowly shifts into the larger, sturdier shape of a mountain pony. The bigger dogs brace their paws on her flanks to make sure he's centered, and the birds grip talonfuls of his shirt to tug him forward so he won't slide off the back. Thank you, Daine says again as most of the animals move off a little - enough to give them space, but not so far that they can't jump in if needed. The raccoon - Cleverpaws - has wound up sitting at the base of her neck, Edgar's head cradled in his tiny, almost-human forepaws.
Daine's an experienced enough rider to have a good idea of what a pony needs to do to keep a person from falling off, but she still takes extra care as she slowly turns herself toward the base. She glances toward Peeta to see if he's ready, her head jerking a little in an equine wince at the sight of Almondine bundled in his arms. Then, she resolutely steps forward.
no subject
Gently, he lifts her from the ground, cradling her against his body. She's still warm, but heartrendingly still in his arms. He holds her close.
He turns to Daine, who - seeing that he is ready - sets off, Peeta following a few steps behind. He hears the flutter of wings behind them as the birds take to the air again and knows, without looking, that the People are following them. Supporting Daine, honoring Almondine and Edgar.
Peeta keeps half his focus on Daine, half on the area around them. He keeps putting one foot in front of the other, heartsick and angry and weary to his bones. It's a familiar combination, but it takes him a few minutes to recognize why. He feels like he did in the arena, in that time between fights for his life, when the desperate rush was over and the horror of what had been seen and done finally had room to stretch inside him.
no subject
She can feel the tickling of little claws as birds briefly alight on her mane, lending her bits of their strength before flying off and letting others take their place. She can't thank them all individually, but she knows they can feel her gratitude beneath the heavy weight of her sorrow.
They're nearly halfway back before she even realizes that two-leggers are staring. She doesn't bother to acknowledge the gawkers, though if any tried to get too close, she wouldn't hesitate to bite them. Most of them just look, though, hands over their mouths - or phones out, filming. She and her friends must be quite the spectacle, she realizes with mingled resignation and contempt. Don't any of them have better things to do?
Fortunately, they manage to make it to the subway entrance without any ugly incidents. Daine pauses there as it belatedly occurs to her that she's going to have to navigate stairs. In this shape, it's not a problem, but with what she's carrying… well. She'll just have to be careful, and trust her friends to be quick. Still, she allows herself a moment to heave an audible sigh and gather her strength - and the strength she's been gifted - for this last stretch.
no subject
After what feels like hours, they finally make it to the subway entrance. When Daine pauses there, Peeta does, too. For a moment, he isn't sure why she stops. Then he remembers the stairs.
"Do you - do you need me to help you?" he quietly asks. He isn't sure if she wants his assistance, or if she even needs it. There's every chance that she can manage the stairs without any problems.
no subject
She gathers her haunches beneath her so back stays level as she carefully makes her way down the stairs. It's a surefooted shape she's in, which helps a great deal, but it's still not easy going. In the end, it takes two of the hawks to keep Edgar from sliding off as Daine makes her way down to the entrance to the base.
Once she's reached it, all her friends except Cleverpaws leave her. She can feel Sarge and Molly just on the other side of the door - they must've broken out of her room - and it's not overly surprising when Phil cracks open the door before she can knock her hoof against it.
"Daine," he says, and then he sees what she's carrying and falls silent, stepping back to let them in.
no subject
When Peeta spots Sarge and Molly, his first reaction is mild surprise; Daine never lets them roam free inside. But then he realizes what must have happened and is sick all over again at the thought of them sensing Daine's distress but having no idea what was happening and not being able to get to her.
Almost immediately after the thought crosses his mind, he belatedly thinks of what he's carrying and what it will mean to them. Too late, he attempts to turn his body to block the dogs' view of Almondine.
Sarge sees her first, having turned to check on Peeta even as Peeta moved to turn away. He goes still for a heartbeat, then hunches over, head and tail drooping so much he seems to shrink in size. His whine draws Molly's attention, and the second she spots Almondine, her tail - already abnormally low - dips between her legs and her ears go back. She looks back to Daine, but Peeta keeps his gaze on the floor. He can feel all the emotions roiling just under the thin layer of numbness that shock and weariness have stretched around him, and he's half convinced that the combination of the dogs' and Daine's reactions will be his undoing. So he looks at the floor and waits to be told what to do.
no subject
What happened? Molly asks as Sarge turns to check on Peeta. We heard you - all of us heard you! - and we thought…
Where's Edgar? Sarge asks, baffled and frightened. Then, Where's Almondine?
Daine shivers. It's not that either dog has missed the bodies - it's just that they don't understand where the rest of Edgar and Almondine have disappeared to, and they know enough to know they all ought to be of a piece. I'm sorry, she says, a tired exhalation stirring the dust and grit on the ground in front of her. I… I couldn't save them. She wants to say that she tried, but she'd rather not have to explain why she failed. Then, her mind-voice steady in a way her human voice couldn't be, They're dead.
But, Sarge starts. He doesn't seem to know where to go with it, though, and he whines. But… he says again, glancing between Daine and Peeta as if one of them will explain things in a way he'll understand.
Daine plods forward another pace, then halts again. She doesn't know where to go, either. If the rebels have a - a system for this kind of thing, she doesn't know what it is. So she stands, Molly nosing anxiously at her face, and half-listens as Phil makes a call on his little radio.