[O] Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Printable Version +- HELOVIA || The Way to the Sun (http://helovia.com) +-- Forum: Out of Character (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=1) +--- Forum: Archives (http://helovia.com/forumdisplay.php?fid=11) +--- Thread: [O] Thick, Juicy Tenderloin (/showthread.php?tid=18605) |
|||||
Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Roskuld - 03-16-2015
RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Mauja - 03-19-2015
i am the vanguard of your destruction
She was gonna, and she did. But there were more things cutting through the air—larger things, dangerous things on broad, silent wings. Things with keen eyes, sharp beaks and sharp feet. Things.. things that were drawn to motion, to mischief, like moths to a flame. Wing-tips just barely not touching they rode the updrafts rising from the meadow, souls stretched into feral grins. Watching.. waiting... Until it all happened at once, a cry, a streak of white, and the flash of sunlight on blue barring. And his freedom surge had become a prison. A prison lined with soft, white feathers, a prison with sharp-talon bars, the pitter-patter of his heart echoing against the bones of her feet. Overhead, Diego made some kind of noise that could only be described as laughter. Asshole bird. "HEY!" he yelled at the sky, knowing what they were doing, but having lost them to the sun's harsh glare. It bit his eyes whenever he tried to find them visually, so after a moment, he just gave up. He knew what they knew anyway—saw what they saw, the world so distant and so small now that they both rode higher again, where it was colder, but her closed grasp shielded the small animal from the worst of the wind-chill. And he saw what they saw, that small, stocky mare who looked like she'd been dipped in milk, or had had it poured down her back, or, or, something, whatever. Point is, that lizard was Elding's, and his bastard owls had snatched it from the air just like that. Never mind the almost tender precision which with her talons had closed, never mind how flawlessly they had avoided sinking into his fragile body, never mind how owls don't hunt like falcons (they're a different kind of death, gliding on silent wings, striking with much the same lack of sound, hot blood spilling out over claws as they carried their prey away, but they don't plummet and free-fall in their chase), never mind how she was just giving him a prolonged ride, and— I get it. Irma's cool amusement had turned to indignation, and he knew she had half a mind to just fly off with the damn lizard and let them tear after her like mad, but in the end.. In the end, what? It wasn't over yet. Nothing was over yet. It was just that he knew her, and she knew that he knew, and they both knew that she was mostly just annoyed, and jealous, that he was so afraid she'd hurt Elding's pet lizard (where the hell had it come from anyway?) that he almost, almost accused her of wanting to eat it. I'm sorry. Murderer. He knew how that kind of thing hurt. And he hated how he'd projected it onto her. She deserved better. She knew very well whose lizard they had caught. And that was why she had caught it in the first place, instead of just shredded the little fucker and eaten it for dinner. "I know," he rumbled, to no one, because there was no one near enough, but he knew that she heard him anyway, echoing through their bones. "I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. It's just—" And he swallowed, ears hanging back in shame. "It's just kind of.. rude?" But rude was the middle name of both those owls. Sighing, Mauja picked himself off the ground, and set off across the meadow, trying to chase down the lightning before it burned his soul-mates to cinders. [ @[Roskuld] ] RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Roskuld - 03-21-2015
RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Mauja - 03-24-2015
i am the vanguard of your destruction
both of us half-damned, one of us the lion... So if it wasn't enough with Mauja projecting all of his unsavory ideas onto her in those 6.23 seconds—his blasted friend had to try and murder her, too. Her talons were firmly sealed around Chico, the grip tight and grumpy (I can squish you, little thing, and you'd better hope they don't give me reason to), and her attention elsewhere (on him, and his apology)—on that idiot they called bond-mate. And just as he was soothing the tirade she was working up, putting ruffled feathers back into their places, Diego did something that was.. a little bit of everything; sound, projection, mind control. She had the unpleasant sensation of a cold flood sweeping her out of her own body, her mind spinning and free-falling through a blizzard; a sickening lurch, like a strong wind flipping her over, and the sun spun overhead. In the next moment, the bolts had passed, close enough to have left a faint trail of molten feathers—a dirty streak across her back. Irma drew a breath like a drowning man just coming back above the surface, sorting through the facts with razor precision and predator speed—and white rage ignited in her mind. With Chico still in a too-safe grip (she makes me wish I could just drop you) she swerved sharply, frozen eyes and frozen heart reaching out to the mare. You will know yourself better after this. It was a tidal wave of darkness and ice, asphyxiation, a titan's fist closing around Elding's heart—it was a wolf, preying on everything she had hid deep within her soul and tried to bury. It was a split-second moment of whatever she feared the most. A moment in thrall to Irma's vengeance. With an indignant huff she released the illusion after a few seconds, winging away with a wary, curious Diego close behind, and a lizard trapped in her grasp. They could be worried all they fucking pleased, but if she wanted her pet lizard back, she'd better be ready to work for it. - - - - - - - "Shit," he spat, out of breath, white knees bent and forced into the earth; grass and thistles had broken where he had somersaulted onto the ground. The sun had spun for him, too, a blur in the sky. None of them had been ready, and Diego's compulsion had taken Mauja completely by surprise—the end result had been that all three of them had sort of careened sideways, two to save their lives, and the third just because he couldn't stop himself. Gurgling out something incoherent he peered up, more shaken than he wanted to admit, trying to steady his rattling nerves. He could still see them, two distant shapes growing smaller and smaller, the vehement flash of Irma's rage cooling in the pits of her mind. And without knowing it, he had held his breath again—and when he realized it, he forced it out in a sigh and fell back onto his side. Most of his body throbbed, not entirely appreciating his sudden stunt trick. He wasn't appreciating it, either—it was just dumb luck that he hadn't stuck his horn into the ground and snapped it off, or broken his neck, or something. "The hell," he mouthed into the grass, white mane spread on top of him like the cloth draped over the dead; he could barely remember it, just.. the crackle of static, the searing heat, and his vision spinning... ".. whatever," he said after another moment. His nerves were starting to shut up, too, and sure, he'd remember this for a long time. Sure, the sensation of being halfway out of his body and sort of semi-intentionally throwing himself down on one shoulder and then rolling in some way over himself was creepy as fuck. But why linger on it? So with a grunt he heaved himself back onto his feet, disheveled and sort of filthy, and climbed the small hill he'd been heading up. The lizard was safe. The owls were pissed. If Elding's pose was anything to go by (now that I can see you).. .. well, he didn't know her well enough to take any hints from it. But if the lightning was anything to go by? Yeah, no. Might want to be careful, King of the Asshole Owls. "Elding?" he called, wary, starting down the hill on the other side and heading for her hill instead. Please don't kill me. This was the second time her rampant destruction had him hanging back; the second time he witnessed the destructive capacity she held within her small, compact frame... Wings of flame fluttered in the back of his mind, in the back of his soul. Destruction bore many masks. The corner of his mouth flicked up in a small, dark smile. Perhaps he should start giving others reason to approach him, too, with care. [ @[Roskuld] ] RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Roskuld - 03-25-2015
RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Mauja - 03-25-2015
i am the vanguard of your destruction
“CHICOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO—“ Like, what? Chiiicoooo.. and as always when he was around her, it made him want to yell things (like he'd yelled about that motherfucking boat in the Veins, to Gods who never listened). So right now, he wanted to yell CHIIICOOOOO too (or, potentially, he wanted to yell chicken), but he didn't—the words were dead in his throat, because this wasn't fun-screaming. It wasn't the kind of yelling that obliterated your problems and made you ride this awkward, exciting high, like you were on top of the fucking world. This was the kind of yelling that sent your heart hurling out your mouth and into the air, the kind of screaming that turned you inside-out and let out all the emotion-blood from whatever wound had teared up inside your soul. Irma? he asked into the silence—not accusing but just confused, mouth dry and his heart hammering faster in mounting, silent panic. He asked for her because she was stability, she was safe, and in this roaring storm he'd suddenly found himself in he needed something to hold on to. What was going on? What was—who was Chico? (The lizard? Had to be.) Why was Elding practically shrieking at him? “LEE, SHE DROPPED HIM, SHE DROPPED CHEEK, CHEEK’S FALLING--“ And she came hurdling after her own words like an avalanche of fear and agony, and he just stood there staring at her kind of dumbly. “—what if it’s not what they needed? What if they needed someone great who could do all this amazing shit--but instead—instead they got me and now TOTO’S DEAD!!” The intensity of her soul awed him, and the strength of her love shamed him. Because where she was raw lightning, untamed and wild and fierce, he was just a statue carved from marble, with eyes that spoke of life but just covered up something dead. Where she was able to cry her eyes out and scream all of her pain out, he was just cold and silent, as if everything he held within just ceased to exist. He was nothing. He wasn't sure he was frozen over or some such shit—he was pretty sure he never had felt like she had. It was almost as if that level of depth was just.. missing. And it was an incredibly depressing thought. But let's re-wind because there's factual errors and she's staring at him kind of dumbly, as if she walked into a wall, and he's staring at her in a kind of detached confusion masking the hurt he felt within at his own realizations— "No..?" he hedged to that dumbstruck visage, 'brows furrowing and shit, that shadow cast over his gaze could just be the shadow from the sun, and not the chasm opening underneath him and threatening to swallow him. Half-life— —but there was a tiny, wriggling lizard stuck in his (her) grip, safe still in its prison of insulating owl-feathers and sharp talons meticulously cleaned of blood and gore. They were going further and further away, but if it's one thing that's never stretched thin with distance, it is that kind of love. Irma was sort of indignant still, not exactly angry because the fire had burned out, but still irritated. Otherwise, maybe she would've told him all the things she knew and that he needed to hear, but for now, she didn't, and Diego simply glanced back once, torn between his need to follow Irma's silent lead, and the need to let a certain spotted stallion know that he had a heart. He was just a bit dumb about it, most of the time, trying to forget about it or bury it and then dragging it up at odd times and just cutting himself on it because it was shot full of glass slivers. “Uh,” marked Elding's return from the land of crossed eyes and slack jaws, and he figured she had realized that Irma was a responsible owl who didn't drop her passengers mid-flight. He shrugged where he stood, not sure when he had stopped moving but he had, and for what felt like the tenth time made an attempt to close the distance between them, hoofing it up to where she stood. Uh came out again and he agreed silently. Like, what else do you say, when there's been a pretty serious case of companion kidnapping, and then assault, and then yelling and more accusations, and, uh, shit? It's not like he's angry, though. But damn, his left shoulder is still throbbing, and in the back of his mind he can still feel the unpleasant smell of Irma's heat-slick feathers. And he still can't get angry. "What," came his instant response, sort of blurted out because with her, he never took those eons of silence—never had those eloquent phrases shaped in his head, taking their sweet time to roll off his tongue. With her, shit just fell out of his mouth and he didn't know whether he liked the change or if it scared him witless. Then, "Oh,", and he could feel the dirt-streaks on his body and the tangles in his mane and, yes, thistles. "What, don't you think I look good in them?" [ @[Roskuld]! ] RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Roskuld - 03-26-2015
RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Mauja - 04-05-2015
i am the vanguard of your destruction
And it's not like he knows why he said that, or why it even mattered, or why he cared, or why she cared and who the hell cared if he was covered in thistles anyway? They were purple and kinda pinkish, and that's a nice color, right? Right. Right. Diego was laughing at him. Mauja glared into the distance after him. It was just the knee-jerk reaction that had fallen off his tongue, playful and kind of coy, a defense mechanism—he couldn't count all the times those kind of sentences had torn themselves from his skull, his fragile attempts at controlling a situation which he had no control over, situations that terrified him and came after him like wolves braided up with lotus flowers in their long gray fur. “I mean,” she was saying, sounding like she felt like he did, sort of raw and confused and like she was just spitting words trying to find her feet again (but the ground keeps on bucking). And she was looking at him with those oddly colored eyes; what should've been black was spitting blue, a highway to her soul, and he figured it was fitting that she had lightning in the center of her eye. Because he thought she had lightning in the center of her heart too, electricity arcing through metal-wrought veins. .. bustin' your ass. Bustin' my ass? It was a throw-back to that first time on the beach, when they'd found that odd, unbalanced draft, the one who got so indignant when Mauja pushed him over in the shallows (gods he couldn't help but smirk at the memory, a moment of his dark lips curling before he smoothed out the expression again)—when Elding (Loudmouth) had told him to take that dark moron and bounce. Maybe.. maybe bustin' your ass had something to do with bouncing. Or it had nothing to do with it and he fought down the urge to say vamoose because after all, he didn't want her to go. The realization struck him like something cold in the face, sudden and demanding; he recoiled mentally, bounding back a step in his head, but the only thing that happened in the real world was that, maybe, his eyes got a little colder, and his breathing a little stiller. And it was like she felt it, or if she had some thought-demons of her own suddenly coming into her skull, because her kind of adorable grin fell and she was biting her lips and he was drowning, struggling in the tide of emotion because it was like she was his kid or something but he didn't want to ever make her feel like she was lesser or young and stupid or something, so maybe she was more like his little brother or something— Yeah whatever, mister confused, just shut up. "He'll be fine," Mauja said quietly, unable to look at those eyes, turning to stare after the disappearing owls; they weren't even specks in the sky anymore, having disappeared somewhere into the distance, playful and violent and rolling through the heavens—but she never opened her foot, never allowed Diego to wrestle his talons into hers in their crazy owl-games, holding that tiny, fragile body with the kind of tenderness you never really expect to find in a predator with a soul as cold as Irma's. "And she'll be fine, too," he went on as she blurted her explanation, but his gaze had narrowed, as if he couldn't blame her and he could forgive her, but still there was something there, some kind of warning, like, if you actually hit my owl the next time you'll regret it— —but then she was plucking thistles from the ground, awkwardly pressing them and her soft nose against his right side, the burrs sticking happily to his thin summer coat. Mauja turned his head to look at it, at what she was doing, sort of confused and curious but then she said “You’re lopsided,” and despite everything going through his head (owls and companions and soul-family and whatever) it pulled a bark of a laughter from him, brief but soft and deep like thunder. And then, he simply rolled his eyes, fell to his knees and then to his side, rubbing himself vigorously against the ground, and somewhere, someone was probably crying at what it did to his long, luscious mane. [ delirious fever posting yea @[Roskuld] ] RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Roskuld - 04-10-2015
RE: Thick, Juicy Tenderloin - Mauja - 04-30-2015
i am the vanguard of your destruction
About the only good thing with having a horn attached to your forehead was this: you could skewer someone. You could turn them into shish kebab. (You could do that with ice spires, too.) You could punch your way in between their ribs and end that otherwise ceaseless motion of their heart—and the red would follow the spirals down until it pooled on your forehead like a battle necklace of rubies. But it was dried blood. Aside from that one, violent fact (and maybe a few other things, like poking about in holes?), having a horn.. well, if he was going to be completely honest, as he lay there under a clear blue sky and rubbed himself green against the ground, he figured that maybe, in the long run, the unicorns weren't the best off. Wings... The Pegasus could fly. They could spread their wings and take to the skies, soar and fall and spiral through the air, travel and play and fight, and... And equines, they could roll onto their goddamned backs without getting cricks in their neck. For a brief, glorious moment, Mauja lay as much on his back as any horse could, pale belly bared to the disinterested sun. His front legs were tucked, and his neck stretched out, buuut.. instead of being able to rub the top of his head on the ground, which he imagined would feel pretty damn awesome, it got stuck at this odd, uncomfortable angle because there was a horn in the way. "I thought," he grunted, coming down on one side again, sprawled but peering at her with the air of utmost dignity and sincerity, "that green and purple work well together." But then there was that shift again, like her eyes went out of focus, up into the clouds and the sky where the owls had since long disappeared with her new friend. He knew what it felt like, to stretch across the distance and feel someone else as intimately as you felt yourself—to share in their highs and lows, their thoughts, their feelings, to share their vision and their hunger; satisfaction. How many times hadn't he felt the echoes of them gorging on some unfortunate rodent spilling over the bond? How many times hadn't he lurked in the backs of their minds, enjoying that wolfish kind of feast? With time, with practice, it got easier to keep one ear on them, and one ear on his own life. They faded into the backdrop, they had their own lives, satellites around you but more like your roommates and not some annoying cat living underfoot. But they never disappeared. They were never silent—apart from that one time, when he had been lost in time. Irma had ridden his withers, but if he had reached for her, he had only found .. nothing. Come to think of it, now that he had lived years and not just months with her—it was terrifying. If that were to happen again.. now... He swallowed, and decided to not think of it. "Yes," he said after a moment, sober now; still lying down, but within the confines of his mind again. He wasn't sure why it hadn't surprised him when Irma hatched—maybe.. maybe he had been surprised for a moment, but she had come so violently into his mind, a blizzard raging before falling asleep with her belly full... And after that, there just hadn't been any room to doubt or wonder. It was just the way things were. "You're never going to be alone again." For better or for worse. His dark lips curved into a small, almost sad smile, but he let her see it only for a moment before hauling himself to his feet. Without them, I wouldn't be alive anymore. They hadn't saved him from some kind of danger. They existed. They cherished life. And they would die with him. That simple fact had made him step aside from Ophelia's horn. "Come on," he said, wondering if she would sense that the cheer in his voice was faux. He felt old and heavy and afraid, ashamed, sick to the core with how deep he had fallen. "Let's go see where those featherballs took him." Because I can feel him squirm in my grasp. [ @[Roskuld], the end. <3 ] |