The seething tension, strain, antipathy, and antagonism seared into the cretin depths of his desecration, molding, weaving, contorting, carving the foundation of rage, fury and ire until he thought the loss of his control imminent. It somehow remained, forged and resolute as words became clamors, as phrases became threats, as emboldened, hurt, audacious embers foiled and spoiled old glories. The sparks of indignation tore, ignited, incised, exasperation exploding into the breadth of shame, and he felt no weight of the responsibility, the blind accusations. Did she blame him for her recent tribulations? Did she place all her rancor, all her bitterness, upon a beast who’d asked for a declaration of response from his leader, one who’d flown into the night, left them to falter in the sand and grit? All the savage discourse was misplaced malevolence upon his resolute fervor, when all of her tirades and turbulence should have been sunken, harpooned, into her chest, into her thoughts, into her mind, congealed in the taste, in the flavor of belligerence and humiliation. He would willingly give her the credit she was due, the uniting of a broken harem, the sharpened edge of their animosity, the grinding, puncturing friction of their heresy, but hadn’t they all contributed? Hadn’t they all fostered pride, forgot condemnation, consigned themselves to the persevering anchor and weight of cumbersome loads? Hadn’t they fought, hadn’t they all dreamed, hadn’t they all yearned? And now, she hoisted herself upon a pedestal, poured all their strength, all their tangible prowess, into her own doing and possession? The Reaper’s brutal fortitude, resilience and capability had not been for her to claim, to hold, to dominate, but for the land, the earth, for each glacial cavern, for each stone placed upon their chilling empire, and she sought to reign over its brawn, diminish, distort, the reasons behind his queries? The festering of his heated acrimony, barbaric enmity, hostile loathing, didn’t fall over his brow, but curled into his chest, pierced the vicious, ferocious, forthright tones. “You twist my words. I asked for explanations.” He paused, directing the full, taut contempt of his stare into her gaze, to spew her accusations back into the midnight air, to correct inappropriate, misguided, ill-judged phrases. “Not for your departure.” It wouldn’t have been his place to demand her withdrawal, not when others mimicked the same actions, but to sully his regard, his dominion, for theatrics, for dramatics, was an unsuitable ploy. He refused to be maligned by her, the General who’d served their sovereignty without complaint, without refusal, grinding his daggers into souls, ensuing depravity, unwinding calamity, at the pulse of her word.

Then she tossed them away, flung her distinction, her title, her circlet, into the air, as if it didn’t matter, as if they’d tarnished her reputation into damnation (hadn’t she done this on her own?), as if by conjuring her errors into the land, they’d purred and poured her destruction. Deimos stared, shocked, surprised, eyes widening, as she effectively thrust her diadem into Ulrik’s covetous grasp, forgoing triumphs and conquests because she’d been reminded of her faults, of her errors. Instead of yielding, unwinding and attempting to embark on crusades to right the faulted ship, she simply abolished her credentials. Had someone so embossed with credentials, absolution, and obliteration, with impending sway, with foretold authority, tossed it aside? Had she been always been such a creature, and they’d never seen the end of her ambitions, the toppling of her figurine? Or were they treated to this juncture because they’d witnessed the stumbling, the faltering, the vulnerability, and she could think of no other way to combat the moment? Psyche’s actions were met by his stunned, stony silence, the reticent claws surfacing back over his corrupted features, gaze sliding back to the smirking, snickering mechanic, wondering what was to befall them next. Was it to be dissolution at the culmination of all their wicked deeds, leaving a fragmented coronet behind to be embodied by another? Was this the end of her reign, suffering defeat one last time, incapable of feeling anymore crashing against her senses? If they’d all been, become, beings giving up, retreating, waning and whining, surely, wouldn’t the Basin fall?

[W/C | ---]

The Reaper listened as turbulence disturbed the boundaries of their iced aspirations, halted ambitions, torn and frayed audacities, as Lady and engineer turned against one another. He kept a silent hold over the shadows, bent and molded into the shades of Stygian corruptions, captured each ripple of shambled, simmering damnation, offered not a single opinion to the tension, to the tiresome, loathsome contention and discord. Psyche exhaled her torrent, Ulrik maintained his savage puncturing of her leadership, and the General absorbed, a corporeal presence of deadly contortions, of vicious, infernal convictions, as hostilities fell apart and only the boiling, bubbling animosity filled the night’s flourishing gloaming. Absences, losses, failures and defeats built and stirred the rhythm of their anguish, of their heated wrath, of their screeching, screaming defiance and insurrection, and sedition, revolution, landed, harked and heralded its bewitching, beguiling innards, claimed subversion over hands that’d merely asked for answers and declarations. Blatant, festering wounds, scything tongues, nefarious lacerations clawing and ripping, engraving abhorrence and contempt into the loathing gestures of both, scarring their once heinous munitions and motions into crumbled bits of antagonistic animosity. Superiority brutalized and fumbled, and all the while he was the pondering, meticulous, calculating witness, wondering how they’d unite tyranny again, how they’d corrupt virtues, how they’d embark on heathenous sketches and molds, how they’d blend their twisted hearts and distorted souls into the same breadths of domination. Poisoned and contaminated, blighted and spoiled, the rancorous clarity, the severe doldrums, the heat of their riotous clamor and uproar only spelled out the disastrous art of their former triumph; they’d spun quickly into a downward spiral, into the incensed umbrage, into the cold, harsh, unrelenting truth of catastrophes. Barbarians’ wills tightened and stiffened, soldiers’ hands incapable of encompassing swords, indifference and complacency soiled into the roots of their specious brutality – perhaps all along they’d been deluded by their strength, by their philosophy, by the weight of their might and dominion – and the General stoked the flames of his apocalyptic strife, harbored and harpooned the absolution of their remorseless bounty, their ruthless embers, thought how to destroy over and over again instead of making enemies of themselves.

But his name crossed over their molten mouths, and Deimos’s attention was drawn back to the torrential schemes of monarch and mechanic, captured the edges of their statements. He’d been sown into the winter tapestry, he’d been unearthed and christened for the raw brutality, for the wild, heinous, ferocious debacles, for each and every brushstroke of satanic origin, gleamed when the prosperous, warped calculations severed virtues, puzzled and attempted to fix the broken shells when conquest stomped upon their rasped backs. He’d held his rapier, he’d allured, beguiled, seduced death upon their opponents, beckoned the Tartarean, carnivore sentiments to move, to swindle, to stitch and stain their adversaries, clenched power aloft, possessed dominion in the strength in his stride. He lived for treachery, for the vicious, vile villainy pressed into their minds, into their debauchery, for the horror, for the terror, of unwinding the lesser; except now, it appeared as if they were the indulgent, the weak, the inept and vacuous. His eyes widened a fraction once more, as their lips blended, sank into the murmurs of sovereignty pressed upon his skull, a crown to bear. Instead of contemplating further, for perhaps it was to blight Ulrik, perhaps it was to muster the weaknesses of Psyche, he swore himself again, felt no need to repress the bestial, feral anarchy built into his lungs, into his chest, into his veins. “My efforts are for the Basin and the Plague.” It hadn’t been for Lordship, for a throne, but for disaster, for destruction, for ruin and abomination. And if he so deserved the mantle, rule, monarchy and kingly pursuits, he said naught about it, and instead, permitted the notion to ignite inside his cranium, slink and crawl, past the burning fires of his father’s prowess, and into the alluring, entrancing tides of complete, utter domination. Even indifference couldn't sunder the image of conquering foes with a darkened, deadly coronation.

[W/C | ---]