centuries deep

DEIMOS And in your darkest hour, I hold secrets flame Damned if he’d done nothing at all, damned that he had; the Reaper had been used to the double-edged tactics, but rarely stood before gods in the same stead. Perhaps that had been his first mistake (or just a mere episode in the reel of errors). Rexanna had ultimately paid the price for his ignorance, for things he should’ve known and thought he understood. But he comprehended some weight of it now, after the warnings, after the considerations, after the attempts, a trial gone to decay. It was a wonder anyone tried anything at all here; to have so many consequences blasted back at them. His fingers curled around the chimes in his grasp, preventing the entirety of his fist to close, but they rang together in a cluster, of his stupidity, of his derision, of his melancholy. Perhaps Safrin meant rhetorical inquiries, and he had to swallow down the choking noose grating at his nape once more. “I did not think.” An admittance,  just presumed, just went headfirst, just went into thinking he’d prolonged others’ lives, and then ultimately ended his friend’s. One and the same, monsters and Ascended, lines subtly blurred, manifestations rendered differently, but the contortions of their prowess still present. He glanced upwards at her from his stare at the ground, at the speculation written there. “It was not.” But it could be. And deep, deep down, beyond the workings of anguish and despair, was a malicious anger. The Reaper still had ties to the Sword’s blood, and the menace, the hatred, the contempt for things considered adversaries, for actions he should’ve, might’ve taken, so long ago. Had it been kept in reserve because of Rexanna? After the blight? After the Mathair? After hearing the Ascended could’ve stopped LongNight’s assaults? Or was this more manipulation? He’d stuck himself into a path of crosshairs – and neither avenue seemed sufficient. Save for one, curled and coiled amidst his eternal loathing (for himself, and for those harmed) – no longer holding back, no longer any need of it. The Sword’s eyes looked towards the door, to the series of machinations rolling in his mind again. It should’ve been stopped, after everything – but he stuck to his characteristics, of repercussions, of consequences, of spillovers, of what was to come. “Can the door be altered into something else?” master of nothing place; of recoil and grace