troubles yet to come

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

Aside from his first stop, putting the two remaining roses back home where he knows they can’t be damaged, he slips out the door the next morning along a familiar path. One rose clutched in his hand, imagining that it’s the least he could do for Phoebe after the events that had transpired rather freshly. He wears a fair amount of furs, leather along his pants now to prevent the penetration of the snow into the fabric of his clothes, and he makes his way toward her clinic.

He doesn’t know how the blight has affected her recently, nor does he really care. If this helps, then it helps. And he had promised her that he would help her, regardless. Maybe it makes him soft, maybe it makes him different from who he was before – a ruthless rebel with a cause back in Korofi – but he can at least try.

He kneels along the edge of her property, pushing aside the snow until the hard frozen earth is revealed, and he sets the blood red rose before him as he pulls out a small shovel of sorts to break apart the ground. An effort given, an attempt made, and he chips away at it in the early morning hours as the sun beats behind dark clouds, leaving little rays of light that cascade through the cracks.

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

As wrapped up in his thoughts and focused on his task as he was, Jata seemed to ignore his surroundings. An understandable mistake. It was rare that the settlement was home to hostility. But things had changed - people had changed - and now little clinics that were once warm and cozy were now cold and plagued with monstrosities. The midwife Jata had in mind was actually sitting up above the porch, perched upon the awning with her dragon at her side. Black stained her lips and the whites of her eyes as she watched, a wraith of the woman the man had once known. She watched as he knelt, and dug in the snow, then produced one of the violently red roses from the shrine. Her lips curled over black stained teeth in a snarl.

Kill it. Kill the flower.

With a shout she jumped down from the awning, the snow that had piled up in front of her porch cushioning her descent. And yet she moved nearly unhindered, charging towards Jata as Pim flew overhead, roaring loudly at the man below.

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

He works away at the frozen earth, paying more attention to the shovel in his hand rather than the porch. The light is rising now, and he feels no real need to – imagining that Phoebe in all her exhaustion the last he had seen of her, was probably sleeping. Still, he keeps the rose protected before him, using himself as a shield, having seen the sickest of them crush them underfoot. He’s thankful he left the last two at home, hidden away.

He’s almost lost in thought when there’s a loud shout, steel eyes narrowing as he lifts his gaze to the porch to find Phoebe flinging herself from the awning – while Pim roars loudly overhead. Phoebe doesn’t stop, though, and he sees the dark changes over her, and he grits his teeth – aiming to take the charge head on. He’s sure to step over the flower, however, to protect it when she nears.

And she hits him with a force he didn’t know her small body had, knocking the air out of him as he reaches up to try and grab onto, to push back, to get her to back off. “Phoebe. Stop.” He tells her, rough demand in his voice, albeit breathless.

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

At her name, she paused, blinking at him, looking almost confused. But he wouldn't get a reprieve for long. Her face twisted as she glared and snarled, staring at him with an almost unrecognizing gaze. She screamed in his face as he grabbed her, told her to stop, inky black spittle spattering his face. Her arms flung out, clawing at his face, his throat, legs kicking out towards him, not caring if they fell. Crush the rose, kill the flower, the ugly, hideous flower! The warmth was gone from her eyes as black tears of frustration welled up and rolled down her cheeks. This body was small and weak and useless! But she would fight never the less, shoving back against him, anything to make him fall or step back or let her get close enough to her target.

Pim for the moment did nothing but make threatening noises. His little squishy human had to learn to fight after all. If it got too hard he would swoop in and help.

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

The first thought he has is ‘holy shit’.

The second thought he has is that he needs to protect the flower, imagining that is the sense of her distress, and he grits his teeth, eyelids fluttering as the black of the blight splatters and covers his cheeks. She’s shrieking like a banshee, and he tries to push her back – but she’s on him again, hands reaching for his throat covered by furs and leathers, then to his face – and he reaches for those arms again with a harsh narrowed look.

This absolutely wasn’t her. All darkness and rage, all fight and fury. In the struggle, the scarf of sorts leaves his neck and her fingernails claw at the faded bruises along his neck, as she pushes him back further and further, but he plants his feet and surges back, aiming to grab onto the hands that aim to maim and attack, a few small scratches line his throat now and they welt with dark ruby hued blood as he tries to keep himself between her and flower. “Stop.” He tells her again, a growl to his voice, not wanting to have to push her to the snowy ground and pin her there – but he will if he has to.

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

Holy shit was a very logical reaction.

Her rage is incited further as he fights back against her. Him. Him. Him. Why him? Her heart ached to see him and she couldn't quite remember why but it only added fuel to her fiery wrath, screaming at him again with a hoarse voice, her usually soft timbre having been stretched beyond what it was comfortable with. But he braced against her instead, snatching up her hands with a practiced ease that her own body lacked, ceasing to slide backwards towards the flower.

"No, no, no, no, NO!!" she started softly, building to a shriek as she ripped and tore against him, thrusting her full weight forward in any hopes of fighting off the much larger and stronger person. Black tears continued to fall, streaking through her blonde hair.

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

A part of him relishes in the fact that he’s grasped onto her, but it’s short lived as she shrieks further – a series of no’s that has him wishing he hadn’t come to her, wishing he didn’t have to see her this way. But that was the entire point of it, the point to plant the flower and disappear, as though he were never there, hoping and praying to all these new gods and old that it worked. Yet here he was, fighting with a woman wrought with madness and sadness, and he finds there’s naught he can do.

She flings herself back at him, and he grips onto her wrists hard enough to leave a small amount of bruising as he pushes her back, something akin to sorrow glinting in his steel gaze before he reverts to previous training, pretending the ground is the flood battered grounds of Korofi and he’s focused on apprehending. His boots grip the snow just enough to give him an edge, and he surges forward again, hoping it does enough to knock the two of them to the ground – hoping it knocks her backwards where he can follow up straight down. “Let. Me.” He tells her, another demand hidden beneath the hiss of his voice. “Plant the fucking rose.”

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

With his training used against her, even in all her rage and pure instinct, Phoebe was no match for Jata. Her feet, in just small slip on shoes - nothing that suited the weather - slipped against the snow and she fell with a shout. Pure white snow was smudged with black as her face pressed into it. For a moment she felt like she was drowning, suffocating, nose and mouth shoved into the snow and Jata's full weight pressed down upon her. Panic. She cried out and thrashed, twisting and clawing, gasping for air as she tried to escape from beneath him. Pim felt her panic and was quick to land roaring at Jata loudly. He began to charge...

But pulled to a stop. As feral as he was and felt, he still recognized this man - he had given him food regularly for a time. And Phoebe had carved out herself a small hole and wasn't in so much of a panic about breathing as she had been. And so the dragonling paused, even as Phoebe thrashing and cried out against the man atop her, before roaring at him fiercely, lightning playing around his silvery teeth.

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

She slips like he expects her to, and he follows her down, furs and scarves falling in the snow about her. And he watches while the black ink of her tears mixes with the snow, melting and shifting the colors of it. His attention only shifts when Pim approaches in all fury and loud roaring, electric and fierce, beginning to pause while Jata decides it’s the end of him here and now, and he’s surprised it’s taken this long. But Pim pauses, and Jata’s steal gaze slides toward the dragon in the hesitation.

He’d come prepared for the possibility, at least, reaching down into a pocket and pulling out a bit of dried meat, while he uses his other hand to keep Phoebe pressed beneath the weight of him into the snow. He tosses a piece of it to the dragon as a bribe, hoping it’s good enough to not get electrocuted, before he averts his gaze back to Phoebe with a raised brow.

He loosens his grip enough to flip her over, until she’s facing up at him, but he keeps her there. “Phoebe calm down.” He tells her, fighting the urge to brush away the dark ink stained tears. Instead he keeps her arm pinned, a vaguely familiar look about him as there once was, but he pulls back enough to narrow his gaze at her. “It will help.” His accent comes through thicker now, but he doesn’t move until he knows she’s not going to rage at him again – but judging by the ruby blood that streaks from his neck onto his collarbone and shirt, he finds it unlikely.  So he tries a different tactic.

“Remember, you were going to show me what snow was? How you laughed when I didn't understand what a snowman was?” He still didn't know what a snowman was, but that was beside the point.

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

Pim snatched the bits of jerky out of the air, tearing at them, pleased to have made the right decision. He watched as the man flipped Phoebe over so she could breath better. Perhaps he intended to breed with her again. Stupid humans, unable to smell lack of fertility. Oh well. He had jerky.

Meanwhile Phoebe's rage did not cease just because she no longer felt as though she would suffocate in the snow. Phoebe screamed up at him, still thrashing around, thoroughly drenched from the snow already. Nothing she wore was fit for such weather, and where her skin was not stained black, it near glowed bright red from the cold. "NO! NO! NO! NO!" she shrieked at him. The flower would not help. The flower would kill and ravage and destroy, the cleansing of Vi upon their souls like boiling mineral spirits on tar. But as he spoke of the snow, of their, past, of things she had done and said, she stilled, glaring up at him, inky tears still rolling down her face.

"Yes. When you loved me. When you picked me. When you wanted me." she hissed through gritted, blackened teeth. "But Lusea came and you forgot. You forgot how I held you, how I healed you, how I soothed your wounds and hurts and pains. You forgot how I made you whole - you don't want to admit it. You want her as she tears  you to the pieces I found you in." she hissed, before laughing near maniacally at him. "And when you realize that you want to be loved, that it is all you wanted, not destroyed over and over and you realize that she cannot give it to you, you will realize you tossed me aside - the only one who ever really loved you scars and murders and vulnerable spots all, Jata." Her mind knew what would cut, what would hurt, where to poke and prod. Where her body was weak her mind was sharp and she would cut what and how she could, striking back against him.

"Because she loves your darkness. I love you. All of you"

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

Well, he lives for another day, in a way as Pim seems content and Phoebe continues her banshee screams. And for a moment he thinks his memory has worked, as she stills and he pants slightly – hands moving to press her shoulders into the snow as he leans back just enough, narrowed eyes watching as his words digest. But he’s not prepared for the next part, not prepared for the venom that shoots back. He should have expected it, should have realized bringing up a past comment that would have never happened, would have backfired. But he can’t take the words back now.

She hisses at him, and he takes the initial insults like a dartboard, letting them reach him and stay, to be removed later when the air is more sober. But she doesn’t stop past her grit teeth, and the words strike harder, and for a moment he feels like he’s seventeen years old again, the night he couldn’t sleep before the day his life took a darker turn for the worst. When he had lost all hope, and hoped his soft heart and mind got him killed. Had Phoebe made him whole? Or had she made him that trembling, depressed child he had once been?

Had he changed, reverted back into the young naïve version of himself, or had he been the boy to hold the pistol to the others clamoring for his head. Gods, how he wanted to give it to them. Instead, he grinds his teeth while she speaks of Lusea, of the woman who incites his bad habits, into he version of himself that didn’t want to jump off the roof that stormy night – to only want to jump off the roof with her by his side. He doesn’t know what hurts worse, the information he knows he’s given her, or the maniacal laughter she has while she says it.

To be loved? He is, was, had been loved. First by his mother, where he could do no wrong, and yet he still wanted to destroy it. He wanted to destroy himself, it’s all he’s ever wanted, but she doesn’t know that. She doesn’t know that he’d rather be devoured whole than become his soft self again. His grip tightens on her shoulders instead, the darts turning to daggers, souring his heart and his mood, and he feels as though he’s back in Korofi again, laughing before his father.

The only thing he can do is bark a laugh back at her, dark and deep and ignited from the insanity she sparks. He leans down toward her with a raised brow, the blackness of the blight streaking down from his cheek as the blood on his neck begins to clot. “You never loved me, Phoebe. You loved what I could give you.” His voice is coated with the accent of home. “You loved the idea of us, of changing me to fit you better, to be the proper man that could give you children and a happy stable life.” He leans down toward her now, taking her strikes along his face as he pushes her down further. “But that is not me. That version of myself died when I was seventeen years old, and it’s been a long decade since then.” He growls, baring his teeth back at her.

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

His head tilts forward, his brow furrows, his anger ignites and he forgets. Good, yes, forget it all. Thing you have the upper hand, that physical strength is all that matters. Her mind is sharp still, her memories weapons, her words poison and he but a simple man, too convinced of a false reality that his possession of a penis and musculature makes him somehow more capable. She smiles slowly, eery and inky black, even as tears still stream down her face. Slowly she lifts a hand, resting it on the back of his neck, his ear caught between her thumb and her index finger. "It hurts less to believe that, doesn't it? But is that really me, Jata? Is Phoebe so cunning as those in Korofi to use you? Is that the Phoebe you know?" she asked, her voice hoarse but soft, a near whisper as her thumb stroked along his cheek bone as she often had. "That boy never died. He adapted. He learned. He protected himself. He survived behind layers of ice and scars and sarcasm. He chased a woman who encouraged that and mistook it for love. That's what she does, isn't it? She encourages you to hide in the shadows so you might fight another day?"

Again she laughed, head tilting back briefly, looking at the clinic upside down. "I saw that boy. I saw you. For the first time in a decade you could not hide and it scared you." she whispered, looking back at him again. "I did not seek to change you. You changed yourself. Because remember...I'm not the one who can lie. Jata." she said, a cross between a whisper and a hiss. "I loved you. The real you that you pretend is dead. And it scared you to be loved. Didn't it?" she said, her other hand lifting to cradle the other side of his head.

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!

if there's a light at the end, it's just the sun in your eyes

i know you wanna go to heaven

She lifts her hand and he expects the clawing of nails along the side of his neck, but where her earthy fingers touch, it’s gentle, and subconsciously he loosens his grip on her shoulders in the snow, pressing not as hard as she speaks. Bared teeth become grit as his steel gaze narrows, pushing away the thoughts. Yes. He wants to tell her, because that’s what they’ve always done. He’d been used again and again, and with Lusea he had a choice.

Didn’t he?

Her voice is hoarse as she whispers, stroking her finger along his cheek, melding with the black of her, and he wants to pull away from her hand, to tilt his head so she can’t touch him anymore, but he doesn’t – instead he looks down to her, listening to the barbs that dive and settle, twisting and pulling as they’re removed. He shakes his head to her, a small amount of the blood dripping from his neck onto her, red melding with the redness of her skin.

He had wanted Phoebe to have a bit more fight, but fuck if it hurt like this.

She doesn’t understand that he loved the darkness, loved the ability to scream anarchy into the nights under the streetlights, lighting up a cigarette in the face of his once-fellow shoulders, partners in arms. Lusea had seen him through it, seen the fighter and the broken puzzle piece he was trying to put back together. But it seemed Phoebe could see straight through it, and he hated that, he hated her in that instance, and he finds himself holding his breath as her head tilts back to look at the clinic.

“You. Don’t. Know. Me.” He tells her at first, through grit teeth and short words, of pants and frustration, and a small amount of fear. She had changed him, couldn’t she see that? Medicated him, made him regret the things he’d done, he’d dealt with. She doesn’t know the darkest parts of him, of how many times he wished he could slip off the ledge of a building into nonexistence, disappear in a riot, the chosen son fallen at the hands of himself.

But he was loved, he was sure of it. Loved by the only person he could reciprocate the feelings with, who didn’t ask, didn’t crave it. And he tears his head away from her hand in response. Scared? Pfft. “You didn’t see that boy. He died a long time ago. You saw what you wanted to see.” He bites back. The soft version of himself had been sorrow and pain and anger. He didn’t want to be that again. He became sharp edges and shards of glass. He wanted people to be afraid of him, of hurting him, because it was easier that way. It’s easier to prevent it than pick up the pieces.

but you're human tonight

SUNJATA

PHOEBE

He pulled away, and she faltered. It might appear as hurt, but it was frustration. She should have struck but she didn't. She would have to try harder. She couldn't best him in strength after all. She needed the surprise. But it would come. He had already loosened his hold. Her lips curved up as she reached for his head again, her fingers curling into his hair. "You're lying." she whispered, a low laugh escaping her lips. "I do know you. I knew you the moment I saw you. It scares you to know someone exists who can see through your defenses, doesn't it?" She let her weight pull back against him, as little as it was, to pull him closer again.

"He isn't dead. You just wish he was. And you don't know how to handle me loving all of you. It's easier to be with Lusea who only sees your armor." she whispered, hands trailing down his head towards his neck. "That's why you chose her isn't it? Admit it." she said, a hiss hidden in her tone. "She can't reach all of you, and I did what you thought wasn't possible."

When dark creeps in and eats the light

Bury your fears on sorry night

For in the winter's darkest hours

Comes the feasting of the Vours

No one can see it, the life they stole

Your body's here but not your soul

Table Code by Sky!