From being an Abandoned who had rarely left the Hollowed Grounds, to embracing the call of adventure, to dying and being reborn first as an Ascended and then as an Ancient, Maea has gone through quite the amount of changes in her life. One thing remains common, though, in her attempts to find out just where she belongs; she’s always had a craving for knowledge which has brought her to so many places and to meet so many people here in Caido. We can’t wait to see what else is in store for her!
Congratulations, Maea!
Credits
Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
Skinning and hosting by the epically talented Kaons, and functionality fanciness by the coding magic of Neowulf. If you ever see either of them around, make sure to show them some love!
The Nightshade hadn't expected to come into the house turned bar and run straight into a inky purple web, yelping at the strangely cold and glowing strands as they tried to wrap around her. Thankfully she managed to miss the newly created Voidweaver that was in the high corner waiting for prey. Managing to clear her face, the Nightshade stumbles into the bar, twirling quickly to see the glowing violet eyes of the spider staring back at her, fangs seeming to drip with venom.
Pulling her whip from her waist, Maeve flips out the fiery weapon with ease, snapping the arachnid against the wall and making it burst into flames. This place was crawling with Wine Spiders the last time she was here. She had no doubt the same could be said for these new little creatures.
I admit that I'm a little messed up but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up
01-08-2024, 03:27 AM (This post was last modified: 01-08-2024, 03:27 AM by Michael.)
TW: Suicidal thoughts, idealization of suicide, violence, blood.
MICHAEL
Kid, get off the ground. Spit your blood and bare your teeth.
How many fucks does it take to give one fuck? Just one. Even half of one. A QUARTER. An eighth was too small to count, a sixteenth would never count, but, come on, Michael.
The world isn’t asking for much.
He disagreed, of course. Made his way quietly, carefully, to the old stone steps with ancient cracks and the evidence of a thousand footfalls. Didn’t care about who had come before him, who would come after him. Survival mode was like that when you were locked in, held so tight you couldn’t breathe, clenched too firmly to disagree when paranoia was a hinderance instead of an advantage. When your every waking moment was spent analyzing everything that could go wrong.
And nothing that might go right.
Trust no one, trust nothing, drink whiskey unless the numb washes over you, drag the heel end of a blade’s hilt across the hard bone of his forearm to distract. Unable to choose between what he really wanted, always tended toward NUMB but sometimes yearned for the flood of endorphins and the heart-hammering rush of adrenaline.
Today, as he glanced over both shoulders to ensure no one had seen his descent, he was leaning more toward booze, seedy bars, and cantankerous assholes. A decision made mostly to evade other people, finding the company of those as fucked up as himself far more agreeable than anyone who might look at life through a more positive lens.
Down narrow streets, eeling through alleys and between decrepit buildings. Knowing his way around The Last Whisper because this was where he came when he was too exhausted to run from his problems, when nothing he did made any sense.
When all he wanted to do was god damn die.
He snuck in through the staff entrance, the quickest way to reach his final destination: A corner booth that was situation in such a way that he could see every exit and every space where people travelled most consistently. Sure, it put him into a corner, but he’d see trouble – or ASSUME it was trouble based on his aggressive paranoia – and bail before anything could happen.
Hopefully.
In this case, paranoia and an innate understanding of how to survive even in the most perilous of situations did not prepare him for what he walked into:
Sticky, grabby spider webs, the skitter of an eight legged VOIDFreAk, and the brilliant flash of SOMETHING that came from the opposite side of the VlamVoed. White dots colored his vision from the strike of the flaming whip and the fire that burst around the thrashing of the creature.
Another didn’t hesitate to take advantage of his distraction, leaping straight at his face with legs spread wide, fangs exposed and ready to STAB. Michael knew he’d be fast enough to avoid the thing, but not graceful enough. His injured right forearm had taken a toll on his overall dexterity, and a simple dodge could be as troublesome as actually getting hit.
Except, he didn’t want to know what would happen should those fangs pierce flesh, and so he fell back. Landed with a harsh grunt and slammed both boots into the side of an overturned table, something light, not that heavy, but… it would stop it for now. Sent it directly into the path of the spider and half scrambled to a knee, that right arm flaring with pain as he applied weight to it. His back and sides coated in thick, tacky webbing.
“What in the god damn FUCK is going on in here?!” Hadn’t yet noticed exactly who was in the room with him. WOULD have had he enough time to care about what people looked like in that moment.
There were very few things that got past Maeve. Someone sneaking in wasn't in the category of 'goes unnoticed'. The Nightshade, even before the war, was never caught off guard. Especially not now.
Michael wasn't the only one who was paranoid these days.
She barely has time to register who decided it would be smart to sneak up on her when another void affected cellar spider appears, going after the intruder who has enough of a mind to kick a table in its way. The Nightshade bares her teeth in a snarl, fire whip snapping out with a near deafening crack, igniting the creature in a burst of flames. Sensing her fear and trepidation, Aidon swoops into the doorway, black lips curling to bare his fangs in a near mirror of his bonded's own snarl.
Maeve doesn't even give the command. She doesn't have to. Her fear too strong and palpable to be thinking clearly thanks to the combination of spiders and intruder alike. The Nightshade poises her whip to strike, but Aidon is there already, pouncing on the man with a growl. Fire already sparking in his throat, the heat nearly unbearable this close to his face, preparing to release it at his bonded's command.
The threat of the spiders isn't nearly as pressing, the ones having seen their friends reach a fiery demise, deciding that they weren't interested in meeting the same fate just yet and skittering off to hide in the dark for the time being.
The Nightshade appears above Michael, jade eyes narrowed into angry slits, fist holding onto her whip in a white knuckled grip as she stares down at him. "What the fuck do you think you're doing?" She hisses, five seconds from pressing a dagger to his throat, but Aidon seems to have it covered with the way his large claws are planted on his chest and pricking at the exposed skin above the collar of his shirt. Completely ignoring his first question, refusing to give this stranger a single fucking answer as her heart pounded behind her ribs.
I admit that I'm a little messed up but I can hide it when I'm all dressed up
TW: Suicidal thoughts, idealization of suicide, violence, blood.
MICHAEL
Kid, get off the ground. Spit your blood and bare your teeth.
Something there. Pouncing, much larger than the spiders. Too fast to avoid, too large to truly dodge. Where would he go anyway, between this and those skittering arachnids? And okay, sure. Let’s add teeth, claws, and FIRE, why not?
His heartrate increased substantially, shoved more blood through his system and fired up his adrenaline. The subtle remnants of a defensive snarl there and then gone, pupils expanding. Motion and any decision making held in check by old training that was still online. Had been since the end of the war, would likely never truly leave him.
He could smell it as much as he could feel it. Heating his skin, forcing his eyes to squint against it. Breath there, too, wafting against his own. No struggle at all, not even a flinch, gaze averted away from the thing. A reaction, not a response.
He knew the difference between a predator that wanted to devour him as opposed to one that wanted to subdue him. Tough lessons learned on his own between life as a soldier and life as a nomad. Being alone increased the threat of injury and death, made it harder to stay ontop of resources. All of these things kicked up his paranoia, forced him to remain in a state of awareness, constantly alert. Except when he was distracted. Except when the drink he’d come here for had turned into some twisted version of a horror story.
Maybe he’d get eaten. Or stabbed.
Maybe he wouldn’t.
Did his death count as being ‘deserved’ if he wasn’t the one who caused it?
And then a face. One he recognized, made eyebrows lifted briefly when he caught features in his peripheral vision. A queen, once. But, that was the world, wasn’t it? You were royalty, you were powerful. And then you weren’t.
He saw the way her digits coiled around her whip. Held it white-knuckled. Heard it in her voice, the strain of anger… or maybe something else. Michael didn’t know, he wasn’t a god damn mind reader. He didn’t care, either, either get it done or let him up.
"What the fuck do you think you're doing?"
“I came here for the whiskey.” A gravely tone drenched in snark. Haunted by a past he’d never tell anyone about. Not even himself. “Didn't you? Or were you waiting for me?” Still no movement from him. The uptick of his beating heart remained, breaths slightly faster. Would have been more frantic had he led a more civilian lifestyle.
