new old pavements [open]

[theguideless]

Date & Time: 10/5 and beyond if need be
Location: Not far from the Hold
Characters: Martin, you
Summary: Looks like a lot of things need rebuilding or fresh construction (be it in prose or brackets or drawthings)
Warnings: I...I don't have to warn about 8 billion apologies anymore.............HOW...






With bare feet and over-sized clothes, Martin looked more like a refugee than a familiar transport. But then, things weren't particularly familiar anymore. In that, it was exciting...and frightening. Already the expectations he had were greatly sobered through mere days alive in Exsilium. Perhaps the timing of his rebirth was off. Things had tapered to a tense silence above ground, though by the itching feeling in his throat and lungs, things weren't utterly clean of the attacks. Rubble and broken places – even the places where transports called their tentative homes...It wasn't as disturbing to him as it perhaps ought to have been. But he had little to compare it to; life as a Darkov was sheltered and sparse, with community life restricted to family and a rigorous cause.

All in the past. Exsilium was now, for good or ill.

He hugged his arms and settled them on his knees, seated on..a piece of wall? Something that wasn't designed to be a seat, whatever it was. Probably a piece of wall. His mind wasn't on it.

Where to start?

...Start? Hadn't things already begun? Strange, the way his mind started tapering away from the things he knew were right. The human condition was at play, dropping heavy drapes over his clarity. Heavy was the best word for it all – uncertainty, grief, excitement, guilt, relief...it wasn't the miserable trudge of days long gone. This was a steady and certain hope, not the desperate clawing and groping of a boy ignorant of the world and himself. Even with fear crowding in, the flicker of truth within remained.

It was going to be alright. Even through the worst of things...

His body shuddered against both the chill in the air and the unknowns.

Comments

[stonefaith]

--Martin.

The call.

Bariyan had been letting the boy roam free for the past few days, not wanting to impose upon his newfound freedom, not wanting to isolate him from all the chances that were now his... and so Bariyan had suppressed his own gnawing worries and kept them to himself. But now-- now the call came, without knowing intention and without urgency but strong all the same, slow, its demand building up and piling until the whole thing rolled over and burst through the dam.

Now, the flood.

He was on the highest floor of a gutted building, one wall torn out completely, leaving him free to sit at the edge with his legs dangling into the air. He'd dragged up a crate of beer with him. The crate was half-empty, now, and he had taken to throwing the bottles out into the open air to watch them crash down in the debris below.

He slumped against the column to his left; hair falling across his eyes, head bowed, hunched and bleak. He'd been angry, at first. He'd been angry ever since they'd returned to the city. But that anger was gone from him, now, and it had left precious little behind.

--Martin.

[theguideless]

Even if he'd wanted to, Martin was unable to protest the summons, silent though it seemed. To him, it was an immediate pull, an alarm of sounds or smells or feelings – anything to shake him from his thoughts and refocus all of his attention on Bariyan.

Without a word or even thought of it, he scooted forward where he sat until he slid down, back against the bulk of the rock he'd been seated upon. And from there, his whole body sagged as his spirit fled, leaving it just the shell it truly was. It breathed shallow and made no sound, and would remain so until he could reclaim it...or some force or affliction forced him back to tend to it. That was part of the contract, after all...keeping that body. Keeping it well was important. But he was the human second, not first.

The gold ghost rose in a noiseless flap of billowing light, fluid in shape for its first seconds of resurgence. Burning, feline eyes were turned unblinking toward the source of the call, and the man's head bowed before shifting into motion. Flickering out and into time made distance nothing, and he was before Bariyan without another moment wasted in miserable silence.

Here I am.

Words without a physical voice still could resonate as he willed them to, and Martin posed a question in just a look while he hovered at Bariyan's knee, looking up and smiling all the while.

[stonefaith]

He didn't question the boy's appearance, his sudden presence when Bariyan needed him the most; questioning would come later. When his mind cleared.

He reached out, fingers passing through and grasping at the intangible light that made up Martin's ghost. And he wondered, again, with a lurching horror, whether this whole thing was a lie. Where would he wake up this time? Back on the moors, the medallion still clutched in his hands, cold and lifeless? Or even further away -- thrown centuries into the future in a world far away, forced to start again. This time alone.

At least that would invalidate his current woes.

And that was altogether too much to contemplate at once. Parts of Bariyan's mind began to close off. He let his walls fall away, holding on for just one moment before giving in. Because Martin was the one person around whom Bariyan didn't need to defend himself.

He looked up, wretchedly, staring blind into the sky.

"Koltira is gone." His words rang curiously flat and calm. Gone. Not dead, not hurt. Just gone.

[theguideless]

It was something realized, though already known; Martin couldn't have touched that truth without being directed to, with the greatest expanses of his power restrained in a mortal world. An existence with no need of time, residing in time regardless...it made for strange gaps in awareness. Yet the young man's face did not show surprise, only a gentle waning of a warm smile to show sympathy. He couldn't despair in the news, but he could feel the pull of grief for the terrible violence he felt echoing in the recent past.

Arms reached out and settled around Bariyan's shoulders as Martin's head came to a hovering rest against one of them. With the gesture came the gentle rush of affection and condolence, cloaking him in it.

Will you tell him you grieved? The question bubbled up from beneath all that. When you see him again.

There was no doubt in Martin of that. Nothing within the span of time could truly unmake the made, evil or otherwise. There was only change – it was the change itself he could no longer track. To that, not fear, but anticipation. He had yet to have the chance himself to address Koltira as he wished...so how would he in the future?

[hornedomen]

For the past few days, Ico helped rebuild the city while others recovered. He wanted to help in any way he could but there were some places where he was not allowed to go. The citizens kept him away from the dead but he knew they were out there. He could tell by the look on their faces as they moved in front of him to hide the bodies.

But seeing Martin alive again was enough to make him smile. At times, he still thought it was all a dream. He called out to Martin to see if he was real enough to hear him.

“Martin!”

Ico’s voice sounded louder today in contrast with the quiet of the city. The residual gas was not enough to make his throat hurt. He did not feel it at all at this point. The pieces of rubble scratched the ground under his feet as he ran to him, as if he thought Martin would disappear if he dawdled.

“What are you doing out here?”

[theguideless]

Martin's head lifted at the sound of his name, searching the source out in quick glances before settling on the shape rushing toward him. There was no mistaking those horns, let alone the sound of the call. He could still hear the desperate please in the back of his mind, echoing as reminder of the unforgettable horrors of his past life. In that, a fresh chill creeping across his skin as he shifted and rose from his seat. Regardless, he was smiling.

He held out his arms.

[hornedomen]

There, that smile was a source of great joy to him and yet it raised the most questions. Martin had changed now and while Ico was glad that he looked happier, he wondered about what happened. Maybe it was all an elaborate dream yet he could feel his warmth when he hugged him. He put his head under his chin so the bend of his horn circled the side of Martin’s neck. The sharp, blackened tip was pointed away so Martin was in no danger of getting hurt.

Ico squeezed him a little tighter before he let go. His face was getting red with tears but he wiped them away before they fell.

“You’re really back, right?”

[theguideless]

He couldn't hug away the past, but the contact was comforting – something Martin would've never offered, let alone taken, as the scared boy he was before. Finding the truth of yourself after death kind of washes out the need or use for such fears, though. He made a sound, feeling his hair tickle under his ear when the horn moved to place. And, freed, he was no less beset by emotion.

"Yes, I am," he said, nodding.

[ex_bandai157]

Barnaby never thought he'd grow to like this city in any way, but there's something horrible about seeing it taken apart. Every cracked wall, piece of rubble, broken space makes the anger bubbling in his chest that much hotter, more ready to overflow into action. His earlier thoughts about possibly staying out of the conflict were foolish, he sees now; the Initiative has made the war a pressing concern for all of the transports, and he can accept that now. The United Earth, whatever else they are, have done something horrific and unforgivable, and he'll be happier to see them gone.

(And before when he looked around these roads, these walls, these paths, he'd seen a city not so unlike his own; now he sees where people had to flee, where people have died, where fire consumed.)

He'd been looking for a purpose before, fumbling around in the dark for a reason to keep going; and now he has one, all but literally falling into his lap. It's his own will (he's sure, right?) to accept it.

It's lost in thoughts like these that he approaches the area where Martin sits.

[theguideless]

The sound shook him out of his train of thought, and Martin turned his head toward the source. Barnaby was no one he'd met prior to his unwinding, but given the chance to watch and consider and put the pieces together. They'd encountered just once after the fact, but it was enough, fresh enough in Martin's memory to make it all click. Everything but a name.

He shifted where he sat, hands pressing on the rubble on either side of him, ready to stand if the need struck. Words were likewise in a state of pause; what was he to say? In what way? What sort of man was this stranger who'd wound up in the tangled mess the Darkov made not so long ago?

oh god what are tenses

[ex_bandai157]

It was the movement that caught his attention, making him pause and notice the boy not sitting far away. The same boy, he realized now, from the catacombs, and then before that from those tense few weeks when he was a fear, a danger to the people of Exsilium. Connecting that person - whom he'd even doubted to be a person at the time - to the polite, vulnerable-looking boy before him now was difficult.

He wasn't particularly in the mood for small talk, but he approached Martin anyway, expression settling into something neutral but not unfriendly.

"You're feeling better, I take it?"

things to be SMITTEN

[theguideless]

"I am."

He said it quickly, feeling a nervous flutter in his stomach. Nervous-worried or nervous-excited...it was hard to discern between the two then and there. The nod was after-the-fact, as was the small smile, but connected all the same. It was hard to smile; he could see himself lashing out at the man, incoherent and lost. I was terrible to so many people.

"I had..." How to put it? He'd tried different things in his head so many times lately, but putting things out into the world proved to be harder than just imagination. "I'd wanted to try and...explain. Maybe. Or...simply apologize." He felt his face warming up. "Though...I'd apologized so much before without knowing what it really meant..."

[caligulas_aquarium]

Admittedly, he hadn't really thought much of Martin these past few weeks. Koltira told him he had died, and aside thinking about it for a few minutes, Eridan wasn't all that bothered about the whole thing, completely forgetting about it after he went off on his own for a while just before the bombing had started.

In fact, he still hadn't remembered. He had other things on his mind and it wasn't until he spotted the familiar figure outside during a little excursion out of the hold he recalled having not seen the guy in weeks, though it was surprisingly difficult to actually place it as that withdrawn, sad little figure he was so used to Martin being, but familiar enough to avoid passing him by entirely, instead approaching him by his makeshift seating.

"Mar?"

[theguideless]

Martin, who was rubbing an itch at the corner of his eye, stopped at the sound, not certain what it was at first. It wasn't an often-used nickname, save for one person. And though he wondered how Eridan had been, he'd been far from his mind in the scope of the many he'd hurt – killed. In that way, it was a good thing. And it made the surprise a good one, as big eyes found the fishy-looking troll approaching.

It took a second more to click. He began to smile, shifting and rising up out of his seat.

"Eridan..."

[caligulas_aquarium]

"You're lookin' different. Well, ewen."

He takes note of...well, whatever seems different. It's definitely there, he's just not exactly sure what's changed yet, but at the very least he doesn't sound so timid anymore.

So much for being dead, too - well, unless he revived somehow. Back where he was from it wasn't exactly unheard of for that kind of thing to happen. Especially, for some reason, with all the wrong people. But Martin didn't fall into the category of people he'd want to stay dead, no; he was better than most of them, even if Eridan wouldn't exactly call on that often.

"I heard you died or somethin'."

Sounding all too blasé about the idea, too.

[theguideless]

Martin nodded slightly, looking slightly worried despite the smile. It was a weird subject to touch on, and he hardly knew where to start or how. Even so, he was miles from the wretched, miserable child the monster grown from. Which meant...miles from this oddball friendship? He hoped not.

"I did. A lot happened really quickly..." He pushed up one of his sleeves over his elbow in idle movement, only to have it fall back down again. His shoulders lifted and fell with a breath that seemed to encourage him, brightening his expression again. "But nothing like that will happen again. And...I'm grateful you didn't get caught up in it. Very grateful."

I'm late but I heard you like... drawthings... so I... made... some...

[speakveryclearly]

It was Kanaya's third day above ground in Exsilium, and the experience was beginning to wear on her. She had expected to have more answers than, but instead her ascent only offered her more questions. The other trolls, Eridan in particular. Her future, and the dubious state it had been cast into by Feferi. Up here there might have been some light, but it was still dark and grey, and also cold. She'd been informed there were some blistering deserts out in the wastelands. Maybe those would be more suited to her element. It wasn't as if anyone else here knew how to glow in the dark--

LMFAO AW THEY MOVE

[theguideless]

–albeit temporarily. She had encountered the tail end of that glow, where Martin returned to his physical body. The gold and light enveloped, blended, then dissipated under his skin, leaving behind the healthy and whole boy he was contracted to be. His breath drew out longer, accepting his consciousness once more, and sat up straighter. A single shudder against the chill through his thin clothes passed, and he opened his eyes to look about.



It didn't take very long for him to see her there, not so far away, and not particularly a common sight. The strange memory of seeing her in...in another's memory had yet to wholly take shape, and so he was left with one of those nagging, troubling feelings of missing something. But perhaps it was just the surprise of being seen for what he was by someone other than his contract? That, too...

He held the next breath, uncertain of how to react.

shhhhhh YOU'RE UNVEILING MY DARK SECRETS TO LOOKING REMOTELY GOOD AT ART

[speakveryclearly]

She suddenly had the strong feeling that she had seen something outside of the domain intended for her ocular globes - which she'd been feeling almost as strongly had been narrowing even as the dewy dawn of her second life had increased the clarity with which she observed it. So he was a being of the light in some way. Like how she was a daughter of the day. But... somehow she doubted that this stranger would exactly jump at the self-descriptor of "a creature of sin", unlike her. The sunlight meant something different entirely on Earth, maybe more similar to what it had on Prospit. But... that had been so long ago. What was the date of its destruction now - eleven months? She still described herself as "6" just as she would have before, but now she was certainly 14 years old, though to her that inferior measurement of relative age didn't matter anymore. Not since she'd been turned, and to be honest for a while before she had taken to wearing real makeup on both her lips and eyes. Back in her own universe, she had taken the presence of colors for granted. Not anymore. Not in her old white hell and not in her current gray purgatory.

Well, she couldn't let this meeting go by uncommemorated, and so it was that she ended up awkwardly raising her dextral extremity in the greeting gesture known universally (at least in her experience), as a "wave".



"Hi there, uh... I'm Kanaya Maryam; it's nice to meet you." There. Dialoglog accomplished.

h e l l o

[sacrificar]

Martin, she remembered him well. Their last encounter, news of what he had done, and now... this. So much, all coming from the same source. Whatever he was, the boy was truly full of surprises. Whatever he was, it warranted an additional conversation. Was it to satisfy her own curiosity as well? Absolutely. She wouldn't deny that.

"You seem well." She said, approaching him.

Halibel could tell, just by looking at him. The changes now went beyond the physical. She couldn't keep but ask herself the same question multiple times:

Was that really the same Martin?

aw yiss HI

[theguideless]

He startled out of his thoughts at the voice, whipping his head about until he could find her. It wasn't half the reaction he'd had as Darkov, however; the fear was in the body, not his mind. That was something to be learned in time, perhaps. Or perhaps not; he wasn't afraid of what happened after dying.

But it took him a moment to recognize her; his memories of her were always clouded in the superstitions and terror-teachings of his old home, defining her as more a concept than a being with a name or cause. But he remembered quick enough, and it spelled out on his features. Yet he couldn't figure out how to feel...relieved? Cautious? She was still a great deal of mystery. It was hard to tell where her words came from.

"I am," he replied, turning a little to sit more in her direction. He pushed a small, brief smile. "A lot better now."

[sacrificar]

He observed him continuously, watching the way his body moved and how he reacted in order to act accordingly herself. Most notable was how much he had changed. It was striking, to say the least, when compared to her last face-to-face meeting with him.

He said he was well, and there seemed to be little that would make her doubt his claim. Though there was something she wished to hear him say.

"You are the same Martin as before?"

HELLO I AM SLOWW also lemme know if post-koltira death is too late a date!

[seamend]

Aileen was frustrated when they came back above. Yes, the relief was there, to finally see the sun, but it changed none of Exsilium's problems. None of her's. The many battered pieces of rubble were symbolic to their struggle and how badly they were failing.

But how much worse its gotten over the days, now that Koltira is dead. Now that there seems to be less and less to keep her mind off certain swelling worries.

So it is a strange thing to spot Martin after all this time. Hadn't she just asked Bariyan about his well being? And... that reminded her too, of how little she was able to do for the boy.
It took a certain skill, to ignore the twist of her insides as she approached.

This time, Aileen made sure to give him a bubble of personal space.

"Hello. Martin." She nodded along with the greeting, giving as friendly a smile as she could despite the awkward circumstances.

SLOW IS OK AND SO IS THE DATE

[theguideless]

There was seldom a good memory to connect to the faces of Martin's past life; much was the same in Aileen's case. The woman had meant so well, tried in her ways to tend to him...all ways turned foul and wrong by his own twisted biology. It wasn't truly her fault, nor his; he didn't know what he was, what he was changing into. It was bad for everyone.

Yet his suffering was done, gone for good. He held no one in Exsilium accountable for it. And when he turned his head and looked her way, no shade of accusation or distaste passed over his features. Mild curiosity, then the click of awareness (it'd be a challenge to mistake that hair color for anything). And then a second realization. I don't remember her name.

"Hello," he replied, the smile small, already apologetic.

[seamend]

It was the smile that got her showing one in return, even if just as small and something sad in it too. He was obviously doing much much better than their last meeting, and that was enough for her to step a little closer. It was a relief that somehow things looked like they were turning up for him.

"...You've been through quite a lot." And then, after a nervous clearing of her throat, "I'm so sorry I hurt you."