assorted non-canon and AU threads

[aesculapian]

who wants delicious post-forest terribleness

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[miraculess]

[ they've been following the new group of shades for a while now‐ long enough to start getting an idea of their Arbiter's personality and testing goals, as well as the individual shades' patterns and habits. enough to make sure they can leave the group and catch up easily, all without being noticed if necessary— which is really just in time, because one of the more bloodthirsty teams started a messy fight yesterday and as a result they really need a bath.

thankfully, bathing is easier, nowadays. she's had time to get over self-image issues (well, some of them) and her phobia of the water, and for all that her partner tends to be quiet on her own she's very good at keeping up enough of a running chatter to distract Lilith from thinking too hard about what she's doing or the water tugging at her legs.

(but then, distracting a mopey girl from her own thoughts is probably easier than distracting someone from the fact that they're hideously injured. the serpent has had a lot of practice at that.)

unfortunately, being distracted enough not to get into a panic spiral of some sort and keeping someone distracted enough not to do that means neither of them are really paying attention to the shore. ]

[rootless]

[He came to bathe too, but he's not bodyshy and has no real concept of it either. Not yet. So he doesn't particularly check them out, but he's not looking away, either, when he clears his throat from not far away at all.]

Mind company?

[miraculess]

[ things he was probably not expecting: for her to jump and sit down hard in the water, covering up as much of herself as she can ]

— what in Hell do you think you're doing?!

[ ...while that's the same voice, it's nowhere near her usual high, soft tones; it's a low, nearly snarled alto instead, although her voice cracks at the end. more than that, the skull's jaws are open; he can see both her expression and the fact that she is bright red rather clearly ]

[rootless]

[He startles, badly, reeling for a few seconds before shouting back, flustered and a little stung, even noticing that it must be her host.]

Wh-

I need a bath too!

[aesculapian]

[ another day, another Arbiter and their shades popping up, another test. apparently the snake-skull knows this one, because almost as soon as they'd shown up she'd made a beeline for them and chattered excitedly for a while, leaving the two groups of shades to cautiously intermingle.

the result of that chattering, however, is apparently the two of them co-running a game— something rather unexpected on snake's part, since she hadn't done any so far, but not bad. just bingo, with various intimate acts...

...and, of course, the free square is to kiss one of the judges. the newcomer seems rather selfishly pleased with that, even announcing something to the effect that although she's happy to provide kisses to all, some of them should take pity and kiss the poor Serpent, too.

Arbiter politics, man. ]

[rootless]

[He does his best to simply not participate, but while spaces for relative privacy were provided, they keep being taken, so in the end he's mostly just doing his level best to look aggressive and unkissable.

This will inevitably bait some of the less savory shades present, so it's really a matter of whether or not Serpent approaches before or after he gets his shit wrecked.]

[aesculapian]

[ ... she wouldn't actually admit it, but she is a little disappointed when he isn't among the people who line up to fill out that free spot. almost as bad (and also something she wouldn't admit to caring about), they don't get as many kisses as Ivory and thus lose the informal competition.

(Lilith, of course, can't make up her mind whether to be grumpy about that as well or just highly flustered.)

it's nice to run a proper game, though! especially one that Lilith had thought so fondly of... or at least that had been her attitude until squares had started getting filled out by force. which she should have expected, really, and it wasn't as though it were against the rules, but. ...but.

she can't interfere, of course, and wouldn't even if she could. so it isn't after the game is over and judged that they make their way over to him. ]

... Will you accept a trade for yourself this time ... ?

[rootless]

[Since the game is over he's managed to find a little place of his own to lick his wounds, and for a few moments he looks torn between terror and murderous rage, that he's being approached right now.

...But it's them, so it's fine. He relaxes back to his normal levels of skittish, even if he doesn't settle into the level of calm he normally carries around them specifically.]

...That'd depend on the trade, I guess.

[miraculess]

[ it isn't often, but sometimes they come across bodies in the kudzu, shades used and used up by the Spill. sometimes they can be pulled away from the grasping vines; sometimes trying just causes them to fall apart, the plants the only thing holding their flesh together. sometimes they wake, after being removed; sometimes, all they're good for is spare parts and meat.

sometimes—less often, but sometimes they're people they've known, and tested. people who have wandered away from the current batch of shades to never be seen again by their old comrades; they have well-worn fights over what to do in those cases each time it happens, one of the few things they really snap at each other over.

(the fight goes the same way each time, and the shade is left as mulch. as much as they hate it, they both know taking the body back will only end in pain for everyone involved.)

this, though, is the first time it's someone Lilith knew— which is why the snake skull is completely silent as she tears kudzu off of Lethe's still body, breath catching harshly as she rips him free of the earth with shaking hands and far less gentleness than they normally use. ]

[shutsdown]

[He doesn't respond for a while. It's not like they can't move him even with his height, but he's very much a dead weight for a good thirty minutes after they unearth him.

Finally, though, he does regain some kind of consciousness. But true to his old training he doesn't move, doesn't groan, doesn't even open his eyes. Just... listens, to try to get a feeling for the situation.]

[miraculess]

[ there aren't any voices (their conversation, if it can be called that, is entirely internal.) there are the familiar sounds of the forest; the rippling of the river, faint bird calls, rustling and the occasional snap as whoever is carrying him (princess style, of course) steps on a twig. they're breathing roughly, the sound catching occasionally, and they're holding him to their chest (...her chest) just a hair shy of too tightly.

...the smell of them is familiar. as is the very, very faint mechanical whir as she shifts her grip. ]

[shutsdown]

[It's enough to draw a reaction from him, enough to make him feel secure enough to do so. His voice is raspy from disuse, really more of a croak, but his eyes open too.]

Lilith...?

[miraculost]

[it's been a relatively peaceful night, and the sky is slowly brightening with a still and quiet dawn

at least, until the familiar gasping and splashing that signals a new arrival, someone thin and pale struggling in the river under the faint half-light.]

[aesculapian]

[ Lilith doesn't have Sasuke's chakra reserves or honed skills, but that's fine; Samael is soaked in it, remembers how everything works even without muscle memory to fall back on. their water-walking isn't as steady as hers used to be, but it will hold long enough to let them snag a single struggling shade out of the water by the back of their shirt and carry them to shore. ]

Breathe, if you can.

[miraculost]

[the shade falls to the ground on hands and knees, coughing and wheezing until he can finally catch his breath.

now that he's out of the water, it's easier to see what he looks like. the wet labcoat clings to his skin, and his soaked, shaggy blond hair is only barely kept out of his face by a tight, high ponytail.]

[aesculapian]

[ they're in the middle of bending down to steady him when the familiarity lines up—hair short instead of long really the only difference they can easily see from this angle, and—

for the first time Lilith is violently shut out as she goes from half-awake grumbling to incandescent rage, the kind of hysterically manic anger she hasn't indulged in since she ceased being tested. it's followed by a shock of betrayal, and it's with profound unhappiness that Samael tunes both it and the body's jolt of adrenaline out.

the entire power struggle is over in no more than a second or so, and she finally finishes her earlier motion by squatting the rest of the way down and withdrawing her hand. she can make that concession, at least.

though she still dumps a towel on his back. ]

[counteredfaith]

[ some shades are corrupted, abandoned to the wayside, lost -- some fall into the forest of their own accord, laid down on the ground and waited for oblivion to take them. what happened next isn't oblivion -- the opposite; it's eternity, an even more endless one than the last.

by the time they see him again, it's been days -- so long that a new group of shades has already gotten far along the path. the church lies ahead, to be passed for the third time or so, now. what's inside is a mystery, but outside, nearer to the river, is a large stone with a thick rope ward circling it; on top is a man with long white hair that reaches past the his crossed knees, reaching the ground and then some, like unruly overgrown kudzu. he stares to the church's direction, or perhaps past it -- like he's stopped seeing it since long ago, and the man himself is so still that he might be a statue. perhaps he is. ]

[aesculapian]

[ that's... new. the forest is fairly mutable, but there's still a pattern to it; stable landmarks that can be found so long as you know where you're going among the hauntings and the greenery. this has the feel of one of them... and yet neither of them have seen it before.

their first thought as they approach is "another Arbiter?" which comes with its own set of hopes and fears for the shades they've gathered. the second...

...don't they know this man? ]

...Kuuha?

[counteredfaith]

[ there's a moment or two of stillness, as if their voice doesn't reach. then -- a slow blink. he doesn't move, but he does speak, quietly -- as if he hasn't spoken in a long time ]

. . . Ah . . . Someone who knows me . . . ?

[miraculess]

[ it was fine, she'd thought. finding Kuuha-san again, even if he was only "living" because he couldn't do anything else— it was fine, that he was willing to wake up and spend time with her. it was fine, because she'd offered to free him, and he'd turned her down. she could still be selfish, and she could take what he'd offered, and she'd leave him be about the rest of it.

...leave him be to long for a home he couldn't have, to be forced to exist when otherwise he would have stopped.

it wasn't really fine at all.

it takes a while for them to come to the decision—neither of them has ever liked to force a choice on anyone else—but as time goes on, it becomes more and more obvious that he won't make the choice for himself. in the end, they give him the only choice they can—

they rip the kudzu out of him, instead of destroying him and it with him. they pull the corruption from his veins and leave the degraded fragments of his soul to either fade or try to patch itself together— and they bind him to Lilith to give him the strength to do so.

if he fades... then they'll feel it. they can take at least that responsibility. and if he doesn't... well. they'll take things as they come. ]

[counterfaith]

[ the bond is quiet, clear and unperturbed like still water -- perhaps too still, for some time. the body needs to recover, and without the kudzu to help, it takes some time to heal, even with assistance. it's like the body doesn't want to heal.

but eventually the stillness breaks - it's just a gentle stir, waves lapping quietly, but waves of wakefulness nonetheless.

hopefully they didn't like, leave his body somewhere unattended because otherwise it's, like, not there anymore - if they did leave his body somewhere like in a room then they'll find him wandering around in the vicinity. regardless, he's looking at everything quietly - it's hard to discern what emotion is going over the bond, or rather, it feels as if there isn't much emotion in the first place, besides a growing curiosity. ]

[miraculess]

[ they put him in their futon, actually— so when he wakes up, it's in her room, which is incredibly traditionally japanese. there are a lot of flowers everywhere, as well as pictures— people wearing a rainbow of different colors, most of them smiling.

(one of the faces may even be familiar...? though there are no mirrors, so perhaps not.)

a jolt of hopeful surpise blooms out of nowhere, and then a knot of exhausted anxiety as he looks around. it's shortly followed by the padding of bare feet and the sound of the door sliding open ]

You're awake...?

[anappleaday]

[ Tseng wakes up.

that in and of itself is probably enough of a shock. however— as far as these things go, it's hardly the most pressing one. more important is the icy cold of the water pressed against him, pulling at his hair and clothes and dragging him mercilessly along. the surface has to be somewhere, but making out where it is is impossible, and the sharp burn of suffocation is quickly overtaking every other sensation—

—and then there's a sharp jerk as something—someone—scruffs him like a kitten and implacably hauls him out of the current to be towed toward dry land. ]

[missioncomplete]

[ Why yes, all of this is quite a shock. His last memories are of fire and stone, his back firmly planted against the ground as he felt the life literally draining from him.

Little more than survival instincts have the time to go through his mind with the sudden movement, the pulling, the brand new searing hot pain tearing him apart from the inside this time--

And a very undignified hacking as he's surfaced, survival still a higher priority than curiosity at whatever's grabbed him and focusing on getting breathing to be a thing again. ]

[anappleaday]

[ fortunately, whatever's grabbed him seems more interested in getting back to shore as quickly as possible than in giving him anything else to focus on.

(though... if he somehow has enough presence of mind to notice, that may actually be enough, seeing as she's darting over the top of the water rather than slogging through it.)

in the end, he's dropped more or less gently onto grassy shore to get the water out of his lungs, and it isn't until he's got his breath back that a quiet, low voice asks: ]

How are you feeling?

[ there's a tall, tall woman—presumably his rescuer, if her wet sleeves are any indication—crouched back on her heels in front of him. her clothes are casual; jeans and a hooded shirt with a ruffled hem and cuffs.

this is perhaps slightly at odds with giant, toothy skull she's wearing over her face like a mask. ]