I call him the devil because he makes me want to sin
(and every time he knocks, I can't help but let him in)
The sun has not yet crested when Bruise awakens, the slumber falling from him as dust falls from rising giants. He yawns, cracking his jaw, and rises, lifting his lithe body from the earth. Pangea is still this early in the day, but never quiet—not to he who listens. It is truly a dead thing, but it teems with noises, with the most delicious and guttural of sounds, the Fear that sings through the air, a constant humming. Bruise tilts a heavy-horned head, one sooty ear flicking forward as he catches wind of the cries, the moans, the unheard noises that create a cacophony of misery, screams of a land that’d never truly wished to be born.
Bruise does not love Pangea, will never love anything truly—
But, he appreciates her. He appreciates her death-like beauty, the poison that Carnage first injected into her veins with fang and claw, the venom that Pollock now cultivates as eagerly as any doting gardener. He appreciates the freedom and the sorrow—he appreciates the curdling of her beneath the winter son, the thin, watery light never quote warming her innards. He appreciates these things, even now, as he stands there, cursing the bite in the air and the frozen ground beneath his cloven feet. Even now.
When his father arrives, Bruise quickly shifts, giving the goat-stallion his full attention. Pollock was, after all, the only thing truly worthy of it. His flat eyes wash over the pale gold man’s face, watching the gore that drips from it, falling upon the grey earth and splattering, with fascination. He does not bother to hide his curiosity, his hunger, that open thing that takes over his sharply angled face. This is art, truly. This is the thing he has so longed to create, this thing he labors for, this thing that he dreams of—
This is it.
Bruise inhales sharply but just nods, stomach rolling with anticipation.
The sun paints the sky with the colors of her birth, but Bruise pays no mind.
The true beauty was yet to be seen.
