Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Printable Version +- Beqanna (https://beqanna.com/forum) +-- Forum: OOC (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=24) +--- Forum: Archive (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=81) +---- Forum: Lands (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=98) +----- Forum: Nerine (https://beqanna.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?fid=91) +----- Thread: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? (/showthread.php?tid=21219) Pages:
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Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Sabra - 10-19-2018 Dum Ba-dum I feel it. A pulse. A beating heart. Mine, I realize with detached surprise. Later, I do not know how much later. I remember where I am. Or where I should be. It's dark for the Afterlife. So utterly dark that I have to wonder... but no, I know I'm dead. The scene repeats and I wish I could look away. Klaudius. All smiles until he wasn't. And then... Pain. The kind of pain that makes you wish you'd never been born to feel it. Muscle and bone rending apart until it's all I could do to stay conscious. Why did I want to stay conscious? So much pain that I almost didn't notice when he gripped me close. He'd held me like that once before, when I'd been too foolish to see what he was. Now I saw, but it was far too late. Like an observing spirit I watch as he used my broken body, the look on his face so fragmented and hateful, even as he parodied a lover. Poor, broken girl. What had she done to make him so vengeful? I feel the ache of violation. I feel... sick. I want to look away, but can't. Ghosts have no eyes to speak of. I have to look, and watch the defilement unfold. His face, that twisted triumph when he builds a mask of jagged iron over his face, the razored pike protruding with undisguised menace. The girl knelt before him, too damaged to stand. Her wing dangled by thin skin and tendon, splintered bone visible and blood clotting down her side. They held that frozen position for a moment, saying words I cannot hear. He lunges. I want to scream. For a second time I see that copy of myself be violently penetrated. It was quick. He'd had his fun, I suppose. Vented his frustrations. It slid cleanly between the ribs. Split the hide like it wasn't there, and sank until it met its mark. At last the horrible show was over. Fade to black. Later. I have a body. And it hurts mightily. Training must have really kicked my ass yesterday. Had my chest been stepped on by a whole battalion of soldiers? Go away, Mother, please don't make me get up. The air feels like ice in my lungs. Ba-dum Ba-dum Later. Less pain, I think. It's dark, but I can see no stars, no moon. I can't remember... where I am. Why I'm here. My name... I have a name. Sabra. Princess. Queen. Failure... Sabra. It floats in front of me, and I'm not sure I want to claim it. That woman, who could be me, if I let her. Was she a one worth being? Being Sabra hurt. The scars were growing, marring the beauty she'd once been known for. Her heart was fragile, weak. Weak. And who would mourn her, should she vanish into the ether? Faces flicker in my sight. Friends both new and old. Children that I could only hope would grow to be better than me. Stronger. Cas... I'm so sorry, Castile. I'm sorry I wasn't strong enough. I only just got you back, and now... I feel a solid coldness beneath me. Smell the wind that I loved so dearly. It pulls me down like stones in the sea. Irresistible and undeniably real. Just as irresistible is the darkness I am floating in. I can feel it, the desire to unbecome. I know I can make the choice. And... I find myself leaning towards the unbecoming. Isn't that what I've wanted, deep down, for years now? If I decide to be real, it will hurt. I will not be okay. I don't know if I will ever be okay again. I feel my heart- beat @[Kagerus] so maybe possibly if you're interested dream-talk her into wanting to live again? RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Kagerus - 10-22-2018 Trigger warning: suicide Kagerus { and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times } @[Sabra] RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Sabra - 10-23-2018 I have always had to save myself. I've had help along the way, who hasn't? But in the end, it's always come down to my own will. I am not old by equine standards, let alone by those of the immortals. Yet already life feels overwhelming. Ravaged, raped and murdered. "It's enough to make anyone bitter." I observe to the void, and anyone else who might care to listen. The tenuous threads that are holding me to life stretch and thin, gossamer ideas that could break at a glance. I see them now, like fine cobwebs in morning dew, glowing like starlight and leaking from my skin. They pull away, downward. To the dull outline of a pale body prostrate in the black. Each gleaming strand links us, tugs lightly at my mind. No one really talks about how easy it is to part someone from their life. Now I'm being given a prime example. Before me, one more thread fades, winks out of existence. I bob just a little higher. When they're gone the choice will be made for me. That in itself is a choice, though. I wait and watch two more strands die out, feeling like I did when I used to play at challenging Death. Flying as high as I could, then folding my wings and dropping like a stone. Watching the landscape rise up to meet me. Finally snapping my wings open, at the last possible moment, never quite willing to let myself end. I'm less surprised than maybe I should have been, when a voice not mine echoes in the dark. Sabra, it's time. Time for what? Time to go, and leave this mortal coil? Time to sever those last few lines and find out what lies beyond? The voice is vaguely familiar, but I can't be bothered to think of why. This is my death, I'll do it how I want to. A taste of irritation flavors me, a more vibrant emotion than I've felt since I got here. "What do you want? Can't a mare die in peace? Haven't I been through enough?" My voice echoes back, biting and scared. More emotions, and I note with horror that they seem to be thickening the lines that draw me toward life. Good, be angry, someone had told me once. Anger means you'll fight. Images not mine play across the endless night. Almost images. Impressions and emotions, vibrant and rich. Love of such an intensity that it could create or destroy anything. I don't think I've ever felt a love like that. Or if I did, I ruined it. We are all broken pieces, trying to find where we all fit. I am so tired of trying to fit. I cut myself on my edges and lose myself in my own reflection. Love is a beautiful, fickle thing. It breaks my heart with the wanting. Far away, on a high up cliff, tears stream down my body's face, muscles twitching in frozen seizure. I am so cold. The core of me is dropped so low in temperature, preserving me for my body to heal itself. For flesh to knit and bones to mend. Tears crystallize on my cheeks, icy streams that track to the hard stone beneath me. I could be a frost coated monument to broken things everywhere. With the wanting I break. But what of the having? Am I done with possibility, curiosity and chance? Am I done filling my lungs with cold air amid the stars, and feeling the wind kiss my wings? With the wanting I descend. Until my feet stand next to her, almost solid. If I touch her, this will be gone, and I will have to try again. Fine then. Be that way. I'll return, and I'll avenge myself. Bring ruin to those who would destroy me. I've always saved myself, haven't I? @[Kagerus] RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Kagerus - 10-25-2018 Kagerus { and in my dreams I've kissed your lips a thousand times } @[Sabra] RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Sabra - 10-25-2018 I'm being petulant. I can feel it, and it's irrational but still I can't seem to stop. I want to be angry at the world. I want to be angry at Klaudius and at everything that let this happen. I want to be strong enough to handle these things and I'm terrified that I'm not. More than anything, I'm angry at myself for being so weak. This is no way to die. It's not... like sunrise breaking over the mountains, it dawns on me. This isn't how I want to go. When I die, it will be on my own terms. Not because some jackass stallion is having a bad day and decides to take it out on the closest living thing. My eyes linger on the body before me, lifting when a motion catches my sight. There she is, the disembodied voice that has been coaxing me down to this point. She's familiar to me, a unique pattern of browns and blacks and whites that undulate slightly in this ethereal plane. It's strange seeing anyone here, let alone her. How long has she been watching me try to drown myself in self pity? I meet her gaze for a moment, trying to assess something deep within, before dropping my line of vision back to the crystalline form between us. I could be made of some precious stone, faceted and almost glowing from within. How much of it is real and how much is vision I can't tell, but I don't mind looking either way. "I'd make a hell of a poltergeist, you know. He wouldn't have another moment of peace between now and his own grave. Doesn't deserve any less." I'm speaking to myself as much to the liquid form of the antlered woman. The blandness has returned to my voice, no more inflected than if it were the weather we were discussing. My crystal gaze flicks back up to meet hers. Stoicism is not my native state, but it's all I can muster at the moment. "I'll go back, if only to see what's happened since I fell. We will come back to this, you and I. Some day." I am no prophetess. Still, the words felt true enough in the moment. This conversation would resume at a later date, perhaps many years down the road. Maybe then I would know if it was gratitude or disdain I felt now. I wait a moment longer before bowing my head in it's graceful arc, placing a delicate kiss to the brow of my doppelganger. The threads of light between us grew in an instant, until the darkness filled with them entirely. All else was blocked out. Until it wasn't. Somewhere between the earth and an eternal twilit sky, my eyes flicker open. Air that has recently only trickled in and out of damaged lungs now courses in a steady stream, shifting ribs that protest the need for motion. The internal damage has all but healed over the weeks (months?) that I've been inert. By the splintering shock of pain in my wing, however, it would seem that the priority has been keeping me alive. There had been no extra energy to spare to repair the torn muscles and tendons that gift me flight. What had started as an irritating numbness in my extremities soon rises to the forefront of my awareness as a burning, prickling sensation overcomes every inch of me. My circulatory system has kicked back on with a vengeance, and it's all I can do to lie there gasping and trembling as the fire burns away the cold I've been existing under. Oh gods, I'm going to kick Kagerus' ass when this wears off. @[Kagerus] @[Castile] RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Castile - 10-29-2018 and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was castile RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Sabra - 11-02-2018 Living hurts. It's a simple reality that's been known for as long as beings have drawn breath. It doesn't hurt all the time, and the kinds of hurt are certainly variable. But there will be pain. I had been existing in a comatose stasis for longer than I knew, for as long as it had taken to repair my damaged heart and lungs, and to overcome the pure shock of being mostly dead. Right now, I was wishing the damn ghosts would have kept me. Shaking like a beast on the verge of hypothermia, I let the pain wash through me in unsteady tides. In and out, in and out, until the trembling becomes less severe, less spasmodic. Slowly, I'm able to notice things beyond my own skin. The burning in my limbs has subsided enough that I can feel the stoney surface beneath me, the warm air around me. My first fleeting thought is that I've somehow come to be resting in some volcanic cavern. This could be true. But there was a bigger, more persistent truth to be had. All around me was a scent like fire and ash mingled with a musk I knew. A deep, rumbling sound echoes throughout the whole of me. I can almost hear my name in it, as though the mountains themselves were welcoming me back. A sigh, the deepest breath I've been able to manage thus far. My eyes blink away blurriness, and like magic, a face comes into focus. Black and white and shining, with mismatched eyes that hold the same expression. "Cas...?" It's the smallest thread of a voice. There is far more fear and pain in it than I would have wished. It takes an agonizing amount of effort, but I pull the weight of my skull from where it's been resting upwards, try to roll to my knees. Dizziness creeps up on me, threatening to take back this small ground I've regained. "Cas, help me. Please, love." This time there is stubborn frustration woven into the low notes of my voice. My nose is a hairsbreadth from the ground, everything hurts, but I can't bear to lay down any longer. I hate myself for the weakness in my limbs, that he has to see me this way. Still, it's so, so much better than being alone. @[Castile] RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Castile - 11-04-2018 and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was castile RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Sabra - 11-05-2018 Despite Cas's support, my legs are still too unsteady to hold me. I satisfy myself instead to be laying a bit more upright, offending limbs folded against my barrel. One tattered wing drags lifeless alongside me like an abandoned cloak. He's in his draconic guise, far larger than me. All sharp edges and glinting scales, fearsome enough to strike terror into his foes. I've never seen him fully shifted before. Still haven't, as he's curled around me like an enormous cat, one wing a sheltering canopy above our heads. Still, it's not fear I feel with him close by. Not of him, any how. As trusting as a newborn foal, I settle into the curve of him. He's solid as the ground beneath us, the warmth emitting from him almost uncomfortable. Still, I press close. I need this touch, the sense of security I've always had in his embrace, because nothing else feels safe right now. Maybe he can burn away the wretchedness I feel inside. Unbidden, a wave of nausea rolls through me, making my teeth clench and one traitorous tear slide down my cheek. This coming back to life thing is an utter bitch. Blinking hard, I rest my head against the smooth scales of his shoulder, waiting for the world to stop reeling around me. You're alive. Like good whiskey; His voice is warm and smoke-smooth, woven together with emotion and filling me with melting heat. I nod mutely, finding my own throat tightened with feeling. I miss his mane in this form. Burying my face in it and kissing the satin skin underneath. Instead, I press my lips to the hard scales of his shoulder. Not an urgent kiss of passion, but simple physical reassurance that he's really here. "You came for me. W-where are we, what's happened?" My voice is still hoarse from disuse, but growing stronger. My shaking begins again as memories filter back into my mind. My last recollection is Klaudius' ironclad face as he stood over me triumphant, blood pulsing from my chest in a fatal stream. The fury of it is almost enough to bring me to my feet, only to slide back down again, trembling like a thing hunted. "I'm going to kill him. I'm going to fucking kill him!" A ludicrous claim coming from someone who can't even stand yet, but it felt good to say it. My body, however, is quick to make me regret the sudden increase in blood pressure. Dizzy again, I have to let him support me. "I'm almost didn't make it back, Cas." My ice-blue eyes meets the glow of his, voice mixing fear with the childish belief that he'll make things better. I can't face it on my own. @[Castile] RE: Sleep baby sleep, what are you waiting for? - Castile - 11-06-2018 and underneath the layers, I find myself asking what's left a hollowed out form, the skeleton of a ghost, the pitiful echo of what once was castile |