route666rp | [closed]

Entry tags:

[closed]

Who: Heat, Jack Russell, John Doe and Serph
What: Serph takes an old comrade to meet new comrades, not knowing they've already met, for better or worse
When: The night of Heat's arrival
Where: The Convoy, in the large bedroom closest to the washrooms
Warnings: Violence, as usual :') Somehow not as bad as what is canon-typical (on all fronts)

Of all the people to arrive in this strange new world, Serph somehow hadn't expected to encounter anyone he'd personally known; he was dead after all. His responsibilities to the Embryon had been passed on to the rest of the Tribe. They had to live. If they didn't, who would keep Sera safe? Who would remember the Junkyard and all its inhabitants?

But it isn't like everyone else from other worlds are dead. (Well, aside from Jayce? Sort of? He's still not really sure about that one. People don't usually un-die.)

So when Heat shows up lacking any knowledge of having left the Junkyard, Serph feels like he's been blindsided by the strongest Megidolaon spell in existence. All the things that he'd thought he'd accepted come roaring back with a vengeance and he finds himself even more off-balance than ever. Heat is still loyal to him, but outside of battle he feels strangely out of step with his comrade. Had he changed so much in 5 months?

He squashes his feelings down -- like he always does -- and takes the only action that makes sense to him; to have old comrades meet the new.

Usually the faint scent of blood -- sensitive enough for a werewolf to smell -- clings to Serph whenever he returns to the bedroom he shares with Jack and John, but this time it's much stronger from all the monsters both Heat and Serph had gorged themselves on. In a way, it feels good to openly devour, to eat until even Varuna's nigh insatiable urges quell into a quiet rumble. But afterwards he can't help but think about how this sort of existence can't coexist with the Nirvana he dreams of; if Nirvana is a place of peace, a place where there are no enemies and he can live with his comrades, then the only people to devour are his friends.

Then it would no longer be Nirvana.

But the search continues.

Heat's cloak -- grey with a distinctively orange cross marking it -- drapes over his front and right shoulder as Serph enters the shared room, stepping aside to let Heat in after him.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Though it hadn't been a terrible day by Heat's standards, it could have gone better. He didn't, wouldn't voice his doubts and concerns, many of which directly involve Serph and his altered appearance and caginess when talking about these 'new comrades'.

The more things change the more they start the same. This isn't Nirvana but it's a lot closer to what the fractured pictures in his head suggested should be, and the rest is recognized too, from atma brands to demons in need of falling into line or being devoured. At least he's taken the time to clean up a little, even he doesn't enter sleeping spaces filthy if he could help it, the only addition he's picked up along the way being a set of gloves (now fingerless) from the depths of the hospital, very nearly the appropriate shade of orange.

Any sign of injury unhealed is completely hidden as soon as the door opens. He wasn't so trusting of new comrades and showing weakness immediately was an absolutely horrid idea. But to sharp senses the scent lingers, not just the residue of delicious hunt but at least one prey fighting back harder than expected; some of the blood smell is his own. On a glance, Heat is perfectly hale and whole, confident to the point of arrogance.

"Alright, let's see these comrades of yours."

Jack is the only one in the room, right now, grooming a tangle out of one of his fluffy fox tails, tie already undone and shoes set aside. He looks up when the door opens, ears perked, and he blinks at the unexpected face, then smiles a bit wryly. "So you two do know each other?" he guesses, pleased that he'd made the right connection. The smell of blood doesn't disturb him, he's used to it on Serph by now, and he might pick out the one coming from Heat in particular eventually, but not from first whiff. "Hello again."

Ah. They've already met? It's not often that he's the one to do introductions -- most introductions in the Junkyard were made with gunfire, magic, or melee weapons of all kinds -- but at least he has Argilla's as an example to draw from.

Serph nods. "This is Heat, one of my officers."

He holds Jack's gaze for a moment longer than usual. Jack normally has a pretty good read on people, surely he doesn't need to speak for Jack to know not to say anything about what he'd shared with him about Heat? Heat would likely pick up on the silent signal -- he often didn't need to speak for his old comrades to know his intent -- but... well. Heat is already cross with him. He'll need to explain to Jack afterwards.

Breaking eye contact, Serph turns to Heat. "This is Jack. He made these clothes after I broke my armour."

Serph's wings ruffle before he tucks them back behind him, as if to illustrate the point that the usual Junkyard armour isn't made for the kinds of monstrous changes of this world.

It's that little fox guy.

This revelation doesn't come with immediate aggressive response on Heat's part, so that's probably a good sign. Or as much of a good sign as Heat ever has. But it does mean the scrutiny turned on Jack is far sharper this time than when they'd met not long after his arrival. This time it's not just weighing Jack versus what he knows and expects from people, it's weighing whether or not Jack can be trusted around the Embryon's leader so closely that Serph already considered the kitsune comrades.

So closely that Serph's given Jack a warning. He knows that look, he's seen it countless times across his life. There's subtext he's missing already, again, and it doesn't sit comfortably.

There shouldn't be secrets between comrades, he's pretty sure of that.

"Yeah. We do." Jack's made new weird clothes, fine, but why was it the wrong color. "Make his stuff with orange on it next time." It's an important color. Every OTHER color could still be there but that one ... was expected to be most prominent. Even if it came with penguins.

Which left that silent signal, and everything NOT being said. "You could have just said you found another information guy and quartermaster," is what he actually says about it, frowning. Jack knew stuff, fine. He could accept that. Jack knew how to make stuff, also fine. Those were useful things. "What's with all the cagey bullshit, Serph?"

Jack looks amused rather than offended. Information guy and quartermaster. That's one way to put it, he supposes. Did Serph sleep with (non-sexually) and kiss (kinda maybe sexually) his former information guy and quartermaster?

"I'm sure I can manage that," he says. "I didn't realize the color was important. Serph, don't you still have that bit of your old clothes in your car? I could work that into something for you, easily. Or I could rework that cloak into any number of things." That's nicer material than the other oranges or near-oranges he has available.

Serph doesn't immediately answer Heat's question. On the one hand, it seems that Heat has had at least a... non-violent introduction to Jack. Which is good. A relief even. He knows what Heat is like. He already had to separate Heat and Jayce, who were eating each other. He hopes he doesn't have to do any more of that before the night is over.

Nodding at Jack's offer, Serph says, "Use the one in my vehicle." He lifts his right arm so the orange cross is briefly more visible. "I'll return this to where it belongs."

With Heat.

Turning to said red-head, Serph replies, "Jack is a non-combatant." In some ways, he's a lot like Sera. In other ways, completely different. Sera held power over them, but she didn't need to be contained like an out of control demon. But that's a conversation for later, when Heat has adjusted to the routine of the Convoy. "He doesn't come from a place like the Junkyard."

"Of course it's important, it's the tribe's colors." This is really something Serph should have explained already, and it's disturbing that he didn't, in a way Heat doesn't even try to articulate. Eloquence eludes him at all times, but he can get the point across in other ways. This matter of 'non-combatant' was irrelevant, and he really doubted anyone didn't come from places like the Junkyard. People came from SOMEWHERE, and this isn't Nirvana, so.... "It's how I know not to kill your ass. Orange, you live. Some other color, you get eaten."

Nothing in his tone or stance suggests he's intending to do that right now, at least, it might just be an explanation and not an active threat, but with Heat it could go either way. A thumb is jerked towards Serph. "And he's our leader. Dunno why he's running around without it, when it's the best way to find comrades at a distance." Find the familiar color, beeline for it.

Explains the gloves he picked up. Can't be without orange somewhere, and it didn't really matter if he got his cloak back or not even if it felt ... strange to be without it. "And anyway, that's not a good reason to be leaving things out, Serph. This guy's no Sera, but at least he can do something."

"I'm glad I am not considered entirely useless," Jack says, amused. "Maybe I'll make myself an orange tie." He doesn't want to wind up fighting anyone on accident, after all.

He shakes his head a bit. "Serph is right, though, most of the people here, including me, do not come from the same place you do. Most people do not have demons, and the sun is not broken, and everyone knows what emotions are. We do not run in tribes, or at least we do not call the units we make up tribes and do not have representative colors. Serph has been learning to adapt, that's all."

Heat doesn't need to know he's had very Sera-like feelings towards Jack...

Serph knows Jack's explanation won't entirely satisfy Heat; he would have kept the Tribe's colours anyway, a declaration of who he was and a beacon for allies he expects to find. And he would have, if he hadn't felt like he had given the Tribe to those who remained. The Embryon couldn't have two leaders.

Except it seems that it will need to be that way after all.

"A lot happened in the time since I last saw you." Five months... and more. In their short lives, five months is an age. Subdued, he adds, "It didn't feel right to have the Embryon without you there."

Most people definitely have demons. He can see their different forms, and their brands, and it's a little surreal that everyone keeps insisting it's somehow different when it's exactly the same.

It's mostly stuff he's heard before, though one bit needs immediate addressing. "...Why would the sun be broken?" There's a time-gap here somewhere. "That's the bright thing in the sky right? What's wrong with it?" It seemed like it was the way it was supposed to be, bright and hot and hard to look at without seeing little spots everywhere, and part of him was pretty sure that's right. "And anyway I know what emotions are." Don't put that to the test.

Adaption isn't an excuse by the long, measuring look cast at Serph. Not at all. Serph had said more or less he'd given up the position as leader, but that ... wasn't acceptable either. "...Yeah well I'm here now, and we'll find everyone else. So get used to it again." It would be easy enough to say if Serph didn't want the job he'd take it but he never wanted the position to begin with and wasn't about to start now. A lot more goes into being a leader than just telling people what to do, and he knew it wasn't something he had.

"Mmm." Jack considers whether or not to argue about... any of that. He would honestly rather not. Heat will learn the truth of the situation soon enough, without having to be lectured about it now, when he's only been here less than a day. Apparently Heat is from a different time than Serph, because Serph's dream showed him the broken sun... hmm.

"Well, I don't know that there is a lot of leadering going on," he says instead, taking a different tack. "We are mostly following the convoy's directions, at this point. We work together but no one really gives orders."

Sometimes his silence means there's nothing more that needs to be said; they know what to do. Sometimes his silence means he doesn't know what to say; sometimes it feels like his connection to his emotions is so muted compared to the others.

But this time, he doesn't want to elaborate on the topic of the broken sun. No matter what he says, there will be more questions and right now? Trying to explain 'Nirvana' will muddy things more than they already are.

Serph folds his arms, his bottom pair of wings wrapping around his waist. "The Convoy's destination and the Embryon's are the same."

Nirvana.

However, Jack has seen what Serph envisions Nirvana is like and it's almost guaranteed the Convoy's actual destination will be nothing like it. But the declaration is acceptance of leadership of the Embryon once again, even if he won't lead the Convoy as a whole.

His gaze slides over towards Heat, his usual expression somehow looking even flatter than usual. "The others travelling with us are our allies. So don't devour them."

Or pick fights with them etc. and so on.

A lack of leadering? That earns a noncommittal grunt. Serph taking the mantle of leader back up wasn't ever going to be a problem, so he doesn't even consider it. They had their places.

"Sounds about right. Don't know what you're imagining but Serph's leadership isn't like the Brutes, we don't get micromanaged." Imagining getting a constant parade of orders? They'd all get frustrated really fast. "You're expected to know your role and do it however seems best, not have someone breathing down your neck the whole time to make sure it's getting done by some kind of checklist." With small guidelines, like 'don't eat allies' and 'don't eat subordinates that screw up' and 'betrayal isn't allowed even if it helps the tribe'. The Embryon tended to move by consensus, which might be unusual amongst the tribes. But when a decision is made, it's followed.

Didn't mean he'd go along with it happily, with the addition he's not to eat Convoy people; he pointedly doesn't meet Serph's gaze, crossing his arms over his chest. "I only tried to eat two of them." Three. But it's not refusal. "And anyway, they should be marked." Even if everyone started running around skyclad he'd still do his reasonable best to not munch the next tasty looking demon to cross his path. But it could be made so much easier if everyone just happened to be wearing orange.

Jack has no idea who the Brutes are, but he decides not to ask. Probably another tribe where these two came from. "It would probably be difficult to convince the entire convoy to be marked in a particular way," he comments. "I haven't had any trouble recognizing faces I know, but it's possible I'm cheating a bit, since everyone has a unique scent that doesn't change that much when they're transformed."

He eyes Heat a beat. "Who did you try to eat?"

Behind them, the door opens again. In steps John, damp and rumpled, who looks like he's been freshly mauled by a tiger. Long gouges have been cut from his new cloak. The hem is in bloodstained tatters, spattered with iridescent ichor that he's tried and failed to blot clean. Even wrecked by violence, the cloak is still a vivid yellow.

He's not surprised to find Serph and Jack here at this time of night. That's rather the problem: he looks at Jack and immediately goes sheepish, shutting the door guiltily behind him.

"Uh." In his hurry for a distraction, he turns to the unfamiliar red-haired man. "Who's this?"

"Some moving corpse and..." Whatever Heat was going to add falls silent when the door opens again. In such a confined space, there's not really enough room to nudge Serph aside in case it's an ambush, but almost immediately he decides it's not necessary anyway, some of the immediate tension leeching away to recognition and what looks awfully, malevolently pleased. Suspiciously so, for Heat, who doesn't really look that delighted very often. It's really the only warning.

Obviously Serph was already aware of the Solid.

Of course he would be, Serph would know some upstart was looking to take up Mick's mantle.. literally. Which meant this was deliberate, some considerate treat on his Leader's part; who didn't like food being delivered right to them before bed? He could share willingly enough with this new comrade, maybe Jack wasn't good at killing, and nothing really brought people together like sharing a meal. It's a nice feeling, even if he didn't have a word for it, at Serph's thoughtfulness. "Aw, you shouldn't have."

He looks different, as a human. Sounds different too from the creature that attacked John earlier, lacking the gutteral, growling overtones, but there is something familiar in it anyway, isn't there? It takes only a few seconds between the door shutting and Heat lunging for him with reaching hands and an absolutely savage grin.

Jack spies the rents, smells the blood, and dons a resigned sort of expression, verging on long-suffering. It's mostly for show, though a little bit of him is already mourning that cloak. He's not sure he has enough yellow fabric to make him a new one.

Before he can say anything about it, teasing or otherwise, Heat is... attacking?

Jack has supernatural reflexes. Has ever since his arrival-- it's probably the only thing that's kept him alive this long. He gives a little yelp and lunges, too, grabbing for John's cloak and yanking, trying to get him out of the way. Serph can handle Heat. Jack expects he won't be able to hold that one back, but pulling John off balance or away from the brunt of the attack is something he can do.

Several things happen all at once. John appears, battered and bloodied. Heat looks maliciously delighted, which sets off all kinds of alarm bells, before he lunges for John. Jack can handle John but Heat? Even as a human, Heat is much stronger than Serph is, capable of picking up and throwing people around with one arm and not break a sweat. Whenever it came to reining Heat in, it was never through physical strength.

"Stop!"

This time, the command isn't just words; there is a power in them that makes his hair and all three of his eyes radiate blinding light, a force emanating from Serph that demands they obey.

Heat doesn't know anything beyond the Junkyard. John's bright yellow cloak.

Of course.

"He isn't from the Solids. He's a comrade."

Even before the recognition hits, John knows that expression. He has spent long enough in Arthur's head to know a predator about to pounce.

He recoils too late and clumsily, with a ragged gasp of surprise— and then Jack has him by the cloak, and John goes down on top of him in a tangle of bony elbows and yellow tatters. He scrambles, swears, and cannot reconcile the reflex to protect Jack with the reflex to protect Arthur. Running has always been their best and only option. How the fuck does he run for someone whose body he can't control?

Serph's command flattens every thought in his head. John halts at once. Then his gaze fixes on Serph, aghast: nothing has ever done that to him, seized him by the fiber of his mind and being, except a god.

There's nowhere to run this time, John's trapped like a mouse in a bucket and Heat fully intends to capitalize on it. The interference from Jack isn't really a surprise, a lot of people hesitated or got mixed up on their first kills, didn't want to devour, clung to morality that had no place at all anymore, well, he'd change his mind when the smell of fresh blood hit the air.

The tangle of limbs isn't hard to discern, and Heat wades right in to reach for the struggling ragged yellow shape, two atma in human shape isn't much harder to deal with than one, he's strong enough for that.

And freezes mid-reach. Stop!

The Leader's orders are always absolute. He could disobey, just like Bat had, but he never chose to, never wanted to, and this ... wasn't anything like that. It's no thought process connected to it, no choice to acquiesce, it's ... it's almost like Sera's compulsion to obey. Only heard twice, once not directed at him but Mick but STILL felt like a reverberation in his very bones.

Heat doesn't reach for the tangle of John and Jack again but he's still there, a hostile looming presence, one visible red eye not on Serph but on his would-be prey. "Is that what he told you? Funny, he told me something else."

The half-familiar voice jars his attention back to the real threat. From his place on the floor, crowded half on top of Jack, John bares his teeth in a terrified snarl.

He remembers the red beast's satisfaction when he finally shed Arthur's form. Its utter lack of surprise. He discards whatever incomprehensible thing Serph just said: John has to defend him, too.

"Careful, Serph! He can become something horrible— a monster!"

Jack is not particularly happy to be the one being shielded. Heat has shown no aggression towards him, so he really ought to be the meat shield, here. Even if he's really only good for blocking, not hurting back. He clings to John, anyway, ready to throw up an illusion or phantom fire the instant Heat gets his hands on either of them.

"Well, of course he can," he says, a little breathless. "He's from Serph's world. He's got a demon form, too. What is going on?" The last comes out a bit plaintive.

Serph feels a headache coming on. So John met Heat at some point while he was hunting and whatever their exchange was, it's left them with negative impressions of each other.

Serph folds his arms and the bottom pair of wings, his gaze turning to Heat first. "Explain."

Heat has no great interest in attempting to kill and devour Jack. Jack's fine. Jack knows stuff. Every Tribe needs a few people who just know stuff, and it's such an important skill that he can magnanimously overlook any spectacular lack of combat ability to go with it. Even now he's more interested in untangling his prey from Jack before someone got hurt in the crossfire, except stop lingers, and he can't .. quite bring himself to disobey. Not yet.

But John's frightened warning to Serph of all people brings that terrible grin back in his own bared teeth. "You're right." He's a horrible monster, and he never disliked it even once. "And I eat people too."

So do all of them. Why pretend otherwise? What's the point? He can see Jack's not a human, the rest of them were just pretending right now.

"Ran into this asshole at the fucked-up hospital before I found your zombie pal. He declared he's taking over the Solids and then ran like the coward his boss was when I decided to remind him of his tribe's place: under the Embryon." It is very straightforward in Heat's opinion.

There's a few wires crossed. That's not what John meant about making that color his. "Let me finish what I started, Serph. We don't need another Bat."

Said through that grin, it sounds like knowing mockery. Like this entity already knows how John responded when he first saw Serph with blood in his teeth. How familiar John is with the taste.

"Fuck you!" he spits, finally picking himself up and clumsily hauling Jack along with him. The room is already a crush of tails and wings and, now, two human-shaped monsters baring their teeth at each other. "I don't know what a Solid is. This creature mocked my yellow cloak and then tried to carve me open. Of course I fucking ran!"

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Page 1 of 3

[closed]

no subject

no subject

no subject

oh yeah since unicorn, red jeep got swapped for red rv. e.e rest remains the same.

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

heat is going to die on the spot if the jersey thing happens and people pick yellow.

Jack might too, yellow is NOT his color

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject