EVENT LOG: BURY A FRIEND

[inthenightmods]

EVENT LOG:
BURY A FRIEND

characters: everyone.
location: around town.
date/time: october 9-17.
content: the hallucinations begin...
warnings: psychological horror. please cw tags appropriately.

it's probably something that shouldn't be said out loud

October 9 feels like a normal day at first, save for the red lighthouse beam cutting through the darkness overhead. You know by now—or you've heard—that the lighthouse is only active during ferry arrivals and events... And there's definitely no ferry docked at the, er. Beach. The town is quiet, the forest spirits behave business-as-usual, Rastus doesn't know what's up. Whatever's going on, you'll have to figure it out for yourself.

And you will, though the hallucinations are subtle at first: objects moving when they shouldn't, people's proportions looking just a bit off, voices in an empty room, and so on. Is it just your mind playing tricks in the darkness? Might be! Will did warn you all about the effects of living without a sun and a proper day/night cycle.

As the days go on, the hallucinations are harder to ignore, no matter how much you may wish to wave them off as flukes. What's wrong with everyone's faces? When did all the howling start? Who do you hold onto when the world drops out from under you? And those hands...

While you might know it can't be real, it certainly feels real. But at least it can't last forever!

...Right?

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[pearlstrings]

[Riku screams, a horrible, animalistic sound of distilled rage. Grief. Bruce recognizes it immediately because he's made this cry himself, felt it close up his throat and seal his lungs, like they'd been cauterized around the agony. It's the reason he holds onto his breath even as he prepares for the pain that's coming- the moment that Riku throws all of his body weight into a frantic jolt, as if he'd been shot through with electricity. Bruce feels it the moment he loses the advantage and saves his strength, lets his body roll. His lantern gouges over the ridge of his hip and into the small of his back, cutting through cloth and skin indiscriminately. The pain is white hot. In the scuffle his mask shifts and the bottom of it begins to lift, baring his chin and a few inches of his throat. There's no barrier then, to keep Riku's tears from reaching him. They're small brands that sear into him. Bruce loops the wire around the meat of both palms, almost invisible around the thrashing, for the way it could be seen as his attempt to dislodge Riku's grip on him.

Wait it out. Alfred tells him. Wait him out.

But the world streaks by him and his breath is hard to hold onto. The smoke distorts everything around them, an element of unreality in an already unreal place. He anchors himself with Riku, even as the other boy spirals out of control. His fingers catch in Bruce's shirt and he's slammed backwards, back into the ground. His vision blacks out, a concussion, the lantern bites into him again. The pain he can take, but his lantern will only endure so much.

Riku's voice is a furious, tortured whisper. Bruce jerks just enough that Riku will be encouraged to do it again- to draw him up and slam him back down, to try and stun him, make him stop fighting. But when he's pulled up once more, instead of pushing out at all, Bruce's arms go up, straight up over his head, then around Riku's body in one solid motion. It looks like it could be a hug. But the wire extends as he pulls down on it, pulls it tight around Riku's back and around to the front of him, where he clips it into itself- tying Riku's upper arms against his chest. Instead of waiting, Bruce slams his head forward, cracking his forehead into the bridge of Riku's nose, the space between his brows while he slams his hands forward, shoving hard at the boy's chest to widen the gap between them, to serve as momentum for the reflexive recoil.]

[equinoctials]

[ The other boy's lost track of his own lantern in his grief and rage; dislodged when they rolled around in the dirt, it lies a few feet away, its heat melting the frost that clings to the withered grass. Better that way. Had it still hung from his hip, it might have ended up sandwiched between them.

Riku could have his weapon in hand with just a thought, with it he could pin Bruce to the cold earth in as much time as it takes to fill his lungs and empty them again, there's enough fury in him to be violent, evidently.

He doesn't. That's not mercy or restraint, either.

Instead, Bruce is a kind of deterrant for only a moment, and that's when his arms go around Riku. It might seem like an embrace and that's what makes him falter. It's something Sora would've done, to reach out even if someone was trying to hurt him, because on some level he understood that they were hurting, too.

But he isn't Sora. No one can replace Sora. There's never been anyone just like him.

And then Riku feels the cable wind around him. Jerking back, Bruce's headbutt causes Riku to recoil, bleeding a hot dark streak down over his lips and chin. The shove knocks him back and Riku's boot snaps out to kick at him - his stomach, or maybe to fly right over his prone torso.

Regardless, he rolls to the side, swings back that leg and aims it again, heavily, for Bruce's ribs. ]

[pearlstrings]

[Riku's weight shifts, and in the absence of sight, with his lungs stinging from the breath held inside them and the effort he has to put into protecting himself, into moving on the offensive- it's the only sure thing he can follow. There's a moment after their heads collide where he can feel Riku's body stiffen as it moves backwards, the body's reflexive attempt to protect itself. The difference between this boy and petty criminal on the streets of Gotham is that Riku doesn't go quietly. He protects his retreat by lashing out with his legs.

His arms are held tight to his body but his heel misses just enough in the first swing that it feels like a shove against Bruce's belly. The second has more force. Bruce feels the boot slam into his ribcage with furious momentum, feels the tender bone and tissue within seize in on itself, locking up tight. His mouth opens, spittle flying across the leaves; half of his air goes. His lantern clatters dangerously. There's so much blood in his face now that Bruce can't open his left eye, his vision is compromised.

There's a second kick on the way and Bruce fights the instinct within him to curl up and protect his organs. He keeps his hands loose instead- ready. So when Riku comes close enough he catches the ankle, stops the kick short and takes the force of it to his sternum, where he'll have an impressively detailed print come morning. But it's enough.

Bruce uses Riku's calf like the center of a pinwheel, his weight comes up off the ground and onto his shoulder blades until his own legs kick out, a short roundhouse that catches Riku's only remaining leg between his own and drags him back to the ground.]

[equinoctials]

[ He's caught by the ankle. At first, he thinks he's going to twist it, wrench until it finishes what his little cable started, maybe even break it. That should worry him in that brief second but it doesn't, it doesn't when Riku doesn't see anything for himself after this battle, nothing's there but whatever sharp drop he'll disappear into.

Bruce doesn't.

Instead he uses that grip to some kind of advantage and in spite of the fury and despair, he... guesses he admires this guy's ability to strategize on the fly. It's a thought that occupies that one split second when Riku grunts out when his back hits the ground and the impact knocks the breath out of him. The blood that had fallen freely from his nose, pulled by gravity, goes down the back of his throat instead. Riku coughs, still raw from the smoke.

His eyes shimmer, and when he tries to remember how to breath on the end of his cough, he blinks quickly at the image of the Seeker looking on, interested. He thinks he's looking at his masked attacker.

That makes something in his guts curdle.

With his arms pinned to his chest, he can't swing, but he calls his Keyblade into his waiting grip in some desperate, clawing need to keep fighting. This close, maybe he could even stab it into--

Riku looks down at the weapon in his hand, so startled by its altered appearance that he doesn't do anything with it, just looks at Way to Dawn, its tip broken off. Why did this appear, it should have been-

Your heart was ever destined to return to the Darkness. ]

[pearlstrings]

[He's crying.

Even through the smoke and the dirt and the leaves, despite the darkness and his mask, the clouds their breaths make, he can see it. Riku's eyes are red and his lashes stick together. There's a smear of dark blood across his bottom lip and around one nostril, his left eye is turning purple. But instead of looking back at him or even staring wildly at the cord that's wrapped around his arms and chest, he looks at something else.

Another vision, Bruce thinks. Not Sora, who he can't help but call for. Someone he feels less fond of- a reason for his pupils to widen, for the wary creases in his face. The rise and fall of his chest increases and Bruce's next thought is that he might hyperventilate, that some kind of panic is beginning to saturate. The concern isn't cut off by the blade that appears in his hand, but it is tempered. Restrained doesn't mean safe, Bruce knows this, it's a lesson he's learned the hard way and one he's reminded of again now. But before he can charge, Riku seems to freeze in place, startled by the vision.

Bruce weighs his options in rapid succession.

There are many different ways to make a person unconscious, he knows a rear chokehold would give him a few seconds, that he could hit the nose, the side of the head, or the chin and that also is likely to result in brain damage. But many of these methods also require Bruce to narrow the distance- to not just get close, but stay close. For as long as it takes. It wasn't ideal to begin with, but now Riku is armed and Bruce has, he suspects, at least one broken rib and perhaps two broken fingers.

He reaches for a narrow case along the back his belt instead; it is little more than two inches wide and inside are a pair of syringes. He thinks he will only have time for one, but also that there isn't an abundance of ketamine here. It would be ideal to save something. The decision is made. Bruce rolls towards him and raises his left arm just high enough to be level with Riku's face, to draw his eye. And he sticks him with the syringe with the other, a little too high on the thigh. That's unfortunate, it will probably sting.]

cw: oops I should probably warn for drugging 8')

[equinoctials]

[ Only time will tell if Bruce's deliberation to choose the least potentially harmful of his options was a wasted effort; Riku's very much a danger with that weapon in his hand, even if his range of motion is heavily limited, if his attention is fraying by the distractions he sees both in his fist and somewhere beyond Bruce. It's still a weapon, and one used at close range can still maim. Even a near miss could bleed enough to put Bruce's life in jeopardy, compounded with all his other injuries.

Bruce rolls nearer and his raised arm is all Riku sees, he moves as if to counter him as naturally, as quickly as something reflexive. If he'd been just a little more in his own right mind, he might have had a small chance at recognizing the diversion. In hindsight, he'll see more evidence piling up that he's quick-witted, willing to change tact without hesitation - and can be reckless with his own safety.

Possibly a calculated risk, but the calculation weighs his own bodily integrity too lightly.

Riku flinches, because the jab is high and it stings like hell and he never saw coming what caused it; with his attack aborted by the surprise at the pain, he just shoves at him. Adrenaline makes his blood swift, his metabolism also works against him, because the shove he attempts next is clumsy as his heartbeat chases the chemical through his body. ]

You're wrong- [ He says a word, maybe it's a name, nothing from Earth, probably, as he starts to lift his arm and the weapon with it, forgetting the cable that keeps his arm caught against his torso. The weapon seems heavy enough that his arm lists back down, until it comes apart, like little gleaming pieces of ice melting on hot pavement. ] -s' not...

[ One eyelid droops and his pupils have been steadily starting to swallow up the teal around them, his arm drops and his words just come apart like so much unspooled yarn. He inhales in a gasp, like he's surprised, lets it out in his great sigh when the drug rolls right over him, cuts down all his jagged edges, flatlines the pain. ]

[pearlstrings]

[It will be a very close call- Bruce knows that the moment he makes the decision to reach for the syringe, but how different is it really from the jeopardy he put himself in when he decided to pursue Riku in the first place? There's safety to be found in preparation, in the element of surprise- neither of which he'd been afforded when he caught sight of the boy sprinting into the brush. Bruce made his peace with the consequences the moment he chose to act. Choosing to prowl city streets and pursue criminals, to strengthen his body and his mind and his will had never been entirely about justice. In private moments, when no one looks directly at him, Bruce can acknowledge that it's about not wanting to see anyone else with eyes like his. About wanting one less funeral.

Riku's gaze snaps to his face as the needle connects and Bruce sees the recognition that lives there. He sees the precise moment that he understands what's happened, what's going to happen. Perhaps this is the reason that his strange blade begins to dissolve- a powerful mental redirection. Perhaps it's as simple as the chemical taking effect. Riku tries to raise his arm, says something that Bruce doesn't recognize, but like a sail without wind he begins to collapse in on himself. Fury and terror and agony wipe themselves from his expression, muscle unspools in his fingers and arms and shoulders, his pupils blow. He gasps.

It isn't a very large window of reaction time. Bruce draws the syringe away, angles the tip of it from their bodies and bears forward just in time to catch Riku's body with his own. His knees buckle, as if they've been cut out from under him, and Bruce meets him with a one armed embrace- gathering his weight against his chest and shoulder. It will be easier, after all, than hefting a prone body off of the ground, even if it also means that he can't see Riku's face, that he misses the instant that his eyes roll back.

Bruce's heart thrums hard inside his ribcage. His shirt is soaked with blood and sweat, his mask is plastered to his hairline with more of the same. Riku's lantern is a short distance away. He's in a not-insignificant amount of pain.

And it's going to be a very long walk.]