logsinthenight | Don't Fuck with the Forest Spirits || OTA

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Don't Fuck with the Forest Spirits || OTA

characters: Vanitas (

evulsed) + OTA
location: mostly The Church, the Invincible + the Boathouse
date/time: July 19 and the days following
content: just waking-up-after-being-dismembered things
warnings: violence

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[ Vanitas comes back into his body like he's been slammed into it from a great distance, dropped from the sky and plunging into physical reality like hitting the surface of the ocean. He comes awake with a start and it all rushes into him the way the forest spirits had— too fast, too violent. He was strong, had felt stronger than he'd felt in longer than he can remember— and they'd been more than he could take. Cold, skeletal hands all over his body, pulling limbs and yanking at his hair, around his ankles and his wrists and his throat. They'd torn through his Unversed like they were nothing but paper, torn through him the same way. The popping of joints, the shredding of muscle, the acrid, iron smell of blood and the taste of it in his mouth. Vanitas knows what it feels like to be run through, he knows how it feels to break bone— but that—

He doesn't hear himself screaming, because in his head, it's as though he'd never stopped.

Darkness floods out of him, an solid rush of black magic that punches from his body and covers the floor of the church, throwing anything and anyone away from him within a one meter radius. He doesn't hear the clatter of furniture smashing into one of the columns holding up the church ceiling, or the subtle crack of floorboards splintering under the force of his terror. After the initial blast, it lingers around him, a black puddle that undulates where he sits, like a summoning circle that never quite manifests.

It's everything he didn't have a chance to do in the moment. He doesn't even think he managed to swing his Keyblade before the hand holding it had been separated from his arm. His scream morphs into a hysterical sob, and wildly Vanitas looks down at his body. He rips off his breastplate— it vanishes in a wisp of smoke— and pulls open his top to look at his own body. He's covered in scars, but none of them are from the gripping hands of the spirits. His guts are in his body, his ribs are unbroken. He puts his shaking hands on his stomach and his ribs, as if to check everything is really still there. ]

[ He should go back to his room, so that's the direction he heads, but the way he perceives these things is different from before.

When he enters the pub on the way up to his room he stops in the corner, watching the forest spirits behind the bar with a fierce sort of intensity. It isn't aggressive, exactly, but the look is still pretty intense, given that Vanitas doesn't really seem to blink as he's doing it.

Eventually he'll head back up to his room, which has been very quiet compared to before. His Unversed vanished when he was killed, meaning it's been abandoned for the better part of a week, now. The first thing he does is crouch in the doorway and summon a Flood. ]

[ Even though it doesn't look it, Vanitas feels like his insides are trembling. It's a new sensation, a little like the weakness he'd felt from not eating for days, but deeper. Something hollow and straining right in the very core of him. He's heard that when you die here, you come back changed. At a glance, he doesn't look any different, but he can't help wondering— if those forest spirits did something to him when they ripped him apart. More than just take his limbs from his body, but rattled his head around to shake everything loose and uneven.

He can still summon his keyblade, he can still summon his Unversed, his magic is the same as it was before. It takes him some time, to realize that what he's feeling is vulnerable.

When he finds his way toward the coast, towards the docks, it isn't until Vanitas is on the beach and he can see the dim outline of the boathouse that he realizes what it is he's doing. It draws him up short, his feet scuffing in the barren sand. The pulling in his chest isn't just his own— it's the same tether that's been there since he'd been given a face. They've always been connected, but acknowledging the squeeze in his heart, knowing that what he's looking for is that warm, safe place—

Nobody wants to be alone, Sora said. He stares at the imposing shape of the building, the little lights winking through the window, betraying the inhabitants. He can feel Sora out there, a little star guiding him to his destination. Vanitas doesn't move, frozen in place.

Maybe he should go back. ]

It isn't polite to stare.

[Even though that's almost, nearly more of a glare. And Mary's staring at him, too, from where she's sitting in a booth and coloring. He's back. And maybe she shouldn't have said anything, but she just couldn't help herself. There's a prickling of fear in the back of her neck...but that just makes her angry.]

( he's in the vestry when it happens, that sound of splintering wood an' the impact of furniture hitting stone. gene hits the deck with his hands over his head. some kinda — damn bomb, or grenade? somethin', anyway. he's about to reach for his tablet and send a quick message out when the wail cuts over the settling sound. no time, then, if there's anyone injured. he gets back to his feet, grabs his bag and heads to the main body of the church where he. stops short. no blood in the air, no body parts strewn 'round from the force of the explosion. just that same kid that'd been in here a little over a week ago. gene eyes the destruction wrought on their surroundings, but that ain't ever stopped him on approach before.

he holds one hand out, the other wrapped around the strap of his med kit. )

Hey, hey. Easy. You hurt?

[ Vanitas' head jerks up like he's been slapped, his pupils small and his eyes wide. For a moment, the darkness he's sitting in wells up around him, open horror flooding out of him in literal waves. The church is dark, beyond the wall of candles and the lantern the doctor carries, and in his terror for a moment all Vanitas sees is the pale shape in the darkness. The white of his skin like bone, the shadows of his eyes empty sockets.

What stops him from attacking is not the sound of a familiar voice, but the words. Words, not the endless, rattling death-moan of masks and teeth. Vanitas hiccoughs, like he can't breathe, and in most ways he isn't— each inhale is tight and high, each exhale bringing with it more tears and a wet, animal whine. The wall of darkness sinks again, a bubbling smoke that rolls against the floor of the church.

He can't speak, he can't string syllables together. Instead, Vanitas looks back down, pulling his shaking hands away from his bare chest and looking at them like he's expecting them to be covered in gore. ]

[ Vanitas' eyes cut to the girl, and it takes him a moment to place her. Not because she's hard to recognize, but because he's been so wrapped up in what he's just come back from that he hasn't been thinking about anything that preceded his trip into the woods. On reflex, his mouth ticks up in the corners, like he can't decide if he's going to smile or bare his teeth. ]

Then what are you looking at?

Nooothing...

[Pursing her lips, Mary looks back down at whatever it was she was drawing. She pulls out a black crayon from her box and scribbles messily on top of the artwork. At least this is a more productive way of letting out her emotions than, you know, with a knife.]

( the darkness writhes like a thing alive an' gene eyes it wary an' unsure. ain't like nothin' he's ever had cause to see before, even ghosts ain't like this.

but he steps into it anyway, grimacing at the wash'a cold that crawls up his legs when he does. the shock of it makes him draw a breath that ain't rightly steady, an' throws him right back into the foxholes at st vith. he has to. stop a moment. close his eyes against it. one boot in front of the other. ain't that what bein' a paratrooper's all about? you move up the stick an' you jump an' the air hits you like a battering ram. ain't any different.

he takes another step. comes up to the kid an' sits down beside him on the pew. he's fully aware this could get him killed or worse, an' wade ain't around this time with a gun, but. gene reaches out with the intent to touch the kid's shoulder. )

Look at me. Focus on how I breathe, an' follow along with that, all right? Just nice an' easy. In and out. Ain't nothin' here but you an' me, kid, we're okay. We're okay.

[ If it were anyone else, things might not have ended so kindly for Gene when he stepped into the Darkness, but as it stands— all it does is crawl against his legs like smoke, coiling and clinging like a curious snake before slipping away. He gets near enough to be close, to put a hand on his shoulder, and Vanitas jerks his head up again.

He's known his share of pain. He's known what it feels like to have his heart broken in half, he's known what it's like to be beaten down over and over until his body couldn't hold itself under it's own weight— and he's only ever dealt with it alone. His Master would never have done something like this for him, and Vanitas has never thought to seek it out.

But he was a whole person, once, before he was nothing but darkness, and when the doctor comes in close and speaks to him soft and grounds him with that touch Vanitas looks at him like he really is only sixteen and desperate for someone to soothe him. He swallows through tears, gasping through an open mouth, staring at Gene without disguising any of the unbridled terror. He couldn't, even if he wanted to, not with it so fresh. Even before he's managed to wrangle any manner of control over his shaking body, he stammers: ]

They were— they—

( ain't nothin' else for it. he just pulls the boy in for a hug, restin' a palm against the middle of his back. )

Easy, easy. Shh. Try not to think about it now. Won't do but make it worse. ( how many boys has he spoke to like this? only, they never came back from the dead an' the only thing to be done was comfort the dyin'. ) Y'ever been to Alabama?

( gene knows he hasn't. it ain't the point of askin'. )

[ The doctor pulls him in and for one brief, shocking moment, Vanitas goes perfectly still, his breathing stops— because he expects the reprimand. It's what Xehanort would do— grab him and shake him like a doll, demand more— but the doctor puts his arms around him and that's all he does.

Just holds him there.

It presses Vanitas' face into the curve where his shoulder meets his neck, so when Vanitas expels the breath he'd been holding so hard in a horrible sob it's like he's been shattered anew. Tucked in like this he can't really see anything, his vision blurred by tears and the rise of the doctor's jacket, so all he can feel is the warmth and strength of the arms around his shoulders and the palm on his back. He's never felt anything like this in his life. It's like Gene is the only thing holding all his feelings in and together in the shell of his body.

Vanitas doesn't know what Alabama is, but it's so far afield from what's happening to him physically that he can't help focusing on it at least a little. Hicoughing, he shakes his head. His arms stay loose in front of him, never coming up to return the hug, almost like he doesn't know what he's meant to do with them in this situation— or he's just so overwhelmed that he can't lift them up. ]

( an' you know, he can almost tell. that this is maybe the first hug the boy's ever gotten in his life, just on account'a that utter lack of reaction. gene lifts his hand up and strokes his hair softly, then continues on, )

Well, I'm from a little city called Agathine. Quiet place. Ain't too many folks there, an' I bet I could name all of 'em in one go if needs be. We're just a minin' town. Coal an' forestry nearby. Hills, but ain't no mountains to speak of. I grew up in a shack on the edge of a forest, just outside'a town. Me an' my folks an' three younger brothers. I used to go out as a kid into the woods, climb trees, swim in creeks. Get myself into a whole world'a trouble. Can't tell you how many times I limped back to my Ma with some bone or other broke because I fell outta a tree or off a bridge.

( his voice is suffused with warmth. it's obvious that agathine cleaves to the soul of him. even speakin' on pain, he's fond. )

Ain't been back in years, but I reckon it hasn't changed much. They'd spoil you there, kid. Nan Pearson would as soon stuff you full'a pie as look at you.

[ The words come but they don't really mean much. Vanitas grew up in the desert, four years of barren cracked land punctuated by the handful of worlds he'd been ferried out to in search of the rest of his heart. He knows mining like the dwarves in the woods, he knows what green hills look like at a distance, and how a town at the base of a castle sounds. But maybe it doesn't really matter that he doesn't have an imagination to dream up this strange place, Agathine— because the warm, constant roll of Gene's voice works like a charm.

Vanitas doesn't really realize he's stopped crying, but somewhere between the talk of the mountains and the creek, Vanitas had closed his eyes and tucked his face against the doctor's shoulder without making the active choice to do it. To hide. While he still feels like he's going to shake apart at the seams, and the phantom crawl of long, strong fingers still lingers all over his body— it isn't so powerful to prevent him from realizing it's over. He exhales tremulously, long and slow.

The darkness circling Gene's legs folds back into itself and fades away, as though it's sunk through the floorboards and dispersed to places unknown. ]

[ He should leave well enough alone, but Vanitas is volatile at the best of times and now is no different. Now, in fact, is worse— so he turns toward her and slips into the seat directly across from Mary. His eyes flick down to her drawing, then back to her face. ]

I saw what you were hiding you know.

[Mary's crayon stops in its destructive path, and she feels her teeth gnash together behind her lips.]

Are you going to tell people?

[It's been the same feeling for days- after that first night. It'd been at it's worst then, worse than anything he could have ever imagined, worse than anything he's ever felt. But the after was something else. A stretched out kind of hollow feeling that didn't stop. It was there when we woke up and it was there when he and Riku and Kairi sat down for breakfast together. It was there when he and Dawn went out along the shore and it was there when he went to sleep. It was there the day after that, and the day after that and Sora couldn't bring himself to head into town and be around the bonfire's warm glow, or to find his way to the Invicible and listen to the chatter of voices familiar or otherwise. When he leaves the boathouse at all it's to walk along the sand or to sit out on the pier, to listen to the small waves and to try to close his eyes. To pretend that they're louder.

Being alone was the hardest part- when his friends would head into town or go meet up with some of the others. When the graves had lingered and they'd all had plenty on their minds. He couldn't bring himself to ask because if he did then he'd need to know what the question would be. He'd need to know what words to use. And he didn't, still doesn't.

Only that big hollow space had remained.
Until suddenly, in one deep breath, it wasn't.

Sora's body stiffens from where he sits. The sensation is like- like being hit all at once, like his leg has gone from being asleep to being normal in one big go. He looks back over his shoulder on reflex, an instantaneous snap as if he expects to find the cause right there. But it isn't. He isn't. And Sora looks at both of his hands instead, head swimming. If he lets his vision get blurry around the edges he imagines they might be covered in gore- unrecognizable shapes barely stitched onto his own.

All there really is to do is wait. His lantern is a warm golden glow brought into his lap, obscured from anyone but the lake- and he waits. There's no way to describe that either; knowing that Vanitas will come. It's just there, the same way that there's air to breathe, the same way that his heart still beats. He doesn't know what the passage of time is, in the end, and that feels appropriate too after the timelessness of everything else. Small noises arrive behind him, two feet in the sand. And Sora turns to see him- spots the dark silhouette looking out at the boathouse. So he turns with his lantern too. A single bright point on a black horizon.]

( any medic worth their salt knows it ain't about the words, it's about the tone. you can calm a horse talkin' about the weather so long's you keep your words even an' soft an' your touch tender.

ain't nobody been kind to this boy in a long, long time. he resolves to do it well.

the darkness slinks away, an' gene takes that as his cue to pull on back. he fishes a kerchief outta his pocket an' presses it into vanitas' hand, ruffles his hair again with the other. )

Always hated cryin', myself. Gets real messy, an' you're stuffed up hours after. One more thing that bodies ain't the best about, huh?

⟪ Moving like a ghost around a holy site is not new to her –– she had heard his cries, had seen Eugene care for him, and had chosen to leave the medic to it. No need to crowd the newly resurrected. She gives him some time instead, just a little to return back to his room and take a breather.

Eventually, she heads for the Invincible. Knock-knock at the door to his chambers, polite but insistent. She had taken a detour before heading upstairs, and if he opens the door, or calls for her to enter, she'll glide inside carrying a tray with a hot meal for him.

It's no universal cure, no. He hadn't screamed like a creature who could be soothed with food.

But it's a show of human care, and that could be worth something, maybe. ⟫

[ He watches her steadily, unblinking. ]

I haven't decided yet.

[ He couldn't miss the warm shine of Sora's lantern even if he wanted to. Some part of him knows it intrinsically, the same way he's always known Ventus'. It's familiar and draws him in, like a moth to flame. Vanitas' eyes cut sidelong, away from the almost threatening silhouette of the boathouse to land first on that little star-glow, and then on the boy holding it aloft.

Vanitas has never been afraid of a person. Even Xehanort, his powerful Master, who had forged him into the sharp blade he was today, hadn't scared him. The fear he's always known has never been tied to an individual— but the rushing sensation that floods his ears the moment his eyes land on Sora's unassuming outline feels similar. It's stupid, because what has just happened is proof he has nothing to fear. Even if they fight, even if Sora put the x-Blade that he inherited right through Vanitas' heart, he thinks the magic of this world would only bring him back again.

But facing him, Vanitas remembers what he'd seen in that vision, and what he'd felt. He remembers how violently it had taken his perception of things and shaken it, like a dog with a rabbit. How in that singular moment he understood Sora not just as the darkness to his light— but something else entirely.

His heart thumps hard in his chest. He can feel it like it's straining against his ribcage, like it could leap the short distance between Vanitas and the dock. He pulls both hands into fists, but it's the only movement he manages— caught between a yearning to come closer, and the desperate desire to run away. ]

[ This isn't the first time Vanitas has wept openly, but it is only the second time he's ever had a witness. The last time he'd hit this threshold, he'd destroyed so much of himself that the circle of pain between himself and his Unversed had made him collapse under the strain of so much anguish. Only then, Xehanort hadn't touched his hair or given him something to hold— his Master had only told him what to do to end his suffering, and left him there to pick up the pieces afterward.

He should be ashamed of himself, letting this man see him in such a pathetic, weakened state— but there's no room for it alongside everything else. The terror still pricks at him, his face feels hot and swollen, his throat scraped raw with screaming, and under it is the hollow exhaustion following the punch of adrenaline and violent release of so much emotion, so much darkness.

The doctor lets him go and Vanitas, unmoored, stares down at the hankerchief that he holds in his hands. He doesn't wipe his face with it, just grips it like a tether in his lap. ]

[ Vanitas jerks his head up when the knock comes at his door, and every little Flood that's seeped out of him since his return does the same. It would be easy to tell himself that maybe they were knocking somewhere else, maybe across the hall— but he isn't so ignorant as that.

He doesn't get visitors. He doesn't want, or need them.

Still, he gets up off his uneven bed and pulls open the door. Without any expectations, he isn't as surprised as he probably should be that it's that witch woman standing there with her hands under a platter. The smell of food hits him like a truck, reminding Vanitas suddenly and violently that he hasn't eaten, and it prevents him from saying or doing anything to stop her gliding into his room.

Only once it's too late to do anything but accept the situation does Vanitas turn around to face her and speak. His Unversed retreat into the shadowy corners of his room, nothing but red eyes that follow Melisandre without coming closer. ]

I didn't know you could leave the church.

[ He means it to come out more aggressively provocative than it does. Maybe he's still tired. ]

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