Kaledo Art
he wasn't even looking at me and he found me
One Nice Bug Per Day
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"I'm Dorothy Gale from Kansas"
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we're not kids anymore.
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Litteris : noun meaning ❝ letters ❞ Latin.
an independent multimuse featuring canon characters ( EST. Nov. 24th, 2023 ) all adored by Giffie ( she/her, 21+, PDT, low activity )
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Under less dire circumstances, Rennick would have been positively delighted to hear Clarence utter the word "please" outside of a sarcastic context, providing him with ample ammunition for future teasing; as it is, however, all that registers to him is the terror in his companion's voice, alerting him to the fact that the ceiling is quite literally coming down on their heads. Even the slobbering bone-beast is not exempt from misfortune; of all the different forces at play, whichever way they might manifest themselves, however ancient they might be, gravity is king.
Rearing into an upward crescent like an alarmed grub, the former Shelter manager tries his damnedest to tear away from his, he's certain, would-be kill. There is indeed enough space for Clarence to squeeze through the tunnel behind him, and enough time for a two-legged little thing like him to reach safety, too, but bets are still out on whether there is enough for his larger friend, who, presuming that Clarence intends to lead him to safety, is already on his way over.
At the sight of the two titans starting to detangle from one another (or at least, what he can make out of their shapes in the dark), relief floods Clarence, releasing some of the extra pressure in the form of a thankfully muffled, shuddering exhale. In all (forever unspoken) honesty, he has to hand it to Philip for making it as far as he had, if this is what human anxiety feels like. He's already very goddamn sick of it. But of course, the relief doesn't last long when—
Initially, Rennick's assailant lets go as well, attempting to scramble in the opposite direction; that is, before the metaphorical switch flips again, and at the last second, the creature reaches back, groping for any lingering remnant of the other to try and keep him pinned below the next portion of rock to give way. Succeed or fail, the sinewy silhouette of a nightmarishly thin, long arm as it emerges from the debris to fish for the overseer is the last thing Clarence sees before yet more of the tunnel above them unceremoniously collapses.
The following seconds, feeling like minutes, are spent staggering backward and blinking through grit, despite procedural memory having lifted his arms and shielded his face. A breath reflexively sucked in, a syllable almost uttered, only to result in a coughing fit, all brought on by another explosive cloud of debris, this time having erupted mere feet in front of his face.
If Clarence calling both it and him sons of bitches wasn't enough of an indication that this is very much an unhappy reunion, whichever unfathomable way the two happen to be acquainted, that 'What have you done?' is plenty telling on its own, as is Clarence's understandably unenthused reponse to the beast's approach. Reasonable, yes, Rennick thinks, but a gambler, too, and now that he has confirmation that his ticket out of here is still in one piece, the stakes are different: outplay the presence, and he can live; outplay it, keep Clarence alive, and he can be free.
The explosion of violence is ferocious: heartened by hope, this time, instead of anger, Rennick launches himself at the abomination, raising a sickle-like arm as far above his head as is physically possible in the tight space before bringing it down, driving it through the knotted bones like a slaughterhouse hook and dragging their pursuer into a tangle of whipping tendrils. "Turn your back on me, eh!" Arm-thick ropes of viscera wrench around the abomination's teeth, driving them wider and wider apart in an attempt to snap its jaws. "I'm no— arrh!— letting you ruin this!"
Two behemoths battling to the death in several rounds was not one of the safety criteria (of which, as per usual, only the barest minimum for certification were met) considered during the tunnel's construction, as is reaffirmed when a fine mist of dust erupts from the ceiling near Clarence like a sprung leak. Then another, accompanied by a disqueting rumble from somewhere above. Almost immediately afterwards, a cascade of coarse earth plummets to the ground somewhere behind Clarence, scattering pebbles on the ground, close enough that a rolling few bump to a stop against the heels of his shoes.
Taken by the element of surprise, the amalgamation of flesh and bone goes down easily, claws scraping for purchase against the worn tunnel floor but finding none before it’s dragged back, where it flails and thrashes like a wounded animal, tearing at the tendrils enveloping its maw with its remaining arm. It doesn’t just use its arm, however, lashing out with its powerful legs wildly in the blind hope of snapping, ripping, piercing. Of course, it’s constrained by the same comparatively small space as the other, and each poorly aimed strike leveled at the walls brings with it more rumbles. More plumes raining dust and tiny rocks down directly over their heads.
Clarence knows the quickest way out of this whole mess is to suffer a heart attack and perish on the spot. And yet, the body persists. Even though said heart is beating so fast it might break a rib, he’s lightheaded, and his limbs feel like wet spaghetti noodles. You should’ve ran when you had the chance, he thinks. You should still run. He doesn’t know how blocked the path is behind him; he’s too afraid to look back, but maybe he could squeeze through, right? Sure, he may come to an impasse, something that he would need his tunneling friend to traverse, but at least he’d die in peace, instead of getting crushed under who-knows-how-many tons of bunker.
Deep breaths. Stave off the panic. “Rennick!” It doesn’t bloody sound like he’s staving off the panic. He’s already backing away again. “Now’s a really good time to get outta here— please!”
And thus the pendulum swings. The presence is back, heralded, as before, by a headache that defies comparison to anything Rennick has ever experienced prior to falling ill. A rope of blood-tinged spittle yawns into a low, wide arch as he hoists his hammering head slightly upward, his gaze not so much shifting as careening wildly from Clarence to the thing and back in an attempt to make sense of what this means, first and foremost, as per usual, for his own survival.
Perhaps the wee man does know what he's doing. Gotta be a first time for everything.
'Clarence. His name is Clarence,' he thinks, unexpectedly offended by the misnaming, sagging back against the ground with his eyes still on the smaller infected in an attempt to glean some sort of meaning from that fishbelly-pale face. Reassurance too, maybe—not that Rennick would be caught dead admitting it. "You two know each other?" Observing silently would be the wiser course of action, but far be it from him to pass up an opportunity to get in the last word.
“In the broadest sense,” is all Clarence can think to say, and it’s unclear even to himself which one he’s responding to. Now that the chaos has settled down for the moment, and there’s no immediate concern that the walking garbage disposal is going to pop his free ride (because of course that’s all this is, a partnership of convenience) like a water balloon, he’s left wondering if getting involved was such a good idea, after all. And where he takes it from here.
Without looking away, the beast slowly, seemingly gingerly, begins to remove itself entirely from above the Scotsman. Dragging one limb behind it and ambling along on the others, it moves toward Clarence, who quickly starts to match it step-by-step, only backward and in the opposite direction. “What are you doing here? What have you done?”
“You requested to speak with me just now.” The voice again, same as it was the first time it and overseer had spoken, containing innumerable qualities all at once and rippling across his mind like a pebble skipped across a pond; though fainter than before, as if its foothold over his psyche isn’t quite as strong as it had been. “End this farce, and we can talk.” The implication is perhaps all too clear: do what the other body is now resisting. Put an end to the one-armed creature and Rennick’s misguided accomplice. “You are reasonable.”
Francis
they dropped the world on your shoulders and called you ATLAS
——- how long can you hold the weight?
At some point in the conversation, she lifts her head from the steering wheel long enough to get a proper look at Miles, like he had just admitted to something more bizarre than the garden-variety strange that she was used to working with. Really, lizard people? Illuminati? Now she’s gone and done it. Merris had managed to step into some questionable things herself, ones that had others just as incredulous, if not more so, than she was. Not anything like his before. Had he known something more, or was this man more unhinged than what she gave him original credit for? If Merris didn’t say it, her expression most certainly would have.
“Yer’ act’ually bein’ serious w’me righ’ now?”
So much for the benefit of the doubt right out the gate (She really did appreciate the camaraderie in these trying times), but there’s something still hidden there beneath Miles’ visage of calm demeanour that indeed has her instincts perked now. If he so fancies himself as an investigator, no doubt he could have been grasping for something as well. She didn’t have to trust him, at least not all the way..
“Y’ain’t kiddin’…well, damn..alrigh’.. it ain’t li’ke they be believin’us whole lot an’ways, sure’s hell ain’t lookin’.-.”
She registers something before she turns in the chair, and no sooner is her forehead kissing the steering wheel all over again, once, then twice, trailed by a soft groan and a curse of regret. After an escape that rivalled those from Hollywood itself, she had managed to pull a rookie move by forgetting her laptop and research back at her apartment.
“-Miles..y’ain’t gonna’ be’lievin’ it but w’gotta’ go back..”
Relief (an alien feeling to him at this point), when his cockamamie story is digested with an understandable amount of skepticism but also an as-of-yet unseen level of receptiveness; although to be fair, his cockamamie story is as close to the truth as he’s ever admitted out loud before. He’d been hopeful when he had mentioned receiving the benefit of the doubt, but not particularly expectant. Whether she actually believes him or not is another thing, but at least she hasn’t asked him to kindly step out of the vehicle yet.
Of course, what could’ve been expected is that feeling of relief being short-lived, eyebrows knitting together when the woman begins gently bouncing her forehead off the top of the steering wheel. “What—?” he starts to ask, only to be answered a second later.
We gotta go back.
Staring out from the windshield, it doesn’t take long for his brain to commence offering up flashes of what might be there for them if they go back: a cordoned-off crime scene (witnesses loitering about, ready to point the finger and embroil them both in something they don’t have time for, and things he would really rather not deal with), a Cabal ambush waiting to happen, maybe both. Still, it’s not like he can blame her: most people couldn’t be forced from their homes without leaving behind a few necessities.
After just a moment, Kurtis looks back at the woman, the realization that he hasn’t caught her name yet occurring long about the same time. “For what?”
The 'oh, no' of realizing that Clarence decided to act against his orders, because to hell, right, with the man who just saved his life, switches to 'oh, yes' when the stabbing pressure against his belly lessens, then right back to 'oh, no' when Clarence starts running his mouth again. Being accused of anything, justly or otherwise, has Rennick seriously considering teaming up with the creature to flatten the smallest among them like a tick before the two of them return to tearing out each others' throats. Hopefully he'll get to tear off its other arm before he goes—leave it lying flat in the dirt, using its feet to launch itself forward like a fucked up frog that never gets off the ground.
"Are you out of your fucking mind?" This being his second time asking him that in a far too short span of time. His incredulousness at Clarence's attempt at divine intervention is such that he simply cannot muster the mental willpower for a surprise attack while the other infected is distracted. "What— I told your stupid erse to run!"
If it helps the overstressed overseer to feel a bit better in some cosmic kind of way, Rennick isn’t the only one chastising Clarence’s half-baked distraction tactics— Clarence himself is doing plenty of that on his own; now that the impulsive panic is waning, and he’s left with just regular panic. Maybe the hope had been that the larger of the two would seize the opportunity to maim the other arm, or somehow manage to snap the monstrosity’s nonexistent neck. Hollywood makes it look so easy, after all. Whatever he was thinking, he must be out of his fucking mind. A chuckle, seemingly faint in the profound darkness. “Well, how’s that for gratitude? Whatever happened to standin’ by your pals, huh?”
Fortunately, before Clarence can run his mouth some more (something he’s fully prepared to do at any given point), Rennick hears a grunt from above him, followed by a flinch, the massive torso of the beast shrinking back and to the side; he may recognize the sudden onset of a headache, not unlike the one he’d suffered in the tunnel beneath the library, not at all that long ago. As it cranes forward a moment later, that biting pressure against him eases off entirely, and the creature stares ahead. When it speaks again, pain is more readily evident than before. Undersized tongue forcing exaggerated enunciation.
“... Philip?”
"Worked, though, didn't it? Hello, beastie." Of all the things he was expecting, an actual response was not one of them, and the uncanniness of it, of that rough, brittle voice being produced by something so grotesquely inhuman in appearance, almost makes Rennick wish there was none. Again, he wonders if Clarence made it to safety, and that is presuming, perhaps foolishly, that such a thing even exists anywhere in the Shelter. Does it know where he was planning on taking Clarence? Where they were going to hide? Is it, in fact, probing his grey matter this very instant, and he simply cannot tell over the white-hot agony already tormenting him?
"We can keep doing this all day, or we can... we... ah, Jesus..." A trapped lungful of breath loosens as a tortured, closed-mouthed groan that leaves Rennick gasping wretchedly for a replacement, as though to remind him that only one of them is realistically able to keep fighting, and that that someone is most certainly not him. "What's with the accent? Who are you, really? Indulge an old dog, will you, before you... pop my fucking liver..."
“You are wasting time. Prolonging the inevitable, maybe.” It says this as if answering its own unasked question, because it is. It may not particularly care for them, but there is some genuine curiosity regarding humans and their nature— and given Rennick’s refusal to assimilate, he is still entirely too human for the entity’s liking. Which is why it doesn’t let him up, despite this vessel operating with one less appendage; why it doesn’t entertain the notion of satisfying any of those curiosities. No. Instead, it simply clamps down harder, gaunt fingertips threatening to punch right through the flesh as its terrible maw begins to close the gap between them once more.
“I know.” He hadn’t intended to get involved (should have, in fact, been a mile and a half away by now), but the words leave Clarence’s mouth before he can reconsider, feet regaining the ground he had retreated just a moment ago. He’s scared, and he certainly sounds it, but there’s also something else: anger. And concern? Surely not for the ornery old Scotsman. He’s doing all this to try to save his own neck, at the end of the day.
Looking up and past Rennick, the creature does pause. Although probably not for long, if the previous dialogue had been any indication.
“I know what you are now, I know who you were before, and yet somehow, both you sons of bitches are the reason I’m stuck in this glorified deathtrap!”
Seeing as it’s his side the bony claw is currently digging into, the overseer might notice its iron grip loosen just a little bit. Absentmindedly. If the body hadn’t been mutilated beyond all recognition, there may very well have been a glint of realization behind its unseen eyes.
This isn't a farewell either, because he is not going to die to a hair claw clip made flesh; more of a 'get the hell out of here before it turns its attention on you,' but Rennick cannot adequately convey that when a shamble of sinew is stamping around on top of him, driving its limbs deep into his mostly boneless body. Those hideous fangs arch above him like ribs filed to points, and, oh, okay, so its feet are hands, too, preventing him from moving what might once have been his hips. Wonderful. Thank god he still has his tendrils.
"Put your mammy on the line," he gibbers breathlessly, hardly able to speak past the mutual flurry of savagery but insisting on trying, for his own sake, in an attempt to keep his bravado from crumbling. "The one I spoke to before. I want a word. Or are they already listenin'? Are you? Am I speaking to you right now? Is this the best you can do?" So much blood, by far most of it his. Hooking one quaking, gore-slick arm and a tangle of equally unsteady tendrils around the abomination's left humerus, he musters every remaining iota of fast-waning strength still left in him and wrings the bone around, spitting through his gritted, bared teeth, in an attempt to wrench off the limb at its base.
With an involuntary lurch forward and to the side, Rennick can feel the pressure against his left go slack when suddenly, the arm that had been pinning him down is reduced to dangling by a thread of shredded, twisted muscle. The pain that cuts through the creature’s entire being, experienced to the fullest even now, is unimaginable; forks of lightning setting every nerve on fire. And yet, the only noise that escapes from its mangled, fleshy gullet is a low and grating rasp.
For a brief moment, it doesn’t move, which is perhaps a blessing and a curse: no longer trying to rip and tear at the other, but also continuing to dig into his right. After this beat passes, it slowly recenters above him. “I am here. Ever-present.” The voice, coming from a source other than the Scotsman’s own mind this time, is singular. The speech is stilted, emerging from somewhere deep inside and struggling to form around a tongue that’s too small for the space it occupies. Despite this, its most recognizable trait still prevails: an English accent. Thicker than the one his companion has been phasing out. “Do not invoke me with mere taunts. You cannot be allowed to keep on this path.”
His companion, who has taken a couple of steps back. Torn between listening to Rennick’s order and hightailing it out of there while he has the chance, or staying put for whatever good he thinks that might do. At this point, if the big guy goes down, he’s as good as dead anyway. The decision is made for Clarence, at least for now, when the two begin exchanging words, already wide eyes managing to round even more, fear turning to shock. He isn’t speaking to Howard, no, but the others— the Tuurngait, and he knows it.
The one I spoke to before.
… Why haven’t they spoken to him?
what animal(s) do you associate with each of your muses 👀
( I could have rambled in more detail about all of these, but I know me and it would’ve taken me another month (and I’m trying to be back after the head cold I thought would take days and then took the aforementioned month instead), so here they are!
This would make for one weird Incredible Journey. I also can’t put it under a cut or it murders the formatting, so apologies for the long post! The images all have names in the descriptions so it’s easier to keep them straight. )
Karlee: black cat It’s bad luck if she crosses your path.
Monkey: gorilla I know they’re apes instead of monkeys, but they’re still primates and have biceps larger than their heads— just like Monkey!
Jesper: golden hamster Hear me out: they’re blonde, love to stuff their faces with food, they’re scared of everything all the time, and they zoom around a lot.
Francis: black bull Something something, bull in a china shop.
Raziel: raven Boy once had wings, too (and they both seem to do a lot of puzzles).
Max: belgian malinois Becoming increasingly more popular as police dogs.
Stan: common grackle Black bodies, yellow eyes, traits of Stan’s shadow form. And I hear they’re quite the menaces of the bird world.
Clarence: least weasel I’ve seen these described as “parasites” because they’ll latch onto the necks of animals ten times their size to drain their blood. I find this a little too apt to ignore, all bastard-son-things considered.
Zeke: lion Excessively proud with majestic manes.
Xenres: wolverine Will fight anything at any time.
Malik: black bear Large and relatively chill, but terrifying when they’re angry. They also don’t have many natural predators.
Kurtis: black panther Tall, dark, and mysterious.
No light reaches them here, this far from the hole in the ceiling that previously served as their one and only source of it, but Rennick is blessedly adept at seeing in pitch-darkness; his main problem, aside from the very large one snapping at their heels, is Clarence, who is at risk of slipping from his grasp with each graceless, panicked lunge forward. The rapidly-advancing abomination leaves him no opportunity to measure his movements—not like before, when he first carried the other infected here, before their situation turned from bad to worse, then to absurdly horrible.
And now Clarence does slip from his grip—is all but launched, in fact, from his safe spot against Rennick's shoulder, when a skeletal hand clamps down on Rennick's trailing tail, yanking him backwards with a strength far surpassing his own and bringing their flight to an abrupt halt. Phantom limbs still heed the call of the nerves they were severed from, but all the former overseer manages to do is to thrash uselessly on the floor like an infant swaddled too tight, sputtering and jabbing blindly at the thing with the ends of his arms.
"RUN!" he bellows, whipping his head around in an attempt to spot Clarence. What did he say again? 'I really think you can take him.' Maybe he can. Maybe he has to. Fucking hell. "Run! Just fucking do it!"
Clarence’s gasp is cut short when all the air is forced from his lungs upon making contact with the ground. While not quite as traumatizing as going through a car’s windshield, the body does roll several times, luckily protected enough by the arctic-grade parka Philip had shown up in as to avoid flaying most of his already necrotized skin off in the process— most of it. Somewhere in the confusion, he’s aware of a heat rising against his left cheek; warm liquid beading to the surface in bloody patches.
When Rennick tries to look, he might catch a glimpse of the humanoid numerous feet ahead, failing at first to climb back up from his hands and knees, but succeeding the second time, albeit with a wheeze, a cough, and a stumble.
Before much more thought can be given to the least threatening among them, however, the creature is on top of the overseer with shocking speed, skeletal hands brought forward to either side in an attempt to pin whatever flailing limbs they can, while its maw (once so aptly compared to a meat grinder) lashes out like a savage dog, intent on ripping loose whatever fresh it can.
"I won't, you daf—" An earsplitting crash. The presence, now bloodcurdlingly close, looming in the whips of dust like a nightmare mirage, revealing itself to be much larger and far more terrible to behold than Rennick presumed it would be. In his mind's eye, he imagined its mutation to be something similar to his own: grotesque but messy and not exactly practical, but this... this is a weapon through and through: a living phalanx with a maw like a flesh grinder, every inch of it intended to rend limb from limb.
That is when every single nerve in his body fires all at once: a cacophony of primal impulses that he cannot resist any more than he can consciousness, driving him to seize Clarence without warning, shoving him feverishly under the base of his arm like he did on their way here before lunging into the smothering darkness. His stream of thought is a never-ending string of curses that he mutters under each quaking breath, incoherent but venomous enough that there is no doubt as to their family-unfriendliness.
"Different route this time."
Digging its claws into the rubble, the creature launches after the pair, abnormally long legs giving it a powerful yet clumsy start— clumsy, since it doesn’t allow itself time to gain its bearings; large, mutilated mass, unfamiliar even to itself, trying to fit within the confines of the tunnel ahead; the slick, bony protrusions jutting out from its body scrape along the rock walls as it works to reorient itself while already on the move. Because of this, there’s an initial misstep or two, further adding to Rennick’s lead. If only by a small margin.
“No arguments here, you know this shithole better than I do!” Clarence shouts to be heard over the chaos directly behind them, and to compensate for the fact that he’s currently trying to make himself as small as possible, tucked in and clinging on for dear life. Again. The word, “shithole,” is spat out with more vitriol than perhaps strictly necessary, but between daddy dearest and the reality of turning around empty-handed, it’s shaping up to be a particularly crummy day all around— to put it delicately.
Diversity win: you’re a weird little thing
"Take it? Me? Have you lost the plot? You woke it!" Perhaps Clarence is right: perhaps he could take it, but confidence is everything, and Rennick, staring down his nose at the mangled body breaking itself upon its own bloodlust, has none of it. Fuck this, actually, and that notebook and that might-be cure of Swanson's, because nothing is worth dying for, and those claws are hideously sharp, as he is unfortunate enough to discover first-hand when two of them snag in the skin above his right brow.
"Come on down, then, you mawkit prick!" he bellows at the inexplicable mass roiling above them, flecks of spittle flashing in the sliver of light that winks in and out of existence like a dying lamp with the lurching of that huge body. It's a challenge that Rennick has no intention of following up on, but his pride would never let him turn back without this admittedly pathetic attempt at saving face after being caught unawares by its talons. "Let's see how well you fare without the upper reach, taking potshots at a pair of fish in a fucking barrel! Ohh, aye, that's bravery, alright—bravery the likes of which I have never seen! The Danes are falling over themselves to stick a medal on your tit!"
Turning to face Clarence, he realizes, mortified, that every inch of him trembles ever so slightly. Even his tendrils. Him, frightened like a bloody kid... "I'm leaving. Now." Cold though it may sound, it is less of a farewell and more of an invitation for Clarence to join him in evacuating the premises post-haste. Never let it be said that the draconian, notoriously self-serving David Rennick is entirely heartless.
For an instant, Clarence’s panic-stricken mind does indeed mistake that invitation for a farewell. It’s only by the grace of whatever fictional character one chooses to believe resides in the sky that he doesn’t blurt out the first thing that enters his head (it was a joke! C’mon, you can take a joke!), solely because he wants to say everything at once, effectively causing a bottleneck of words that die in his throat. Externally, this translates into stammering, mouth opening and closing (not unlike the fish he’d just been compared to), with nothing more helpful than the occasional nonsensical sound escaping in between.
Every time he thinks his anxiety can’t spike any higher, it surprises him. It’s been steadily building since waking up alone in the sewer, and now, his chest feels tight from trying not to hyperventilate. He’s had misgivings about his compulsory comrade ditching him this whole time, but maybe he hadn’t realized how much he wholly dreads the thought of ending up alone again.
This floundering only spans a couple of seconds, but before Clarence can gather himself, a deafening boom erupts from above— a sizable chunk of the floor dislodging, crashing down, and briefly obscuring the tunnel with billowing debris. What’s more troubling is the noise that follows: a second thud, wet and moving, suddenly down there with them.
“Look, whatever you say, okay? Just don’t leave me here.” Clarence finally manages, rapidly, tone suggesting that he’s just about at his absolute stress limit.
