You can not breathe. You can not see. You can not feel anything. Nothing but the hot static burning away at your finger tips.
You’re on fucking fire. Which is to say, you’re sparking with electrifying spurts of raw, pink energy. Remnants from the game.
You get to a transportalizer minutes after you hear the news.
You punch in a string of coordinates. A specific string you had memorized for days like this. Days where catching a glimpse of your brother on TV refused sit still in your stomach. Days where particularly bad arguments with your AR turned too sour. Days where you couldn’t stand to look yourself in the mirror.
But it was never anything like this. There had never been a death to anyone you knew since Sburb.
The field went on for miles. If you squinted, you could probably make out trees in the horizon. But save for that, it was all open sky in all directions.
Kurloz was, by everyone’s definition, not a good person. He murdered, manipulated, threatened, plotted, and worse. You know that. You know everything about him. You know about the people he’s killed, the ones he hurt (you included), and the grief he’s caused (ha).
But you also know Layfette. You know his father. You know his brother. You know his heart (or was it his diamond?) and you know what he did to protect them too. You know his grief and his hurt.
No, you can’t rest, asshole! You’re too busy tending to a sleeping killer clown!
It has been a long week. It feels longer. You’ve been stressing about a lot of things, as you tend to do. But lately you’ve be driving your brain into the ground. And it’s your fault. Your fault for treating Kurloz the way you have been. Your fault for making it hard for him to keep from talking to you. His stress, his worry, his insomnia...
You thought you were done with this splinter business.
You are now, at least.
If only you could say it hurt you more than it hurt him. The splinter had been in there for about a month. It had buried it’s roots deep into him. You had no other choice but to use your soul sucking powers to pull it out. And while he did want it out, you can tell by his blood curdling screams that he definitely did not want that.
You’re such a fucking idiot.
But your splinter is out of him. Back into you. Ripped from his own soul where it was leeching off like a fucking parasite. It hurt him, and it’ll leave scars. But it’s out.
You have a feeling that it wasn’t a clean cut.
After you took back that shard of your soul, you felt something new. You couldn’t put a word on it, though. Instead, you watched Kurloz sleep, finally sleep, with his head on your lap. It was while threading your fingers carefully in his hair did you realize; a solid black... shape on your wrist. Almost like a tattoo. What was it? A dragon? A hippocampus? A sea goat? Around your wrist like a bracelet. You don’t remember getting that. At all.
You place a finger on the shape. A part of your skin.You trace it’s body, and before you can get to the horned head of the picture, the dragon-seagoat-thing, it... it dances up your arm. Circling your bicep. Almost as if it were flying or swimming. You watch it in awe.
It’s quick, but you’re fast. You poke it’s head again, and it reacts with a start. Your vision fades slightly, only to see...
Kurloz.
You’ve seen this before. When Kurloz tried to get in your mind, and you pushed back and saw his entire life fold in front of you;
A memory. Father and son. Smiles and love. Your heart throbs. And you know what you’ve done.
It was stuck to your splinter you took back. This memory. This fraction of his memory. You grimace and press your fingers gently to the sea goat but- it evades you once again. Not sitting still and just circling your arm over and over. Finally, you pinch the skin where it settles on, and it appears you’ve got it in your grasp? Pink lightning zaps from your fingertips. It writhes and gets away again. And sends a jolt of pain within you- like being hit by a fucking train.
It hurts. You can’t do it. You took- no, you stole a piece of Kurloz’s memory. Of Layfette’s memory. (You know he won’t miss it, all things considering, but you can’t help but feel guilty.)
You sigh softly and rub your temples. Try to calm down. Can’t panic now, Kurloz needs you in this moment.
It’s just a memory. Just a small memory. Not the whole thing; you only remember with just a bit of faintness. Surely, he still has it, if a bit fuzzy now.
It’s okay. It isn’t bad.
The sea goat curls around your wrist. You sigh once again and lean your head against the headboard of your broken bed frame.
You can only hope that after Kurloz wakes up, he’ll be free of you. And he’ll never have to depend on you. And you never have to bother him. And he can sleep again. And live in peace without you-
You were trying not to cry, but you can’t help it. Your organic eye feels wet and hot. And tears fall.
“TT: This is a bad idea.”, Auto-responder said before you promptly shut him and the bulk of your cybernetics off.
This has been one of the worst weeks in the past few years since the end of sburb. You can’t count all the times you felt lonely despite being surrounded by people you care about. This week is no different from all the rest. But it’s left you taut. Wired. Stressed out beyond believe.
The difference between now and then, is that you’ve never had a solution. Drugs do nothing for you. Even trickster magic couldn’t penetrate your stone hard brain. A.R. said himself that you could never truly be happy under normal circumstances. And you were finally coming to the realization that maybe, just maybe, you were destined to be miserable for the rest of your fucking life.
But you have a solution this time. Offered to you by a troll who has been nothing but kind to you. Sure, you’ve heard of the Chuckle-voodoos before. You’ve heard of their dangers. You weren’t quite sure what Kurloz was up to when he asked you to clear your mind and close your eyes, but you caught on quick when you felt something slither into the corners of your mind.
But you let it happen, because he promised to help.
You heard the soft hissing, the static. You felt the prodding and poking. And just when you were about to push everything out, you felt your whole body turn into hot butter, melting into the bed you laid on. Creamy and light.
Your heart sings out as you hear Kurloz’s voice lull your mind. You hear distance carnival rides. You feel warmth. Safety. Security. Gentle hands in your hair, on your jaw, over your chest, reaching into the caverns in your heart. It feels like pure sunlight is dripping onto your bones and seeping into your marrow.
You took too long finding Laffi’s Dad. Everything was chaos, fire raining down and people flooding into the streets in panic.
Then the world tossed itself like a salad and it was over.
People picking themselves off the ground only a full minute after the shaking stopped, unable to believe it was over. Looking around in the sky for the next wave that never came.
It was over. It was over, and the world was not.
What had happened to Laffi?
There’d been enough time to glance check that the eldest Makara was fine before hoofing it--pressing concern aside, with the world as shaken up as it was it would be utter shit to be mistaken for a horseman of the apocalypse or something.
You knew right away where you needed to go. Doc was a miracle worker of mind boggling proportions, and there was nothing you needed more than a miracle.
Wherever they’d gone, whatever had happened, you needed in. And you knew she had what you needed to get there.
You don’t even know all the details exactly--something about a game, an apocalypse, someplace called Skaia. Doesn’t matter. You’d worry about it later. You just had to find him, and you needed to find him immediately.
You shouldn’t have tried to find him.
When you do, it’s a first glance that would stop anyone in their tracks. It’s nearly hilarious how someone you’d looked so hard for would be marked so obviously.
He’s resting in a bed of dahlias and dark lilies, like Snow White in her casket. The untrained eye might think he was sleeping and honestly the expert job done with the makeup and coloring on his corpse helps that impression.
But it’s too still, his lips too blue. And you’ve seen death before.
You don’t consciously decide to walk over and you’re only aware of dropping to your knees when the world shifts and your knees ache distantly. Your body feels like it just came out of the water into winter air, cold and colder still and seconds away from being too much for your body to handle. You haven’t breathed this clearly in ages.
Doc could probably tell you all about the symptoms of shock, but you’re not looking at her. Your eyes are too busy scanning his form and noting where everything is. Look, those are the lips that pressed against the back of your neck and ears; there, the cheeks that smooshed against yours during Rabbit streams and hollowed when he was biting on the insides as he thought; or there, the fingers that ran soft over your stitches and the palms that pressed into your aching back muscles--
You see it then. The hands clutching something red and shiny in them.
Mardi Gras beads. Red ones.
(A golden sunset, funnelcake and boardwalk lights, sweet night air, Cendrillon in the festival lights)
You did this.
It hits dull in your stomach. No one else would have understood--it was a multiverse full of hope. This kind of misfortune is something you seem to have brought with you; why else would you be so accustomed and everyone else so shocked? This is your element, after all. Dread, and the turning of your eyes away from it. Turn until you can turn no more.
He shouldn’t have died. That’s not how it works. Doc said that’s now how it worked. It doesn’t make SENSE.
It makes perfect sense. You swore him to life--he swore you to being there. You broke that oath, so what came next was only natural.
(Things this good don’t stay. That’s the rule. You hit thirteen, you become an adult, and it’s all over. The idea that a new world meant new rules was horseshit of the highest caliber.)
It took some extra months, but it came around in the end like clockwork. This is how it was always going to be.
...It's so beautiful.
You understand, in a moment bordering madness, how beautiful this is. How inevitable. This is the kind of sorrow poets throughout the ages have immortalized for all of time, so that it may echo throughout the ages. No artist could ask for a greater muse than this, what you feel now. It's lovely.
It's hopeless, that's what it is. You can literally feel your life screeching to a halt. Every first instinct you have demands you start to clean this up, chunk it into bite sizes so you can start to handle this like a Strider.
Dream's done. Show's over. Wake up, numbnuts, there’s work to do here in the real world. It's a full plate, and it’s time to start digesting it. There's even an audience for incentive--Doc is watching, remember? Get cracking. Time to quit being a little bitch about this and get moving.
...
You take a breath. The heart he started back up in you pumps.
(It pumps hard, and it gives you something like. Courage maybe, but that’s not right. Something. Laffi gives you Something.)
You tilt your head back, and choke. Cough.
You start to sob.
Daveth Strider begins to WAIL.
You don't think you’ve ever done this before. You can already feel resistance go up as internal alarms blare. What the HELL do you think you’re doing, shit for brains??
You’re mourning, that's what you’re god damn doing. Laffi is fucking dead.
This isn't beautiful. This isn't funny. This isn't nothing.
You loved this man. This man meant EVERYTHING to you. This man WAS everything to you. Not like you’d even done him the courtesy of admitting it, of course. You were so goddamn proud about how little you trusted this guy. How little effect he had on you. You were a REAL Strider, not these wishywashy little special snowflakes this site fostered ect ect insert shitty boasting here.
So how’s that holy Strider credos treating you asshole? You feeling like a champ? You surpass emotions and got right the fuck to walking on sunshine yet? Where’s that coolkid enlightenment you were supposed to find?
It’s here, hitting you in the face like an entire freight train you have got no chance in hell of dodging at this point. You could deny it top to bottom as you have been for only the past twenty fucking years of your life, but the fact is no matter how hard you peel your eyes off it the reality remains.
He’s dead. You loved him. He’s gone. You couldn’t save him. He’s dead. He meant everything. He’s dead. And he’s not coming back.
Being the coolkid didn’t save you from any pain. It just let you look the other way for a little longer.
The man who gave you a taste of life deserves everything you have to give in this moment. Because he’s taking it all with him anyways.
Daveth => Break Down Completely
(art done by @gris-grisly ! They are AMAZING, and whipped this up like NOTHING. Also they are just lovely and made of magic, seriously guys.)
