#lesalut

[useup]

@lesalut , one - line starter .

" i'm not anything like i used to be . "

[reliver]

he's cautious, given a blessing of an ego that does not blind him to the dangers that rest directly in his path. he turns bourreau's arm over where he lays nearing consciousness beneath him, checking the connection 'tween his body and the iv drip he'd been nursing for quite some time now, among various other lines connecting along his body. all for the betterment of his health, despite how ghastly it all looks.

communications had long since been cut off with most the rest of their scattered group. it would be his luck, he supposes — to have trapped himself entirely with the one man who'd decried the necessity of his death the loudest, though perhaps not the most earnestly. judging by the way his body jerks, he's starting to wake up since he'd first retrieved him, too. at last.

"don't move. you're still being detoxed." his voice is matter of fact, albeit softer than he'd normally speak. he's hardly an empathetic sort, but even he knows when to temper himself. he slowly lets go of him, turning his attention up to the human's face as his eyes start to flutter open. they're less bloodshot, now. not so glazed over, either. now he's starting to look familiar. "lucas proust..." he's not even certain he remembers coming into his care, how brief their interaction had been. scien had hardly expected him to give in so easily, but he thinks for once he should be thankful for human desperation. this is not how he had foreseen his path converging with arpéchéle's infamous serial killer.

an unwilling one, it would seem. a plot twist, indeed.

"can you hear my voice?"

UPLOAD://@lesalut.exe/LUCAS

[lykorises]

he's crawling on hands and knees, the skirt of his robe bunched up and getting caught on the branches of the flower field around them. not the poisonous ones, heavens no, though their petals still blow in casual current over them where the watchman of death lingers, nails digging into dirt and root. it must have rained in this realm earlier that day. he couldn't tell, in the dim starlight overhead.

"shh, shh..." where he's oft so awkward, now he falls gentle, crawling in the space 'tween yves' legs up towards his waist. he's only hovering in front of him, but the way he has his hands pinned on either side of the man's body, one would think he's trying to trap him. truth is, that's exactly what he's doing. he's afraid if he doesn't, he'll bolt.

"don't be afraid — the shadows know me..." his mask is gone, but ankou doesn't budge where he seeks calm his racing heart. yves is crying, isn't he? just like ceres was, that night. he stops inches from his face, eyes narrowed. he doesn't flinch away, as he thinks the other expects : it has been a battle to pin him down.  "everything is okay." 

moving stuff over / @lesalut

[otomates]

it is a hand extended, a fate changed where it should not be. bourreau should have died, and lucas proust along with him. the very foundation of idea depended upon the natural flow of the world, with minimal intervention aside from where its apostles came in. he should have left this man to die on the streets of arpéchéle, nothing but an onlooker, a being beyond this world's understanding. simpler would it have been to retain his identity hidden among chedis noblemen. now the soft steam of london proper sounds off in the distance, and his life has grown far more complicated than last he has been home. the very man whose fate he'd rewritten, now a house guest, among the others he'd welcomed under his mansion's roof.

"i trust everything is well?" saint germain places his teacup gingerly 'pon the table in front of him as he watches lucas emerge from the room lupin had turned over to nadia, at behest of allowing her to stay closer to the middle of the mansion, enclosed, guaranteed safety in quarters not far from lucas or germain's own. the best fighters of the group, and it's not coincidental. "she woke up before you did. her recovery has been shockingly quick, for all the ... well. for what she went through."

what she went through, he says. she shouldn't be alive. she hadn't been! how he had retrieved her body was one thing. how the saint had seemingly performed a miracle in returning her to life is another entirely.

his calm expression melts, and in its place, a sweet smile, eyes narrowing in tender regard. "would you like something to eat? our dear friends prepared a rather extravagant breakfast before they left us this morning."

@lesalut / 2 out of 4 here u go lucas

[reliver]

he's not blind, though he's certain lucas proust certainly wishes that were the case. in another time, he'd have plucked out his eyes himself if it meant getting revenge against demons he'd convinced his own imagination of. now, he's subject to his own humiliation, scien is certain. no one except himself is making a fool out of him, though.

not even he.

"do you have something you want to share with the class?" he slams the files in his hand down on his desk and does something quite unthinkable. he gives him his attention, swiveling in his chair to face him. did he think he wouldn't notice him staring a whole into his back? "by all means. i'll hear you out, since i seem to have your undivided attention right now."

starter call / @lesalut › › lucas

[otomates]

... this is embarrassing. he's been hiding behind his sleeve for a good few minutes now, watching the caretaker of his blooms move his arms in excitable animation with each word of admiration that tumbles past his running mouth, and were he a crueler reaper of souls, he thinks he'd clap a curse on him just to keep him quiet. it isn't from frustration or dislike, of course. his fingers are trembling, oddly demure where he fights the eager pull to turn on his heels and run.

he'd done so well avoiding noirges' descendants until now. yves especially, the way he'd oft turn tail back to hades the moment he sensed his presence. all for what...

" — ... ahem." he tries to clear his throat, however muted the sound may be. his eyes are narrow, the only part of his face visible from how he hides. "are you... done...?"

@lesalut / ft yves and w/e gay rant he just went on ig

[otomates]

" . . . " it's bourreau's fault, the watchman of death's blood still staining his robe. beheaded. cut up. left for dead. ankou comes back like a plague — he is one. "you've been written a terrible fate, haven't you?" he kneels down, hooks his arms under knee and back alike, and lifts lucas proust effortlessly. like a princess. a delicate flower, whose bloodied halberd clangs to the ground. "but i can't set you free, i'm sorry. you aren't dead yet."

@lesalut / lucas. :^)

[hakureimaiden]

Finding the girl had been easy. Even if the villagers hadn't told her what she looked like, the girl stuck out like a sore thumb. A child, an Outsider, one with an off-putting smile who the farmers had spotted at the forest's edge the dawn before. Some claimed she herself was a youkai, one stalking the villagers looking for an easy meal, others that she clearly was just a confused girl that needed help. None of them dared venture into the forest after her to find out which was the truth.

Thus, the unnerved whispers had reached the shrine maiden's ears as she left Suzunaan that warm midday.

How could she not go to investigate the truth for herself? If for no other reason than to satisfy her own curiosity. Human Outsiders didn't last long in forest unless someone kind found them before the hungry youkai did, but if she wasn't human at all, then Reimu couldn't very well have some strange youkai getting any ideas about the villagers either.

After spotting Clara from above, Reimu slowly floated down towards her, a hand up in a simple greeting.

"…You lost?"

@lesalut for Clara!