Mark of a Martyr--Path
once arriving in UNDERTOWN, the group starts to set up camp. there's no sun to tell the time, but your inner clock pushes you towards sleep. you lay down, feeling something strange inside your chest. a pressure you can only point towards as the strength the ambrosia ignited within you. you feel it growing, multiplying, attuning you closer to your own senses and the power residing in you.
if you ever doubted the power within you, now more than ever, you feel it.
you 'awake,' but you're alone...not in the tent you drifted off in, or perhaps you are. blinking, the area around you seems familiar to you. describe this place you've awoken in. what does it look like, sound like, smell like?
After winding down for the night with Vincent beside him, Julian fell asleep to the burning oil drums and smell of ash and soot falling from the 'sky'. The feeling, however, grows and proliferates in his heart until he wakes. It is different. Where his lover was sleeping is empty space. He isn't in the underworld anymore, nor undertown for that matter.
Instead? He is in Norway. The meadows surround him and he stands in front of a patch of bluebells, under one of the many spruce trees. Sunlight flits through the overarching leaves and branches, while the cool breeze wafts down the mountain side. Birds chirp and deer roam the forests. It smells fresh; like the cusp of spring and summer, where grass is vibrant and lush while sun ever-loving.
the sunlight dapples onto this familiar meadow stretching out before you. the gentle breeze - refreshing like spring water on your skin - tussles your hair and makes the bluebells sway. a few stray strands of grass dance into the sky, distracting you for a second. the light reacts oddly behind where your eyes have focused on the blades of greenery drifting away, and your eyes drift towards it.
a figure is stepping towards you, slowly, through the knee-high flowers, blocking the light here and there. as it approaches you - what do es they - or it - look like? describe the figure that approaches you, and how that makes you feel.
Julian's eyes drift to the swaying bluebells and the wedding ring since buried under it. The warm breeze, however revitalizing and refreshing, catches his attention from the past. He takes in a breath and blues drift to a figure. It approaches and sifts through the grass and flowers, becoming one with reality rather than the shadows. Julian furrows his brow and squints, trying to gauge what it is.
Only when it nears, illuminated by the sun's golden rays and the vibrant flower petals refracting its color, does he recognize them. Her. His heart clenches and his mind blanks. Julian takes in a slow breath. This isn't a wraith. This isn't real; it's a dream. It's a dream.
"Rachel." It's his belated that wanders over, tan skin and brown hair that shines auburn in the sun. Her hazel eyes look more or less like moss as they dance above freckled cheeks. Julian's heart aches for the sight, but he's already grieved her. Instead, he feels homesick and nostalgic. Love, too, for what ended too soon. "What--What are you doing here?"
auburn hair cascades around her face, catching the sunlight like you remember it always did in the morning light dappling through your bedroom drapes. a smile that always caught your breath, and she stops in the middle of the field of flowers, directly over the area you buried the ring. she looks impeccably like rachel, standing before you, clothed in light.
her mouth moves to speak, but the sound is incoherent. it's like tinkling sunlight made manifest, the sound of the breeze catching in your ear at just the right time to snatch her words away. you try harder to hear her - maybe even approach closer.
what does she sound like? she is rachel, in body at least, but does she sound like you remember? or is it another voice? male, female, animalistic, melodic? describe how it makes you feel, and if it's familiar to you at all.
Julian's hands tremble but his breaths soon return to him. He swallows and, as her likeness nears, he starts to ease. It's as relaxed as he can get when his dead fiancée is trying to speak to him. The words are initially lost on him. It isn't the surrounding forests's fault nor the wind's strong gusts. He steps closer to understand her.
Layers of varying voices and cadences--masculine, feminine, animalistic and primitive--settle to one tone. One by one do the voices depart for the stronger to remain. In the end, it's a rich, sweet voice reminiscent of sweltering summers in the Kentucky blue grass. The voice is the same one he's associated with long summer nights, stargazing atop a car, and sunday morning hymns at church.
He can't seem to place the voice beyond it being Rachel's own, but hearing it soothes his heart. It washes over him and envelops the smattering of gunshot, stabbing, and biting scars he's since received from his job and the accident that claimed his aunt. Hearing her heals him in ways he imagined only the afterlife would.
"i've come to help you, julian," her voice rings out again, as if she knew by just glancing at you that her words had been missed before. and you realize the voice is both on the wind and in your mind. it's everywhere, coursing around; existing as both separate and apart of you.
"you've done so well so far," she encourages you, smiling. it's like her words are stitching your soul back together.
"but i fear it is only just beginning. do you think you're ready?"
It isn't a dream. It's something more.
Closure, cathartic. A final end like the one he's buried under the bluebells. It's almost as though the ring and what love went into it proliferated the flowers. They've certainly grown and spread in this...dream. Julian's gaze softens to Mediterranean blues and his lips part for something. Words? He's lost them right now.
He feels her sweet words and praise bring him back together. The gunshot scar on his side feels warm and forgiving, mending, much like the stabs to his arms and gut. The bite on his forearm and the jagged scars on his back, too, seem to lighten and mend with her voice. What was once broken in now whole.
He catches her question and raises a brow. Julian gives a soft laugh that rolls off the lip like the start of a summer's breeze, "I'm as ready as I'll ever be. There's no guidebook to follow beyond what we learn in the moment; it's practice and survive, out there. I'm here because of those around me, the family I've found and protect. I'm here because of you, Rachel." The last words, and name, come from the soul.
"But you are not Rachel, not quite."
her smile illuminates the field around you once more. her own laughter like airy wind chimes echo around you and mingles with your own. she nods, slowly, hand brushing against the nearest set of petals lovingly, tenderly, expertly.
"as astute as ever, julian," she agrees, eyes of molten honey turning back towards julian. "i'm an echo of your power, of your father's power. your soul has given me this form."
she sighs, contentedly, breathing in the aromas around her, but her eyes harden. her features set in a determined glint, "adapting to overcome is a fair methodology, but where have you found the strength for such feats?"
If only she were real.
But she isn't, not his fiancée. The 'she' is power manifested into a memory. It's much like angels from scripture, ones that take on many faces but retain their powers and epithets and more. Even the gods, from what he knows, do the same. Different faces, different pasts, all the same being on the inside.
He watches her warm gaze shift and sharpen to a dangerous degree. Julian's heart doesn't skip a beat, but his breath does escape him. Lungs stumble to find their place and the passing wind brings him back. Julian reaches down, adjusting the wicker basket of herbs and flowers, before he runs a finger along a bluebell. It's soft and a little resistant to the touch, but sunlight lends it to yield.
"It is," he agrees in a gentle cadence. Spanish accent is his to claim, yet it's from his mother's side rather than his birthplace. Smooth and easy on the voice, it continues to seep and bleed into his words, "I've found strength in my life and the people I've met. It's been with me a doctor and surgeon, but also as an uncle and lover. Father-figure, too, in some instances. As much as I love to have a plan, life doesn't work like that."
she listens, intently; hazel eyes watching every twitch of your lips, every beat of your heart against your neck, every fraction of movement in your eyes. her determination never wavers; instead, she seems gradually more impressed by your stalwart stance and clear understanding of the chaotic nature life conceals under its beauty.
"the people you've met," she echos your words, turning them over on her lips easily, "you've found a place where you prop others up. you're a foundation, are you not? do you trust them to return the favor?"
He's support, an ally. Julian isn't meant to be the hero in the traditional sense. He's the foil for many, the archetype to compliment the unyielding and courageous. While only thirty-five, he's old enough to acknowledge not everyone can be 'the main character' in their position. Such mindsets compromised the group. He is the rising star in his own life but for different reasons: putting others before him, ensuring the well being and lives of those he sees, and likewise providing a presence or friendship for many more.
Julian Dorado is many things. A foundation for others is one such thing, while family another.
Her words are returned with a little smile and a tender weight to his gaze. He remembers his promise to Dane, to Vincent, and Greyson and the others. Julian recalls his assurances to be there for them and keep them alive. He's promised it countless times and even pulled through when Yves almost died. Julian wants to ensure his family's safety--he has the power; he has to keep them alive.
No; he wants to.
"I am a foundation. I am the person that keeps us up and keeps us going. I may not be the one on the frontlines, but I like to say I'm the one that reminds them of the good cause. What we're fighting for." He looks to her and his smile settles, "I do; they are my family. They have taken blows for me, risked their lives, too." Hudson risked his own against the Rhino, one that even Julian almost died from.
"They trust me with their lives; I trust them with mine, too."
she listens just as intently before, but as she listens, her hand waves over the flowers below her. the petals twist and turn, pulling themselves into the likeness of those closest to you. as you remember the promises you've vowed, each recipient appears in front of you in bluebell-likeness.
"then you understand you cannot do it alone," she echoes his sentiments in more laymen terms. and a smile paints her lips; dazzling like Rachel's had always been for you.
"how would you react if i told you even with the bonds that tie you and them together-" she waves her hand over the flowers again. who do you see?
"you'll fail?"
The boys--oh, the boys--appear. Greyson; Voithos' youngest, brimming with possibility and light, appears before him. Dane; Aspida's stubborn and tender, one he's taken under his wing much like a father-son dynamic, appears beside Greyson. Another Aspidan joins the fray, one whose bright smiles ease him and company, too, in a way only brothers supply. Keaton stands beside Dane, smiling much like he usually does. Then his lover, the aloof and since self-condemned to independence but transitioning to reliance, follows suit. Bluebells they may resemble, his family they resemble more.
Julian swallows at the sight, "Mi familia," he whispers. Her smile is charming and her understanding is sound. Dane, Greyson, Keaton, and Vincent, amongst plenty more, are his family. He rips his gaze from the group to watch her words and how she delivers them.
Fail?
He doesn't like to fail, but it's always a risk.
"I can't do it alone, no," he starts. Julian's eyes gain a humble glint, even a little hurt in the prospect of failure. He straightens himself, standing back up to meet her gaze. The basket remains in the crook of his arms but eyes are resolute in spite of their hurt weight, "If we fail, we'll learn from it. There's always a risk that the odds won't work in our favors. I'm willing to fight it, however. We all are."
she nods along with his words, eyes fluttering shut for but a moment. they open to rest on yours once more. her fingers clench and the bluebells shaped like your family start to crumble. fade away, drift off on the breeze you once thought was comforting.
"they're being taken from you, julian," she explains, stepping back. "what do you do?"
dane's petals flit off to the west, greyson to the north, keaton to the east, and vincent's petals rush behind you.
"who would you chose when all are facing peril?"
His smile falters. It drops. Julian looks around to the petals as they start to crumble and drift away. His heart runs cold and skin shudders from the likeness. They're passing, they're passing. He's failing them, by letting them all go. But he won't work like this; no. Julian knows better than that.
Dane's been with him since the beginning. He's let the doctor into his life, let him care and hug and be there for him. He's let Julian heal when needed or laugh when their alone. Dane's let him crumble and rebuild in the Aspidan's presence. He's his son in all but genetics and name; if it means Dane'd live, he'd sacrifice himself.
Greyson's a boy whose meant for medicine yet family life deemed otherwise. He's a positive and young one Julian's guided and tried to protect. He's kept his eye on the boy with the manticore and consoled with the inevitable loss. Greyson's too young to die; he has far more potential in his future than he.
Keaton's his younger brother in all but name and genes, too. The boy's been a positive figure in his life, one that's helped Julian expand to defend just as much as he supports, but likewise loosen up for time to bring family back into the light. Keaton's a growing cook because of him; the man's too kind, too strong, to go down in such a way.
Vincent's been with him in the beginning, too, but for a different reason. Paired together for Nomiki, investigated the manticore's den of deceased, they've braved many things and consoled in others. Julian's taken the man in as the lover he's grown to become. Vincent's his and he's Vincent's. If he betrayed the man's trust, what would that make him?
The whicker basket comes in hand. He slides it down to his hand and grips the handle with a strong, determined grip. With it, he arks it through the air to collect the first three's petals and then his other hand reaches behind for Vincent's. He'll try for them all.
"All of them; I will choose them all at the expense of myself."
the gentle breeze is slow. it's cool, and the petals lazily drift across the air. you spin around, scooping them all up in your basket, where they dance together happily. they start to shrink away from you, always out of reach, but where you can still see them happily spending time together.
rachel steps up to you, a hand on your shoulder, and a soft, kind, empathetic smile sits on her lips.
"this path could be painful," she explains, "but you already know that. this path could be lonely, but you already know that. you've chosen them over yourself, which is the mark of a true martyr."
she holds out a hand, where a ball of light floats. it's emitting a warmth, a love you realize, a medicinal magic you're familiar with - "i'll help you. you've convinced me your heart is pure, so i can inhabit it. we will protect them.
together."
she presses the ball of light into your chest, where the heat radiated before. and you awake, suddenly, with a gasp. you expected to wake in a cold sweat, but there's a heat that's comforting enveloping you. and maybe a little sparkle on your cheeks.
you feel revitalized, empowered - confident.