#tw:falling

[dreamy-sonata]

The self is not so weightless/nor whole and unbroken

Her muscles ached. Her ears begged for release, for a silence to finally descend, for a curtain to be drawn across her stage - to block out the audience of screams, the chorus of mind-bending torture. Each cut burned like no heat ever had before, and Nihachu stumbled backwards as the enderman relentlessly pushed on. 

Its’ movements were sloppy, but not nearly so clumsy as her own. Its’ body and blows seemed to have weakened considerably, but not nearly so drastic as her own. And it had made a mistake, but not nearly so crucial as her own. 

When it came down to it, Niki wasn’t the most talented. She’d been somewhat out of practice, only fighting the slowest of mobs, running purely out of habit instead of to push her physical limits. Regret hit her, and so did three blows in rapid succession. 

One. It pushed her towards the cliff’s edge.

Two. Her sword clattered out of her hand, scattering along the cliff beside her. 

Three. It struck with the force of someone - or something - who knew this was it, this was the decisive do-or-die blow. The end-all be-all strike. 

And she fell, her back to the crashing waves down below. 

Someone came through the trees, someone yelled out something indecipherable. She could barely hear it. Her eyes widened, for a split second, and she reached an arm out. No use, the figure who had pushed her wasn’t going to help her, and the other was too far away.

Such a silly thought, from such a silly girl.

No. 

A voice threw a melodic sound into her mind, to overpower the intruding thought, and a falling figure leapt after her. Clad in all white, definitely not of this plane, feminine in appearance. Tendrils of white streamed behind them, and they formed into just the barest shape of wings. Curly red hair, and jet black eyes - fish scale patterns across their arms and cheeks, the latter appearing somewhat like odd freckles. Time now seemed to slow, as the figure caught up. 

Nihachu reached out her arms, and the figure reached back towards her. In one swift move, Niki was enveloped by the white cloth and by the smell of saltwater and sandalwood. She had this sense of falling, still, but...the urgency of gravity no longer pulled at her quite so strong. It seemed miles below - and it certainly still was, but as the trees had stretched out visually in that forest, she now felt as though that effect was happening to her. 

The small of her back flared up with a sharp heat, and underneath that a cool and slow cold spread out from that point - but the point continued to burn. The sensations mixed to a point that was almost painful, and as soon as they came, they stopped. When Nihachu opened her tightly squeezed eyes - her only available reaction to such an intense and undoubtedly internal experience - she felt as though a more blue tint had settled over the world. Everything seemed cooler, more muted, and was still moving much too slowly. 

Not that she minded, of course.

The Matron - for her name was now burned into Niki’s brain, through whatever had just occurred - smiled against Niki’s hair, and whispered something to be thought of later, a promise or a gift, or maybe a curse. It wasn’t for the present to decide, only for the future to take care of until then. She felt herself drift down, and all at once gravity took hold of her once again.

Like an angel from heaven, Nihachu plummeted towards the rocks down below. 

Except...they weren’t there. Not in the clustered, messy sense - no, she could feel the gaps below as if she were looking at them herself - but more like a map. The formations made themselves clear to her in her mind’s eye, and she felt herself shift midair, falling towards one of the gaps that gave way to deeper water. 

She hit the water all too soon.

And slipped right on in. It almost felt like it cradled her, and she felt the salt on her skin, felt each particle even through her tough clothes. The point burned at her back, and she clenched her fists tight, closed her eyes yet again, as some invisible force carried her through the water, navigating between the rocks. She went to inhale - and found a force blocking her lungs from being filled with water. When she opened her eyes, the water was clear for as far as she could see - and she found that it was pretty far.

All of these sensations bombarded Niki; she drifted through the water, her life intact, and her eyes once again closed. The cool feeling of the ocean wrapped around her like silken ribbons, so she let them slip past in her state of bliss. 

There was nothing to do. She was...safe, here in the embrace of the ocean that promised to be kind. The Matron, invisible now as she would be for a while to come, watched on as Nihachu fell asleep.

[crouchingtiger28]

A Good Fall

Sol didn’t think humans could fly. He had seen their screaming metal birds, and the humans strapped to fake wings made of fabric and metal, but he was pretty sure that humans, with no contraptions or magics, could not fly on their own. They certainly didn’t look it, at least. He could see no reason for them to be able to fly, with their short, featherless limbs. 

So, humans can’t fly. Why, then, was this one so high up, with no human trickery to hold them? 

Sol tilted his wings, soaring up over the building and towards the falling human. He could see none of the straps and buckles of the hidden-sail that humans used to break their long falls from the metal birds, nor was there the triangle of bars and fabric that they used as their fake wings.

As Sol watched, the human spun in the air, their long head fur flying above them. They didn’t have much time to catch themselves, at this point. Even if they got a hidden-sail open or fake wings unfolded, they would still have to slow themselves before they hit the smooth-mixed stone.

It wasn’t until Sol looped under and over the human that it registered. The fear in their eyes was not the uncertain nervousness of a fledgling unsure how to fly, but the panicked helplessness of a blind kitten pushed out of the nest.

He was a different species, but he could not, in good faith, let someone fall to their death. Especially a human. Sol may only have been alive as long as the human themself, but he was strong enough to carry off a horse – and had, in his younger, more foolish years. 

The only problem with catching a falling human was his claws. Sol had the front claws of a harpy eagle, which meant sharp talons used for tearing apart prey. It was generally frowned upon to shred the person you were trying to save. Luckily for gryphons, they had evolved to fix this. Unluckily for Sol, he had never had kits, and had never had reason to use said evolution.

He trusted instinct to take over, and dove for the human. He reached out for their shoulders, and something slid into place. As his talons closed around the human’s fabric covering, his claws were sheathed in a thick, hazy white material. 

The human was heavy. Sol had forgotten that humans were so dense and nonmagical. He threw himself out of the dive, flinging his wings out to their full extent. He strained against his momentum, primaries brushing the building the human had fallen from. Sol could feel his joints pulling and tendons stretching. Nothing broke or disconnected, and his momentum faded. 

Deeming the street too chaotic and cluttered to land on, Sol veered upwards, circling for height. He deposited the human on a nearby low roof and flapped away to his roost. His wings would ache for weeks after such a sheer stoop and harsh stop. He was getting too old for this.