Vanilla Skyy versus Mordecai

[Zero]

DEADLINE ONE - 3,250 WORD RP ALL COMPETITORS 7TH JUNE 2019 2359 EST


DEADLINE TWO - 750 WORD SHOOT / SEGMENT 9TH JUNE 2019 2359 EST

[Kas]

### THE PAST ###

I wish that my life was pain.

Anything would be better than this numbing lethargy that wraps around me. Food is like ashes, there is no rest in sleep, and I can't bring myself to care. It simply is.

Sometimes it hurts.

When my fists smear flesh against bone, send blood splattering to the ground, then I feel pain. It tears me inside, and I am grateful for it. Those that stand opposite me rarely are, for their pain fuels my pain, and I would do anything to feel again, to fill the hollow that SHE left.

SHE was my world and now SHE is gone, there is nothing for me.

HE could not hold me, not without HER. Oh, HE tried, but HE didn't have the strength, and neither did those HE hired.

Sometimes I let them find me again. HE doesn't want to lose me, and so HE keeps sending his followers. HE always was glib.

They fall just the same as the ones before, and for a while I feel again.

Alcohol sometimes helps to break through the distance. I prefer the city bars. Always so busy, always so full. No one pays attention to the man in the shadows, no one cares to see. And there's always the chance of a bar fight.

Small town bars are filled with the locals, filled with the curious, and filled with questions I can't answer. SHE took my voice with her when she left.

But today I need a drink, it’s been too long since I felt something other than this blankness, and this small town will have to do. Madison, it is called, just another dot on the map, just another small town that will never see HER, never miss HER.

All eyes are on me the moment the door to the oddly named 'Betsy’s' opens. It’s still early yet, and only the barflys are there, ragged and tattered bits of humanity. But their money is good enough for the barmaid, and so she simply serves them in silence.

She watches me approach cautiously, one hand resting under the bar as if confident that her protection could stop me.

"What'll you have?" she asks, and I shrug, pointing along the top shelf. Before she can deny me, I slide the fifty dollar bill onto the bar, and watch as her face starts the metamorphosis.

SHE taught me well, and even in my numbness, I can pass for human.

She reaches down a bottle of vodka, pours a shot into a glass, and slides it to me. The glass is cold against my fingers, the liquid sliding smoothly down my throat, trailing a burn with it. It feels good, and I slide the glass back to the woman.

I've passed some sort of test and the eyes no longer follow me as I take the next glass to a booth seat and settle in shadows.

Time passes. The woman eventually left the bottle with me, and brought one of whiskey when the vodka ran out. She understands my need for silence, and works quietly. She even brings me food which I had not expected.

In return, I think, I'll refrain from any bar fights. She deserves some courtesy apart from the money.

SHE would be proud of me, I think.

A few people have joined the barflys as the evening has drawn on, but the bar is still mostly empty when the door opens. Those that enter, they're loud, they're bright, and my heart gives a kick in my chest.

I know these people.

I've felt their blood on my hands. I've felt their bones break. One stood toe to toe with me, blazing aggression, matching me hit for hit. And the other...well, he was at our mercy, a long time ago.

They're too bright to see me, lost in life and laughter as they are, touching each other with casual affection. SHE used to touch me like that, and I try to remember the last time I felt a touch that didn't have anger behind it.

SHE took that with her too.

But as much as I want to lose myself in the taste of the whiskey and pretend for a little while, I can't seem to take my eyes off them.

He sees me, the one who stood toe to toe and matched my violence. I know that the moment his eye widens in shock, and his teeth bare in sudden fury. But he hides it from his companions.

My heartbeat thunders in my ears, pounding out HER name in my pulse. He jokes something that makes his friends laugh, before turning away from them. For a second I see the holstered shape at his waist under the lines of his coat, and know that it is no accident.

Its oddly peaceful as he walks towards me, bringing my end with every welcome step. There is just enough whiskey in the bottle for two glasses, and I pour him one as he enters my booth.

I can feel the fury and the fire pulsing through him, and it burns through my ice with ease. It burns, it scalds, it hurts and it is fucking glorious!

I've never felt so much since SHE died.

Everything feels overwhelming. The lights are too bright, the barflys are too loud. My clothes are harsh against my skin, the air smells of rot. His eye is a violent inferno, and one hand rests on the hidden holster.

I wish that I could beg him to take my life, so that I could be with HER again. But SHE still holds my voice in HER cold still hands, and SHE would beg me not to join HER just yet. SHE always wanted me to live.

And then he lifts his hand away from the method of my end, and reaches for the glass, downing the whiskey in one shot, before the glass clatters back to the stained tabletop. He watches me, scrutinising me, and I have not felt so...open since SHE took her final breath in my arms.

“You poor bastard,” he says quietly, and then looks towards where his friends are still celebrating. “They’re not drunk enough yet for this,” he mutters, eye calculating before he slides out of the booth again. “Don’t go anywhere.”

I should.

But I don’t, even as the ice starts to creep back, bringing with it the numbness and the thrumming pulse of HER name. I sit, and I watch, and I wait as they warm the bar with their merriment.

Alcohol has lost all its savor for me now, turning my mouth into a desert that tastes of the grave.

I want their heat, I want their light, I want to feel again.

I want.

I have not wanted since SHE left me alone, and beneath the ice, my body sings. And I stay, waiting at his request. He could have ended me, he could have left me alone. He didn't.

Why?

Did SHE send him?

As best I can, I muse on this thought as I watch them bring life to the little corner of their world. He banks his fury and returns to them, raising his glass in a silent toast. Is SHE still watching over me, even though SHE is gone from the world? Is HER ghost walking in my footsteps, as I walked in HERS in life?

I cannot tell beneath the ice if this is a comforting thought, or not.

I cannot tell how long it takes for him to judge them loosened enough to meet me. But in the end, he rises from his seat, barely swaying, and glances towards me. Like ducklings, his friends follow his lead, and I can see the thoughts behind their bright faces as they struggle to deal with what they are seeing.

I cannot start a fight here, not after the kindness that I have been shown.

I cannot bear to snuff out their light, the light that has warmed me in a way that nothing else has.

I wrap both of my hands around the glass that holds the last of the whiskey, and stare into its depths. I find it hard to meet their eyes.

I hear their footsteps on the wooden floor, tapping out an unsteady pattern. Chairs screech as they’re moved unwillingly from their position, and the whiskey slips down my throat in a silken glide.

I can almost hear HER laughter in the air.

“Fuck me sideways with a rusty spoon!” one of them exclaims, the one who we took from his friends. His feet slip on the floor, and flesh catches on flesh as one of his friends catches him. Heat radiates along my left hand side as a body bumps into me, sliding into the booth with no care given. A hand pokes at my arm, my shoulder, my cheek, and still I cannot raise my eyes to look.

“If this is cosplay, it’s well done,” another growls, and I remember the feel of his shoulder in my fingers, the way that bone slipped away from bone.

“Lindsay’ll kill us if we don’t invite her to the murder party,” a third remarks, his voice mimicing the sound of shattering bone.

“Wait,” he says, and I feel strong fingers grasping hold of my chin, through the dirty stubble that didn’t seem important not so long ago. I feel the rough calluses pressing into my jaw, dragging my eyes up from the empty glass.

Does SHE want me to fight?

No, SHE wouldn’t want me to turn away this first bit of kindness that I’ve had since SHE left me.

I let him raise my head, until I’m looking at him directly. There’s something softer about his face now, about the way that he looks at me. Beside him sits two of the others, each looking at me with their curiosity undisguised.

And the fourth sits right beside me, freely sharing his warmth, despite all that I and SHE did to him.

It cuts. It cuts deeper than anything else has since SHE left, and the pain burns through me like a fiery brand. The ice has subsided, only a few jagged shards remain to cut into my heart, but everything else is alive in fire.

They watch me, but there is no caution, no fear.

What do they see?

They tell me their names, names that I had long forgotten that I ever knew. Names that no longer rip into my veins like razors because they don’t belong to HER. They include me in their laughing conversation. My glass is filled as often as theirs are. The one called Chris stays next to me, hip to hip, showing no fear.

The one called John is always watching my eyes, his own face changing to a smooth blank mask in a way that seems to annoy the one called Mark. He verbally dances around the one called John, doing with his words what I used to do with my hands. And yet the one called John does not react with anything but a small smile.

The one called Josh comes and goes from our company as barflys demand his attention and his skill. But always, he returns to this table.

I...

HE would want there to be blood spilt. HE would demand that I tear these men limb from limb for daring to laugh in the presence of a monster. HE would mark me with their blood, and make sure that I knew that my place was beneath HIM.

SHE...SHE always had a soft spot, a gentle side. SHE guided me, SHE was my light in the darkness. I do not think that she would begrudge me the chance to find another light.

But HE is not here, and neither is SHE.

What do I want?

How do I know?

### THE PRESENT  ###

Family.

That was something that I thought that I lost a long time ago, to the stifling ice. But now I find, that by HER grace,  I have a new one.  Even after all that I did to them,  they took me as one of their own in the end.

The one called Lindsay rides first.  Her horse is white, and struts through the rain,  bells in the mane jangling with each step.

The one called Chris rides a horse that is black,  a sturdy looking creature that tolerates the one called Chris and his excited movements.

They have chosen a workhorse for me.  Dark brown,  with what the one called Chris tells me are feathers around its feet. I can't tell if he is being truthful,  but that is not unusual.  

I am just contented to be included with them, for what may be the last time.

I doubt that I will die in the ring aboard this ship.  I do not think that she has the ability to stop my heart.  But I do not discount her ability to injure me to the point of death.

She has to be coming for blood. She has to be coming for vengeance.  And there are no ties, no strictures holding her back.

But I am unfettered too.

Do they know what they were unleashing when they booked this match, those officials? Are they prepared for the damage that will be done?

Penance must be paid,  this I have come to understand.  The one called John has always made that clear. I cannot buy forgiveness with my blood,  but I have bought and paid for forgetfulness from my family.

I doubt that she will be so forgiving,  or so forgetful.  SHE and I left our marks on her,  wounds beneath the surface that even time cannot heal.

I do not regret what she suffered at our hands.  I cannot, for I did it out of love for HER and for the price that was paid for our freedom.

But now it is time to pay the penance due to her. Our blood, our sweat, our strength and our will. I doubt I will earn anything from her but undying enmity. And that is fair.

The one called Lindsay reassures me that she would not have accepted the challenge if she had not felt me capable. If she had not thought that this was something that I had to do.

And then I am to partner with the one called Dante once more, in a supposed quest for the titles.  The one called Dante  sees it as a chance to get revenge for his lost allies. What I see it as...I have not yet decided. After she is through with me, perhaps I will not even make it to the side of the one called Dante. And I am sure that the ones that call themselves Tombstone would be delighted by this.

The woods we ride through are peaceful. The trail is barely a depression in the grass but the one called Lindsay knows where to go. The rain is light, but a constant hissing presence as it slowly soaks us. I quite like it.

The one called Chris tugs on his horses reins to match my pace. "Race?" he suggests.

I look at him, and then between my horse and his. The words still stick in my throat like broken glass, but he knows that I cannot answer him. I shake my head.

"C’mon," he mock pleads with me, pushing his hands together as if praying. "I'll even give you a headstart."

Inelegantly, I thump the sides of my horse, and the beast stubbornly refuses to pick up the pace, shaking its head. Out of sight of the one called Chris, I pat its neck in approval.

"Spoilsport," he accuses the horse, before he is distracted by the one called Lindsay letting out a shout and urging her own horse into a faster pace. With a new target, he leaves me in peace.

The two race across the meadow, and their laughter fills the air. The one called Chris is throwing out comments and taunts as he tries to get ahead, while the one called Lindsay is simply smiling brightly, enjoying the day.

Slowly and steadily, I continue towards them, to where they make the day brighter with their infectious laughter.  I can feel the corners of my mouth tugging upwards in an expression that is gradually becoming more familiar to me.

I know what I want now.

I know what I'm fighting to keep.

My family.