capeandcowllogs | (no subject)

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WHO: Jonathan Crane ( phobiaasphyxia ) and Ruka ( gallitrap )
WHERE: Random Bus-stop number 4
WHEN: Around five-pm, May 25th
WARNINGS: Mind fucking of the highest order
SUMMARY: Ruka just wants to go home. Jonathan has other plans.
FORMAT: Quicklog or paragraph.

[ We have a Crane dressed in civilian clothing -- nice workshirt, tie, pants, etc -- and he's waiting for the bus. How much harm could he do? ]

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[ do you like not being able to move any part of your body? Because you can't. You really can't anymore. And Crane's suddenly disappeared from sight. ]

[ No, no, that's a definite no. The hands in her pockets — as close as they are to her communicator, and her taser — are useless. Her heart, beyond her control, beats faster in her chest. ]

[ off in the distance, there are sounds! They seem violent. ]

U-unhand me you degenerate!

[ Sounds! She can't turn to look — is she too scared? What's going on? Things are different and frightening and this isn't how things are supposed to go, what's supposed to happen. She tries to tighten her fingers on the communicator to hit emergency broadcast (but wait she disabled that function because of all the accidental posts clogging the network, it wouldn't work if she tried), but they wouldn't respond. She can't even tell if she recognizes the voice. ]

[ Oh, and there was the familiar burn of her birthmark, lighting up through her sleeve, a jagged red beacon through layers of clothing — but no pressing of a shield because there was nothing to defend against. ]

[ Crane "struggles" at the periphery of her vision, and it sounds as if he's being accosted by several men. Zounds! ]

Get- get away from me! I did nothing wrong!

[ Gasp! And hey, it's that guy! If only he were a little closer, if only she could move, she would be able to protect him. Her birthmark continues burning, straining against whatever it is preventing her from doing anything. ]

[ She's right there, and she can't do anything to save anyone. She's helpless. ]

[ GUNSHOTS, and a THUMP. ]

[ ohgodohgodohgodohgodohgodohgodohgodohgod what was she going to do? ]

[ Silence for about five good minutes.

The watching begins to tick rather loudly. ]

[ It is, perhaps, the longest and most terrifying silence in Ruka's life. She is unable to move, to speak or scream or shield herself from harm, unable to spot any dangers, unable to call for help, unable to escape, unable to save herself or anyone else. She doesn't know where the other man went, doesn't know why his attackers have not come after her, doesn't know how long she's been immobile, how long she will be frozen in a stasis not unlike ice. But ice was good, ice and cold things were the gifts of her guardian — of some of many people who had so often told her not to risk herself alone to the City. ]

[ Clearly, she would die because of this. But Ruka didn't want to die — not in this place, where death would be undone so quickly, the maw of the underworld wrenched open and broken. She did not want to lose any of her precious memories, her dear friends. ]

[ She did not want to cry either, as terrified as she was, but whatever had frozen her in place prevented that as well. ]

[ Tick. Tick. Tick. ]

[ Between the ticking, deep, deep down, where sounds make no distinction between alpha-wave and theta-wave, she'll here something entirely different than the world around her at night. In this place there are no sounds of a city at night, no sounds of death or of the dying, and her breath and heartbeat are muffled, as if she were hearing them from underneath the water, diffused yet somehow still present, as if they were the beating of a drum int he far-off distance ]

Listen to the sound of my voice.

[ Muffled and drowning in darkness, everything seems to slow, and calm. Everything else seems to fade away, almost but not quite like dying. ]

[ It's pleasant and numbing, calming. ]

[ She's listening. ]

This world is not for you, heroine.

This world is full of men and women who are uncaring to those around them, who would no sooner kill those in their way than help them, and they infest the nook and crannies of our society, burrowing in and leeching what they want from us until they are fat and thick from it. They save, and preach, and "do what must be done for the good of all," without a second thought to the lives they ruin simply be existing and upsetting the natural order.

Nature abhors a vacuum.

Heroes create a vacuum.

By existing, they rob us of our need to be "special". Unique. They are, in and of themselves, beings that are an endpoint to the natural evolution of our species.

Though it is wrong to hate them for what they represent, it is more than right to fight back for our own right to exist; to rise above and show them that we may stand on equal terms with each and every one of them, even if many of their kind can unravel the world in an eyeblink.

Help me show them how, heroine.

Make them see that they are wrong.

[ It makes sense — wasn't her brother completely normal, constantly surrounded by 'heroes' that, simply by being, made him doubt his own worth? Made him think that he could never be good enough to protect her? He had been crushed by his normality, crushed... ]

[ It makes sense — even though there were thousands of living creatures dying every day when Godzilla was angry, who among the heroes had actually done something about it? She had tried reasoning, and it had worked for a little while... but no one else seemed to take action until it was personal, or until people were hurt. They hadn't done anything... ]

[ It makes sense — but... ]

What about me? I've always been different... marked, before anyone else could see it. I'm one of them ... aren't I?

[ A low, reverberating chuckle, like crackling fire. Then the ticking gets louder, almost painful to hear ]

No. You are merely a pawn in their games, either too weak too be threatened or too good to be seen as a threat.

They will never accept your way: that of peace, and tranquility, and caring for those who have fallen, as the way the world ought to be. It is simply antithesis to their views of white and gray and black.

No, you are too innocent for this world, heroine.

Far, far too innocent.

[ If she moves, she covers her ears; the ticking and the voice too loud, the searing burn on her arm painful. If she sees, everything is stained red by her own destiny. ]

[ The voice is strong, and powerful, and wraps around her in the darkness. It is like fire and smoke and the cold press of glass pushing down. She wonders if this is the voice of the Dragon whose mark is, even in this not-realm, trying to burn down through her marrow. ]

Then, why am I here? I am the claw, who stands firm. I protect. I can't not protect. I am marked. There is no choice for me.

[ No choice in any path; her oaths were made when she was only three years old, chaining her heart and her mind to the world of spirits. She had neglected them, and their world had nearly been destroyed. Before she had come here, it was protect both worlds, or watch both be consumed by decay, by destruction and death for all things. ]

[ But in this place, this world, there were no spirits to defend, no dark gods to vanquish. What, then, was the use of being a Signer in a place like this? What use was there doing any good here? Nothing lasted... Her shields could protect no one, and her sight only caused her pain. She only seemed to get in the way, when no one else would do the defending properly. Everyone else was more powerful than she, stronger and braver and being heroes by choice. What could she do in the face of that? ]

This isn't my world. Is my mark worthless here? Am I——?

Edited 2009-06-17 11:15 (UTC)

There are none left to protect.

[ A pressure, now, faint but there, scraping against her temple. The voice is loud -- so very, very loud, rattling through her bones, screaming through her, so loud -- and every word that comes with it is like being struck across the face. ]

You are alone.

no...

No!

[ With every fragment of her being she screams, screams out denial, a harsh and high note of negation, of refusal, of the only name worth crying. She is being crushed by the pressure, by the overwhelming power of that voice, and so many others chiming in from her own memory. She feels the world decay beneath her feet, and so many voices chiming the same thing. She cries, and screams to be rescued — like she has been so many times before, calling for the only person who could ever help her, ever protect her, ever save her from any darkness or doubt. ]

[ She screams, and is met with silence. ]

[ She is silent, even in her sobbing. ]

[ She is alone. ]

Yes.

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/gives crappy tags

/fails to see crappiness

We can end this here.