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polarvoidWELCOME TO YOUR PRIVATE CHANNEL, CHARACTER NAME/ALIAS. FOR SECURE COMMUNICATION, USE 018.07.154.55 *** CHARACTER NAME/ALIAS has joined 018.07.154.55 <Daisy>This is Basil! I'm not around right now, but if you leave a message I'll get back to it as soon as I can. <BANNED USER> SCREENED MESSAGE. UNSCREEN? Y/N -- sample for when you ban someone <USERNAME> First sentence of message. <USERNAME> First sentence of message. | ||||
no subject
Date: 2023-07-26 06:01 am (UTC)Max nods with a jerky kind of motion. ]
Right. Yeah. If something's- if I need to, I can just...call your name.
[ She wants to do or say something else. Doesn't want to leave it on that, should give him something else because she knows he must be freaking out too, but—
But Max has to hunt. She has to.
So. Very quickly, she turns and leaves the part, claws lightly clacking on the concrete but generally quieter than hooves or Basil's current set up. And Max does what girls are not advised to do, in general, she wanders the dark city streets at night.
That never scared her when she lived in San Diego. Okay, she didn't go out of her way to—but she's walked on the beach under the pier, stayed out until the sun had long gone down, walked home with fireflies as her only light. It's never scared her before, yet now...
Now, what she fears isn't some kind of external threat. It isn't muggers or perverts or anything like that—it's that she may come across a perfectly innocent person and snap.
For that reason, she's remarkably careful. Remarkably selective on where she walks. Jaw clenched tight, Max finds herself going down the nearest alleyways she can find, fully disregarding every single city lecture she's ever sat through. ]
Come out, come out...wherever you are... [ Max murmurs under her breath. Involuntarily, her tongue swipes across her muzzle as she starts weaving through the alleys.
From Basil's perspective, almost ten minutes have passed, and Max hasn't returned. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-07-26 11:23 pm (UTC)Besides, you're in danger during the day, too. It often matters little for the people here, even when they try to be careful.
He's diligent, standing at the park entrance with his hands together, nervously twisting his fingers as he occasionally looks up and down the street to see if anybody is coming. Max, someone else...but there's nothing.
Ten whole minutes of nothing.
Basil starts to pace, his wooden feet clomping against the sidewalk as he goes. Another moment passes. Then another...]
Oh, Maaaax....where are you?
cw: violence + threats against teenagers, mild unreality
Date: 2023-07-27 07:09 am (UTC)That's the complicated part. But at least this time, she's aware as a human foolishly approaches her, this one with a knife. He gets a small slash across the membrane of the wing attacked to the arm reaching for him—slashing him across the chest. It isn't foolish in motive, as his goal is to stop the trance Max has his uppity, fast-talking leader caught in. The trance... The trance, that Max is so completely unprepared for. Has never once attempted. Wait, rewind, it's—
It would be very noble to say Max found a trio of twentysomethings menacing some innocent kid or a lady in the wrong part of town. But no, they're just loitering, lingering, talking big and talking shit. One of them catches the light reflecting off the bits of her body that are not scales, are instead a pastel carapace, and yes, he does shoot off some charged things that Max will not repeat, and he does start towards her with a threat to skin her like the beast she is—
But even before that. The moment she lays eyes on them, a bunch of assholes who're sneering and wearing too much denim, hair a little too curly and eyes a little too eccentric but sleepy, smile a little too tight, it's a foregone conclusion. One of these men is going to be who she hunts tonight. Before the threats. Before the trance. Before one nicks a wing. Before the other throws a metal trash can at her that she slaps back with her tail. Before she's walking backwards, barely able to keep track of the lackeys as her whole attention and focus is on this guy with dirty blonde hair and a bad attitude, who reminds her in so many superficial fucking ways of the brother she lost July 4th, 1985, at Starcourt Mall.
Time continues to stretch on. Until there's a noise, a soft one normally, but for Basil's ears...? Well.
It's the clatter of two sets of footsteps, distant but quickly approaching, and notable in how quickly. They almost cover up the slower ones, one with the same general weight and sound—of shoes on concrete, step, step, step—and the other scratchier and heavier—scales, claws, clack, clack, clack—that are closer, down the hall, down a nearby alley.
They don't cover up the small gasp, though. Nor the heavy breathing, or the wince, all familiar in voice.
Max backs out of an alley, eyes wide by force and watering. She looks dazed but determined, like her very hold on her sense of self is floating away. Red, living blood runs from a small cut on her left Gargoyle wing, and she's gritting her teeth. Both sets of teeth, clenched to a soundless snarl, save for her struggles.
She's been doing this for nearly six minutes, all the while being assailed and distracted, and for a first time with no practice... That is, about, her limit. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-07-27 11:33 pm (UTC)And so, he does. He stands shrouded in the flickering light of a streetlamp, his ears flicking every so often when a bug buzzes past them. Sometimes he'll lift his head and look stiffly in one direction, thinking he'd heard something. Is that her? Is it something else? He wants to go look, but he can't. Close enough that he could cause problems if he intervened, yet far enough away that he can't actually hear Max anymore. If she's found someone, it's out of reach.
But then, over twenty minutes later...Basil's head snaps to look down the street, his eyes wide and reflecting the light oddly as he cranes his neck when he hears the sound of twin footsteps headed in his direction. He can hear, he hears almost too much, but he can't see-]
--Max-!
[He hisses under his breath when she finally emerges from the darkness, and honestly it's such a relief to see her his knees almost buckle. That relief is short lived, however, when he spots that she's been wounded- not badly, but there's been an altercation of some kind already- and just ahead of her following against their will...is a human. A young man.
Basil never met Max's brother, obviously. He doesn't even really know what he looked like, moreso what kind of person he was. The kind of car he drived. What he meant to Max, and all of the complexity therein.
The fact that her chosen target...is someone who could very well be the same isn't lost on Basil, yet he doesn't want to think about why right now, nor does he imagine Max is either. He just steps forward a little, waving her in.]
Over here! This way, hurry!
no subject
Date: 2023-07-28 06:31 am (UTC)Through her teeth, she mutters: ] No- Basil, I- I can't—
[ The young man is out of the alley too—but so are his friends. One moment, there's two blurs approaching, and the next, a glass bottle flies in Max's direction and explodes at her feet.
She yelps, and she jumps back, back still to Basil—and blinks.
The human Max has been leading shakes his head and shouts. He's a moment from backing away, a moment from charging, and it's impossible to tell which he'll do. ]
Sh- shit!
cw: cannibalism, suicidal imagery, major omori spoilers
Date: 2023-07-29 03:17 am (UTC)She, intentionally, impulsively, or accidentally, led multiple people back here...and that's a problem, when they could only feasibly share one human between them. It's a problem, because even though that one person she led here seemed under her control initially, all of a sudden it seems like he isn't anymore the moment Max's concentration breaks. He snaps out of it, and begins to realize what's going on.
Basil feels panic threaten to flood his system, and for a very real moment, he thinks he might turn and bolt on instinct. He wants to run, run, run away until he's somewhere far away from here, somewhere he doesn't have to deal with this. He doesn't want to fight these people. He doesn't want to kill these people. And he doesn't want to die.
And Max...
They're all focused on her. He's not sure if they've even noticed him yet or not, too focused on the Gargoyle that assaulted them in the first place. A smarter person would be grabbing Max by the hand and trying to get her to come with, to run until this gets worse. They could always try again later, somewhere else, with someONE else...
But Basil once more is finding himself trapped between a rock and a hard place. He's once more standing tentatively at the top of the stairs, looking through her bedroom door, seeing Sunny curled up beside her bed, mortified and unresponsive. In that moment, even before he'd come up with a plan, Basil knew he had to do something to save him. To protect his best friend.
And it's happening again. In another world. Another life.
Basil is still standing behind Max's shoulder when it happens, a split-second response born of a desire to protect her above all else. He barely even notices it happening as the long, rope-line vines that trail from the backs of his shoulders suddenly rush out of him all at once, whipping through the air and lashing forward with all of the speed of a striking cobra. They rush at the boy in the front- the one Max lured here- and snap themselves around his limbs. One attaches to his forearm. Another loops tight around his torso. The third, his upper thigh.
The fourth snags him around the neck, tightening like a noose.]
cw: ptsd, flashbacks, mentions of past abuse
Date: 2023-07-29 04:01 am (UTC)So in that mindset, it's no wonder that the moment a vine shoots past her, she gasps. Her arms can't feel goosebumps anymore, but the scales find a similar sensation regardless, one that's so incredibly cold.
The park's fenced in. They're alongside that, on the sidewalk. Max, remembering the feel of the vines at her wrists and armpits, curling around her ankle, squeezing her neck—she stumbles back into it with a clang, just as she watches the young man she was luring to his doom who reminds her vaguely of her deceased brother choke and gasp, like she once had. Her claws grope blindly for the fence, clattering against it, and she looks not in the direction of her prey but where the threat is coming from, eyes wide and dazed.
The stature isn't right. Nor the height. Nothing is, but it's all shapes and vague colors, and Max's brain just screams: DANGER.
And wouldn't you know it, her body responds, all the cold replaced with warm burning hot, rising from her stomach up her esophagus, throat glowing brightly.
Max is, in a moment where she is not standing on the streets of Bavan, mere seconds away from unleashing her fire on Basil. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-07-29 04:46 am (UTC)The chain-link fence rattles as Max runs into it, just in time for the other two boys to suddenly come rushing forwards, one of them running towards their friend while the other angles themselves at Basil, though Basil can't tell what they might be planning to do if they can get to him. They could all have weapons on their person for all he knows- knives, if Max's wound is anything to go by- and they're probably just bold (and scared) enough to act irrationally.
Like now, happening to move in just as Max's throat begins to glow. Basil spots the flash of light out of the corner of his eye, like the headlights of a car rushing right for him. He goes very still, flinching backwards.
It feels like time is passing slowly, but right this moment before Max is Basil, the three boys, and a several foot-long gap between the four comprised of Basil's vines. And Basil, at what quite possibly is the very last second, is trying to get out of the way.]
cw: immolation, breathing difficulties
Date: 2023-07-29 06:44 am (UTC)And Max would never hurt Basil. She could never.
Her jaws shudder, and Max jerks her head in the opposite direction Basil's inching in.
Right at the boy moving in on Basil, engulfing him entirely. The ear-splitting screams he emits chill Max to the bone—and will become a new fixture in her nightmares, she's sure. The other newcomer yells in shock and fear, while the initial boy chokes in Basil's vines.
Max can't aim. She can barely see beyond a blur of flame. But she knows her fire's burning the boy, cooking him like a steak. And the most fucked up part? Some part of her starts to feel good.
Satisfied. ]
cw: immolation, death
Date: 2023-07-29 10:20 pm (UTC)All at once, one of those boys is most certainly dead. One other is alive but disoriented, choking as he takes in huge gulps of air to catch his breath again. The third is, as of this moment, unharmed...but it looks like he's seconds from running away at this point.
As it happens, Basil...can do nothing. He can't stop her, nor can he get any closer to pull that other boy away from the flames as he watches his friend die in front of him. He can only look on, once more trapped in headlights.]
cw: immolation, dissociation via hunting instincts
Date: 2023-07-30 03:10 am (UTC)Away? No. No, that won't do.
She snaps her jaws closed, ceasing the flame, and the boy she'd caught in the blast—his charred body drops to the sidewalk. In the same moment, she starts forward, jerking her head toward the remaining humans, and reopens her mouth. Fire spews out just a little too far to the right for it catch both of them...or even the entirety of one of them. The boy preparing to run has his lower body and right arm completely aflame, screaming in horror as he collapses.
And Max...isn't done. No, a screech emits from her jaws, one that's much more animalistic than not. Her eyes are set on the last target standing, the one she'd gone after to begin with...but there's a problem.
In her state, she's forgotten that energy feeders require live prey, not dead. Energy feeder, that is what she partly is. That is what her body's hungering for...yet the hunting instincts tell her to kill.
One boy wails in agony, quickly going into shock. He'll be dead soon. The other, choking, is Max's next target. If both die, they'll have to find someone new. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-07-30 05:30 pm (UTC)The heat is so overwhelmingly intense that Basil can't get close. It's creating an invisible barrier as much as a physical one, because even just the proximity is enough to cause his eyes to water and his body to start singing in the process. Any closer to the open flames, and he- too- will be set alight. The boy Basil had ensnared, now free, could potentially be getting away soon if something doesn't change.
Frantic, Basil backs closer to the fence, and desperate to do something, anything, he screams.]
Max!! Max, stop! You have to stop!!
no subject
Date: 2023-07-31 04:52 am (UTC)Even in this state, she won't hurt Basil. Even though she lumbers forward, though her unfocused eyes glaring at him, she will not hurt him. A low grunt of resistance reverberates in her chest. She doesn't feel like she's done hunting. She can't just stop hunting.
The living but injured boy reaches out his unburned arm, unburdened with blisters and sizzling flesh, toward his living friend. He tries to incoherently call out for help, and the other boy begins to back away.
That brings back Max's attention, and she roars.
If Basil does something, he has to do it now. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-08-01 03:11 am (UTC)But when he was in a similar state, he would have very willingly ripped Bakugo's throat out, had he not been stopped. But that can't be the same as what's happening now, right? She's not starved, she's just...
Basil looks over quickly to the boy dying on the ground, and it's truly awful to watch. Not only have they taken one life tonight, but three...and if Basil doesn't do something, it's going to be more than that. Yet even as he watches the other boy- alive, with the chance to run- there's a part of him...the human, empathetic part, that wants nothing more than to let him go.
If he dies here, he won't come back. Not like they all can. You don't come back from this.
Choose to save one life, or ultimately many?
...
With a sob welling up in his chest, Basil acts. His vines whip out a second time, only this time he has no intention of letting go. He reaches for the boy, wrapping them tight around his torso while avoiding his neck entirely, tight enough to keep him bound and unable to run, while also forcing him to stumble back towards Basil. And instead of putting the boy between him and Max, Basil ensures that he keeps the boy just at his side, almost behind him.
He's been spared so long as he stands close to Basil, but only for a few minutes.]
no subject
Date: 2023-08-01 06:45 am (UTC)For a good, long thirty seconds, Max's brain turns itself in circles, around conflicting instincts and urges and feelings. There's the girl, there's the bug, there's the dragon, and they're all fighting to be the dominant voice.
A growl vibrates in Max's throat, dying down until it becomes a whine, smoke slipping from her mouth through her teeth. ]
Ba- Basil—
[ Her voice breaks. Her voice, which feels foreign and strange in her mouth. Sounds strange to her ears. ]
Wha- what- did I just—?
[ Her eyes pass over Basil and the restrained boy, to the cooked corpse on the ground, and the last dying breaths of the other. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-08-02 10:52 pm (UTC)But if he did start crying, Basil wouldn't blame him.
He can't keep looking. He has to turn his face away from the bodies, even the boy who is still alive but barely. It feels cruel to leave him there as he gasps his last, but what could they do? He would die on the way to a clinic, and even then...most other monsters would likely find it a waste. Waste not...
Right now, he tries to keep his focus on Max, who seems to have finally regained her senses, if only briefly. He knows that it's not going to be for long, not until she's actually fed.]
...we need to get into the park.
[He whispers, grave. They need to hurry before they attract any more attention, and if they're lucky, some hapless humans won't stumble on those corpses on the sidewalk before they can return to do something about them.]
cw: implied cycle of abuse themes
Date: 2023-08-05 12:05 am (UTC)It reminds her...of the stoic way Billy would—
This isn't right. This isn't...how it was supposed to go. It was supposed to be quick. She was supposed to lead him back (—lead one back, she screwed up the moment she caught their eyes—) and he wasn't supposed to be aware, it was supposed to all be...
She doesn't know. But she just knows it isn't right.
Max dimly nods, feeling something rise up in her yet again, the desire to tear and rip and kill and feel the blood run over her claws. It's dizzying, and she can't look, not at the other boys (both now dead), nor at Basil and their unfortunate captive.
All she can do is walk, mouth clamped shut to prevent any more mistakes like the last one. She hurries to the park entrance, and her heart—it's beating so much, and cruelly, she just wishes it would stop. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-08-06 01:37 am (UTC)It's up to Max to decide where to actually set up her ring, yet it's Basil who chooses where to actually stop. He takes them deep into the heart of the park, as far away from the streets as he can get so as to avoid attracting more unwanted attention. He feels a low buzz of anxiety thrumming constantly beneath his skin, yet somehow, he isn't shaking from it, nor does he feel any fear. He just feels...numb.
It's the same way he felt when he was helping Sunny. It was something he had to do, because he had no other choice, and no one else could do it.
He's here for Max. She's been here for him, every single time he's had to hunt like this. It's just...going to be different, this time.]
...okay. Whenever you're ready.
cw: the cannibalism
Date: 2023-08-15 01:12 am (UTC)Her mandibles quiver. She both does not and desperately needs to do this. When Basil comes to a stop, she keeps walking for a moment, almost bumping into the boy, who tries to jerk away one last time.
Max looks into Basil's eyes, hers fully dilated, and wordlessly nods. Every bit of her feels alert and on edge.
All she needs to do is focus on a point on the ground, and she chooses one around the boy, so Basil doesn't have to drag him any further. She feels bad enough making him do this already, the less he has to keep doing it—
Her jaw twitches as a ring of mushrooms grows out of the park grass. Basil will need to hold on tight, as the boy starts thrashing again. Starts begging, finally finding his voice again. It's directed not at Max, who he's watched kill his two friends, but at the boy holding him.
And that is, in the end, what cements his fate, as Max rushes forward and acts on instinct. She doesn't know how "energy feeding" works. Hasn't been able to wrap her head around it, even now. But all she knows is she has to—to keep this from hurting Basil anymore.
What it looks like is Max pouncing, her claws digging into the boy held immobile by Basil's vines. Except blood is...minimal. Just like scratches at the site of the puncture wounds, at his shoulders. The boy gasps and his struggling stops, wide eyes locking now with Max's as their breathing falls in sync. It's surreal, as all words just die on the victim's lips. It's unlike the hypnosis from before, though, he is clearly aware of what is happening.
But he can't stop it. None of them can anymore. Not as Max drinks in what feels like pure vitality, and the boy starts trembling instead. ]
cw: The Cannibalism(tm) continued
Date: 2023-08-15 04:41 am (UTC)It's the first time one of their victims has been this actively aware of the fact that they're dying, never mind the fact that two others died pointlessly for them to get to this point.
But...for a small mercy, the moment doesn't last long, even if it is long enough to burn itself permanently into his memory. Basil forces himself to keep his hold on the boy tight with those vines, not wanting him to jolt or jerk away at the last second and set them back at square one. And though there's a part of him that...doesn't want to look, he does. He keeps his attention focused on what's going on for Max's sake, and...to respect this life they're taking, if nothing else.
It's the least he can do, as he watches Max drain this boy's very life force away. It's almost oddly peaceful, in the way it happens.
Not that Basil knows what's about to, next.]
cw: the cannibalism (traditional!), gore + death
Date: 2023-08-20 06:13 am (UTC)There's a light glow to Max, the magic doing its job, and the boy... He grows weaker. Soon, he's sagging against Basil's vines, against Max's claws. His face is paling. It's like draining away all his vitality, and even in her surreal calm Max feels unsettled. As the boy falls out of sync with her breathing. As she can feel Basil's eyes on them. As her head's- screaming, still, despite going through this whole damn ritual, why is something in her still—
It's like a switch flips. The Faerie is satiated, but the Gargoyle still thirsts. Hasn't ripped or torn a single thing.
So Max's watering jaws open, mandibles parting, and she burrows her snout into her victim's chest, ripping away clothes and flesh, clacking against bone, tearing artery in a sudden bloody fit.
Perhaps this is the more humane end, even though it's messier. Because from the moment her fangs pierce the boy's aorta, he's gone. ]
cw: cannibalism, gore
Date: 2023-08-20 10:20 pm (UTC)...well. That thought gets tossed pretty much immediately, because before Basil realizes what's even happening, Max lunges. Basil feels a soundless scream catch painfully in the back of his throat as Max all but tears the guy in half right in front of him, using her mandibles and fangs to tear his chest open.
It is so violent. So bloody that Basil gets caught in the crossfire, flinching back as blood splatters on his face and clothes. His vines tighten around the now-corpse that he's more or less just propping up for Max to feast on, struggling to fight back waves of nausea over the smell of blood and death.
Basil doesn't feel the urge to rip and tear. It's bad enough that the deer deep in him wants to feast along with her, to gorge itself on flesh...but it's kept in check by the Nymph, the much more peaceful and sensitive side that would prefer to take nutrients from a corpse in a much slower manner. The two sides clash, and it makes him dizzy.
As Max tears away strips of flesh, the bones of the boy's ribcage glinting in the moonlight, Basil sobs under his breath.]
cw: cannibalism, gore
Date: 2023-08-23 12:57 am (UTC)That is all that's on the forefront of Max's mind, as blood slides down her jaws, her chest-mouth licking up anything that her muzzle and mandibles miss. An almost giddy sense of fulfillment, because she's free, at last, her brain reaches a zen calm that she doesn't think she's ever felt before. The strange sense of loss that started when the strange figure that passed through her is gone as well. Her beating heart is full, her body rejuvenated.
A piece of flesh catches in her teeth, just as she has the passing thought—and now, I won't hurt Basil—
And it all comes crashing down.
With a start, Max gasps, because she recalls Basil is there, watching, keeping her prey still with his vines. And she recoils, shaking claws and trembling jaw withdrawing. The panic overwhelms the endorphins flooding her, leaving Max a mess of mixed signals. She loses her footing, leaving the boy—the body, slightly withered, a hole in his chest like—
Leaving it supported solely by Basil's will alone.
Bloody snout first, Max turns her guilty, horrified gaze to him. ]
I'm- I didn't- it just- I c-couldn't stop—
[ Sorry, doesn't cover it. Between this and the others, the roasted corpses that she left on the sidewalk.
Everything she's put him through tonight.
It would figure when she's the one with the hunting instincts, it all goes terribly wrong. ]
no subject
Date: 2023-08-23 11:55 pm (UTC)Which brings them to now, with three corpses under their belts, one of which Basil is still supporting between them. The boy died the moment Max tore his chest open, and now he's nothing more than a dead body kept held aloft by Basil's vines. Though...he doesn't keep that up for much longer, slowly- shakily- lowering him down to the ground between them. There is still plenty left here, and he imagines the plan will be to either consume the rest here or to save it for later...he isn't sure if the other two bodies are salvageable, charred and burnt as they had been.
Basil isn't taking the usual sharp, heavy breaths that he does when he cries. His body no longer needs to draw breath, which means this expression of grief is equally silent. No tears fall, but that doesn't mean his head doesn't ache from it, his body feeling weak and hollow.
As Max begins to apologize, Basil shakes his head. He doesn't move, staying put where he is in front of her.]
You didn't...d-do it on purpose.
[He knows she didn't. She would never.]
no subject
Date: 2023-08-27 09:03 pm (UTC)Her claws dig into the grass. While Basil doesn't gasp while he cries due to his dead body, Max does, and it surprises her. Max doesn't know if she can catch her breath, as hot tears cut through the blood coating her face.
Now, the instincts that have been guiding her all night are mercilessly quiet, leaving her just with her own disgusted thoughts.
Max can't form any words, as they get stuck in her throat and she has to breathe now, and that's just far too many actions at once. Her arm-wings wrap around her, as she keeps gasping in shallow, quick breaths and lightly shaking her head in return. ]
cw: gore desc, omori spoilers
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From:cw: disassociation, omori spoilers
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