2021-04-03: Lunar Fangs
- Log: Lunar Fangs
- Cast: Xander Lovell, Riley Arwell
- Where: Bikanel Island
- Date: April 03, 2021
- Summary: In which Riley and Xander arrive in Spira, and learn once again that hope is fleeting and easily crushed.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
The idea of traveling to another world sounded absurd, but Xander's skepticism was mitigated by the fact that two different groups of Drifters had spoken of traveling to another world. He also did not suspect Dean, Avril, and Rebecca to be the types to make up such a story as a prank... though perhaps the types to fall for one themselves.
And maybe, just maybe, there was also the tiny spark of adventurous desire that just wanted it to be true.
Xander rolls his shoulder as they exit the ruins, stepping out into a world of... sand.
Sand. Like Filgaia has sand. Dunes, stretching onward, barren and familiar. There's a chill in the air. It is a desert, and without the sun in the sky, there's no moisture to keep the heat in. A sea of stars stretches above them -- but one different than the view from home. The air is different. So are all the plants and beasts and the very nature of how the world works, in some ways.
But at glance? Sand. Xander's lips curl into a wry smile as he shrugs his arms and shakes his head. "I don't know what I expected," he says.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Based on the descriptions of the other world, Riley is ready to see lush greenery, with unfamiliar plants and animals. Instead... a cold nighttime desert greets them.
A frown quirks on Riley's face as he seeks a silver lining to mask his own disappointment.
"Well, we are in a different place than we were when we came in, so that's... something. It means we're lost, which makes it an adventure by default."
Though being lost in an unfamiliar desert can be a particularly dangerous and dull kind of adventure.
At least even in an endless landscape of dunes, there's the beauty of the starry sky to look upon...
And when Riley does just that, he startles and grabs Xander's shoulder.
"Holy shit, Xander, look!"
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
What a joke. Did he really think they were going to find some other world to run off to, somewhere out of Valmar's reach, and, what, actually have a chance? Well, no. That's what makes it so easy to doubt right now.
Xander sighs, brushing his hair from his eye. "I suppose after a fashion." He glances out over the landscape. "At least we know a little something of desert survival."
But his attention is seized, literally, by Riley. He looks first to Riley with a furrow of his brow before trying to follow his gaze to find out what exactly he's supposed to be looking at. "What are you --"
The words are stolen right from his mouth as he's left staring wide eyed up at the sky... and the bright blue star shining in it.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
"I think we might actually be on another world," Riley whispers, as if a louder voice might knock the marvelous blue and white marbled sphere from the sky and leave leave them back in the unknown Filgaian desert they thought they were in.
The hand on Xander's shoulder turns into holding him from behind as they both gaze up at it. "Are we looking at Filgaia right now...?"
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
Xander stares in silence, bringing his hand over Riley's arm and squeezing into it gently. His eye searches the sky.
"There's no moon," he says, matching Riley's whispered volume. He huffs a sound that's almost a laugh. It's not a new moon tonight, he knows that much.
But you can't see something in the sky you're standing on. And the rest of the sky, the angle of the stars one might use in navigation, everything, all of it, it's different.
"I..." He swallows. It feels so dangerous to dare think it. "I think... we are."
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Home is so... far away. Everything that ever happened to them -- all the terrible moments that made them who they are now -- all happened down there in some minuscule speck of that distant world.
Can Valmar still reach them here? Instinctively, Riley feels for his fangs with his tongue, finding the familiar prick of their points. So that hasn't changed. But... the punishments? The control? Could they be gone, or softened on this other world?
The hope is almost painful, but it flickers in his chest, regardless of whether he wants to encourage it or not.
"Do you want to start a new life here?" he asks. He means to make it lighthearted, a joke, but he's already imagining what it could be like if they could stop killing and live full lives. Could they atone? Could Xander heal? It could never be like it was, but wouldn't it be different if they weren't ripping the wounds open again and again? If they actually had a future?
What would it be like to have this whole nightmare just be... in the past?
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
"The moon," he says in awe, and this time he actually does laugh, unguarded and joyous. He's -- he's on the moon. With Riley. All the adventures he dreamed of having together and not once, never even once, did he fantasize about reaching an entirely different world together.
But here they are.
Xander flinches at the question. He shifts in Riley's arms, turning to look at him. Hesitation is plain on his face. His tongue presses to a sharp fang. It's not a dream, and it's still there. But what if the consequences can't reach them...?
His gaze locks on Riley, a glossy glimmer in his eye as the intoxication of false hope dares to take hold. Xander curls his fingers into Riley's vest.
"Can we?" he whispers, even quieter than before.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Xander's delighted laugh pierces right through to Riley's heart.
Xander is never like this anymore. Could he heal here? Could this be a second chance for them, as inexplicable and senseless as the first turn of luck that brought the Fangs into Riley's life in the first place?
What if it is over? And if the universe hasn't settled its mind yet on whether it is or it isn't, is there any way Riley can make it be over and protect Xander from having to lose that little flicker of happiness that's in him right now?
Can we?
"We can try," Riley offers, his own tone wavering between not wanting to make a false promise and being ready to fight fate if the opportunity presented itself.
Of course, fate didn't do this to Xander. Riley did. But if he could undo it...
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
Xander doesn't dare breathe for a moment, as if that alone might chase it all away. Like they might wake up. But deserts under the stars aren't where they go when they dream.
And maybe, strangely, that makes it more believable, more enticing, more hopeful. Not a blossom starving for lifeblood in sight. Dry, flowerless sand, a sky without a silver moon, and a distant blue star.
Hope overwhelms him. Xander takes hold of Riley and pulls him eagerly into a kiss, Xander's fingers weaving into his hair. The moment's so warm and light that he doesn't think twice of the flutter in his chest.
But it's not butterflies. It persists until Xander's chest convulses.
His eye shoots open. Xander shoves of off Riley, narrowly avoiding coughing on him and instead into his own hand. Pain rattles in his heart and lungs like a nest of thorns and he rasps for a breath, only to break into another fit, unable to stop the blood from seeping between his fingers.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
The hope is so fragile, and Riley feels like he's trying to make the possible future in his imagination real through a force of his own will. Xander is still filled with that rare light, that excitement, and pulls him into a kiss.
Riley doesn't want time to move. He doesn't want to be proven wrong, and he doesn't even need to be proven right if they can just hold onto this moment, where the possibility can exist--
But Xander pulls away, coughing. Riley tenses. Maybe it's nothing? Dust?
But then he sees the dark liquid dripping from his hand, and his heart drops.
He takes Xander gently by the shoulder, smoothing the other hand over his back. "Oh, Xander... are they in your chest?"
And it's all gone, just like that. A dream of hope and healing replaced by a particularly cruel manifestation of Valmar ringing the dinner bell.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
Xander looks to the blood in his hand and laughs again, if it could be called that. It's a broken, mirthless sound. An absolute fucking joke. Just what the hell was he thinking? How could even, for a second let himself believe that there were other options?
All the joy drains out of him, spoiled and poisoned by his own idiotic urge to hope. Xander bites down, hard and tense, trying to still his own quivering. Fear? Pain? Right now it feels like rage.
"It's fine," he hisses, jerking his shoulder to pull away. Xander forces down the rest of the metallic taste in his mouth. "Are they in your chest?" Feels like it, Xander thinks. Sprawling from his heart and digging into his lungs or whatever the fuck obnoxious, poetically appropriate thing they're doing right now.
"At least no one can see them there."
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Xander pushes him away, his bitter, guarded demeanor snapping into place so rapidly that it's hard to believe how happy and open he was just a moment ago. Riley's own chest squeezes, not with thorns but with sorrow and loss and disappointment and a visceral empathetic echo of the pain he imagines Xander must be feeling right now.
"That must really hurt. We should find someone..." He scans the horizon for some signs of life, a road or city lights.
Just a moment he was fantasizing about never doing this again and now he's ready to kill the first person they see....
But Xander was happy for a moment and now he has thorns in his lungs and maybe someone should die if the world is going to be like that.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
It already hurts all over again. Shoving and pulling away, like Xander wasn't being given the one thing thing that takes the edge off. He growls in his own frustration.
"... Yeah," he says, already resigned. This is just how it is. "It's going to start for you soon, too. If it hasn't already." He throws an accusatory glance toward Riley, half wondering if he might have felt it first and tried to hide it. But that anger's quick to fade, Xander already disgusted with himself. Even if he did, who could blame Riley for wanting to?
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
It's going to start for you soon, too. If it hasn't already.
"Yeah, probably," Riley responds, with an uneasy look. He wasn't hiding it, but he does take a moment to give himself a little mental scan for any sensations he might have been tuning out. Nothing so far...
"Let's explore a little, maybe we can find some signs of civilization or at least a good place to set up camp. But I want to get those out of you as soon as we can." That may mean if they set up camp he can keep looking while Xander rests... if Xander will cooperate with such a plan.
He starts out with Xander to begin exploring their surroundings -- it will at least give them a goal to distract them from how badly they played themselves with their false hopes.
It's only about five minutes into the search that Riley feels a sharp pricking on his neck, as if he was stung by an insect. A small flowerbud has emerged, with tendrils of stems trailing into his skin. He yelps in surprise and reflexively rips it free, flinging it aside. Blood wells from the spot where it grew.
"Ow--there it is!"
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
It's not always even between them, and Xander often wonders why. He's got weaker fortitude than Riley, he supposes -- he certainly proved that in the past -- but daily health can fluctuate, too. What he also hasn't figured out is whether it's better or worse to be the one stuck with anticipating the inevitable approaching.
Each breathe is claws in his lungs, and it reminds Xander a little too much of the way they manifested the first night he had them. The way hope died. The way everything crumbled. He can't -- he can't afford to break apart here, on a strange new world, leaving Riley alone with an empty shell as dead weight.
"I can manage," he insists, but he punctuates that with another bloody cough.
The placement of thorns makes it difficult to distract Xander for long, although he tries to shove it into the background noise that is his life. Riley does point out a desert plant Xander's never seen before, and Xander cuts off a sample to place in a vial. The forceful, pointed slice of his knife suggests he may be taking his anger out on the vegetation.
It's just as he caps off the vial that Riley winces, and Xander jerks up from where he is. "Riley --" Xander sighs and gets his kerchief, trying to gently press it to Riley's neck to slow the bleeding even though they both know how futile it is.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Xander was happy. Riley can't stop worrying that thought. Xander was happy and delighted to be here and now he's angry at this new world's plants.
But then there's his own manifestation of symptoms -- not as severe as Xander's, and it's good when they're uneven like this because then the one not getting hit as badly can take care of things for whoever's hurting more if it comes to that. It will only get worse from here, so Riley doesn't like things to be starting with bloody coughs.
"Looks like I'm getting off easy this time so far," he says with a shrug and an awkward smile as Xander tries to tend to the injury. "And we're still good on stealth as long as I can keep up with them. No scary bleeding eyes." He probably shouldn't tempt fate.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
Xander gives Riley a flat look precisely because he is tempting fate.
But he resumes carefully dabbing at the blood, despite his own reflexive tendency to pull away from such care. It feels so fucking helpless. There's only one way to fix it, and they both know it.
"Let me know if you need to borrow my mantle," he says. They don't tend to leave witnesses, but the less they show off their symptoms in general, the better, he thinks. It leaves a trail. They can't afford to be sloppy.
This new world, at least, is starting from zero on that front. Small mercies.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Riley will treasure the attention for its own sake even if the injuries caused by Valmar's curse do tend to be resistant to ordinary care. Especially after having his touch so recently rebuffed, even if he does his best not to take such moments personally (or perhaps to wave them off as well-deserved).
"Your mantle..." Riley gets a strange gleam in his eye as he pictures it. "Do you think I would look dark and mysterious?" Riley pretends to swish a miniature cape. Even in these terrible moments he literally cannot help himself from attempts at levity, it seems.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
Xander squints further. "No."
But the gleam is there and Xander sighs in exasperation. He unclasps his mantle and drapes it over Riley's neck and shoulders to help cover the wound. It's a little chilly, anyway. The cold might distract Xander from his other discomforts, but Riley...
It's another one of those moments Xander's trying to apologize without using his words.
<Pose Tracker> Riley Arwell has posed.
Xander dresses Riley in his mantle.
"I do feel a little more mysterious," Riley insists softly.
And then, becase he has a different perspective on how Xander might feel about the cold desert night, and because Xander's standoffishness often has something of a cooldown period, he tries to put an arm around Xander's shoulders to share a bit of his warmth as they walk.
<Pose Tracker> Xander Lovell has posed.
"...What you do normally is fine," Xander says, looking away.
He makes to continue on, knowing they're on borrowed time, and instead gets Riley's arm around him. Xander's whole body goes tense, and for a moment, it's hard to tell if that tension will spring back out against Riley.
Instead it fizzles out, like a fuse in the rain, and Xander leans into it. It's a little colder out than he thought it was.