awakenerd | Aurora - Rean Heart

You feel terrified, you fear being trapped in your own mind, you long for a solution without sacrifice, in the void there is nothing to do but get out get out get out get out GET OUT.

You float in a void--darkness around you, above, below, in every direction, nothing. You stand on nothing, you even breathe nothing. It presses in on you, it confines you, it enters your nose and mouth and pours and infects your blood, it fills your lungs, it suffocates you in nothing. It drowns your thoughts.

Who are you? What are you?

You are a curse.

You are a tool.

You are--

???

.........................

[THIS IS TERRIBLE WITH ZERO CONTEXT.]

[THIS IS TERRIBLE WITH CONTEXT, SO JUST EXTRA TERRIBLE.]

[His heart is racing, his breathing is heavy, and he's not fully sure he's choking on void, or his own breath because it's hard to focus on the panic that's trying to grip his heart.]

You're fine, this is fine, you can deal with this, just need to focus. Calm down, calm down, calm down and look for a solution, there might be one if you can just see-

[Except he can't see. It's all dark and it's hard to move, and it's like being locked in his armor and this is fine this is fine this if fine-]

[THIS ISN'T FINE-]

[The more you resist the more the darkness swallows you. The more you panic the more it clings.

Nothing is fine. You certainly aren't fine. You feel something burning in your veins, anger and malice and power. Like warfare and hate and violence distilled into an essence, a drug corrupting your soul.]

[Hatehatehate]

[Hates the Counselor, hates the Director, hates Temple, hates them trapping him, torturing for things that weren't his fault-]

[But the thing about his hate is its oddly stabilizing. Angry Agent Washington does not rage, he plans, cold and cruel, because when he hates, death is too simple an option.]

[He can't die. He WON'T die, he eon't give them the satisfaction-!]

[The more you rage and want to live the deeper the poison infects you... But now the darkness is taking shape, screams and the sounds of warfare, tanks, explosions, the stink of fire and metal.]

[Oh, he knows this. He knows this well, going on edge for another reason. Ready for a fight.]

[But the panic finally starts to lessen. He's not trapped, there's somewhere there and he's far more willing to go that way then stay here.]

You feel the battle in your blood--countless battles, wars, massacres, skirmishes, over years and decades and millennia, back through time, the wrongness in the hearts of others, it's in you--violence and battle and change and--

You open your eyes and it's around you, death, and fire, men and woman dead and dying around you as houses burn.

[...I mean, that's not new.]

[Just the amount of time, but violence and change and the wrongness of people is so very common-]

[He opens his eyes and he sees the disaster. His heart is still racing, panic still thrumming through his veins-]

[But people are in danger and this is a town, these are civilians and he's moving, running, ready to help who he can.]

There's a woman holding a child, huddling in a corner, terror in her eyes, pleading.

"Don't hurt us, please--"

There's soldiers coming. And you can probably save the woman and child but chances are the soldiers will see you.

[I will do the hula in front of the soldiers if that was necessary, and he isn't even sure if these soldiers could keep up with him in a fight.]

[Especially with a mother and child, WHY NOT ALL MY TRAUMA.]

Ma'am, we need to move now. Come with me, I can get you to safety.

[Though he will still go for the route that seems most likely to avoid soldiers because he wants THEM out of line of sight.]

She's uncertain but she follows you. You can dodge soldiers for a while but eventually, in the unfamiliar streets, you find yourself cornered, the woman and kid cowering behind you, soldiers in front advancing.

Four soldiers. Two people you're defending. They're raising their weapons, demanding you surrender.

[If he was alone, he'd fight. He's taken on worse than four, though he is taking a mental stock of what he has.]

[Are his gun, knives, and pendant still present?]

Well, that higly depends on you guys. [There is a cold, authorative edge to his tone, staying between the soldiers and the pair behind him.] If they go free out of this mess, I'll come quietly. If they don't, still pretty good odds I'll kill all four of you anyway. [Even without weapons.]

Edited 2020-02-08 16:55 (UTC)

You have all your stuff!

The soldiers are pretty young, but aren't most grunts? War eats the teenagers and young adults, after all.

One of them looks hesitant.

"All of you need to come with us."

Are they bad? They probably are just regular people following orders but who knows if those orders or the people giving them will let you or the two behind you live.

[They are young.]

[So were the New Republic soldiers and he killed them too.]

...considering the extent of damage to the town? I don't trust what's going to happen to them. Slavery, prisoners, execution, all thise are pretty likely when armed soldiers attack civilians.

Attacking civilians for orders doesn't make it right. You're making a choice, they aren't. So now you're making mine. Walk away or you're not going to walk anywhere.

They kind of look at each other but they have the guns and also their orders and you're just... Some guy?

"I said come along."

One of them is more aggressive, or it might be bravado.

[He sighs.] Stay behind the light, ma'am.

[And throwing up a barrier in front of the mother and child as he pulls out a knife, throwing it to bury it in mister bravado's knee as he rushes forward, ducking low to get ready to dodge a shot. Super soldier enhanced speed is your friend.]

Edited 2020-02-08 18:09 (UTC)

Honestly you're twenty times more than a match for these kids. How do you deal with them?

[Well, if he's that much better, he'll focus more on disarming them of guns and then kneecapping them with one of the guns. If they don't become a serious threat, he sees no need to kill them.]

[But he's gonna make sure they remember this and hopefully rethink their life choices.]

They scream a lot in pain but you disarm them without fatalities.

From behind you a deep and pleasant man's voice says:

"How interesting."

[DON'T LIKE BEHIND.]

[Retrieveing his knife from the knee and turning quickly, already focusing in the back of his mind to switch the pendant's power. What's the status of woman and child?]

They're... gone.

Standing behind you is a man.

"To be perfectly honest... I expected you to kill those men."

They were kids. And not enough of a threat for their dumbass decisions.

Where's the woman and kid?

He shrugs.

"Where are those men you subdued?"

They're gone. The blood remains though. On the ground and on your knife. The distant sounds of fighting have gone quiet. It's just you and this man in the silence and smell of smoke.

....

[Its like showing up at Iota's place all over again.]

Goddamn magic bullshit.

His chuckle is deep and warm.

"That is a way of putting it. But you have made choices, and even if, in a fashion, those you saved and those you spared were not, strictly, real, your choices have real effects."

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