[open] Haunted by what he knows he can't do.

[spirit]

i was alone, falling free, trying my best not to forget.

He has lost all or what little he has held precious in this world, he supposes. Maybe his father was right when he said something in their blood was simply cursed. Maybe they were each just born under a bad moon. He doesn’t allow himself to dwell on these theories, lest they spin him into some infinite sorrow as they had for Risk. So he leaves the collected corpses of his dear family and he travels to the forest.

Outside of Hyaline, no one knows his name or his story and he likes to keep it that way. Really, no one in Hyaline knows these either, but he won’t take the gamble. He can rest assured that he is simply some handsome stranger here between the old towering trees. Spirit comes to rest his shoulder against the gnarled bark of a middle-aged maple as he observes those around him. Some are newborn children who have not grown into their legs while others seem to be parents fussing over their firstborns.

Before he knows it, a smile makes its way across his lips and he remembers Sochi teaching him to pounce as a child. He’d bundled his small legs under him and hardly covered much ground at all. Still, she told him he was a remarkable hunter and spoiled him with the best morsels of her kills. Then Breach was born and he thought they would never be apart, two little cubs gnawing each other’s ears and giving their father all kinds of new fears.

These memories should fill him with a sharp knife of agony that twists between his ribs, but he can only laugh.

[Sabal]

s a b a l . She wanted to get away. Needed to. She had tried so hard to hold it all together, but she had finally found her breaking point. The darkness, her failure at returning the light, birthing a son, the attack on Maze and her utter failure at protecting her friend and her home. It was the repeated string of failures that had really set her off, she supposed. So, here she was.  It was unlike her, to be so far from the water and to have shed her aquatic form. But for the first time in her life, the water felt like a prison and not like a respite. The cool touch of the river or the ocean was not a comfort, but a reminder of her failures. And so she had climbed from the riverbank and thrown herself into the arms of the forest – trying to reach a place where she couldn’t hear the gentle caress of water over rocks. She doesn’t have a name for this feeling, but it makes her want to be reckless. Sabal is many things, foolish maybe, but reckless? This is new.  So she tries to break into a run, weaving through the closely knit trees that threaten to leave bruises on her scaled skin or delicate fin-like wings. It feels like she’s running from something, but there’s certainly nothing chasing her. Not today, at least. So when she nearly barrels into something – or someone – she stumbles and slows for the first time.  She turns immediately, already knowing that she has like totally fucked up. Like what kind of psycho goes running through the woods like they’re being chased for shits and gigs?  Apparently her. She looks up at the stranger sheepishly, “I’m sorry. I’m – I don’t know what’s wrong with me today.” Because the short answer was honestly literally everything. But nice to meet you too, stranger!

@[spirit] meet an unhinged, slightly traumatized sabal.

[spirit]

i was alone, falling free, trying my best not to forget.

When your heart has broken a hundred different ways, you learn to spot the same sort of ache in others. Spirit realizes this when a girl comes crashing into him and sends him stumbling to regain his balance. He opens his mouth to ask just what on earth she was doing, but those eyes are troubled waves just looking for the storm to finally break. Slowly, he sighs. Don’t get involved, don’t get dragged into more despair, he tells himself.

And a part of him almost reaches down into his core to change into smoke again.
But he is just as alone, just as lost, and so he takes a step closer instead.

“It’s alright. There are far worse tragedies in the world than being bumped into,” he assures her with a gentle smile. “Are you hurt at all? I’m no healer, but I know a place.”

His eyes travel the landscape of her body without perversion, only honest concern as he searches for wounds. He pauses briefly to admire the shade of pink that blushes her nose and the particular shade of blue in her eyes, but he says nothing of it. Instead, he shifts his weight and repositions himself to lean once more against his tree.

“Can I know the name of the girl who crashed into me, for when I tell this story later?”

@Sabal