this old place again

[Gallows]

Visiting this place is like an extreme version of deja vu. Look, there's the pining, lovelorn mare who just wants someone to mend her poor wittle broken heart. There's the badass stallion who's gotta claim 'em all. Add a dash of darkly evil bitch and a sprinkle of orphaned foal, and ta da! The Meadow, in all her glory. And what is that delicious aroma? Ah yes, it smells like sweat, sex and piss. And yet, the foul wench has stolen my heart. It probably has to do with this being the biggest stage in Beqanna. Anything and everything can happen here. It's hot. There's no point in describing it because it's too hot, and I'm just plain grumpy about it. I make an extremely graceful landing, tuck up my wings and make a reluctant trot towards a brook I know is around here somewhere. Probably complete with a copse of trees and a mourning lover, if I'm exceedingly lucky. Ah, there it is. I splash into the shallow water, enjoying the feeling of the ripples as they tug at my legs. Oh summer, you foul bitch. I really, really, really do hate you. I glance absently into the water. Not bad for someone who has seen more years than she has feathers on her wings. It's faded from sun, and graying in some places, but my coat is still a reddish sheen. I'm average looking, in both height and features. I've never been able to claim anything more than that but it doesn't bother me. If I was in it for the looks, I certainly wouldn't have shacked up with Carnage. Have you seen him? I think he may be more wasted flesh than actual stallion at this point. Ah, a girl's first. You never forget him. Anyways, where was I? Ah yes, pretending to reminisce and hoping that the Meadow will reward me yet again with an encounter of the strange kind. I haven't been disappointed yet. G A L L O W S We must all hang together or, assuredly, we shall all hang separately.

[sleaze]

I’ll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife He is a man torn asunder. There was a world, he thinks. A strange and terrible world but it exists as ghosts do, shadows at the periphery of vision. He can’t look far, it’s too dark, a purple so dark it’s nearly black. (Just like him. He is the purple. The purple is him.) Those lives exist, perched; they skitter out in dreams and nightmares and parade the events that happened. (That could not possibly have happened. There was no girl.) There are multiple lives echoing like heartbeats through his body, and worse – worse is, he loses his mind. We mean this quite literally – it slips away, a new power, slips into trees and rocks and rivers and sometimes other animals. It touched a wolf, once; head thrown back mid-howl and the blood-hunger grew strong inside him, the air rich with meat-scents. It touched an old oak and he stretched his branches up to drink down the sun. Once there was a boy who prayed. Once there was a boy who knelt in the grass til his knees wore bare. Who let his father lay a forlorn head across his withers, thinking, this is love, this is love. But the father had left and while the boy had kept his prayers, it set in motion the return to Beqanna. It set in motion the toybox memories, the purpling of his thoughts, the mind that skitters from place to place and is no longer entirely his. He is a man torn asunder and he is not suitable for company but he sees her, the bay winged mare. His mind scampers out, touches her, but recoils as if slapped after a second. It returns to him with only a sense of years lived and he realizes she is old, though her body does not betray it. “Hello,” he ventures, unsure what to say next. He was never good at small talk even when he was not a man torn asunder, it’s a thousand times worse now, a million. “My name is Sleaze.” Like she cares, or needs to know. sleaze cancer x garbage

(so sleaze was in a quest where he basically was turned into a toy horse where he met all sorts of gruesome fates and his mind has mostly blocked it out but there's some major PTSD. also! from the quest he has possession but he has like zero control of it. i know i didn't mention him in plots but his trauma plus her mind reading seems like it could be hilarious)

[Gallows]

Oh. My. God. (Whoops, that was a bit valley girl, even for me) You've got to be kidding me. This is probably the best conversation I'm about to have ever. It's like being on a three way call. And two of the three people are completely out of their mind. Okay, maybe all three. How am I supposed to judge who is sane anymore? I've seen way too many wierd things in my life not to appreciate them. Most people spend their life trying to avoid the abnormal, but I actively look for the odd. I'm not normal. Define normal for me, and you'll discover you aren't that either. Listening to the pace of his thoughts is like tuning into the in between of two radio stations. I can hear him before he's fully stopped nearby, and I twitch an ear like a fly is buzzing around. Most people have some control over their thoughts. Your brain is like a box that you can shut or close away the things you want to hide, even from yourself. Of course, I just so happen to have the lock to every box, but I still have to use it. This one, Sleaze, his mind is more like a sieve. He may have tried to lock things away, but only part of his brain is fooled. The rest is… leaking. Images flash before my eyes. Wolves with a howl so terrifying I stiffen, trees that tower, whispered and then shouted words. I recoil mentally, and hope I haven't stunned the stallion with the force with which my mind recedes from his. I look at him, and speak dryly, "You're either on something, or you need to be on something." Slowly, like tiptoeing into a cold pool, I file back into his mind. There are remnants of so many lives lived here. I can't tell if he even knows how deeply the damage goes. There's something else, too… possession? He seriously has possession? Oh man, that's got to make life interesting. I grin darkly. "I'm Gallows. And I'm pretty sure it's completely my pleasure to meet you." G A L L O W S We must all hang together or, assuredly, we shall all hang separately.

ooc: I love it. SO much. Do whatever you want. ;-)

[sleaze]

I’ll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife He tries not to sleep because in sleep the purple recedes, bleeds into dreams. In sleep the images come: the clown with the Glasgow smile, the tiger with no face, the name carved in his stomach. The thought, so assured, like a mantra, a heartbeat: she loves us. She loves us. She loves us. He wakes and thinks, torn: there was a girl. He wakes and thinks, torn: there was no girl. There was no fire, no name writ across his stomach, no water filling his body, drowning. The lack of sleep further lessens his control over his mind, and it ricochets, unsteady, visits animals and plants and other horses. From her, he sees a valley, a kingdom ruled. But then there is a new sensation: his own mind, being touched. Does she see the purple? Does she see beyond? “I’m…” he begins to respond to her question but truth is, he doesn’t know. He wishes there was a drug to explain it away, “I don’t know what happened. What is happening.” “My name is Sleaze,” he says. The name is his. Behind the purple, in unplumbed depths of his mind, chime other voices from other worlds: I am Cloud. I am Velvet. I am. I am. I am. sleaze cancer x garbage

[Gallows]

His mind is overwhelming. It's like dropping a full vial of potent perfume and being asked to pick out the individual strains. No, I don't smell lavender with a drop of baby's breath. I smell everything and nothing at once. My mind rebels and then tiptoes forth, a bit at a time. I know his name, but I pretend I don't. It's just polite and I am fucking polite when I want to be. And it also seems like it takes a lot of effort for him to even pull his name out of the sludge of his brain, and who am I to destroy that kind of achievement? "You do realize that part of your brain thinks you're a child's plaything, right?" Well, believes it, to be more accurate. What I can't tell, because I can only see what one's mind sees, is if what happened to Sleaze is truth or fiction. Post traumatic stress disorder is a funny thing. He's not the first I've read with it, but he is the most damaged by it. Honestly, in this land, nothing much would surprise me. I heard there was a dinosaur roaming about somewhere. Roar. I cock my head, listening. For a moment he and I are experiencing his thoughts in tandem. "Also, apparently you are a cloud and a piece of velvet. Any idea why?" G A L L O W S We must all hang together or, assuredly, we shall all hang separately.

[sleaze]

I’ll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies tell you my sins so you can sharpen your knife She’d been less a child and more a god: cupped in her hands, carved with her name. There had been a sense of worship, too, among them, the mantras, the words like a prayer. A reverence even as he was taken apart piece of piece. “I was not,” he says, but the words are weak. Still, he pretends he can lie, pretends he can convince her otherwise. Girl or god, whatever she’d been, in the end he thinks he fire had taken her, too. Still, he can deny this, to her and to himself. He hadn’t conceptualized her as a child, hadn’t had the words or knowledge for it. He can lie. He can pretend. There was no girl. But the other names – they drift from her lips, they drift from the purple. They were his names, his selves, made for the girl. The girls. (There had been two. One cruel and one kind and he had loved them both.) “They were…” he says, and the purple trembles, the memories clamoring to shout their name. Their names, his names. Whoever he was. Is. “They were names.” A pause, a moment to stare at her, a caged animal, eyes too-wide. “They were my names. I think.” sleaze cancer x garbage

[Gallows]

Who did this to him? I don't know whether to construct a rosary or award a medal. There is some grade A mental shit plaguing this momentary companion of mine. My voice is gentle, much gentler than I knew it could be. "You were. There's no use in denying it, darling. It's incredibly fucked up, your mind, but it hasn't broken completely yet." Names, hm? He had several, but then, he wouldn't be the first. My name has always been apt but not everyone has been so lucky. Phases of life can change more than who we are. I move closer, my head snaking forward and nudging him gently on the shoulder. He reminds me of Nyx in this moment. Broken and seeking but full of danger because he is unknown. "Sleaze. That's your name now, whatever it was before. Tell me about the girl, and the ones you loved." A mixture of curiosity and sadism war within me. I want to hear this tale. I want to unravel the twisted turns of a unique mind. You would be surprised to know that after the first hundred minds you have read, they start to blend together. Very little is truly unique. And this one, this stallion with the broken head and heart, is. G A L L O W S We must all hang together or, assuredly, we shall all hang separately.

ooc: Feel free to use his possession if you like. ;-) And I'm sorry that took a bit! I could have sworn I'd responded but brains did not function correctly.