won't you take your time on me; Tenebris

[Cagney]

there's an ocean inside my head; waves that don't ever rest

won't you take your time on me? 'cause we got nowhere else to be

Despite the reformation of lands around Beqanna, some things have not changed, and this is one of those places. The bay roan stallion steps from the embrace of the forest into the sunlit meadow and lifts his head to the sky, letting the sunshine wash across and warm his dark hide, soaking in the first fingers of spring warmth. After a moment he lowers his eyes to the Meadow itself, and takes a quick survey of those available to be approached. Mentally he eliminates groups entirely, because he’s not sure he’s ready for that sort of concentrated social interaction.

(Maybe not ready for any interaction, but this is what father has requested of him. He will not fail again so soon.)

His eyes settle on a painted stallion standing alone not terribly far away, and he strikes out in that direction, keeping his dark brown eyes focused on his quarry though he takes a round-about path across the Meadow, steeling himself for the moment when they will intersect paths. Or, rather, when Cagney will get close enough to the stranger that he has to give up his pretense of wandering, since the other stallion isn’t moving.

That moment comes sooner than perhaps he’d hoped, time marching steadily on without his interference, and so the boy clears his throat as he walks up to the other, not making any attempt to hush his approach – it’s bad enough to actually approach a stranger by himself, he’s not going to deal with having surprised them as well. “Hello,” he offers, tentative, and attempts to stretch a smile across his lips to go with the words.

(He fails. He has nothing to smile about anyway.)

“I’m Cagney,” he adds after a moment. Could you be any more awkward? he wants to ask himself, trying to cover a wince.

CAGNEY

master of time

@[Tenebris]/@[Elise]

[Tenebris]

It doesn't matter what I do. It all remains the same.

It didn't matter anymore. Nothing mattered after the island. No matter how hard he had tried to find meaning in the now colorless life he had been thrust into... he found nothing. All was gone. All the beautiful images so painstakingly painted by the gods had been ripped from his absent view. The painted stallion no longer got to witness the sunrise in its holy glory, the stars in their twinkling mantras, the mountains robed in purples and green. In their place lay a mismatched swathe of colors painted on the back of his ever closed lids. They were ugly and misshapen, no longer a beautiful reminder that he was alive and blessed with air in his lungs. No, instead they were a horrific reminder of what had been done to him. Of who had done this to him.  

Each day was begun with the same aimless wanderings of the previous sunrise and ended with the same restless sleep of the previous nightfall. Every day the stallion wished he had paid more attention to his surroundings when he COULD see. Maybe it would have helped him when he ran into things or got lost. It was many months into his blindness before he found the meadow. (He only knew it was such from the new smells and quiet chattering of pleasantries thrown across the expanse. That and he had asked the first equine he had stumbled upon). As soon as he arrived he never left. Though he would never admit it aloud, he was weak now. He had been dropped into a cage filled with thorns that he could not see. Best not to move then, right? The meadow was always lively and scarcely vacant, so, therefore, he was safer here than say the forest or the river. 

The day Cagney so chose to stumble upon our dear Tenebris was a bad one. It was a day he cursed the island and all its inhabitants for wronging him like this. What had he done to deserve this? Was a mantra that he thought often. A broken record stuck on repeat in the overactive mind he possessed. It is playing as the man approaches (loudly at that) and as he speaks the milky gaze of the star painted stallion stays trained forward, lost in its aimlessness. The stranger's voice (he introduces himself as Cagney, a nice enough name) does not seem cruel or hint at any intentions other than a nice chat. So Tenebris clears his throat and readies himself to speak.

"Hello Cagney, I am Tenebris." He vocalizes with what he hoped wasn't a manic grin (if he could see it he would know it was actually quite pleasant looking, almost sad). Suddenly he hoped the stallion was looking at him, maybe his new company thought him rude if their eyes weren't meeting? By gods was Cagney even addressing him.

"You'll have to excuse me, I can not see you." He adds with a sigh, his sightless eyes roaming in their socketts.

T E N E B R I S

OOC: I hope this didnt ramble to badly and that it made sense kind of.

[Cagney]

there's an ocean inside my head; waves that don't ever rest

won't you take your time on me? 'cause we got nowhere else to be

The stallion he has chosen to approach doesn’t jump as if startled, and he even smiles as he offers a response to the roan’s greeting – and Cagney considers that a great success. He’s always been shy, even before everything else that had happened, so social interactions have been fraught with uncertainty – what do I say, how do I act? – and the success makes him a little bolder. And then surprised – because he hadn’t even noticed that the other stallion was blind.

(This is why he’s been hiding by himself for all these years. How stupid can he be?)

There’s nothing to say about that, I mean, he can’t exactly apologize. It’s not his fault the stranger is blind, even though he is sorry for it. But he also can’t say nothing (which is his default mode) because Tenebris certainly isn’t going to be able to read his facial expressions and body language like he usually relies on. “Oh, um, that’s ok. I’m just in front of you, and a little to your left…not wait, that’s my left.” He chuckles nervously at himself, “It’s your right.” This time when he smiles and Tenebris can’t see it, it’s a self-deprecating smile if ever there was one. Cagney will never be the sibling who turns into a mini-me of his father, because he’ll never have half the gumption Brennen does; it’s hard for him to see past his own limitations.

They share a darkness in their history, though of course they’d have to have a pretty in-depth conversation to find that out, and that would require Cagney to open up about his past. About the things he had done, or at least witnessed. About the monster he had saved.

(But oh, how he loved her. Even now, he loves the memory of her.)

“So, ah…where are you from? Do you live here?” It skirts around the real question in Cagney’s mind – because despite his lack of suaveness, he at least knows it would be exceedingly rude to ask why the dude’s blind.

CAGNEY

master of time

it made perfect sense <3 Cagney is super rusty for me, so bear with me as well while I try to get back into the swing of him!