feed the fire and burn it slow; laura pony

[garbage]

Alive? he might be dead for aught I know,  With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain,  And eyes squeezed shut ‘neath rusty mane; He’s said it before, but – he was never supposed to return. His world had a hard stop, walking into the ocean, following her to the depths. The completion of an overlong life, and a welcome one. He had not struggled when he sank. He had struggled when he woke on the same shores he’d died on, in a new-but-same body, with a head full of blurred memories and wet, orange eyes looking out at a world he should never have seen again.   He’s come to terms with it, more or less, but it doesn’t mean he’s particularly happy. Perhaps that’s why he hasn’t sought solace in one of safe havens. He doesn’t seek death, but he doesn’t run from it, either. He moves in the forest, seeking nothing in particular. It still feels odd to him, at times, this new body – as his memories returned (not all of them – there are names on the tip of his tongue, faces that are blurry, indistinct) he recalled the aches and pains of his old age, how he’d been gaunt with flecks of gray in his black coat. It had hurt to move faster than a walk, and even walking had hurt, if it was damp, or about to rain. This new body, though, is that of a young man – he is sleek black again, unscarred. No gray yet mars his muzzle, the only color on him is the jack-lantern glow of his eyes. The air is cold, but his bones don’t ache. He’s almost healthy, in body if not in spirit.   Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe;  I never saw a brute I hated so;  He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

[sochi]

there are wolves in my head and their howling
there was a garden of evil in the palm of my hand

She has not died, but she has breathed it deep into her lungs.

She has felt it flood through her, the infection and rot of it sinking deep. She has fallen beneath the muck of it—and it has changed her. It has morphed her. The pressure of it has hardened her, shaped her, turned her into something she was not before. In the time before Carnage—before he took and took and took—she was a simple girl with an animalistic hunger for the world. She was ashamed of the darkness that clawed in her throat and the greedy want that spread through her, that turned her into something new.

She is not afraid any longer.

She is not ashamed.

The disease has begun to peel from her, like old bark from an old tree, and it reveals something fresh beneath it. She is stronger in the aftermath. Her silver eyes grow bright, her coat regains its sheen, her muscles come back to leave her strong and lithe. The scars remain, the crimson tiger slashes raked across her chest—a stark difference against the obsidian of her coat and a reminder of how far she was willing to go to survive. How much she was willing to sacrifice to see things through.

She is not ashamed of her scars either.

For a while, her belly had grown swollen with child, but she has since breathed life into her dragon girl’s lungs, and she is grateful for it. She leaves Reia today in a safe place, turning from her and slipping into her tigress form. Hooves bleed to heavy paws, the onyx of her melting into jagged lines across a coat of cream and orange. She lifts her feline head and breathes in deep, the land morphing into something entirely when she gives into her predatory senses. It is no longer the same. She is no longer the same.

She moves quickly through the shadows, stronger now than ever before, and the darkness slips from her as she begins her hunt—searching for something she is not sure she will find.

That is until she finds him.

He is not prey but she is intrigued and she is willing to ignore the biting hunger in her stomach to approach him, her steps mostly muffled. When she emerges from the shadows, her eyes sharp and yellow, she growls low in her throat. For a moment she considers pouncing. Considers what he will feel like breaking apart before her, but she refrains for now, instead discarding the tigress body as easily as she had put it on. She morphs before him, turning equine once more, the glowing sheen of her blaze faint.

She thinks of speaking but instead says nothing.

She no longer feels obligated to do anything.

now I'm broken and bleeding, I’ll never find my way

S

OCHI

stranger in this land

@[garbage]

[garbage]

Alive? he might be dead for aught I know, With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain, And eyes squeezed shut ‘neath rusty mane; He had scars, once, a slew of them he thinks he can sometimes feel. But when he goes to touch them he feels only his coat, slick and glossy. The scars are memories, too, gone in his new body, and it feels strange, to live without them. This body has not been kissing distance from death, like the old one. This body has not killed, either. It’s only the memories of both, haunting. Scars of another sort. He sees the glimpse of orange in the corner of his eye, and before his mind even registers the creature his body has gone tense, on high alert, a thousand years of instinct crying out that a predator is in his midst. He whirls, wild-eyed, ready to run, when the tiger begins to change, form shifting, no longer feline but equine, and then before him stands a smoky black mare. His heart’s still pounding, trying to accept the change. He manages a shaky exhale, wanting to laugh at himself, but also feeling a strange relief that some semblance of survival instinct remains in him. The instinct hasn’t gone so far as to keep him from wandering infected lands, but never mind that. He manages a smile to the mare, the smile weak and watery, but there nonetheless. “You startled me,” he says, and laughs, then, “hello.” Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe; I never saw a brute I hated so; He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

[sochi]

there are wolves in my head and their howling
there was a garden of evil in the palm of my hand

Once, his admission may have driven forth an apology from her lips, may have flooded her with guilt. The teachings of her mother, well-intentioned and rooted in love, still ring and echo in her ears, reminding her always about how horses will not like having her nearby when she is in her feline form; how she will frighten them. Things that morphed into her mind to mean she will not be loved as she is. That she will always be different, always other. Something that cements her defiance to such things now.

She lifts her chin, silver eyes nearly molten as she studies his face.

“You should learn to not frighten as easily,” she finally says, her voice even. She wonders at the fact that she does not feel guilt now saying into his orange eyes, does not feel the least bit sorry for startling him. Instead there is a hunger that growls low and deep in her, something that reminds her that she is meant to feast on those weak enough to startle at the mere sight of her. She is a predator, after all.

She takes another step forward, her gaze unabashed and unwavering. “What is your name?” Her voice is feminine but deep, smooth and even on the edges with a husk that almost makes it masculine. It rolls like smoke in her mouth, low as it floods between them. “What brings you here to the forest?”

Questions she pushes into him without offering any answer of her own.

now I'm broken and bleeding, I’ll never find my way

S

OCHI

stranger in this land

[garbage]

Alive? he might be dead for aught I know, With that red gaunt and colloped neck a-strain, And eyes squeezed shut ‘neath rusty mane; She is a predator, and he is prey, no doubt – not only because of nature’s laws, but because he exudes a sort of weakness, it seems. He is easy pickings, low-hanging fruit, a man desperate and strange and returned from the dead, too full of hazy memories and aching desires to be of much use. Maybe he was a predator, once – he’s a killer, sure enough, his body may be new but there’s still blood on his hands. (Those memories are faint and indistinct, and he is grateful for that small mercy – that he does not have to recall with any degree of vividness what it was like.) So he is small because her unwavering gaze. He is not frightened, not exactly – with the fleeting insight of instinct gone, he is like with his conscious mind, and his conscious mind is much less devoted to keeping him alive – but he is cautious. “My name is Garbage,” he tells her, “what’s yours?” He’s barely finished his question before she fires off another, which he answers. Compliant in all things. “I lack a true home,” he says, “so I wander.” He’s never found true solace in any one place (save, maybe, for the depths of the ocean, in those final heaving moments), and thus, he keeps searching. Seldom went such grotesqueness with such woe; I never saw a brute I hated so; He must be wicked to deserve such pain.

[sochi]

there are wolves in my head and their howling
there was a garden of evil in the palm of my hand

Perhaps his honesty pleases her. Perhaps she simply finds that he is not interesting prey, something about him too compliant, not frightful enough—at once responding to the flash of teeth and leaning into it. Regardless, she calms slightly, the hunger roiling in her belly turning to just a murmur, the yipping of her predatory mind quieting so that she can focus on her molten eyes on him, somber and still.

“Sochi,” she answers, surprising herself with her readiness to share her name—a name given to her by a mother she has not seen in ages, a mother who knew her as something different entirely. Perhaps she should rename herself. Perhaps she should take up a new moniker—something with which to mark the changing of the tide in her life, the closing of a chapter and the opening of a new door.

But, unsentimental as she is, she does feel some pull to her name, and she holds it close, letting the syllables of it ring in her mind as a reminder of a youth so unencumbered by the weight of today.

As he explains his lack of home, she nods again, something almost maternal striking her, a confusing feeling that she assumes must be misfiring hormones from the recent birth of her daughter. “Sometimes a home is vastly overrated,” her voice is still clipped, the huskiness of it steely, but the words are a kindness that she offers in the only way that she knows how. “It can be a crutch, a shield, an identity when you lack your own.” She rolls her shoulders, uncomfortable with the sharing of her thoughts with him.

“Or perhaps you are simply too weak to survive in a place for long. Who am I to know?”

Her silver gaze slides to the side, a muscle jumping in her jaw before they come back to rest on him.

The bitterness of the last sentence doesn’t still well in her stomach and she rolls her shoulders.

“I don’t have a home either. I haven’t for a long time.”

now I'm broken and bleeding, I’ll never find my way

S

OCHI

stranger in this land