01-23-2016, 05:15 PM
(This post was last modified: 01-24-2016, 06:51 PM by Xero.)
Oh, it's in my roots—in my veins.
It's in my blood and I stain every heart that I use to heal the pain It was somewhat disconcerting to be back in the land of Beqanna once more.
Everything here was lively and moving forwards. Vastly different from the space where Momma Sol had taken her. It had been stale and stagnant, no changes to their environment whatsoever. It was a space just for the two of them; the passing of time was of no consequence within their little bubble.
But Xero had decided that it was time to move on with her life.
She was the daughter of the both the sun and the moon – a child born of the jungle. But she could not return back to her home. The moon still lingered painfully within that shadow and sunlight world. Momma Sol had not yet left their space and her family was otherwise scattered to the wind. The jungle was empty without those who grounded her and the decision to move on cut straight through her still fragile heart. She was truly determined to try and put the loss of the moon firmly behind her. It was time she finally lived for herself instead of just solely for her family.
But for the first time in her young life, she was truly alone.
And it hurt.
Xero stood quietly amongst the other field-dwellers and actively watched the interactions of those who approached the homeless. It was interesting to her that all it took for such a momentous decision was some small talk and a positive first impression and soon the homeless ones were happy to follow. She continued to watch the others around her with both trepidation and curiosity.
She hoped she didn’t appear too pitiful or lost to anyone.
She felt like everything was out of her control. Xero Nocturnal x Quark
The grand highway
is crowded w/ lovers & searchers
& leavers so eager to please & forget.
Grains of sticky, wet sand. And darkness, deep and blue, as night rolled in overhead. Waves. Not hard and crashing, but softly pulling at and worrying the shoreline; the shiver of that second, unsteady moon on the black water.
Stillness, the likes of which he could not have possibly understood at the time.
That is what he remembers of his own mother.
Those few kin stalking Beqanna would agree he had been the lucky one. Lucky to be last, and lucky to have been spared her hand. He had met Pollock a few times, a husk of anger and bitterness. Epharim—somehow his damage was even more extensive. The blue stallion had always imagined that was because he had been the golden woman’s first.
Untried, there was more room for mistake.
They are the vestiges of a cruel rift in time—Epahrim, Birkenau, Warring, Pheper, Pollock.
He is weighted down by nothing; he has none of that clenching anxiety, unhindered by the vice grip of her caustic haunting. He was moved and shaped by other things. By the whisper in his ear that night, ‘be grateful, kid’; the heat of breath on his neck without a body to fit it to. By the mare that found him and dusted him off and kept him in her quiet, sad company. By the sureness in himself that his siblings had never been afforded.
The difference, in the end, between him and some of his siblings—there is subtlety in the quirk of his lips. A heavy chain tethering the discord humming in his chest to something comparable to civility. Whole and safe, he is what they could have been. What they never will be.
He could never manage to muster any sympathy.
They have nursed themselves on their own madness or self-hate or sexuality.
Baby brother can do nothing for them.
Whether or not she feels pitiful, or lost, is irrelevant. To him, anyway. He can hear her uncertainty in his mind as his black eyes find her in the squall of bodies. He moves to her without a cursory glance elsewhere. He has found his mark. And without her consent, a chink in her armour.
He means not to wound her with his ill-begotten knowledge, but it would be a lie to say he had never used his ability to his advantage.
“Hello,” his voice is deep and graveled, but he softens it. Makes it welcoming. “You look like you could use some company,” he grins, cocked and deep blue, “I'm Chessur.”
CHESSUR
Trashlip and Phina's
BASE BY BRONZEHALO
Oh, it's in my roots—in my veins.
It's in my blood and I stain every heart that I use to heal the pain One could say that her childhood had been vastly different in comparison. She was one of the oldest children, the eldest girl in their family of sunshine and moonlight. But perhaps she could claim the honor of having been raised within the happiest of times. Gendry had been kidnapped before her. But all was calm within the jungle’s embrace during her time of birth. She had been coddled and prone to exploring throughout her vibrant home beneath the watchful, loving eyes of her parents. But as her family continued to fall apart, her younger siblings did not have the chance to experience that time of bliss that she treasured from so long along.
The fairytale beginning never stayed wonderful for long.
There was always some darkness to come along and ruin one’s happiness.
Momma Luna was gone from this world by her own hand and Momma Sol remained just out of reach with her withdrawn grief. Xero greatly missed her brothers and her little sisters. No one remained within her grasp. She had always been there to help care and watch out for her younger siblings, but now she didn’t have even that to help keep her grounded. Of course, children grew up and flew out of the coop. It was inevitable. Still, she wished that even one of her siblings remained behind to help her pick up the pieces.
Honey brown eyes catch sight of a flashy-looking man making his way towards her. His blue color is quite striking, but Xero was quite familiar with color. Her family was vibrant to begin with (just like the yellow inherited from Momma Sol that colored her forelock) and she had witnessed many interesting shapeshifting throughout her time with them. She was quite unfazed by the unusual by now as it seemed to be the norm within her family.
He is steadfast and confident in his approach, no distractions in his gaze, something to be admired. Her nervousness rises up once again in anticipation of what has to come. Here was what she had been observing all this time. This was where she was going to be making a decision that was going to affect the rest of her life – the jungle was no longer to be her designated home.
She offers him a small smile, a pale reflection compared to her normal warm self.
“ Do I really appear to be so lonely?”
Of course, the truth was that she was alone. The support had been dropped from beneath her feet and she was left flailing on paper-thin wings. It was a struggle to breathe in such a high atmosphere and the panic sometimes overtook her during the long fall.
She was ready for the fall to end and she would land back on solid ground once again.
“ I’m Xero.” Xero Nocturnal x Quark
The grand highway
is crowded w/ lovers & searchers
& leavers so eager to please & forget.
“Doesn’t everyone here appear a bit lonely?”
Maybe not. Not the bodies joined in hushed and close conversation—or those engaged in posturing, like birds bristling out their colourful feathers, their counterparts inspecting the quality of the shades.
Not compared to her own demure seclusion away from the throng. But he feels the need to gentle the moment, having done enough already by revealing her own fears on his tongue. A weakness of his, that clinging tendency towards a sly kind of meanness.
It does not shake easy.
Besides, he knows there can be loneliness even in these playacts.
“There’s nothing wrong with looking lonely, anyway.” Not as far as he is concerned. But then, her early fairytale had been foiled by his own utterly unromantic childhood.
Whether that golden mare could, or would not, talk, he does not know to this day.
Her strange, soft mind-voice, with its usual inflections, had been a poor substitute. She hadn’t thought in full sentences, and he could never communicate to her that they could talk to each other that way, if only she could find some clarity.
So he grew up around a lattice of silence and solitude, always getting the sense from her body, and confusion of thoughts, that she wanted to keep him at arm’s length. Protecting herself from something. From him?
In retrospect, he understands. But at the time, it had only served to fortify himself—a fortress of iron bones and blue stone.
“Besides, by definition, you don’t look it anymore,” he could not make her feel any less remote from the things that once steadied her.
He would if he could, probably. He has never been one to find pleasure in misery.
He has felt pity for horses far less deserving of it than she.
“Xero,” he glances at the bright hair against her dark forehead. He is used to paleness. Silvery, like his own, against gold. But this is sunny. Not pale, but vibrant. She may be used to his own intense colour, but he is still taken by anything not gold-skinned and white-haired, the colour of all his ghosts and the way he imagines darkness would looks like if it took a solid form.
He lingers there, for a second, because it is bright and he wants so badly to feel something warm there. To recognize the beauty, but he is still a work in progress; he is still bleeding out the remnants of his forebearers, purging all that he can.
He quirks his lips, shifting his weight, “I'm not sure what you are looking for, but I am trying to make something. Somewhere. And I can't do it on my own.”
CHESSUR
Trashlip and Phina's
BASE BY BRONZEHALO
Oh, it's in my roots—in my veins.
It's in my blood and I stain every heart that I use to heal the pain Her considering gaze briefly sweeps over the various little groups throughout the field and lingers on those who have chosen to stand patiently alone for others to approach just as she had. She supposed there were many reasons that drove people to this place of gathering – loneliness, independence, hopefulness. Most importantly, there was a bright optimism for the chance at a new life. There were certainly worse things in life than worrying over a potential stranger’s view of one’s appearance.
“ I suppose that you are right,” she laughs breathily.
She was oblivious to his obvious insight to some of her thoughts and feelings, but she certainly wouldn’t have been a stranger to such intimate touches. Momma Luna possessed the ability to project her thoughts into others and Xero had cherished those unspoken words between them. There wasn’t ever a question of whether she had been loved by her family, which was why it unsettled her to be riddled with such melancholiness. It remained a foreign invader within the castle of her heart.
He repeats her name and looks at her with something akin to puzzlement. She doesn’t know how she would cause such a reaction in someone else because nothing about her would stand out in such a way. She didn’t possess any gifts like most of her family nor was she outrageously colored like Gendry or Dare was. Xero was even the smallest when compared to her other siblings despite the gypsy blood running through her veins. She was as normal as normal gets amongst a world full of strange wonders.
That one brief moment is broken with the shifting of his weight and his immediate attention is brought to her once again. She wondered what had caused the faint glimpse of darkness she had spotted within his guarded eyes. Perhaps they were both fighting the fall and struggling to land on all four feet once again.
“ All I know is that I can’t go back home for now. I don’t know what I can offer you, but I’m willing to try with you.”
This was spur of the moment – perhaps the most impulsive decision she has ever made before. She didn’t know a thing about him, but he reminded her of Drow and it was enough for her to take a chance.
“ What do I call you?”
Maybe they could help piece each other back together again. Xero Nocturnal x Quark
The grand highway
is crowded w/ lovers & searchers
& leavers so eager to please & forget.
If they could put each other back together, make wholes from scattered parts like jigsaws, he would be grateful.
It’s not what he expects. He’s not sure what to expect, but that seems a heavy hope to have; he’s trying to fish for answers down dark holes, but when one is afraid of what might be uncovered, it becomes less about being sewn back up, and more about being made anew from different material.
That’s what he expects.
While she yearns for what she has had and now does not, he’s searching stranger faces and crooks in the earth for ways to keep himself afloat. Trying with brute forced, bared naked, to demolish the dynasty of malevolence that winds around him like an old, rusty framework; he is trying to build something.
When she wonders on his darkness he tucks his chin into his chest, exhaling slowly. He does not like to be read. He is master of himself – he keeps rigid control, drilled to the bone. When he lets slip, he is often advised, unwittingly – as she has done. A favour, really. He can learn from it.
He would tell her that her yellow forelock (like sun or spring) stirs the sediment – not her fault, but all the same, it does. That he is trying, but beauty is bathed in salt water and sticky sand, and maybe always will be for him.
Somehow, she still ruins like a storm, his mother.
Maybe one day he can tell her all this.
But maybe it’s his own to keep and then purge.
“Until you can, then,” he keeps a cool eye, clearing his throat. There has always been a confidence in that tight and deep blue, if he wants there to be. “You would be surprised.” She has offered enough already, however unsettling. “You can stay only as long as you want, of course. Maybe until you can go ‘home’,” wherever that is, “it’s a better option than this, at least. Even if it isn’t the best.” She has not seen it, of course. It smells of salt spray, much like the Beach, but with the saccharinity of wildflowers instead of the cloy of decomposition. It is bright and woozy in the way it towers over the crash of waves and sparkles. It is better than here.
“Chessur,” he smiles, shrugging his shoulders a bit, “of Gemstone Ridge, I suppose.” He’s never been Chessur of anywhere.
CHESSUR
Trashlip and Phina's
BASE BY BRONZEHALO
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