video; un: leavegodalone

[necrolord]

Is this thing on?

[ The camera opens on a man, but there is something horribly inhuman about his eyes: they are black from edge to edge, the iris burning with a ring of white light. He is flanked by two skeletons which stand at attention, each with a speck of glowing red in their shadowed eye sockets. ]

Been a while since I had to do this. Hey, hello, kia ora. You face the King Undying, the Necrolord Prime.

[ He claps his hands together. There is something wrong with them: the whites of his metacarpals are exposed, flesh crumbled away like so much ash. ]

But let's not stand on formality, right? I hear we're on a first-name basis, now. So: I'm Emperor John Gaius, creator of the Nine Houses, and also God. Not locally, mind, [ and he gestures vaguely upwards, ] here it's a more crowded playing field. I'll admit, it's been an adjustment. I tried to get a peek at my usual domain... turns out Mariana doesn't like to share.

Now, I get that I've made a few mistakes. [ He says this like funny understatement, hands splayed. It shows the bare red tendons in his palms. ] Let's clear up some misconceptions.

[ He stands accused of baby-killing, human sacrifice, and the destruction of whole planets. He riled Mariana into a deadly storm. But what he says, with all the gravity of a king, is: ]

My wife is that hot.

[ Fantastic. Amazing start. He leans in to regard the camera. ]

Look, I get it: I haven't made myself popular. I'll get a lot of kids at my door screaming log off. We're on, what, bloody retribution attempt six or seven? It's been a constant parade of death lasers and witches and kids with swords. And I see where you're coming from. I put a serious damper on everyone's fun vengeance beach party.

But it's getting a little old, so consider this a friendly warning to all my executioners: I will start losing patience. [ He quirks a smile that does not touch his eyes. ] Not to be all, I have over ten billion confirmed kills, but: maybe do not fuck with me.

Cheers.

[ The skeletons perform an ancient First House salute, and the feed cuts out. ]

Comments

[asas]

[ L DON’T DO IT!!!!!! ]

what you’re saying is
you planned this
from start to finish
but what happened doesn’t matter because shit hit the fan with this guy
and i get to find out on the internet
because you want to get one last hit in
and by the way thanks for the donuts

is that what you’re saying to me?

Cw: death memories, alcohol use, grotesque introspective indulgence

[hearthebell]

[It’s not that, precisely, but it is like that. L realizes it as he wanders around Shōyō’s empty house, still damp from the tub, Omni in hand as his first priority, the one he reached for as soon as he had hands again and conscious thought and his brain was back online.

What makes him a good detective, single-minded and fixated and obsessive, can make him a terrible friend, and a worse boyfriend. After reading Shōyō’s response he sets aside the Omni, and Lycka hovers near it as he wanders through the house to do what he does: investigate.

The food that was here several days ago is largely untouched, save for a huge pile of donuts that’s been, presumably, used to feed his squid form. Soot streaks the floor in places (Paul) without having been swept up, which is uncharacteristic for someone as fastidious as Shōyō. In Shōyō’s room, the bed is rumpled and unmade, and a trace of blood is visible on the pillow. It’s some shuddering small relief that this was it, his death a soft severing in the waking world instead of the truly gruesome one that splintered him in the dream.

Since coming back, he’s dissociated from the memory of what happened to him with chilling efficiency. Just as the sight of his restored hand had startled and distressed him for a time, the restored integrity of a body that he felt disintegrate isn’t wholly natural, doesn’t feel right or good or stable. He’s had to disconnect to function at all; a world of Bigger Picture is lost because he’s clinging to one tree in a dense forest that drowns out light and sound. He peels himself from the trunk, limps off, and keeps looking.

Finally, he sees that the sword above the mantle is gone. Shōyō went to confront him; when? Paul was here; Shōyō wouldn’t have been alone. Then there’s Paul, who felt him shredding and came here burning alone and there is a whole backlog chronicling a story of fear, panic and misery that L will see, once he returns to his Omni and looks at his lost time, the suffering and pain caused by the price of blood and life that he had called worth it, at the time.

He crouches next to Lycka. Shōyō first; Paul knows the Emperor better, and the way that L thinks and operates. Paul appreciates sacrifice to a fault; Shōyō’s wound is not only fresh but completely new to him, poorly understood and raw and entirely unfair.

If he wants to keep his bargaining chip, he can’t even tell them, either of them, exactly what he lost his life to gain as leverage.]

The truth is precious to me, but I didn’t plan for it to come to light this way and actually had very little to do with it. I’m just one of many he killed in the days after he angered Mariana.

Are you going to try to attack him because you want to get back at me? You’ll get killed, too, if you try. When I died, I wasn’t trying to hurt you.

[Just conveniently disregard the possibility that it could happen as collateral damage, because that’s how he is, that’s the person Shōyō fell in love with and that’s the knife that L envisioned on the night he didn’t reject Shōyō’s kiss, and chose selfishness. He chose the promise of twisting that knife at some future point, and here they are.

He sets aside the Omni again and sets to work. He drains the tub after fishing out bits of donut, fills a bucket to mop the floor, strips the sheets and disposes of the pillow. He makes the bed with a clean set of linens, weeds out the expired food and not-so-fresh fruit, and takes it to the bin on his way out.

He leaves, wearing the same clothes he wore the night he stayed over and subsequently died in his sleep, an uneasy respawn who doesn’t know how to feel with the reality of someone else’s pain. The Omni is distance and safety; he can keep it with him and find a place that will serve a sleeper alcohol in July.

He’ll get numb before he can work up the nerve to demand things from John. Communication broke down with Shōyō because he’s just so good; conversely, L and John speak the same ugly language and use the same ugly currency.

When he finds a bar that will serve him, he asks for the cruelest shot he can, something sharp and pure that burns going down. He asks for two more, then he gets to work.]

cw: more of deez

[asas]

[ so many words that lights across his screen makes shōyō’s eyes burn until they trickle. until bubbling tears swell hot, until they slip off his cheeks and pool beneath his nose, until his nostrils flare through inhales and run as uncontrollably as his eyes do. he bites his lips through each reread, and feels sick:

I’m just one of many he killed in the days after he angered Mariana. his heart hurts. you’re not just one of many to me. you’re voiding what i feel. you’re saying what i think doesn’t matter. he has nothing in his stomach to lose, but he still tastes the dry, sour rise of bile on his tongue. ]

you didn’t just write that
any of that
who the hell are you talking to? john? light?

[ are you going to try to attack him because you want to get back at me? that can’t be right. he can’t be the one writing this. a helpless sound comes from within shōyō’s throat, buried, high-pitched. a cry that’s choked to death before it can escape his lips. you’ll get killed, too, if you try. when i died, i wasn’t trying to hurt you. ]

you weren’t trying? or you didn’t care?
don’t you dare treat me like your enemies
or some damn stranger you picked off the street to play house with on the side
i didn’t do it to get back at you
i did it to see your enemy shit himself
i did FOR YOU

[ he’s shaking, beyond his control. whatever is locked within him surges like eruption. he can’t type anymore. he can’t sit still in the sand, watching his hand, his damn hand still together after it wasn’t. it’s alien to him. his chest rises and falls in panic—

then he runs. he doesn’t know where to, but it’s the only way to trick his mind into shedding off the impossible energy that threatens to rip out of him. ]

a few hours later, cw: more of deez

[hearthebell]

[When L looks at his Omni again, he's still at the bar. It's possible Shoyo's made it back to his cleaned-up house by now. L's not feeling good, and he's not sure if it's because he's had too much, or he's just come back from his squid form, or his boyfriend is fighting with him, publicly, on John Gaius' network post.

It should be a private discussion between them, he thinks foggily, asking the bartender for another two shots. There's a part of him thinking about this tactically, though; John will see just how high his threshold is for being embarrassed, voiding it as a potential strategy that can be used against him.

He keeps it public.]

So it's done, and you're OK?

[Paul came through; Shoyo didn't get himself killed.]

I don't care if you made him shit himself, I just want to know that you're safe. I'll give you as much space as you need after I find out; you're right to be really angry at me.

[asas]

[ when shōyō returns to his omni after the run (hours, he’s been running for hours), to message viktor, to ask for help— lazarus digs the knife deeper, whether he has meant to or not.

that’s all he wants to know.

that’s all he has to say.

not even an apology? even if it was private. shōyō couldn’t be damned to consider all he’s written has been public. he isn’t thinking either. he can’t, it’s foggy, and muddled, and his heart pounds in his ears when he keeps reading these mechanical words sewn so meticulously. was this a mask, or the face behind the one he’s always seen?

an alien, trespassing shimmer of positivity infects his sadness, taints and twists it. it shouldn’t be here, with how he sobs for every crack his heart makes. and yet, it still gets him to type, even if it would otherwise hold an air of biting sarcasm: ]

i’m fine
you found out
now you can sit back and relax

[hearthebell]

[L blinks heavily, staring at the screen. Was thinking about what he said before he typed it the wrong thing to do? Did he not use enough emojis? Hell, for once it's not like even Shoyo is using emojis.

The last time he cried for someone and wore his heart on his sleeve, it didn't make a difference. He grew up cynical and wary, and now he's made Shoyo a little more into that same nasty person who can't trust or love or palpably feel. He's good at soothing his own ripped-up soul, shh, shh, this has already happened, you saw it coming, so clever, so correct, but it would be completely new to Shoyo. Shoyo couldn't have seen it coming; is that what L liked, was it just "playing house?"]

You can jump, alright. To conclusions, that aren't correct or fair, but no one can ever claim that you can't jump.

[asas]

[ his pocket vibrates, picanha pings him as a reminder— he yells out a bark and keeps going. drives that impossible energy somewhere. by the time he stops, another hour or so later, to text viktor, anyone, for help— he's—

he sees the words. opens the message with a drop that drags his gut to his feet. he's so confused. this time, he doesn't respond, possibly for the better. he needs to keep running, his heart feels like it could burst from his bones, the ones that wrap around his lungs and feel too tight when he tries to breath back from a choking sob.

he'll come back around. it just won't be now. ]