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HOUSE OF M(ETA)
HOUSE OF M
A DREAM IS A WISH…
In dreams you will lose your heartaches,
whatever you wish for,
you keep.
Anti-Meta sentiments are on the rise. This is no secret. Check the news and you see it, politicians arguing about the dangers that superhumans pose to the world. What if they go rogue? What if they stage a mutiny? How can they tell that heroes are really the good guys, when so many of them have secret identities. In the last week, multiple protests against metahumans potentially moving to their cities have broken out across the United States. Some cities have proposed legislation that would make it illegal for metahumans to live within their borders.
Excelsior is leading the charge, politicians are looking to ban any metahuman whose abilities are not technical in origin from living there.
It is little wonder, then, that so many go to bed dreaming of a better world. One without the hardships of this one, or of the one they endured before.
Meanwhile, across the country, Sunset Falls is in a state of change. Mayor West finally has candidates willing to take the position of Mayor from him. This shift in the city's attention prevents anyone from paying much mind to the odd and potent energies taking shape. Sure, there are strange occurrences happening. A young woman walks by the school and immediately forgets her name, her job, and where she lives. Others report a strange feeling of being watched. Those sensitive to it may feel something otherworldly and strange hanging in the air. Bearing down on them with oppressive force.
And, dear heroes, as you know - two forms of surging energies create what is known as a Confluence.
In dreams you will lose your heartaches,
whatever you wish for,
you keep.
Anti-Meta sentiments are on the rise. This is no secret. Check the news and you see it, politicians arguing about the dangers that superhumans pose to the world. What if they go rogue? What if they stage a mutiny? How can they tell that heroes are really the good guys, when so many of them have secret identities. In the last week, multiple protests against metahumans potentially moving to their cities have broken out across the United States. Some cities have proposed legislation that would make it illegal for metahumans to live within their borders.
Excelsior is leading the charge, politicians are looking to ban any metahuman whose abilities are not technical in origin from living there.
It is little wonder, then, that so many go to bed dreaming of a better world. One without the hardships of this one, or of the one they endured before.
Meanwhile, across the country, Sunset Falls is in a state of change. Mayor West finally has candidates willing to take the position of Mayor from him. This shift in the city's attention prevents anyone from paying much mind to the odd and potent energies taking shape. Sure, there are strange occurrences happening. A young woman walks by the school and immediately forgets her name, her job, and where she lives. Others report a strange feeling of being watched. Those sensitive to it may feel something otherworldly and strange hanging in the air. Bearing down on them with oppressive force.
And, dear heroes, as you know - two forms of surging energies create what is known as a Confluence.
THOSE LEFT BEHIND
You wake to pandemonium.
An emergency broadcast is blaring across any transmissible signal. A Confluence of unprecedented size has struck. Half of the country has been consumed by it.
By noon, there is a quarantine in place - not that anyone seems to be trying to leave the affected area. No, this quarantine is to prevent people from trying to go in. Unauthorized access is not permitted, not until the capes in charge have a better idea of what is going on. Once again, the Godfall Protocols are enacted. All able-bodied metahumans are recruited to the task, and once again, the Starfallen will find themselves standing shoulder to shoulder with those far weaker than them.
This time there is no giant monster to fight. Just a barrier, invisible to the naked eye, that seems to alter anyone who enters into it. The early metahuman scouts report themselves to be unaffected for the first few hours, but any normal humans who enter this space quickly find themselves… no longer themselves.
Atomight, Frances Starling and Mechanima are all at the Alliance HQ. For once, the three faction leaders seem to be in perfect harmony. This is a bad idea, they cannot send their people into this No Man’s Land… but they have no choice. The Godfall Protocols are what they are, they were created for this very reason. Though they are not arguing with each other, the government agents suddenly standing in HQ are telling a very different story. The three of them are not hiding the fact that they are all too aware that their “freedom” comes with a price, and their resentment is reaching a boiling point.
At some point during these early hours, Atomight finds himself temporarily locked out of his office. While the three leaders are distracted trying to regain entry, Fantastic takes center stage and begins issuing the most scripted heart-felt speech you have ever heard. Unlike the other three, he doesn’t seem to care much for what he could be sending people into. This is not a speech meant to inspire confidence that all will work out in the end, that the weakest among them will be taken care of, it is a speech to inspire soldiers.
By the end of this first day, they have gathered enough information to make a determination. The Starfallen seem to be more resilient to whatever effects are occurring than the rest of the population. They are called to a unique, private meeting - one in which all three leaders attend.
“We don’t know what you will be facing there,” they state plainly. “But we know you have the best chance of making it out with your minds intact.”
The choice is yours. You can help secure the area, you can retreat to Little Love and hope that this expands no further, or you can step into the unknown.
You can engage with the leaders here.
HOUSE OF (M)ETA.
Inside the quarantine zone, all is well.
Your alarm rings a little late and you find yourself groggy and briefly disoriented, as though waking from a very long dream. One that you find yourself considering to be unpleasant, and not worth thinking about. You stretch and slide out of bed, perhaps kiss your partner good morning and prepare yourself to wrangle your children and get them prepared for school, but today is like any other day. The world is as it always has been, and you find yourself oddly comforted to know that things are not as bad as they could be.
And then your day begins.
If you are a card carrying member of the Guardian Alliance, then you report to work before most of the world is up and running. Atomight appears to be busy in Central City, as he is not present and is not answering any calls, but you know what to do. The Guardian Alliance is all about finding ways to be useful, without enrolling in any of the government run Metahuman departments. It pays less, and you have to have frequent check-ins with actual government approved heroes, but you find a measure of freedom in it… though the pressure is immense. One wrong move and you may find yourself imprisoned for “irresponsible” use of your powers, branded as the reason why metahumans should stay under the thumb of the government after their service ends, and not allowed to organize themselves in fear they may take over the world.
If you took the darker path, then you will find yourself reporting to an ordinary office building in whatever city you live in, for a boring job that you do not have. Villainy is not a safe passtime, but those who band together tend to stay alive a little longer. The Society of Villainous Reformation exists to provide the community that most villains lack. Villainy comes in many shapes and sizes, and the Society has all sorts. The only uniting factor in this faction is the fact that you do not want to be used the way heroes are. You want to use your powers as you see fit, whether that means you get an edge on tests or rob banks to your heart's content is up to you.
Or are you a vigilante? A complete wildcard, answering to nothing and no one but your own personal sense of justice? Vigilantes have a reputation for being brutal and efficient, needing none of the teamwork and oversight that the guilds use. They are also generally less accountable, unless The Society or the Guardian Alliance steps in.
Starfall, formerly Starstruck. He was one of the first heroes to enroll in the government's War Hero project, which has now become a mandatory military service for all young metahumans upon reaching 18.
The most concerning thing right now in the world is the cult, the Battlements of the Shining God. They are known to sacrifice people to their fearsome God, stating that it will give them the power to put things right. But… you have never seen them in person. Only heard of the wreckage they leave. But disturbingly, if you tune in to the nightly broadcast that the Dreamers of the Willow Maiden put out to help lull you to sleep, you will note they seem… off. Warning of a war that is coming. You are fairly certain you can handle a confrontation with them, though. After all, nothing you couldn’t handle has ever happened.
And as you fall asleep at night in this perfect world, in your perfect life, you swear you hear The Lady herself whispering in your ear. Wake up, wake up, this dream is not yours to live.
Yet when you try to hold on to those words, they slip from your thoughts. And when you awaken, all remains as it should be.
SNAP BACK TO REALITY
For those who agree to go into the quarantined zone, you find yourself given the best gadgets both the Alliance and The Society can offer. They are unsure how to prepare you for this, though the scouts that made it back say that things seem… fine. Peaceful, even. Everyone seemed so happy, but they did not recognize them.
Contact will be difficult to maintain. The radios were functioning while they were inside, but it seems that the further they went into these zones, the worse communication got.
When removed from the quarantine zone, those who were affected regained themselves bit by bit. Some held on stubbornly to their illusionary life, but when presented with undeniable evidence of the life they had before, and reminders of any joy they found within it, they came back to themselves.
“Are you saying that they have to befriend them to remind them of their sanity?” Mechanima asks, torn between incredulity and amusement.
“What he’s saying,” Frances cuts in, “is that they need a reminder that they have a life worth living outside of whatever the hell is going on in there.”
Atomight nods. “This appears to be a shared delusion manifested by magic. So, a mass psychic relay would be the best way to break the hold. However, it will take time to do safely.” He turns to the gathered volunteers. “Your job is to start cracks, so the whole thing shatters when we deliver the final punch… and no one soul is left bearing the brunt of that psychic backlash.”
There’s a moment of silence. You find yourself being handed resources for your trip inside - no weapons, just first-aid kits and any items you may have told people to gather that could remind your lost friends of who they are.
"This is going to change everything," Atomight continues. "Even if all this goes to plan, the fact that it happened at all means things won’t stay like they’ve been."
He doesn’t elaborate. Mechanima’s mask turns to troubled static, and Frances throws a glance back towards the Alliance’s tents. Many of the native metahumans are gathered, and Fantastic is posing for photos with them. The hashtag #METASTOTHERESCUE has been trending for hours, and were you to believe social media, Fantastic is the one leading the charge.
You turn, take a deep breath, and walk through the invisible threshold into another world. The teleportation devices you have been given will take you directly to the city of your choosing.
IN SUMMARY...
- The unrest in Excelsior and the upcoming election in Sunset Falls has caused a massive confluence, which has affected a great portion of the country.
- Anyone within the border of these affected areas finds themselves thrust into an alternate universe, wherein they lived a very different life as a native citizen of this world. In this version of the world, the Godfall Incident never happened.
- All metahumans - regardless of if they belong to Society, the Alliance, and the Unaligned - find that the Godfall Protocols are being enacted, meaning that metahumans will be conscripted into assisting. Knowing most metahumans do not stand a chance against whatever metaenergies are causing this, the leaders of these groups are asking the Starfallen to enter willingly.
- Being in the alternate universe for more than 72 hours will make you start to believe that you are part of it. It is very keen to assimilate you into it, and you may find yourself slowly developing false memories the longer you are in there.
- Exiting isn't an immediate cure, but the longer you are out, the faster you will come back to yourself.
- You can bring your AU-affected friends back to reality by reminding them of who they are, and that the life they have outside of the bubble is equally good as the one inside.
- Anyone who wants to sit this one out can kick back, relax, and enjoy some Kansas hospitality. Little Love is a safe area and will protect any citizens who do not feel capable or are unwilling to jump into the unknown.
Please direct any questions regarding this log HERE.
no subject
this isn't where they need to be! they need to go. they need to go home, to contact lilith—
the heroes of the alliance don't waste any time in identifying eda as a threat, several of them starting to gather around them to box her in. more importantly, one of them ushers hunter away from her.
it happens all too quickly.
it's too fast, it's too fast.
eda lunges, desperately throwing herself in the direction of her charge. )
No, don't take him! Hunter—! Hunter!
( she shrieks, reaching and grasping for him as her body starts changing around her again. whatever personhood she had begins to rapidly burn away in favour for something more feral, more beastlike. two heroes grab her before she can get anywhere, locking her limbs together with rings of shimmering electricity.
then another presses her hand against eda's side and she slumps to the floor, suddenly lifeless.
"let's take her to one of the rooms. looks like she needs some time." the heroine says, moving to help the others carry the owlbeast out of the room. )
no subject
[She isn't the only one that can fight back. Hunter's never had to fight before, not with the alternate life he's led. But he can do magic. With a magical language of the world that's slowly revealed itself to him.]
[And...something else filters in. An instinct. A ferociousness he's never needed to have before. The same thing that erupted out of him as he fought feverishly at Eclipse Lake for the portal key.]
[He knocks a paper cup out of a survivor's hand. Fortunately, it's grape juice instead of water, making it even easier to draw with. It splashes to the floor. He dives and sticks his finger in it, drawing a symbol. Plants erupt from the floor, cracking through the concrete foundation and wrap around two of the heroes, pulling them away from his aunt. But another hero dives behind him and holds out a glowing finger, tapping him gently on the back of the head.]
[There is a zapping feeling inside his head and consciousness leaves him almost instantly. He collapses face first on the floor.]
[Some time later, he wakes up. It's after Eda has been woken up and assessed for safety, after a telepath helps soothe her mind somewhat. Not enough to allow her to change from her owlbeast form but enough that she's safe to be around. They're not about to put a teenage boy in the same room as someone that's lost control of themselves.]
[But they do decide to put them together, due to Eda's panic about where he is and worries she'll lose control again. And concerns for him, and what it'll be like for him to go through the memory regain alone when he was already panicked.]
[A forcefield goes up over the door as soon as he's gently placed inside.]
[He wakes up just in time to see the magical symbols go up over the door.]
["Here he is, as promised," says Penumbra at the door. "He's not hurt, he was only knocked out telepathically. It will take some time for your real memories to filter back in. So far, everyone that was changed by the unreality bubble have had a gradual return of their real memories. We'll be keeping you here for your own safety until then. I'm so sorry about this, I promise it'll make sense eventually."]
no subject
how many times have these heroes told her that? eda has already lost count. lost count of the platitudes and reassurances. the stalling. if they hadn't brought hunter in, hadn't finally given in to her screams and threats (and rather serious attempts at biting), she would have lost whatever little faith she already had in this operation.
sure, she had heard the explanations that they have been trickling her way. heard what they've been willing to say, but that doesn't change the fact that she feels more like a prisoner than a refugee.
restraints have been left on her, locked around her limbs, but this part had been the condition of getting her child back. they weren't just about to let him into an enclosed room with her without them even after she had been soothed. "not yet", they'd said.
thankfully, seeing hunter in front of her and whole does wonders for quelling the festering rage inside of her. she stands up despite the restraints then all but waddles in his direction, her body big and bulky as the owlbeast. )
Hunter! Are you alright? Did they do anything to you?
no subject
No, they woke me and tried to explain some...reality stuff I didn't understand, but I tried to fight them so they knocked me out again.
[He looks over and sees...]
Oh no.
[She's changed even more. And they have her in chains!]
Why did they...?! You're Alliance!
[That they're caging and chaining up someone who's registered is...]
[He goes over and tugs on them, but they're fixed pretty tightly. After a moment, he gives up, falling over into a sit in front of her, looking like he's about to burst into tears. But instead of crying, he crawls up close to her, fearlessly, completely unafraid of her hurting him despite her cursed form. He throws his arms around her neck - they doesn't even fit all the way around, and buries his face against the feathers there.]
[It's as much to try to comfort her as it is to seek comfort himself.]
Whatever's happening to you, it seems to be happening more when you're upset.
[He pets the feathers of her shoulder.]
I know this is...really bad, but we're together now. So you don't have to be upset about us being separated at least.
[Even though he's terrified, he wants her to be able to calm down. Wants her to not suffer from...whatever this is. And if they're together, they can be together to just deal with whatever happens next.]
no subject
such as seeing hunter desperately trying to break her out of her shackles. she hates it. hates the expression on his face, the panic, and the near tears—
eda takes a breath. )
It's okay, it's okay.
( she begins to say, just about to explain that she agreed to it before his face falls into the fluff of her feathers. her body is warm and her feathers soft, but her shape is incredibly limiting. there is little she can do to return the gesture at the moment, aside from lowering her face down to rub her cheek against the top of his head. )
Are you trying to tell me to calm down, squirt?
( she tries to joke, but then immediately thinks better of it.
that's not going to help. not either of them. eda has been desperately trying to push her feelings down. down, down, down. just get through the next moment and then the next and then she could let herself feel her feelings. but there is always another moment in the way. )
I'm-
( she starts and then begins again. )
I'm scared. Scared for you. Scared for what's happening to me. I'm scared to be here.
no subject
But you're here so. Whatever happens we'll...we'll be here together, so we'll be okay.
[His words are strained, though.]
[He's already starting to hear things, see echoes of things. A cloak and antlers moving away down a cavernous hallway that looks like it's in a palace, with a sense of relief that the figure is leaving. He's trying not to let it affect what he's saying, doing, but he isn't sure he'll be able to do that for long.]
Stuff is...it's already happening in my head.
[That sentence trails off into fear.]
But it doesn't matter because I've got you. And maybe they're... maybe they're telling the truth about whatever it is. They were trying to say people's memories got changed by something.
We already thought that something possibly made us forget something. Maybe it'll eventually make sense and we'll remember running into - into some kind of bad guy that messed with us. And it'll stop being as scary because it'll all make sense.
[Because it'll just be their lives, with some missing events they remember added in. Nothing radically different. Even if some weird memory reality blip happened, their baseline reality still has to be the same, right?]
[Even though it's...it's getting bad already. Titan, his head is starting to hurt.]
[Wait...he meant God. God, his head hurts. Why did he think "Titan"?]
We just have to -
[He sees the flash of something out of the corner of his eyes.]
[A white cloak. A flash of yellow. The colors of the haunting figure that wore his face.]
[But when he suddenly turns to look at something Eda can't see, he sees something different. Less ominous. It is...himself. Just...himself. Wearing a brown shirt and gloves, pants and boots, that kind of reminds him of a Disney character, like the woodsman from Snow White or something. Or Robin Hood.]
[The other him has bags under his eyes. He looks very sad and very tired.]
[It is too late now for him to get away. From himself. From the part of him that's been fighting to exist again, to be remembered. Because even despite the pain, the real him wants to exist. Doesn't want to be erased.]
["I know you're scared," he says, "But they locked me away and they locked them away. And this has to happen because they're worth remembering. They're worth how bad this is going to hurt. Still, I am so, so sorry."]
No. Please, I don't want -
[There's nothing he can do. His eyes roll back in his head and he goes limp, slumping against his aunt.]
no subject
once more, one more hellish time, eda has to watch as something grips her child right in front of her. she cannot see him properly, not from this angle and with him pressed against her, but she can still hear him. she can still hear the fear in his voice, feel the way his limbs tremble again like he's experiencing a waking nightmare, and eda is little more than a chained up beast in a room.
eda lets out a startled gasp when he eventually crumbles, already moving to help gently lower him to the floor. she only has a couple moments with him, just long enough to try to embrace him before the magical symbols activate on the barrier again. heroes file into the room just in time to see eda fall herself, legs going weak underneath her.
only darkness follows.
then there is a flash of light, like a thunderbolt, and eda is back in her childhood bed. warm, cosy, and groggy with sleep. then there is lilith in the threshold. her memories blur, shifting to a standoff between the two of them. one where eda forfeits, where she refuses to fight, and—
for the first time, control of own body starts to get ripped away from her.
lilith did this? lilith did this? lilith did this?
when eda wakes this time, it's in a bed. not on the floor or in a cage or anything else. just plain, mildly comfortable bed. or did they call these a cot? eda isn't sure and doesn't really care, not in the face of the fact of that she could fit in the bed. that's all that matters. her body had been restored at some point while she slept, but that apparently hadn't included her clothes.
someone had taken the time to change her into an alliance branded hoodie and sweatpants, which was probably better than walking around stark naked.
there is a young lady at her bedside, the same one who had forced her to sleep earlier. she is already explaining to eda, yet again, that she had been trapped in an unreality bubble. about unstable memories, about a possibly unstable body in her case, but she had been able to help force the curse to retreat some. she apologies for not being able to remove it.
eda doesn't react to it, exhausted and her mind still swirling. she can only listen right now.
the young heroine continues to explain that after she passed out, the alliance had taken them to separate clinic rooms. they just needed to run some tests on them, like everyone else, to make sure there aren't any strange side-effects. that they are recovering properly. she thinks now is a great time to inform eda that they're both doing well now.
most importantly, she can go see him now. they'll be free to go soon. she can walk out, he is just down the hall.
her mind is still a mess, fuzzy and full of divided memories, but there is no question about what to do next. no question at all. she is up and out of the cot near instantly, rudely walking away from the heroine who had been trying to be kind to her. she could stay and ask some more questions or figure out how they helped push back the curse, but—
she needs to get down the hall, she needs to get hunter out of here, and she needs to leave. )
no subject
[Barraged. With one memory after the next. Most of them painful. Only a few were good, small little beacons of brightness in the shadows. Precious gems made even more precious by how rare they were.]
[Worth suffering to remember. Willow. Gus. Luz. Amity.]
[His friends from this world. Especially Dylan and Nico. Jason. Huvrye.]
[But there was a price. As it went on, he came to understand a terrible truth.]
[He wasn't real. He'd never existed. His childhood with his aunt was a lie, the person he was because of it was manufactured.]
[Hunter died and Hunter felt him die. Felt him melt under the weight of reality, until only one of them was left.]
[Until the heart ache and rejection and loss (why did he still miss him sometimes, even though he was terrified of him?) and heart-clenching fear and anxiety replaced most of the happiness, leaving a far more modest remainder. Until he lost the confidence and pure sense of self he'd had thanks to dear Aunt Eda, the result of a secure connection as a child.]
[Now there were just doubts. Regrets. Worries that there was no way to truly make up for the things he's done. Now he knows he used to be a bad person and has to grapple with the fear he'll never properly be a good one. Now there's a wellspring of shame.]
[Another hero directs her to his room.]
["Well" is certainly relative. He is stable. No longer trying to fight them to escape. No longer crying. No longer slipping in and out of consciousness, a telepath trying to temper his pain and keep him as out of it as possible to spare him whatever troubled memories were pouring back in, in recognition that his were clearly more traumatic than some.]
[But after they asked him enough questions to realize most of his memories were back, after he gave enough terse answers that they thought he was stabilized, he'd slipped somewhere out of the way. Wanting to hide from everything but knowing he can't when he carries so much of it with him. But still doing it anyway.]
[When Eda finds him, he's pressed against the back corner of the room on the floor, knees drawn up, arms wrapped around them, hands clenched into tight fists. His face is drenched in sweat and his cheeks are still sticky with tears. His eyes are bloodshot and red-rimmed, with those circles back under them. He is staring ahead at nothing. But there is no tension in his expression. It's slack, eyes half lidded.]
[Sluggish with outright depression. Resigned.]
[This was what he'd wanted. What a part of his mind had been fighting for. He'd wanted to be again. The real him. The current him.]
[He'd just had to kill Hunter Clawthorne to do it.]
[(Or at least that's what he thinks, as utterly unable as he was to see the full shape of him under so much he has to work through.)]
[His eyes briefly train their way up to Eda when she walks in. He doesn't address her. His gaze just falls back to stare at nothing.]
no subject
it does her no favours that her body feels exhausted, sore, and sluggish. this much, at least, is familiar; the usual experience after she'd been transformed for long periods of time. the owl beast within her always wrings her out like a sponge. taking everything she had and then some. she's a little more acutely aware of it right now with her memories so fresh in her mind—painfully, bitterly aware.
there's an open hole in her chest, bleeding with the years of lost potential. years of building a career, a legacy, a name, a family. years of living a life without the fear of the beast inside of her devouring her alive, tearing off a little more of her with each conflict.
years of loving a child that never existed. years of having her sister.
years of something eda knows that she was never meant to have.
a sense of loneliness settles within her, making itself at home.
her feet continue to carry her forward anyway, following the guidance of the heroes to find the room they'd put hunter in. when she finds him, he looks like little less than a smear against the big white wall. he looks so small, so fragile, so—
familiar. for a brief second, she thinks back to herself spending years alone inside of a broken down old tower. nights spent curled in on herself, face tear-streaked and red. )
Hey.
( eda eventually says after a moment. slowly, gradually she moves to kneel down in front of him.
she doesn't know what to say, where to begin—she's not his aunt eda, not his anything—but. . .
she is here. )
cw: warning of probably mention of child abuse in the rest of the thread
[He seems to be struggling for words through a haze.]
Are you back? To Normal?
[He feels disconnected and floaty. There are times this has happened in the past, especially certain times when he was young. It got easier as he got older. To not go away in his head for as long.]
[It was important to not get too dazed in some situations of danger, like his scout trials.]
[And it helped that he'd made less mistakes for Belos to get angry with, that he'd become a better soldier. A better tool. A better extension of his will. Better at not questioning him or saying things that angereed him.]
[It also helped that he learned how to get better at ducking.]
no subject
eda bites back the urge to snort derisively. )
If you could call it that.
( there's no guesswork required to know that hunter's memories have returned or at least enough of them. enough to make him think he shouldn't be on the bed, enough to put him on the floor, enough to have him wound into a tight ball of stress. )
Are you alright?
( almost a rhetoric question.
she knows just by looking how poorly he's doing. )
no subject
I'll be fine.
[To say he's fine now would be a lie. He probably will be eventually. He's survived worse. After all, he'd survived all this the first time. The majority of it as a scared child.]
I've still had a few of my real memories trickling in. But I think - I think it's mostly finished.
[His voice is toneless, closed off, cold. Neither the more gentle and earnest voice he's used since he stopped working for Belos, nor the snide swagger of the Golden Guard. He doesn't sound even close to fine.]
Mostly.
[And she can tell it's not quite finished because all of a sudden he full-body cringes into the wall with a cry, holding his hand to his face, curling as far away from her - or rather what he's seeing in her place - as possible.]
[He holds the hand to the right side of his face, over his scar.]
I'm sorry. I'm sorry.
[If his voice sounds young and small it's because it was younger and smaller at the time and this is an echo. For a moment, he's there.]
[The memory of the cause of the injury being a fall from a tree fades. So does his memory of his aunt comforting him, holding him, sitting with him in the emergency room, even making him laugh as the doctor worked on his face.]
[It is replaced instead by what really came after, the harrowing hour it took to frantically stop the bleeding. Tending to the wound with his healer coven first aid kit. Cleaning up after, including sneaking back into the throne room when it was empty, desperately trying to get it off the floor before his uncle returned. Scrubbing at his Golden Guard uniform in a washbasin - and still doing it long after his hands got wrinkly and the stains were gone.]
[He doesn't go through all the motions of it. Just the initial reaction of fear and pain. But it takes a good ten seconds for the memory to fade and for her to fade back into view. His breathing is ragged at the end of it, as he tries to calm it down. He's struggling to not go into a panic attack like he did in the reality bubble. Like he did with Gus, that day in Hexside.]
no subject
however, the terror in front of her now is something completely different. something more poisonous and insidious than a feral beast. hunter jerks away with a movement that speaks volumes, an echo of familiarity. he pulls even further inside of himself, much like a wounded animal. cowering and small.
eda's eyebrows furrow, tightly pinching together as she shoves down a wave of revulsion. there's another part of her, the little bit that remains, that is screaming in fury and outrage. that much needed to be kept in check as well. )
Oh, kid.
( one of her hands reaches out for him, just barely making it forward before eda thinks twice. hunter doesn't know her like that. her touch might only frighten him, rather than bring comfort.
instead she pulls her hand back then pushes it forward in a short movement, trying to imitate the act of breathing. )
Just breathe. It's going to be okay.
( is it? )
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["I'm sorry" isn't a thing he'd have said during scout trials.]
[He can't reckon with the feelings of her knowing yet, especially when his first brush with something other than fear is shame. Logically, he even knows it probably shouldn't be shame but it is. He'd cultivated an image of strength as the Golden Guard, and even after rejecting the identity, the idea of someone knowing about that kind of vulnerability by accident rather than by hus choice to tell them is embarrassing.]
[Enough that he looks away and his ears go red.]
[So he tries to shove those feelings down.]
[But then she tells him to breathe and he looks up at her again. He remembers how she'd tried to calm him after he and Luz escaped Belos' mind. Even though he had rejected it, he hadn't forgotten that kindness. He knows if he hadn't run from the Owl House that day, she probably would've have kept being kind.]
[Now that it's been offered again he accepts it. Is willing to take refuge in it.]
[He nods and tries to breathe. He's not quite in a panic attack yet.]
Gus. Taught me Willow's breathing...thing.
[He holds up a hand and silently counts with his fingers. Raising them one by one as he breathes in, putting them down one by one as he breathes out. Then he keeps doing it.]
[That he'd needed to be taught it isn't shocking. That his friends were willing to do it is a testament to the levels of kindness and care they've shown him.]
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he doesn't. instead hunter takes his time to breathe, as she'd suggested, counting his breaths all the while. )
Breathing thing? You wanna tell me how that goes?
( she asks once hunter is in a better position to speak. if he learned it from his friends, from luz's friends, then it's probably connected to a good memory. a good memory of a friend who cared enough to teach him how to help himself.
he could use some reminders of the good. )
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You just. Use your fingers to count each breath.
[And he shows her, putting them up one by one as he breathes in, then down one by one as he breathes out.]
[Asking to be shown helps, though. Instead of just doing it, he's focused on showing her, which takes his attention away from his panic, gets him out of his own head.]
[After a few breaths, he's able to breathe out a final huff of air. Then there's finally some calm.]
[Now he seems a little more alert. A little less distant. Less disconnected from himself.]
[He does have trouble meeting her eyes, though, ears still red. He sits there twiddling his thumbs.]
Did I - Did I say? Anything? Just now?
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slowly, she takes in large inhales, holds it, and then exhales while counting along with her fingers. a mirror of hunter's actions.
one. two. three. four.
breathe.
it's funny. maybe this had been for her benefit as well. breathing alongside the kid has managed to help settle some of the upset churning her stomach, calm some of her fraught nerves. )
I didn't hear anything if you didn't want me to.
( an easy answer.
hunter has already been rubbed raw, an open wound of misery. they didn't have to talk about this now. or ever. not if he didn't want to. eda didn't exactly feel like he owed her anything and she wasn't really looking for anything either. she already knew without asking that life in the emperor's coven is much less than it's cracked up to be. her childish idealisations in her youth were never anything other than falsehoods.
it's something she'd long since known. although, she's been long since discovering that the scope was much wider than she thought. since lilith had been ousted, she had been more than vocal about the conditions they experienced. what the scouts went through. what belos took from them. luz had cracked the already thin floor under that after that whole mindscape spell debacle, revealing that things were far worse than lilith ever knew.
and hunter had it worst of all. believing wholly in his "uncle".
eda moves to fold her legs in front of her, sitting across from hunter. )
But you don't have anything to be ashamed about. Sometimes we get dealt a crap hand by life.
( then she holds her hands together, palms upwards. she bends the tips of her fingers, gesturing for hunter to place his hands on hers. )
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[When she extends her hands, he lifts his, hesitates for half a second, then reaches out and places his hands in hers. Something about it still rings with a familiarity that's fading away. Vague echoes of a small hand held in hers.]
[It is almost too kind for him to bear. Especially after all he did to her. All he threatened to do, especially to those she loved. She probably remembers enough now to know that everything she believed about him was false, that he had never been her family.]
[That he had never been that innocent. Even from an early age, he'd done all he could to obey his uncle's will.]
[The word "we" in "we get dealt a crap hand in life" sticks out, though, and he thinks hard about that. Yes, in everyone's mind, including his own, she was the daring outlaw... but what did that mean? Running from the law. Hiding herself away. Exiled on the fringes of society. Someone from her family, Lilith, turned against her.]
[Probably alone. Until whenever King came into her life. Until Luz.]
[In the reality bubble she'd been a part of the world. Had a job at a school. Had been a daring adventurer. Hadn't had to hide. Had friends like his imaginary dead parents, even if she'd lost them.]
[Had a child, even despite losing said friends, the last gift said friends left her - along with the gift of their trust - a child more precious to her than any magical artifact.]
[It's all gone now. She's back to a life that must have been much more isolating until recently. She's back to a world that cast in the role of the monster, and nearly turned her into stone. Maybe it grew richer at one point, but so much of it must have been lonely, must have felt bad. She must have at times truly felt cursed.]
[He's emotionally intelligent enough to understand it really probably is a "we."]
I'm sorry. Not just for everything I did to you. And Luz and King.
Also just...that you went through everything you did.
I know you probably just got some good things back like remembering your real family. But I also know I wasn't the only one that was awful to you, and you had to get that back too.
You should never have had to hide. [From the Emperor's coven. From him.] You should never have had to worry about being executed.
[In a way that was meant to publicly shame her. Make an example of her. Look at the evil wild witch, cursed and monstrous, suffering the terrible fate she earned in her unapologetic rebellion. Her pain and horror encased in stone forever.]
You should never have had to worry about your loved ones being hurt by me, or him, or anyone else.
[Somehow, despite how much he's hurting, he manages to unearth some compassion for her. She's owed it. By him and everyone else that tried to hurt her.]
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what is done is done. the blood has already been spilt.
and for who he used to be, hunter clearly isn't that person now. it's something that she already knew, could figure out from just the initial conversations. luz had seen it first, of course, when the nuggets of goodness inside of him were buried deep down. then eda had seen it for herself, in the shape of a young man who didn't grow up under the thumb of belos. )
Oh, you feeling bad about it now, huh?
( a little laugh, but she's definitely poking a little fun at him. )
A lot of things happened that shouldn't have. My sister should have never cursed me either, but here we are.
( . . . that is not what she meant to say. it was just a slip of the tongue, an accidentally voiced thought that shouldn't have ever left her head. however, eda has also been rubbed raw herself. she too, is an open wound of betrayal and hurt.
still, she thinks she should have been better than to say that.
so she sighs, trying to play it off like she meant to reveal that tidbit of information about herself. )
These things happen. Some of it, we just can't control. Like I said, sometimes we get a bad hand.
( that's just how it is. sometimes fate, luck, and happenstance whisk everything out of anyone's control. it's been a difficult thing for eda to grasp, that there are bigger things at play then herself, but an important lesson to learn nonetheless.
with a gentle movement, she presses up against hunter's hands and helps turn them over. slowly, slowly, slowly. at the end of the gesture, she lifts her own hands up to reveal that she's left a couple playing cards against his palms. light sigils have been scratched over the card-back artwork, activating only as eda moves away.
small, bright orbs lift in the air between them. they shine brightly, almost like a promise. )
But a bad hand just means you need to need be more thoughtful about what you'll do with it.
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[But it makes sense. She'd done wrong. She couldn't undo the damage entirely, but she did fix as much as she could...and then did better. Rebelling against Belos at her sister's side.]
[He's surprised at the light glyphs, though. Magic is precious to him, now that he finally can do it, but he still thinks the light glyph is the most beautiful. It'd been such a comfort those cold nights he'd tried to live on the street, when he realized he could create light glyphs mixed with the fire glyph. In the dark, with only Flapjack's presence taking the edge off his loneliness, he'd had that glow and warmth to help make it so his only other company wasn't the dark.]
[The lesson is precious, too. He nods at her words.]
[And it doesn't escape him how nice it feels to have the Owl Lady, of all people, guiding his hands with magic. Maybe he'll be able to earn his way into being taught by her, like he hopes.]
[At least there is hope. At least even despite all he's done, he has a chance to do good. At least he's away from Belos, even if he didn't have the idyllic life they just lost. At least he has people around him that actually care about him; love that comes without sharp edges. In Luz's world, right now, there are other people that care about him, too. People he needs to get back to.]
For what it's worth... you were a really good aunt. I wish I had been lucky enough for that to be real.
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that much causes eda's expression to soften, a momentary crack in the brave front that she's been trying to put forward. between the two of them, hunter is still just a boy. he's young, he's fragile, and the least eda could do was try to be a strong presence for his sake. any falling apart was to be done later.
yet being told that she made for a great aunt is enough to make her want to cry. the kid is just trying to be nice and she shouldn't take it so seriously, but— )
Yeah, me too. Would have been lucky to be your aunt, kid. I was real proud of you.
( an honest statement. her heart still mourns for the life they lost, for the world that never existed, and for the gift of being given a child to raise. not like how she found king, rescued from his own lonely tower, but entrusted to her. )
You deserved better than what you got.
( hopefully that's something he knows already. )
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["Yeah. Gonna make sure you're safe too, Hunter. You're family now."]
[They haven't been said yet.]
[Still, this is close. Maybe he isn't her family. Maybe he isn't Hunter Clawthorne, but she's still able to look at him and wish he'd been instead. Rather than hating him, rather than wanting nothing to do with him, rather than even just having empathy for him but not wishing for something they could've had.]
[And he wasn't entirely different, he and the other Hunter. There are some things they share. He isn't going to be be a total defeatist when it comes to his character; he can be objective enough to acknowledge that maybe there is some good in him. Maybe he can be even better. His friends back home had to have seen something to see him as worth being kind to, right?]
[And maybe this means there's hope in earning her esteem in this world. Perhaps not the same level of love and affection but...something. She might agree to be his mentor, right? Maybe he can prove himself to her.]
[But then she says "You deserved better than what you got" and it just breaks him. It's not the first time someone's said it to him, but it's the first time it's been said to him by someone that experienced what he used to be like, that saw him at his worst.]
[Sometimes he wonders if the people he's met in this world would feel the same way about him if they'd faced him as the Golden Guard, if he threatened them, if he'd kidnapped them, if he'd been vicious to them. His friends back home are, after all, pretty exceptional.]
[But Eda not just heard about how awful he used to be. She had seen him at his ugliest.]
[So to hear both things from her, spoken one after the other...]
[He slaps his hand very suddenly to his face, covering his eyes. His other covers his mouth. What he's doing becomes pretty obvious when the first few tears can be seen dripping off his face from underneath his hands. There's a light sniffle and a snorfling noise as he tries to hold most of it in, but he can't. They aren't wracking sobs, but he does start to sob, clearly trying his best to stifle it, like he's used to trying to cry quietly.]
[It's different from the way he'd cried while regaining his memories. Through most of that, he'd cried as the other Hunter, slowly regaining a hurt he'd never known.]
[This time...it's mostly as his real self, his current self.]
[This time it hurts in a different way, one that doesn't feel like something awful is eating him alive. This time it feels like poison is draining out of him, like a wound's been lanced so maybe eventually it can actually heal.]
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there may not be much she can do as herself, as no one more than luz's mentor, but she can still be here.
eda places a hand on hunter's knee, trying to remind him that he's not alone. this isn't like what earlier must have been, terribly alone and left to suffer through the return of his memories without an anchor. but what anchor did this kid ever really have aside from flapjack? )
It's okay. Take your time.
( there is no rush. there is nowhere else they need to be. she also didn't particularly imagine that any of the alliance heroes were going to get involved. after all, they played their role here.
gently, she rubs her fingers against the space just above hunter's knee in a steady back and forth motion. it's okay.
then after a beat, she adds: )
But you better wrap it up or they're gonna think I did something to you.
( the tone behind it is nothing but warm and playful, a clear joke. she laughs a little, but it's quiet and tired. )
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[The joke does its job. There is a loud snorfle that is clearly more of a laugh than a sob.]
[He looks a little less sad as he wipes at his face with his sleeve, trying to get rid of the snot and tears.]
[When he looks at her it's clear the crying helped, and so has her presence, that he feels slightly better.]
I'm okay. I'm okay.
[He's ready to leave.]
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she gives his leg a few pats, almost as if to warn him, before moving to stand. )
Then why don't we get out of here?
( because please. she'd really like to leave.
eda extends a hand out to him then, offering to help him up off the floor. )
It's not like you know, but Big Owl Mama over here did get a swanky place.
( although the décor is vastly different than what he might remember from the fake reality. )
You can pick out a room.
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