Dirk Strider (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
string_instrument) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
thenashira2025-11-18 09:44 pm
string_instrument) wrote in thenashira2025-11-18 09:44 pm
All Night, Me And My Wretched Device
Who: Nova Pastos, Lil Cal, the Abyss, and-- (you!)
What: Catch-all for Nova Pastos' time in the Abyss
When: 7/31 and on until they're saved
Where: The. Uh. The Abyss.
Warnings: Suicidal ideation, derealisation and depersonalisation, break with reality, child neglect, more to be added as things are written
Like failure itself, the Abyss knocks the wind from him.
Not physically, and not like a punch, but mentally and like the hard, bone-shattering impact with the water's surface tension. It cracks across his psyche just like that, splintering across the sheer plane of his mind. It wants him to break first, of that he's sure, but he doesn't.
The pain, however, wraps around his brain the same way his body was engulfed by ocean--in that dream.
But this is not the Abyss of his ocean. In some ways, it's similar. Endless, with an infinite depth and a vastness of existence that renders any single living object irrelevant. But it still has solid ground, and gravity, and air to breathe. The terrain varies from lifeless sand to gritty soil, peppered with inert rock. It's like the earthy quasi-beach before one reaches the ocean shore, but without ever seeing the sea at all.
There is no ocean.
The dark sky yawns hollow above him, void of sun or moon or stars.
This is also reminiscent of the ocean, but without the pressure, the movement, or the power. It's thin and strange and empty. There is an absence, a death of substance, that he feels every time he breathes in, filling his lungs with nothing and leaving him aching for purchase, for presence, for reality--for any sense of realness at all. It is as though reality itself has disincorporated him, and it...
It is horribly familiar.
It feels like home. Like his penthouse suite, its rooftop 168 metres in the air, a perfectly isolated habitat soaring above the Chalra skyline and filled with a restless accumulation of stuff. Computers, horse statues, movie posters, horse prints, puppets, furniture, weaponry, mechanical dreams, workout equipment.
But it never felt any less empty.
Now, in this uncanny echo of that infinity of loneliness, that lonely infinitude--the reality he holds in his mind gives way to the tangible waste of his existence. It seeps into him through the cracks of his broken heart--the soup can, rent asunder into mere atoms, compressed and devoured by the sea. A discaded husk whose failure was inevitable. And that was okay. It was always meant to be.
But not like this. Not like this. There is nowhere for him to go, nothing for his essential nature to become.
This is not his ocean.
There is no ocean.
This is just stone, and grit, and Nova Pastos, and Lil Cal.
And--
What: Catch-all for Nova Pastos' time in the Abyss
When: 7/31 and on until they're saved
Where: The. Uh. The Abyss.
Warnings: Suicidal ideation, derealisation and depersonalisation, break with reality, child neglect, more to be added as things are written
Like failure itself, the Abyss knocks the wind from him.
Not physically, and not like a punch, but mentally and like the hard, bone-shattering impact with the water's surface tension. It cracks across his psyche just like that, splintering across the sheer plane of his mind. It wants him to break first, of that he's sure, but he doesn't.
The pain, however, wraps around his brain the same way his body was engulfed by ocean--in that dream.
But this is not the Abyss of his ocean. In some ways, it's similar. Endless, with an infinite depth and a vastness of existence that renders any single living object irrelevant. But it still has solid ground, and gravity, and air to breathe. The terrain varies from lifeless sand to gritty soil, peppered with inert rock. It's like the earthy quasi-beach before one reaches the ocean shore, but without ever seeing the sea at all.
There is no ocean.
The dark sky yawns hollow above him, void of sun or moon or stars.
This is also reminiscent of the ocean, but without the pressure, the movement, or the power. It's thin and strange and empty. There is an absence, a death of substance, that he feels every time he breathes in, filling his lungs with nothing and leaving him aching for purchase, for presence, for reality--for any sense of realness at all. It is as though reality itself has disincorporated him, and it...
It is horribly familiar.
It feels like home. Like his penthouse suite, its rooftop 168 metres in the air, a perfectly isolated habitat soaring above the Chalra skyline and filled with a restless accumulation of stuff. Computers, horse statues, movie posters, horse prints, puppets, furniture, weaponry, mechanical dreams, workout equipment.
But it never felt any less empty.
Now, in this uncanny echo of that infinity of loneliness, that lonely infinitude--the reality he holds in his mind gives way to the tangible waste of his existence. It seeps into him through the cracks of his broken heart--the soup can, rent asunder into mere atoms, compressed and devoured by the sea. A discaded husk whose failure was inevitable. And that was okay. It was always meant to be.
But not like this. Not like this. There is nowhere for him to go, nothing for his essential nature to become.
This is not his ocean.
There is no ocean.
This is just stone, and grit, and Nova Pastos, and Lil Cal.
And--
no subject
It's a relief--and, weirdly, a moment of perverse almost-pride)--that she takes his words to heart. His and Cal's. He knew Mortis had some strength in her--more than 'some,' really, because isn't she a Knight?--but to see her grasp it with her own hands seems like a positive sign. He nods slightly in tacit approval of her grit.
He even relaxes one micromeasure of whatever unit is used to measure the tension in his body and brain.
That microscopic difference might have been microscopically premature--but all that this new revelation elicits from him is a noticeable furrow of his brow.
"What do you mean, her voice?"
no subject
"Melly talks to me," she says, her lips pursing into a little frown. "All the time. Doesn't Contra talk to you?"
no subject
Right as he'd started to feel like he was in control of the situation a little bit, she asks him a question he's been asked a thousand times if he's been asked once--a question that he usually ignores, because it's not anyone's business what Cal says to him in the secret, shared silence of their privacy.
Usually, this question isn't asked with Cal's no-longer-fictitious voice still ringing in in his ears, having become untethered from Dirk's mind and his control. It's not asked by someone who has all-too-clearly become accustomed to Cal in a way that absolutely no one except... never mind who except, it doesn't matter, really. Despite Pastos' many years of wishing and willing and projecting and pretending as a lonely prince of media confined to the top of his tower prison, Lil Cal has never truly been alive in the way that another living person would have been.
He was never fully, truly capable of replacing the, quote, real thing, unquote. No one knows this as well as Pastos himself.
But the so-called 'real thing' could never have come anywhere close to replacing Lil Cal, either.
In a world perceived within, experienced within, and contained within the mind of Dirk Strider, Lil Cal's existence was far more real than any 'real' human being's. And if Dirk's fictitious world in which Cal lives and thinks and feels is--as he well knows--just an artifice inside of him... then what does that say about the rest of it? The world 'outside' him that oscillates between real and unreal, its existential topography altering constantly as he perceives and believes and refutes and refines? He knows, intellectually, that the world is a static, enduring thing. That reality exists.
But does he? Is it? How much of it, really--and if so, if reality is constant, what does it have to do with him?
"HUMAN EARTH TO FUCKING PASTOS," Cal's voice jolts him out of the (frankly extremely short) daze of an unanswerable question--and in doing so, provides him with an answer he can accept. Hopefully, so can Mortis.
"He just did," Pastos notes drily.
no subject
"No, before now. Before...this." The Abyss, though it's clear her fright has her discomfited. She's a sturdy little thing, getting right back up after she's been dropped, but Mortis has never been trapped in the Abyss before. But the traces of fear in her eyes give way to doubt — not about this place, not about Melly's fate, but about Dirk. "Hasn't Contra always talked to you?"
The doubt is clear in her voice now, and it sounds an awful lot like can you even help me?
no subject
His shades, as usual, obscure his gaze. Whether or not he makes eye contact with her doesn't matter, though--it's guaranteed that he sees her, and sees the look in her eyes. He hears the anxiety and reproach in her voice. He's not a stellar reader of people, but he doesn't need to be. Simply the way she's worded the question digs in under his skin and seeks out something more vulnerable than surface flesh. Hasn't he always?
A different person would find the truth easy to speak--or else would have the sense to lie. Neither is true of Nova Pastos. Lying is something he has never put up with in himself. It's not that he's incapable of it. Far from it. He simply doesn't, and won't. He has to define himself somehow, has to create the man he is, and that means drawing lines and securing borders around who he is and isn't. This, like so many things, is a rule drawn up by the man himself as a direct result of having grown up without such things. No boundaries. No rules. No definition at all.
He can say and do whatever he wants. He chooses not to lie.
It's never bothered him before--or if it has, the truth and its consequences bothered him magnitudes less than the cost of not being true.
And it's not like it's that black and white. He literally just manipulated the truth and evaded full disclosure two seconds ago. That's fine.
But lying outright? He presses a hand over his mouth, grasping his jaw in tense fingers. Thinking.
His heartrate is accelerating--he can feel it pounding in his ribcage.
"We don't really have that kind of relationship," he says at last, having removed his hand from his face.
His voice is flat and low.
"SHITTY PATHETIC COWARD," Cal calls him immediately. Pastos sets his jaw, gritting his teeth in irritation.
"We don't need words to communicate," he continues, actively ignoring the insult while Cal stares Mortis in the eye. "I've always been his voice," he glances at Cal again,m who looks him in the eye as well.
"...until now."
no subject
She maintains eye contact with Cal like she's afraid to break it, and her voice drops to a whisper — she almost sounds like the old Mortis, but still markedly different, marked with fear.
"Pastos...are you sure that's really him?"
no subject
It's such a sudden and absurd question that it actually bypasses the state of absolute certainty that defines his relationship with Cal--the same secure source of confidence and calm stability that has anchored Dirk to a shared reality with the puppet for so many years--and prickles along the perpetual paranoia that edges the boundaries of his brain.
Of course, it's not that easy. Despite the superficial (can one even use that word when it comes to the mind of Dirk Strider?) trajectory of his brief fugue--measured in seconds, in single digits--over Mortis' question, what sent him there wasn't reality, or the lack thereof. Nor was it the matter of Cal's (lack of) speech in that reality, or even the possible temptation of lying. It was the relationship between him and Cal, and the challenge to it. The judgment implied and pending delivery, the suggestion that somehow he and Cal were less, were inadequate compared to Mortis and Melly--that's what pushed his brain back into a small proto-crisis, and the lie he didn't tell was as much about protecting himself (and Cal) as it was about not disappointing or even hurting Mortis.
Which is, it must be noted, an extraordinary amount of investment in another human being's opinions and feelings for someone like Nova Pastos. He has, after all, managed to maintain his persona's stability so well in part because Pastos is not beholden to interpersonal concerns the way Dirk Strider might be.
In her innocence, Mortis is threatening all of that.
(But then, what good has any of it done, in the end?)
"RUDE AND NASTY BITCH--" Cal starts, and this time Dirk interrupts him.
"You don't think I would notice if he wasn't?" he asks, seemingly calm as anything. His head turns to stare at Cal, who stares Mortis down unblinkingly.
"She's freaking out, dude, you and I don't need to add to that."
Something about Cal's aggressive tone shift gives him a little more focus, a little more control--albeit in a perverse way. Maybe Cal's little tantrum is just something manageable to address and correct. He can be in control of Cal, if nothing else. Maybe that's why Cal is like this. Cal doesn't need control because that's Dirk's job. And maybe Dirk needs Cal to escalate, to react, to even lash out--because then he doesn't have to.
"WHY DO YOU CARE IF SHE'S 'FREAKING OUT.' ARE YOU A WEEPY LITTLE WAIFISH BITCH NOW. WHO CARES ABOUT WHAT WEEPY LITTLE WAIFISH BITCHES THINK. IS THAT WHAT YOU ARE?"
"You know the answer to that, and don't talk to or about her like that."
"I WILL TALK ABOUT ANYONE ANY WAY I WANT. BECAUSE I CAN. AND IN THIS CASE. BECAUSE I HATE THEM. WHICH IS TO SAY. I HATE HER."
What? Pastos cannot believe the shit he's hearing right now--anger begins to simmer in the back of his thoughts, but its fuel is mostly just bewilderment. What the fuck did Mortis ever do to Cal?
"What in the hell are you talking about? You have literally no reason to hate her. She's a fucking Knight. And she's done nothing but respect you, so show some respect back."
"I WILL NOT RESPECT A WEAK PIECE OF SHIT. WHICH IS WHAT SHE IS. I AM LOOKING AT HER. AND I SEE A SNIVELLING BULLSHIT WASTE OF OUR TIME. AND I AM LISTENING TO HER. AND SHE IS JUST FUCKING CRYING. SNIFFLING. WHIMPERING. I HATE THAT SHIT. AND SO DO YOU. I DON'T KNOW WHY YOU PRETEND THAT YOU DON'T. INSTEAD OF JUST SLAPPING THE WEEPY SHIT OFF THEIR FACES. WITH AN EPIC BACKHAND. USING YOUR SUPREME ANIME SWORDMASTER MUSCLES. THAT YOU HAVE BUILT SO EXCELLENTLY. INTO YOUR FLESH. YOU SHOULD DO THAT. YOU SHOULD MAKE A FIST. WITH YOUR STRONGEST HAND. AND HIT THEM IN THEIR SNOTTY SOBBING FACES. SO THEY HAVE SOMETHING TO REALLY CRY ABOUT. AND YOU SHOULD KEEP HITTING THEM. UNTIL THEY STOP CRYING."
"What--okay, you know what? Yeah. I see what's happening here. She got upset and this triggered you somehow, and now you're having a big old tantrum about it."
"I AM NOT TRIGGERED--"
"Yeah, you are."
"I AM NOT."
"You are, though."
"NO."
"Yes."
"NO."
"Yes."
"NO."
"Yes."
"NO."
"Yes," The loop of back-and-forth assertion-and-denial got Pastos sucked into its pattern for a second, but it also gave him enough time to think. His brain feels like its on fire, but in a way where the outside is still made of solid ice. Or maybe his brain is the ice, and the fire is somewhere else. Like in his chest. Or maybe it's Cal. He's ice and Cal is fire. Fire melts ice, ice becomes water, water puts out fire--the anxiety of not having a ready retort ebbs as soon as he finds his words. Thank fuck.
"--and for the record, that's called assault and battery, and I am not going to do that. You sound like an unhinged monster right now, and you're making me sound like one, too. I'm not going to hurt people for no reason."
"I GAVE YOU THE REASON. I EVEN DESCRIBED IT. WITH DETAILS FOR YOUR FULL IMAGINING. LUSCIOUS TECHNICOLOUR DREAMS. LIKE THE MIRROR SHOWED. ALSO YOU ASSAULTED-AND-BATTERIED THAT SNAKE WOMAN. EVEN IF SHE DID HUMILIATE YOU. AND YOU ATE SHIT COMPLETELY. BY SHIT I MEAN DIRT. YOU ATE SO MUCH DIRT AFTER SHE OBLITERATED YOU IN ONE HIT."
"That was for a reason. A real reason, that had nothing to do with her having feelings like a human being." It did seem to have something to do with feelings, but... Neo's feelings, not the snake's. He thinks. Her didn't really care at the time, and he still doesn't. But even if he did, now isn't the time to try and unpack it.
"AND I AM NOT FUCKING TRIGGERED. I AM GIVING YOU ADVICE. THAT YOU SHOULD FOLLOW. YOU KNOW THAT YOU WANT TO. BUT YOU WON'T TAKE IT. EVEN THOUGH THE ADVICE IS EXCELLENT. YOU ARE BASICALLY IGNORING ME. AND IT IS PISSING ME OFF."
"Dude. You are absolutely fucking triggered, and I'm not taking your advice because I'm not a fucking sociopath."
"WHY NOT? WHY NOT BECOME THE SOCIOPATH. IT WOULD BE SO MUCH FUCKING EASIER. FOR BOTH OF US." Why is he acting like this all of a fucking sudden? He loves Cal, and there is no question about that, ever, on any plane of existence, and he knew in his heart that Nova Contra is a being of contrasts, contrariness, and general extremes--but this is unfathomably out-of-pocket even for him. Why is Cal turning on him so suddenly? They're a team.
"Yeah, I'm sure it would be. Not. You're being a real piece of shit right now. Is this some kind of 'me' thing? Some kind of like, untethered Id gone completely rogue? Where the fuck did all of this come from?"
As he speculates aloud, trying to troubleshoot his until-now-faithful (but isn't Cal still faithful, isn't this its own kind of loyalty), he remembers Melly, and the question of Cal's speaking to him, and the thought that follows is desperate and angry and honest in a way that's unequivocally them. Him and Cal, in their private moments, high in their apartment, shut away from a world that aggravates and alienates them endlessly and seemingly without remorse. Which is to say, it's manipulative, it's low, it's passive aggressive and petty--and it comes out of his mouth immediately, without the slightest hint of reservation.
"I bet Melly doesn't talk to Mortis like this--"
"DON'T EVER COMPARE ME TO THAT FAKE KNOCK-OFF COPYCAT TOY. THE MELLY DOLL IS NOTHING. COMPARED TO ME. AND YOU KNOW IT." Pastos isn't sure about that--not least because he's not sure Melly isn't his fault. But Cal knows it--that's what he means when he calls Melly a copycat, a knockoff, and a fake. He hasn't talked to Mortis about this. Hasn't asked any questions, except in private--he's a bit afraid of the answers, but now is not the time, and this is abso-fucking-lutely not the way--
There's a brief flare of panic; he needs Cal to stop, right the fuck now, he needs to shut him up before he starts to suggest it any more fucking clearly--
"Cal. Shut the fuck up. Now."
"I DON'T FUCKING CARE ABOUT HER MELLY DOLL. I COULD NOT CARE EVEN ONE ATOM LESS ABOUT IT. IN FACT. MAYBE I AM EVEN CELEBRATING. WITH CONFETTI. AND CAKE. AND ICE CREAM. EXCEPT THAT NOW SHE'S HERE AND SHE IS BEING A WEEPY LITTLE BITCH. WHICH IS ANNOYING. AND PATHETIC. AND I HATE IT. BUT OTHERWISE. I COULD TO FOR THAT CAKE. AND ICE CREAM. AND CONFETTI. THAT IS HOW LITTLE I CARE ABOUT WHAT THE FAN WAVING HARPOON CATWALK MODEL MAN DID TO HER. OR TO HER MELLY DOLL. I AM CELEBRATING THE LOSS OF HER PATHETIC MELLY DOLL. I HOPE IT STAYS GONE FOREVER. I HOPE IT IS FULL OF HOLES. AND HARPOONS. AND DRIPPING. AND ROTTING. FOREVER. SHE IS LITERALLY CALLING ME FAKE. SHE JUST TRIED TO SAY THAT YOU ARE FAKE. AND YOU ARE DEFENDING HER. LIKE A COWARD."
That one hits like a boxer's slugging fist right in the temple. His head feels like it's ringing--and maybe it is. His heart is racing, dizzyingly fast, nausea washing over him as he stands there, struck dumb for an entire span of multiple seconds by the accusation--the proclamation, and Pastos realises (through his sick feeling and the lightheaded haze) what it is Cal has just struck on.
Betrayal? He thought this was a betrayal?
It is. But not the way he thought.
He thought this was Cal betraying him, when all this time--Cal was calling Pastos out for betraying him.
He kind of wants to puke. His gaze flicks--somewhat pathetically, not that she can see--towards Mortis.
Suspicion--a new kind of paranoia--eclipses the first.
smashes in here with a backtag
Until Contra's grand tirade, that is: Mortis's eyes fill with tears again, though this time her eyes are alight with anger. She pushes herself to her feet with an air of fury, her hands balling into fists.
"Don't you talk about Melly like that! What do you know about her in the first place, anyway? There's nobody more important in the whole world!"
The anxiety, however, has not completely left her. She's still tense with anger, but when she looks back at Pastos, her eyes are uncertain, flickering with fright and concern.
"Pastos..." It doesn't take an in-depth read of the room to know that this is all wrong, and he knows it, too. "Are those the kinds of things your best friend would really say?"
It's not that she doesn't understand the gravity of coming unmoored, but if this isn't the real Contra, then it must be the Abyss — in which case they are not safe.
Subject to edits if my brain reinstalls after yesterday's Ordeals, but--
Pastos, however, hesitates, and lets Cal ramble.
His instincts crash into each other, a twenty-car pileup on a spaghetti junction interchange--what was once a simple tug of war between Mortis and Cal has become much more conflicted and complex, and Pastos was not prepared for it.
The possibility that Cal might not be Cal had not exactly occurred to him, somehow--simply the fact that the puppet accompanying him was Cal was sufficient to make him Cal, to Dirk. There is no constant in his reality more real than Cal. No physical body more solid, no person more enduring, no Other more essential to knowing and feeling like.... well, himself.
Perhaps it speaks to Dirk's faith in his pal that he never, not once, considered the fact that Cal is capable of speech at all to be cause for concern. Or perhaps it speaks to his assumptions about reality, or the nature of the reality he constructs. Within the small sphere of his absolute control, puppets speak because he gives them their voice. In the greater scheme of things--an expansion and extension of his lonely planet that encompasses such phenomena as Peanut Place--it's equally natural for puppets to live and speak without his hand or his voice. Questioning it now is harder than questioning Mortis.
Thankfully, or cursedly, he has already figured out why Cal sounds like this. He just tread that ground ten seconds ago.
"YOUR WORLD IS PUNY. SO YOU THINK IT'S IMPORTANT. BUT IT'S NOT. IT'S NOT IMPORTANT AT ALL. THE MELLY DOLL IS NOTHING. YOU'RE NOTHING. I KNOW MORE ABOUT THE WORLD THAN YOU. THE MELLY DOLL IS A DISTRACTION. YOU ARE TRYING TO CONFUSE US. AND WE ARE NOT FALLING FOR IT."
"--you're the one who's being distracting, asshole." He glances at Mortis. "He sounds like that because of me. I'm not a very nice person."
He sounds... more dry, and more tired, than expected out of his deadpan. Still flat, still drawled, just... flavoured with exhausted impatience.
"Bad role model." Is Cal the bad role model, or is it Dirk whose whose influence on Cal has led them to this?
It's an ouroboros, of course. Cal's tirade continues over his shoulder, the dummy's jaw clattering in a frenzied rush of words.
"WHO FUCKING CARES. I DON'T CARE. AND NEITHER DO YOU. I DON'T KNOW WHY YOU ARE PRETENDING TO CARE. LIKE IT ISN'T PATHETIC. AND BORING. I DON'T KNOW WHICH ONE IS MORE DISGUSTING: ACTUALLY CARING ABOUT THAT SHIT. OR PRETENDING TO CARE. BUT KNOCK IT THE FUCK OFF."
Dirk's jaw clenches, and he takes a breath in through his nose. Balancing his temper here is actually becoming a real challenge. Is he pissed at Cal, or at himself? It's hard to keep up, especially when Cal keeps alternating between agreeing with him, arguing with him, and just throwing him under the fucking bus. And then Mortis, and Melly, and--
"Can we please just fucking focus?"
"ON WHAT? THE MELLY DOLL? NO. SHUT UP. SHUT UP ABOUT THE MELLY DOLL NOW."
no subject
"You shut up!"
She's on her feet, and her posture is no longer small and scared, but alive with electric anger. Her golden eyes blaze with a sharp light as she lifts her chin.
"Enough already! I know you're trying to intimidate me, but I'm not scared of you! And I won't let you talk to my friend like that!"
no subject
"YOUR FRIEND? HIM? THAT'S SO FUNNY IT MAKES ME ACTUALLY LAUGH. HOO HOO. I AM LAUGHING SO HARD. HAA HAA. HEE HEE. I AM PRACTICALLY ROLLING ON THE FLOOR. LAUGHING MY SUPPLE COTTON-PLUSH RUMP RIGHT THE FUCK OFF. HOO HOO HOO HEE HEE HAA. AND SO ON."
He's not surprised that Cal didn't let him sit in that for very long--but the result is that the shock has little time to develop any lustre, gratitude or affection are prevented before they take root. He is left with the feeling that this is simply how he really feels--when he's not tricking himself into a version of reality that not only doesn't exist, it very much can't exist. Still, though--his jaw clenches.
"If she says we're friends, then it sounds to me like we're friends. That's not your call." It's a weak defence, and he knows it. After the brief, bewildering breath-stealing high of being seen as a friend to anyone--let alone somneone he wanted around like he did Mortis--reality is a cold bitch. But the core assumption--that he mattered begin with, that she trusted him--was validated, and that's enough.
Enough to defend, and to protect. Even... it stings a bit to think of it this way, but... even from Cal. He thinks.
It doesn't matter what he thinks, though. Cal just rolls his eyes (when did he get the ability to do that?)
"HE'S NOT YOUR FRIEND. YOU THINK HE IS. THAT'S BECAUSE HE TRICKED YOU INTO THINKING HE WAS. HE TRICKED YOU TO MAKE YOU THINK THAT HE WAS NOT JUST YOUR FRIEND. BUT SOMEONE WHO IS CAPABLE OF BEING A FRIEND. TO YOU. OR TO ANYONE. (EXCEPT ME.) THAT WAS HIS TRICK. AND YOU FELL FOR IT!!!"
"No. No, no, no. Don't even--that's not fucking funny. I get that you're jealous or whatever and I--we can talk that out, okay? But you can't just fucking say that shit. You can't tell her that. Are you even listening to me? Fucking--stop, asshole, don't--"
"NOW. LITTLE GIRL. LISTEN TO ME VERY CLOSELY. OKAY? ARE YOU LISTENING TO ME NOW. AND NOT YELLING. OR CRYING. OR--NO? YES? WHATEVER. GOOD. SO THIS ISN'T YOUR FAULT. UNLIKE THE MELLY DOLL THING. YOU DON'T KNOW HIM. YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT HE'S REALLY LIKE. HOW NASTY HE IS. HOW HE TWISTS THINGS. YOU SEE HOW HE PRETENDS TO BE. I SEE THE REAL HIM. ALL OF HIS DESPICABLE LITTLE SECRETS. LIKE THE THINGS HE DOES TO ME. THE THINGS HE DOES WHEN NO ONE ELSE IS LOOKING. THE THINGS HE THINKS ABOUT. WHEN IT'S JUST US TWO. I DO. I KNOW. I KNOW EVERYTHING THAT HE KNOWS. I SEE EVERYTHING HE DOES. I AM HIS FRIEND BECAUSE I KNOW. AND BECAUSE. I ACCEPT HIM. HIM AND ALL THE VILE, PERVERSE THINGS HE WANTS TO DO. AND LIKES TO WATCH. AND--"
Pastos does something extremely uncharacteristic of him:
He grabs Lil Cal violently by the face, his big scarred hand closing over the puppet's mouth and forcing it shut in a sudden fit of. Well. Some kind of emotion, which is--for once--written clear on his face. He yanks the doll off his shoulder in a single fluid movement, and--
And stops. He stands, staring down at Mortis.
Cal dangles, his head mostly engulfed by Dirk's hand and its iron grip.
"....."
no subject
She jumps a little when Pastos takes direct action against Contra, and her eyes widen — not in fear, but in validation, anticipation, perhaps even a little triumph. Pastos has acknowledged her as a friend, and that counts for something much more than all of Contra's sneering condemnation.
Her eyes are shining when she meets Pastos's gaze. There's hope in those eyes — no warm comfort, but the promise of the handle of a pan on a hot stove. There is no safety in the Abyss, no sure thing, only what you can close your hands around and hold on tight, no matter how much it burns. Mortis takes a step toward the two of them, tilting her head to the side before leaning in close to Contra.
"I don't care," she tells him. It's almost a taunt. "I don't care! He's a Nova Knight, and he's put his life on the line to protect me. I already know everything about him that I really need to know."
Her voice drops, almost sotto voce, though her gaze burns like refracted light. "Everyone has thoughts they don't want to share. Everyone has a part of themselves they don't want to show to anyone else, knowing they might be rejected for it. I know you're going for shock value here, but you're trying too hard."
Who here is trying too hard? And what darkness resides deep in the Death knight, who used to keep to near silence?
"That's not a reason to keep away from other people. That's just your excuse for keeping him all to yourself."
It's not as though Mortis doesn't have at least a partial grasp on the subtleties of Contra and Pastos's intertwined existence, so it's not clear entirely what she means by it. But her conviction is unwavering, and she looks back up at Pastos with eyes unclouded by doubt or fear.
"I don't care," she says, to him this time. "About any of it."
She holds out a hand, tiny and pale in the Abyss's dark wasteland. There's no guarantee he won't get burned, but what other safety is there to seek?
no subject
That can't be true, of course--he's selfish to the core and he knows that, and if he's not selfish then he's pragmatic, and that's no better when it comes at someone else's expense. But something about the way she says it--sounding stronger and more certain than he's ever heard her--penetrates his mental armour and presses up against his raw, bare, beating heart. Pastos' brows furrow over his shades.
He wants to say something.
No. Want is the wrong word. He doesn't want to say something. He doesn't want to say anything at all. He doesn't want to speak, doesn't want to comment, to contradict, to correct.
But he thinks he should. He thinks he should say something. He thinks--no.
He knows he should something. He knows he should say a lot of things.
He knows that.
And he really, really--for once in his way-too-long, way-too-lonely life--does not want to.
He stares at her for a long second, stony and still, then lowers his gaze to stare at the hand extended in his direction--so much smaller and more delicate than his own.
He swallows--and for once, he stays silent. His calloused hand remains closed over Cal's face, forcing the puppet's mouth closed, though the puppet is none too pleased with him, and has now begun to... squirm? Cal's legs and arms are wriggling, just the tiniest bit. He shakes the doll a little--correctively--and then looks back at Mortis. A muscle in his jaw works, moving visibly as he suppresses the words he is trying so hard not to say. He can feel emotion welling behind his eyes, and it physically hurts to have it there. Growing. Swelling. Burning. It hurts so goddamn much. But he can't bring himself to back away from it. Even though he should. He should stop this here.
But he doesn't.
There is a metaphor here--maybe several of them. About flying too high, perhaps. About hope, and moths and flames. But there's something much less highbrow in play as well.
The child who is not embraced by the village will burn it down to feel its warmth, or so someone claimed someone else said, but can a child really be said to be denied village's embrace if the village itself doesn't exist? If a child who was never personally hurt, and who went unembraced simply because there was no one to embrace him, instead creates his own village, and wraps himself in that embrace, has he lost anything? Has he suffered? What is there to resent if no one has wronged him?
And if he grows up unfamiliar with real warmth, if he grows cold and tough and calloused and numb, what would it take for him to recognise warmth? How hot must it burn before he can feel it? At what intensity will he be able to feel its heat from the distance he's keeping? And when he reaches for it, if must then sear through emptiness and apathy and thick skin and deadened nerves to reach something alive? What does that feel like?
Love? Comfort?
Hope?
Slowly--and still silently--he takes Cal's soft off-white mitten hand in his, rubbing a scarred thumb over the worn and comforting fabric. Cal stops struggling for a moment, and he lets his hand close over it. He takes a deep breath. Steadying. Stabilising. Strengthening.
Then with that same hand, he reaches out towards hers. He casts a short, pointed look at Cal (still forcibly restrained in his other hand) before looking down at her outstretched hand opening his again and taking it--enclosing her small, pale hand in his own, and folding his puppet's unresisting hand between the two.
Warily--almost apprehensively--he glances back up to see her face. He's already braced for whatever he might see.
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She closes her other hand over the back of Pastos's, completing what feels like a hug in miniature with a surprisingly fierce grip. Hope reflects in her golden eyes once more, not quite as timid as she had been before. She'd sought his help and his protection in the first place; she still needs those things, wants those things from him.
"Will you help me find her?"
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Just kidding, no it doesn't.
'It' was already fucking done and dusted.
As soon as Mortis called him a friend, a protector, a hero--his ass was done, cooked, and served up piping hot on a platter to whatever the Abyss could want of him. The warmth of her hands--strong and callused from her guitar but still so miniature and seemingly delicate against his heat-and-steel toughened skin--makes his breath freeze in his lungs, his heartrate spiking into a kind of panicked, emotional Ken Tucker Derby finish line sprint.
In some ways, his heart isn't unlike a horse. Powerfully performance-built, sensitive and flighty, prone to catastrophic injury that render euthanasia the kindest option.
The adrenaline spike is adding to the level of anxiety to this moment in a way that really wasn't necessary for Dirk to be aware of how desperate he feels. The need to meet this moment, this call to live up to and be.
Be what? Be someone worth being. Someone worth trusting, someone who can not only care about another person but make good on it. To earn--to deserve--that trust. He feels lightheaded from the sudden pressure. And maybe tachycardia.
He keeps his hand where it rests, sandwiched firmly between Cal's and Mortis'--unable and unwilling to take his hand back until Mortis does hers.
His gaze flicks to Cal--still forcibly silenced.
"Yeah. We're going to find her." He turns his head to directly address Cal.
"I don't want to hear any shit from you like that ever again. You've been overruled. I'm the one in control here." Cal's bright, unblinking eyes track him--then turn to Mortis, then back to him again, and so on. Pastos narrows his own eyes--tired and yet too-sharp--behind his shades. He doesn't let go of Cal's face. Not yet.
"Not you. So don't make me put my hand up there."
.... hopefully no one has forgotten Lil Cal is a ventriloquist's dummy.
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Mortis tugs lightly on their hands before releasing them, turning out to gaze at the jagged horizon cloaked in eternal night. A chill wind whistles through the Abyss, sweeping her hair away from her face.
"Come on! I know she has to be around here somewhere...we're just separated. They couldn't have really taken her away from me."
She sounds like she's probably trying to convince herself, but she's putting on a brave face nonetheless: she's moving forward, step by little step. They wander the barren landscape for what feels like a small eternity while Mortis calls Melly's name, but the longer they're in the Abyss, the harder it is to tell just how much time has passed.
The only changes in the otherwise featureless wasteland are changes in elevation: what seem like mountains loom on the horizon, but nothing here seems to consistently obey the laws of perspective, and it's just as hard to judge distances as it is time. One of the mountains in the distance seems to be pulling itself closer to them with every step, and the moon looms too low, too close for it to look quite right.
Mortis comes to an abrupt halt mid-step, glancing around with wide eyes, searching for the source of a sound that only she can hear.
"Melly?" She turns, a quarter at a time, as though by some psychic echolocation. "Her voice...I can hear her..."
As she turns to face the encroaching mountain, it seems to have all but landed at their feet, and Mortis's eyes brighten with the light of conviction. "I can hear her! I know where she is! Melly, just hold on!"
Just a few feet above ground level is the mouth to a yawning cavern that seems to lead directly to the heart of the mountain, and Mortis is for sure heading right for it.
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And this time neither does Contra.
Pastos starts to follow almost as soon as Mortis pulls his hand forward, but he doesn't let go of Contra immediately. It's not until she's let him go and her eyes are off of them both that he lets go of the puppet's face, transferring him from hand to hand, this time gripping him by one plush arm.
Cal dangles and stares back at him, eyes unfocused and bright as ever. He doesn't say anything. Not a peep. He does, however, wrap his arms around Dirk's--almost beseechingly. This puts a brief pause in Dirk's step--not a faltering, not exactly, but a beat of surprise that immediately softens into clemency.
He tilts his head, inviting his bro back up onto his shoulders before transferring him the rest of the way himself. The feeling of those long, cotton-fill limbs wrapping securely around his neck, the heavy solidity of Cal's head bobbing in time with his footsteps... it feels like forgiveness.
And why wouldn't it? It's Cal, after all.
And he just can't stay mad at Cal.
--
Pastos follows in Mortis' wake--mostly silent, always close. He doesn't call out for Melly, but he keeps a sharp eye out. So does Cal, which he appreciates. But for what, he doesn't know. Melly, obviously. But also Reese, or corpses, or anything else that might appear. Hour after hour, though, yields nothing of the sort. It's hard for him to tell how many hours, or how far they've walked--there's no reliable landmarking, and navigation isn't his strength anyway. He doesn't even try. There's no point.
He doesn't tire the way he probably should. Sleep is a distant orbital body, fatigue might be closer but it takes a perfect eclipse of the two to stop him under normal circumstances--and these are anything but. It's almost harder to move at Mortis' slow pace--she's so much smaller and so fixated on Melly that her pace is positively glacial by his standards. It gives him way too much time to think, and worry--about what he's doing, about what he's not doing. About whether they'll find the doll, and whether they won't find her. What he'll do if that happens, or this happens, or this or that doesn't happen... it's like one long, sustained attack of anxiety and paranoia that rises and ebbs and rises and ebbs inside of him, feeding on the monotony and lack of progress. Boredom, worst of all, threatens him and his conviction to do right by one human being.
And the only thing he can do is the same thing he's ever been able to do. Which is to not quit and not complain.
When Mortis stops suddenly, he almost trips on her.
For a moment, there's relief, even... well, maybe not excitement, that might be too strong a word, but anticipation. He focuses, quickly; then she starts to bolt, and he sees where she's going, and--
And it is a goddamn good thing that Dirk Strider has spent untold hours drilling himself and his reflexes to unrealistic and frankly unnecessary standards, because even caught off guard, his hands are faster than her legs.
His left hand snatches her by the back of her cowl and yanks her back, almost jerking her off her feet in the process.
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Mortis lets out a noise of surprise as Pastos forcibly pulls her back, her shoes scrabbling briefly over the unforgiving ground. She shakes loose of his grip and turns around to face him with some kind of fear-driven indignation.
"What are you doing? She's in there! I have to get to her!"
There's real urgency in her voice, like she can't bear to be separated from her doll much longer.
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It's not a suggestion; it's a command. And he stands over her, ready to move the instant she shows the slightest indication of bolting. It's not a matter of thinking that she would or wouldn't--it's about himself, and his ability to intervene on cue. It's about being ready, and covering every base that no one else has. Which, in this case, is every base except 'communicating with the Melly doll.'
"Don't fucking run off. If you go sprinting off without me and end up alone, what then? This could be a trap, and you almost ran right into it--we can go in there and be smart about it, but we have to be smart. You got that?"
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"Okay, fine! I won't! You don't have to be so mean about it." She lets out a small huff, but even through the sulky look, it's clear she's being driven by anxiety. "So let's go inside together, then. I think she's all alone in there. I'm not going to leave her like that!"
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Or at least, most of present company. Dirk hasn't forgotten Cal's disruptive outbursts.
Which is why he casts a sharp look sideways--but Cal simply meets his eyes with a stare full of charming devotion. Maybe he's mollified by the implication?
...
"She won't be any less alone if you're dead. Remember that."
Not like he doesn't know a thing or two about being left alone... he takes a deep breath, bracing himself for the decision he's already made.
"Here--" he shifts Cal on his shoulders, letting the puppet's arm dangle down next to him. "Take Cal's hand, and--"
"FUCK NO. THAT'S DISGUSTING. I DON'T WANT HER TO TOUCH ME. WITH HER NASTY SWEATY SOFT GIRL MITTS."
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"No! I'm not holding hands with him." She holds her hand out to Pastos with a stubborn little pout. "I want to hold hands with you!"
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"Oh, come on." He says it quietly. Not quietly enough to be inaudible. And it's not clear which of the two he's talking to--both of them, neither of them, one or the other, take your pick.
The tone is pretty clear, though.
"This isn't the time to get precious. I can't do your job because you've suddenly decided to independently invent the idea of cooties," he snaps at Cal. Then, turning to Mortis, he hits a slightly kinder--but no less hard--line.
"This isn't negotiable." There is a pause, however--unlike Cal, Mortis doesn't have the explanations. Her desire to hold his hand is... not unreasonable, he realises that. Considering the way Cal has been. And it is, on some level, gratifying to Dirk. The fact that she wants his hand, to hang onto him and feel... safer that way, as opposed to Cal. Even if it's because Cal is being a total shitheel. He's protecting her, and she wants him to be her protector.
But he needs her to do what he says. Even if that means... explaining himself. At least enough to get her on board.
"I need both of my hands free. All right? I need them to. Uh. To hold my sword. And that kind of thing. So just do what I say and hang onto Cal."
From his back, Cal stares at her. His arm sways a little from the movement that dropped it to Dirk's side in the first place.
His face is, as ever, unchanging.
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"Okay, fine!" Mortis takes hold of Cal's hand with a definite air of resentment, but she is resolute. "But if he says another word about Melly, he's going to have to say sorry."
Odd how she makes it sound more like he's going to be sorry. She whirls back around to look at Pastos, impatience starting to get the better of her.
"Now can we go?"
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Truthfully, Dirk expected more resistance. But he desperately, desperately did not want that resistance, and so when Mortis and Cal concedes without any kind of actual fight, he actually slips up enough to let out a heavy lungful of breath he didn't know he'd been holding.
"You got it," he affirms, and even flashes Mortis a right-handed thumbs-up, readying his sword in his dominant hand. Her threat to Cal hardly registered, and falls below the threshold of acknowledgement--and it would have even if he wasn't desperately trying to get her to cooperate with his plans. He doesn't think Mortis is actually capable of hurting Cal--not in any way that matters.
As for Cal himself? His arm hangs just as limply and unanimatedly as it always has. Dirk appreciates that.
"Don't worry. If we get separated, Contra will protect you."
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