la vie en noir ; beck & talon

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[nyte]
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la vie en noir ; beck & talon May 11, 2022 19:34:13 GMT -5

Post by [nyte] on May 11, 2022 19:34:13 GMT -5

B E C K .

y o u s h o u l d n ' t w a s t e a p r e t t y f a c e

What a terrible way to die. The thought sticks to the back of his throat, turning cigarette smoke sour as it coils in his lungs. Caged in a machine so easily mistaken for salvation until it steals your final breath. Packed in a room with a dozen or so strangers he can't stand, Beck finds a strange sympathy in unorthodox chains.

At least he was alone in the eye of his storm, at least there he felt safe enough to unravel. Everyone is looking at Talon right now, and they've made sure they know that.

Nine days built up to a single, inconsequential second. Talon's dagger sinks into Ellis Gallagher's mech - nothing more than a macabre glint beneath neon lights.

The canon that follows is deafened by the roar of gluttonous pride around him. Beck watches as they tear what is already half dead to pieces, eager to claim scraps of Talon's victory as their own. It happens every year, but watching the vultures descend twice in a row has left him pissed off and a little bit nauseous.

Beck exhales a string of expletives alongside toxins, ducking under a camera lens and shoving its operator back toward the buffet table. Acting out is no longer weakness, all anxious thoughts and desperate attempts at escape. These days Beck has found himself hoping to hurt. There's all this anger in him and he's still searching for a single fucking outlet.

"Where are you going?" Someone, a stranger or a friend he can't tell over the roaring in his ears, calls out to him.

"To make sure Talon is okay."

At first Talon hadn't been their own person to Beck. It's a shame but it's true that every time he looked into those eyes he saw Turner. Talon was nothing more than the ghost of one of his victims, a grotesque reminder of an earlier fuck up. Maybe the fame has made him self-obsessed or it was just easier to make Talon into something he'd already lost.

He thought he'd done well enough this time around, then Talon fought Parker and, of course, he realized he'd come to love them both in spite of it all. That was the worst night he'd had in a while so he tries not to dwell on the details.

This is all new to him, this weight in his chest turned to restless pacing outside of the infirmary door. Annie hadn't been around to help him and Nixie hadn't needed his support.

Talon - he wants to protect Talon. He thinks, at least, that's what this feeling is. He doesn't to watch those wounds scar over, knotted tissue to hide all the exposed nerve and open emotion that makes them the only victor in District Four worth a damn. Talon Grey is genuinely good and Beck doesn't know what to do with that.

"You're cleared for entry, Mr. Hailsham."

He levels the nurse with a glare, always eager to shoot the messenger - "No shit, I'm their mentor."

No less restless than he was outside the room, he quickly realizes it's still a fucking waiting game. With a long suffering sigh, he pulls out the chair beside their bed and winces at the way it shrieks. "Sorry." He apologizes to thin air because it feels like the right thing to do. "For the noise. I mean. I didn't want people apologizing to me after I-"

He chastises himself, picking at the sheets beside Talon's hand because he doesn't know if the new victor would even want that comfort. "What am I doing?" His exhale breaks into a nervous laugh, six years is an exceptionally long time to go on being the same kind of useless. "You can't even hear me I'm just,"

He thinks of the day he woke up and all the parts of him that were still in that jungle. Of the nights she still calls him back to her. "trying to fill the silence." And everything that may hide within. "It doesn't feel real, yet. I don't know what to do now that you're back." He sinks his teeth into his cheek, more honest than he should be because there's no one to hear, "I'm so glad you are, though, Talon. Thank you for coming home."

[elegant]

Last Edit: May 11, 2022 19:34:35 GMT -5 by [nyte]

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la vie en noir ; beck & talon May 11, 2022 20:56:55 GMT -5

Post by Arrows on May 11, 2022 20:56:55 GMT -5

t a l o n .

"you are weak
but not foolish
you have learned
how to die."

The last thing I see is Parker's crown. Low lit against a backdrop of darkness, a scrapyard of loss, it begins to waver. There are hands wrapping around me, faces I don't know that actually aren't trying to kill me, but all I see is that virtual little light beginning to fizzle. Voices are telling me to come inside and sit, but my hands, still sheathed in paint and blood, are reaching out as if they can actually catch the crown before it goes. I can just begin see the rays of dawn streaking across the dusty dunes of the arena as something stings into my arm. Then all I can do is fall into sleep as I watch the last fractal of light die away.

The beach is quiet as my toes wriggle in the sodden sand. There's a low gale gusting out from the south sea, but its breath isn't cold. I wonder how long I've been sitting here, waiting for the sunrise to sneak through the morning marine layer. I've watched the same seagull try to dive into the ocean for a fresh fish at least a dozen times. Each time it emerges with nothing more than a frock of watered down feathers. I almost feel kind of bad for it. It just kind of seems like it's-

"Trapped, right?"

I wince my eyes as the icy water rolls off of his wetsuit and splashes across my skin. He's such an ass. My eyes roll as I pull my legs tighter against my chest watching the waves rolling in over themselves. He's right though, per usual. The poor thing just seems stuck in the same cycle, endlessly failing. "It's sad."

Turner sits in the sand next to me running a bar of wax along the edge of his board. His hair is still soaked from the most recent swell. He only looks up at the bird for a second before shrugging. "It doesn't have to be. It has wings, it could go anywhere the fuck it wants. Somewhere with actual fish."

"You don't know that." My head shakes before my forehead falls onto my knees. Maybe it can't, maybe it has a family here or it's hurt. There could be a million reasons for why it has to stay. Not everything is as simple as flying away.

Finished with his board, Turner stands looking down at me with that same ice blue stare that's haunted me ever since I was just a kid. I feel like there's something that I'm not understanding, that he isn't saying. What does any of this have to do with a seagull? Why am I even here? "You made it back to the beach, Talon. Are you gonna stay here and get dragged back out by the waves or are you gonna finally get up and leave?"

It's cold now, I'm floating in a pool of paint watching the stars give way to dawn. I can feel my toes tingling and there's a warmth on the tip of my tongue. Out of the silence surrounding me, I hear a shriek followed by a whisper. Someone is saying something, but I'm just here floating. I can't see them, I can't talk to them, but I can tell they're close.

"It doesn't feel real, yet. I don't know what to do now that you're back." The tingling has spread like embers across my body sparking small spurring flames of warmth throughout me. I can feel my toes twitching. I can feel my fingers slowly starting to tap to life. The pool around me is fading into darkness, but there is a weight over my eyes: a curtain I feel like I can lift. "I'm so glad you are, though, Talon. Thank you for coming home."

My eyes open into small slits staring into pure fog. Something is beeping, somewhere a phone is ringing, and there's a figure in the fog. I hear the beeping start to increase and my eyes begin to blink away the harshness of the mists hanging over them. As things begin to focus, as the hospital room around me begins to take form, it comes crashing back over me: the crown, Ellis, the arena. I won. I was hurt. They knocked me out. Wait did they-

"What did they give me?!" My body lurches upright causing my head to suddenly pang with pain.

"Ack!" Both my hands raise up to where a bandage has been wrapped around my head. I remember the wire cutting free after Ellis' attack and the red rivers that ran over my eyes. I sit there for a moment, my fingers tracing the fabric before my eyes find the person by my side: Beck Hailsham. I vaguely remember the sound of a voice.

So it's real, I'm alive. I'm not just alive, I'm a Victor. Oh my ripred, I- Another pang passes through my head. "Did they give me anything? I- I can't have anything or- or I'll- and I can't, not after-"

I got clean in there because of them. They're all dead, I can't already be high. Am I high? Would they give me something knowing what I am? Did they have to? I'm too worked up to even be able to tell if I am or not. All I can feel is the throbbing in my head and the way my breaths are starting to shake my chest. Something falls onto the back of one of my palms and I realize it's a tear. When did I start crying?

My eyes, wells of water, look up and find those of the man by my side. My mouth hangs open not being able to say more than: "I-" before my head falls right into the chest of the older boy, no, older Victor.

elegant

Graphic by the Breathtakingly Talented Stare