charon's obol — bastian. & nico.
Jun 13, 2019 5:22:10 GMT -5
Post by gunner, d9 ₊⊹ 👹 ɢʀɪғғɪɴ. on Jun 13, 2019 5:22:10 GMT -5
we overcome the sirens
we look both left and right
and I can feel the numbness
accompany my plight
we look both left and right
and I can feel the numbness
accompany my plight
Bastian lived with omens, premonitions.
He was a songbird, capable of picking up a distant storm from miles away, a weasel going into frenzy before an earthquake, a wolf howling at the darkness and what lurked amongst it. The moment he stumbled into the training center last year, cheeks flushed and heartbeats feverish, he could almost see the gossamer veil of Death suspended over Myrcella Hudson’s beautiful, petite form. But, even beneath its dirtied veil, her beauty shone through—she was a young bride, wedding bells aloud around her, waiting for her spouse at a white altar. Only Bastian and Ulysses were there to see her, and both of them weren’t good enough to take her hand in marriage.
So, they jilted her
at the white altars,
to rot and decay.
Bastian regretted that till this very day and the guilt that wound its claws around his heart when Myrcella fell had yet to loosen its grasp. At least now, Bastian Fray had all parts of a war howling within him: violence, rage, surrender, and guilt. He was not a creature of war anymore, but the war itself. The moment Myrcella died, any hope of an armistice for this violence within him died with her. His name was a regular in the district’s sparring rings, where teeth ran loose and every man was a bruised statue, purple galaxies scattered across their bodies.
He fought others, men bigger, quicker, and stealthier than him, but all Bastian could see on the other side of the area was himself—a furious part of him that would have done anything to rescue Myrcella from her fate, a howling part of him that screamed obscenities at his cowardice.
The more he lost, the more he crumbled.
And, whenever he won the fights, the only spoils of war he got were technicolor-bright flashbacks of Myrcella crashing to the earth, graceful like a ballerina after she’d danced to her swan-song, knees buckling and eyes aflame. She was a star he let slip from his fingers, who, with no sky to live in, exploded to a thousand, bright pieces. To this day, Bastian refused to lay his eyes on a horseshoe. They were said to be talismans, the horseshoes: pieces of metal that, when hung with the ends pointing upwards, collected good luck in its metal curve. But for Myrcella Hudson, they collected her doom, her untimely death.
It was a bleak day, like all days had been, cold with unthawed frost clinging to fern leaves and condensation across the windows. But, it was also the day Nico Thorne was supposed to arrive at One for his victory tour;
the tour for a king with twelve-three un-resting spirits laced to his haunted crown. For Nico, his spoils of war were guilt and ghosts conjured by this guilt—the same as Bastian’s. He was the one who crawled out of the arena Myrcella went to die in, and Bastian had to meet him.
He breathed out a wisp of fog,
folding his arms over his chest, the worn jacket he had on, tattered from wear, offering not much protection from the weather outside.
After the victor had arrived and been introduced to the district, which greeted him with rapturous applause that should be reserved for a festival, not a funeral, Bastian parted through the crowd, eyes glued to Nico Thorne’s form. In the winter light, he was a mere boy, a teenage veteran, someone who’d seen death and spit at its gnarled face. The barbed wire that he’d seen flash between his teeth had been removed but he was still a soul scratched and frayed at its edges. Bastian understood the feeling, or at least he thought he did. He also mused that if it was him instead of Saturn who’d went with Myrcella, he would have reigned victorious over Nico.
Thorns were no match for iron.
“Nico, right?” Bastian started, clutching his hands into taut fists in his jacket’s pockets.
“Victor,” he added with a small grin that was as hollow as a bullet-hole. “I am Bastian Fray—the last name should sound very familiar to you—but you can call me Baz, for short.” He wondered why he was reluctant to skip to the main topic at hand, the main reason he’d sought after the boy. After making a sharp intake of breath that chilled the cavern of his mouth, Bastian spewed the words out.
“Myrcella Hudson was my comrade.”
The moment the words left his mouth, Bastian became confused with what he’d come here for. He was all equal parts grief and fury, mourning and anger, but also he knew that Nico Thorne played no role in Myrcella’s tragic end. He came here simply to see fragments of Myrcella in Nico, the way the arena could have ruined her if she’d gotten out alive and, like Nico Thorne, half intact. “I don’t know why I am here,” he admitted, words a trembling laugh, ocean eyes beginning to spill salt-water.
“I guess I just wanted to be assured that she was a great warrior, and a soulful girl, that she used every ounce of strength within her to fight for own life. Did she, Nico? Myrcella didn’t give up easily, right?
Tell me I am right—assure me.”
and i know that someday i'll see you
but now you're out of sight
and you'll kiss me like you used to
in the january night
but now you're out of sight
and you'll kiss me like you used to
in the january night
lyrics : big thief — mary
words : 919
( takes place during 81st victory tour )
