Night in the Forest

[mogget_cat]

Yrael comes down the outside bypass stairs, not wanting to have to take the time to pass through the bar. In there, he might be stopped or questioned before getting to retreat to the relative quiet of the forest at night.

He strides out into the trees, his bare feet silent in the grass and moist soil, on rock and tree root.

He wants... he doesn't know what he wants.

Comments

[ten_of_swords]

And Ruin is there in the trees, Bane absent, and a faint smile is on his lips as he steps into Yrael's path.

"I told you, Yrael. You don't matter anymore."

[mogget_cat]

Yrael snarls with the force of a Bright Shiner's Voice as he shifts his direction slightly to go around Ruin, not breaking stride. "You do not want to talk to me."

Though perhaps, most truthfully, it is vice-versa.

[ten_of_swords]

The warnings in that voice, the fear it tries to evoke in him, is disregarded without pause. Ruin has faced down more powerful, more frightening beings than Yrael, and his own immortality gives him a certain feeling of security.

And so he steps to the side, again placing him in Yrael's path.

"I think, Yrael, that it is you who doesn't want to talk because you'll have to verbally admit what both of us know." His eyes flash, like liquid silver in the moonlight. "He's up there, snorting coke off the carpet while Nathaniel tries not to weep at the hopelessness of it all. Your words... touched nothing."

[mogget_cat]

Yrael growls, stopping within inches of Ruin. He is shorter than Ruin, his eyes around the level of Ruin's nose. Yrael, at his on-edge state, is radiating heat like a human-shaped oven.

He speaks at Ruin's collarbone, voice low, quick and sharp. "Remember what I said about there being consequences for your choices, as well? You might want to be considering the possible repercussions right about now."

[ten_of_swords]

Ruin doesn't hesitate.

"I'm well aware of the consequences, Yrael."

He was a servant of the sentients, no matter what the sentient needed. Ruin doesn't back down.

[mogget_cat]

"You're going to be painfully aware of a few more, if you don't leave me alone," Yrael warns, his hands curling into fists. He turns to walk away again, at an angle into the forest.

[ten_of_swords]

He doesn't follow Yrael, but he calls after him.

"He'd rather die than let any of you help him." Ruin looks over his shoulder. "Then again, you never could save yourself, so why should you have thought you could save him, Mogget?"

[mogget_cat]

The name is still halfway on Ruin's lips when Yrael turns, lip curling in a snarl, and leaps upon the Tarot Card from behind. The hands and feet meeting Ruin's shoulders and back are no longer remotely human, as each finger and toe has elongated into sharp, curved claws the color of old ivory.

[ten_of_swords]

The Bright Shiner wasn't as quiet as perhaps he hoped, and Ruin is already in motion when the claws make contact. Ruin throws himself forward, muting some of the impact. When he hits the ground on all fours, he rolls to his left. Then, counting on Yrael to follow the instinct to remain upright and move right, Ruin drives his right elbow back and up and is rewarded with the crunch of bone against face.

[mogget_cat]

Yrael growls at the impact, quickly darting forward to sink his no-longer-remotely-human teeth into the flesh and tendons of Ruin's arm at the elbow with great force. His right side takes his weight, leaving his left hand claws free to rake savagely across Ruin's back and side where he can reach.

[ten_of_swords]

Ruin howls in pain and fury. He hooks his wounded arm around Yrael's neck, continuing his roll to peel the not'cat off his back. The stray rocks on the ground dig into the claw marks on his back, but he just grimaces and keeps rolling until he's back on his feet and a couple of yards away.

"Claws and teeth. I must have really hit a nerve. The little puppy must mean a lot to you."

[mogget_cat]

Yrael hangs on, digging his claws in as much as he can, but eventually his grip gives way, leaving him to return to his feet. He balances on the balls of his feet, his claws leaving small furrows in the ground.

"Seems like what you were going for," he growls, low, licking a left hand claw clean. "Jason's my brother. Would you expect some other reaction? Expect me to say 'Thanks for repeatedly poking at the fact that my brother is destroying himself and I'm unable to help him. I really needed that'?"

[ten_of_swords]

Ruin laughs, the sound rough with pain, but he exerts enough of his own power to heal the worst of it.

"It's about time you saw the truth of the situation. I knew you weren't so stupid as to believe it when it's right in your damn face."

[mogget_cat]

"You will never be able to convince me not to help Jason in whatever ways I can, Ruin, even if I cannot save him in the end. You are not so powerful as all that," Yrael growls.

"Even if he is no longer really the Jason I knew, loved and considered my brother. That Jason is not completely dead yet."

He has seen glimpses of him, these past few weeks.

[ten_of_swords]

"Not yet."

He remains alert though, muscles coiled.

"But well on his way."

[mogget_cat]

"It is not altogether certain that he will, until he does," Yrael insists.

He holds out hope.

"Given the right trigger, he can turn aside, even up until the last moment."

[ten_of_swords]

"He can only save himself, Yrael," he says with a wince. "It's his choice. It's... always been his choice."

[mogget_cat]

"Yes," he says. "I know."

"But if I can still seem glimpses of my brother in him, there is a chance that he will be able to."

[ten_of_swords]

Ruin straightens up, though he groans briefly, and shakes his head.

"For his sake, I hope you're right."

[mogget_cat]

"You sound like I used to." Yrael exhales a quick, unhappy laugh.

"It's for my sake, too, you know. I'll sleep better when I know he can smile and not make me cringe with how false it rings."

[ten_of_swords]

"I know."

And he does.

Ruin leans against a tree.

"Your sleep, though, is going to be as restless as it has been for a while yet."

[mogget_cat]

Yrael growls in frustration, but it's only partially directed at Ruin.

"Tell me something I don't know."

[ten_of_swords]

Since Yrael asked...

"JD's Bar-B-Q has great ribs if you're in the mood for pork."

[mogget_cat]

Yrael eyes Ruin in a way that says perhaps Yrael doesn't have time for Ruin's crazy, today.


Then the curiosity strikes.



"Got an address?"

[ten_of_swords]

"Woodstock, Georgia. Great place."

He laughs, the sound tired and worn.

"It's my job, Yrael. Nothing more. It will end, one way or another, soon enough."

[mogget_cat]

"I'll see if I can find a door there," he commits it to memory.



"I understand," he says. And he really does. He just doesn't feel pity for him. "So don't take it personally if I feel the sudden need to play skip-rope with your small intestine if I catch you looking at Jason the wrong way."

[ten_of_swords]

Ruin smirks, shoving off from the tree.

"If I look at Jason the wrong way, it's due to a choice he's made that's invited me to do so."

He sighs. Ruin doesn't want pity. Understanding is all he's ever wanted. He was a part of a greater whole, just an unpleasant part.

"It's what I do. I can do nothing but be what I am."

Trudging through the forest, away from Yrael, Ruin tries to focus his energies, repair what damage Yrael's teeth and claws had done.

[mogget_cat]

Yrael knows about unpleasant but necessary parts of wholes.

It has never meant that he must like them.

He heads in the opposite direction, towards the far side of the lake, and the beginning slopes of the mountain. A light burns among the trees there until morning.