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It's almost like dancing. One two three - bite, two two three - strike. The Game never lent you such fluidity, you were always the weakest, the slowest, the fattest. Roxy in men's angles with her sniper's eye and raw-boned confidence. Jake with his guns and his fists and his deep-tanned muscle and Dirk - well, Dirk who'd handled a sword every day of his life and even stretched thin over a lanky frame who freckled and bleached and moved like lightning - and you.
You who had been small and slow and dumpy, whose strife specibus had always, always been a joke, a homage and now, now you are faster and brighter and stronger, now you're streamlined and your curves are weight, are muscle, and you are the dancer -
-CONFLICT-
Only dancing doesn't end up with you covered in your friends blood, doesn't end up with you flickering and shimmering and red thoughts overwriting your own over and over and over because you need to say sorry you need to scream and you push and you push and your hand touches the tiara -
-REBOOT-
You're curled at the Batterwitch's feet and there's another girl curled with you. There's blood spattered on her too, and the disconnect is real enough that you reach out and touch her cheek. She growls and it is like no human sound, overtones of canine but deeper and darker and horrifying and instead of pulling back you push forward, trace your hand over her face, trace her eye sockets and slowly she pushes her head into you. She trusts you, of course she does.
The two of you are cohort, are pack, are.
-CONFLICT-
That's not your word. And what are you doing, this whispering sussurus, those aren't your sounds -
-REBOOT-
It gets easier. The dance and the push and the pull. None of the blood now is red, there are no human faces. Only machines and oil and sparks and scents that your poor friend cannot handle. She pushes her head into your bosom and you allow it, your poor beast. You drag your fingers through her hair in lieu of a brush and cup her silken ears softly. Something seems wrong about them, somehow, but you ignore it. You are mostly alone, fighting and training and over it all red words and numbers and code spill in a way that almost seems familiar.
You have been almost invulnerable so far, (and why does that seem wrong) and so when red blood spills from your barkbeast (wrong) you reach for her and then you r e m e -
-CONFLICT-
You scream and she howls, pushing her head into you but is she under the spell or is she remem- remem- rem e
-REBOOT-
One two three - she moves like a whippet, like the green lightning that trails her steps. Two two three - your trident guards her blind spot. Around you falls mechanized carnage. You are the best, the most honored, the most beloved. Your Empress curls a hand round her ear and you snarl because that is your place, yours, she removes it and laughs, words distorted by something so you can't understand them but you take it as an apology anyway.
"T)(e programme's harpooning an effect, then?"
She strokes her cool hand down your grey cheek and you grin at her because yes this is your right (wrong)
(wrong)
- CONFLICT -
wait
- REBOOT -
The two of you jostle for position not because you want to be the first but because you want to be the protector. Her lightning flickers across your skin, your code embraces it and she growls and you speak
" yea)( beach, "
-CONFLICT-
-REBOOT-
blood soaks your hands you are winning
-CONFLICT-
-REBOOT-
her name is
-CONFLICT-
-REBOOT-
your na-
-CONFLICTREBOOT-
-REBOOT-
-REBOOT-
You know something is wrong, but you can't figure out what. Your face is being peppered by kisses and you laugh, a strange, digital sound. She chuffs happily and you kiss her back. Above you your Empress sits as you tussle around her feet - you are the most privileged of trolls, to do so.
"kelp me"
She whispers in your ear.
"shore"
you whisper back as you kiss her forehead. You're her matesprit, after all. Whatever troubles her, you can help with.