singillatim | you can run but you can't escape

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you can run but you can't escape

THE DARKWALKER COMES

The Darkwalker strikes again. This time, it does not come for one Interloper — but four.

WHEN: March 2nd.
WHERE: Milton.
CONTENT WARNINGS: death of playable character; supernatural death; mention of dead body; themes of death; supernatural beings; themes of terror; themes of peril.

YOU CAN RUN BUT YOU CAN'T ESCAPE

The sun sets on another day in the Northern Territories. The night is calm but cold, scant clouds drifting low in the skies promising snowfall soon. A waning moon sits in the skies amongst its sea of stars, and those looking up may notice it — slowly, one by one, the stars begin to go out.

Then the moon's light is swallowed whole, and a blanket of green gloom descends upon the town of Milton. One more, the sky is dark and green and terrible. Many of those will recognise it, what this means and what will come. Others will not understand it, not know what it is that awaits them all.

They will soon find out: the Darkwalker comes.

Fear washes over you like a cold wave, a vice-tight grip that squeezes the breath from you. Interlopers will find themselves over-come, and everything in their bodies and minds tells them to run. To flee. And so you run, heading for cover indoors. Curtains will be drawn, some may hide under beds, within closets or wardrobes. Some desperate attempt to conceal themselves, make themselves small, unseen. Some Interlopers, in that fear, may rush to friends or loved ones to hide with them, others may simply cowered alone — crawling and whimpering away from the night. The fear is irrational, unable to be overcome — even by the bravest or most stoic of Interlopers.

The Darkwalker howls: indescribable, unnatural, demonic. Low moans and groans. It comes from the east, the faint booms of footsteps in the distance growing ever nearer. It is coming, once more. It's coming for one of you. And still, you are powerless, unable to do anything. And it is an agony, awaiting its arrival. You cry, you whimper, you cower. Curling up for some shred of comfort, and finding none.

The footsteps draw closer and closer, and you feel like the ground itself may be threatening splitting open beneath you. It isn't you that it hunts, but you notice its path — a straight line from the east towards Milton Church. It seems to go on forever, building into a crescendo. Your heart beats so hard you fear it may burst from your chest, as if you might die of fright.

There is an almighty sound; the Darkwalker devours and suddenly the sky is alight: streaks of pale colour shoot across the gloomy green — almost blinding for one long moment. A woman's scream fills the air and then snaps into silence.

The skies return to normal, the green is gone, the fear melts away from you. It is done.

There is no body in the street. Interlopers venturing out will need to go looking for whoever it is that's fallen victim to the Devourer. The answer will be found within Milton Church.

Towards the altar, peppered amongst faint glimmers of intangible green that will fade by morning, lie the twisted and mangled bodies of Nicholas Wolfwood, Millions Knives and both iterations of Vash the Stampede. There's no blood, no physical wounds — simply the contorted bodies that lie dropped like ragdolls. Each of their faces stare with wide eyes, frozen in horror — just as La'an Noonien-Singh was.

The Darkwalker has devoured more. There is a story, told by Methuselah: It is said that the Darkwalker will awake from its slumber and swallow the world whole. One head will swallow the stars and moon and sun. Another will swallow the seas and lakes and rivers. The third will swallow the land, and every living thing upon it — and only then will the Darkwalker be satisfied and return to sleep once more.

It feels as if the Darkwalker is making good on its story: one by one, it will devour you all whole. And now the Interlopers of Milton must grapple with more death.

FAQs

1. Essentially, a 'party post' for reactions to the Darkwalker's attack, the immediate aftermath, and any funerary preparations. Have... fun???

2. Information on the Darkwalker's attack can be found here.

3. An OOC Rundown for the original Darkwalker's attack, which includes some FAQs can be found here.

4. Notes about the characters:

Wolfwood: He doesn't leave any messages behind. Folks are welcome to go through his house, which is the cabin by the pond -- there's nothing in there of his, and the only changes he made to the house was pulling a twin bed over in front of the fireplace. The wall of the cabin is also scorched from inside, from where his Lightbringer power erupted at one point.

Vash The Stampede (Trigun Stampede): He really didn't have much belongings or anything in particular of note, so it is a free for all situation in terms of possessions.

Vash The Stampede (Trigun Maximum): He'll be leaving behind his meager belongings. all of it can be found on either his person or in the church's living quarters which is also decently stocked with foraged foods. alas he's prepared no messages because he is absolutely atrocious at saying goodbyes.

Millions Knives: He'll leave behind sharpened hunting and skinning knives (hah), some fishing equipment, and scattered feathers around the church.

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In spite of all of Lestat's presumptuous arrogance, there is a slant of soft surprise to his mouth before Louis covers it with his own. He kisses him like he might be able to chase the elusive taste of Louis' laughter, that melody as sweet as his maudlin sighs are bitter.

He could suggest other worst things they could do in a church. The door has a lock, and they have practice being quiet as church-mice themselves. But something of the moment forestalls him. The bruised tenderness, the risk. The delicate elation of being reached for first, as though he is balm and not poison, or so it feels.

Lestat slips an arm around Louis' waist and anchors him to his chest, willing his heartbeat to bleed through the insulation of his coat. He slows the kiss, deepens it, drawing it out like a dream of a long summer night.

He has rarely been so happy at a wake. He was right about snow.

Louis would not describe Lestat as soft, warm, and pliant, but he has his moments, often looking like the love he so cloyingly binds catches him by surprise too. The young man Lestat was peers through the curtain from a century ago. As Lestat presses them together, Louis makes a small urgent sigh against his mouth. His hand finds his pulse under his scarf, made so dim by their muffled senses. His drum beats faster.

The moth burns himself on the flame but reaches for it again and again. It's not joy precisely, but a perverse relief at not being slain and discarded like broken marionettes in the next room. Louis is alive enough to taste Lestat between every breath, and he seeks the reminder like the faithful seek their communion. He who opened Lestat's throat with a knife opens his mouth to receive him.

Louis, usually so fastidious, murmurs into Lestat's mouth, "I can't even remember if I locked the door..."

His intent had been to discuss vampire business in private, but kissing a man is also business he'd like to keep private. Bashfulness doesn't enter into it, but fear of being discovered and hunted does.

Lestat is almost certain Louis did not lock the door. Perhaps, without his own knowing, he neglected that security precisely so he would not be tempted to indulge himself in this.

There is the opportunity to make another idly playful threat in demonstration of his devotion to stave off Louis' anxieties. Parting heads from bodies is beyond him now without the use of a good, sharp edge, but he could always shoot or strangle, or even put his still-wicked teeth to use. But then there would be yet more fussing over unnecessary bloodshed, and he's in too pleasant a mood to spoil it.

He nips lightly at the fullness of Louis' lower lip, employing only the bluntness of human dentation, and laves his tongue over the sting in apology. Louis' fingers find Lestat's throat pressing into them, Adam's apple bobbing in a swallow of anticipation.

"Would you like the door to be locked, Louis?" He murmurs, with a smile. "If it's privacy you want..."

He steers Louis as if in a private ballroom, backing him towards the door with another firm, speech-stealing kiss. It won't keep Louis from talking if his heart is set on it, since it never does, but it is always fun to try.

His lip was bitten tonight first by himself in reflexive fear, and now carefully nipped just enough to remind him of skin so easily broken, that little taste of blood so easily coaxed out. It's only enough to whet the tips of their tongues, but blood is everything to vampires. He exhales a stuttering hum.

They're not together. They can't keep doing this.

Louis's feet follow the turn of Lestat's as gracefully as the curve of the waning moon as it turns from the light. He leans against the door and draws Lestat to him--not too tightly so that he can still ferret out the lock behind him and click it shut.

He breaks the kiss just enough to speak. "Yeah," he gasps unnecessarily after the fact.

Louis also benefits from Lestat shutting up for a bit, but that's not why he kisses him. He is once again in the ballroom decorated in the style of The Garden of Earthly Delights, filled with that same rosy breathlessness that led them to kiss before God and everybody. The only detail deemed not fit to print, and it rankles Louis that they must hide more than couples who are man and woman, for all that he puts so much effort into it.

"Can I..." He's probably going to regret this, but he can't stand the thought of trying to remain calm alone in his hovel with that thing probably out there. "Can I stay with you tonight?"

As soon as the lock clicks shut, Lestat melts into Louis like sugar melts into shallow, simmering water, sweet syrup that scalds as it clings. He makes a tiny noise into Louis' mouth nearly like a purr as his tongue, no longer apologetic, delves hungrily past Louis' swollen lip.

It's one of the great pleasures in life to be wanted. Lestat enjoys it often. He has suffered dreadfully from the absence of want from the one person from whom it means the most, Louis' baffling insistence on restraining himself from what he desires worse than ever in the cold.

But here is Louis, letting himself have what he wants. Here is Louis, asking such a wonderful question that it justifies the brief parting of their lips - a parting he mollifies himself through by slipping his knee between Louis' as his weight pins him to the door.

"I want nothing more," he murmurs, eyes half-closed, heavy with desire - for everything, heart and body and soul, as it was in the garden, as it is every night. "I hardly sleep without you."

The red crescent on his lips stings with the momentary struggle of hunger and hunger. He licks and sucks the blood off Lestat's lips when he can find it in himself to part from the soft slickness of his tongue. He can feel his inevitably protruding fangs tasting the blood in the air and gliding across vulnerable skin. They have to be so careful now.

"Fuck--" He exhales a heated breath with lopsided control through parted lips as he's pressed against the sturdy door. His hand at Lestat's neck traces the line of his shoulders before slipping into his hair. His other splays across the furrow of his lower back just discernible through his jacket and tugs him, as if the strong thigh between his legs wasn't enough for him to arch against. It's easier to let go when he's held; someone else holds him in his shape like a vase holds water. All this is at odds with the hesitant way he asked to stay over.

One night asleep and dead to the world would be a balm. For the troubled Louis, this is just as much of a temptation as the low heat in his belly winding him taut. What was it Lestat said humans could only think about? Hunger, sex, and going home? Food, companionship, and shelter aren't bad priorities to have, and vampires are kidding themselves if they think they are immune to these wants. The dilation in Louis's mirror-like eyes and the crimson thinly smeared on his chin and kiss-softened lips should be proof enough.

"Then grab your gun and let's get out of here."

Louis thinks the investigation would interrupt their dalliance whether they made noise or were silent as the corpses in the next room. Louis is not above breaking into a house and getting carnal in it, but there is a ridiculous poster in the office in this house of the Lord asking What Would Jesus Do?. The savior himself stares placidly at Louis in an almost bored way. It's off-putting in a way Louis can't currently summon the words to explain.

Edited 2024-05-08 08:26 (UTC)

For an evening that began so inauspiciously, Lestat could not imagine a better conclusion. His face lights with profuse and genuine pleasure, that glow that has endeared him to so many, and to most of their detriment - but not Louis. Not in this moment, when Lestat is once again his refuge from his troubles, a wanton distraction audacious enough to tempt him from his path of dour sobriety.

He brings a hand up to cup Louis' face as he kisses him once more, firmly, for luck and for gratitude and for the sake of kissing him. The tug of friction between them is no more than a tease, and one that happens nearly by accident, a byproduct of his exuberance.

There's no true innocence in Lestat. He doubts that there ever was. Perhaps there was the rough and lovely ignorance of an untested sinner, some soul not yet damned, only doomed to become so. When he breaks away from Louis, perhaps this is what makes his eyes bright and untroubled as the colour of a sky he no longer remembers when he wakes.

He seems on the cusp of saying something, then flattens his lips over it as though containing a secret. With a shake of his mane, he all but floats to the desk to retrieve his gun, all the troubles of terror and morbid conversation apparently forgotten. As easy as he is to plunge into dark moods, he is nearly as easy to pry from them. A difference from Louis, and one of the rare ones he believes ought to count as a virtue.

"After you, mon cher," he says, with a brief and ostentatiously gracious half-bow, and he pays no mind to the watchful eyes of God. If there's anything left that Lestat can do that can give him fresh offence, it certainly will have nothing to do with what he hopes for the night.

He hums and shivers enough to draw out the kiss he matches with his own firmness. Louis has to work hard to not respond too readily with enthusiasm that could very well doom them here and now. Well, doesn't Lestat look satisfied as a well-fed cat! Louis curiously ducks his head closer, as if he can pry whatever it is Lestat chose not to say. (Now there's a miracle.) Louis thought the young boy who wanted to study with monks and was brought back and beaten could have been innocent, but it could be Lestat dealt the final blow to the child himself. Violence begets violence.

"Un moment," he replies. He licks his lips, demurely savoring the taste with thoughts that are anything but demure. He dabs at them with his handkerchief. His hands straighten the collar of his jacket, adjust his cuffs, and go through all the familiar motions of making himself presentable, though he has no dressing mirror, only Lestat to tell him how he looks.

Lestat looks so ridiculous bowing like a character in a stage play that Louis nearly laughs. He reaches up and delicately rubs away a small spot of red on Lestat's lips. Louis is reminded of women and lipstick and kissing loved ones. It's oddly homey.

Before unlocking and opening the door, he glances once over his shoulder at Lestat to check if he's composed himself from pink-flushed insouciance. If Lestat thinks his own gaiety irresistible, he has called Louis's unexpectedly soft looks the same. (Maybe deep in the night they'll light two precious cigarettes tip to tip and cup their hands around the orange embers.)

Lestat knows he looks composed. Decades of practise have removed self-consciousness from how he holds himself in his mind's eye, his every gesture and movement such that he rarely breaks the lines of his clothes in any way he doesn't care for. This world may have taken some of his gifts, but it cannot remove his lifetimes of experience.

That isn't to say he doesn't like to fuss over his appearance. Quite the opposite. It's a pleasure exceeded only by watching Louis do the same, as he always did before they went anywhere, and by being the subject of his fussing in turn. He submits gladly to Louis' absent-minded ministration, the delight in his eyes mingling with a deeper, warmer vein of contentment.

He could almost forget their circumstances, like this. Transport himself back to countless early evenings at the threshold of their shared home. In that nostalgic spirit, he picks Louis' hand up in an unrepressed swoop and presses his knuckles to Lestat's freshly dabbed lips, then lets them fall away with the outer trappings of his exuberance. He composes a mask of solemnity over his features, betrayed only by Louis' familiarity with the persistent sparkle in his gaze.

"I'll behave myself," he assures Louis, a promise he even intends to keep until they're back out of sight. "You look the very picture of decorum."

Louis knows Lestat is, as ever, as composed as he wants to be. Behaved is what Louis is looking for, as well as the absence of certain damning pieces of evidence like his flush or a too-sultry look. Louis has to school himself when Lestat kisses his hand, resisting the urge to turn his palm up and capture more of the electric spark that shivers up his arm.

"Well." Well. "I admit I feel a little warm."

Then the shutters come down, and Louis wishes he had his sunglasses. He doesn't touch him, or he will be lost here forever. He opens the door.

Cool as a cucumber except for the glittering of his eyes, he strides past the gloomy proceedings and people in the nave. The bodies are sobering at least. He is reminded of himself, Lestat, and Claudia exiting his mother's funeral in step with the surety of well-dressed vampires not wishing to be around a corpse anymore.

A reversal of the pretense they once engaged in: Lestat follows two dutiful steps behind Louis, an attendant on a princeling of the night. To the indiscriminate eyes of this motley crowd, liberated as they are from so many of the social mores of their time, it means nothing. It means little to Lestat, who knows his place wherever he might stand. Playing at the fool or the dilettante were no more an insult to his dignity than playing at the follower is now.

But such things mean a great deal to Louis. His propriety, his station, his gravitas. With the state of their rebalanced truce, Lestat thinks that this gesture will help shield the little spark of warmth that they kindled in the priest's vacant office, nurturing it through the dark like a candle.

He pays his respects to the dead in passing in his own way. He thinks of them even when they are out of sight, bestowing upon them the unusual distinction of being worthy of his recollection. In a hundred years time, he will still be able to call the scene to mind, marked out from anonymity. Few humans ever merit such consideration. It will do them no good, but it is what he can provide.

The night is beautiful. The moon floats in her sea of stars, untouched by any mortal concern, and the air is as clear as glass. The cold barely touches him as he steps up to Louis' side to guide him home.

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you can run but you can't escape

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cw: imagined murder

cw: a little blood

cw: a little blood, goddamn it, a little nsfw

nsfw cont. and they're awful also i'm sorry

nsfw cont

Re: nsfw cont

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