Shimmer, Glimmer, & Gleam - A Quest of Loss & Gain
- Thread starter Morrowlark
- Start date
- Original Sci-Fi Fantasy Horror
Morrowlark
You've lost something, haven't you?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
One hour
Morrowlark
You've lost something, haven't you?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Now what are we working with...
Threshold 3: Perspectives [Marie III]
Morrowlark
You've lost something, haven't you?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Focus Marie, focus. You glare. It's not a very good glare. Glaring was not a survival tactic, Inside. Nevertheless you narrow your eyes and start in: "So you've been hanging around my big sister."
"She's very energetic in a subdued sort of way," Garnet muses. "And so polite."
Someone in your head flips a lever and your mental trolley goes from running over one (1) spider to running over, in order: your idea of how this conversation is going, your fragile and barely-mustered anger, your confidence, your self-image, and your ability to, at any given time, refrain from crying. You tug at your hair in frustration, stomp over, and sit in a huff with your side against one of Garnet's warm glass legs. "She's not polite," you mutter, petulantly. "And she won't stop looking at me like I'm weird. Jack stopped her from coming to yell at me but I'm different now and she's just, she's, UGH!"
"Are you different?" Garnet asks.
"I'm sure not the f-frickin' same!" You cross your arms and glare up at a whole lot of t-shirt covered ribs because girl, Garnet is taller than you, and you sat down. "...I tried playing one of my games," you admit. "One of my favorites. Orchid made me a spreadsheet about it, 's Dream Lab 4. You play?"
"I'm about to make you unhappy," comes the answer.
"You don't play?"
"No, I'm a gen one warrior."
"Oh you bitch!" You elbow her leg. "What's it like sleeping in a coffin with the other undead wizards? You want a cane so you can tell me to get off your lawn too?"
She laughs, and laughs, and you kinda catch yourself laughing along. Of all the things to care about in the new world it turns out you still care about this. Maybe that's fine. Not like it's life or death. Or justice.
Garnet settles down into a 'sitting' position, which is a sight to see, and also gives you rather more warm body to lean against. "You were saying, Ms. Marie?"
You wipe the faintest of laughing tears from your eye and sober up. "Yeah, um. Well, I recruited this entomologist, right. To study the alien nests? And I'm just puttering along, picking a new trait for her when she leveled up, and it hit me. All at once. I thought to myself, 'she'd put me in one of the containment cells and produce research points, and then the player would hit 'tag and release' so they get more points, and that's all I'd be to them'. And I turned the game off." Your voice gets smaller as you tuck your knees under your chin. "...And I smashed it with a hammer. 's in the garden soil supply."
There is no verbal answer, but a gentle hand goes near your shoulder, and you tap it. The reassuring squeeze makes the tears come out.
"H-how do you do it? I see the way p-people look at you s-sometimes, which is fucking wild when you're this radiant goddess and sex icon at the s-s-same stupid time, and -" damnit, damnit, you're crying like some stupid kid, you sniffle and try to recover and just break down harder, pressing your cheek against Garnet. "I-I'm this freak and 'm not even the biggest freak here, i-it's stupid, I already had wings b-but people act like I did something b-bad but that place is dead, it's DEAD AND I KILLED IT AND N-NOW I'M THIS AND -" Words fail you, and you bawl against Garnet's glass flesh, tears slicking from it like rain from a window, leaving behind only thin traces of sticky salt.
By the time Garnet speaks, the shadows are in different positions, and you feel tired, and drained, and thirst - oh she's tapping you with a canteen. The water inside is a welcome relief, even if you have to sip the tiniest gulps past the hiccups in your throat.
"I've had practice," Garnet murmurs. "I got into stripping to save up for university, you know? There's clubs all over this city, probably full of women just like me now, but the thing is that to everyone else strippers are whores, and whores aren't people. The looks, the way some of the parents move their kids away from me, I'm used to it. You're not to blame for not having practice, Ms. Marie." You make a little noise to show you're listening, and it's not a sob, it's not. "There's no magic thing you can do to make people think you're normal, but...well." Her voice picks up a little, and she nudges you. "Are you normal?"
You scoff weakly. "Never."
"So don't be. You can hack away as many pieces of yourself as you like but you'll never be the version of you that the Empire woulda liked. So don't. That's wounds you don't need to carry around. You can figure out who you want to be for yourself, and when you become her...I bet she'll be happy you did."
Another little sip. You breathe out your nose, close your eyes. "...I was gonna march up and fuckin' do the whole 'what are your intentions with my big sister' and 'you better not break her heart' and all that." Garnet laughs merrily, and you shoot her an irritated glare. "What?"
"That might be the most normal conversation I've had about my love life since the world ended. Wish you'd done it." She scuttles back a bit so you can see her face, and smiles at you. "Do you wanna know?"
"...Kinda, yeah."
"I'm sorta seeing one of the engineering students, maybe. Shy little thing, never once in life considered the raw erotic appeal of spiders until I came along." She sighs wistfully. "...But I got some news recently. If I ever want to start a family I need at least two people willing to help, and Horace and I -"
"Wait, wait," you interrupt. "Horace?"
"Horace," Garnet repeats, patiently.
"Who the fuck names their poor kid Horace?"
"You're gonna have a wild time when you meet Ethel," Garnet not-answers, mysteriously, while you sputter. "Anyway, we've been talking, and if your sister...if, big if, the biggest if ever, if she's amenable maybe I want to see where that goes too. If. Not just to have a family but because...because..." she hrms. "...Because when you're not normal sometimes you gotta turn normal against itself, and if I can say I can't have a family another way, this super normal thing to want, maybe people hear out that I wanna stomp on the corpse of traditional marriage."
"This is just like the comic books Dad doesn't think I own," you mutter.
"There is this problem where Sasha has a crippling crush on Orchid."
You make an ugh sound and sip your water. "I really do not want her dating Orchid, it'd be like, like, Orchid's like the cool sibling instead of the two dork-ass monsterfuckers I got, fuckin'."
Garnet laughs, and she laughs, and she ruffles your hair, and gods damn it, you laugh too.
* * * *
You spend the rest of the day in the garden. Most of the night too, when you end up falling asleep. Sometimes people try to approach you, and they get headed off first by Garnet, and then also by the more conventionally human people working the crops. And then the work is done, and it's just you, illuminated by the burning flame of your wings, and there's no one to warn people off when Sasha comes walking up armed with pancakes. You reluctantly let her approach, silently accept the food, and eat it sullenly.
"I'm not here to start a fight," Sasha murmurs.
"We're gonna fucking have one," you shoot back.
"Language!"
"Wasp!" you exclaim, pulling your sleeve back to show the black-and-yellow stripes that start just past your elbow and go all the way down to your wrist. "I can swear as much as I want forever! Shit! Fuck! Balls! Cunt! Family values!" That takes Sasha out like a two-by-four, wheezing in her attempt to not laugh during what she had planned as a solemn moment, so you press your advantage. "You weren't there, you don't get to judge me, okay?"
That gets her back upright quick. "Marie, you think you're the only one Granny told the old stories to? Is that what you think? You think I wouldn't have done the same thing?"
"Then what is your fucking problem?"
"Don't go!" Sasha exclaims. "You're a kid! You should be here making questionable decisions! Learning from the college students! Helping out! Staying safe!"
You point your fork at her. "I promised."
"Yeah, to the god of chaos. The 'do whatever you want forever' guy, just don't fucking go!"
"That's not how this works," you mutter. "You shoulda paid more attention to Granny."
She huffs and turns away, so you huff and turn away and angrily scarf pancakes. And long after you're done with the plate and stuck there holding it like an idiot, Sasha says: "I'm paying attention now. Tell me."
You roll your eyes. "For a self-described anarchist you suck at this. I'm freed from the Law, right? A beast of chaos. I can do whatever I want forever. No limits. Nothing I do matters to the Wasp."
"Sure."
"...If nothing I do matters, then what I choose to do is the only thing that matters. Maybe the Wasp isn't gonna like eat me or lay its eggs in my ear or whatever, but I wanna be the kinda person who keeps my promises." You tap your fork against the plate. "How would you feel if you saved someone's life and they were a total buttass about it?"
"...Learn better swear words."
"Butt. Ass."
You get a hard elbow to the ribs and drop the plate, so you elbow Sasha back and point your finger in her -
- wait, no. You fold the finger back, and pull away, heart racing. She looks confused, and then understanding hits her. "Hey. Hey, sis - it's okay. I know you'd never hurt me."
"No you fucking don't," you whisper. You stand, and back off. "Don't find me again."
"Marie -"
You take off into the night air, and spend the rest of the night sleeping on a rooftop, hating yourself and Sasha and the stupid Wasp who answered when you called.
* * * *
Day five. This weed tincture somehow only tastes worse as you keep having it. Nevertheless, when you forgot your dose the pain coming back hurt worse than it being there in the first place, and Doctor Wheelwright bawls you out for flying, so now you're rowing an office chair with a neat stick you found towards the docks. It looks deeply stupid and everyone is staring at you but, you see, looking deeply stupid was the joke when you came up with this idea so you're having a grand old time.
Clara is not hard to find.
"Yo!" you call. The mermaid looks up from the laptop she's doing...something with, it's near the shore so she can dry her hands off and fuck with it. "Are you dating my brother or what?"
"Not really no!" she calls back. "He had an attack of scrupulosity and said he had to figure out how to not be objectifying me in his head or something. Which. Sure, whatever, but man I got dumped by an ethics 101 textbook that ate the light from behind his eyes, shit sucks."
"...Want me to kick his ass?"
"It's Jack, he's kicking his own ass." You sigh and nod. She's right. "I'm kinda in the middle of something here, 'cha need? Was that it?"
...Is that...
"No," you decide. "No 's not. You know how I'm leaving soon?"
"Nope, nobody tells me shit." You blink several times. "What?" You gesture to the Wasp-ness of it all. "Yeah your bugsona is sick nasty and you refracted into it late, so what?"
"Do you not fuckin' read at church?" you ask, at last.
"Do you one better, I don't even go to church." She sticks her tongue out at you. "My grandpa built the fucking internet, I'm invincible. The gods seem busy and priests seem stupid so I don't bother the one and I don't listen to the other, seems to work out fine. Sometimes I dream about the Everlasting Lady but mostly she just pours a couple shots, asks after my health, and suggests an activity in her fuckin' dead dude funhouse. Best god ever."
...
What.
It must show on your face, because Clara shrugs, and tips you a grin. "Y'know, the funny thing is, the Church Universal spent centuries telling everyone that lesbos and fags cause hurricanes and heresy causes plagues, and we've had tons of hurricanes and plagues and so has everyone else. And weirdly, all those foreign countries with their weird gods seem to be able to grow crops and have families and live happy lives. So fuck 'em. They're peddling, at best, some self-help advice. Here's mine: figure your own shit out and the gods'll meet you where you are. Now fuck off I gotta adjust some satellites."
"...What are you doing?"
"I think someone might be trying to hijack the birds," she mutters, as she focuses back in. "...Or crash 'em. That'd be inconvenient as hell."
[ ] Clara, reaching out to any of the precisely 8 furries that own the internet to get some backup here
[ ] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
[ ] Diamond, unofficial leader of the spiders
[ ] Jackie Reeds, the kitten whisperer
"She's very energetic in a subdued sort of way," Garnet muses. "And so polite."
Someone in your head flips a lever and your mental trolley goes from running over one (1) spider to running over, in order: your idea of how this conversation is going, your fragile and barely-mustered anger, your confidence, your self-image, and your ability to, at any given time, refrain from crying. You tug at your hair in frustration, stomp over, and sit in a huff with your side against one of Garnet's warm glass legs. "She's not polite," you mutter, petulantly. "And she won't stop looking at me like I'm weird. Jack stopped her from coming to yell at me but I'm different now and she's just, she's, UGH!"
"Are you different?" Garnet asks.
"I'm sure not the f-frickin' same!" You cross your arms and glare up at a whole lot of t-shirt covered ribs because girl, Garnet is taller than you, and you sat down. "...I tried playing one of my games," you admit. "One of my favorites. Orchid made me a spreadsheet about it, 's Dream Lab 4. You play?"
"I'm about to make you unhappy," comes the answer.
"You don't play?"
"No, I'm a gen one warrior."
"Oh you bitch!" You elbow her leg. "What's it like sleeping in a coffin with the other undead wizards? You want a cane so you can tell me to get off your lawn too?"
She laughs, and laughs, and you kinda catch yourself laughing along. Of all the things to care about in the new world it turns out you still care about this. Maybe that's fine. Not like it's life or death. Or justice.
Garnet settles down into a 'sitting' position, which is a sight to see, and also gives you rather more warm body to lean against. "You were saying, Ms. Marie?"
You wipe the faintest of laughing tears from your eye and sober up. "Yeah, um. Well, I recruited this entomologist, right. To study the alien nests? And I'm just puttering along, picking a new trait for her when she leveled up, and it hit me. All at once. I thought to myself, 'she'd put me in one of the containment cells and produce research points, and then the player would hit 'tag and release' so they get more points, and that's all I'd be to them'. And I turned the game off." Your voice gets smaller as you tuck your knees under your chin. "...And I smashed it with a hammer. 's in the garden soil supply."
There is no verbal answer, but a gentle hand goes near your shoulder, and you tap it. The reassuring squeeze makes the tears come out.
"H-how do you do it? I see the way p-people look at you s-sometimes, which is fucking wild when you're this radiant goddess and sex icon at the s-s-same stupid time, and -" damnit, damnit, you're crying like some stupid kid, you sniffle and try to recover and just break down harder, pressing your cheek against Garnet. "I-I'm this freak and 'm not even the biggest freak here, i-it's stupid, I already had wings b-but people act like I did something b-bad but that place is dead, it's DEAD AND I KILLED IT AND N-NOW I'M THIS AND -" Words fail you, and you bawl against Garnet's glass flesh, tears slicking from it like rain from a window, leaving behind only thin traces of sticky salt.
By the time Garnet speaks, the shadows are in different positions, and you feel tired, and drained, and thirst - oh she's tapping you with a canteen. The water inside is a welcome relief, even if you have to sip the tiniest gulps past the hiccups in your throat.
"I've had practice," Garnet murmurs. "I got into stripping to save up for university, you know? There's clubs all over this city, probably full of women just like me now, but the thing is that to everyone else strippers are whores, and whores aren't people. The looks, the way some of the parents move their kids away from me, I'm used to it. You're not to blame for not having practice, Ms. Marie." You make a little noise to show you're listening, and it's not a sob, it's not. "There's no magic thing you can do to make people think you're normal, but...well." Her voice picks up a little, and she nudges you. "Are you normal?"
You scoff weakly. "Never."
"So don't be. You can hack away as many pieces of yourself as you like but you'll never be the version of you that the Empire woulda liked. So don't. That's wounds you don't need to carry around. You can figure out who you want to be for yourself, and when you become her...I bet she'll be happy you did."
Another little sip. You breathe out your nose, close your eyes. "...I was gonna march up and fuckin' do the whole 'what are your intentions with my big sister' and 'you better not break her heart' and all that." Garnet laughs merrily, and you shoot her an irritated glare. "What?"
"That might be the most normal conversation I've had about my love life since the world ended. Wish you'd done it." She scuttles back a bit so you can see her face, and smiles at you. "Do you wanna know?"
"...Kinda, yeah."
"I'm sorta seeing one of the engineering students, maybe. Shy little thing, never once in life considered the raw erotic appeal of spiders until I came along." She sighs wistfully. "...But I got some news recently. If I ever want to start a family I need at least two people willing to help, and Horace and I -"
"Wait, wait," you interrupt. "Horace?"
"Horace," Garnet repeats, patiently.
"Who the fuck names their poor kid Horace?"
"You're gonna have a wild time when you meet Ethel," Garnet not-answers, mysteriously, while you sputter. "Anyway, we've been talking, and if your sister...if, big if, the biggest if ever, if she's amenable maybe I want to see where that goes too. If. Not just to have a family but because...because..." she hrms. "...Because when you're not normal sometimes you gotta turn normal against itself, and if I can say I can't have a family another way, this super normal thing to want, maybe people hear out that I wanna stomp on the corpse of traditional marriage."
"This is just like the comic books Dad doesn't think I own," you mutter.
"There is this problem where Sasha has a crippling crush on Orchid."
You make an ugh sound and sip your water. "I really do not want her dating Orchid, it'd be like, like, Orchid's like the cool sibling instead of the two dork-ass monsterfuckers I got, fuckin'."
Garnet laughs, and she laughs, and she ruffles your hair, and gods damn it, you laugh too.
* * * *
You spend the rest of the day in the garden. Most of the night too, when you end up falling asleep. Sometimes people try to approach you, and they get headed off first by Garnet, and then also by the more conventionally human people working the crops. And then the work is done, and it's just you, illuminated by the burning flame of your wings, and there's no one to warn people off when Sasha comes walking up armed with pancakes. You reluctantly let her approach, silently accept the food, and eat it sullenly.
"I'm not here to start a fight," Sasha murmurs.
"We're gonna fucking have one," you shoot back.
"Language!"
"Wasp!" you exclaim, pulling your sleeve back to show the black-and-yellow stripes that start just past your elbow and go all the way down to your wrist. "I can swear as much as I want forever! Shit! Fuck! Balls! Cunt! Family values!" That takes Sasha out like a two-by-four, wheezing in her attempt to not laugh during what she had planned as a solemn moment, so you press your advantage. "You weren't there, you don't get to judge me, okay?"
That gets her back upright quick. "Marie, you think you're the only one Granny told the old stories to? Is that what you think? You think I wouldn't have done the same thing?"
"Then what is your fucking problem?"
"Don't go!" Sasha exclaims. "You're a kid! You should be here making questionable decisions! Learning from the college students! Helping out! Staying safe!"
You point your fork at her. "I promised."
"Yeah, to the god of chaos. The 'do whatever you want forever' guy, just don't fucking go!"
"That's not how this works," you mutter. "You shoulda paid more attention to Granny."
She huffs and turns away, so you huff and turn away and angrily scarf pancakes. And long after you're done with the plate and stuck there holding it like an idiot, Sasha says: "I'm paying attention now. Tell me."
You roll your eyes. "For a self-described anarchist you suck at this. I'm freed from the Law, right? A beast of chaos. I can do whatever I want forever. No limits. Nothing I do matters to the Wasp."
"Sure."
"...If nothing I do matters, then what I choose to do is the only thing that matters. Maybe the Wasp isn't gonna like eat me or lay its eggs in my ear or whatever, but I wanna be the kinda person who keeps my promises." You tap your fork against the plate. "How would you feel if you saved someone's life and they were a total buttass about it?"
"...Learn better swear words."
"Butt. Ass."
You get a hard elbow to the ribs and drop the plate, so you elbow Sasha back and point your finger in her -
- wait, no. You fold the finger back, and pull away, heart racing. She looks confused, and then understanding hits her. "Hey. Hey, sis - it's okay. I know you'd never hurt me."
"No you fucking don't," you whisper. You stand, and back off. "Don't find me again."
"Marie -"
You take off into the night air, and spend the rest of the night sleeping on a rooftop, hating yourself and Sasha and the stupid Wasp who answered when you called.
* * * *
Day five. This weed tincture somehow only tastes worse as you keep having it. Nevertheless, when you forgot your dose the pain coming back hurt worse than it being there in the first place, and Doctor Wheelwright bawls you out for flying, so now you're rowing an office chair with a neat stick you found towards the docks. It looks deeply stupid and everyone is staring at you but, you see, looking deeply stupid was the joke when you came up with this idea so you're having a grand old time.
Clara is not hard to find.
"Yo!" you call. The mermaid looks up from the laptop she's doing...something with, it's near the shore so she can dry her hands off and fuck with it. "Are you dating my brother or what?"
"Not really no!" she calls back. "He had an attack of scrupulosity and said he had to figure out how to not be objectifying me in his head or something. Which. Sure, whatever, but man I got dumped by an ethics 101 textbook that ate the light from behind his eyes, shit sucks."
"...Want me to kick his ass?"
"It's Jack, he's kicking his own ass." You sigh and nod. She's right. "I'm kinda in the middle of something here, 'cha need? Was that it?"
...Is that...
"No," you decide. "No 's not. You know how I'm leaving soon?"
"Nope, nobody tells me shit." You blink several times. "What?" You gesture to the Wasp-ness of it all. "Yeah your bugsona is sick nasty and you refracted into it late, so what?"
"Do you not fuckin' read at church?" you ask, at last.
"Do you one better, I don't even go to church." She sticks her tongue out at you. "My grandpa built the fucking internet, I'm invincible. The gods seem busy and priests seem stupid so I don't bother the one and I don't listen to the other, seems to work out fine. Sometimes I dream about the Everlasting Lady but mostly she just pours a couple shots, asks after my health, and suggests an activity in her fuckin' dead dude funhouse. Best god ever."
...
What.
It must show on your face, because Clara shrugs, and tips you a grin. "Y'know, the funny thing is, the Church Universal spent centuries telling everyone that lesbos and fags cause hurricanes and heresy causes plagues, and we've had tons of hurricanes and plagues and so has everyone else. And weirdly, all those foreign countries with their weird gods seem to be able to grow crops and have families and live happy lives. So fuck 'em. They're peddling, at best, some self-help advice. Here's mine: figure your own shit out and the gods'll meet you where you are. Now fuck off I gotta adjust some satellites."
"...What are you doing?"
"I think someone might be trying to hijack the birds," she mutters, as she focuses back in. "...Or crash 'em. That'd be inconvenient as hell."
One way or another, you will see Marie's exit later.
You are...
[ ] Clara, reaching out to any of the precisely 8 furries that own the internet to get some backup here
[ ] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
[ ] Diamond, unofficial leader of the spiders
[ ] Jackie Reeds, the kitten whisperer
Last edited:
Morrowlark
You've lost something, haven't you?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
Your vote made me realize I typo'd that option, it has been edited which MIGHT mean you need to edit your vote. My sincere and profuse apologies.
[x] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
As much as I wanna see the internet furries uniting in net-battle against something, we haven't checked in on Doctor Heller in awhile.
Marie is going through the ringer, but I think Orchid will catch her before she goes, give her that last push she needs one way or the other
As much as I wanna see the internet furries uniting in net-battle against something, we haven't checked in on Doctor Heller in awhile.
Marie is going through the ringer, but I think Orchid will catch her before she goes, give her that last push she needs one way or the other
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamned coma
YOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO -
[X] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
- Pronouns
- They/Them
[X] Diamond, unofficial leader of the spiders
- Location
- Diamond City
[X] Clara, reaching out to any of the precisely 8 furries that own the internet to get some backup here
[X] Clara, reaching out to any of the precisely 8 furries that own the internet to get some backup here
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
- Location
- United States
- Pronouns
- He/Him
[X] Diamond, unofficial leader of the spiders
- Pronouns
- She
[X] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
[x] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
Twei
I have a face!
- Location
- the land where they write things
- Pronouns
- They/Them
[x] Doctor Heller, still in a godsdamed coma
[X] Clara, reaching out to any of the precisely 8 furries that own the internet to get some backup here
I would be happy with either of these. Or honestly any of these!!!
[X] Clara, reaching out to any of the precisely 8 furries that own the internet to get some backup here
I would be happy with either of these. Or honestly any of these!!!
Morrowlark
You've lost something, haven't you?
- Pronouns
- He/Him
I'm awake! For reference there will be a brief Orchid interlude before the effects of this vote take place; the choice will be fairly important.
One hour
One hour