Calibrations Spill-Over Post

[thespaceopera]

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[mortalcoil]

[if he tries to undo the chain lock to actually leave, he'll find it stuck tight. seems as though the door is only demanding that someone looks through the gap and witness what is happening on the other side.

the room beyond seems like something one might find in a great, archaic manor, lit with nothing but moonlight peering in through a high window. the hall has been razed, with the toppled angles of broken furniture lying among the softer, fallen shapes of bodies. it's all wreckage, with very few things left unbroken.

and one of the things still standing is a familiar teenage boy with one moonglow eye. he's frozen in his tracks, tears streaming silently down his face, staring up into a set of orange eyes that have a similar light gleaming from them. the tall stranger before him is terrifying--dressed in a heavy black coat and face painted like a skull--but the man doesn't hurt him. instead, he motions for the boy to step forward, away from the bookcase that he's cowering against. because the skullfaced man has decided that he's worth saving.

the glow in the boy's eye-- the color is brimming with a potential for power, a potential to understand. it's a spark he's only ever seen a couple of times in his life in anyone else. and as he watches the boy break his gaze to look over the still, ruined bodies of his family, it reminds him of too many old, familiar things.

so, as the boy steps closer, the man shrugs off his jacket.

it's neither the motion of something done on a whim, nor something with a great deal of weight to it. it just has to happen, so he does it without grudge or grandiose gesture.

stepping forward just as certain, he swings the coat up and over the kid's shoulders. he pulls the collar forward to make sure it hangs well, reaches into an inside pocket to pull out a kit that he'll need later. And then he steps back, returning them to their separate boundaries.

"I'll need that back," he says, half-signing the words anyway, "Don't lose it."

and Coil looks so small. the coat makes him look like a child, with weights dragging down on his shoulders. as if the thing weighs a thousand pounds, it makes something about him buckle and crumble beneath it.

it's because the gesture brings reality pressing down. it's something sudden and tangible, and it isn't what he'd expected from the frightening man. it surprises him, hangs on him, pins him down to the present. everything is a little more real, then.

he's grounded now.

the heaviness helps still his shaking; it pulls him back together. as the man heads out of the room and leaves him with the finality of his surroundings, Coil steps and sinks back against the bookshelf again... but the coat keeps him on his feet.]

[unbearablynaive]

["Something safe to show me" - yes, a memory of being grounded in reality when the unreal is happening qualifies. It more than qualifies. The bodies, the ruin of the manor around him--he doesn't need the tears on the young man's face to know this is a scene of horror, but the simple kindness in the stranger's (is he a stranger? there's an odd familiarity around him, but that may only be an echo of Coil's own emotions) gesture brings a nod of approval.

Of course, for all he knows, the skull-faced man was the one to bring the damage in the first place. It's hard to tell without a deeper probe, and this place seems jumbled enough that he doesn't want to pry any more than absolutely necessary; it's why he'd asked rather than poking around on his own.

I'm sorry you were there, he signs after the memory fades. I'm glad you got this coat.]