Wounding
Tin Man
((Ahem. Again, rated for material. Language mainly.))

"The heart. So many underestimate the power of the heart and both the joy and damage it can deliver."







It was the shock that confused him at first.

Strange as the shock was, it wasn't actually that itself that surprised him. It was in fact, the contrast from freezing ice and snow to the warmth of someplace "inside" and the smooth touch of a floor beneath him as opposed to a pair of frozen arms or cold earth. The unnatural quiet, broken only by occasional winds, was shattered by the sound of something canid yapping at him like it intended to charge and the sound of chattering voices.
Part of him didn't really care how he got to wherever that was -- it wasn't magic and that was all right with him. Part of him didn't want to move for the next ten hours. But he did move as flesh and muscle began to slowly thaw enough to let him regain some control of his temperature.
It wasn't total control, nor would it be total control for some time yet but it was enough.

When he felt a blanket dropped over him and a voice call his name, Renne almost smiled.
When he'd thawed out sufficiently, Renne crawled clumsily toward the voice and immediately felt a wash of joy he hadn't felt in a long time. It was a voice he knew, loved and missed terribly in the last hellish year of his existence.
Melkor.

For a time, the joy was sustained and hope rekindled in his mind. He didn't understand Rhy'Din or how it worked and at that moment, he didn't care. Rhy'Din spat him out into a place where part of his family was present.
Fondly, he remembered what was taught to him within walls now long turned to ash -- he still harboured a charred section of those walls as one of his many treasured possessions.

It was as if recalling the Less Crowded was a sort of cue when next he heard Melkor's voice pose a question.

Had he heard the news about Zonker?

It was as if words had regrown their potential to deliver a kick in the gut, just as they had almost a year prior. He listened and like some child that fought for hope, Renne found himself following Melkor like a bloodhound.

------------------------------

Already, he had been there for at least an hour, if nor a few hours more than he kept track of. The steady beeping was disorienting at first but he had learned swiftly what it meant. He heard others slowly filter into the room after him but took little more notice than to twitch ears, his nose or offer few words.
The few words he said had become mantras in their own right as Renne had climbed up to the edge of the sickbed, wedged out his stone and dropped it beside the still, quiet Viking he'd come to see much like he did Melkor.
It was a thought that quietly tore him to shreds and lifted him to a place beyond the sky.
It was a mantra that changed little as time went on.
And it was a promise made that only Melkor knew.

No more Ides.

The steady beeping, the voices of those around him and the want to remain where he'd chosen to be were almost his entire world. His world had shrunk vastly and all he kept his ears on was that little world.
No more Ides.

Ble-e-e-e-e-ep.

Slekt. No more Ides.
The scent of brown.

Ble-e-e-e-e-e-ep.

Ghost brown, wolf brown, apostate brown.

No more Ides. Slekt.
Slekt.

That sound began to quickly get to him. That sound, with its constance and shrillness drove into him many, many things. The scent caught on the air was not investigated as might have been typical before. He knew the scent and he knew what ghosts did as part of simply what they were.
They toyed with the mind.
They tricked and led into traps.
They used who they willed, how they willed.

The mantras continued in his head as the horrid, steady bleeping was finally put to silence. Hope fled from him like snow in a thaw and his eyes lost what vestiges of faith he might have carried deep down.
Right then, he discovered the difference between People and Humans.

No more Ides.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

No more Ides.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

He heard the sound come slowly. He heard a Female's voice he dimly recognised take on a tone of command. Her words and that steady beeping compelled him into both surprise and a spark of determination behind the thin, fragile shell of cold cynicism he tried so hard to adopt.
Fight, damn you! Fight, you bastard!
Beep. Beep.
Slekt.
Beep. Beep.

He smelled the ghost again. He felt his hand raise and give the unaware Zonker a light whack on the arm. He remembered his candle, that word Slekt, the charred bit of wood and everything before, between and beyond.
Fight. Slekt. Matty-Mo. No more Ides.

Beep. Beep. Beep.

Then a moment was broken, broken by a sharp inhaling breath and soon, the sound of wonderful, steady, slumbering breath. Breath. Then muttered words. Then snoring.
Beep. Beep.

No more Ides.

Slekt.

He heard other voices chime in, commanding, demanding, begging until that beautiful sound of natural breath was heard. He heard his Lifestone thrum and pulse with relief he couldn't release -- Transcendence wouldn't come to him this night. So as one by one, the others departed, Renne gingerly crawled, found a place at the foot of the sleeping Norseman's bed and curled up right then and there.
But for hours, he didn't sleep.

For hours, he listened as keenly as he was able to the steady breath and something he hadn't felt inside his own chest for many years.
one hand slowly came to find his Lifestone while his other rested on his chest. He felt the soft give and knew there used to be a breastbone there. Fingers felt the sharp end of a latticed ribcage that never reattached to a breastbone it couldn't regenerate. All he heard inside his own body was the smooth rush of thin blood as it ran within him.
And the silence of a heart he didn't have.

So he listened to Zonker's heart and eventually slept by the sound.

Cinder who seemed far beyond the dead tree where once his ravens gathered had appeared into snowy sights of those able to see. But he knew Renne could see him without eyes, he assumed Renne knew he would have came back if he called his name.

He had heard his name being called three times, twice by Renne?s voice and once silently in the Imps grand heart. Cinder thought how could he leave one who thought of him as a brother? Yes surely he must remain, the angels had gotten the best of him he though as he licks his lips comically towards them as if he had savoured one of their kind once before. He coughed and looked at Nathan and Jarrod ignoring the angels once more. He took off his coat, rather large for the Blue Rascal but warm it would be, he knelt down placing the knee length coat made of reindeer pelt on Renne and patted his back comfortingly. He smiled some watching his friend take up the drink.

?I?m here Ren. I?m sorry I hadn?t any word sooner I would have brought some clams so you could make your delicious chowder?. He looked onward at the glowing nexus wondering if this one would last for long. He stomped the snow compacting it some and sat beside Renne and drank some of the whisky from his flask.

?I have a ship anchored near the ice shelf west of here, There?s some rooms to freshen up and get warm. You and Ren should spend some time being alone, youv?e come this far into the cold?.

He looked to Jarrod. ?You too, Human. Not that I know you but at least you wouldn?t need to keep tending to a fire in this snowy place?.
He wondered if they were going to leave any time soon. He really hadn?t intended on behaving so well what with angels.

He had thought about it once more in his mind, ravaging the holy beings.

Wounding
When the Dead Hold Command

"When the dead control the living, it no longer remains clear as to which side rules the world."







It wasn't expected that either Cinder or 'Nathan come.

It was a comforting surprise nonetheless.

Having sat up relatively straight and taken a long, warming sip from the not-firewyne bottle, the blue one extended it in offering. He'd heard of warriors doing this before and much as he didn't think himself one, Renne held onto whatever he could try to emulate. And as much as he wanted to, he couldn't leave yet.

Renne put the bottle down then and allowed himself a moment of just holding onto Cinder and 'Nathan as much as he was permitted. He knew parts of his mind had grown up but the rest of him never would -- his own error made in trusting another soul too soon. He was, as it had been put, as innocent and foolish as a child. So he remained as a child with only the ability to learn but not the ability to grow up.
As the child, he wanted to go back to Home.
As the child, he wanted his innocence back.

As the would-be warrior, he couldn't let the unknown being go where only demons trod.

He spoke quietly and with a small edge of something between a request and bordering on a gentle command.
The last thing Renne wanted was the remnants of his family being torn apart by the avalanche a single bullet had set off.

"Yeu, Harrrr-bourrrr, go ba-ck. Bad thin-g, in dow-n un-derrr. Is li-fe in the-rrrre. Rrr-enne nee-d go ge-t."
It was one last duty running alongside his search for sanity and redemption. It was an unspoken will to return to the Harbours once his mind was returned to what it should be. It was an unspoken will that once he was able to turn his back on these lands, he'd not look back.
These lands had done enough damage already.
His voice stopped then, hesitant. It wasn't said but it showed on his face -- He was terrified and had some doubt.
He didn't know if he could do this alone.

Where the automaton once stood, a forsaken child stood in its place.

Wounding
I Met the Earthen Devil

"Man's natural character is to imitate; that of the sensitive man is to resemble as closely as possible the person whom he loves. It is only by imitating the vices of others that I have earned my misfortunes."
--The Marquis de Sade









He wasn't in Rhy'Din and he was.

He wasn't in the frozen northlands of Rhy'Din trying to regain what the Humans had so callously taken from him. He wasn't in the northlands of Rhy'Din trying to redeem his heart for some atrocity his hands did/did not commit.
Renne wasn't in a forsaken land with heartless life-forms bent on destroying one another.

Physically, he felt Cinder's coat and heard 'Nathan's beloved voice and smelled the scents of the last remaining souls who hadn't given up their virtues. Physically, he knew where he was and let himself stay still.
Physically, his voice whispered soft words of thankful reverence to honour his Brother-Friend and BondMate.
Mentally, his mind went back to another place.
It went to a place of thunder, snow, rain and fire.

He heard thunder in his mind and screamed at it.

He felt rain in his mind and curled inward, into Johnathan and Cinder's hold to shy away from it. His flesh crawled with the feeling of it and tears poured down his face. The thunder didn't stop.
For a while, 'Nathan's voice kept him grounded, centered. It reminded him that his mind was spiraling into chaos again but this time, he knew it. And possibly, could do something about it.
Out came his Odin-Feather, spyglass and alethiometer. And then came his modified cutlass. They were, for a while, held onto and for a while, anchored him to logic as he listened to the rain, thunder and bullets fly inside his mind.

Right now, he hated the past.

It melded with the present in thunder and little pellets of metal and for the first time in a while, his head ached sharply, reminding him that he still bore the scars of being shot down and left like an animal hunted for sport.
He was an animal.
And the animal shed tears when it felt the bullets in his head.

His body soon began to tremble and shake; memory and reality further liquefying into bright sounds and loud-silent colours.
Fingers lost their grip on precious treasures and beloved BondMate.
Eyes went wide as an ache crept into his chest where a heart should have been.

Reality caved in.

Pain became reality.

He became as a puppet thrown about by an invisible, malicious child.

It was his own error, allowing too long for a family history to go unreleased and now, the worst of times bade it to emerge. Physical flaw and mental torment danced into a venomous blend, one that was expressed outwardly as uncontrolled thrashing and a series of great, keening wails.

Reality caved in.

Thunder pounded within.

And a gun went off in the form of sharp reminders of the past.