What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
-T.S. Eliot, The Wasteland
The water pounded on his back and shoulders, washing away the trace scent of cedar-and-pine, and he closed his eyes to lose himself in the sound, in the feeling of it. But his thoughts refused to be lost to it, this strange sense of being here, there, elsewhere. It seemed to be getting worse, not better, and there were getting to be times where he would try to reach out and touch something solid, just to make sure that it was.
His relatively new willingness to socialize had taken a beating; Scotty could barely get himself to go downstairs, to the bar. And when he did, even when he felt up to it going, inevitably his focus would slip and then he would miss things. He couldn't afford to miss things, even if he wasn't trying to tend bar.
He could barely make himself go downstairs, and it was a fight these days just to make himself move at all. He felt torn, but he didn't know why.
He'd asked Silas for help, in his roundabout way, combating this sense of being here, there, somewhere else. He had to get a list together, but his mind kept falling into spirals and then often into something like nothingness, and those were the times he reached out to touch something solid.
It was surreal, and unnerving. Pieces, fragments, of something else from somewhere else. Not always bad. Sometimes it was. A silent, unanchored fury that had been almost unmanageable, then had faded again to something that spiked on occasion, then eased again. A silent fear, that had left him pleading silently in his mind, that had broken. Little things, that weren't his and were undeniably his -- emotions he could recognize as his own, feelings and sense memories that belonged to him, but that he couldn't remember.
He turned in the shower and shoved his face into the stinging spray, eyes still closed. Pressed his hands to the wall to brace himself.
Silas had asked Scotty to put it all together, but it refused ordering. He had no clue, how he got yanked from his native universe. No clue, even really, how he ended up on the beach. The only time he really remembered choosing where he would end up was the portal to Rhy'Din.
But the twinges of some sense memory not his own, but his own, started before that.
Risa. The blond man, that day he was doing his courier bit. That was the first. And some distant look across blue eyes, and a lingering sadness that had taken time to fade in his own head, and it was like deja vu. But Scotty had brushed it off, and as always fared forward.
On the beach. Looking at a gray-cast sea, under a gray sky, and fog; some sense memory. Something in his mind whispered 'North Atlantic,' and an ocean he had never lived by, nor even really visited, seemed more familiar than it should have. Could have.
There were other moments like that, like he was feeling something from some other life. But it was his own. His own senses, sharp and clear and instinctively recognizable.
He'd brushed it all off before. It wasn't even close enough to affect his life.
But this was. Whatever this was.
The water turned cold, while he was chewing over it, and he came back to himself in what felt like rain, pulling back and turning the shower off. Stepped out, grabbed a towel, dried off as he went back into their room. Looked out, over Rhy'Din, covered in snow with more falling.
Under all of the myriad feelings that he couldn't place as his own, but were, but weren't, was a deep restless unease that he had no idea who he was. It wasn't a new feeling. Now, not only didn't he really know who he was, but whatever fabric it was that made him felt... woven across too many impossible places.
How long before it would tear?
And what would happen then?
Scotty had two certainties. Two things that he believed in, regardless of the where, or when, or what would happen. Both had taken some battering, but still remained standing, fierce and defiant and unwilling to yield.
Harold Lee, and how he felt for Harold Lee, was one.
"I'm not broken," was the other.
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.
-T.S. Eliot, The Wasteland
The water pounded on his back and shoulders, washing away the trace scent of cedar-and-pine, and he closed his eyes to lose himself in the sound, in the feeling of it. But his thoughts refused to be lost to it, this strange sense of being here, there, elsewhere. It seemed to be getting worse, not better, and there were getting to be times where he would try to reach out and touch something solid, just to make sure that it was.
His relatively new willingness to socialize had taken a beating; Scotty could barely get himself to go downstairs, to the bar. And when he did, even when he felt up to it going, inevitably his focus would slip and then he would miss things. He couldn't afford to miss things, even if he wasn't trying to tend bar.
He could barely make himself go downstairs, and it was a fight these days just to make himself move at all. He felt torn, but he didn't know why.
He'd asked Silas for help, in his roundabout way, combating this sense of being here, there, somewhere else. He had to get a list together, but his mind kept falling into spirals and then often into something like nothingness, and those were the times he reached out to touch something solid.
It was surreal, and unnerving. Pieces, fragments, of something else from somewhere else. Not always bad. Sometimes it was. A silent, unanchored fury that had been almost unmanageable, then had faded again to something that spiked on occasion, then eased again. A silent fear, that had left him pleading silently in his mind, that had broken. Little things, that weren't his and were undeniably his -- emotions he could recognize as his own, feelings and sense memories that belonged to him, but that he couldn't remember.
He turned in the shower and shoved his face into the stinging spray, eyes still closed. Pressed his hands to the wall to brace himself.
Silas had asked Scotty to put it all together, but it refused ordering. He had no clue, how he got yanked from his native universe. No clue, even really, how he ended up on the beach. The only time he really remembered choosing where he would end up was the portal to Rhy'Din.
But the twinges of some sense memory not his own, but his own, started before that.
Risa. The blond man, that day he was doing his courier bit. That was the first. And some distant look across blue eyes, and a lingering sadness that had taken time to fade in his own head, and it was like deja vu. But Scotty had brushed it off, and as always fared forward.
On the beach. Looking at a gray-cast sea, under a gray sky, and fog; some sense memory. Something in his mind whispered 'North Atlantic,' and an ocean he had never lived by, nor even really visited, seemed more familiar than it should have. Could have.
There were other moments like that, like he was feeling something from some other life. But it was his own. His own senses, sharp and clear and instinctively recognizable.
He'd brushed it all off before. It wasn't even close enough to affect his life.
But this was. Whatever this was.
The water turned cold, while he was chewing over it, and he came back to himself in what felt like rain, pulling back and turning the shower off. Stepped out, grabbed a towel, dried off as he went back into their room. Looked out, over Rhy'Din, covered in snow with more falling.
Under all of the myriad feelings that he couldn't place as his own, but were, but weren't, was a deep restless unease that he had no idea who he was. It wasn't a new feeling. Now, not only didn't he really know who he was, but whatever fabric it was that made him felt... woven across too many impossible places.
How long before it would tear?
And what would happen then?
Scotty had two certainties. Two things that he believed in, regardless of the where, or when, or what would happen. Both had taken some battering, but still remained standing, fierce and defiant and unwilling to yield.
Harold Lee, and how he felt for Harold Lee, was one.
"I'm not broken," was the other.