Searching [Chapter 11]
Oct. 1st, 2011 07:32 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
esp_dragonFandom: Original
Summary: The world of Torpin is open, dragging in xeni from other worlds. The majority of them are monsters, prone to violence. There are some, however, that are not, and are able to live amongst the human population, if allowed to. Marland should know; he's one of them. His job is to hunt and stop the xeni that seek only to destroy what's around them. On one job, a human xeno drops through a portal, an event which Marland has never heard of happening before. And that's not the only thing different about the human...
Rating: R/NC-17
Notes: Contains swearing, torture, bloody fighting and death.
I guess I should stick in an earlier comment about Marland being a bad liar, but I guess the reader knows that his ears and body language are really expressive now? XDD;;
Genre: Urban fantasy
Word count: 6,012
Total word count: 74,987
Status: Work in Progress (reposting, but is complete)
Marland froze, feeling like the floor had just disappeared from under him and his stomach was hanging somewhere above his head.
Shod – Ronthar had his memories back. Marland stared at him, absolutely no idea what to do or say.
Ronthar's eyebrow was still up. "And you are…?"
Marland looked away, feeling even worse than he had been two seconds ago. Ronthar had his memories back – and his memories of when he was Shodin were gone.
"It's…" He clenched his teeth, feeling so incredibly alone, and he hadn't realised that he no longer felt that. "It's Marland," he said quietly.
"Hmm. Nice to meet you, Marland."
He glanced at Sh – Ronthar from the corner of his eyes. Ronthar wasn't smiling, wasn't even looking at him. There had been no emotion in his voice and he’d sounded distant.
Marland got up and walked to the other side of the room. He lay down slowly, his ears feeling like they would never come back up again. His mind felt dead, broken; it kept repeating the fact that Shodin no longer existed, that there was a complete stranger in the room with him.
He angled himself so that he was facing Ronthar, just in case. With his arms pillowing his head, Marland closed his eyes and tried to ignore everything.
* * *
Marland must have dozed off at some point, or just ignored things too well, because Sho – Ronthar was making his way quietly over, when Marland was sure he hadn't heard him getting up.
Ronthar stopped a few short feet away from him and sat down. Marland waited, not opening his eyes, wondering what he would do or say.
"How long have you been here for?"
Marland hunched over and was just able to stop his wings from covering his head. It would have been obvious to S – Ronthar that he was awake, so he could either ignore him, or talk with him. Marland…wanted to do both. He didn't want to talk with Ronthar – he wanted to talk with Shodin. And…he wilted.
Sighing, he looked up at Ronthar, who was sitting cross-legged in front of him. He looked away again immediately, not quite able to suppress his instinctual flinch.
"Dunno," he muttered mostly to the ground.
"Ah, all right."
They sat there in awkward silence, Marland feeling like he wanted to sink through the floor with how much he wanted to be out of the situation.
Ronthar sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I apologise for snapping at you earlier."
Marland grunted, one ear twitching. Then he blinked, staring and studying Ronthar. Ronthar looked back at him for a few seconds before he deliberately turned his head away. If Marland's ears weren't already flat, they would be now after seeing that; he could easily recognise Shodin in Ronthar's movements and he didn't want to, not when Ronthar didn't know him.
Taking a deep breath and shoving away the feeling of loss, Marland considered Ronthar's speech patterns and compared them to Shodin's. They were almost exactly the same, though Shodin's was more like how people talked on Torpin. But that didn't make any sense. If Ronthar had grown up in Lahstron, then shouldn't it be the other way around? The only reason why their speech patterns were different was because Shodin had picked up phrases from the TV.
"Do you always talk like that?"
Ronthar turned his head enough to look at him from the corner of his eyes. "Yes."
But…no-one talked on Torpin like that, not that formally.
Ronthar sighed, raising a knee to drape an arm around it. "I'm not from around here."
'Here' as in Lahstron, or 'here' as in Torpin?
Ronthar smiled quietly at him; it was muted compared to Shodin's. "Torpin."
Marland hadn't realised that his ears had been going up in curiosity until they flattened again. He was not that transparent in his thoughts. How did Shodin and Ronthar always seem to be able to read him so easily?
"Wait." Marland's ears slowly went up and faced forward. "You're a xeno?"
Ronthar's eyes flicked away in thought before he nodded slowly.
But – Then – Argh, what the hell? "But Balt had a picture of you and-" fuck, he'd forgotten her name "-a woman with red hair!"
Ronthar blinked at him, both his eyebrows going up. "Saisha?" He then frowned at Marland. "How do you know about her?"
Marland growled at himself. "Balt showed us-" fuck! "…a picture."
"Showed…'us'." Ronthar’s voice was flat and he was regarding Marland closely, his eyes narrowed and untrusting.
Fucking hell, he couldn't keep his mouth shut. Marland looked away, his wings wanting to cover his head. He sighed, his claws scratching the floor. "I'd found you in an alley, and you'd lost your memory," he began slowly, taking long breaks between the words. "I took you home and you'd been staying with me for over," -he blew air through his teeth- "a month, I guess. We'd bumped into Balt at some point and he pretended to be a friend of Saisha's. After…you told him that you weren't going to meet with him anymore, we ended up here a couple of days later."
There was a small pause and then Ronthar snorted, one eyebrow raised. "And you expect me to believe that?"
Marland's claws created more furrows in the floor. Right, he thought bitterly, his heart sinking. Because that was how normal people reacted to a story like that. Marland clenched his teeth and didn't say anything else. Ronthar moved back to the other side of the room.
Silence enveloped them.
* * *
When Balt came for Marland, Ronthar charged at him, a battle roar in his throat. He hit the ground after one step, Balt smirking over him.
Balt tsked at him. "Really, Shodin, you'd been on such good behaviour before; don't waste all that good work, hm?"
Balt nodded at Marland, and Marland walked out of the room, his eyes flicking back and forth over to Ronthar's twitching body.
* * *
Marland was dumped, shuddering, on the ground, the door closing behind him after a few seconds. He gasped for breath, feeling the emptiness that the loss of his magic. He was glad that his magic wasn't taken from him every time they brought him back, but it hurt. Marland knew that he was clutching at something he didn't really understand but he didn't want to lose it. He didn't want to lose anything else.
He lay there for a while, just trying to regulate his breathing, waiting for the warmth to start spreading again, waiting to be able to control his body better. One of his ears flicked towards the sound of Ronthar approaching before flattening again.
"Hey."
What.
"Asking how you're feeling is redundant so…" He heard Ronthar take a deep breath. "If there's anything that I can do to help…"
"'M fine," he muttered, unable to muster up the strength to turn his head away.
"And I know what…" Ronthar trailed off at the sight of Marland's glare.
"Said I'm fine." So just go back to the other side of the room already.
Ronthar sighed irritably, crossing his arms. "Has anyone told you that you're a bad liar?"
Marland bared his teeth at him. He really didn't want to talk with Ronthar right now.
Ronthar merely raised an eyebrow at him, completely unaffected. Was anyone affected by him doing that anymore? It didn't seem like it. "All right." Ronthar went back to the other side of the room.
* * *
Marland lost track of how many times he'd been taken through after Ronthar had gotten his memories back. There seemed to be a bigger break between each time he was taken through now. Balt was also getting frustrated, or better, the circle spell completing faster, and so much more of Marland's magic being torn out of him every time. It was starting to make him feel close to throwing up now and his heartbeat speed up as soon as Marland started to call his magic to him, practically already feeling the pain before it hit.
He had mostly recovered from the most recent draining when he heard Ronthar start to come over. Marland hunched his shoulders and looked in the opposite direction.
"I doubt you'd know the answer to this, but do you know why I'm still here?" There was a small pause. "They have my 'magic' so I'm no longer useful to them; I don't know why I'm still alive." Ronthar snorted. "Not that I'm glad to be, but…I don't understand their actions."
Marland clenched his teeth, resolutely trying to ignore the pang of loneliness in his heart again. There wasn't any point in talking with Ronthar; he wouldn't believe him, no matter what he said.
"Marland…?"
He whirled his head around, seeing the world tip for a second, but he ignored that in favour of baring his teeth and glaring at Ronthar. "It's t' keep me 'n check, okay?" He'd fucking said it, so go fucking not believe him, and leave him the fuck alone. He turned his head away again, vibrating with frustration.
There was a small pause, where all Marland could hear was their breathing, his ragged and Ronthar's deep. "All right, thank you."
Right, whatever. Marland ignored him.
* * *
"I don't understand it," Balt muttered as he walked beside the guards as they dragged Marland through. "Why did it work with Shodin, but not with this?" Fuck you, asshole.
They dropped him to the ground and left quickly, Marland curling up on himself as soon as they did. Again, it was when Marland was nearly mostly recovered that Ronthar came quietly over.
"Marland…may I ask what name I went under when I didn't have my memories?"
He curled up on himself more. What, for some magical (ha) reason he believed him now, or was he just trying to make conversation? Or did he want more information so that he could poke holes into that too? "Shodin," he mumbled to the wall.
"The…tree?"
"Yes, the fucking tree," Marland snapped, still not turning around. "I'm shit with names, I know." He paused, running over what Ronthar had just said. How the hell did Ronthar know about what a tree from Torpin was called? He shook his head and ruthlessly quashed that spark of hope. He wouldn't be that lucky; there'd be another, more logical reason how Ronthar knew that, that had nothing to do with him getting his memories back.
"So, you were the one who named me?"
"Yeah." Fuck off and stop talking with him.
He heard Ronthar sit down, and Marland turned his head towards him. He was too close for Marland's comfort, so he eased himself onto all fours and edged away until his wing hit a wall. It…probably wasn't enough to satisfy his comfort levels fully, but there was enough distance between them anyway to at least mollify them a bit.
"Thank you."
They were just words. Words that he'd been told to say when the situation demanded it. He didn't really mean them.
There was a soft exhalation from Ronthar. "I'm sorry…for not believing you."
"'S fine. 'S not like it matters or anything at the moment." Because having your memories or not meant fuck all when you were trapped who knew where and you had your magic stripped from you. Or already had your magic taken from you. And what, Ronthar believed him now? Why?
"But it does to you."
He flinched, his claws scoring the floor. "No, it doesn't."
"You're still a bad liar."
"Fuck off," he muttered quietly, turning his head further away.
"I… All right."
Marland got back to ignoring how miserable he felt.
* * *
The hours were then spent with Ronthar cautiously trying to talk with him, and Marland rebuffing him every time. It slowly got easier to do, to just turn his head away and not say anything (unless Ronthar said something that just broke Marland's control like a piece of string trying to support the weight of a car).
Ronthar wasn't as stubborn as Shodin, Marland eventually realised and he didn't know what to make of that. He could see Shodin's mannerisms in Ronthar's actions –or whatever direction that was supposed to be- in how he tilted his head when he wanted to know something, or the fact that he fiddled with his hair when he wanted to do something to distract himself, or that he started tapping his fingers when he was thinking about something. He also spent a lot of time with a hand wrapped around the top of his arm.
But Marland could also see where he was different. Ronthar's actions were faster, more conscious, and he sometimes seemed to thrum with energy, where Shodin had been the opposite, able to just sit there, his movements flowing and smooth.
He hated it. In some cases, he did want to talk with Ronthar, because fuck, who else could he talk to here? He didn't want the awkwardness, but every time Ronthar opened his mouth, it just drove it in further that Shodin was no longer there.
"Marland…"
He twitched an ear towards him before he turned it away.
Ronthar sighed, and Marland could hear him tapping his fingers on his arm. "Right," he muttered, but there was something in his tone that made Marland wary, and it only increased when he heard Ronthar stride towards him. And kept coming towards him until he was only a foot away.
Marland jerked his head up, staring at him with his eyes wide for a second, before he started skittering away. What the hell? Ronthar backed him in a corner and before Marland could attempt futilely snarling at him, he sat down so their heads were more equal in height. It didn't help, and fuck, the way Marland was now, the only way he could even get up would involve him moving closer to Ronthar. Shit. His stifled the whine in his throat, his ears going flat as they could go. What did he want?
"I am not going to leave until we've talked properly."
Marland growled at him; he couldn't turn his head away – he'd still be able to see him one way or another. The tips of his wings were up against the wall too, so he couldn't move them either. So much for Ronthar not being as stubborn as Shodin; it just took him longer before he dug his heels in.
Ronthar sighed again, brushing his hair away from his face, and Marland looked away at that. They were silent, Ronthar with a hand on the top of his arm, a finger stroking the area. Marland tried to not notice the downcast look on his face.
Ronthar took a deep breath and began talking. "I know that you were telling the truth now, that I really did forget my memories."
Marland looked at him suspiciously. Right. "Yeah? Why do you think that now?"
"There's a couple of things," Ronthar said, playing with a part of his hair. He then rolled them between his fingers before waving them at Marland. "This, for a start; my hair's a little longer than I remember it being. For another, that man, the leader-"
"Balt," Marland supplied listlessly, realising afterwards that Ronthar wouldn't know him – Marland had never called him by name when he was there, and it wasn't like they talked about him when they were alone.
"Oh." Ronthar looked away, down at his hands. "I see." He shook his head, his hair waving slowly, before he looked up again. "Balt keeps referring to a 'Shodin' and that was the name you gave me."
Marland shrugged, trying with his wings first but when that failed, he shrugged with his shoulders. "Could easily set that up."
Ronthar blinked at him, his head tilting to the side. "… I suppose." He hummed, looking less certain now. "My wounds I remember having have healed and I have new ones that I don't remember receiving."
One of Marland's ears twitched down. "So?" he replied dully. "They coulda, dunno, drugged you for a month and added new scars to make you think you'd been out."
"Marland," Ronthar said slowly, a confused set to his eyebrows, "are you trying to make me not trust you?"
Marland flinched and stopped breathing for a second. "You didn't before, and there's problems with your proof," he said quietly, shoving his memories away.
"…And if I want to trust you?" Ronthar asked cautiously.
"Why would you want to?"
"Well, we're in a similar situation, so the best thing we could do right now is team up together," Ronthar said frankly. One part of Marland began to point out that since Ronthar didn't have magic, then he would want to work together with him, but he stopped that thought before it was fully formed.
"And what if that was the entire point? What if all this" -Marland indicated the room with a jerk of his head- "was set up so you could trust me?"
Ronthar crossed his arms, an eyebrow raised, a small smile on his face. "Then you wouldn't be trying to persuade me to not trust you." He paused, his eyes drifting away before he turned back to him, his smile now touched with teasing. "You're also a bad liar, so it would have been obvious from the start."
Marland looked away, his ears not going flat, but moving, not really sure on what direction they were supposed to go. So, again, Ronthar was adamant that he wanted to trust Marland. He sighed, loosening stiff muscles. "All right, fine." Now what?
Ronthar sighed too, in relief, his smile widening. "Then-"
He was interrupted by two sharp knocks on the door. When Balt entered and saw then, his eyebrows rose. "So you two are talking with each other again."
Marland's ears sank down as he got up slowly. Ronthar was regarding Balt warily and moving away.
Balt gestured to the door with a sweep of his hand.
He nodded and walked out the room with Balt and the guards. He didn't know how to feel about the interruption. He and Ronthar were maybe finally able to talk with each other, but Marland knew that it was going to be awkward anyway. Going straight into an easy, casual conversation after all that silence just wasn't going to happen.
The stuff inside the bowls this time seemed a little different from usual, more watery and the colour was off too, lighter. Balt must be trying something new, Marland realised uneasily.
When the circle formed though, it didn't seem to be any different from what it was normally like, but that didn't mean anything.
Balt waved a hand, indicating for Marland to start. Taking a deep breath, bracing himself for the pain, Marland began to call his magic to him.
It hit him like a punch to the stomach, and that was when Marland knew something was wrong. He fell to his knees, one hand braced on the floor. The sucking magic usually felt like it had snatched his insides and whatever else it could reach away and this, this was a whole lot weaker. It wasn't as concentrated, and it felt like it was tugging at his magic, rather than grabbing it in a tight hold and wrenching with all its might. Marland pretended to gasp for breath, his mind working furiously. He normally only lasted two drainings now, so he just had to stand up once more.
"Again."
Marland nodded shakily, desperately hoping that even if he was a bad liar, he might be a decent actor. He flattened his ears, hoping they hadn't been up for too long. He slowly got to his feet, taking deep breaths, making sure to not stand like he had before, more hunched over.
He called the fire to him again, and when he felt the impact, he fell to the ground completely, his arms splayed and wings limp. This would be the hard part, because when he'd been shocked, he normally only recovered enough to be able to do anything after he had been back in the cell for a couple of minutes.
The shock came, Marland scratching the floor when he clenched his hands into fists. It was over as soon as he'd just curled in on himself, and he held himself there, not understanding, not believing what was happening.
"And again, nothing." Balt sighed irritably. "No point punishing it if it can't do any more," he muttered. "It's trained anyway."
Marland kept himself as still as he could, barring the twitching. This couldn't be happening. Since when did something work out so well for him? … Okay, the original situation was really bad, so he couldn't really think of this as amazing luck. Something had to go wrong though, so Marland waited, cautious to see what would happen next.
"Take it back."
Balt had already left the room by the time the guards had reached him. Good.
The guards hefted him up, the brown-haired one taking his left shoulder and arm, and the black-haired one taking his right. Marland nearly gave himself away when he braced his arms before the guards pulled him up.
The brown-haired one snickered, shaking his head. "Do you think it's trying to help?"
"Could just be it doesn't want its arm to be ripped out the socket," the other one grunted. "It's still heavy though."
There was a bark of laughter. "Yeah. You'd think we'd've gotten used to lugging its weight by now."
Marland didn't attack straight away; he waited until they were about to leave the room, before the door had been opened, so they'd tire themselves out a little. It meant feeling his shoulders supporting his entire weight but his arms weren't the only things he could use as weapons. Marland flexed his fingers, bringing his claws out in his left hand. He was stronger with his right, but the angle was better with his left.
Marland brought his feet up and shoved to the left, raking his claws in and then pushed them across the man's body.
"Shit!"
"What - Fuck!"
Hoping that would be enough to kill him (he wasn't sure; he didn't think it was deep enough), Marland whirled his attention onto the black-haired guard, who was fumbling for the controller attached to his belt, his face white and staring at the blood splatter on the ground. He still had an arm hooked under Marland's armpit.
Snarling and baring his teeth, Marland tried to do the same to the black-haired one, but it didn't work; the guard let go of him with a high-pitched cry as soon as he tensed his arm. The guard hastily backed up a few steps, his fingers still groping for the right button.
Marland smacked his hand away with a backhand, but he was only able to scratch the guard when he lunged, the guard quick on his feet. He snapped his wing out; the guard hadn't been expecting that, and fell to the ground from the impact. The guard had landed on top of the controller, so Marland considered himself lucky he didn't end up getting shocked or worse because of that.
The guard was still intent on the controller; didn't they have any other weapons, or were they that reliant on them?
Marland grabbed the guard's wrists in one hand, using his claws to make sure he had a proper grip on them. The guard winced and began shaking, his breathing uneven, and his eyes were as wide as they could go. Marland looked away for a second, trying to find something to tie him up with, and the guard seemed to take that as a sign because he started babbling, pleading to be let go.
"Wait, please, don't – I don't want to die; I was just doing my job. Please…"
There wasn't anything he could use that Marland could see and even if there was, it would have been out of reach. Marland's ears flattened – he was running out of time and he had to get out of there as quickly as he could. Which only left him with one option. …Shit. Marland flicked his eyes back to the man for a second before he ripped his throat out with a sweep of his arm.
He was sprayed by the man's blood, the guard twitching and gargling in his throat before he stopped moving. Marland gingerly pulled his claws out of the man's wrists and as soon as he did, the guard's arms flopped to the ground. He tried to wipe the blood away, but all he was able to do was smear it across him instead. The only thing he could hear was his own harsh breathing.
Glancing around the room revealed nothing that he could use to clean himself with, but maybe there was something in the boxed-off area? If he and Ronthar were to get out somewhat easily, they'd have to draw the least amount of attention to themselves; being blood-splattered wasn't a good way to stay inconspicuous.
Marland quickly made his way over to it, his ears twisted towards the door, just in case. When he poked his head in the room, the first thing he saw was a softly glowing, translucent cube on a simple square table, one face about twice the size of Marland's palm. So that was how Balt was doing the magic: something had come through a portal and it eventually ended up in Balt's hands.
Making sure that he didn't get too close to it, in case he knocked it over and it did something, he looked elsewhere. The rest of the room was bare though, and he couldn't see anything else.
Shaking his head, Marland left the room and padded over to the second guard he'd killed. He took his cardkey and then glanced at the other guard, wondering if he should take his cardkey as well, just in case he lost or broke the one he had. As he made his way over, Marland realised that the rasping breath he'd been hearing wasn't his own: it was the guard's. And his hand was on his controller.
Marland dived at him, but he was too late and pain slammed into him while he was in the air. Snarling, his dive still carried him to the guard and he barrelled into him, knocking the guard's hand away. Marland shuddered on top of him, unable to do anything else. But…the guard wasn't doing anything either. It took a couple more seconds before Marland realised he couldn't hear the guard breathing.
It took an agonisingly long minute before Marland had enough control to be able to move properly again. The air stank of blood. When he was able to move, Marland lifted himself off the man. His right wing was stuck on something, and when he tried to pull his wing free, he realised why.
Marland turned his head to see the claw on the top of his wing buried in the man's throat, the curved part caught under his chin. He slid his hand under the junction of where the claw and his wing met and pushed up, the claw something free with a squelching sound. It dripped with a steady stream of blood and Marland got as much of it off as he could with his shaking fingers.
He took that guard's cardkey as well and then checked for any weapons. There was nothing. A quick search of the other guard revealed nothing as well.
He deliberated taking the controllers with him for a second but he decided against it. They could use them to maybe get the collars off, but there were too many unmarked buttons, so who knew what would happen if they pressed the wrong one. One could cause instant death or something. He passed on destroying them for the same reason.
That no longer concerning him, Marland considered the guards' clothes in a different light. They weren't going to need them anymore…
Marland unsheathed his claws and ripped an uneven strip of cloth from the brown-haired guard, using that to clean himself up.
He then left the room, one of the cardkeys tucked safely in a pocket, the other getting blood spread across it. Hopefully it would still work with that on.
He stumbled down the corridor, his legs not fully supporting him yet. The card didn’t work, even when he’d cleaned the cardkey as much as he could. He threw that cardkey away and fumbled with the second one.
That one, thankfully, opened the door without any fuss.
Marland poked his head through the open door, one hand on the doorframe to keep him upright.
"Ronthar?"
Ronthar gaped at him, his eyes flicking to where Marland couldn't quite clean the blood away from, he was sure. "Marland…?"
"We're getting out of here." Hopefully. He really fucking hoped so.
Ronthar got to his feet, eyeing the door warily, but still coming towards him. "What about Fion?"
Shit. Marland's ears flattened. "I don't know where he is but we have to go now." If they spent time looking for Fion, they would increase the chance that they’d get caught again.
Ronthar hesitated, looking away and shit, there wasn't anything Marland could say to him that could get him moving. The hesitation didn't last long, and Ronthar’s shoulders slumped and he dropped his head. He took a deep breath and nodded at Marland, resolve in his eyes. "We're coming back later to get Fion."
Marland wasn't sure if he could really agree to that, not when he didn't know where they were, but they would try, when Marland had his magic. He nodded back. Now for the simple task of getting out of here.
They headed down the corridor, Marland's ears pricked towards any sounds.
"How did you – never mind. Later."
Ha. And there was Sho – Ronth – his? their? his curiosity coming through already.
They were able to get around without bumping into anyone for a few minutes before Marland heard someone walking along the corridor they were about to go down. He shoved Ronthar back around the corner and they waited on their toes just in case they had to move quickly. They didn't have to, the person continuing on straight.
The place really needed a map stuck on the wall. But how were they going to get out? The front door? Ha. Windows wouldn't work that well with Marland either, not with his wings.
Ronthar had gone down to the other side of the corridor they were in and was waving him over. When Marland got there, Ronthar whispered, "What does a green light mean?"
He was asking a question now? Marland couldn't really be that surprised though. "What's it for?" he whispered back, his ears constantly on the move. Ronthar knew the situation, so he couldn't be asking a question unless it was something important.
"There's one above a door over there, and it seems significant." He pointed around the corner.
Marland peered around the corner and then breathed a sigh of relief. A fire door. An exit. A noisy exit, but it was one nonetheless, and maybe it would mask their exit while everyone else got out the building too. Good. "It's a way out," he told Ronthar as he went over to it. "It'll set off a loud alarm when it’s opened it so-"
"Is that wise?" Ronthar asked, his eyebrows high.
"It'll create a distraction, so yeah." He waited, and Ronthar nodded. Marland's ears went flat just before he shoved the bar down. It didn't help, but he was outside just as the alarm went into full swing.
And it was daytime, maybe about midday, going by how much the sunlight seared his eyeballs. "Fuck!" He stumbled into something and whatever-it-was crashed to the ground.
"Marland! What's wrong?" Ronthar was beside him, a hand on his arm. He shied away from the touch.
"I can't fucking see in sunlight," he growled. It had to be during the day when they finally got out!
"It's all right," Ronthar soothed, his voice calm. "Come on; we need to get away." Ronthar took his arm again, tugging him in one direction.
They did need to get moving; there was probably people heading towards that fire exit already – no, there was people heading there; Marland could hear them coming towards them, their shoes and chatter echoing through the door. Shit.
Fuck, his eyes weren't that bad, but he let Ronthar guide him until his eyesight cleared up. He was able to see fairly decently, but most things seemed washed out in colour, and his headache from having the lights on constantly got a whole lot worse. It didn't matter that they were in the shade; it was still brighter than the artificial light he'd sort of gotten used to. It was also louder than Marland was used to; there were too many cars rumbling past, too many people talking and walking around. It heighted his paranoia of getting caught and the world just seemed to close in on him, like there was only a certain distance he could walk before he was caught.
The roads weren't familiar, not that he could see the names, but Marland couldn't place where the hell they were. Shit, shit, shit. And that was what Marland heard the gun cock. He shoved Ronthar away, ears trying to find where the hell the person was. In front of them, maybe.
There was a hiss of static. "Requesting back-up," a man said softly, but urgently. Marland span around, but the empty street they'd been walking down suddenly had people in it. Fuck! "There's a xeno on Kretsin Street with a human. Over six-foot, bipedal, green scales with gold markings, and big wings." The static stopped.
The person who came around the corner, gun aimed and ready was wearing a dark grey uniform, some parts coloured with blue. He wore a stiff hat with a rim on his head with the same colouring. Dammit, police.
"Sir?" the man called over, glancing at Ronthar –who was no longer as far away as he should have been- his gun trained on Marland the whole time. "Are you okay?"
Ronthar's eyebrows went up in confusion. "Yes? What are you–" The confusion cleared up, his eyes widening. He held up a hand and started walking towards the man. "Wait. Don't shoot him."
Marland considered the options. Ronthar had the best chance of getting out of here with the police; he wasn't sure about them protecting him, but for the moment, it was the best thing for him right now.
He didn't have that option; he was going to get shot as soon as Ronthar got close enough to the policeman to not get accidentally hit. There wasn't anything he could hide behind, and while the exit looked clear, he could hear people moving around. He got another burst of adrenaline, making his heart beat so much faster, but he didn't want to deal with screaming humans, and he'd probably trip over something if he tried to run anyway. Those humans would probably be carrying their own weapons to protect themselves against xeni.
He was right. As soon as Ronthar got far enough away from Marland, the policeman opened fire on him. One bullet went straight through his wing, while the others impacted above his head as he fell. After the who knew how many days or weeks they'd spent with Balt, getting their magic sucked out over and over again, never quite recovering fully from it by the next time rolled around, getting electrocuted after every session, not exactly getting the best food there, having what felt like his eyeballs being stabbed because of the daylight and then getting shot, it was what tipped the scales of Marland's endurance. He fell into unconsciousness; the last thing he could hear was the echoes of Ronthar's shouting.
"Stop shooting him! He hasn't - Marland!"
Previous Chapter | Next Chapter
Summary: The world of Torpin is open, dragging in xeni from other worlds. The majority of them are monsters, prone to violence. There are some, however, that are not, and are able to live amongst the human population, if allowed to. Marland should know; he's one of them. His job is to hunt and stop the xeni that seek only to destroy what's around them. On one job, a human xeno drops through a portal, an event which Marland has never heard of happening before. And that's not the only thing different about the human...
Rating: R/NC-17
Notes: Contains swearing, torture, bloody fighting and death.
I guess I should stick in an earlier comment about Marland being a bad liar, but I guess the reader knows that his ears and body language are really expressive now? XDD;;
Genre: Urban fantasy
Word count: 6,012
Total word count: 74,987
Status: Work in Progress (reposting, but is complete)
Marland froze, feeling like the floor had just disappeared from under him and his stomach was hanging somewhere above his head.
Shod – Ronthar had his memories back. Marland stared at him, absolutely no idea what to do or say.
Ronthar's eyebrow was still up. "And you are…?"
Marland looked away, feeling even worse than he had been two seconds ago. Ronthar had his memories back – and his memories of when he was Shodin were gone.
"It's…" He clenched his teeth, feeling so incredibly alone, and he hadn't realised that he no longer felt that. "It's Marland," he said quietly.
"Hmm. Nice to meet you, Marland."
He glanced at Sh – Ronthar from the corner of his eyes. Ronthar wasn't smiling, wasn't even looking at him. There had been no emotion in his voice and he’d sounded distant.
Marland got up and walked to the other side of the room. He lay down slowly, his ears feeling like they would never come back up again. His mind felt dead, broken; it kept repeating the fact that Shodin no longer existed, that there was a complete stranger in the room with him.
He angled himself so that he was facing Ronthar, just in case. With his arms pillowing his head, Marland closed his eyes and tried to ignore everything.
Marland must have dozed off at some point, or just ignored things too well, because Sho – Ronthar was making his way quietly over, when Marland was sure he hadn't heard him getting up.
Ronthar stopped a few short feet away from him and sat down. Marland waited, not opening his eyes, wondering what he would do or say.
"How long have you been here for?"
Marland hunched over and was just able to stop his wings from covering his head. It would have been obvious to S – Ronthar that he was awake, so he could either ignore him, or talk with him. Marland…wanted to do both. He didn't want to talk with Ronthar – he wanted to talk with Shodin. And…he wilted.
Sighing, he looked up at Ronthar, who was sitting cross-legged in front of him. He looked away again immediately, not quite able to suppress his instinctual flinch.
"Dunno," he muttered mostly to the ground.
"Ah, all right."
They sat there in awkward silence, Marland feeling like he wanted to sink through the floor with how much he wanted to be out of the situation.
Ronthar sighed, running a hand through his hair. "I apologise for snapping at you earlier."
Marland grunted, one ear twitching. Then he blinked, staring and studying Ronthar. Ronthar looked back at him for a few seconds before he deliberately turned his head away. If Marland's ears weren't already flat, they would be now after seeing that; he could easily recognise Shodin in Ronthar's movements and he didn't want to, not when Ronthar didn't know him.
Taking a deep breath and shoving away the feeling of loss, Marland considered Ronthar's speech patterns and compared them to Shodin's. They were almost exactly the same, though Shodin's was more like how people talked on Torpin. But that didn't make any sense. If Ronthar had grown up in Lahstron, then shouldn't it be the other way around? The only reason why their speech patterns were different was because Shodin had picked up phrases from the TV.
"Do you always talk like that?"
Ronthar turned his head enough to look at him from the corner of his eyes. "Yes."
But…no-one talked on Torpin like that, not that formally.
Ronthar sighed, raising a knee to drape an arm around it. "I'm not from around here."
'Here' as in Lahstron, or 'here' as in Torpin?
Ronthar smiled quietly at him; it was muted compared to Shodin's. "Torpin."
Marland hadn't realised that his ears had been going up in curiosity until they flattened again. He was not that transparent in his thoughts. How did Shodin and Ronthar always seem to be able to read him so easily?
"Wait." Marland's ears slowly went up and faced forward. "You're a xeno?"
Ronthar's eyes flicked away in thought before he nodded slowly.
But – Then – Argh, what the hell? "But Balt had a picture of you and-" fuck, he'd forgotten her name "-a woman with red hair!"
Ronthar blinked at him, both his eyebrows going up. "Saisha?" He then frowned at Marland. "How do you know about her?"
Marland growled at himself. "Balt showed us-" fuck! "…a picture."
"Showed…'us'." Ronthar’s voice was flat and he was regarding Marland closely, his eyes narrowed and untrusting.
Fucking hell, he couldn't keep his mouth shut. Marland looked away, his wings wanting to cover his head. He sighed, his claws scratching the floor. "I'd found you in an alley, and you'd lost your memory," he began slowly, taking long breaks between the words. "I took you home and you'd been staying with me for over," -he blew air through his teeth- "a month, I guess. We'd bumped into Balt at some point and he pretended to be a friend of Saisha's. After…you told him that you weren't going to meet with him anymore, we ended up here a couple of days later."
There was a small pause and then Ronthar snorted, one eyebrow raised. "And you expect me to believe that?"
Marland's claws created more furrows in the floor. Right, he thought bitterly, his heart sinking. Because that was how normal people reacted to a story like that. Marland clenched his teeth and didn't say anything else. Ronthar moved back to the other side of the room.
Silence enveloped them.
When Balt came for Marland, Ronthar charged at him, a battle roar in his throat. He hit the ground after one step, Balt smirking over him.
Balt tsked at him. "Really, Shodin, you'd been on such good behaviour before; don't waste all that good work, hm?"
Balt nodded at Marland, and Marland walked out of the room, his eyes flicking back and forth over to Ronthar's twitching body.
Marland was dumped, shuddering, on the ground, the door closing behind him after a few seconds. He gasped for breath, feeling the emptiness that the loss of his magic. He was glad that his magic wasn't taken from him every time they brought him back, but it hurt. Marland knew that he was clutching at something he didn't really understand but he didn't want to lose it. He didn't want to lose anything else.
He lay there for a while, just trying to regulate his breathing, waiting for the warmth to start spreading again, waiting to be able to control his body better. One of his ears flicked towards the sound of Ronthar approaching before flattening again.
"Hey."
What.
"Asking how you're feeling is redundant so…" He heard Ronthar take a deep breath. "If there's anything that I can do to help…"
"'M fine," he muttered, unable to muster up the strength to turn his head away.
"And I know what…" Ronthar trailed off at the sight of Marland's glare.
"Said I'm fine." So just go back to the other side of the room already.
Ronthar sighed irritably, crossing his arms. "Has anyone told you that you're a bad liar?"
Marland bared his teeth at him. He really didn't want to talk with Ronthar right now.
Ronthar merely raised an eyebrow at him, completely unaffected. Was anyone affected by him doing that anymore? It didn't seem like it. "All right." Ronthar went back to the other side of the room.
Marland lost track of how many times he'd been taken through after Ronthar had gotten his memories back. There seemed to be a bigger break between each time he was taken through now. Balt was also getting frustrated, or better, the circle spell completing faster, and so much more of Marland's magic being torn out of him every time. It was starting to make him feel close to throwing up now and his heartbeat speed up as soon as Marland started to call his magic to him, practically already feeling the pain before it hit.
He had mostly recovered from the most recent draining when he heard Ronthar start to come over. Marland hunched his shoulders and looked in the opposite direction.
"I doubt you'd know the answer to this, but do you know why I'm still here?" There was a small pause. "They have my 'magic' so I'm no longer useful to them; I don't know why I'm still alive." Ronthar snorted. "Not that I'm glad to be, but…I don't understand their actions."
Marland clenched his teeth, resolutely trying to ignore the pang of loneliness in his heart again. There wasn't any point in talking with Ronthar; he wouldn't believe him, no matter what he said.
"Marland…?"
He whirled his head around, seeing the world tip for a second, but he ignored that in favour of baring his teeth and glaring at Ronthar. "It's t' keep me 'n check, okay?" He'd fucking said it, so go fucking not believe him, and leave him the fuck alone. He turned his head away again, vibrating with frustration.
There was a small pause, where all Marland could hear was their breathing, his ragged and Ronthar's deep. "All right, thank you."
Right, whatever. Marland ignored him.
"I don't understand it," Balt muttered as he walked beside the guards as they dragged Marland through. "Why did it work with Shodin, but not with this?" Fuck you, asshole.
They dropped him to the ground and left quickly, Marland curling up on himself as soon as they did. Again, it was when Marland was nearly mostly recovered that Ronthar came quietly over.
"Marland…may I ask what name I went under when I didn't have my memories?"
He curled up on himself more. What, for some magical (ha) reason he believed him now, or was he just trying to make conversation? Or did he want more information so that he could poke holes into that too? "Shodin," he mumbled to the wall.
"The…tree?"
"Yes, the fucking tree," Marland snapped, still not turning around. "I'm shit with names, I know." He paused, running over what Ronthar had just said. How the hell did Ronthar know about what a tree from Torpin was called? He shook his head and ruthlessly quashed that spark of hope. He wouldn't be that lucky; there'd be another, more logical reason how Ronthar knew that, that had nothing to do with him getting his memories back.
"So, you were the one who named me?"
"Yeah." Fuck off and stop talking with him.
He heard Ronthar sit down, and Marland turned his head towards him. He was too close for Marland's comfort, so he eased himself onto all fours and edged away until his wing hit a wall. It…probably wasn't enough to satisfy his comfort levels fully, but there was enough distance between them anyway to at least mollify them a bit.
"Thank you."
They were just words. Words that he'd been told to say when the situation demanded it. He didn't really mean them.
There was a soft exhalation from Ronthar. "I'm sorry…for not believing you."
"'S fine. 'S not like it matters or anything at the moment." Because having your memories or not meant fuck all when you were trapped who knew where and you had your magic stripped from you. Or already had your magic taken from you. And what, Ronthar believed him now? Why?
"But it does to you."
He flinched, his claws scoring the floor. "No, it doesn't."
"You're still a bad liar."
"Fuck off," he muttered quietly, turning his head further away.
"I… All right."
Marland got back to ignoring how miserable he felt.
The hours were then spent with Ronthar cautiously trying to talk with him, and Marland rebuffing him every time. It slowly got easier to do, to just turn his head away and not say anything (unless Ronthar said something that just broke Marland's control like a piece of string trying to support the weight of a car).
Ronthar wasn't as stubborn as Shodin, Marland eventually realised and he didn't know what to make of that. He could see Shodin's mannerisms in Ronthar's actions –or whatever direction that was supposed to be- in how he tilted his head when he wanted to know something, or the fact that he fiddled with his hair when he wanted to do something to distract himself, or that he started tapping his fingers when he was thinking about something. He also spent a lot of time with a hand wrapped around the top of his arm.
But Marland could also see where he was different. Ronthar's actions were faster, more conscious, and he sometimes seemed to thrum with energy, where Shodin had been the opposite, able to just sit there, his movements flowing and smooth.
He hated it. In some cases, he did want to talk with Ronthar, because fuck, who else could he talk to here? He didn't want the awkwardness, but every time Ronthar opened his mouth, it just drove it in further that Shodin was no longer there.
"Marland…"
He twitched an ear towards him before he turned it away.
Ronthar sighed, and Marland could hear him tapping his fingers on his arm. "Right," he muttered, but there was something in his tone that made Marland wary, and it only increased when he heard Ronthar stride towards him. And kept coming towards him until he was only a foot away.
Marland jerked his head up, staring at him with his eyes wide for a second, before he started skittering away. What the hell? Ronthar backed him in a corner and before Marland could attempt futilely snarling at him, he sat down so their heads were more equal in height. It didn't help, and fuck, the way Marland was now, the only way he could even get up would involve him moving closer to Ronthar. Shit. His stifled the whine in his throat, his ears going flat as they could go. What did he want?
"I am not going to leave until we've talked properly."
Marland growled at him; he couldn't turn his head away – he'd still be able to see him one way or another. The tips of his wings were up against the wall too, so he couldn't move them either. So much for Ronthar not being as stubborn as Shodin; it just took him longer before he dug his heels in.
Ronthar sighed again, brushing his hair away from his face, and Marland looked away at that. They were silent, Ronthar with a hand on the top of his arm, a finger stroking the area. Marland tried to not notice the downcast look on his face.
Ronthar took a deep breath and began talking. "I know that you were telling the truth now, that I really did forget my memories."
Marland looked at him suspiciously. Right. "Yeah? Why do you think that now?"
"There's a couple of things," Ronthar said, playing with a part of his hair. He then rolled them between his fingers before waving them at Marland. "This, for a start; my hair's a little longer than I remember it being. For another, that man, the leader-"
"Balt," Marland supplied listlessly, realising afterwards that Ronthar wouldn't know him – Marland had never called him by name when he was there, and it wasn't like they talked about him when they were alone.
"Oh." Ronthar looked away, down at his hands. "I see." He shook his head, his hair waving slowly, before he looked up again. "Balt keeps referring to a 'Shodin' and that was the name you gave me."
Marland shrugged, trying with his wings first but when that failed, he shrugged with his shoulders. "Could easily set that up."
Ronthar blinked at him, his head tilting to the side. "… I suppose." He hummed, looking less certain now. "My wounds I remember having have healed and I have new ones that I don't remember receiving."
One of Marland's ears twitched down. "So?" he replied dully. "They coulda, dunno, drugged you for a month and added new scars to make you think you'd been out."
"Marland," Ronthar said slowly, a confused set to his eyebrows, "are you trying to make me not trust you?"
Marland flinched and stopped breathing for a second. "You didn't before, and there's problems with your proof," he said quietly, shoving his memories away.
"…And if I want to trust you?" Ronthar asked cautiously.
"Why would you want to?"
"Well, we're in a similar situation, so the best thing we could do right now is team up together," Ronthar said frankly. One part of Marland began to point out that since Ronthar didn't have magic, then he would want to work together with him, but he stopped that thought before it was fully formed.
"And what if that was the entire point? What if all this" -Marland indicated the room with a jerk of his head- "was set up so you could trust me?"
Ronthar crossed his arms, an eyebrow raised, a small smile on his face. "Then you wouldn't be trying to persuade me to not trust you." He paused, his eyes drifting away before he turned back to him, his smile now touched with teasing. "You're also a bad liar, so it would have been obvious from the start."
Marland looked away, his ears not going flat, but moving, not really sure on what direction they were supposed to go. So, again, Ronthar was adamant that he wanted to trust Marland. He sighed, loosening stiff muscles. "All right, fine." Now what?
Ronthar sighed too, in relief, his smile widening. "Then-"
He was interrupted by two sharp knocks on the door. When Balt entered and saw then, his eyebrows rose. "So you two are talking with each other again."
Marland's ears sank down as he got up slowly. Ronthar was regarding Balt warily and moving away.
Balt gestured to the door with a sweep of his hand.
He nodded and walked out the room with Balt and the guards. He didn't know how to feel about the interruption. He and Ronthar were maybe finally able to talk with each other, but Marland knew that it was going to be awkward anyway. Going straight into an easy, casual conversation after all that silence just wasn't going to happen.
The stuff inside the bowls this time seemed a little different from usual, more watery and the colour was off too, lighter. Balt must be trying something new, Marland realised uneasily.
When the circle formed though, it didn't seem to be any different from what it was normally like, but that didn't mean anything.
Balt waved a hand, indicating for Marland to start. Taking a deep breath, bracing himself for the pain, Marland began to call his magic to him.
It hit him like a punch to the stomach, and that was when Marland knew something was wrong. He fell to his knees, one hand braced on the floor. The sucking magic usually felt like it had snatched his insides and whatever else it could reach away and this, this was a whole lot weaker. It wasn't as concentrated, and it felt like it was tugging at his magic, rather than grabbing it in a tight hold and wrenching with all its might. Marland pretended to gasp for breath, his mind working furiously. He normally only lasted two drainings now, so he just had to stand up once more.
"Again."
Marland nodded shakily, desperately hoping that even if he was a bad liar, he might be a decent actor. He flattened his ears, hoping they hadn't been up for too long. He slowly got to his feet, taking deep breaths, making sure to not stand like he had before, more hunched over.
He called the fire to him again, and when he felt the impact, he fell to the ground completely, his arms splayed and wings limp. This would be the hard part, because when he'd been shocked, he normally only recovered enough to be able to do anything after he had been back in the cell for a couple of minutes.
The shock came, Marland scratching the floor when he clenched his hands into fists. It was over as soon as he'd just curled in on himself, and he held himself there, not understanding, not believing what was happening.
"And again, nothing." Balt sighed irritably. "No point punishing it if it can't do any more," he muttered. "It's trained anyway."
Marland kept himself as still as he could, barring the twitching. This couldn't be happening. Since when did something work out so well for him? … Okay, the original situation was really bad, so he couldn't really think of this as amazing luck. Something had to go wrong though, so Marland waited, cautious to see what would happen next.
"Take it back."
Balt had already left the room by the time the guards had reached him. Good.
The guards hefted him up, the brown-haired one taking his left shoulder and arm, and the black-haired one taking his right. Marland nearly gave himself away when he braced his arms before the guards pulled him up.
The brown-haired one snickered, shaking his head. "Do you think it's trying to help?"
"Could just be it doesn't want its arm to be ripped out the socket," the other one grunted. "It's still heavy though."
There was a bark of laughter. "Yeah. You'd think we'd've gotten used to lugging its weight by now."
Marland didn't attack straight away; he waited until they were about to leave the room, before the door had been opened, so they'd tire themselves out a little. It meant feeling his shoulders supporting his entire weight but his arms weren't the only things he could use as weapons. Marland flexed his fingers, bringing his claws out in his left hand. He was stronger with his right, but the angle was better with his left.
Marland brought his feet up and shoved to the left, raking his claws in and then pushed them across the man's body.
"Shit!"
"What - Fuck!"
Hoping that would be enough to kill him (he wasn't sure; he didn't think it was deep enough), Marland whirled his attention onto the black-haired guard, who was fumbling for the controller attached to his belt, his face white and staring at the blood splatter on the ground. He still had an arm hooked under Marland's armpit.
Snarling and baring his teeth, Marland tried to do the same to the black-haired one, but it didn't work; the guard let go of him with a high-pitched cry as soon as he tensed his arm. The guard hastily backed up a few steps, his fingers still groping for the right button.
Marland smacked his hand away with a backhand, but he was only able to scratch the guard when he lunged, the guard quick on his feet. He snapped his wing out; the guard hadn't been expecting that, and fell to the ground from the impact. The guard had landed on top of the controller, so Marland considered himself lucky he didn't end up getting shocked or worse because of that.
The guard was still intent on the controller; didn't they have any other weapons, or were they that reliant on them?
Marland grabbed the guard's wrists in one hand, using his claws to make sure he had a proper grip on them. The guard winced and began shaking, his breathing uneven, and his eyes were as wide as they could go. Marland looked away for a second, trying to find something to tie him up with, and the guard seemed to take that as a sign because he started babbling, pleading to be let go.
"Wait, please, don't – I don't want to die; I was just doing my job. Please…"
There wasn't anything he could use that Marland could see and even if there was, it would have been out of reach. Marland's ears flattened – he was running out of time and he had to get out of there as quickly as he could. Which only left him with one option. …Shit. Marland flicked his eyes back to the man for a second before he ripped his throat out with a sweep of his arm.
He was sprayed by the man's blood, the guard twitching and gargling in his throat before he stopped moving. Marland gingerly pulled his claws out of the man's wrists and as soon as he did, the guard's arms flopped to the ground. He tried to wipe the blood away, but all he was able to do was smear it across him instead. The only thing he could hear was his own harsh breathing.
Glancing around the room revealed nothing that he could use to clean himself with, but maybe there was something in the boxed-off area? If he and Ronthar were to get out somewhat easily, they'd have to draw the least amount of attention to themselves; being blood-splattered wasn't a good way to stay inconspicuous.
Marland quickly made his way over to it, his ears twisted towards the door, just in case. When he poked his head in the room, the first thing he saw was a softly glowing, translucent cube on a simple square table, one face about twice the size of Marland's palm. So that was how Balt was doing the magic: something had come through a portal and it eventually ended up in Balt's hands.
Making sure that he didn't get too close to it, in case he knocked it over and it did something, he looked elsewhere. The rest of the room was bare though, and he couldn't see anything else.
Shaking his head, Marland left the room and padded over to the second guard he'd killed. He took his cardkey and then glanced at the other guard, wondering if he should take his cardkey as well, just in case he lost or broke the one he had. As he made his way over, Marland realised that the rasping breath he'd been hearing wasn't his own: it was the guard's. And his hand was on his controller.
Marland dived at him, but he was too late and pain slammed into him while he was in the air. Snarling, his dive still carried him to the guard and he barrelled into him, knocking the guard's hand away. Marland shuddered on top of him, unable to do anything else. But…the guard wasn't doing anything either. It took a couple more seconds before Marland realised he couldn't hear the guard breathing.
It took an agonisingly long minute before Marland had enough control to be able to move properly again. The air stank of blood. When he was able to move, Marland lifted himself off the man. His right wing was stuck on something, and when he tried to pull his wing free, he realised why.
Marland turned his head to see the claw on the top of his wing buried in the man's throat, the curved part caught under his chin. He slid his hand under the junction of where the claw and his wing met and pushed up, the claw something free with a squelching sound. It dripped with a steady stream of blood and Marland got as much of it off as he could with his shaking fingers.
He took that guard's cardkey as well and then checked for any weapons. There was nothing. A quick search of the other guard revealed nothing as well.
He deliberated taking the controllers with him for a second but he decided against it. They could use them to maybe get the collars off, but there were too many unmarked buttons, so who knew what would happen if they pressed the wrong one. One could cause instant death or something. He passed on destroying them for the same reason.
That no longer concerning him, Marland considered the guards' clothes in a different light. They weren't going to need them anymore…
Marland unsheathed his claws and ripped an uneven strip of cloth from the brown-haired guard, using that to clean himself up.
He then left the room, one of the cardkeys tucked safely in a pocket, the other getting blood spread across it. Hopefully it would still work with that on.
He stumbled down the corridor, his legs not fully supporting him yet. The card didn’t work, even when he’d cleaned the cardkey as much as he could. He threw that cardkey away and fumbled with the second one.
That one, thankfully, opened the door without any fuss.
Marland poked his head through the open door, one hand on the doorframe to keep him upright.
"Ronthar?"
Ronthar gaped at him, his eyes flicking to where Marland couldn't quite clean the blood away from, he was sure. "Marland…?"
"We're getting out of here." Hopefully. He really fucking hoped so.
Ronthar got to his feet, eyeing the door warily, but still coming towards him. "What about Fion?"
Shit. Marland's ears flattened. "I don't know where he is but we have to go now." If they spent time looking for Fion, they would increase the chance that they’d get caught again.
Ronthar hesitated, looking away and shit, there wasn't anything Marland could say to him that could get him moving. The hesitation didn't last long, and Ronthar’s shoulders slumped and he dropped his head. He took a deep breath and nodded at Marland, resolve in his eyes. "We're coming back later to get Fion."
Marland wasn't sure if he could really agree to that, not when he didn't know where they were, but they would try, when Marland had his magic. He nodded back. Now for the simple task of getting out of here.
They headed down the corridor, Marland's ears pricked towards any sounds.
"How did you – never mind. Later."
Ha. And there was Sho – Ronth – his? their? his curiosity coming through already.
They were able to get around without bumping into anyone for a few minutes before Marland heard someone walking along the corridor they were about to go down. He shoved Ronthar back around the corner and they waited on their toes just in case they had to move quickly. They didn't have to, the person continuing on straight.
The place really needed a map stuck on the wall. But how were they going to get out? The front door? Ha. Windows wouldn't work that well with Marland either, not with his wings.
Ronthar had gone down to the other side of the corridor they were in and was waving him over. When Marland got there, Ronthar whispered, "What does a green light mean?"
He was asking a question now? Marland couldn't really be that surprised though. "What's it for?" he whispered back, his ears constantly on the move. Ronthar knew the situation, so he couldn't be asking a question unless it was something important.
"There's one above a door over there, and it seems significant." He pointed around the corner.
Marland peered around the corner and then breathed a sigh of relief. A fire door. An exit. A noisy exit, but it was one nonetheless, and maybe it would mask their exit while everyone else got out the building too. Good. "It's a way out," he told Ronthar as he went over to it. "It'll set off a loud alarm when it’s opened it so-"
"Is that wise?" Ronthar asked, his eyebrows high.
"It'll create a distraction, so yeah." He waited, and Ronthar nodded. Marland's ears went flat just before he shoved the bar down. It didn't help, but he was outside just as the alarm went into full swing.
And it was daytime, maybe about midday, going by how much the sunlight seared his eyeballs. "Fuck!" He stumbled into something and whatever-it-was crashed to the ground.
"Marland! What's wrong?" Ronthar was beside him, a hand on his arm. He shied away from the touch.
"I can't fucking see in sunlight," he growled. It had to be during the day when they finally got out!
"It's all right," Ronthar soothed, his voice calm. "Come on; we need to get away." Ronthar took his arm again, tugging him in one direction.
They did need to get moving; there was probably people heading towards that fire exit already – no, there was people heading there; Marland could hear them coming towards them, their shoes and chatter echoing through the door. Shit.
Fuck, his eyes weren't that bad, but he let Ronthar guide him until his eyesight cleared up. He was able to see fairly decently, but most things seemed washed out in colour, and his headache from having the lights on constantly got a whole lot worse. It didn't matter that they were in the shade; it was still brighter than the artificial light he'd sort of gotten used to. It was also louder than Marland was used to; there were too many cars rumbling past, too many people talking and walking around. It heighted his paranoia of getting caught and the world just seemed to close in on him, like there was only a certain distance he could walk before he was caught.
The roads weren't familiar, not that he could see the names, but Marland couldn't place where the hell they were. Shit, shit, shit. And that was what Marland heard the gun cock. He shoved Ronthar away, ears trying to find where the hell the person was. In front of them, maybe.
There was a hiss of static. "Requesting back-up," a man said softly, but urgently. Marland span around, but the empty street they'd been walking down suddenly had people in it. Fuck! "There's a xeno on Kretsin Street with a human. Over six-foot, bipedal, green scales with gold markings, and big wings." The static stopped.
The person who came around the corner, gun aimed and ready was wearing a dark grey uniform, some parts coloured with blue. He wore a stiff hat with a rim on his head with the same colouring. Dammit, police.
"Sir?" the man called over, glancing at Ronthar –who was no longer as far away as he should have been- his gun trained on Marland the whole time. "Are you okay?"
Ronthar's eyebrows went up in confusion. "Yes? What are you–" The confusion cleared up, his eyes widening. He held up a hand and started walking towards the man. "Wait. Don't shoot him."
Marland considered the options. Ronthar had the best chance of getting out of here with the police; he wasn't sure about them protecting him, but for the moment, it was the best thing for him right now.
He didn't have that option; he was going to get shot as soon as Ronthar got close enough to the policeman to not get accidentally hit. There wasn't anything he could hide behind, and while the exit looked clear, he could hear people moving around. He got another burst of adrenaline, making his heart beat so much faster, but he didn't want to deal with screaming humans, and he'd probably trip over something if he tried to run anyway. Those humans would probably be carrying their own weapons to protect themselves against xeni.
He was right. As soon as Ronthar got far enough away from Marland, the policeman opened fire on him. One bullet went straight through his wing, while the others impacted above his head as he fell. After the who knew how many days or weeks they'd spent with Balt, getting their magic sucked out over and over again, never quite recovering fully from it by the next time rolled around, getting electrocuted after every session, not exactly getting the best food there, having what felt like his eyeballs being stabbed because of the daylight and then getting shot, it was what tipped the scales of Marland's endurance. He fell into unconsciousness; the last thing he could hear was the echoes of Ronthar's shouting.
"Stop shooting him! He hasn't - Marland!"