genessia | [ action | closed ] in the dark, in the night and in my dreams

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[ action | closed ] in the dark, in the night and in my dreams

Who: Cassian Lynch, Tannusen
What: One night out of the many that happen regularly, off camera.
Warnings: Angst.

Tannusen's never been an easy sleeper. Before chrysalisis, he'd had more than enough nightmare fuel just from living under Trench's thumb. After, the downpour of snippets of countless lives had simply added itself to the pile.

These days, most of his nightmares revolved around more recent events. Even those that didn't start that way often ended up morphing in that direction; a tightrope act gone wrong melted into the sensation of that knife in his hand, popping through Cassian's chest cavity.

Sometimes, other nightmares added their own twist. Sometimes it happened in the Subarchway, just like in reality, the Faerie easing Cassian's dying body into the mud, badly-burned hand still clutching the knife through his heart. Other times, the death happened in a dark and filthy cell somewhere out in the southwestern desert, done as a mercy killing to save the priest from the unending horrors that awaited him if he continued to draw breath.

Once in a while, the theme of the nightmare came after the killing. After he'd washed and re-dressed and tended to the body, like in reality, and those blank-faced automations had come to take him away. In his dreams, he wandered the hospital corridors and either never found Cassian at all, or found him still dead, room temperature and slack-faced.

Permanent.

Gone.

Lost by his own traitorous hand.

No matter what spin the nightmare of the night took, Tannusen never woke gently from these dreams. Nothing so dramatic as to gasp or jerk awake, but consciousness would suddenly click on, and he'd hold very still, just like now.

Just like now, awake in the dark, heart pounding in his chest, his hands shaking slightly wherever they'd come to rest. The burn scarring all across his right hand ached more than usual, even where it spiraled up his arm, and he slowly pulled it close to tuck against his chest. Eyes still closed, he shuddered, wondering how much had been real. Maybe Cassian being alive in the hospital had been the dream, after all... maybe reality was a lot colder than that.

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"Tannusen."

He gestured now, out the window.

"Never mind ye compared to the lumps and pillocks of me own world, the lumps and pillocks there are masterminds, artists and poets compared to the wobblin', slack jawed, gigglin' wads of interdimensional goose droppin's here.

If ye be better than anyone I've found at home, ye be a god compared to anyone else here."

That earned a startled, but amused, sound out of Tannusen.

"What, you mean you're not going to be running off with Ted?"

It couldn't be all bad, if Cassian had it in him to insult the whole rest of the world.

"If by runnin' off with Ted ye mean runnin' off with bits and pieces to feed to the frogs, aye sure I'll run off with him."

Cassian.

"I'll run off with that giggly blond minger too.

Run her off a feckin' cliff."

"I did offer to invite him to the wedding to use as a piñata," Tannusen pointed out, "it's not too late."

"Even if ye did we all know all he'd do is make obnoxious phone calls from the next city over for a full hour.

The man's twig and berries approach the size and functionality of the statue of David, Tannusen."

"Just think, he's already dressed the part; we wouldn't even have to staple tissue paper streamers on him." But no, for one, he wouldn't show up. For two, a piñata was supposed to be silent and Tannusen doubted Ted was capable of silence even when unconscious.

Three, he doesn't actually want to deal with that nonsense.

"Sorry I aggro-ed that other idiot onto you. And that poor potato joke didn't deserve to be beaten to death and then beaten into paste and eaten. Though I suppose it explains some things."

"Eats it by the dollop, doesn't she? It's the lead paint chips that gives it the pleasin' texture, I'm sure."

"Crunchy," Tannusen agreed, and reached over to thread his fingers through Cassian's hair.

"Like her feckin' beloved crisps."

He couldn't hide the laugh behind the caustic tone though, as Tannusen moved to run his fingers through his hair.

"Maybe she has the two confused. She did say they make them out of lots of stuff besides potatoes."

"Dim as a dead bulb, she is. I've a mind to hunt her down and pelt her with potatoes, but I don't need the constabulary crawlin' up me arse."

"Considering how fast she had at least one other idiot charging in blindly to her defense, I think you'd get swarmed by more than the local popo."

Nothing he hasn't seen before, of course. Entire Freeholds full of idiots had tried to try to take him out over perceived slights against a member or three of theirs. One of those Freeholds didn't exist anymore, nor did the house Tannusen and Isaac had owned in Toronto, packed full of Roande's best explosives before the twenty or so Fae had gone sneaking in there looking to jump the pair.

It was all one big crater, now.

Yeah, the tiger wasn't a big fan of herd mentality.

"Unrelated, but you know that spell I accidentally turned Lil human with?"

May as well bring it up now, now that his mind's a little cleared.

"Bloody useless twat, can't even defend herself against a bloody child."

The muttering tapered off as Tannusen mentioned the spell. His brow arched a little.

"Aye, I recall."

"I need to practice with it more before I use it for this, but," Tannusen continued to toy with Cassian's hair, "I could use it to turn you into a tiger temporarily, if you ever want to know what that's like. Or anything, really. Works on me, too."

A few months ago, he might have balked at the idea. Now, however, considering everything that has happened...

"... Sounds like it might be interestin' aye."

"It's not based off your current form, like my pooka shifting is."

So he wouldn't be stuck as a scraggly, albino, wheezing tiger with bad eyesight.

"A... tiger is a great deal different than a human though. Different leg shapes, skull and teeth and such...

Seems like it might hurt a bit."

"Oh," Tannusen blinked, not having considered that concern. "Well, like I said, I'll be trying it out on others first. But if it works like my pooka shifting does, it's instant. It's nothing like having everything pulled and pushed into shape. Neither of us has enough mass for a tiger, even, if that was the case. Let alone a dragon or something."

That's right.

Once he gets this down he can turn them into fuckin' dragons.

"Lil certainly didn't have the mass or the meat for a human body."

"... Aye, this is true." He'd almost forgotten about the tiny AI.

"... Alright, and we know now it wears off eventually." He'd been so relieved when the angel shrunk back down to six inches again.

"It doesn't tire ye none, does it?"

"No more than drawing doors through things or shifting myself the normal way," Tannusen twisted some of the hair he was playing with, before letting it un-twist on its own. "Glamour is glamour. None of my magic takes anything else out of me. And when I do it on purpose, I should be able to control how long it lasts. Lil going human was an accident. One minute I was talking to the little ball, the next there was a damn human on the table sending papers everywhere."

"So it won't hurt you, and it won't hurt me, and it certainly won't be permanent."

Not seeing any downsides so far.

"Will I still think like meself? Or will I be a tiger all the way through?"

"From what I can tell, it's supposed to work a lot like pooka shifting. Maybe a little less complete, since I am a tiger and you'd be borrowing the form of one, but it has to come with a set of instincts or the form wouldn't work. You wouldn't be able to walk. And if I shifted one of us into something with wings, apparently flight works just fine -- that wouldn't be the case if the shape didn't come with a manual of a sorts."

Tannusen shrugged a little.

"I've not used Elder-Form on myself yet, so I don't know for sure. But even for a pooka, I retain my own thoughts while shifted. It's just that there's a lot of instincts piled on over the top of it, a lot more than usual. I've always got some of them, no matter the shape I'm in, but even you would be in danger for a second or two if you startled me too badly while I was in my other form."

And if there was one person he wouldn't consciously harm, it was Cassian.

Not without a damn good reason, anyway.

"But considering I can still cast spells and fight alongside squishy meaty people while in that shape, I'd say it's not too bad other than the startle response. We've both got pretty significant willpower."

"So I'll think a bit like a cat, but a cat with a mans brain, aye?" That, at least, was what he could make of it.

A very, very smart cat.

"Just have to be careful then, I suppose. I don't want to run headfirst into someone, scare meself shitless and eat them."

Tannusen laughed at that, "If it's anything like being a pooka, it's like being yourself... but sharper. Like being you but with another layer added on top, I suppose. Everything's sharper, stronger, with urges and instincts firing off in all directions. It's nothing like being controlled or anything, it's just... like tuning into a different frequency. I imagine if there's any form I can cast with such accuracy, it'll be that one."

Otherwise any other kith could just emulate being a pooka with this spell, and they couldn't.

"As for running into someone and then eating them, I'll be with you the whole time. I just want you to see what it's like, if you want to. Not come out of it bloodied and traumatized."

Tannusen knew well how that could go.

He'd done it, after all. In more than one lifetime. Bloodied and traumatized summed up his entire experience as a tiger in that last lifetime, the one he had the pelt and skull from.

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[ action | closed ] in the dark, in the night and in my dreams

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