Work Text:
(Two men sit side by side
On a cliff in a desert.
Green eyes meet sunshine
Before a whispered secret is told.
"I'm a Watcher. A being of chaos.")
Wary glances thrown
From one person to the next.
Cautious whispers of death and destruction and danger
Thrown back and forth,
Words untrusting.
Seeds of purpose planted,
Twisting around,
Growing like vines in the mind,
Waiting to be triggered.
(“Is it true, then?”)
A glimmer of a smirk
On a pale face with crimson eyes.
The whispers are screaming.
His eyes contain a gleam
Of danger,
Of death,
Of madness.
(“That you were mortal
Before you were a Watcher?”)
Before, he would walk calmly.
Side by side
With a man who had
The warmest yellow eyes,
Like contained sunshine.
Slowly he watched those eyes
Turn to a colour of danger
That matched the sticks in his hands.
The smell of TNT
Has never been more pungent.
(Feathers ruffled, unorderly
An unheard chant falls from his lips.
Yes. Help me. I feel like I’m losing myself in this charade of holiness
And it’s scaring me.)
One fuse,
Then another.
The cursed Watcher tries to blow up his humanity
Bit by bit,
Blow by blow.
His attempts are futile.
A bite of a golden apple settles on his lips
The sawdust flavour is sickening.
Its purpose is to taste like home.
It’s futile for him.
He's never felt at home anywhere.
Ostracised because of his former mortality,
He doesn’t belong with the Watchers.
He’s too human for their taste.
Yet he’s unable to ever truly be at home with mortals,
Sunshine eyes and promises of 'together'
Are only ever temporary
In the eyes of humans.
He's never deserving of a forever home.
(“No.
How could someone
Like me
Have ever been mortal.”
Venom and fear stain his words
As he looks into those bright sunshine eyes.)
Apathy and self-loathing walk onto the plain.
He stands, lights a stick of TNT and chucks it carelessly.
The Watcher tries to drown
The feeling of solidarity
And mortality
With the burn of explosions
And the stench of gunpowder.
He lights a match.
Fast forward and he’s still fighting.
Still drowning,
Still apathetic.
He lights a match.
(“I think you’re lying.
I think you’re too scared to admit
That you were once like us too.”)
The day he was taken by the Watchers
Was the day he gained his powers.
Was the day he lost the remnants
Of what kept him sane as a mortal.
Was the day he consigned himself to isolation for eternity.
Too human for the watchers,
Yet his soul still itches with chaos.
The vines take grasp in his mind,
Whispering thoughts and promises
To a broken shell of a man.
Sunshine eyes and promises of forever
Can't be betrayed if the person isn't alive
To break them, after all.
(Here’s what he doesn’t say:
“You’re right.
I’m scared and alone,
And I have no idea what I’m doing.”
“I may have been mortal
But I was never like you,
Hence why I am a watcher,
Sitting above you all.”
“I’m simply playing the role of the Watcher
As a mortal.”)
(Here’s what he does:
“I was never mortal.
My soul which hums
With unfathomable chaos
Proves that.
I was never mortal.
I will never be one of you,
Stop trying to humanize a Watcher.”)
(Here is what he thinks:
Stop trying to humanize a monster.)