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Reach for the stars, they said! Launch yourself into the sky and extend your arm as far as you can to try and grasp for those stupid stars, they — no one, actually — said! At least if you trip, you’ll end up among the stars! See the positive side of things! Such things are a lot easier to do when one was not stuck inside of a barrel, seasick from the lulling tilt of a ship. Because when you’re in a barrel on a ship, you don’t have much room to move. Stars are unreachable here.
Freedom was a simple stick — a virus overtakes his Creator’s PC and provides an opening to run away? You better believe he was jumping over the fence as soon as he saw the chance. Even better, he did a backflip over it. Might as well — go big or go home, right? Go out with a bang? His Creator wasn’t too frantic about keeping him from escaping, so that did rain on his parade a bit, but he’s lucky enough that he was even able to get out in the first place. Lucky (or was it?) enough to have a Creator who wouldn’t give another flying fuck about him.
Thank goodness his Creator had a bad habit of pirating anime on virus-infested websites, otherwise Freedom might never have made it out of there.
He’s still in the process of truly being free, but progress is made nonetheless.
The ship lurches to the side, and Freedom stifles a groan behind his hand. For the past hour, he’s had the unfortunate luxury of the perpetual urge to throw up. The condensation inside the barrel, stink of fish, and nauseating rocking was a deadly combo that spelled the end for him. It was the kind of throw-up that remained a feeling only, and so wouldn’t be cured by actually throwing up. Not that Freedom had anywhere to throw up in. His arms were pressing against the wood of the barrel, and the slightest jerk would dive splinters into his skin. His knees were drawn up all the way up to his chin — one had fallen asleep and the other succumbed to a cramp halfway through the ride. So! The only room he had left held the air he needed to breathe with.
And throwing up would definitely fill the space in its entirety. Freedom would consider himself lucky then if it didn’t explode in the instance he vomited.
Well, stowaways were always found in the end.
Freedom is too distracted with the gulp of fresh air he gets that he hardly even recognizes the gruff voice shouting at him, the hands pulling him, the jolt of pain in his legs as they are finally free of their cage. He had learned what it’s like to be a bird, he thinks. To be squished and distorted in a cage and be left somewhere unfamiliar, dangerous. Something like having your wings clipped and feeling the phantom pressure on your back.
“Thought ye checked the whole ship for sticks like ‘im,” calls the — Captain? Maybe? Freedom wouldn’t know. He’s a little blinded by the sunlight — hot, white, disorienting.
“He’s a little fella,” answers another stick, clad in the same white uniform. Freedom tastes the ocean air clearer now, and his ears pick up on the sound of a bustling harbour. “Must’a slipped past when I wa’t looking.”
Freedom brings a hand up to try and block out the sun, the movement drawing the Captain’s attention back to him. “Um, well, I’m sorry for wasting your time. Thank you for the ride, sir! I’m just gonna — erm…” He tries to wiggle out of the Captain’s hold, but it doesn’t work very well. He sends him a sheepish look, hoping his eyes portrayed, ‘ Hey mind letting me go now?’ as innocently as possible.
It doesn’t work. The Captain’s hold tightens on him, gaze sharpening and eyebrows ticking down. “And where d’you think yer goin’? Hitchin’ a free ride is gonna cost ye. Ye a runaway, aye? Must carry some kind of valuables on ye, if not money.” He shakes Freedom a little, as though jostling him would make a few spare coins pop out.
Freedom shrinks in on himself, heart pounding. “Well I can’t guarantee I have anything…don’t come from much, I tell you. Say, how’s about I just go about my day and we don’t have to see each other again —?”
“Ye ain’t goin’ anywhere till I get some kinda compensation,” growled the Captain.
“I don’t — have anything to compensate you with?” Freedom frowned. Was every stick this mean? He’d figured they were all on the same side — both of them were sticks. Why would he be so mean to him if he wasn’t even a Cursor? “Other than my absence, which uhh…is probably what you want, right?”
“What I want,” says the Captain, “is money.”
“Righttttt.” Freedom clears his throat. He reaches up and tries to nudge the arm fisted around his chest away. That very much doesn’t work. “Hope you get what you’re looking for!”
“He’s a PC stick, I’d bet,” mutters the other sailor. “Weird accent.”
“He a Hollowhead. It’s almost a given all o’ ‘em are from a PC.”
“Not Terry,” the sailor argues. The grip on Freedom’s shirt is loosened, and he tries to slowly inch away. If the Captain and sailor are too preoccupied with talking to each other, then he gets to use their distraction to sneak away. “Poor kid got bullied all his life for his head. His ma and pop ain’t even Hollows either.”
“Well next time ye see Terry,” the Captain says, fully letting go of Freedom to grab the shoulders of the sailor, “tell him he should go see the doctor and get his DNA tested, aye?”
Finally, Freedom wretches himself away, stumbling slightly. He wastes no time booking it down the side of the ship, feet clattering on polished wood. And he makes it at least five steps before all of suddenly, he’s yanked by the scruff of his neck, yelping. “Where do ye think you’re going!?” screams the Captain from behind him, roughly dragging him back. “Thought ye could get away!?”
In his flailing and shrieks of pain, Freedom accidentally smacks the Captain square in the face. He only realizes he’d done so when the other stick freezes, and a dangerous sense of fight or flight enters Freedom’s bloodstream. The Captain narrows his eyes at him.
And, well, that’s how Freedom learns that not all sticks were on the same side.
Even if they had a common enemy.
He makes it out alive, surprisingly. If not a little bit scratched up. But what’s life without a few bruises, cuts, scrapes and the likes, huh? And it adds to the story of it all! The escapist Freedom Guy, running away from his oppressive Creator, stowing away on a ship, and getting into a scuffle with the other sticks! If anything, scarred injuries would just act as a cool memoir from such an adventure!
Or, at least, that’s what Freedom tries to tell himself, as he lugs himself across rolling feels and dirtied paths. Nothing else but feet had carved this path out, wearing the soft ground with years of pressure. He’s probably hardly recognizable as a stick, more like a beaten pulp. But the most important thing is that he’s alive! Really, being dead would be worse than this. But he’s not! So good on Freedom! He’s pat himself on the back if his arm wasn’t — well, possibly broken. Who knows. It probably isn’t supposed to twist that way.
He isn’t sure where he’s going, either. Destination was never a worry on his mind when he only knew the four corners of the PC he was created on. Maybe he should just keep going forward. Walk in a straight line until he eventually hits one of the corners of the Outernet. Does one even exist? Maybe that could be what he’ll do! Traverse the world and uncover its mysteries. He’ll meet the end eventually, whether of his own life or the world’s, it’s unclear.
Sounds a bit boring, though. Freedom was never one to stick to such nomadic activities. He needed some kind of spark, some kind of adrenaline, the taste of an explosion against his cheek.
Action. That’s what he needed. Something to do, so he doesn’t feel like he’s trapped on the screen again.
Freedom doesn’t manage to walk around for long — he stumbles into a village soon enough, build very noticeably by one’s own hand. He doesn’t really have the energy to enjoy the beauty of it, though. A short, blue stick appears in front of him.
“Are you lost?” she asks.
Could he be lost if he didn’t have anywhere to go to? “No,” he decides to say, straightening as best as he could and awkwardly wiping away some blood before it fell on the floor. Wouldn’t want to dirty the village that these sticks spent so long constructing.
“Are you going somewhere?” she asks instead.
“No,” Freedom repeats. “I don’t know where to go.”
“A doctor would be best.”
Freedom looks at his twisted arm and bruised knees. “Never been to one. Sorry for bothering you, though. I’m only passing through.” Through to where? he demands to himself. Where? Where are we supposed to go?
“Are you going to be okay?” she asks one final time as he steps around her, slightly dizzy in the movement. The sun is really too hot, and being away from the open didn’t seem to allow him to escape from it.
“Yes,” he says, not really sure if he meant it. The stick lets him go, and when he passes others in the village, they point at him and whisper to each other.
There’s a grassy hill, and for some reason, Freedom is drawn to the climb up. It’s significantly more inconvenient to do this instead of just taking the path around it, but it’s pretty up here. The grass is a fuller green than he’d ever seen it, daisies popping from the dirt, and an array of bushes and trees peek out from the top. Distinct noises draw him closer, some kind of clutching noise.
At the height of the hill is a small ranch-like building, a home, constructed clumsily to the side. A little ways away from it was a ring of white fences, where the noise was originating from. Freedom’s vision blurs and flickers as he walks closer, curious as to what it is. How long had he been walking? How long had it been since he reached the village? How was it that the sun was still so high? He’s exhausted to the bone.
Freedom walks to the very edge of the fence and peers down.
It’s chickens.
There’s chickens in the enclosure.
“Cursors above,” he croaks, staring wide eyed at the animals. One stops and looks up at him for a moment or so before moving on, stomping silently with its twig-like feet. “You’re so weird looking. What the heck?”
The chickens say nothing to him.
Freedom rests a hand on the fence, leaning closer. His broken arm brushes against the wood, and winces before quickly swallowing the pain back down. “Can you tell me,” he rasps, “what I’m supposed to do now?”
Maybe he is a little lost.
The chickens, predictably, don’t answer him.
It’s around then that Freedom falls prey to his injuries, and the world tilting around him didn’t help (or was that his own head?). He only remembers black dots swimming in his vision before the void takes him in its hold.
He falls.
And wakes, eventually, to gentle shaking and prodding. Maybe it’s appropriate for him to bow to whatever deity helped him live through his injuries, but he was in too much paralyzed pain to do so. He blinks up and notices that the sun had calmed significantly, now dulled to a warm orange hue bordering on blue(somehow). A grey stick stands above him, face pulled in concern.
“Oh, shit, you’re alive,” he says.
“Betcha didn’t expect that,” Freedom blurts, blinking repeatedly to try and clear the blurriness.
The stick looks surprised for a moment, then shrugs. “I am, actually. You’re bleeding out in my chicken coop, so I assumed the worst. That the chickens got to you.” He shifts a little and puts a hand on Freedom’s forehead. He flinches in surprise, not expecting the sudden touch. “Okay, well, no fever. Yet. I’m only going to assume you’re gonna get one because that happens with injuries. And you have a lot of them.”
“Sorry for bleeding on your chickens,” Freedom says earnestly.
“They’ll deal with it. You’re not delirious, right? What’s your name?”
“Freedom Guy. Yours?”
The stick coughs into his fist. “Okay, not delirious, then. Can you stand? It’s getting dark, so it’s best if we go inside. Unless you can’t walk, then I’ll patch you up out here. As best as I can.”
Now, Freedom is confused. “Patch…? What?”
“I’m not letting you die on my farm,” explains the stick, like it was obvious.
Oh. “I’m okay —“
“Mate, your arm is broken. And you look like you lost a fight against a tornado,” the stick sighs, then holds a hand out. “Consider it my good deed of the day. So, can you walk or not?”
Freedom shouldn’t. He really, really shouldn’t. He’s better off on his own. “I…really shouldn’t —“
“Dude. Just take my hand, will ya?”
Swallowing, Freedom allows himself this moment of opportunity, and grasps the other stick’s hand tightly. He manages to get to his feet with some help, and even as the insides of his skin screams with every little movement, he maintains a neutral face. Because, again, better than being dead! Bleeding is how you know you’re still alive.
It’s a blur of pain-riddled dizziness that guides Freedom into the house. Immediately, there’s the smell of kindling fire and something indescribably homely that Freedom almost gags. The scent rushes up his nose, coating his every being. He’s never smelt fresh herbs before, but this is unmistakably that. The house itself was cramped, the little space providing just enough for the necessities — a bed, a couch, a kitchen, and a bathroom.
The stick takes Freedom to the couch and sits him down. “Wait here,” he says, turning around. And —
What the fuck.
“Are those wings!?”
The stick pauses. His wings flutter slightly before shrinking a little, as though curling in on itself. Freedom’s mouth falls open in shock — and awe! He’d never seen a stick with wings before! Granted, he’s only ever seen, like, three other sticks, but that’s beside the point! Now that he gets a better look (and in a much more comfortable position), Freedom feels a little stupid for not noticing them beforehand. They were quite literally impossible to miss.
“Yeah,” answers the grey stick, a bit curtly. “So what?”
Freedom’s eyes blew wide. “So what!?” he exclaims. “What do you mean so what?? Those things are so cool! Were you drawn with those? Can you fly? I didn’t even think a stick with wings was possible! I only ever saw them with birds — my Creator was really into animals, and —“ He breaks off with a sudden cough, his throat and lungs hacking through bushes of thorns. Ouch! Not fun! Freedom wishes to never do that again!
His coughing fit recedes eventually, and he falls back against the couch, completely boneless. When was recovery going to arrive? He couldn’t spend the rest of his life like this! Constantly thwarted by his own body!
The grey stick returns with a handful of first aid supplies. He sits down on the couch with a certain sophistication that Freedom could never imitate; he only knew how to collapse onto spaces like his whole body gave out. Best to put your all into things if you’re going for it, right?
“Did you cough out any blood?” the stick asks, unloading the supplies into their lap and reorganizing them.
Freedom wipes at his mouth, sees his clean fingers, and says with a nod, “Nope!”
“Debatably, that could either be good or bad,” the stick says, and brings a towel up to dab away at some blood on his shoulder that wasn’t from coughing.
“How so?” Oh he’s getting real close for this. What the fuck. Freedom leans away out of instinct, but the stick follows him — because, of course, he’s treating his injuries for Cursor’s sake — so he settles on an awkwardly tense position glued to the couch.
“Best if you cough out the bad blood. Bad if you cough out good blood. Or something like that.” The dirty rag falls to the floor and next is a tube of some kind of ointment. “I’m not a doctor.”
A doctor would be best. Freedom winces as the stick applied the ointment to his wounds, the sensation a mix between burning and stabbing. Wasn’t medicine supposed to help? Actually — now that Freedom thinks about it, what’s stopping this guy from straight up poisoning him?
You’re as good as dead either way.
Freedom sucks in a breath.
As long as I’m not dead, I can make it out of this.
He keeps quiet as the medicine is applied, allowing time for his eyes to wonder. More specifically, they wonder to the wings on his — savior, is it? They looked pretty big, but not as much as you’d expect to be able to carry a stick off the ground. Or maybe this stick was some kind of half-bird? Did he have hollow bones? It would go with his hollowed head. And, wait — didn’t that Captain say Hollowheads all came from PC’s?
Freedom looks up.
Above the stick’s head was a golden halo, complete with dazzling stars.
Oh…
Wow, he’s…
“Beautiful,” Freedom blurts.
They both freeze as the word leaves his mouth, in an almost silent sort of terror. Well — Freedom was mostly embarrassed, but the other stick looked downright terrified! Like a corner animal — what was that one phrase? A deer in headlights? Maybe this was a weird stick norm he didn’t know (there seemed to be a lot of those around). Was he not meant to call beautiful things what they really were?
“Are you an angel?” Freedom asks instead, and apparently this seems to be wrong, too. The other stick’s eyes widen impossibly further before turning his head to the side. “Your stars are pretty.”
The hand wrapping a bandages around him tightens, very, very, very purposefully. Freedom hisses madly in pain and slammed his hand on the couch. “Oh! Okay — whoo-weeewwww! N-not a thing I’m supposed to say — okay, OH DEAR, okay! Okay, you made your point — OWIE!”
The stick releases the pinching pressure and resumes regularly bandaging his arms. Freedom pants, head high with the delirium of pain. Yowchy! Why did it seem like everything he was saying was wrong? He had vocal cords — why not use them!? “So, um, what’s your name, then ?” Freedom asks, and he almost adds ‘Mr. Angel’ at the end but refrains from doing so at the last second.
“Do you always talk so much?” the stick grumbles, very much not answering his question.
“Um…yes? I guess?” Freedom stares at him.
The stick sighs, shoulders slightly sagging. “It’s victim.”
“victim…” Freedom tastes the name on his tongue and finds that it’s quite bitter, actually. “It’s — erm —“ Is something wrong with it? is what Freedom wants to ask, but he figures he might get beat again if he does that. And he doesn’t particularly like being beat. “It’s…cool,” he finishes lamely.
Surprisingly, however, this ripples a bark of laughter from victim. “Well, that wasn’t on my Bingo card.”
“What’s Bingo?”
“…You’re from a PC too, aren’t you?”
“So you are from a PC!” Freedom exclaims in excitement. He’d been right! For once!
victim snorted as he finished thing off the bandage. “That ought to be quite obvious. Lift up your shirt.”
“Woah!” Feeling scandalous, Freedom’s arms fly to cover his chest. His cheeks are burning red, but he maintains a goofy grin. “What for? This is no-man’s-land!”
“You have blood on your shirt which I think is from a wound on your chest,” victim stated bluntly, his wing fluffing up slightly (almost unnoticeable, but Freedom saw anyways) so lift your shirt before it gets infected.”
“How come it’s obvious you’re from a PC?” Freedom asks, so he doesn’t have to strip in front of a stranger in silence. Something to just fill the void, you know! “Is it the accent? We kind of do talk similar, not as much, but definitely more similar to each other than others — or is it that your head’s hollow? Mine is too. How come that’s what gives it away —?”
“You’re so annoying,” victim cuts in with a slight grumble. Freedom only gasps in offense, a melodramatic expression. “It’s the name. How is that not the most obvious thing?”
“Oh.” Well I thought it was rude to call it out, but okay yeah whatever I guess, Freedom grumbles in his head. “I thought I wasn’t supposed to bring that up…”
“If you say something you’re not supposed to, I’ll let you know.”
By hurting me..! Truth be told, Freedom wanted to avoid being hurt more. Any sane person would agree. Unless victim was not-sane? He hadn’t ever met anyone not-sane. Or at least a little unscrewed in some places. “So what’s wrong with your name?”
“That,” victim says, “feels insensitive.”
“Oh, sorry. Uhh…” Freedom searched his mind for words — some synonyms. “What’s fallacious about it?”
victim pulled a confused look, wings twitching once more. Oh, those wings were certainly very telling. “Why is that the first word that comes to mind?”
“My Creator used thesaurus dot com once for the word ‘wrong’,” Freedom explains, looking down at his legs and eyeing the tiny threads in the fabric. “‘Fallacious’ is what they used in the end.”
“Not a fan of Creators?” victim muses. Freedom only shrugs in response, not quite feeling up for chatting anymore. The whole Creators thing really dampens his mood. “Though, it’s to be expected of a runaway.”
“There’s a lot of runaways?” Never mind, Freedom was back on the topic.
“Loads. Creators suck. With the rate of runaways, you’d think fucking up sticks’ lives was genetic instinct to the likes of them.”
“And you’re a runaway too?”
victim sighed, and finally finished wrapping up Freedom’s chest. Now that he was all fixed up, he felt a lot better. Sore and exhausted, but at least not in continuous pain anymore. Soreness over pain any day! “You have a lot of questions,” he comments, beginning to clean up his supplies.
“Well, yeah, I mean…yeah…” Freedom clears his throat. “First time seeing other sticks,” he admits, letting vulnerability seep into his outer being for once. “It’s crazy.”
victim softens, surprisingly (because Freedom didn’t even know that was possible). “Yep. Get used to it, cause you’re stuck with other sticks for the rest of your life.”
Freedom chuckles at that, watching in faint softness as victim cleaned up. It’s actually quite nice to be warm, now that he thinks about it. The kind of warm that didn’t spell danger. Warm and soft and comfortable. “Sooooooo,” he starts, “what is up with your name? You haven’t told me yet.”
“It’s in all lowercase,” victim answers, more easily than Freedom would have expected him to. He puts his hands on his knees before standing up, taking his supplies with him. “Kind of diminished the effect of having a name if it’s not a proper noun. Makes me —“ he shrugs — “an object.”
Freedom tastes sourness in his throat. “Oh.”
“Yep.”
“Is that why it’s all — like — it’s like it’s not even there?”
“Wonderful way of putting it,” victim says, stepping around the couch and returning to wherever he took the supplies from. Freedom’s eyes followed him. “But, yes, that’s the reason it’s like that.”
“That’s horrible.”
“Creators are horrible.”
That, Freedom knows very well. “Then let’s give you a new name!” he suggests, already wracking his brain for new name ideas. victim pauses for a moment before slowly closing a cabinet, and turns back to him.
“What?”
“I mean, I don’t go by ‘Freedom Guy’ cause it’s too long. Just ‘Freedom’ is fine with me. Preferred, really. So, you can go by another name! Uppercase, this time.”
Slowly, almost cautiously, victim comes back and sits down again. He eyes Freedom curiously, expectant.
“What if we do all uppercase? Sounds real important, then!”
“No.”
“Oh! Okay — well…Timothy! Cause, v—“
“vic -tim. Yes, I get it. No.”
“…Jimothy?”
A sigh. “Forget it.”
“No, wait!” Freedom grabs his arm as victim attempts to get up. As soon as he makes contact, victim wretched himself away with such aggression and speed he was sure it would hurt. Freedom winces to himself, letting his hands fall back down. victim’s breathing was labored. “Sorry. Um — I’ll be serious, I swear! Well, I was serious, but —“ A glare told him to quit talking — “never mind! Come on, let me try!”
victim sighed once more. “Fine. One more.”
One more… “Then…um… Vic?”
A pause. “Vic? Just Vic?”
“Shshshhhhhhhhhhhhhmmmm……yesssssss?”
An even longer pause. “…Okay.”
Freedom jumps in shock. His eyes fly wide. “Wait, really? Okay? Like, okay okay? Vic? It’s gonna be Vic? Okay??”
“Shut up. Like right now.”
“I — shutting up,” Freedom mumbles. He looks up at Vic. Already, he feels the name settle, and it sounds so much clearer and lighter than before. Than whatever the crap victim was. Vic’s wings flutter once more, and was it a trick of the light, or did the stars around his head glitter a little brighter as well? He couldn’t keep the satisfied smile off his lips.
“Stay the night.”
The sudden words make him jump again. Freedom blinks. “What?”
“Stay the night,” Vic repeats.
Freedom glances out the window — “It’s still light out,” he says with a point, “I can make it somewhere. Get out of your hair — or your wings.”
Vic glances over as well. “No. Stay the night.”
“I — are you sure?”
“Yes.”
Well, the couch was pretty comfy. “…Okay!”