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The Ministry Gardens have always been Dewdrop’s favourite area. Lush plants, a giant greenhouse, tiny rivers and waterfalls along the paths, and beautifully sculpted benches made coming out here always relaxing. But the best part was the large pond at the edge of it.
When this place was built, the pond was already there. The builders didn’t know how to fill it or if they should fill it, so they built it into the Gardens, with a long path lined with hedges leading to it.
Dew would spend stressful days in that pond. He’d run out here, strip down, and just let himself be embraced by the Element. If there was nothing else to do, he’d stay floating for hours until it grew dark or someone came looking for him.
Now, looking at this little pond, barefoot in the grass, Dew’s breath quickens.
“You alright?” Rain asks, already removing his clothes. Nudity was never a taboo thing for Ghouls, so the sight of his bare bottom isn’t off-putting.
“...I don’t think this is a good idea anymore,” the Fire Ghoul whispers. His claws dig into his jeans as he tries to ground himself. It’s not really working.
Rain looks behind him at Dew; at the way the colour drains from his face and his ears fold back like a frightened animal. He puts his hand on his shoulder, receiving a flinch, but Dew doesn’t move away. “You know how to swim, Dewdrop. I know how to swim. So if anything happens, I’ll pull you out.”
“That’s not what I’m worried about,” Dew grumbles, pulling his shirt over his head. Rain did bring up a good point, soothing a fear he didn’t know he had. Still, what he was most worried about was how his body would react. As he removes his shirt, he looks down at his torso; at the orangy skin and lack of fins or gills.
Rain slowly backs away and lowers himself into the cold pond. “Then do tell me what worries you.”
Dew shoots him a glare. “I feel like a fucking lab rat. I am a lab rat. Satan knows what’s going on with my body.” He unbuckles his belt and shucks his jeans off, then his underwear. Again, he grimaces at how bare he looks without Water attributes. Not to mention the nasty scars left in their places.
“I don’t think water will harm you,” says Rain. “Otherwise you’d never be able to shower or bathe. And you are able to do those things, right?”
“Yes.”
“Then you’ll be fine.”
Dew frowns and bites his lip, but steps into the pond. The water is freezing. It starts off soothing for a moment, but after that, it almost pains him. It disrupts the balance in his body. For the past week or so, he’s been trying to adapt to the new warmth of his body. He’s never been used to being warm. As a Water Ghoul, even a little too much heat made his skin dry and brittle, and it would feel like he was boiling. Now, he’s always warm, and he has to stay warm to sustain his Element.
After half a minute, he pulls his foot back out and shakes his head. “No, nope, I’m not doing this.”
Rain frowns and swims a bit closer to the shore, keeping his body horizontal so most of him is still submerged, and reaches a hand towards Dew. “Try just sitting on the edge here a minute.”
Hesitantly, Dew takes the outstretched hand and sits cross-legged in the grass.
“I knew you for a good two minutes when you were still a Water Ghoul,” Rain starts. “So I’m not gonna pretend to know anything about you, or that part of you, or even how you feel now. But I do know that in here –” he waves his hand over the surface of the water– “it’s safe. It’s good. I wouldn’t have suggested we do this if I wasn’t sure it was going to be okay.”
The water shocks Dew momentarily when he steps in again, but he takes a breath, and then another step. There’s a shallow stone staircase of sorts, only five steps, but enough for him to get knee-deep. After this last step, it falls off straight into the pond; off of polished stone and onto packed mud and aquatic foliage.
Dew takes a small breath and just dives right down. He keeps his eyes open, but notices that his vision is not as clear under the surface as it once was. On top of that, he’s slower. He doesn’t have his fins or webbing in his hands and feet to propel him.
Instinctively, Dew tries to take a breath through his gills, only to find no air coming in. He tries again, and again nothing happens. He can feel himself starting to sink. One more time, he takes a deep gulp of air, this time through his mouth, and only water rushes in, making him cough.
Rain notices the bubbles coming up from Dew’s gaping mouth and rushes towards him. Before he can reach him, Dew is grasping at the sides of his neck, unsheathing his claws slightly, and digging shallow scratches along the already scarred skin.
“Hey– stop it! Stop it!” The Water Ghoul gurgles, speaking in such a way that his voice still travels in the water. He hooks his arms under Dew’s armpits and swims up to the surface.
“Can’t breathe… Why can’t I breathe?” Dew gasps as his head comes out of the water, looking down at how there are splotches of red in the clear water. Rain takes him to shore and pushes him out onto the grass.
“I can’t fucking breathe, Rain! I.. I…” Dew starts to hyperventilate, fisting his hands around tufts of grass and ripping them out of the dirt. His body is freezing and boiling at the same time. He’s shivering, and yet there’s steam coming off of his back as he dries off rapidly.
“Hey, hey.” Rain comes up to sit next to the Fire Ghoul. He places a hand on his back, making Dew recoil harshly. “Sorry. Look at me. Please.”
Dewdrop looks up with wide eyes, his red irises accompanied by bloodshot scleras. “Can’t… can’t…” He holds his hands to his neck to stem the already slow bleeding.
Rain moves the other’s hands away to cautiously place his own. When Dew doesn’t recoil this time, he squeezes gently. “You’re okay.”
“No, I’m not!” Dew cries. Hot tears stream down his cheeks. He grips Rain’s forearm, right below one of his fins. “What did they do to me?! I don’t understand what’s going on with my own goddamn body!”
“Listen to me!” Rain yells. His eyes look scared. Sad. Like they did in that cell. His hands are shaking, too.
That makes Dew shut up. The fear in Rain’s eyes. He didn’t cause that, did he? Is he scaring Rain?
“I’m sorry,” he whispers, his voice rough. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry.” He can’t stop saying it. His head is pounding right where the remnants of his broken horn are. As if the magic in it has seeped out and his soul is draining with it.
Rain lets go of his neck and, seeing that it’s not spouting blood, places his hands on Dew’s face instead, cupping his cheeks. “Listen,” he says again. “ You’re okay. You tried, and it didn’t go well, and that’s alright.”
“I thought I could do it,” Dew sobs. His tail thwacks the ground behind him. “But it’s like I forgot how to breathe. I miss my gills.”
“I know, Dr–” Rain stops himself before he lets that nickname slip. Droplet , he wants so badly to say. He’s heard Aether use it for Dewdrop before. “–Dew.”
Rain’s hands on Dew’s face feel so cold, yet so nice. They’re still wet, creating a subtle sizzle as the water evaporates on Dew’s skin. It’s calming. It’s soothing.
“It feels like my body isn’t mine. Like, like I’m wearing a suit made of someone else.” The Fire Ghoul cringes at the thought and his choice of words.
“We can go back inside…” Rain lets go of Dew’s face and starts to stand before Dew grips his forearm.
“No, no, I want to stay. I want to try the pond again.” Dewdrop wipes his eyes with his other hand and fixes his face. “I’ll just float. I just… I want the water.”
He also wants Rain’s cool hands on his face again, but he keeps that to himself. So he crawls on his hands and knees back into the pond, letting himself sink a few feet down, then surfaces and flips over. Rain swims in after him, but treads water so only his head is above the surface. He looks at Dew’s face– how the sun hits his cheeks, how his brows relax and his eyes close, how he just looks so calm in here.
The warmth of the sun on his front and the cold water on his back is perfectly balanced. For the first time since everything happened, Dewdrop feels balanced . He’s not too warm, not burning from the inside out. He floats on his back, folding his hands on his chest.
“I remember when I was summoned,” he starts quietly. “All of us were new. We were never told why the past Ghouls left all at once but we knew better than to ask. We heard stories, though.” He furrows his brow as he recalls all the past Ghouls’ names and counts each one with tapping, twitching fingers. “There was the Earth Ghoul Pebble, who came before Ivy, who was replaced by Mountain after I arrived; Mist, the Water Ghoul before me, first woman in the band; Alpha, Fire Ghoul and lead guitarist since the Ghost Project began and predecessor to Ifrit; Aero, Air Ghoul before Zephyr, and now we apparently have two Air Ghouls…”
“Ghoulettes,” Rain corrects. Dew rolls his eyes.
“See, we never called Mist that. I don’t know why the distinction needs to be made. We’re all Ghouls. Demons. Who gives a shit what’s in our pants?”
Rain scoffs and flicks water at Dew with the fin on the tip of his tail. “Anyways. Was there a Quintessence Ghoul?”
Yes . There was one more. It hurt, in a way, to even think about him. Knowing that another Ghoul had gone through what Dew has isn’t comforting in the slightest. It’s angering. It's infuriating to think that the Clergy has done that before.
“Delta,” Dew sighs, almost fondly. “He was the Quint before Aether, and that’s all we knew about him for a while. What we learned later, though, is that he was a Water Ghoul first. He was here before Mist.”
Rain’s face falls. The Clergy’s demeanour during Dewdrop’s situation made more sense now: they’d done it before. They were calm and indifferent because they’d done it before.
“Why…”
Dew interrupts him. “His transition was weird. He was the first to go through that. They did it in the middle of a tour, so he was out for almost a month before he properly made the instrument switch. And they were without a bassist for almost two months before they summoned Mist. Part of me thinks that’s why that whole ‘era’ of Ghouls left at once. Too messy.”
“Why?” Rain asks again. “Why did they think they needed to do that?”
“Fuck if I know. All I know is that they learned from their mistakes when they did it to me. That’s why they chose to do it now. Between tours, with someone ready to take over.” He looks at Rain through the corner of his eye, and while his words are harsh, his gaze is soft. He holds no grudge against the new Water Ghoul.
“Who did it?” Rain asks quietly, dipping his head below water for a moment to wet his hair and push it back. “If, um, Mist wasn’t here yet.”
“My guess is Omega– the first Quint– but I don’t know. Like I said, we knew better than to ask these things. The fact that we were told about Delta at all is a lot.”
The two Ghouls float in silence for a while. Rain doesn’t know what else to say about any of this. There isn’t much more to say. The Clergy summons, then kills, then summons again, and dabbles in torturous experiments along the way. They claim to be better than Churches of God, but all he’s learned in the past week tells him otherwise.
Dewdrop, on the other hand, thinks of nothing but the feeling of the water, and how Rain’s hand feels in his when he reaches to grab it below the surface.