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It's storming outside. Which you wouldn't assume was unusual, except for the fact that it so inherently is. It doesn't feel like something that can be explained as weather, too violent, too fundamental. More like the universe fracturing than any atmospheric phenomenon. It's something about the way the sky looks, he thinks. Joel had been the first to notice anything off, a rowdy, "It's proper pelting it down out there," having been Grian's introduction to wakefulness that morning. An accord had been arranged and it'd been decided amongst all antagonistic parties that conflict was going on hold until the weather improved. Everyone was sick and tired and needed a break anyway, so the vote was unanimous, despite the day's worth of time loss. You could ask why they're fruitlessly flinging themselves at each other in the first place, in service of bloodthirstily gunning to be a winner (of what?) (for what?). But it's just one of those facts of life, isn't it? So they don't.
Dark clouds rot fluorescent amber over their putrid skies. Colour spewing into a swill of blues, purples and cold hard steel, dripping headily down what one could call a sky. If they were being kind.
The horizon is merely a melting pot, a smear where what's above sinks into what's below. The boundary itself undulating, dripping and distorting where it should maintain separation. A canvas that's failed to dry, paint hastily applied, shapes bleeding down into one another and disrupting any semblance of form.
But it's not like the rest of this world has anything more than an abstract hold on sense anyway — a grand physics-disrupting stairway their own accursed mark on reality. Wooden poles and scaffolding that tear across every inch of visible sky, attaching to nothing, supported by nothing. Affronts to gravity hanging still and unmoving, barely even buffeting in the harsh winds. So, what's a couple more incidental anomalies to add to the list?
Grian had thought about waiting out the storm on Skynet, just to see what would happen. Sit up there and soak himself down to the bone, every drop of freezing rain from above serving as evidence in the grand trial of proving they're alive. He'd stand there and wait, immersing himself in the cold hard weight of reality — the unignorable shock to the system as the survival system lights up… and fail to die of hypothermia anyway, because that's just not how things work here, now is it?
So instead he's in the abandoned mansion. In one of the freakishly repeating square rooms, far too empty to feel lived in, far too nonsensical to feel built. Grown maybe, like a mathematical fractal that spuriously spins out smaller versions of itself with frank mechanical stability. Burnt down one day, fine again the next. Time both controlling them and laughing at causality all the same.
And that's what's important here, isn't it? Time. It must be, or why else would their wrists shine out with that obnoxious luminescence, monotonously ticking down whenever they so much as glance towards their own arm. Tracking void knows what, how much time has passed since arriving? Or how much time is left?
Every crack of thunder feels like a portent of doom. He couldn't place why.
Condensation fogs up the window, humidity racing across any exposed bit of glass surface left inert. It's a continuous effort to keep hold of his view outside, to not have it torn away, leaving him with nothing but the claustrophobic cage of himself and this dingy room.
So there he sits, curled up on the window sill, methodically rubbing away building condensation, as if it's the only task he's relegated to in this accursed box they insist constitutes a world. Playing his duty as the cog in whatever contraption they're all apart of. Clockwork animatronic on its regimented motor, doomed to repeat a singular action until reality as they know it rusts into stillness.
Exactly 13 minutes and 41 seconds pass. He wishes he could lose track of it. But it's almost like the timer on the wrist is a formality, a way for them to rationalise how their brains blare at them every single second that passes by, like their minds are constantly deferring to some ephemeral signal out there in the aether, that ensures they remain updated on and in sync with every individual tick of the universe.
"Now, would you look at that, I knew those rascals were lying." The step-step click of legs and cane had already alerted Grian that Scar had been in the corridor, even before he'd spoken up, "It's heartbreaking, all I want to do is say 'hi' to an old friend and all Jimmy and Joel do is distrust and fib and deceive. Grian's out mining, they said. Get out of the mansion. What are you doing with that flint and steel. I tell you, no one's heard of trusting a pal these days!"
Grian scoffs, "Yeah, cause we have all the reason in the world to trust you." Grian's body trusts him — his mind doesn't, has no reason to see him as anything but a dangerous foe, one that has killed him multiple times at this point, but his heart rate calms at his presence, his fight or flight dulls to a whisper, his hypervigilance focuses in on an us. Protect us, it screams out, no care in the world for protecting him from Scar.
Scar trots further into the room, "Exactly! I've done so much for you guys, I even kept you safe during your whole sleepy episode."
His 'episode'. That's certainly a thing to call it. His consciousness blipped out from reality, only to return a day later. No recollection why.
"Right, and you did such a good job at that. Remind me, how many times did you blow me up? Two? Three? I wasn't exactly around to keep count." He hasn't turned from the window yet, it still needs him - the condensation resolute in its constant creep over the glass.
"Sure, sure, I didn't say there weren't… imperfections. A little TNT here and there may have gotten misplaced along the way. But my goals, my heart, I assure you, Grian, they were as noble as can be."
"As they always are."
There's a lull in conversation. Scar shuffles around the room, knocking and prodding at the odd chairs and tables that account for furniture.
"You could really clean this place up, y'know. Spruce it up a bit and make it a home. It could really use some TLC."
That gets Grian to look over. He's not sure why, something or other about the idea of entertaining the concept compels some intrinsic thread of his soul. An eye for design, maybe. A focused task, maybe. The idea of building something with Scar, maybe.
"Sure, if we had all the time in the world for frivolities, maybe I'd consider it." Scar looks tired. Now that he's looking at him, he can tell he looks tired. In a way he's as put together as ever, it's the kind of thing Scar cares about much more than anyone else. His hair is groomed properly, silky smooth without the matte and tangles that plague most everyone else; his colourful shirt and trousers contain none of the cuts and nicks. It could be a vex thing, some fae illusion here and there to put everything back in some regimented, perfect place. But he's not putting as much effort into the emotional facade as usual, maybe it's just cause Grian wasn't looking, but the tiredness weighs heavy on his posture and face, drooping them down with none of the positivity that tinges his voice. Though, upon Grian sliding his eyes over to meet his, he perks up, artificially or no.
"I don't know Grian, base aesthetics have been said to do absolute wonders for a person's fighting spirit! Good room, good sleep, good…" He knows they don't sleep, "Beat! Good for beating enemies! It can't be frivolicious if it helps you in battle." Scar strides up beside the windowsill, Grian tracks him with his eyes. "What if the difference between me killing you and you killing me is just a few better placed blocks… wouldn't that be an embarrassing way to lose?"
Something in Grian's heart lurches at the proposition, Scar volunteers their deaths with a casualness that they all feel but only Scar expresses to him verbally. Like a shared secret, we know more than the rest of them, don't we? Grian doesn't feel like he knows anything. Except Scar. He feels like he knows Scar better than himself, he knows Scar has taken the eye contact as an invitation. He knows in approximately ten seconds Scar will sit down opposite him, nudge his legs up against his, with a proximity that's unnecessary but not unwanted. He'll make some silly joke about it being a bit cramped, and they could better use the space, wink at the implication that Grian would be better placed in his lap.
"I'm just saying, anything would be better than your bread boy bakery up top."
Grian sighs, "I'll consider it." He'll consider it but there isn't time.
Scar knows that. He giggles anyway.
Ten seconds pass. Scar sways lightly, then with a hum lowers himself down onto the window sill, stashing the cane to lean against the side alongside Grian's sword. He pauses, momentarily, before swinging his legs over to face his body fully towards Grian's. His knee knocks against Grian's own, almost accidentally at first, but then sinks against his form in purposefully grounding contact. Perfectly intersecting parallel lines, aligned at last.
"Wow, there isn't a lot of space here, is there? More than enough, of course, though it could be better utilised." He winks at Grian.
Like clockwork.
Grian laughs, "Go get your own window sill then, if this one's so unsatisfactory. There's plenty of choice."
Scar gasps, "And ignore your fine recommendation. Your discerning taste. Why Grian, that would be such an insult. And we Clockers are not in the business of insults, no sir!"
Grian bites his lip, he can't hold down his smile, "I don't remember recommending anything. Maybe I just picked randomly."
"I don't know, Grian. Sure, you're impulsive but you're not random. And if it's not the space or comfort, maybe it's something else. The view perhaps?" He looks out at the glass. It's fogged up again, Grian's wiping routine disrupted. "Well, okay it's a bit-"
"Here, let me." Grian leans forward, pushing himself towards Scar, leaning over him and reaching out to wipe clear a small patch of window next to his head.
He turns back and stills, his position is- well it's- One arm propped up next to Scar's hip, the other reached out along past him, all resulting in his body properly leaning over Scar's own. There's a light flush to Scar's features, his hands have raised up, hovering lightly above Grian's waist, like they're drawn towards him, drawn to keep him there and hold him close. Their heads aren't close, Grian's not- he not stupid, he understands personal space. He's gotten into this position, but it's not actually improper yet, it's easy enough to pass off with an awkward laugh and a retreat.
Scar would let him if he leaned down to kiss him.
It's another one of those things he knows.
He thinks he knows how Scar would like it too. How they'd press their lips together, aligned like puzzle pieces, Scar's ears are sensitive, pointed vex ones with heightened hearing, hearing that transcends physical sound and into more underlying vibrations of the world, the waves created by magic, by time, by disorder. Useful practically, but useful for physical pursuits as well. Scar's glamour loses control when he's distracted for long enough, vex traits unfurling themselves, teeth and claws sharpening, eyes glowing, the shallow afterimage of wings materialising behind him. He knows how Scar craves closeness, to be pressed up against a partner in every way that matters, to hold them close against him and feel their breathing. That's probably why his hands are hovering like that now, the urge to pull Grian against him wired so far back in his brain it's become a reflexive neural impulse.
Grian' doesn't know why he knows this. They've not- they haven't- Sure, he's thought about it but they haven't-
Scar tastes of the blazing desert sun.
Scar's blood runs down his hands in wave after wave after-
"You haven't been keeping your wings in good shape." Scar suddenly speaks, his words a knife through all the tension and Grian's train of thought. His voice sounds almost indignant, like Grian somehow owes him his own self-care. He's no longer staring him down, his attention now diverted behind Grian to his wings, studying them with none of the momentary flushed embarrassment of before. Without prompting, he brings a hand up to the primaries of Grian's wing, the one away from the direction of the window, studying them with an offence that's not owed.
The situation artfully defused like a time bomb. Grian doesn't dare move.
"I've not had a lot of time to focus on it, I guess." He shrugs and glances at the part of the window he wiped down for Scar. Scar didn't even look at it, and now it's fogging up again. Useless.
Scar makes an aggrieved noise of discontent, moving his left arm to steady Grian's waist, and filtering his right through the lowermost primaries, as if to assess the damage. Carding two fingers, precisely up to the root of the feather in question. Grian can't help the aborted exhale of breath as Scar loosens the built up grit at the root of the feather, running his slender fingers along the barbules and springing them clean. "But they're important! This is like if I stopped bathing in the morning. Have you considered how unhygienic that would make me? And you've just been wandering around in this state?"
"It's not like that." Grian squawks, before Scar continues adjusting a feather, one that he now realises must have been particularly uncomfortable, bent all out of place, and his voice betrays him in trailing off with a light warble. "It's just- uncomfortable. And sure, if you leave it for weeks, it gets gross but we've only been here, what, a few days. It's fine."
"Sure, sure. Whatever helps you sleep at night."
Grian grumbles, but leaves the argument be. Scar continues along his primaries, eyes locked firmly on Grian's wing, as he slowly teases out the trapped particles and smooths them down anew. The tip of his tongue is stuck slightly out between his lips, an unconscious habit of when he's zeroed in all his focus towards a task. It's nice — the attention.
"Stop." Grian interrupts, and bats him lightly on the chest, Scar immediately pulls back. "If you're really going to do this, I'm not hovering over you like this, my arms will cramp." He sees Scar's surprise at the factual frankness of the statement, like there was no other way this was going to go, an immediate acceptance of the state of affairs. "Lean back. You got what you wanted after all, pretty boy. I'll sit between your legs." It maybe has more dignity that being on his lap. Grian's not really sure anymore.
Scar is caught off guard for all of a moment, which Grian gleefully internalises for his ego, before launching into action. He readjusts frantically, making room for Grian to sit down with almost too much sporadic verve, all the while spirited, almost nonsensical platitudes stumble out of his mouth. Grian can't help but chuckle, can't help how endearing it all is.
So there they become, Grian encased on either side by Scar's legs, baring his back to a man who's killed him, letting said man run his fingers softly through his feathers. What a fool he is.
Scar trails his fingers gently through the blacks and reds of his feathers, feeling out between them, clearing them of dust and debris, before smoothening them down. A practised action, though void knows with whom he got the practice. A possessive part of Grian feels jealous of whoever it could be, the knowing part of him fears equally that it may just be him. Another him, another time, another life, or maybe just here, outside of this distorted cage they're all drowning in.
It's hard to describe the mental experience of allopreening. It's roughly equivalent to any ritualistic act of affection: hair-brushing, a massage, stroking your hand across someone's back in a hug — but with the added satisfaction of re-aligning some fundamental part of yourself. Dislodging a stone that has been stuck in your shoe for too long, scratching an itch, finishing a build. Every feather smoothed over is a piece of his sense of self re-aligned, an underlying, buzzing wrongness muted, the silencing of a tinnitus you had grown so accustomed to, you thought the ringing equated to silence. It's not overwhelming exactly, but in the right contexts it can be a lot.
Grian couldn't say whether this context was right, or oh so very wrong.
Maybe both. He thinks with them two it's always a bit of both.
Scar carefully makes his way through, feather by feather, re-adjusting each one, slotting each puzzle piece into place. He treats each individual feather with the utmost care, like each and every one is its own sacred thread in a grand tapestry, of tantamount importance to the fate of reality, to love, to worship.
He mirrors the performance on the other wing before moving up to the converts — gently murmuring at Grian to curl his left wing over so he can access it.
Grian nods, not much in the mood for speaking, thoughts settled down to a single-toned hum, and curves it around the two of them. A curtain of feathers settling into the scant available space in the nook of the window, around and above Scar. A protective canopy of safety, if they decided to be romantic about it.
He feels more than hears Scar's intake of breath. A twinge in his senses at the momentary uptick of some strong emotion, before settling back down to Scar's baseline frequency. Scar leans back to focus in on the new canvas. Grian mourns the loss of warmth by his back.
The window is fogged again. Far too long has Grian abandoned his post for there to be any alternative. There's a thin line of moss built up along the ridge connecting pane to glass. Moss that must build further each day, mould that must permeate underneath the peeling wallpaper, if anyone cared to look. Or maybe this world doesn't do mould. Maybe the blip in the timeframe of the universe in which they're given the right to exist doesn't allow for such signifiers of age, for anything to be given the glory of growing, living and then deteriorating back into the earth. An aborted life cycle for all things of immediate birth to immediate death, with no transition in between. One day nothing, the next day something, and once more into nothingness only a week later. No one here is offered the dignity to decay.
He can still hear the thunderstorm outside, raindrops pelting against the glass and gnarled wood, whips of wind as it screams out to be heard. They can feel every gust through the drafty seam of the windows fixing. At least one remnant of cause and effect maintained in their static diorama.
3 minutes pass. Scar finishes on the bottom of his left wing, and turns back to focus on his slow traversal up each tier of feathers.
He hasn't taken off his jumper or jacket, so Scar can't properly reach the downiest feathers at the centre of his back, though he makes a resolute effort all the same. Picking around the edges of the hole cutouts his wings poke through, to try and smooth out the feathers that are accessible. Grian doesn't think he could handle the intimacy of anything more. Baring his soul any further than his own terms. Desperately pretending Scar doesn't know it all anyway.
13 minutes and 14 more seconds pass. Scar preening, interspersed with small amounts of banter throughout — a small laugh here and there, a pithy comment.
The condensation remains, mocking him with its idle permanence. It sits, languishing in stillness, neatly sequestering them off from the world to the point where it's hard to tell whether the rest of it still even exists. Sure, he can feel the wind through the cracks in the seams, he can hear the rain, but he can't see it. There's nothing to confirm its existence with the hardest sense to trick.
The more he stares, the worse it feels. The pattern of the blurring feels generic, it doesn't quite match with the patterns and colouration he remembers outside. It moves with the movements of his head but doesn't move like a thing that's alive, like a world that's living and evolving even without direct observation. It feels in stasis, much like he feels in stasis. An active stasis within the room, against a dormant stasis outside. And once he's outside, they'll trade places, and the mansion will become dormant, gain no further dust and decay until it is once more observed.
The ambiguity lingers, itching at his mind, an incessant incongruity burning like sandpaper against his brain. He knows its paranoid, he knows by all sense and logic, that the world is continuous, exists outside of those who exist within it. But his mind is abuzz with radio static, danger signals ringing that something is wrong.
He must be jittering, fidgeting idly where he sits, judging by the low cooing of Scar he can hear behind him. He barely even registers the calming sensations of preening with the adrenaline that's begun coursing through his system. His thoughts may be calmed, but his instincts are wired, perhaps more than usual.
He tries, he really tries to ignore it. But as the tapping of his foot becomes increasingly erratic, his breathing more laboured, he knows he needs to- He needs to just check. Halt the paranoia in its tracks. See that it's all okay.
He juts his arm out. Swiping along the window and cutting through the built up swathe of occluding vapour. The water is as cold as ever against his fingertips. He keeps his head hunched down. The time between moving and actually looking out is 4 seconds.
Pitch.
Pitch is the only real way to describe it. A roiling pitch absence, blindingly discongruent from the technicolour miasma of the blurring around it. A missing texture. The contiguous seam of reality strained to the point of splitting open, exposing what's beyond its extents.
But still, it reflects, and with the outside supplemented by nothingness the reflection is all there is to focus on. And there he is. A smear of Grian-esque shapes distributed down a waterlogged track. It flickers at the edges, details not staying put long enough before deforming and merging into something else. He tilts his head, it tilts back. It looks tired, he thinks. He supposes he must look tired too, but it looks worse somehow. Something that has lived longer and died further than he has. He doesn't think it has a face. He thinks he smells burning.
"Oh dear. Not a good day for the world, is it?"
Scar. Scar is here, he isn't in the reflection but he's- Scar can-
Grian flings himself around, Scar yelps, his fingers losing their hold on his wings and moving with the inertia of the situation to raise above his head, like he's been caught red-handed.
"Oh my gosh Grian, give a guy some warning, I could have had a heart attack with you jumping around like that. Or pulled out a feather or something. More likely that second one."
Grian scans his face, eyes darting this way and that to try and gauge any amount of acknowledgement of what was out there, any tucked away horror of a world that doesn't make sense, anxiety of the disconnection of anything and everything.
Instead, Scar just cracks an off-kilter smile, muscles slowly relaxing the longer Grian stays still.
"Fancy speaking, birdie? I'm glad you enjoy my face but just staring is often considered to be a bit rude." One of Scar's arms has migrated to his back, running soothing circles up along his spine.
It reminds him of the concrete situation, the way his wings feel like an in-place constant, no longer a trickling discomfort at the back of his mind, the way that despite it all his muscles are calmer, the way in which Scar is warm.
"What did you mean by that? What you said about the world?" He needs to know.
"Ohhh, right, that." Scar grins, "I was just commenting on this absolutely terrible weather we're having. Such a bad and unpleasant day!" He gestures a hand at the window. "Shame how it put all the fun stuff on hold. Not that you're not fun of course, but I wasn't up to much of anything before I came along for a visit," Grian turns back, through the condensation he can properly see the thunderstorm once more. A normal world, ticking along normally. For all intents and purposes the previous horrors he saw may as well have not existed.
"Right. Gotcha." Grian sighs, it was too much to hope for really, wasn't it? For his madness to be corroborated by another, for all his inklings and impulses to be any more concrete or backed up than the idle visions and paranoia of someone all too plagued by such things.
"Buuuuut… in other news, I'm all done!" Scar's voice rings out triumphantly. "All thanks to the special services of your good friend Scar, you should be feeling spic and span. A new man! Revitalized like no other!"
"Thanks, Scar." He mutters.
"It's no problem. Let me know if you need them doing again before the end of all this." Scar's smile is blinding. Lighting up the world and the room, a sparkle of such radiant joy that feels ill placed in these dingy depths of despair. Some beacon of truth in the body of a liar. "Assuming I'm not already dead by then, of course."
He doesn't tell him about the window. He doesn't tell him about the reflection. He doesn't tell him about it at all. And yet-
"It probably would do you good to not get so lost looking out of windows, though. The world struggles with reflections, they always do. I've always found it best to focus on the more concrete things around you." Scar winks. "It's more fun that way, anyway. Take it as some free advice, on the house, alongside my services."
"I don't know what you mean."
"Sure you don't."