CLOSED; and as the blood runs red down needle and thread

[hypertoxic]

Who: Vriska Serket (serkets) and Tavros Nitram (uncertainty)
What: [S] Showdown.
When: Backdated to January 21st (real world time, natch.) Directly after this thread.
Where: Gefion Park.
Rating: Prrrrrobably PG-13? Maybe brushing gently against R?


[ This is a bad idea. This is the worst idea. What the actual flying fuck does she think she's doing?

The problem is she's not really thinking. She's so AAAAAAAANGRY, and all she wants to do is hurt him. Make him pay. She's so sick of holding back. For fear of retribution. When did she ever care about that? Why does she care about it now?

But as she stands in wait about 30 feet from the park entrance, she can't ignore the incessant thought, pounding in the back of her mind like a drum, that this is a bad idea. She can't do this.

Karkat.

She will never, ever get a another chance.

If she loses his support, she loses everyone's. Permanently. He's the only thing right now between her and Terezi and Sollux and maybe even Gamzee. She'd lose, forever, every friend she'd ever had in one single moment. And there is the nagging fear, lurking, that she will somehow lose John, too. That Karkat or Terezi will convince him she's too dangerous ... or he'll just decide it on his own after she kills the cripple again.

She should leave. She should just -- no! How could she leave? Weak! Cowardly! How pathetic! No. Her pride won't let her. She can't turn her back and run again, not like she did earlier that night. And Sam is coming. She won't have long before he gets here. What would HE think, if he saw her standing there over a dead body? There would have to be limits to even his understanding. Would it matter if there were? Why does she care what anyone, ANYONE thinks? Why does she--!

... there is something ... very lonely, about being the enemy. (She misses her friends. More than she's had the courage to admit to them.)

She doesn't leave. She waits. But she has absolutely no idea what she's going to do. ]

Comments

[uncertainty]

[ It goes like this: he is worthless. The dirt he steps on has more value than he does, the air he breathes is more than he deserves. Lowblood, cripple, a culling waiting to happen. He'd spent so long believing all of this, living in quiet contentment in the massive shadow that she cast. Everytime she hurt him, he approached her again with that hope, that trust that she wouldn't again. He could get stronger, she was probably right, how could he argue when time and time again he proved his cowardice and his unworthiness to live.

He'd never been angry about it before.

After the accident - they'd agreed to call it that, somehow, in some way, as if her instructions hadn't been right in his pan and hadn't mocked everything he'd ever hoped and dreamed for - he forgave her. After she'd mocked what she'd done with stairs he could never hope to climb, he forgave her. When they spent all that time in the game together, gaining levels and proving to be a remarkable team, he'd forgotten that there was ever anything to forgive. She was Vriska - she was rough around the edges, she was mean and could be cruel, but she was good underneath it all. They were friends! Which was why anytime it came up, anytime Kanaya warned him away, or Terezi, or Aradia - somehow he ended up back there again.

Back here.

Walking towards her like a moth to the bright, deceitful flame.

He wants to hate her. Thinks that he could if he weren't -- him. But he's angry, hurt and angry and damnit he trusted her and look what she'd done, time and time again.

He keeps the lance in hand when he finally arrives. The grip is whiteknuckled and he's slightly pale with fear, a slight tremble to his free arm and a rattle to his steps that shouldn't be there. He could be intimidating. Maybe, from a distance - the horns, the iron legs, the shoulders that will one day probably be broad and powerful. ]

I'm here. [ But even now his voice is filled with hesitance and uncertainty. ]

[hypertoxic]

[ One day.

But now he just looks sad and small and weak and scared, and it makes disgust and bile claw into her throat. The desire to kill him and be done with it surges back to the fore, and she has to shut her eyes.

It doesn't help. She opens them again, as deadly serious as anything, and moves slowly toward him. A dark, sick smile crosses her face. ]

Toreadork. You came. My hero.

[ Her eyes flick to the lance, then back to his face. Her grin widens, turns into something very nearly insane. It's just like before. Exactly like before. She almost feels detached from herself, separate, rewatching the exact same scene from the lab. Only this time, there is no abyss into which she can toss the body when she's done. ]

I remember that lance. It's the lance you failed to kill me with the first time, when I really needed you to!

[ She tilts her head, still grinning so sick. ]

Think you can actually do it this time?

[uncertainty]

[ His hands are shaking now. But this is right - this is, this is the one brave act he's ever done in his life. It means something. If not to her, then to him. It means something and proves that he can stand on his own two feet, he can push back when pushed, even if it's ineffective and doomed to end in failure he can't even imagine.

Pupa Pan would say something charming and witty. Flash a cocky smile, retort that she'd left him (but not really him, because no one ever got the best of Pupa Pan) wrecked and alone when she'd had him jump from that cliff. But he just swallows hard, and tilts his head back a little, attempting to stand brave, tall and proud.

It doesn't quite give the desired effect. ]

I, if I have to.

[ He's a lowblood, physically weak with only psychic powers to fall back on that weren't even here. Not to mention a pacifist who had only ever charged at dummies that didn't move or fight back.

It's incredibly unlikely he would win if it came down to it. He knows that better than anyone else. False bravado or not, he knows that this could - probably would - end very, very badly.

But he stays his ground to her advances. ]

[hypertoxic]

Of course you have to. Isn't that why you're here? Don't tell me you're losing your nerve again! How pathetic are you, Tavros?

[ The last line is nearly a shout. She's going all out in provoking him, isn't even all that sure why she's doing it, other than she desperately wants to see him angry, even though seeing him angry only infuriates her.

She doesn't understand much of anything, right now. ]

[uncertainty]

[ He's not.

He is, but he isn't. Tavros grits his teeth, lips pulling back ever so slightly in an angry grimace. ]

I want you to stop calling me that! [ His voice rises a little near the end - nothing threatening, nothing impressive, but the words don't falter for once and his brow is furrowed. It's not a demand - he's not good at that, it's a desire, and there's a clearcut difference he hasn't quiet grasped yet. ]

[hypertoxic]

[ What does she have to do to get him to charge? ]

MAKE ME!

[uncertainty]

[ He's hesitating.

Of course he is. He's downright terrified. But his nostrils flare and he shifts his weight. He has legs, two working legs, he's mastered stairs and made friends and proven that he can save people!

So he does. He charges like a goddamn bull towards the cocky matador. ]

[hypertoxic]

[ Yes. Finally. There's almost a sense of relief when he moves. The detached feeling returns, inducing almost a sense of ... calmness. Like watching a shitty movie play out all over again, second verse same as the first.

Even without her God Tier powers she can very easily, very nimbly at the last moment sidestep his charge and grab his lance. She twists it in her hands, smooth as you please. And she hefts it, brings it up, and coils her arm for the killing blow. It all happens in an instant.

Except...

That blow never lands.

Her arm stays where it is.

She doesn't move.

For a moment too long, she doesn't move. The replay stops. And Vriska is frozen, the enormity of the thing she is about to do hitting her all at once, slamming into her with all the weight and gravity of a dark and terrible truth.

A step. Two steps. Back. Away. No. She can't. She should! He deserves it! Make him pay. Make him pay. White Text Guy, over and over in her mind, whispering to her the sins she will commit before she even thinks of them, but as soon as they were uttered she knew. They were hers, all hers, those ideas, all along, but it was his fault, always his fault too, goading her, pushing her. Whisper, whisper, goes the voice.

But it's not really him, is it. It never has been, since she set foot in this place. Doc Scratch - though she does not know him as such - is no longer an influence on her. He was possibly never an influence at all -- not really. Not outside of giving her the windows of opportunity to do what she wanted to do anyway. "White Text Guy" is simply the name she puts to her own urges, her own dark and fucking evil impulses, to do the horrible things that she does. Shifting blame. Not taking responsibility. It's one of the things she's best at.

Make him pay. For the first time in a long time, she recognizes it as her own voice.

What -- what is she making him pay for?

(Insulting her. Infuriating her. Degrading her. Failing failing FAILING HER. When she needed him, when she trusted him, when she maybe sorta kinda loved him. For betraying her trust and betraying her feelings and betraying her faith. Her faith. She believed and he shattered it how could he HOW COULD HE LEAVE HER TO DIE?)

All at once she turns, the motion as fluid as it is vicious, and she throws the lance. Hard, very hard. Away from Tavros, and into the depths of the park. If he can even find it, he will have to retrieve it later. Because Vriska is turning to face him now, and her eyes are blazing with her fury. But there's something else there, too, in her expression, the set of her shoulders. It is something bizarrely similar to grief. ]

Get out! You make me sick. Get the hell out of here, Tavros, and don't fucking ever try killing me again! I won't be so nice the next time!

[uncertainty]

[ The minute the lance leaves his hands he knows it's over. He's about to die. The end is here, looming dark and heavy on the horizon. His eyes widen and he tenses, prepares, says prayers to the Gods from home he hardly even knows and the ones from here. He's doing it again, trying to rely on someone else to save him when he gets in over his head.

But it doesn't.

His entire body is shaking and he's terrified, he's going to die, this is it and he knew it wouldn't be any different. He watches her pause, wonders why - imagines that it's probably because she wants him to know the full weight of what he's done. He feels sick - he doesn't feel justice or right in the knowledge, this goes against everything that he's ever tried to be or known.

When she moves he clenches his eyes shut, waits again, but only hears the distant sound of his lance clattering into the darkness. His eyes snap open in surprise, and in the dark he can see everything. Tavros doesn't understand, he can't keep up with these shifts, he doesn't know where he stands much less where she is. His metal knees knock together as he stumbles back, heart hammering in his chest and each beat is a flood of relief.

What was he thinking?

Why was he holding onto that suicidal impulse for so long? He could never win. Ever. Rufio can't change that. ]

Vriska, I - [ but she goaded him into it. manipulated him like a puppet on strings. He doesn't think of that now, just spares a glance backwards and starts walking. Looks back at her, thinks about speaking again - but he can't. He's choking up and trembling. He almost died. He could have died.

He doesn't know why she didn't do it. But that hardly matters. Once he gets to the edge of the park he twists around and bolts down the roads, running blind until he's racing through the doors of his room.

What was he thinking? Why did he think that fake confidence made all of the difference?

Tavros cries like the pathetic little boy he is. Draws his metal knees up to his chest and gropes for the book stashed under the bed. By moonlight he reads the familiar words of Pupa Pan and for the first time in a long time. The window is shut that night.

Even if this was the night Pupa Pan finally arrived on his window sill, he couldn't muster up a happy thought for the miracle of flight. ]

[hypertoxic]

[ There is nothing but a very dull sense of surprise as he leaves. Why would she even be surprised at all? Or is it that she's surprised at herself, for letting him live? For not having that muddy sticky blood all over her hands right now?

Suddenly, she is exhausted. Through every last inch of her body. She sinks, right there, to her knees, and sits on her heels, her fingertips trailing across the ground. Vriska tilts her head all the way back and stares at the deep dark sky.

It will take her a very long time to understand what just happened.

(Is Tavros looking at the same sky, right now?)

It's not too long before she pushes to her feet, and retreats to the bench she'd found when she first got into the park. It's not five minutes later that Sam arrives. By the time he does, she's got her bearings and her composure back, enough to pretend everything is more or less fine ... at least to start. It will fall apart quickly.

But those five minutes are spent very deep in thought about what she's done. Or, more accurately, about what she hasn't done. Sparing Tavros's life...

If that was supposed to be the right thing to do, why doesn't she feel good about it at all? Why does she simply feel nothing instead? ]