All 35.1 - Making Peace

The devil disappeared, leaving the group standing in the hall of the ancient building, once a castle, now a public office and monument. Emotions were high: frustration, disappointment and fury were evident in Ryuji’s face as well as Cohen’s. Percival was agitated and on the verge of panicking; disgust at Ryuji’s hypocrisy was clear in Lucca’s demeanour. Only Victor and Nisa were largely unaffected, and it was Cress who mentioned that they had better get out of there before the All arrived.
It was late: it was nearly seven hours after they had docked in the late afternoon, and nearly everyone was tired and hungry. They questioned where to go that the All wouldn’t find them, so that they could sleep. Those not overcome with their anger discussed the problem, and settled that since the All were focused on reordering the plane, there shouldn’t be many of them in places that didn’t require much organization. It was then that they had Gemini take them to the Mitsurhym: the vast empty desert. They found shelter behind a rocky outcropping, and settled for the night. Sleeping without a guard was out of the question, but as Cohen put it, there were four of them that didn’t require sleep to begin with. Five, if Gemini actually counted as two people. Three and a half? He didn’t care. Regardless, Cohen, Nisa and Ryuji would watch for the night, with Gemini watching from Etheria, since it was important that everyone else have all the rest they could get. The next day would mark the beginning of their final attack against the All. The three unaging, undying, unsleeping beings walked apart, and kept eyes over the sandy dunes.
At first Cohen paced, fueled with the desperate energy of frustration. The more he thought, the more his anger faded, and eventually he sat down in the sand, his posture weary and defeated.
In the hour preceding dawn, before anyone else was yet awake, the sound of footsteps behind him made him turn his head. The briefest of glances revealed the silhouette of Ryuji, and Cohen turned away just as quickly; he was in no mood. Ryuji walked closer, and it was then that Cohen noticed that something was off. The Yetoman’s footsteps were heavy and shuffling, and he was making an odd rasping noise. With a tired sigh, Cohen turned around properly again, and was briefly shocked at the sight, illuminated only by the now-setting moon. Ryuji was not wearing a shirt and his skin had a deathly pallor to it, along with a strange, shimmery texture that took Cohen a second to register as frost. He was standing in a defensive sort of posture, and in his one hand was a still-beating heart. His other arm was held across his chest, keeping closed a giant gash sliced from his collarbone almost to his navel. The crimson wound stood starkly against his blue-white skin, but no blood flowed from it. Instead, crystalline globs of partially-frozen congealed blood stuck to the edges of the hole in his chest where he had cut out the heart that Ratik’nun had put there, that was now still-beating in his hand. His teeth were bared as he grimaced, and his eyes screamed of fear and barely-restrained hunger. Cohen looked at him flatly, dispassionately. After a moment, he sighed, “Didn’t think that one all the way through, did you?” Ryuji gritted his teeth; he looked terrified, about to cry, desperate to eat and barely keeping himself back from the others. Cohen pulled his gun out, loading it calmly. The fear in Ryuji doubled, and he shuffled back a few steps clumsily. Looking at the vampire calmly, holding the pistol pointed up towards the night sky, Cohen said, “If I feel like I’m going to pass out, I’m going to blow your head off.” With a look of resignation, eyes rolled, he shifted his position, leaning back in a subtle motion of exposure and assent. Ryuji noticed this and closed his eyes, his expression sad and relieved. In a flash, his face lost its humanity, mind lost in a starved, predatory hunger. He leapt forwards with uncanny speed, dropping the heart as his bloody hands outstretched to grab Cohen. Tackling the sitting man bodily, Ryuji bit cruelly into Cohen’s neck where it met his shoulder, violently draining his blood from the wound. Despite the assault, Cohen kept his vocalization to a muted cry, not enough to wake the distant sleepers, and he did not struggle or retaliate.
The click of a cocking gun and a steel muzzle pressed to his temple snapped Ryuji to his senses. His eyes flew wide and he practically threw himself away from the doctor, crabwalking backwards in the sand. Cohen coughed, dropping his gun as he brought his other hand to press against the still-bleeding wound. Struggling against the limpness in his limbs, he weakly rummaged through his coat to pull out a small vial, a curing potion. Drinking it closed the bite wound and stopped the loss of blood, but obviously did nothing to restore his strength. He glanced over to Ryuji, crouched warily in the sand, the gash on his chest not fully closed and the desperation of hunger still in his eyes, not fully satiated. Drawing another pair of bottles from his coat, Cohen tossed them clumsily towards the other man and they landed in the sand. “Drink them, quick,” he said. Ryuji looked from Cohen to the vials, filled with an ominous, black fluid he recognized as the potion form of an Inflict spell, the negative energy equivalent of what Cohen had just consumed. Unsure, Ryuji looked like he was about to ask questions, but instead did what Cohen had ordered. Quickly drinking the two potions, the last of the wounds on Ryuji’s body healed. The appearance of vitality had returned to him and he looked healthy once more, sitting shirtless in the desert sand. He sat motionless and calm; the overwhelming hunger had passed for the time being.
He looked at the bottles for a second as Cohen attempted to weakly pull himself back up into a sitting position. “Those...those don’t usually stop the hunger…” he noted quietly.
“Well, usually you don’t need much blood to get full,” Cohen said. “It was the damage. Since you just ate, more than usual, it was just the damage making you hungry. Fix the damage, and you’d have no reason to keep eating. Which is good,” he said dryly, swaying slightly from dizziness, “because I don’t think I could give much more.” He sank slowly to the side, “Mmm, no, sitting isn’t working…” he mumbled, pitching into the sand. Cursing softly, Ryuji scuttled closer. He focused, and glowed softly as he channeled the power of his god into restoring Cohen’s lost constitution. Cohen made a quiet scoffing noise as the magic completed, “Well, I guess that helped.” He tried to push himself up again, but failed. “No. No, guess I’m staying here then…” he muttered to himself.
“I’m sorry, I know that magic isn’t very strong…” Ryuji said.
Cohen rolled his eyes, “I honestly can’t do much better, I only bothered to study the weaker version of Restoration. The full spell is expensive, and I didn’t see a pressing use for it. Not many things can drain a person that powerfully. I suppose I’ve learned my lesson now, though. Heh. I didn’t even prepare the weak version yesterday. Guess I know what I’m making extracts of now.”
“I’m sorry,” he apologized again. “I can’t use that more than once a day, or I’d…”
“Oh, shut up. If you’re going to apologize in every sentence after, I’m not going to let you have my blood again.” This caused Ryuji to blink. He opened his mouth to say something, but decided against it. Instead, he moved closer and held out his hand. Cohen raised an eyebrow, but took hold anyways. Ryuji pulled him up out of the sand, shifting around so they were back-to-back and letting Cohen lean heavily on him. After weakly dusting the sand out of his hair, Cohen let his arm fall back down. “...Thank you,” he said.
“What are you always saying? Can’t do much less?” Ryuji said, looking off in the other direction. Cohen gave a short, quiet chuckle.
The two sat quietly in the slowly brightening pre-dawn desert. “...I just…” Ryuji muttered. “Just...hate this...so much...but…” he paused. “...but that felt...more wrong...I could feel it beating, constantly reminding me that it was wrong. That I was...supposed to do something, and I couldn’t handle it. That I was selfish. That I betrayed...everything. Betrayed what I believed. And I panicked. I panicked that I’d feel it, if I was alive, reminding me every second that I did something wrong.” He looked down, “I’d rather live forever thinking I was doing the right thing, then spend fifty years thinking I did wrong and couldn’t change it, couldn’t apologize or take it back or atone. Just...wrong.”
Cohen’s gaze was off into the distance, focusing on nothing. He considered this before offering, “Well, mistakes are always made. Benefit of being Materian, I suppose, that we can take them back.”
“...I should’ve listened. I shouldn’t have said anything to him.”
“Probably not.”
After a short pause, Ryuji said quietly, “...For someone who fucks up as much as I do, I’m really not as forgiving as I should be…”
“I wasn’t going to say anything, but you are a bit of a vindictive and hypocritical prick, yes.”
Ryuji snorted, “Don’t mince words or anything.”
Cohen gave a sardonic and vague grin, “It’s just one of the many reasons I have no friends.”
“I can’t imagine why.” Both men snorted. Eventually, Ryuji looked up at the dimming stars. “I guess...that’s it then. That was the last real out, and when it came down to it, I wouldn’t take it. So. This is what I am then.”
“You’re myopic, and hypocritical. You change your mind and fluster and make mistakes and burn bridges and beg forgiveness and give in and keep trying to get better. So yes. You are Materian. Just like the rest of us. All of us are stupid, self-centered, short-sighted idiots.” Ryuji turned his head slightly to look at Cohen as he spoke. The doctor sighed, “And I hate us for those qualities, but I will do anything to help us improve. So we’re protected from being destroyed by extraplanars who don’t understand, and don’t care. From being manipulated and disposed of, whether it’s things like the All or Pandemonium, with their soldiers and force, or things like Ratik’nun, who pervade and defile. It is nothing but frustration, watching people fall to them again and again and I never have the ability to do anything. But the picture is bigger. Bigger than me, and Ratik’nun, and Pandemonium, and I have to look at that picture, because focusing on any small piece just highlights my own impotence and inability.” Cohen sighed again, and fell silent. Ryuji just turned back to the horizon again. They watched for some time in unbroken silence.
As the horizon lightened, Ryuji said quietly, “I miss being human.”
Cohen snorted, “I miss being a person.”
Ryuji turned his head again to look at him with confusion. “What’s that mean?”
Cohen looked at him wearily and explained, “For all of your complaints, for all of your fears, for all of your hiding, and pains taken...has anyone ever treated you like less than a person? Has anyone actually treated you like a monster, like an animal, like an object? And the necromancer doesn’t count; he treats everyone like puppets, you can see it in his words. No one means anything to him; it has nothing to do with who or what you are.”
Opening his mouth, Ryuji paused and frowned, considering carefully. “...Cheko...Cheko tries...but, she’s afraid of me. I’m...what did she say...a person in a shell. I’m a monster to her.”
“No,” Cohen retorted. “You just said it. A person. She’s afraid of what you can do, but she recognizes that you’re a person, someone who thinks and cares and has feelings.”
“I know my family would execute me, for what I am.”
“Have they tried?”
“...No. They would, if they knew.”
Cohen frowned thoughtfully, “...Do you hide from them completely? Or, do you…” he paused to find the word, “have eccentricities?”
“The...latter, I guess. I don’t see a lot of them very frequently…”
“But they still speak to you. You still see them. You’re still a part of their family.”
“As long as they don’t find out…”
Considering this, he continued, “...Do they ask? Do they pry? They know you have eccentricities, but do they try to find out why you don’t eat in front of them? Why you’re cold, why you blink and breathe strangely?”
“...I...guess not.”
“If they actually wanted to kill you, they would. They’d nitpick and pry and make excuses. If they don’t, it’s not because they never noticed you were strange, it was because they don’t want things to be wrong. They don’t want to expel you. They want you to be fine, and are willing to overlook the strange things so that things will keep being fine. Because you’re a person.”
Ryuji raised an eyebrow in doubt. “What makes you the expert on this?” he said, voice a tinge harsh.
Cohen replied dryly, “Because I’m not a person.” Ryuji looked at him, expression confused, disbelieving. He remained dispassionate as he explained, “When I was arrested, there were so many things wrong with that crime scene that anyone who knew even partially what they were looking for would have questioned the means, the motive. But I was not a person, not someone who warranted defense or truth. I was an alchemist: a madman, an asset to be exploited by a government afraid of the power of the wizard council. The trial was farcical, a formality to establish their ownership of me. I was kept in a solitary cell and used as a tool for three years, hidden because everyone wanted me killed for justice, and the government wanted me alive and functioning for their ends. Kept in a shoebox in the closet like a coveted, shameful stolen toy.
“I was freed for the same reason: a group of people knew I had skills to be used. So I was moved to another box and told to do other work, and it was no less escapable than the one before it, because to leave there was to go back to the prison, which would be made assuredly less comfortable than before.
“Bounty hunters came, and gave false hope that perhaps I was enough of a person to be dealt with honestly. I was an idiot, believing something like that, and I was put back where I belonged.
“When I was removed again, it was to be a tool. A fey wanted strong minions to save its things. I made the bar, but that wasn’t good enough for the others. The contention, oh the contention, of whether I would be a useful enough tool to outweigh the security gained from my death. Take away his work, take away his will, maybe if he’s blind and bound we’ll feel safe enough to continue to exploit him.
“I don’t know what I care about any more. I’m not trusted to have my own thoughts. I’m the only one still under the dog curse, who has to lose their mind and will and dignity every month, because the whale fey saw fit to free Cress and not me, and because Percival is a self-centered Materian like everyone else.
“Cheko is afraid of your body, but she is terrified of me. She never spoke to me once, and never looked me in the eye. Your family politely excuses your oddness so that they can continue to relate to you. The last time I saw my sister was when I was being held after my arrest, when she refused to look at me and said that I was dead to her, before I was even convicted, completely believing lies despite knowing me for 50 years.
“You can complain about not being human. About missing food and needing blood and never being able to sleep or feel warmth. It’s legitimate. But at least you’re a person. At least you’re trusted. You have freedom. You’re valued. You aren’t less than anyone else.” He sighed, “It could be worse.”
The two sat for a while in silence.
As the horizon began to brighten, Ryuji asked, “Do you still have those earrings?”
“Yes. No one else wanted them. Why?”
He twisted his hand about to lie palm up on the sand, “Because I don’t want to leave it, thinking that a heartbeat should make me feel guilty.”
“I was under the impression that most things made you feel guilty,” Cohen said with a touch of sarcasm.
“It’s why I get angry when other people aren’t,” he replied. With a snort, Cohen reached into one of the many pockets in his jacket, and pulled out the earrings, dropping the pair of teardrop-shaped jewels into Ryuji’s open hand. “You’ll likely want to wait until someone wakes up. That would be a rude awakening.”
Ryuji took them, then reached to pass one back, “I only need one.”
Cohen raised an eyebrow. He took the single gem back. After a moment, he said snidely, “Gods know what I’ll do with your body, especially considering the shape the one you’re getting is in.” He put the earring in, as Ryuji did the same. “That’s a terrible risk you’re taking.”
“Not really,” Ryuji said. Spinning the earrings around, both men blinked as the effect took place. Cohen’s body nearly pitched over as Ryuji took control. Cohen, in Ryuji’s body, quickly moved to catch him, letting go when he was sitting stably again, “How...how much…” he said, dizzy and disoriented.
“Not enough to kill me,” Cohen replied. “I would have stopped you before then.”
“...Would you have actually shot me?” he asked.
“No, probably not.”
“Why’d...why’d you let me…?”
Cohen replied simply, “Because it wasn’t really a risk.” The two sat back-to-back, and watched the sun come up over the desert.
Category:Advent of the All