17 Feb 2021, 19:07
The Reunion
"I have traveled through madness to find me." - Danny Alexander
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
The dungeons, a place where Selim and Aku have taken to lurking most days with intervals of getting food from the house elves and showing up to classes just to grab homework and then leave.
Most rarely saw him in the dorm anymore, if at all. He had become just as elusive as the dhampir that 'claimed' him. Somehow though, hadn't run into any hags. If one thought more about the subject though, they'd realize that fact wasn't too surprising as hags weren't actually common for wayward students to run into. They were a risk, yes, but that's a rather vague term for a broad spectrum of danger. The fact of the matter is that chances of running into a hag were rather low.
At least, that was what Selim and Aku deduced upon not running into a hag despite their dungeon lurking for a full week. A rather logical conclusion to come to from repeated 'experiments' of this fact.
Either that or Selim was just rather unappetizing to the creatures, and a bit too unstable to be used as a tool by them.
Anyhow, the dungeons were where the duo were at the moment. Selim's eyes had long since become more accustomed to the dimness of the massive basement. That wasn't to say he had perfect vision down there, but it was enough to get him by as he idly munched on a protein bar that tasted similar to cardboard, and had the consistency of it as well.
Aku bobbed up and down on his arm, still held upright. Selim rarely used that hand anymore, he supposed that'd be considered a hindrance, as eventually his ability to use both his right and hand with equal fluidity would waste away. Surprisingly, he didn't find that he cared much about that fact.
Steadily, the sallow boy continued his wandering, gaze flitting about as he scanned what he could see of his surroundings. The shadows were pulsing, as if alive, as per usual. Underneath them though, his mind had oh so graciously added the small detail of thousands upon thousands of millipedes crawling just below the surface of the darkness. At a first glance, Selim wouldn't've noticed that small detail, but this wasn't a first glance now, was it?
His frayed mind made him jumpy when he first noticed that lingering addition to the usual breathing shadows, but after nothing further to note about the topic came up, he had gotten used to it, just as he had gotten used to the living darkness that followed his every step.
Of course, he was the only one who likely could see the writhing darkness and squirming, many-legged bugs. Selim had long since figured out that these were all hallucinations. In fact, anything unusual he caught sight of were now almost always filed under that title... as for usual things... well it was harder fr him to decipher if say, that unaccounted for quill on his bed was a hallucination or not. Luckily this downfall to his deceptive mind was easily fixed if he tried to touch the possible hallucination. If whatever he was trying to touch abruptly disappeared then it was likely an illusion.
His biggest struggle was the auditory hallucinations, the ones that got worst in crowds. You can't touch sound in the first place so there was hardly any way for Selim to confirm if the sounds he was hearing were real. These sorts of mental illusions caused him the most strife, and he only got relief from them when Aku stepped in and muffled the sounds.
"That salesmen in irritating." the rabbit in question suddenly spoke up, Selim looked down at him. The 'salesmen' he was speaking of was an unnerving Lie his brain had conjured up for no discernable reason. A fast-speaking male voice that listed off strings words that made sense yet also didn't in a near-monotonous voice with an unsettling lilt to it. The faced-paced talking reminded Selim of salesmen in the streets, so he dubbed the lie as such.
The boy let out a short breath as the slightly-muffled words of the hallucination washed over him. "You've said as much before." He responded to the puppet, whose mouth snapped shut in irritation.
"That's because it's annoying enough to reaffirm the fact that it's annoying." Aku hissed, Selim looked back at him with exhausted eyes.
"You don't need to reaffirm it to me, I can hear it."
They fell silent at the sound of groaning timbers and footsteps in the distance walking in tie to the sound of dripping water falling down from the roof the damp corridor. Selim's fingers twitched, and he picked up speed, sprinting down the corridors and turning into a cell with a hole at the base of its far-right corner wall. Stooping down he crawled into it, emerging in a cobweb-decorated corridor that was somehow more forgotten than the last one.
Pace slowing, he continued to walk down the twisted tunnel, stopping once he reached another old cell. Promptly, he fathered up loose stones and bricks into a circle at the center of the cell and dropped the logs he had stolen from the Slytherin common room in the middle of them, adjusting them so they hand pockets of air in their depths. Crumpling up some loose paper he placed them in the center of the logs.
Then, using the matches he dug up from the forgotten corners of his bookbag, he set the impromptu campfire ablaze, and then simply sat there.
Shadows danced across his sallow face, plastering contorting silhouettes on the old walls of the cell.
Mutely, the degrading boy stared at the twisting flames, mind becoming a pleasant haze of thoughtlessness.
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
Reducio
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Stats & Abilities:
____ ____ ____
2nd Year
/40
Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10
____ ____ ____
Ability: Martial Artist, Evasive Maneuvers
Last edited by Selim Faust on 8 Aug 2021, 03:23, edited 1 time in total.
"False Face must Hide what the Heart Doth Know." -Macbeth
S.F
20 Feb 2021, 07:23
The Reunion
It wasn't working.
Staying away from those he worried about wasn't working. But neither had being protective to the point of near possessive with his 'property'. As for friends? Out of the question.
So what was Jack to do?
One could have said that Jack was imagining things; that the people he worried about were actually getting along fine and he had just convinced himself they weren't because he missed being around them. Perhaps in the case of some, like with Flash, that was true. He had a girlfriend and other friends of his own, after all. Unlike Jack, they didn't seem to cause him misery; not yet or at least outwardly, anyway.
Selim, however, was a different matter. His condition only seemed to have been steadily declining since the summer. While Jack had many ideas about what he would have liked to do to 'fix' his peer, he had already tried them all before the previous year. This time, however, he doubted any of those same tactics would work - not for Selim or him.
After Selim had somehow murdered Victor Moore, Jack wasn't sure what to make of him. It had been strange and mixed enough trying to think of him as someone close while his body remembered the damage done to it by that very same boy. Now, though, his heart and mind were also thrust into the inner conflict. He needed to find Selim and talk to him to sort things out. Like they used to. Like contractual partners were supposed to do when one of them was unhappy with their arrangement.
Jack knew he still owed Selim a dance from the Fall Ball during which he had become quickly preoccupied. He sincerely regretted it, too, because something had happened that night - something major that had caused Selim to gain injuries to his face; enough to leave scars. Well, likely those could have been cured by magic, but more likely Selim had wanted to keep them for some reason. Yet another mystery to solve.
He had tired to ask what had happened, but Selim had refused to answer. They'd even had a fight over it in the common room in front of their dorm mates. Jack tried to go over what had happened regarding the interaction. If he remembered right, he had been about to cast a spell on Selim as a joke and promptly been punched in the jaw.
Reducio"What the fu-"
"Don't point wands at me," Selim had commanded.
"Or what, Fangs?" he'd shot back, agitated, confused, and hurt in more ways than one.
"You're missing some scars now, I could add them on for you. You enjoy matching, no?"
"What do you mean, missing? You got more?"
"They're on my face. You're rather oblivious these days."
It was true. He hadn't noticed them. And it stung that his obliviousness was pointed out. "I've been busy. What happened?" he had quickly replied.
"Masquerade happened," the Japanese boy had snorted, his demeanor affecting indifference. It only hurt more and Jack was willing to bet Selim knew it.
Jack's eyes had narrowed then. "Who did that and why?"
"Some students started brawling, as they do, and I tried to intervene when they pulled out wands, Selim said. A right hook nailed me in the jaw and shattered my mask. Shards of fake bone cut up my face and I got a broken Jaw. A professor intervened soon enough and I was healed."
"Healed with scars? Couldn't they have done better than that?" he'd shot back, frowning. "And weren't you just chastising me before because I was the one intervening in fights I shouldn't have, so you said?"
Selim cleaned his ear as he answered, nonplussed. "Troublesome. There's scars because I refused a full healing."
"And why the fu - Why did you refuse a full healing?!"
"Wow, we have a tough guy over here..." Percival Gray had said, smirking at Selim.
"I'm hardly 'weak'."
"You mean an idiot."
"Well yes, partly."
"You just wanted the scars, didn't you?" Jack had asked Selim irritably, getting up then to face him.
"Personal reasons," Selim had responded, raising his brows. "That much should've been obvious.... Though not in those exact words..."
"No, they're not. WHAT personal reasons?!"
Michael Miller had sighed then. "Yelling at him isn't going to help anything, Jack," he'd tried to advise his upperclassman.
But Jack had only rounded on him out of anger and frustration. "And you would know, Miller?"
Wyatt Starkey had shaken his head at Michael then, warning him to back off.
"Just trying to help..." the first year had huffed in response.
"Why should you get to know that, Fox?" Selim had asked of Jack then. "It's not like the contract states that you need to be my personal therapist."
"Fine," the redhead said, glaring daggers at the noiret. "I'll owe you a favor for the information. So let's hear it."
Michael had looked around then, clearly uncomfortable with the situation. "Should we leave...or..."
"I'm comfortable," Wyatt had announced. "I'm not moving so they can have a private conversation."
"We're fine, Miller," Percival Gray had assured the youngest boy.
But what Selim answered next made Jack's blood boil in his veins.
"Favor denied. The contract states that if the request is personal or has consequences if told, that I can deny it."
"Contract?" Michael had looked at Selim and Jack quizzically then. "What is up with this dorm? Why are you all so..."
But his sentence faded as Jack clenched his fists at his sides, got up, and headed toward his room without another word.
"We will know eventually Selim," Gray had said from behind the newspaper he seemed to constantly be reading. "Only time will tell."
Selim had simply worn a cold smile before sipping his tea and going back to reading.
"Another anti-climactic ending to an argument I don't understand," Wyatt had said while turning a page of his own book.
"You'll get used to it."
"You say that like I haven't already."
If nothing else, at least the conversation had informed Jack that Selim still adhered to the terms of their contract. That meant Selim and he both knew that he had the debt of that Fall Ball dance to repay.
He decided to start there. If he could seek out the snake on the context of wanting to repay that debt, maybe he could convince him to dance with him. During those moments when he had his dorm mate near, he could make sure they exchanged proper words.
At least, that was the plan. Finding his elusive fellow Slytherin was a whole other matter in itself. Luckily he had an idea of where Selim had been skulking about the past few days, but he didn't fancy the idea of wandering around down there. No one seemed to have seen any hags un the dungeons for a while now, but that didn't mean they weren't still there. Besides, the dungeons still gave Jack the creeps.
He wandered into them anyway with a torch, hoping to find Selim as quickly as possible so they could get out just as if not more quickly.
@Selim Faust
PC: Jack Burnett | iNPC: Ginyami Midorimori
22 Feb 2021, 05:09
The Reunion
"I have traveled through madness to find me." - Danny Alexander
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
There was a sharp crack of a long on the fire that echoed down the cobweb-endowed corridor. Dust drifted through the air, tickling his nose, causing him to sneeze. Aku snickered.
"You sneeze like a kitten." The rabbit spoke up, jaw flapping unsettlingly in the musky air.
Selim frowned, the annoyed expression twisting his eldritch-looking face, only made more eery by how his amber eyes seemed to glow in the firelight. "You sneeze like a kitten."
The puppet scoffed as smoke accumulated on the ceiling, coiling its way down the corridor and bringing with it its distinctive scent. A rat squeaked nearby, and Selim slammed his hand down on it after spotting its small form. It bit his hand, drawing blood, but he didn't seem to care, swiftly snapping its neck instead.
Taking out his pocket knife, he decapitated and cleaned it. The pelt rested by the rocks to dry, Selim tossed its leftover organs and such into the fire. He then roasted it over the flames as if it were a hotdog.
Examining the injury he got from the brief struggle, he licked the blood clean from where it was welling in the gash. Eventually, he wrapped it in bandages.
The scent of cooking meat mingled with the scent of smoke. Perhaps Hogwarts should invest in smoke detectors.
The puppet seemed to examine the large cooking rat, ear shifting, "At this rate, you'll be a carbon copy of that dhampir." the voice drawled, Selim shrugged.
"Our personalities are already alike, why not go a step further? Might as well become the monster we're beginning to be viewed as."
"True. Personally, though, I'd prefer we make our own impact on this wretched world, we were already living in our father's shadow, now we've simply begun to shift into the shadow of an estranged upperclassmen." The rabbit tilted his head, button eyes glinting almost darkly in the firelight.
Another shrug. "Who said we'd be in another's shadow permanently, Aku? It'll simply make it all the more unexpected when we strike back against our family. Almost like an ambush." The raven responded, voice a monotonous drawl, "What do you want me to do? Announce our plans to the world like a Gryffindor? Hug it out like a Hufflepuff? Subtly is our trademark, no use in shedding it now, especially since we've grown so close to the source of this cursed school's secrets."
A contemplative hum came from the hand puppet. "I suppose. The dhampir is currently just a very convenient ally in our endeavours, isn't he? Then I guess there aren't many cons in our arrangement." The rabbit relented, both of them ignored the small amount of reluctance leaking from his voice.
They continued to stare at the fire for a while until Selim pulled the skewered rat carcass from the fire and bit into it. Chewing methodically, he wandered through his mindscape, continuing to attempt to clean up the labyrinth that made up his mental space. A haze was resting over it still, and he honestly couldn't do much about how the structure was slowly being torn apart and chunks of it were now drifting up toward the black hole in his mindscape's sky.
He pictured himself dusting off a particular folder in his mind maze, a familiar name on it.
After flipping through it he pulled back to the present, looking over to the rabbit. "Are we going to use Jack Burnett as previously planned? Times have changed and I haven't looked over that old file in a while."
Aku's head lolled to the side, a stubby arm resting in contemplation on his chin. "I mean. He is a willing test subject still, ironically the favour bank we've built up hasn't been paid off.."
A scowl of annoyance "Yes, yes, I know. That little meet-up is hard to forget. Though the fever-dream subsequent to that day makes it very hard for me to recall who owes the most favours." He chewed his lip, tearing the chapped skin a bit before speaking with beads of blood resting where he had gnawed, "Besides, our short-term ambitions currently seem to overshadow our long-term goals." His eyes narrowed and he fingered his blade, tossing the remains of his impromptu meal into the fire. The smoke felt greasy.
"Do we use him for that goal? He's hardly the pawn of my chessboard, No, he's more like the bishop. We can't simply toss him to the wolves so early in the game! It doesn't matter that our previous relationship has decayed to a mere thread. He's still an important piece."
The rabbit huffed. "Well I see no use for him in that particular goal, but you seem to forget that we're still intending to dig our way to the rotten core of Hogwarts in all its corrupted glory; and honestly, you're lacking in your momentum to do just that. Have you ever tried to seek out that eagle since the Fall Ball? No. Have you kept in touch with the Undertaker? No. You're too busy lurking in the shadows to pay attention to any of that." The puppet let out a harsh laugh.
"So, pray tell, why are you worrying about how to put troublesome fox to use when you're not even putting yourself to use?"
Selim hissed sharply in anger, "Oh, pardon me, you have my deepest apologies Akuryō-sama. I've been a tad busy trying to keep my degrading mind from being sucked up into that cursed black hole you call madness." He growled, "I can hardly make myself useful if I become a blabbering, brain-dead mess somewhere in the darkest corner of the dungeon."
The rabbit scoffed, before saying no more, promptly cutting off the topic.
They continued to sit there in silence, staring at the fire as the room became slightly hazy with smoke; unknowing of the fox trying to creep its way into their den.
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
Reducio
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Stats & Abilities:
____ ____ ____
2nd Year
/40
Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10
____ ____ ____
Ability: Martial Artist, Evasive Maneuvers
Last edited by Selim Faust on 3 Mar 2021, 00:19, edited 3 times in total.
"False Face must Hide what the Heart Doth Know." -Macbeth
S.F
2 Mar 2021, 02:14
The Reunion
The smoke and the smell of cooking meat immediately drew Jack's attention. He followed the scents through the maze of dungeons as best he could while trying hard not to inhale too much smoke. It took him a while, feeling his way through the darkness due to not wanting to use a light, but eventually he came close enough to hear voices. One of them was definitely the Japanese student he had shared a dorm with since the start of their first year. The other, however, he was unfamiliar with. Who was he talking to?
Frowning, Jack contemplated trying to eavesdrop. He didn't think that was what people who trusted each other did, but could he really trust Selim at this point? Did Selim trust him at all anymore? The exchange of words back at the common room still riled him just to think of them. If Selim wasn't going to tell him things, how else was he supposed to understand unless he eavesdropped?
But no. The redhead eventually decided against it. If he wanted them to go back to how they were, he would have to be as open and honest with Selim as he'd been before. That meant no sneaking around trying to listen in on conversations that weren't meant for his ears. Not bothering to muffle his footsteps, he began to approach the fire and his dorm mate.
"Fangs," he called, his voice steady, confident, and direct. "We need to talk. I believe I owe you a dance from the Fall Ball." Hazel eyes dropped to his feet. "I'm...sorry I couldn't make it in time to catch you there. I should have. But I'd like to make it up to you now."
@Selim Faust
PC: Jack Burnett | iNPC: Ginyami Midorimori
3 Mar 2021, 00:20
The Reunion
"I have traveled through madness to find me." - Danny Alexander
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
Aku looked up at the unexpected voice while Selim wondered to himself about how he hadn't heard the redhead coming. Honestly, it was mildly concerning that his skills had degraded so much in the past few months.
"My, my, speak of the devil and he shall appear, hm?" The rabbit spoke up after a few moments of silence, and Selim paused the action of gnawing at his chapped lips. Slowly, the snake-like child looked up at his old companion, expression unrevealing of what was churning inside his skull.
Finally, his mind processed the words the fox had spoken. A dance? Had thy spoken of a dance? He barely remembered what he had done before the fall ball. He had been busy getting conked in the face by a vengeful Erin Ryan and her misguided attempts at revenge.
Not to mention all that had happened after, arguing with the resident villain of the student body over whether or not he should chug an unknown potion down to heal the surface injuries of the assault from the fall ball. Almost just a week after being 'kidnapped' by the fox's ex and promptly smelt by her and being called rotten, meeting the dhampir who soon after claimed him as his own.
The mental degradation in between the prementioned events.
To put it simply, Selim was calling bullsh*t on Jack's reasons for searching for him through the dark dangerous dungeons he didn't know like the back of his hand.
Selim stood up, showing his full emaciated and very unhealthy glory. His sunken eyes peered impassively at the seemingly apologetic redhead.
"I don't remember asking for a dance, I was busy being attacked by upperclassmen during the ball." His tone held humour that was as dry as a desert. "So how about you tell us why you actually tracked us down, Fox?"
The hand puppet was held aloof in the air, head tilting, "Yes, prey tell why did you finally go through the trouble to track us down and talk to us? You're a bit late, it's been about... hmm, ten months since you've bothered to have a proper conversation with us, alone." A dark laugh exited the eery new accessory to the elusive boy.
Selim remained quiet as he stared at his dormmate, the one who had hypocritically up and left him after their first year of Hogwarts despite the multiple time he had told his smaller dormmate not to do exactly that.
His amber eyes glinted dangerously in the firelight. He had an urge to stab the redhead again, to finish what he had started as a sign of trust. He wanted to choke the life out of him, to see that spark fade out of his remorseful hazel eyes.
He wanted to snuff out another flame to add to the growing number of kills he had amassed over the span of four months.
It was a dark, violent urge he had noted was becoming more common when he looked at another student. Every time he had to restrain himself from following through the violent burst of emotion.
He was unstable, and he knew it, but he was beginning to care less and less about preserving his image of a good little student who doesn't murder his peers.
'Why keep restraining yourself? How much longer will you be able to hold on to your illusion of innocence, Selim Faust?' Aku spoke in his mindscape words echoing inside his skull.
Selim's fingers twitched.
He was not the boy Jack knew and care about before.
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
Reducio
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Stats & Abilities:
____ ____ ____
2nd Year
/40
Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10
____ ____ ____
Ability: Martial Artist, Evasive Maneuvers
"False Face must Hide what the Heart Doth Know." -Macbeth
S.F
17 Mar 2021, 03:26
The Reunion
It took a few moments of blinking, staring, and processing to eventually understand that the other voice Jack had heard aside from Selim actually belonged to the same person. Well...not that Selim seemed to want anyone to realize that. In a creepy-yet-strangely-talented bit of ventriloquism, the Slytherin boy appeared to be having a conversation with a purple patchwork rabbit puppet he manipulated with one of his hands.
This...was a whole new level of weird Jack wasn't prepared for. Still, that didn't mean he was about to give up so easily. He liked to think he knew a thing or two about the power of imagination...along with going with whatever reality another's mind might have conjured up in their own head in order to get through to them. It was how he had managed to get through to Keagan Deathmote, at least, once upon a time.
"We had agreed to have a dance at the Masquerade," Jack tried to remind him. "We'd agreed on it weeks before the actual event took place. Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find you there."
His eyes narrowed. "I'm guessing the upperclassmen you're talking about are the ones who caused your mask to break over your face. Who were they, Fangs?" He had a few guesses, of course, but he didn't want to jump to any assumptions just yet. "As for why I tracked you down, it's for what I said I did. Along with the fact that we have a lot of things to discuss." His lips thinned. "We've had them ever since last summer and the list has continued to grow. It was one of the reasons I had agreed to a dance with you at the Fall Ball in the first place."
The puppet's addition to Selim's question caused Jack to frown uncertainly. Ten months? Selim had actually been keeping track? And all this time he'd thought his dorm mate didn't give a rat's arse about talking to him or even having anything to do with him at all. Well, no, that couldn't have been true. Why else would he have asked Jack for a dance at the ball?
That was when Jack realized his mistake. He'd neglected the other boy for far too long. Selim wouldn't have asked for a dance if he hadn't still wanted to maintain some sort of...alliance with Jack. After having told him they would dance, though, and then not only not following through, but letting Selim get attacked...
No. No, this wasn't a friendship. He wasn't required to act like a friend did. He wasn't required to show he cared.
...So then why did he feel so shitty about it?
His body began to tremble with tension and he took a step back. His eyes stung and reflected the firelight with flashing wetness, but he wouldn't let them overflow.
"...I'm sorry," he spoke up in as steady a voice as he could manage. Still, it was hardly more audible than a whisper. "I suppose any trust you might have had in me is gone now."
He took several steps forward until he was within an arm's length and held out a hand, as if for a dance. "But...if you let me make it up to you, you know I will." Hazel eyes locked on to yellow. "You know I'll do almost anything it takes. Don't you?"
@Selim Faust
PC: Jack Burnett | iNPC: Ginyami Midorimori
17 Mar 2021, 05:06
The Reunion
"I have traveled through madness to find me." - Danny Alexander
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
Jack's attempts to remind Selim of such an invitation were met with a blank stare of unrecognition. Selim blinked slowly head tilting to the side, easily portraying his lack of memory. A haze of sleeplessness had long since swallowed up such an unimportant scene.
The Fox's probing for info on the attack at the fall ball was unsuccessful. The thin boy infected with a festering madness looked at him, obviously unimpressed.
"I see you're as unable as ever to take no as an answer to such pointless inquiries. All you need to know is that it was an upperclassmen, and I hardly care about the attack anymore." Turning, Selim poked the fire with a stick, sparks billowing into the air, landing on his skin and quickly cooling as if they had landed on frigid ice.
"A list? I'm impressed you bothered to keep track of that, from a distance, it seems." His tone was dull and wholly uncaring, the feeling was echoed in his mind as well. Whether or not the words unintentionally struck a mental blow on the redhead or not was entirely up to the taller boy.
Both of the single entity that was Selim Faust looked over as they heard Jack back up after the wry comment put forth by the purple bunny. The puppet's head lolled eerily to the side as if noting the expression on the red-headed dormmate's face for itself. Neither of the two made a comment, seeing entirely apathetic to it.
Selim took to watching the twisting, humanoid shadows only he could see, mouths agape with a void of white.
His eyes glowed like dying embers as he observed the unsettling entities only he could see. A particular being stood in the corner of the room, one that had been with him since his kidnapping.
They twitched as Jack finally spoke. Selim only looked over as the boy took on the dangerous act of getting closer. Aku laughed.
"Yes, we know very well that you'll do anything to 'fix' the situation. That's all you ever want to do, evidently. Fix things you see as broken, fix them until they can be fixed no more." The words had a double meaning, one they were both sure the Fox would grasp with his supposedly intelligent mind.
after a moment, Selim looked back to the fire, poking it absently. He spoke up after a good few seconds of completely ignoring his contractual partner's offered hand. "Trust is a feeble thing that takes a lot of upkeep, Fox. Once broken more than once it's hard to 'fix' again, and then continue to care for." He spoke dully, voice harsh with misuse. A churning of violent urge continued to make his hand twitch, as his skin began to itch with a familiar feeling. "So far only my older brother has gotten close to the equilibrium needed for such a delicate human pact." A pause, the drawn boy looked over at his dormmate with exhausted eyes burning with an unknown light from within, "He is twenty, you are twelve. Twelve-year-olds are shit with proper relationships. Developing mind easily swayed by impulses do not make for sturdy foundations."
He paused, coughing slightly, before Aku spoke, giving his voice a break.
"Developing minds change, personalities change, usually only steady when one hits around 25." The rabbit commented absently "Selim is hardly the same boy as he was before the masquerade, much less the same as he was before summer."
The puppet chuckled, "In a way, you're trying to reform a bond with a completely different person, dear little fox."
Selim closed his heavy eyes for a moment, inhaling smoke as if he wished for it to smother him. Letting out a breath, he looked back to the redhead uncaringly, "I don't care about dancing. If you want to talk, best do it quick. Sit and speak your mind before I change my own." His eyes narrowed dangerously, "You're already pushing the limits of my stability with your presence intruding on my solidarity."
The eldritch-looking boy jerked a bit as he heard rushing footsteps echo down the hall, followed by eerie laughter and a brief burst of screaming. Letting out a sharp breath, he wrote it off as a trick of his mind.
Looking back to the redhead, he ignored the faint, ghostly sounds only he heard.
He gestured to a spot partially across from him, the fire beginning to die down to a mere flicker of light. The snake did not seem to be in the mood for dramatics.
▁ ▂ ▄ ▅ ▆ ▇ █ ||~♟~|| ▇ ▆ ▅ ▄ ▂ ▁
Reducio
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Stats & Abilities:
____ ____ ____
2nd Year
/40
Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10
____ ____ ____
Ability: Martial Artist, Evasive Maneuvers
"False Face must Hide what the Heart Doth Know." -Macbeth
S.F
17 Mar 2021, 06:37
The Reunion
Jack sighed, then chuckled mirthlessly. "Well...at least it was worth a shot. There are only so many upperclassman who would attack you for reasons related to me, though." He frowned again. "And only so many reasons you wouldn't tell me who it was. Particularly while claiming you 'hardly care about the attack' anymore. If you hardly cared about it, there wouldn't be any real reason not to tell me, now would there?" He crossed his arms over his chest, tilting his head as he regarded Selim and his puppet friend.
"Of course I keep track. Right along with our list of favors. As for distance, wasn't distance what we both wanted and agreed upon from the start?" His gaze drifted idly to the rabbit hand puppet as it appeared to 'look' at him.
When Aku laughed, Jack glared at the puppet and its analysis of him. Then he slowly lowered his proffered hand back down to his side, listening as Selim continued to speak in his own voice. His eyes cut to the twitching of his dorm mate's visible hand.
"Yeah, well your brother's around even less than I am," the redhead retorted, speaking steadily and knowing he was jumping on thin ice as he did so. "I don't care how shit most twelve-year-olds are with proper relationships. I thought you and I were at least mature enough to maintain what we started the day we met. Do you disagree?" Jack glanced at Aku. "Or is the Selim Faust I'm talking to now so different that the contract we made is null and void?"
Upon being told to sit, Jack followed Selim's gesture and did so, still watching the pair across from him. Selim seemed distracted a moment and Jack's lips parted, as if to ask a question of concern, but the moment passed. He sighed and tried a new subject - one he had been dying to discuss for months.
"...Do you know what a legilimens is?"
@Selim Faust
PC: Jack Burnett | iNPC: Ginyami Midorimori
17 Mar 2021, 14:25
The Reunion
"I have traveled through madness to find me." - Danny Alexander
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"I don't care about the attack, and I don't want to tell you who attacked me because it is unnecessary information. I have moved past it, you have not, hence, you would seek after someone on my nonexistent behalf. That is annoying, and would simply lead back to me, and give them what they want. You're annoyance and distress about my condition." Selim peered at the redhead boredly, "If you want to find out who attacked me, figure it out yourself, or search for the information elsewhere."
He paused at the Fox's mentions about distance, and rose a brow, "I don't remember such an agreement, then again I find my memory failing me more often than not these days." He paused in his idle poking at the fire, "But I'm sure, if such an agreement did happen, that it did not mean, complete separation and noncommunication for ten months."
His uncaring tone took on a dry sort of feeling. Unimpressed described Selim pretty well at that moment. Intentionally or unintentionally, the redhead seemed to be forking blame onto him. Selim had only completely disappeared from the dorm recently, the fox could've tried to keep in contact, though his focus had been elsewhere. In fact, the boy had purposefully avoided him, to hear him making excuses wasn't helping his already-poor image.
Then, the boy did, in fact, cross a line. Trying to make himself look better than the man that had been with Selim since he was a baby, was a grievous mistake on his part. That churning violence interrupted the redhead's attempts to talk casually after, was completely ruining them, unfortunately.
Shifting, Selim slowly stood, eyes cold, and suddenly jerked forwards, his free hand wrapping around Jack's throat, the puppet's teeth biting into his flesh on the other. The movement was fast, the evasive boy who had dodged so many dangers put that speed to use in the offence. His full body weight, though lacking in what it used to be, crashed into the fox that had purposefully antagonized a snake that was obviously not in the mood, nor mindset, to sanely deal with the antagonization.
However the attack ended up, Selim would growl like a bloodthirsty beast, pupils narrowed into predatory slits as they locked onto their prey. "Don't you dare poke at something you don't understand fox. Do not try and make yourself look better than someone who has been with me through every the hardships I've been through." His voice hissed. "Because you, in fact, have been there less than him. Your avoidance is inexcusable. The only reason my brother isn't with me so often is because he physically can't be. You had the choice, you were the one to decide to stay away from me. Not him."
He tightened his grip, eyes glinting with an urge to snuff out the fire before him. He wanted, in that moment, for Jack Burnett to die.
"I can pardon your actions because of the little session of... bonding, we had last year, but you do not have my permission, nor pardon, for making excuses for your actions built to cast the only person I care about in a bad light." The fangs of the hand puppet would be biting harshly into Jack's skin now. The seemingly harmless object made into a weapon by the paranoid boy. Honestly unsurprising.
His eyes were shining with it, with the dark intentions, with the violent, unhinged urge to tear apart his once-companion, to make him suffer more before being put into the eternal rest Selim couldn't achieve for himself. His frame jerked and twitched as he tried to restrain the urge, a desperate attempt to cling to what humanity he had left. This was not like the past times he had harmed fellow students, he was not caught in a memory of suffering forcing him to lash out, this was not a shadow uncontrolled by him stabbing into the chest of a fellow Slytherin and snuffing out their dwindling flame.
No, Selim was present, he was consciously making the decision to hurt another, not in self-defence, but in the urge to see someone bleed. Restraining himself was not what most of his mind and body wanted, it was a small part of him that didn't want to deal with more suffering that tried to shove the darkness back into its cage. Past attempts have brought about failure to do so...
Luckily... this time, this attempt succeeded.
He forced himself back, the fangs of the rabbit leaving gouges in the Fox's neck. Blood dripped from its teeth as it slowly raised back into an upright position, head cocking with its gruesome smile agape and stained red.
"We may be more mature than most, but that does not exempt us from the impulses underdeveloped minds have." His cold, serpentine eyes narrowed, "I am upholding the contract as best as I can in my state. I suggest you appreciate the fact that I am still trying to do so with how much you can likely see that I'm degrading."
Taking a few steps back, he walked to the opposite wall, sitting, facing Jack. His visage was once more apathetic, but now, the other boy likely knew better than to be deceived by the perceived indifference. Dark, immoral thoughts and impulses churned below the surface of the mask, and Selim was starting to lose his battle against them. He was, indeed, dangerous... to himself and others.
Aku spoke, voice tinted with sadistic glee, "I suggest you choose your next words carefully, little fox. Our patience is wearing thin~"
Selim Faust was not a stable, healthy boy. He was a boy on the brink of falling into violent madness.
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Reducio
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Mentions: @Jack Burnett
Stats & Abilities:
____ ____ ____
2nd Year
/40
Stamina: 5
Evasion: 10
Strength: 5
Wisdom: 7
ArcPower: 3
Accuracy: 10
____ ____ ____
Ability: Martial Artist, Evasive Maneuvers
"False Face must Hide what the Heart Doth Know." -Macbeth
S.F
19 Mar 2021, 04:40
The Reunion
Selim claiming that he didn't want to tell Jack who attacked him because it was 'unnecessary information' earned an incredulous look from the redhead, but he rolled his eyes and didn't question it. Due to there being only a limited number of likely possibilities, he thought he might have already been able to guess the answers to his questions which Selim refused to answer.
"The agreement wasn't about distance exactly; more like we had thought it was a good idea to make the contract because we weren't close. We weren't friends and we had no real attachments to each other," Jack tried to remind him, but didn't seem too concerned whether or not Selim remembered or knew what he was referring to. There was something else he was more interested in learning from the Japanese Slytherin just then.
His brows knitted together in bewilderment. "It takes two to tango, Fangs. If you were so concerned about us being 'separated' and not communicating for those months, how come you didn't say anything? You could have sent an owl or left a note or something. We live in the same dorm after all. How hard could it have been to get a hold of me if you'd really wanted to? I assumed you'd just been up to your own devices and wanted to be alone."
Of course, there was more to it than that, but it wasn't a lie. Unlike Flash, Jack had sincerely thought that after the summer, Selim had preferred his solitude over anyone's, even Jack's, company. If he was now talking to hand puppets using his own voice, however...perhaps he'd been more lonely than his dorm mates had ever realized.
Even now, hearing Selim mention the exact number of months since they had last talked was so strange and contradictory when spoken in a tone that suggested he didn't care. Obviously he did, so why was he acting and sounding like that? Jack had come to seek him out now, so why was he acting bitter about it like he hadn't wanted him to? Did he want to confront him again or didn't he? The Welsh second year couldn't figure it out.
One thing helped, though. Having intentionally and purposefully baited Selim by comparing his beloved older brother to himself, Jack was both intrigued and pleased to get a reaction out of his peer. It was violent, certainly, which wasn't ideal, but a strong reaction was better than a weak one. It meant that at least Selim wasn't again being the mindless robot that he'd made himself out to be during their first year. He still had emotions and he was still willing to act on them like any other human being.
He was careful not to give his relief away, however. It wasn't like there was any need to provoke the angry snake any more than he already had now that he had gotten the answer he'd baited him to obtain. Instead, Jack cringed at the impact of being bowled over, wincing at the new pains shooting through his body, but at least the pain told him he wasn't dead. Not yet, anyway.
"Heh...I'm the type of person...who learns by poking what I don't understand, Fangs," he grunted with difficulty. "You know that." Not that he'd really been trying to make himself 'look better', but if Selim thought that, Jack wasn't going to waste words, time, or effort bothering to correct him. There were more pressing matters to tend to.
Something Selim said caused him to narrow his eyes in suspicion and confusion, however. "...What makes you think I was specifically deciding to stay away from you?" he wanted to know. "It didn't occur to you that, oh, just maybe I was busy with actually attending school and doing my school work or something?"
He grimaced at the stinging of the puppet's...teeth?...stabbing into his skin. Just what kind of mouth was that thing equipped with? Well, considering Selim, though, Jack couldn't have said he was surprised. He'd always made certain to have a physically dangerous weapon of some kind or another on him at all times. First knives, then chopsticks and now...a hand puppet. But injuries inflicted by Selim were still injuries and they hurt regardless of what they were caused with.
Jack didn't meet Selim's gaze; he wouldn't allow himself to do so lest the bloodlust he knew was there set his memories off. It would have likely caused his body to start its involuntary termors as it did on occasion when he thought back to certain events. Instead, he grit his teeth and closed his eyes lightly, trying to concentrate on his breathing. It beat focusing on the puppet teeth in his neck and what they might have been made of, in any case.
Why did Selim want to kill him? Jack wasn't sure; he just sensed the murderous intent was there. Maybe it wouldn't have mattered who he was and Selim just wanted someone to murder, but...somehow, that wasn't the impression Jack was getting. Not that it seemed tactful right then to just ask why he wanted him dead. Was it really just because of what he'd said about his brother? Or was there more to it then that?
No; there was no time to waste trying to figure that out. He had to stay on track.
He gasped as the rabbit was yanked off him and it left gouges in its wake. Jack's hand flew to his bleeding neck and he tried to remember the bandaging spell. He'd have to get that taken care of before he lost too much blood. Either that, or try to staunch it with something else. Unless he was lucky and it wasn't too bad...but what if it had hit a main artery? No, he wouldn't have done that if he had decided to spare him in the end...
Focus, Jack. Focus!
He tried to deepen his shallow breaths, trying not to panic. At last, he forced himself to meet Selim's gaze.
"...I'll explain everything to you if you hear me out and answer my questions," he told him, trying to speak as calmly and clearly as he could manage. His hand was still clasped about the puncture wounds in his neck. Hopefully there weren't any dhampir close enough to smell his blood. The metallic tang seemed to permeate the air like a nearly tangible cloud. With another low, shaking breath, he opened his mouth to try again.
"Do you know what a legilimens is?"
@Selim Faust
PC: Jack Burnett | iNPC: Ginyami Midorimori