Fic - Destruction's Confidant: Chapter 4
Title: Destruction's Confidant: Chapter 4.
Author: Locust
Rating this Chapter: PG-13
Summary: History between Salacia and Vater Orlaag. Previous chapters: One Two Three
Pairings: None, nor will there ever be.
Warnings: More of Salacia's typical mindgames, and oh dear! It looks like stuff's starting to get kind of grim and convoluted, just like I promised.
“Can you stand on your own?” Salacia asked quietly and without compassion.
Orlaag nodded languidly in response, still somewhat too shaken to speak. Salacia promptly let him go, with no sort of cautiousness about it. “You need to rest, do you not? Let me come in,” Salacia requested. Orlaag regained his ability to speak. “But why would you need to…? Besides, this cell will only accommodate me,” he protested, his words still a bit slurred.
“No matter. I do not require sleep myself, at least I will not require any for quite a while. I must watch you,” Salacia responded.
“Watch me? Can’t you watch me psychically?” At this point, Orlaag was beginning to realize it was very unwise of him to continue showing his discomfort - both with the Half Man himself and with the fact that he was supposedly bound to be his obedient servant, so he tried to ask this question in the least accusing tone he could manage.
Salacia took a deep breath. “Most mortals who have encountered me have been physically and spiritually incapable of tolerating my incarnate existence. You are doing well enough so far, but most have broken down in mind and body only hours after making eye contact with me - even people of your level of awareness, Reimand Orlaag. To watch you psychically, I would need to actively engage with your mind. I must see how you fare in the absence of that engagement.”
Orlaag narrowed his eyes, his mind fixating on what Salacia mentioned about other people who had encountered him. “Most...?” He asked.
“You are not the first to summon my incarnate form into this world. There have been many who have done so before you, but the time was not right, and clearly, they were not right either.”
“Right how?” Orlaag asked, wishing Salacia would be less cryptic. Perhaps as an otherworldly being, it was the most natural way for him to be, but if Orlaag was to end up assisting him in some way, explaining things in clear and concise terms would be the least Salacia could do.
“Right with the prophecy. The vessels of your faith’s gods are to incarnate on earth very soon - the first of them should be born within the next five of this world’s years, but you know this already. You have called me here at a most appropriate time, and you are the first to call me here in a very, very long time...” Salacia was maintaining eye contact with Orlaag for far longer than would be normal or comfortable by any human standard, and his gaze was as sharp as ever (though, thankfully no longer glaringly bright), but Orlaag didn’t dare look away from him.
Orlaag thought back to the lines in the prophecy stating the one fated to become the Half Man’s servant was to be one of the faithful. “Were all of the others who called you here members of the Church of the Black Klok as well?” He asked.
“No, not all of them. Some of them were, most certainly; rebellious and power-hungry ministers and elders who simply wanted to disrupt the balance of things for their own personal gain. Most of them were merely odd occultists and spiritualists who perceived my presence within the cosmos and simply channeled what they perceived, but had no name for me, nor any real idea of my influence. You, however, are a pure-intentioned mystic of the Church of the Black Klok, and still you summoned me in your sleep, as if you unconsciously knew it was something that needed to be done. This is why I strongly believe you to be the one who will be bound to me by fate, but I still have to make absolutely certain.”
“How did the others… break down, as you said? Did they die?” Orlaag asked with stifled concern.
“Not all of them. Most merely lost their minds, or developed illnesses that could not be treated -common sicknesses of the nerves that would not respond to common methods of care, nor to uncommon ones for that matter,” Salacia explained aloofly.
Though Orlaag was less concerned with worldly life than most, he was still very much a mortal human being with survival instincts, and these words struck anxiety into his heart. “I see,” he said softly, nodding to Salacia. “I will allow you to watch me for the night.”
Salacia nodded in response as Orlaag opened the door to allow him in. Salacia had to duck his head walking in, and had to maneuver himself somewhat awkwardly around the tiny monastic cell. Eventually he sat down on the floor across from the small bed in the corner. Orlaag automatically walked straight to his bed and lay down. He thought to himself somewhat wryly about how under ordinary circumstances, he would be trying to make his guest as comfortable as possible, but these were by no means ordinary circumstances, and this guest (if one could even call Salacia that) was the furthest possible thing from ordinary. As he covered himself up, he saw Salacia raise his hand from the corner of his eye, and heard him mutter something under his breath. He felt a different sort of exhaustion take him - a warmer, headier, more pleasant somnolence. He felt guilty for receiving it, but he could by no means resist it; he allowed it to comfort his nerves and to claim his wakefulness, which had brought him little but terror that day.
His dreams that night were of nothing but a hazy, silent, kunzite-colored abyss. Moving through it revealed nothing else; no one else. This went on for hours. When he awoke, he found he was still in the same place. This time, there was another form there - Salacia. Who else would it have been? He approached him immediately. “Salacia… What is going on? You said you would not engage my mind again until you were sure-”
“And I kept my word. You are now awake, you are clearly well, and I have not touched your mind again until this very moment.”
Orlaag suppressed the confused exasperation he felt. “Where are we?”
“This is the space within your mind that has been opened as a result of your encountering me. This is where we will communicate from now on, during times when we are physically absent from one another,” Salacia explained.
“Then where are you now? You were sitting across from me when I fell asleep. Nothing is making any sense,” Orlaag blurted out. Salacia laughed dryly in response, his expression remaining as cold as ever. “You have chosen the life of a mystic. Contradictions should be commonplace to you by now. What you really mean when you say that nothing is making any sense is that you are still afraid - that you still have not fully accepted your fate as my accomplice,” Salacia remarked sharply.
“Of course I still haven’t fully accepted that. You can’t expect me to simply wake up and embrace this role I’ve apparently thrust myself into just because you showed me your psychic projections of… what exactly was it you showed me last night?” Orlaag responded in a tone that revealed more negative emotions than he would have liked.
“I believe you know as well as I do that I showed you a mixture of my knowledge of the future, and your own unconscious urges. Now, come closer,” Salacia commanded. Orlaag walked over to Salacia as he had asked, and looked up at him inquisitively. “Take my hands, and close your eyes,” Salacia instructed. Orlaag complied, his mind heavy with dread and resignation.
“Relax. I will show you just how much sense everything makes,” Salacia rasped as Orlaag felt the very flow of time coagulating into a thick, intoxicating sludge.
Author: Locust
Rating this Chapter: PG-13
Summary: History between Salacia and Vater Orlaag. Previous chapters: One Two Three
Pairings: None, nor will there ever be.
Warnings: More of Salacia's typical mindgames, and oh dear! It looks like stuff's starting to get kind of grim and convoluted, just like I promised.
“Can you stand on your own?” Salacia asked quietly and without compassion.
Orlaag nodded languidly in response, still somewhat too shaken to speak. Salacia promptly let him go, with no sort of cautiousness about it. “You need to rest, do you not? Let me come in,” Salacia requested. Orlaag regained his ability to speak. “But why would you need to…? Besides, this cell will only accommodate me,” he protested, his words still a bit slurred.
“No matter. I do not require sleep myself, at least I will not require any for quite a while. I must watch you,” Salacia responded.
“Watch me? Can’t you watch me psychically?” At this point, Orlaag was beginning to realize it was very unwise of him to continue showing his discomfort - both with the Half Man himself and with the fact that he was supposedly bound to be his obedient servant, so he tried to ask this question in the least accusing tone he could manage.
Salacia took a deep breath. “Most mortals who have encountered me have been physically and spiritually incapable of tolerating my incarnate existence. You are doing well enough so far, but most have broken down in mind and body only hours after making eye contact with me - even people of your level of awareness, Reimand Orlaag. To watch you psychically, I would need to actively engage with your mind. I must see how you fare in the absence of that engagement.”
Orlaag narrowed his eyes, his mind fixating on what Salacia mentioned about other people who had encountered him. “Most...?” He asked.
“You are not the first to summon my incarnate form into this world. There have been many who have done so before you, but the time was not right, and clearly, they were not right either.”
“Right how?” Orlaag asked, wishing Salacia would be less cryptic. Perhaps as an otherworldly being, it was the most natural way for him to be, but if Orlaag was to end up assisting him in some way, explaining things in clear and concise terms would be the least Salacia could do.
“Right with the prophecy. The vessels of your faith’s gods are to incarnate on earth very soon - the first of them should be born within the next five of this world’s years, but you know this already. You have called me here at a most appropriate time, and you are the first to call me here in a very, very long time...” Salacia was maintaining eye contact with Orlaag for far longer than would be normal or comfortable by any human standard, and his gaze was as sharp as ever (though, thankfully no longer glaringly bright), but Orlaag didn’t dare look away from him.
Orlaag thought back to the lines in the prophecy stating the one fated to become the Half Man’s servant was to be one of the faithful. “Were all of the others who called you here members of the Church of the Black Klok as well?” He asked.
“No, not all of them. Some of them were, most certainly; rebellious and power-hungry ministers and elders who simply wanted to disrupt the balance of things for their own personal gain. Most of them were merely odd occultists and spiritualists who perceived my presence within the cosmos and simply channeled what they perceived, but had no name for me, nor any real idea of my influence. You, however, are a pure-intentioned mystic of the Church of the Black Klok, and still you summoned me in your sleep, as if you unconsciously knew it was something that needed to be done. This is why I strongly believe you to be the one who will be bound to me by fate, but I still have to make absolutely certain.”
“How did the others… break down, as you said? Did they die?” Orlaag asked with stifled concern.
“Not all of them. Most merely lost their minds, or developed illnesses that could not be treated -common sicknesses of the nerves that would not respond to common methods of care, nor to uncommon ones for that matter,” Salacia explained aloofly.
Though Orlaag was less concerned with worldly life than most, he was still very much a mortal human being with survival instincts, and these words struck anxiety into his heart. “I see,” he said softly, nodding to Salacia. “I will allow you to watch me for the night.”
Salacia nodded in response as Orlaag opened the door to allow him in. Salacia had to duck his head walking in, and had to maneuver himself somewhat awkwardly around the tiny monastic cell. Eventually he sat down on the floor across from the small bed in the corner. Orlaag automatically walked straight to his bed and lay down. He thought to himself somewhat wryly about how under ordinary circumstances, he would be trying to make his guest as comfortable as possible, but these were by no means ordinary circumstances, and this guest (if one could even call Salacia that) was the furthest possible thing from ordinary. As he covered himself up, he saw Salacia raise his hand from the corner of his eye, and heard him mutter something under his breath. He felt a different sort of exhaustion take him - a warmer, headier, more pleasant somnolence. He felt guilty for receiving it, but he could by no means resist it; he allowed it to comfort his nerves and to claim his wakefulness, which had brought him little but terror that day.
His dreams that night were of nothing but a hazy, silent, kunzite-colored abyss. Moving through it revealed nothing else; no one else. This went on for hours. When he awoke, he found he was still in the same place. This time, there was another form there - Salacia. Who else would it have been? He approached him immediately. “Salacia… What is going on? You said you would not engage my mind again until you were sure-”
“And I kept my word. You are now awake, you are clearly well, and I have not touched your mind again until this very moment.”
Orlaag suppressed the confused exasperation he felt. “Where are we?”
“This is the space within your mind that has been opened as a result of your encountering me. This is where we will communicate from now on, during times when we are physically absent from one another,” Salacia explained.
“Then where are you now? You were sitting across from me when I fell asleep. Nothing is making any sense,” Orlaag blurted out. Salacia laughed dryly in response, his expression remaining as cold as ever. “You have chosen the life of a mystic. Contradictions should be commonplace to you by now. What you really mean when you say that nothing is making any sense is that you are still afraid - that you still have not fully accepted your fate as my accomplice,” Salacia remarked sharply.
“Of course I still haven’t fully accepted that. You can’t expect me to simply wake up and embrace this role I’ve apparently thrust myself into just because you showed me your psychic projections of… what exactly was it you showed me last night?” Orlaag responded in a tone that revealed more negative emotions than he would have liked.
“I believe you know as well as I do that I showed you a mixture of my knowledge of the future, and your own unconscious urges. Now, come closer,” Salacia commanded. Orlaag walked over to Salacia as he had asked, and looked up at him inquisitively. “Take my hands, and close your eyes,” Salacia instructed. Orlaag complied, his mind heavy with dread and resignation.
“Relax. I will show you just how much sense everything makes,” Salacia rasped as Orlaag felt the very flow of time coagulating into a thick, intoxicating sludge.