(no subject)
Who: Tia Harribel, open.
When: Early evening; day 33
Where: The beach, 'mongst the lobstrosities
What: Falling out of the sky hurts.
Rating: TBD
She remembered pain. Not the edged pain of the blade slashing into her, nor even the wear of dogged fighting. The pain was emotional, the crumpling of her ideals as she watched her Fraccion die, unable to save them. Of the words Aizen-sama spoke before he cut her down. To think that all of you would fail me so miserably.
The pain was something she hadn’t felt in a very long time.
But the wind whipping past her as she fell through the sky stripped the immediacy of that pain from her, ripped out the heart of it and cast it off into the hollow darkness like everything else in Hueco Mundo. After all, what was she but a sacrifice? A noble sacrifice to a misguided cause. Just a waste of Aizen-sama’s effort.
Her fingers twitched. She couldn’t see the ground she plummeted toward -- presumably, no pit being bottomless. She could recall how high up she’d been, or when she’d black out. She had. She was sure of it. She hadn’t hit, but that was all she knew. Not how long she had left, or what building she would land in. Harribel needed to move, and she knew it, needed to swing her legs down and brace for impact But her body wouldn’t listen.
Would she fade before she hit? The detached consideration rattled in her head, loose and without answer. Should she have faded already? Surely by --
It wasn’t concrete that she slammed into, but if you fall from high enough, water is just as hard a landing. The violent splash of water it sent up barely registered. It was the brief spray on her face, the liquid chill flooding in against her skin that first broke through the overloading smack of impact. Hierro had saved her life, but it could not hold her awareness in tact, the world flickering and winking out as she sank into the surf.
It came back in similar fits, though they slurred together more, and damp as she was, sand sticking to her skin and kelp tangled in her hair, it wasn’t awareness that she wanted right now. Her body ached in a way she wasn’t familiar with, an overriding throb that seemed the only heat in the cold expanse of sand she lay on, that clung to her. Her fingers twitched out again, but she couldn’t feel or see their movement. Sand scraped against her hollow mask as her head shifted against the sand.
The tide still lapped against her legs, but it took long minutes for her to feel it. An hour for her to brace hands under her and push up enough to move her head, an eon to raise her head, to look out with bleary green eyes at the outcropping of human homes before her.
"Dad-a-chack?" The strange, clicking voice asked, and Harribel let her forehead fall to the sand again. Either not caring, or unable to move enough to look at the creature that made that sound. Many segmented legs scuttled across the sand, but she cared nothing for the inquisitive clicking, the brush of a claw.
When: Early evening; day 33
Where: The beach, 'mongst the lobstrosities
What: Falling out of the sky hurts.
Rating: TBD
She remembered pain. Not the edged pain of the blade slashing into her, nor even the wear of dogged fighting. The pain was emotional, the crumpling of her ideals as she watched her Fraccion die, unable to save them. Of the words Aizen-sama spoke before he cut her down. To think that all of you would fail me so miserably.
The pain was something she hadn’t felt in a very long time.
But the wind whipping past her as she fell through the sky stripped the immediacy of that pain from her, ripped out the heart of it and cast it off into the hollow darkness like everything else in Hueco Mundo. After all, what was she but a sacrifice? A noble sacrifice to a misguided cause. Just a waste of Aizen-sama’s effort.
Her fingers twitched. She couldn’t see the ground she plummeted toward -- presumably, no pit being bottomless. She could recall how high up she’d been, or when she’d black out. She had. She was sure of it. She hadn’t hit, but that was all she knew. Not how long she had left, or what building she would land in. Harribel needed to move, and she knew it, needed to swing her legs down and brace for impact But her body wouldn’t listen.
Would she fade before she hit? The detached consideration rattled in her head, loose and without answer. Should she have faded already? Surely by --
It wasn’t concrete that she slammed into, but if you fall from high enough, water is just as hard a landing. The violent splash of water it sent up barely registered. It was the brief spray on her face, the liquid chill flooding in against her skin that first broke through the overloading smack of impact. Hierro had saved her life, but it could not hold her awareness in tact, the world flickering and winking out as she sank into the surf.
It came back in similar fits, though they slurred together more, and damp as she was, sand sticking to her skin and kelp tangled in her hair, it wasn’t awareness that she wanted right now. Her body ached in a way she wasn’t familiar with, an overriding throb that seemed the only heat in the cold expanse of sand she lay on, that clung to her. Her fingers twitched out again, but she couldn’t feel or see their movement. Sand scraped against her hollow mask as her head shifted against the sand.
The tide still lapped against her legs, but it took long minutes for her to feel it. An hour for her to brace hands under her and push up enough to move her head, an eon to raise her head, to look out with bleary green eyes at the outcropping of human homes before her.
"Dad-a-chack?" The strange, clicking voice asked, and Harribel let her forehead fall to the sand again. Either not caring, or unable to move enough to look at the creature that made that sound. Many segmented legs scuttled across the sand, but she cared nothing for the inquisitive clicking, the brush of a claw.