#date: unspecified

He kicked the door open with bloodied hand held before his face. Fingers all splayed, bone visible in some, blood drenching others, it was clear to even the wandering eye that his hand was crushed, pulverized; but his expression belied a victory, and not a loss. Anyone else whose hand was so immobile, so grotesque in how it appeared to have suffered a great loss, surely would not have smiled as they kicked in the swinging door to the bar, striding inside as if decorated with a mantle of clear victories. And perhaps this was a clear victory - there was no telling who had earned the privilege of making his hand like this. 

You should have seen the other guy. Mason smirked. There was a sick pleasure in parading his bloody victory, no matter how small ( though there is no such thing as a small victory, to a Horseman ) throughout the stomping ground of the plebeians who know better than to make him break bone upon bone in such a way. It wasn’t a chore - the act of physically putting down resistance, and keeping it down, was catharsis. And resistance came in even the smallest tics. His work was never done, it seemed. 

He slid into a chair at the bar, languid and drunk on the high of the fight, away from which he’d walked with an enviable break with which he could play. He’d been berated for using his powers in a place where food was consumed - and meant to be kept down - but it was late, and he was in no mood to cater to the more delicate sensibilities of those around him. And so he flattened his hand upon the bar, ignoring the squelch of blood against the clean surface, and set to work at straightening, lengthening, transforming his weapon-hand into something that showed not each bone in each finger. Sensibilities, after all - once the crackling, squelching, hissing of his power’s effect upon his hand had begun, he was never inclined to stop it. 

“Could sure use a drink over here -” he barked, eyes never leaving his hand as it moved under the duress of his Saintly ability. Without asking, Mason reached for the glass to his left, a clear liquid - vodka, he supposed - and tipped it upon his broken fingers, ignoring the protests of its drinker. It stung, but he did not flinch. 

He chuckled, one barking sound, “Not that one. Another one. For consumption. I’m a little too busy to specify.” 

@sofiabuchanan

He feels her before he sees her, as he always does. She is a flare of electricity within an ever-changing spine, a light shone upon an infected wound; he stands upon a precipice and feels the tug of machine-war behind his navel, pulling him down, down, down - until he stands before her, as he always does. 

They were born to find each other amidst chaos, to deploy from the flanks of their respective charges and come together like machinery fresh oiled. He had always enough pride for her, and for himself, to return here, to seek her out between the thrashing walls of the battlefield, for there was no better extension of his own hand, beyond that which riled within him, than his Sofia. His Sofia; his ginger-snap weapon, his lightning storm, she who he had been so proud to watch grow. They were born to be weapons, the both of them, and so they had been. They were. They are. He’d always known she needed no protecting, and so he had never offered it. And so he stands here now, keen gaze alighting upon a blur of crimson and spark, and he is reassured.

No protection necessary, he thinks, as he takes flight once more, bloodied boots digging into dirt as he begins across the battlefield once more, Only power. It is the elder brother’s duty to protect the youngest, but there has never been anything normal about the word ‘family’ here. And it has worked for the best. Look at how sharp they are now.

Mason reaches forth one hand, fingers the bow of a ship pushing through the undulating sea of the battle. Soldiers fall on all sides, but he stops not; the battle itself will be short-lived once he reaches her, once they stand spine to spine as they had been so trained to do. There was glory in a long-suffered fight, to be sure; there would be tales told of how they fought through two moons and two suns, and yet he wished to clean the mud from his palms and see victory. Mason had always been the least patient of the Buchanan blades; ever sharp, ever just a breath too quick. He’d not know himself without her life to match his decay, surely; the blade knows the metal from which it was crafted. The kinship sings through the sinew - 

- and as he comes upon Sofia on the battlefield, his bones are an orchestra.