#reaptsow

hand raises ,  palm pressed against the fresh stubble of his chin.  he’s been neglecting himself again ,  he’s drowning in jobs.   and he sighs ,   it’s almost absentminded ,  nonchalant.  he knows the consequences of his own actions.

hands are made a woven web, to support the weight of his head. curved prominence of his knuckles curled around the plastic and paint, pressed and imprinting six slits against the planes of his palm.

the flat of his back is still draped in his hoodie - pressed up against the plaster of the wall.. for the vessel's bed has been made into a home, in visible signs of deteriorating mental health. his belly concave and wavering in breath, growling humbly despite the minefield of hostess wrappers, and tin-foil strewn about. like a teenager, in the height of their angst. for hunger is an ache that he's unable to sate at the best of times, despite an inherent desire to feel that fullness only worship can provide. an altar when not a vessel, poured into with offerings. a man on his knees, that now he can barely recognize. sitting in obscurity, a breeze he assumes he never feels passing through his lengthening hair. hair vessel combs, sometimes. when he hears clatters in the bathroom, and goes in to see iii struggling. staring at something, a thousand miles away from him. and soon there are soothing hands on the bassist's waist - a steadying head between two shoulder blades. umoving, whilst still the figure seeks him out like a flare. the lank of him leaning, scapulae pressing in around his head. sweeping of the high tide onto shore.

it never fails to wrack his shoulders. stretches his saliva 'tween the pressed bow of his lips, that part and peel from white enamel in heaving anchors of breaths. now holding down he whom had kept vessel from drifting off to sea. but still he holds fast, and pulls himself up. does what he has to. gentle in making sure the other was taking care of himself while going through the motions, as he himself is continually neglected. already beginning to lose body definition. ( why waste your time caring for the automaton ? he is lost to you. i function for him ). a reverberation, rattling behind the fleshy orbs of his eyes and in the space between his skull and brain. because it makes me feel sane. he answers the disembodied voice. makes me feel closer to him.

he could feel the rage rattle pill bottles in the cabinet. the squeal of a kettle downstairs. the crack, crack, crack of the mirror which reflects a dead expression.

[ . . . ] ii is the only one who has a key to his room. had it just in case of an emergency. in case he needed to come in while vessel was pulled far away. entangled, and unable to pull himself out. in case... well. —

a part of vessel is glad that he'd given ii that key, while another, more tangible part suffuses with the ugly guilt of regret. not that the end result was entirely dependent upon that one detail, however.. nothing had gotten any easier since. iii was gone, and he wasn't coming back. and the cord he had pressed between ravenous teeth, passed from one canine jaw to the other, had still yet to be severed. useless in attempt to bring the other's final dream to reality. to bring him back from the dead, in sacrifice of himself. ( again, the question could be posed - how much of you is left? self acceptance achievable only in becoming someone entirely new ).

an open pad is laid out next to him. a weave of pen in breathing pictures, of the ocean - of a black hole. scrawling of lyrics, the beginnings of words brought to the surface. and it still makes my blood run thin / to remember what you are to him / and i'll live like i've got missing limbs for you. it's been weeks - time ticking by since he'd ultimately decided that he could not live like this any longer. and yet, here he was. so what was he to do? jabbing pen into windpipe and extracting emotion. for they'd written and begun recording a decent chunk of the album by now, which brings offerings of respite for short periods of time. and while he doesn't necessarily intend to write, such things seem to come naturally. an instinct he acts upon, with the nagging itch of sleep's influence. capitalize on your suffering. rawness breeds reflection. your mask their mirror.

he wets his lips, made into an uneven line as he tugs his palms down the odd slopes of his face. thick mucus rattling in the hollow of his chest, while he forces himself to face the imposing presence in the dimness of the space. delayed in shoving mouth in the crook of his elbow to cough. for the hallway cast in infinite blackness swallows up the shorter man's shadow. the intensely woven worry in his eyes staring down at the vessel accusingly.

he whom can almost smell the apprehension in the air. saturating past the stench of his sweat, that's seeped into the mussed bed sheets beneath him. he doesn't wanna face it. dangling limbs from his drawn up knees, and not even bothering to slam the book closed next to him. "what is there to talk about?" he asks, chin finally tilting upward, when wrists bring palms tipped with splayed fingers together. this isn't necessarily unlike him, though it is uncharacteristic at the same time. entrenched in emotion, and dying to expel it. but he's done enough to ii already. has piled enough on top of him.

feet flex with a wiggle of his toes - raising the tendons that so too lift in the side of his neck, when he cocks his head in invitation. taking the time to lean over so that he could usher some random crap off the side of his mattress, and cross his legs beneath one another. "unless there's something that you'd like to say..." mouth moves, monotonous in his staring at a random chip in the far wall. but it's a showing of vessel's support, if nothing else.

though he cannot help but to already anticipate the answer. for ii doesn't seem to like making things about himself - while that is all that vessel seems to do. he feels like shit. back to that gnawing guilt, again. for this wasn't just about iii, or even himself anymore. all three of them remaining had lost their best friend, and — succumbing to the depths of his despair had undoubtedly wrought emotional consequences for the remainder. head turns in the other's direction. lips remaining open, as he flicks his eyes behind mesh. really forcing himself a study of the other's face. and with another swipe of tongue over lips, he shakes his head. "but i can't go back and change it, now. any of it." namely, what he'd done. "i can't bring him back."

oft there is something nurturing attributed to this way in which he serves - call it primal . . . lingering notes of subservience in years since his summoning. long living under expectation to do little but fulfill the needs ones master commingling with the fervid affection harboured for he whom he covets, so. a tidal wave barely staved ( purposely, in this case ) by the way in which claws stroke through raven coils, softening beneath persistent smoothing.

near friction-less pads of his thumbs, free from the callous burdening the remainder of his digits, stroke along the osseous contours of a bared face. his own lightened by the sly upturn of his mouth, in conjunction with the way in which he slithers along the length of the other's form. interrupted only by mutterings of appreciation. a painstaking trail laid from the apex of a thigh, to the angle of his jaw in veneration. typically this way in their slower moments. their passion fuelling in a different capacity. and naught but a bump of the lengthy bridge of his nose against the other's is eventually made a poorly devised distraction for the anticipatory dig of colliding hipbones. drawn forth, in intent to bask in each individual sensation of once again becoming whole . . .

never ( at least up to this juncture ) does he rush. passion having long evoked new meaning to the creature. for he is not one to deal in the bestial swinging of hips - instead opting for a more torturous, skillful pace. no doubt contrasted by the soft hisses, and inward snarls that cut into thunderous purrs. for he cannot escape the essence of his being. and yet, that is not to say that demands do not require the way in which finned back comes to arch, or that no mind is paid to the way in which he deepens his reach. so too strengthening the way he moves. for everything is done gradually. intentional. their collisions more pronounced, in order to accommodate the angle of his hips. tail angling the other's lower limbs, when needed. and eventually, velocity does gradually increase. attentive to the way in which both of their responses change. the meeting of accelerating heart rates, drinking in the sounds which he plucks like notes from the thick strings of his instrument.

his own almond-shaped pupils are scarily dilated, as by this point he has long since littered the other's collar and chest with physical reflections of his love. pricks of perilous teeth scraping, creating beading rivulets, he laps at soothingly. almost apologetic. his webbed hands ever touching, grounding.

framework of sturdy driving never wavers his eye contact, either. broken only by any needed respite taken in fluttering eyes of either, or by reflex of turning heads. however, rain cannot help but to shiver under the hands traversing the musculature of his straining back. heating cool surface, even under such exertion. even so aflame as he is, encompassed. as satiated as can be attained, while so cruelly forced to live as two separate beings. the experimentation aided by attentiveness ultimately factoring into how he operates. yet still, he is surprised by the firmness of the way in which perpetua grips the nape of his neck and urges him closer. ribs knocking with the force employed by the other's desperation to sink teeth into the dip of his shoulder, just below the soft dance of fleshy gills above. those which caress the bloom of a pale cheek, as high pitch whine coos past trills from the ghoul's throat. pausing ripened apple in the centre, and stuttering ceaseless rhythm. rain's grip shifting to cradle the back of v's skull.

"now i know you do not mean to stifle yourself, darling . . ." he warns. lashes fluttering, and gyrations tactfully slowing, yes - but with an intentionally greater curl to the abdomen. pressing their faces together, before he flicks a forked tongue over an ear. growling softly when met with the brackish taste of perspiration. "though i will never be the one to deny you your pound of flesh."

@reaptsow wrote: all you gotta do is call me. / iii for iv !

"I do! All the bloody time, but you never answer," Perhaps his choices when to call out for him or call him on the phone might not always be the best ones, and 99.9% of the time, he does answer. But one unanswered call or two is always enough to make him spiral, just a little bit, and even though he knows how bloody stupid it is, he can't help it, can't make it stop, and it only makes him fret more that he's unloved for being unreasonable and annoying.

Curse his overly sensitive mind and need to rely on everyone for validation. Take one step too far away from him, and he'll be crying himself to sleep at night for them distancing themself from him.

@reaptsow mused: ❛ take my hand, you strange little creature. ❜ / beta

𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐊𝐍𝐈𝐆𝐇𝐓 𝐀𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐎𝐓𝐇. (accepting)

The far more petite water ghoul just squints at Beta and makes a face, ear fins flaring in annoyance. Still, he takes their hand, huffing and nostrils flaring.

@reaptsow mused: ❛  it's  a  fucking  drag ,  ❜ / from iii

LAY IN THE ATMOSPHERE , (accepting)

Dew rocks back on his heels, nose wrinkled, visible even underneath his balaclava. Unusual for them, since the Ghouls always wear their masks out and about, but none of them are around to tattle on him to Papa.

"I'd say it could be fuckin' worse, but yanno, I'm sure being undead is pretty comparable to being unmade, so I'll let ya have it."

He leans forward, squinting.