[open] there's a million, billion, trillion stars

[brightline]

who: marco & YOU
what: catch-all post; some open starters (Perimeter Guard training ground; dreamshare)
when: late Jan and Feb
where: all around the Quarantine
warnings: gore/violence in threads from the nightmare prompt; possible descriptions of morphing (body horror) in any thread - let me know in a subject line if you don't want me to go into gory detail about the not-so-magical-girl transformation sequence



i. the guard

[Thanks to his two week boot camp experience, which was probably one of the worst things he's ever endured, including some of the more nasty battles during the war, Marco's learned one very important lesson - it's totally worth it to have some hand-to-hand training. Chyler had said it herself, technique is important no matter what shape he's in. Besides, he'd spent most of boot camp getting his butt handed to him by an ever-changing round of cadets because he wasn't allowed to morph in training.

So here he is, at the Perimeter Guard training ground, totally rocking a pair of purple camo BDU pants and a T-shirt, with absolutely zero idea where to start.]

Man, this is way harder than it looks in the martial arts movies.

ii. dream a little dream

[Marco's never been one to say no to a trend, so of course he'd checked out the crystal caves. Once he'd taken a stroll through, he'd been really glad he had, too, because the whole thing had been super cool. That had been a few days ago, and after hanging up a nice little collage of some of the photos he'd taken over the mantle in one of the sitting rooms, he'd pretty much been over it.

And then the dreams begin. There's a lot of them. A lot of them are things he'd experienced as a human at home, pleasant things that twist all together - being on TV in front of all the cameras and a live audience, grinning and feeling like the center of attention; hanging out in his pool drinking a Diet Coke with the sun shining down on his face and body, feeling like he hasn't got a care in the world; the sensation of absolute relief when it had really, really sunk in that the war was over, that he didn't have to fight anymore.

Other ones are less distinctly human in nature - soaring through a blue sky, lifting off on osprey wings in the warm updraft of a good thermal, with vision so good he could see a mouse squeaking through the grass hundreds of feet below; being a dolphin leaping joyfully through the waves, with miles and miles of ocean all around, full of joy and freedom; the strength and confidence that come with being a gorilla, massive and proud and able to bench-press a small bus.

Care to join him?]

iii. the nightmare after war (violence/gore)

[Some of the dreams aren't quite so pleasant. While most of what his mind comes up with, for a blessed few nights, is good, relaxing, even fun, he's not really destined to only have good dreams. In fact, having good dreams is nowhere near as common as the bad ones.

When Marco has bad dreams, they're terrible. All violence and gore and fear and pain, his nightmares are full of the screams of animals in his ears and his friends in his head - teenagers who hadn't deserved being thrown into a war they weren't prepared to fight. The bad ones are like a camera roll of all the worst times he's almost died in morph, the feeling of his own guts in his hands, of having his face torn off, being bitten almost in half by a shark; of watching his friends get hurt, a wolf dragging her hind legs, paralyzed, a bear beating an alien with her own severed arm, a tiger leaving bloody footprints in the snow as its feet freeze to the ground over and over with every step.

The worse dreams are all about the terrible choices he's had to make. The times he'd had to fool the Yeerk controlling his own mother and lead her to what he'd been sure was her death, having to choose to save his father at the expense of his closest friends and allies. Every bad dream leaves him waking up in a panic, gasping and sweating and crying out. Some things...well, he wouldn't choose to share, but he doesn't always have a choice.]

Comments

the hork-bajir chronicles (chyler)

[brightline]

the hork-bajir chronicles

[That bad feeling is still lingering in his gut, as he heads out to see Chyler and show her his Hork-Bajir morph, a weird feeling like something is seriously wrong with the situation.

The truth is, Chyler had never gone easy on him. She's always given as good as she took, put him in his place, not bought into his self-spun hype. It's one of the things he likes about her, actually. But this time? He'd offered to show off to her, and she'd just agreed. Not only that, she'd said 'yes please,' which was honestly pretty uncharacteristically polite of her. Usually she's busting his chops, and the fact that she suddenly wasn't is a little weird.

But he can't resist. She asked him to come and show her, so he's gonna do it. Poking his head into the common area of the Perimeter Guard barracks where she said she'd meet him, he raises his brows.]

Hey, Chyler, you around?

[childofaxios]

[ If Chyler were the type to pace, she'd be doing it. As it is she's standing near one of the common area's windows, one that faces out toward the training yard. She's picturing Corbulo's grounds, the way she so often does in quiet moments, in moments when no one else is around. And always, always, in those moments, the grounds are cratered, smoking, and littered with the dead.

She hears Marco's footsteps a moment before he speaks, which gives her enough time to turn and to make sure her expression is under control. ]

I'm here.

[brightline]

[When Chyler turns around and her expression isn't expectant or pleased or basically...well, anything, that feeling of trepidation gets a little more serious. For a moment, he just stands there looking at her, fidgeting a little bit, and then he shrugs.]

Wow, this is awkward.

[A pause.]

So uh, how do you wanna do this thing?

[childofaxios]

Only if you make it so.

[ There's her usual crispness, the lift of her chin and the raise of an eyebrow. She's fine, this is fine, she can do this.

She doesn't want him to back out. ]

How much room do you need?

[brightline]

[Marco rolls his eyes a little.]

Look, you're kind of staring at me with this weird blank expression, so that's totally the awkward part. You sure you're up for this? It can get pretty nasty.

[Still, he undoes the front of his jeans and slides them down his legs, mouth pursed. There's a pair of black leggings underneath, and he kicks his way out of his socks and shoes as he stands up, shrugs off his T-shirt and hoodie, leaving him in a spandex top.]

Don't you dare laugh. It's either this or I'm naked.

[Not that her laughing wouldn't take about five awkward levels off the situation.]

[childofaxios]

[ Chyler rolls her eyes, standing back. ]

I've seen Ivar do it. [ Which isn't an indicator that she's prepared this time, but it's as close as he's going to get.

Deep breath. Exhale. Chyler braces her hands on her hips, something bordering on amusement in her face. ]

Looks like a cryo suit. And I've seen boys naked before, Marco, it wouldn't be revolutionary.

[ CROSSED ARMS. It's easier if she just treats him like she always does. It's easier if she doesn't think about what comes next. ] Go on.

[brightline]

Man, that guy's totally stealing all my thunder with you.

[Marco's brows raise, and he offers her a slightly crooked smile. It's still awkward, but it's less so when she's starting to go back to her usual dismissive Chyler self. It feels a little more natural than that weird polite blankness she had going on before.]

You might have seen boys naked before, but those boys weren't me. Wouldn't want to blow your mind or anything.

[Licking his lips, Marco exhales heavily and closes his eyes for a moment, focusing on the form of the Hork-Bajir in his mind. For a long moment, he's still, and then, with a sickening crunch and a sort of gooshing sound, his neck sprouts upward at an alarming pace, until his normal head is on top of a long, serpentine neck.]

Gross.

[A moment later, the rest of him starts catching up, his shoulders broadening, his spine elongating, a tail sprouting from the base of it, long and serpentine while his shoulders hunch forward and his hips widen. There's a grinding sound as his knees reverse direction, and he crumples forward, catching himself on hands that are swelling and enlarging, the knuckles popping as they become pronounced and thick. His torso broadens, muscles rippling up and over his shoulders and chest and belly, his thighs, even as his skin becomes more leathery, thick and slightly scaled and green.

And then the blades start to appear. Razor-sharp, they emerge at every joint, bursting from his forearms, his wrists, his elbows. The nails on his fingers and toes thicken and harden into claws, sharp and menacing, and his nose and mouth meld together like playdough, then harden into a beak as three forward-swept blades erupt from the top of his head. In the end, he's a seven-foot monstrosity that looks like it's somewhere between a snake, lizard, and T-Rex.]

<See what I mean?>

[childofaxios]

[ SURPRISE, IT'S STILL GROSS.

Chyler watches the entire process with her eyes squinted half-way shut, trying not to imagine how it must feel to be at the center of those crunching bones and that shifting skin. She can handle the neck, the tail. That's fine. Then he starts getting bigger. His skin starts to get scaly.

She takes a step back. She can feel her heartbeat jackrabbiting upward, that adrenaline rush that she never gets in the practice field. The feeling she associates with bombs going off a block away, with ducking and running as gunfire starts to come from everywhere. (The feeling she associates with that final, fatal shot.)

It's the spines that do it. The spines and the size of him, a mountain of monster in the familiar surroundings of the rec room. She can't shake the panic that roars in all at once. The sense that she has to warn someone, she has to protect someone, she has to fight, she has to run. This thing shouldn't be here--

--this thing is Marco--

--this thing is going to kill her--

--stop it, don't panic, don't--

She doesn't know she's backing up until she hits the wall. She doesn't know she's going to throw up until she does it, upper body lurching as she pukes all over the ground at her feet. ]

[brightline]

[The Hork-Bajir's eyes aren't great, but he can see it, the moment she gets that look. Marco's seen it a thousand times, on the faces of his friends, on his own face in the mirror - the moment something comes up that reminds a person of something terrible they experienced, something that left an impression. Something that really dug into the mind so deeply, sunk its ugly claws in so sharply that it overrides everything logical and rational and throws a person into immediate jaw-clenching, eye-popping, pants-peeing terror.

He can see the way she stumbles back from him like he's a monster (he doesn't blame her, he is, and not just right now) and hunches over, she throws up between her feet, and shakes, jerky and violent while she empties her guts onto the floor.

Marco is pretty sure he's never reversed a morph so fast in his life, but it still takes a half-minute to get back to himself. When he jogs over to her, leans in a bit but doesn't touch her just yet, he's gasping for air, sweating slightly like he's run a marathon.]

Hey, hey, Chyler. Come on, snap out of it. It's just me, that was just me, and I'm not gonna hurt you.

[childofaxios]

[ She's shaking. It's a distant realization, a strange thought, one that comes floating from the same distant place that Marco's voice does. What's in her eyes is a glowing shield, the shriek of alien voices, whistling projectiles. Chyler presses her hands to her ears and slides down the wall, hunkering down against her knees.

Tears. Tears and vomit--second time. She shifts her grip from her head to wrap her arms around herself.

I'm not gonna hurt you, says Marco's voice through the fog. ] You don't have to.

[ She barely hears the words that come out of her own mouth, certainly doesn't think about them before she says them. Then she's looking up at his face, the present trickling in like a box full of needles being emptied over her mind. Where she is. Who she's with. Voices outside, training exercises--

She closes her eyes tight and reaches out to grip Marco's arm, to give herself something to hang on to outside of those voices that could as easily be from the training grounds at Corbulo. She's sliding into that place, sliding into that pocket of the past again, and she'll do anything to keep herself out of it. ]

[brightline]

[She's right. He realizes it all in a rush - he doesn't have to hurt her because he already has, just by turning into a Hork-Bajir, and he can't help but feel a flash of anger at the fact she didn't even give him a warning. Didn't let him know and make the choice whether to do it or not with all the information available to him. Marco hates not having all the details, making choices based on incomplete knowledge. Now's not the time to be angry though, because he knows.

The smell of vomit doesn't bother him. Neither do the tears. Marco's not a touchy-feely guy, he never has been, but he knows this, knows that particular combination of puking and tears and blurting words without thinking them. When she reaches out to squeeze at his arm, he takes it as permission, moves forward, crouched down in front of her, and reaches out to close his hand against her upper arm, squeezing gently, letting her keep hold and ground herself with it.]

I know. And hey, wherever you're going, try to let it go and come back, okay? It's not real anymore.

[childofaxios]

[ Not real. What is he talking about, not real? It's realer than this place, sometimes. Realer than living. Realer than almost anything but her duties with the Guard. Realer than the risks she takes jogging alone late at night, realer than the rush of leaning over the rail at the top of the community housing building.

It's the only thing that's real, some days. ]

I'm here. I'm fine.

[ Her voice sounds wooden to her own ears. But she can hear him, she can listen, and that's an improvement. ]

[brightline]

[When she says she's here and fine, Marco doesn't buy it, but he doesn't call her out on it right away either. Lifting a hand, he squeezes at her shoulder, awkwardly places his palm against the side of her neck and rubs a thumb against her face - just a quick, clumsy attempt to calm her down.

He's still a little angry that she sprung this on him without warning, but Marco's always been really good at compartmentalizing things like that. At focusing on the moment. So for now, he makes a soft scoffing noise in his throat.]

You sure sound fine.

[It's laced with sarcasm - gentler, not weaponized, but not exactly humorous either.]

Just keep breathing. In and out. When you calm down, maybe you can fill me in on what just happened.

[childofaxios]

[ It takes a little while. It's the smell that does it, eventually. Bile and sour food. Chyler forces herself to her feet, moving away from the mess with the silent acknowledgment that she'll have to clean it up sooner or later. Preferably before it perfumes the whole common room, though it might already be too late for that.

She's trying to find herself, trying to find her strength and calm now that she's at least in the present again. It's hard to keep her voice neutral, and she's not looking at Marco when she says: ]

I need to clean this up. What do you want to know?

[brightline]

I'll help. It's half my fault too.

[Marco shrugs narrow shoulders and shifts back a bit as she finally moves. It took her a while, and he doesn't blame her. It's pretty obvious what level of trauma she's working with, and you don't exactly shrug that kind of thing off in a few seconds. So he lets her take her time, he shuffles back as she starts moving, doesn't look at him while she asks what he wants to know.]

Oh, I don't know, maybe whether or not you knew in advance that me turning into a big bladed monster would make you flip out.

[childofaxios]

[ Her first instinct is to snap back I didn't flip out. But she's still too shocky to even believe herself. Instead she gets paper towels, cleaning supplies, and one pair of rubber gloves out from underneath the sink along one wall of the rec room. ]

I'll do it.

[ She doesn't want him touching her vomit. It's embarrassing in its own way, worse than her just puking. Having him help her clean it up would be truly humiliating.

Chyler pulls on the gloves. She looks at the mess, then finally, finally looks at him. ]

I didn't know. I wasn't--I didn't know that would happen.

[brightline]

[When she says she'll do it, Marco backs off. He knows that look on her face even if she's not looking at him - he recognizes pride, the refusal to be pitied. It's why he said she flipped out instead of something softer and more coddling. It's not in his nature, sure, but it's also something he'd hate if the tables were turned, and there's something about Chyler that he recognizes. The hardness, though hers is right on the surface instead of couched under a sense of humour.

Marco tries not to think about how nice it would be to see her smile. Now's not the time.]

I get it. [His voice is light, cool.] You can never tell exactly what's gonna happen when you run into something traumatic. But you know it's traumatic.

[childofaxios]

[ It's one part defensive, one part stubborn. She keeps her eyes on the mess and on cleaning it up. ]

I didn't know. I had no way to be sure--

[ She slows, then stops, paper towels soaked with bile wadded in one hand. ]

I had to know if what you fought was what we were fighting, too.

[brightline]

[Funnily, that's what calms down the anger more than anything else. The thing that makes Marco's face soften. Sighing, he rubs a hand over his face, scrubs at his eyes.]

Was it?

[He knows it's not. Or at least he's pretty sure it's not, because just like everyone he's hung around with more than once or twice, Marco's scoped her out, kept an eye on her for a few days. It's habit, more than anything, because as far as he can tell, there's no Yeerk pool here, and besides that, there's no way she'd be a good enough actress to watch him or Ivar morph and fake her reaction but be unable to keep herself from puking when she sees a Hork-Bajir.

But still. He wants to hear it from her.]

[childofaxios]

[ She shudders. ]

No. Wrong neck. Ours didn't have tails either.

[ Ours, she thinks, bitter with irony. Chyler finishes wiping up the worst of the vomit and stands to throw the towels away and retrieve the cleaner. ]

I don't know what they were called. They....

[ She swallows and kneels again, telling herself it's the smell of puke making her light-headed. ] They came from nowhere.

[brightline]

[Marco nods while she explains, even while she's shuddering a bit at the description. She's a tough girl.]

I figured they were different.

[A little shrug, and he watches, dark eyes on her hands as she gets the cleaner and tosses the towels, because it's easier than looking at her face, and Marco's not above being a bit of a coward sometimes.

When she crouches down beside the last of the mess again, Marco shifts a bit to give her more room to spray, licks his lips and nods, eyes flicking back up to her face again, finally.]

These guys...they were the Yeerk shock troops. Back on their own planet they were peaceful herbivores who ate tree bark, kinda dumb and sweet. But you get a slug in their brains bent on world domination and...

[He shakes his head a bit, his expression distant, mouth set in a straight line. Sometimes he can't help but feel guilty for all the Hork-Bajir he'd killed, even if he doesn't regret it.]

Where were you? Before you came here?

[childofaxios]

[ She sees the set, faraway look on Marco's face. She's seen it in the mirror, the times she catches herself staring into somewhere and some time that feels years ago and like yesterday at once.

She finishes cleaning up the mess and strips the gloves off, dropping them into the sink to be cleaned themselves. ]

Circinius IV. Corbulo Academy of Military Science. We were training to fight Insurrectionists, not... Whatever the things that attacked us were.

[brightline]

[While Chyler finishes cleaning up, Marco picks up his discarded jeans and sweatshirt and slides them back on over his spandex superhero knockoff outfit. Licking his lips, he glances over at her again as she explains where she was, then exhales a little huff.]

I'm really not surprised you were at a military academy. Explains why you're so tough.

[Once he's dressed, he flops back against the wall, arms crossed, eyes following her movements.]

I get that. I mean...obviously not the military thing, I didn't have any training, but all of a sudden fighting something you were not prepared for that's way bigger and stronger than you, with more resources? Totally pants-wetting terrifying.

[childofaxios]

[ She almost flinches, because she has wet herself, more than once since coming to Riverview. During nightmares, mercifully in the privacy of her own room where she can tend to it without anyone asking questions she doesn't want to answer.

It's a shame she never plans on sharing with anyone, anyone, ever.

Chyler sits down against the wall as well, sitting in the corner so she can face him instead of sitting next to him. ]

It happened to you?

[brightline]

[That's something Marco's been doing since he was 13. It happens, it's a human thing that people do when they're scared and dealing with more than they should be, especially when they're just kids.

Not that he would ever share that with anyone, ever, either.

Sliding down the wall, he settles in beside her, not close enough to touch, but close enough to provide a little non-verbal support. Looking straight ahead, he nods, mouth pursed.]

Yeah. [A pause, and then-] When I was 13, I was walking through an abandoned construction site with my best friend and his cousin and a couple of their friends. Then an alien spaceship landed, and we found out that Earth was being invaded by parasitic slugs that climb into people's ears and control them. So he gave us the morphing ability and then promptly got eaten by the enemy. Literally eaten.

[He's still avoiding eye contact.]

Five 13-year-old kids with the ability to turn into wild animals versus an intergalactic army that infiltrated all levels of human society.