[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

[deploy]

I never said you looked dumb.

[John just assumes most people under 20 are dumb based on age alone, because he sure as hell was. That said, there are always kids like Chyler who grew up too soon too fast.

He doesn't think she would hang around with Marco, which he's definitely noticed she has, if he were just your typical tween idiot with hormones for brains.

John checks his watch. Chyler has the same one, a black g-shock. John gave it to her.]

She's taking the stats of our last mission to wall R&D, and I told her to grab us some lunch on the way back, so she'll probably be a half hour, or so.

Is she expecting you?

[brightline]

[Marco's brows raise at that, and then he laughs.]

That's a new one. Most authority figures usually think I do. And, you know, maybe I play to it a little. Always better if they underestimate you, right?

[A little smirk that fades a little while he watches John check his watch, notices it's the same as Chyler's and files that away, tilts his head as he watches John's face. There's something a little sharp about his eyes as John looks back up at him, and it remains even as he smiles in an easygoing way, shrugging narrow shoulders.]

Nah. I was just gonna come by, ask her if she wanted to grab lunch together.

[deploy]

Yeah. That's one way to look at it.

[John's been making that same play his entire career. Easy enough to do when you're both the problem child and the runt. No one expected him to get as far as he has. He's always been something of a darkhorse. Something tells him Marco is, too. Maybe that's why Chyler likes him. She's a darkhorse too.]

Lunch, huh? Well, she's already grabbing it, but if you want I could give her a call and tell her to pick up burgers for three. I've got to jet to a meeting pretty much as soon as I eat.

[A slight exaggeration, but, it could be good for Chyler to spend lunch with someone closer to her age. Or anyone that isn't him.]

I'll leave it up to her whether she wants to boot you or not.