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roadkill-frankenstein · 3 months

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Candle in a Catacomb

A collaborative story with an art piece to match. The artwork was done by myself, and the writing was done by my good friend @raelhbishop. Featuring our D&D characters from my home-written campaign.

Grim Blackburn belongs to @vultureteeth-0.

Theoxenia Trismegistus belongs to @raelhbishop.

Content warnings: Talk of sex and sexuality, Violent implications and imagery, Character with PTSD

⎈

The heavens are a dark shade of indigo, not their usual dark blue or even void-like appearance.

Nights like these tend to harbor a mystical quality. Past, present, and future seem to happen all at once. Nights like these burn themselves into one's memories.

If one's lucky, they're shared with someone else.

The Scourge of the Serpent clips across a sea of black, the moon and stars acting as its only guide. The crew and adventurers onboard are either fast asleep or in a drunken stupor below deck.

Captain Grim Blackburn stands alone at the helm, steering the ship and checking its course. Previously engrossed in his work, the golden-armed pirate stops and pivots his head.

He doesn't hear the crashing waves of the ocean on his ship, for that's second nature to him. Nor does he notice the sound of breezes gliding around like ghosts, the crackle of lantern lights, or the ship's groaning and creaking.

No, his undead ears detect the tunes of a pan flute being blown.

It's that damn satyr from the group he picked up earlier. He seemed a chipper enough fellow when he met him in the bar - they even exchanged a salutary high-five.

Given his... phenotype, he thought the fellow would've been a bit more like him – lecherous, loud, libertine. Though perhaps for different reasons.

Instead, he's been... different...

Grim checks everything one final time, then descends from the helm and summons a dogsbody to take over. He takes a mug with him and heads to the bow.

⎈

A bird sits next to Theo. A nearby lantern gives a natural warmth to their appearance.

Theo whistles and blows a few notes on his pan flute, selectively. A response comes from the bird in similar tones. They've been back-and-forth chirping and fluting for a bit now, rather happily.

A slow series of creaks emerges from further inside the ship. Theo's goat-like ears perk up a little; he continues fluting.

The creaks grow closer and closer. Feeling unnerved, the bird flies away, despite Theo's calls to the contrary.

He turns. "Oh hey Grim! What's up?"

"Just coming over to see what all the raucous was about."

"Just chilling." He resumes blowing at the pan flute, this time in a more musical manner.

Grim sips from his mug and steps closer. "Were you... playing for that bird?"

"Oh, no. I was speaking with it."

"Speaking?"

"Yeah. My accent is, like, kind of thick, so the flute helps."

"The bird can understand you?"

"Yup. Little dude's been flying for a few days now. I gave them some hardtack to help them along. They've had a most strenuous adventure." He resumes fluting. Some crumbled hardtack still remains to Theo's right.

Grim sips from his mug and listens to his playing.

"...can I sit here?"

Theo nods.

He sits and continues listening, watching him play. Theo seems to be in his element here, playing an old folk song Grim can vaguely recognize.

Grim's not sure why he felt the need to sit and watch him. But something's drawn him in.

It's calming, in a way.

Theo switches to another folk song, one Grim better recognizes; something about a bloodied horse returning without its rider. It seems like he misses a few notes at first, but then turns it into another song entirely, improvising.

After a bit, Theo takes a rest. "You ever play music, Grim?"

"I haven't in a while."

"Do you like music?"

"I..." Grim hesitates. (He hears screams and shrieks from within, scenes flashing before his eyes.) "...it's kind of painful for me, tell you the truth."

"Oh." He puts his pan flute to his right. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean to hurt you."

"No, I didn't mind it. Actually. I liked hearing you play it."

Theo smiles. "Thank you. I really like music. It's the only thing I'm good at. Maybe we can try something less painful. Do you like stories?"

Grim shrugs. "Sure."

"Great! I love stories. Let's see... did you hear about the one with the sailor who found a lamp with jeans in it? No, wait, I don't think it was jeans in the lamp... was it sesame seeds? But, then, why would they, like, put sesame seeds in a lamp? No, hold on... I know this other one, where there's a king, who's a most righteous dude, and there's this monkey, and, like, the king is a god... no, wait, is the monkey a god? Well, there's this guy that steals the king's wife, and... I think there's a monk somewhere? Or is it a dragon?"

After stumbling on his words, Theo stops speaking. He sticks his tongue out sillily.

Grim chuckles a little. For once, it doesn't feel forced.

"Maybe I should just stick to singing... hey, do you know any stories?"

Grim thinks for a moment. "Did you ever wonder how this ship got its name?"

Theo nods. He gets the feeling this is gonna be a good one.

A story of how, one stormy day on the seas, the very ship they're on took its maiden voyage. A half-rate crew of misfits, concealed criminals, and a single swaddled infant took to the high seas, Grim being the most sea-fared. He recounts how they ventured further into the dark-on-dark seas as day turned into night, how lighting singed the wooded sides of the ship, how many below feared they wouldn't make it out alive.

As the story goes on, Grim seems more animated than before; he speaks with immense gusto, the events pouring freely from him like the grog sloshing from his glass as its tossed about with his motions. Theo's engrossed in the story, as if he's witnessing it firsthand; he even jumps a little at the sound of non-existent lightning.

He goes on to tell how the unnamed boat's hull was rammed by an unseen foe – a serpent, larger than the very ship itself, dare one say even larger than the port they left behind. It smashed through the sides of the ship with its infernal scales, ripped holes in the hull with its adamantine teeth, and curdled the blood of his crew with its growls.

Grim hatched a plan. He told all his crew to assemble below deck, stand-by for repairs, and keep the (he almost says 'his') child safe. With everyone gone, Grim, equipped with a glaive and a rope, leapt from the bowspirit, and hurdled towards the leviathan's-

"Did it take your arm?" Theo's on the edge of the ship's railing, filled with suspense; any more, and he might fall off the damn thing entirely.

"No, that was... something else entirely." Grim can hear a single shriek, feel a singe, feel the sensation of flesh decaying into nothingness.

Theo reads Grim's face. He figures he should change the subject.

⎈

"What's your earliest memory?"

Grim groans. "I... try not to look back that far."

"So, my earliest memory... I'm a little dude, a very little dude, like, not quite a baby but not like a big kid either...

"I'm just chilling in a field. There's grass and flowers all around me. I've always liked sitting in fields. I do it when I can. You ever sit in the grass and just relax?"

Grim shakes his head. "Can't say I have."

"You totally should some time, dude. It is most pacific. Anyways, so there I am, little dude baby thoughts going across my mind. Then someone comes over and puts this 'reed thing' in front of me.

"Now I'm looking at it all curious, and you know how little dudes do things, they put it in their mouth and all that. And then I start blowing air through it, but then I realized that, like, each tube of this thing makes a different sound.

"And that I can copy sounds with it. I listen to the birds in the trees and I start blowing on the different reeds and I try copying their songs. All of a sudden I am fully aware of all of the noises around me. It's no longer just noise, you know. It's like there's this whole band going on in nature.

"That pan flute was my very first instrument. It's still one of my favorites. And I still carry a little piece of that flute to this day."

He picks up his pan flute and shows a teeny piece of rotted wood tied to it.

⎈

It's well past midnight now. As Theo recounts what is (essentially) his entire childhood, Grim's mind vexes him. He enjoys the satyr's company and all that, but he can't understand why. His patience for people doesn't tend to last this long these days.

It could be he's attracted to him, physically. After all, it's not hard to be drawn to someone who's got a real tan and wears nothing but a grass skirt and some odd amulets and wraps here-and-there. Hell, the thought crossed his mind to have him be a one night stand.

Yet he didn't. Something stopped him.

Actually, something's been stopping him the whole week.

For once, Grim wasn't seeing him as a commodity, as a set of erogenous zones for sale like quarters of meat hanging in a butcher's shop.

He wasn't just seeing a bunch of parts.

He was looking gestalt – looking deeper.

It couldn't be mere eroticism drawing him in. That mechanical, fire-like feeling in his nether wasn't alone. Something oddly familiar, yet seemingly foreign, was setting in.

There was this tickly, bubbly feeling emerging from the pit of his stomach. A sort of featheriness to the back of his mouth, a sort of strange transmogrification of admiration into embarrassment.

Grim drops his beer stein.

Oh god.

"Dude, you okay?"

It hit him like a ton of bricks.

He was in love.

He hadn't been in love for so long, he'd forgotten what it was like.

Grim panics. He readies to get up and leave, but a hairy hand stops him in his tracks.

"Hey, is everything alri-"

"Do you love me, Theo?"

Oh god. He said it. He didn't even have time to think it. It just fell out. He would've gone pale if there was any blood in his cheeks to begin with. He's always been a wild card, a man who speaks his mind, but now for once he's mortified, filled with regret, filled with panic, with fear, filled with a need to flee-

"Of course." He blows absentmindedly at his flute.

"...you do?"

"Absolutely. You're my friend. Just like how I love the birds in the trees, or my pipes, or the sound of waves crashing on the-"

Theo's eyes drift to Grim's face. It doesn't seem to express anything at first glance.

He puts the flute down. "It's funny how we use the word 'love.' It covers so many different things."

"Love is love," Grim says tersley.

"Well, what do you mean by that?"

"Fiery passion. Seeing someone and feeling the need to go over to them and get physical."

"Huh?"

Grim looks at Theo quizzically. "You've never been aroused?"

"I've woken up before, I don't understand what that has to do with it."

Grim sighs. "No, haven't you ever... felt attracted to someone?"

Theo thinks for a moment. "I think I know what you're getting at."

"Do you, now?"

Theo nods. "That sort of, like, feeling, where you need to stop in your tracks and take a second look. When your eyes can't help but stare at someone else's body. They're searching up and down a dude's entire being. This strong, primal urge to go over and, like, get to know them, to hold them, to spend every moment with them, to never spend a minute apart from them, to spend every day adorning the temple of the dude's body."

Grim nods after each pause, more vigorously and excitedly with each nod.

"Never felt it."

"What?!"

"Yeah, I've never felt it."

"But don't you ever get the urge to... you know..."

A rogue wave splashes against the bow of the ship, spraying foam upward in a single jet.

Theo replies. "Well, yeah, but not often. It's just like eating or sleeping."

"You must've felt it somehow if you can describe it that well."

"Everyone blabbed on about it back home. The satyrs and nymphs. I've heard it all before. But I just never felt that way. When I see a dude, I don't see a bunch of body parts, or the stuff they carry. I see a dude. I see this... wonderful collection of... thoughts, and feelings, and memories, and songs and stories. Someone to discover, someone to have fun with, someone who is... unique. Sometimes they're happy dudes, sometimes they're sad dudes, and sometimes they're..."

Something clicks in Theo's head. He's been looking at Grim's eyes the whole time, unsure of his stony gaze.

It's a stoic gaze.

The mouth changed between a slight smile and a neutral frown as they talked, but the eyes remained the same.

They look tired. Anguished.

Come to think of it, they've looked this tired the whole time.

Even when he was boisterous in the bar, or cracking jokes with the crew, that same tired set of eyes was there.

Except once.

That afternoon, when Grim had Theo touch his chest to show its absence of a heart...

⎈

It's a week earlier. Theo's sitting by the helm, strumming a little song on his lyre (his other instrument of choice). It's an old song, about a man who searches for the secret to eternal life... whose ending gets cut short by Grim walking by.

Theo waves, his left hand still sprained from giving the pirate's golden arm a full-forced high five.

Grim waves back. He smiles at the satyr, unconsciously.

"Hey, Mr. Pirate dude-"

"You can call me Grim."

"Cool. Mr. Grim dude. How old is this ship?"

"Very old. Probably every piece in it has been replaced once or twice."

The satyr stops his strumming and thinks. "So, does that make it the same ship? Or is it a different ship with the same name?"

"It's got the same captain, that's all that matters."

"So... like... how old are you, Mr. Grim dude?"

He doesn't quite know.

"So, like, sixty? The oldest dude I knew was my tribal elder, he was sixty or seventy. But you don't look anything like him."

Grim looks off to the distance. "You've heard about the avatar crisis, yes?"

Theo nods.

"I was around during then..."

You can hear the cogs turn in Theo's head. "So... older than sixty?"

"Much older."

"...are you an elf?"

"No."

"A vampire?"

"Do I look like I'm burning in the sun to you?"

"No, but someone in the bar said you were 'on fire.' I don't see any flames though." Theo ponders for a minute.

Grim hears the internal screams. Screams of terror. Screams of agony. Blood-curdling shrieks from creatures not meant to be seen by mortal eyes...

He sighs. "Here, let me just..."

He reaches over and grabs ahold of the satyr's arm.

...Grim can feel the thrashing of his limbs against straps, the bloodied beating of his back and arm against a stone altar...

The hand draws closer and closer.

...the piercing of a bloodied dagger shoots across his mind, the sensation of his chest being ripped open as clear as day...

Fingertips hover over his chest.

...his body lies in old snow, cold snow, hard snow. Blood pours out, draining his will with it. An all-too imposing vacancy plagues his mind, his being, his soulless body. He cries to the gods for solace, but hears no response. He closes his eyes, hoping to feed the crows...

Theo's hand touches Grim's chest. It feels no beats.

It feels warm.

...warmth. He wakes in a room, feeling warmth. A grand fireplace burns several feet in front of him. He scans the room, lavishly covered in artwork. He feels the gash in his chest with his remaining arm; nothing but a black-ooze filled cavity remains...

...a woman approaches him, tending to his wounds, draining the heartless hollow. His eyes lock with hers. There's a certain... draconic quality to the woman's gaze...

...they both know what they are. But neither of them could've anticipated what they'd be together...

...what they'd enjoy...

...what they'd share...

...what they'd lose...

...what would fade away, when fate and the gods separated them...

⎈

...that afternoon.

Those eyes shifted. They opened a little.

There was even a little glint to them.

Even now, there's a little trace of that glint in them.

His emerald eyes were somehow less like jewels and more like a candle lighting a catacomb.

And he sees the glint slowly fading from the now-sulking captain.

...

Waves beat on the side of the boat.

He reaches over and grabs Grim by his good hand.

It takes Grim a second to register it. The candle flares up; the eyes widen; the glint returns.

"I think you need this."

Gently, he pulls Grim forward and wraps his arms around the tired husk.

Grim closes his eyes, reciprocating.

The sensation of a cold, metal hand touching Theo's bare back makes him jostle a little, and the resting of his metal claws scratches his flesh.

He doesn't mind, though. A little pain is worth making a friend happy.

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