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doodlebeeberry · 3 years

Text

Vicarious

Shieldy blinked, rubbed at his eyes a bit, and looked back despite the sunspots currently speckling his vision.

A few seconds later, his reflection blinked back.

(In which a couple of old ghosts rear their heads)

GOD I have so much boto on the brain. I really like the concept of like a post-cannon-ish ghost/haunting au sorta thing so! some sheildy meeting rook for the first time for yall. warning for like paranoia if that kinda stuff skeeves you

(ao3 link in source)

It was fairly cool for July, all things considered. Very slightly cloudy, and with a gentle breeze that rippled across the lake from time to time. Summer wasn’t really Shieldy’s favourite season, not usually. One of the more annoying side effects of being metal, he tended to just soak up the heat and sunlight, overheating a bit quicker than most of his friends did. He had the same issue with winter: he’d get freezing to the touch, cold enough that just a short brush could sting your fingers if he stayed out too long.

The mellow morning weather was a relief, then, as he waited for his friends beside the lake. They’d been planning this trip for about a week now: a day spent out in town, at theaters, arcades, and anywhere else they could mess around and, more than likely, cause trouble. They wouldn’t be leaving for another few hours, at least, but he’d woken up early, and the thought of laying around in bed just didn’t sit right with him. He was restless, more than likely from excitement, he guessed, and despite his best efforts to go back to sleep he just had to do something before he completely lost his mind. So now he was here, one relatively short walk later, doodling anything he could think of in the sand as the water lapped at the shore, just below his toes. Friends, mostly: Big Orange Chicken, Shelly, a few Party Hats. A few plants worked their way in as well, mostly little trees and bushes that dotted the environment around him. He was about halfway through a drawing of himself when he paused, studying the uneven points.

Hmm

He scribbled them out and tried again.

And again.

And again, and when the spacing still looked off he grumbled and leaned out over the lake for a reference.

The water was clear, visible right down to its shadow-laced floor. Bright sunlight rippled across the surface, brushed along by the wind, reflecting back into his eyes after a moment and nearly blinding him.

Shieldy blinked, rubbed at his eyes a bit, and looked back despite the sunspots currently speckling his vision. A few seconds later, his reflection blinked back.

He flinched away, eyes wide. An uneasy feeling settled in his stomach.

Just the sunlight, he thought, shaking his head clear, it must’ve messed with my eyes.

But despite letting his vision fully clear, the unease remained.

He hadn’t even noticed at first, but his hands had brushed over his drawing when he’d pulled back. A great arc passed through his little face, obscuring it completely, dissolving the points at the top of his head into nothing but tiny grains of sand once again. He regarded this, frowning slightly. He would’ve tried to fix it were it not for the strange stillness that overcame his hands. Like they’d been weighed down or drained of all their energy, they stayed pressed in the sand, burrowing deeper and deeper holes the more he tried to move them, fingers only twitching as to dig further. Only when they’d dug past the water level could he collect himself enough to pull them away.

The small pits flooded, soddening the already soaked sand further. In the tiny puddle that formed he could only just catch the blue of his face shining back. He sighed. Maybe he should’ve tried harder to go back to bed. Or at the very least stayed in the house.

Instead he shifted until he could just see his left eye in the little pool, staring up at him. It followed his own, blinking when he did. A perfect mirror image. He looked left, so did it. When he looked away it no longer saw him. He watched it, it watched him.

It watched him.

Something was watching him.

Near frantically he searched for his friends’ faces among the trees. The air fell dead. A wide silence settled in its place he was desperate to break.

“Guys, come on! Quit messing with me!”

Nobody replied. No one broke through the tree line to greet him, not a friend or a stranger or even a bird or squirrel. His throat felt tight, and the unease turned into a steady chill that spread to the base of his spine. He was alone. All by himself, sitting on the lakeshore, but he knew something was watching him. He could feel it.

Looking back out across the water, he got some kind of answer. Not in words, nor sounds, but something like an instinct, a calling, a knowledge. A bone-deep sensation, the same that’d forced his arms still, flooded him. The water, lapping ever so gently, filled his ears. Knowing where to look, he leaned out over the lake, staring at its reflection, broken up only slightly now by the sun.

Staring back was someone taller than himself, somewhat thinner too. Pale yellow, nearly off-white really, with three flat points at the top of his head that, in Shieldy’s mind, resembled a crown. Their eyes were wide, almost curious, almost frightened, completely devoid of shine. They mimicked his pose exactly, taking the place of his own absent reflection. They distorted as the water moved.

“Wha-”

They spoke in sync, and while his own voice was clear, theirs seemed muffled, like it came up from the depths in bubbles. They startled a bit at the sound seemingly, eyes widening and trying to look at their mouth. He moved slightly closer, watching with a tense fascination as they did the same. He lifted his left arm, dropped it, and again they mimicked him.

“Woah”

Was someone under the water? Shieldy didn’t know how they’d keep from breaking the surface, nor how they seemed almost flat, unaffected by the lighting. He furrowed his brows, looking them over in full once again.

Something seemed almost familiar about the stranger. Pale yellow, dull eyes, three points.

He reached out across the surface.

“What are you?”

The water was freezing. It felt less like water and more like ice, like dry ice. He thought his hand would freeze through right then and there, but for several moments he held steady.

It wasn’t really the water he was touching, he realized, so much as it was another hand. Their hand. It was just slightly smaller than his own, feeling distinctly unlike skin. His thumb twitched against theirs.

He pulled away. They followed.

The water rose up, up, up against his palm. A small wave, growing bigger. The reflection distorted until it was incomprehensible at which point they severed. He fell back, overcome by a great thrill of impossible freezing that paralyzed him. His hands and feet went numb from the sudden cold, he couldn’t even shiver. There was water in his lungs, in his throat, he felt, and for several unending seconds he couldn’t even breathe. And still the water rose higher, until it crossed over the sun and scattered its light in thin beams in all directions. It roared, churning madly, and inbetween sunlight and stirred water he caught flashes of yellow, hands straining for the surface and the sand, desperate to be free. Like some awful lady of the lake. Like a monster. Like a ghost.

His heart raced faster.

It pitched forward slightly, palms against a watery film, overshadowing him completely. Wide eyes met his own. Several droplets pittered against him, shocking him. He breathed out, a short wet gasp, watching his breath puff into a pale cloud that filled the space between them, and, like it’d broken a spell, the wave shattered from the lake at its center. The lower half returned with a great splash that rushed the shore, climbing past his wrists before retreating. What remained in the air was blown back as he regained his breath, each one forming a fog. They regained form, starting with their head and moving down, freezing stiff inch by inch as they took shape. Their base was jagged as it formed, sharp and broken off in uneven points, like shattered bits of glass. What water dripped from them froze in place, midway through its fall. bits of ice lined their lower eyelids.

The water steadied, and the horrible cold left him, putting his muscles back into his control. He sat up, slightly shaky. They both spent several moments watching each other.

“What do you think that chess guy does when we’re not around?” Slurpy asked. The lot of them were crowded around three tables, all pushed together in a small pizza shop downtown. They’d spent the past several hours floating in and out of every shop on the strip before pausing for a quick dinner. Outside streetlamps and store signs stuck out against the dark sky. Sheildy watched her bite into her slice, mushrooms and extra peppers, curious.

“I don’t know,” Boaty swirled her soda. “Isn’t that whole place just a dream anyway? He probably doesn’t even exist anymore.”

Slurpy chewed, humming. Party Hat spoke around his own slice.

“‘Chess guy?’”

“Yeah, you know, yellow-y, kinda looked like he had a crown on or something? The chess guy.”

He blinked up at her.

“Who?”

“He wasn’t eliminated until the finale,” Popsicle chimed, leaning across the table to steal another slice.

“Oh yeah, right. You wouldn’t know him them”

Boaty set down her cup.

“Do you even remember his name?”

“Course I do. It was...Chess?”

“Mm—“ Popsicle swallowed—“No, it was, like, a specific piece I think.”