#grian is so lost amidst all the trauma rn

[angeart]

hhau rescue rambles - part II

>> part I here // hhau masterpost here <<

The hermits are here to take Scar home but Grian is gone and Scar can’t leave without him, even if the others would promise to look for him. (They won’t find him, they won’t, they won’t. Scar knows how vast these forests are. He knows how many hiding spots there are tucked away if one knows where to look.) (They don’t know where to look.)

They’re not listening to him. He’s half-feral and panicked and desperate, barely making any sense. He keeps saying he needs to find Grian, but he looks half-crazed, clothes stained by a huge amount of blood and—

If it looks, a little bit, like he’s just in frenzied denial of some grief? That maybe something happened and Grian isn’t here anymore? The world is permadeath, after all. The rescue party isn’t sure what to think.

Of course they promise to look for Grian. Of course they’ll try. But first, let’s get you somewhere safe, Scar.

Scar panics and backs away and says he isn’t going anywhere until they find Grian. He’s so so afraid they’ll take him away and he’ll never find him. (He keeps imagining that wretched scream he heard that very first day he found Grian, a year ago. How close of a call that was.) (He thinks of finding him after the mimic incident, barely surviving. Wounded and bloodied and ready to collapse.) (He thinks of Grian sobbing as he begs Scar to never leave him again.)

He can’t leave him behind. He can’t.

He won’t.

He’s done everything he can up to this point and if this is his last fight? Then damn it, he’s going to go out swinging. He is going to find Grian. Even if he has to fight his saviours. (They’re enemies if they’re trying to separate him and Grian—) 

He growls and lashes out and his vex magic comes through. The hermits are stunned and a little bit afraid and a whole lot confused. They’ve never seen him like this, hair white and claws ready to tear. (Cub, especially, is terrified of this development. Knowing that if Scar pushes himself too far in his vex form, he could die.) 

They try to placate him, calm him down, reassure him. They try to get the damn teleportation bracelet on him. They keep telling him they can take him home, it’s okay, Scar, it’s okay.

It’s not okay.

He isn’t leaving without Grian, and he isn’t trusting anyone else with this.

So he runs.

He runs from his friends—from people he loves with all his heart; people he thought he’ll never see again. Runs from the promise of home and safety and this hell being finally over. 

He runs, because he can’t take the salvation if he can’t share it with Grian.

Everything’s a bit of a blur as he rushes through the forest, looking for something to tell him where Grian is. He’s fully in his vex form, senses sharp and heart panicked, calling out, desperate for Grian to reply. 

There’s no answer.

Scar sees it, then: a handful of ripped-out feathers and blood.

His heart jumps into his throat, but he laser-focuses and starts following the trail. The world feels askew around him, his steps urgent, his breaths hovering near growls that want to threaten the whole forest if anything dares to hurt Grian more. (He hopes Grian’s still out there.) (He has to be. He has to be—) (Why is he not replying to Scar’s calls, then?)

Scar’s aware that if he can follow the trail of blood, so can others. He needs to be better than them. Faster. (He needs to be a better hunter than them.) He knows that if he’s following the trail now, maybe someone already followed it. (He tries not to let that thought in. That he might be too late.) 

He’s trailed by the hermit rescue party. They scramble in his wake, trying not to lose him. They lag behind, losing sight of him, but Cub staggers to follow his vex bond with Scar, like a tether, trying to hold down the swell of warning anxiety at the fact that Scar is in his vex form. Scar looks feral, he lashed out and ran from them, clothes stained by blood and hair white—

Them following just makes Scar feel hunted. His instincts go haywire and put him more on edge. 

He keeps going.

He keeps calling out, too. Uncaring that he’s attracting every hunter in the vicinity. He can take them. He will happily attract them to himself if that means they won’t go after Grian instead. (The fact that he’s searching for Grian gets a bit tangled up in him. The fact that if he succeeds, he’ll just be bringing the hunters to Grian fails to quite register. He’s not thinking very straight.)

Hermits hear those wails, echoing through the forest. He sounds like a wandering spirit. 

Inhuman. 

Lost.

 --

Grian is hurt. Hand pressed against the spot on his side that bleeds, he sits curled up, pressing himself into some bushes for a moment of reprieve—just a moment, just a little bit, please, please.

He hears Scar’s calls from far away. He hears them, and his heart tears itself to pieces.

He is terrified and hurting, and it feels dangerously close to a despair-filled memory.

 He tries to shield himself from it. There’s a reason he ran. There’s a reason why Scar should stay away from him. He can’t— He shouldn’t— He—

Scar draws closer. Grian can hear his sobbing and heaving. His pleading, so heartrendingly desperate. “Grian please. Grian answer me.”

Grian finds himself cautiously standing up, every muscle taut. His heart is rabbity fast, fear clogging his throat. 

He doesn’t mean to answer. He really, really doesn’t mean to. (He needs to keep Scar away.) Yet a distressed chirp slips through anyway, like a terrified call, begging for Scar.

The sound of it pitches something in Scar. His sobbing changes to panic and dwindling hopefulness. “Grian…?”

There’s a tinier chirp then. Scared. Still involuntary.

Grian is so so afraid and he should know better, but a part of him is desperate for Scar.

The moment he sees Scar, though, the futility rips through him. No. He isn’t meant to— Scar shouldn’t be near him. Because Grian’s been gone so shortly and yet the hunters have already found him. He’s already gotten hurt. He is a beacon.

He can’t stay near Scar. It’ll get Scar hurt. 

It’ll get Scar killed.

(Everything good that stays near Grian dies—)

He needs to get away from him.

He backs away. Tells Scar, in a wobbly voice, not to approach.

Scar doesn’t care. He needs to get to Grian. He needs to get to him, they can go home, this can all be over. 

Running on some faulty reasoning, Grian tries to get away. It’s useless, he is in no state to outrun Scar—he can’t bring himself to fly and he’s bleeding, dizzy on panic—but he feels like he needs to try, anyway. 

His feet feel heavy beneath him, the world unsteady. Scar is behind him and Grian’s heart begs him to stop, turn around, and burrow into his arms. (He can’t he can’t he can’t—)

It takes only a couple of steps for Grian to trip over some roots, the world as cruel to him as ever, sending him plummeting harshly down in a rough tumble of leaves and limbs and feathers. A pained, fearful yelp gets punched out of him on impact.

Scar’s next to him in an instant, kneeling down and gathering him in his arms. Crying as he buries Grian in a hug, terrified he might try to run again. Frantically telling him, “Grian, it’s over, it’s over, we can go home— Please—”

Grian’s sobbing against him, held in place, unable to understand what Scar is saying. He just wants Scar to get away from him and stay safe. (Grian can’t be safe. He’s been doomed from the start. He’s been doomed this whole time.) (He’ll end up like that bird. Dead, with wings ripped off—)

The words “it’s over” mean nothing to him. All he manages to choke out is, “There is no— There’s no home anymore.” They’ve had their safety ripped away from them over and over again. They’ve been showed that they can’t have a home anymore; this world will not allow it. Nowhere is safe. Nowhere is safe, as long as Grian’s wings are bright violet and attached to his spine. 

Scar insists, a series of reassurances, words tripping over each other as he tries to keep his hold on his voice. He says they’ll be okay. He says they don’t have to run anymore. Please, Grian, we can go home.

But it’s not a concept that exists anymore for Grian; it refuses to register in his mind, words sliding right off him, incoherent.

What he knows is this: he failed to protect Scar, and they don’t have a home to go back to, and Grian is sure the hunters are about to show up, any second. He’s so tired and terrified, and he needs Scar to be shielded from this fate. He needs him to be safe.

Scar isn’t letting go of him. His grip is firm as he continues to plead with Grian. He doesn’t want to be rough, he’s never been forceful with Grian, but he can’t let go now. Even as Grian paws at him and tries to push him away. 

Grian’s crying so hard; his efforts to get free are all frantic and urgent, yet half-hearted. (He wants to give in and bury himself in the protectiveness of Scar’s arms.) (He wants all of Scar’s promises to be true.)

And yet something tips askew.

Because Scar’s never been forceful with Grian.

He was always so gentle. He’d never grab him like this, with so much force. So much insistence.

Grian is hit with a dizzying, nauseating thought. Is this a trap? Is this a mimic?

Grian starts chirping. More of those distressed, scared noises as he can't get free of Scar's grip.

It’s the first time ever that Scar won’t heed Grian’s requests to be let go. Not even if Grian says it hurts. He won’t let go he won’t he won’t. He’ll drag him home if he has to.

Grian’s scared and confused, all his thoughts are jumbled, running on rampant trauma responses and unadulterated panic. He can’t deal with any of this. He keeps trying to wrangle free and push Scar away (is it even Scar???), begging him to let go, but it’s so horribly weak. It’s almost nothing. He just chokes on sobs and hyperventilates. (He feels caught.) (He feels like Scar will get killed because of him.) (He doesn’t know what’s happening.)

It’s awful. It’s wrong. It’s— It’s not what it’s meant to be. 

This should be easy. This should be the best day ever! They can go home! 

Instead, it’s like a panicked final showdown and Scar feels like it’s him against everyone. The hermits weren’t listening to him (Grian needs him, he needs him, he needs him), and now Grian isn’t listening to him either. (He can’t comprehend what Scar’s saying at all, and isn’t that so heartbreaking?) (Scar is desperate to get through to him. To calm him down enough so that this could be anything more than Scar forcefully holding him as Grian chokes on panic.) (The kind of panic he should never feel in Scar’s arms—)

Voice breaking, Scar pleads, over and over again. Please, Grian. Please. It’s okay. It’s okay, we can go home, we’ll be alright. It’s me. It’s me, I got you, we’re gonna be safe.

It’s the kiss he presses to Grian’s hair that tips the scales a little, just enough for Grian’s chirps to mute, his sobbing drifting off into softer cries. He goes limp under the affection, still terrified, still trembling and choking on air, but now he’s pressing himself against Scar instead of trying to get free. 

“G, do you understand what I’m saying?” Scar begs in a wavering voice, unbecoming of his feral appearance. He holds onto the magic prickling along his skin, alert for any sort of danger, anything that so much as tries to approach and hurt Grian. His hands are still clawed. His hair is still white. His veins are still stuffed with unending desperation. 

Nothing is over yet. 

It should be. It should be, but it isn’t.

Not yet, not yet.

 The hunters find them before the hermits do.

-- part III here