[AW] the goalposts of life

[Sada]

Sada found himself outside the Day Court’s walls. They were magnificent, really, to a man who had never seen architecture. He’d grown up amongst sand dunes and zealots. He had just passed through sand dunes, and awaited the zealots both anxiously and eagerly as he entered what he suspected was, in fact, a mirage city.

There were many people within. They stared at him, but not too much, which he did not know may have been because of recent events that left so many others starving. He definitely looked like shit but had forgotten what he looked like. These were horses, he thought. Not quite like that green thing from before. The vultures were still different, which was a sign that things had changed, yes, but he wasn’t sure if it was good or bad. Or if he was still in the mind prison! If everything was in the mind prison! Who could say? Not one caught within its walls.

”Walls,” he murmured. The structure had been explained to him by a very concerned and somewhat frightened passerby. ”Walls.”  Someone walking by stared. Sada stared back. He marched right into the center of the market.

This was a lot of people, even for a very elaborate mirage. He wasn’t really sure what he thought about it, until he started screaming, which was very involuntary and primal. Some people that partake in primal screaming therapy never come back and just scream forever. Sada stopped, eventually, mostly because his throat was hoarse and a crowd had gathered around him. ”This place is lovely,” he coughed, ”Really phenomenal. I just learned what a wall is.” He grinned, very wide and not actually as artificial as one would think.

Dropkick Me, Jesus | open. pls help him

[Orestes]

« don't die so far from the sea »

Charles is reading to him in his study—Orestes is still learning the various languages and scripts of Novus—about the history of the Zolin. It is a biography, one that does not seem inherently accurate. He is deeply invested, in particular, by the chapter regarding Zolin's child soldiers when one of the other courtiers enters. The courtier, Raska, appears deeply troubled. 

“Sir? There is a… man… in the marketplace…” She works her mouth, uncertain of how to proceed. “He is… or was… just screaming? At nothing? We think he might be insane, perhaps from the desert—it happens fairly often—but we don’t know. Should we detain him?” 

It was the last thing he had been expecting, but Orestes supposed such things happened when one was a Sovereign. He shakes his head. “No, no. I will see for myself.” 

By the time Orestes reaches the city center, there is a small crowd gathered around the acclaimed madman. He is muttering something about walls. Orestes parts the crowd and finds himself standing before a man with a knife lodged in his shoulder.

Even as a Prince of a Thousand Tides, a Keeper of Souls, and a reincarnated Prince of amorphous water horses, he is taken aback. It is the first time Orestes finds himself genuinely shocked in longer than he can remember. It takes him a moment to gather himself. Eventually, Orestes says, from bewilderment alone, “Oh my—how can we help you?” 

He is squinting at the wound now, the pulsating black and gold and red that surrounds it, and refrains form asking—do you need a medic? 

Of course he does, but it doesn't look like something a medic could fix. Orestes settles on the second best option. "Could we offer you some water and, perhaps, get you out of the sun?" 

THERE IS A LONELINESS IN THIS WORLD SO GREAT THAT YOU CAN SEE IT IN THE SLOW MOVEMENT OF THE HANDS OF A CLOCK. PEOPLE SO TIRED, MUTILATED, EITHER BY LOVE OR NO LOVE. WE ARE AFRAID.

@Sada / speaks / notes: text text

☀︎

[Sada]

People were staring! People were staring! ”People are staring,” he said aloud. ”I don’t know what to do about you all.” The crowd parted for a very fancy man with very fancy symbols all over him. 

”Oh my - how can we help you?”

(Maybe a straitjacket would do-)

Sada stared at him. ”Nice drawings,” he said, because his people didn’t have tattoos, or really much art at all, and that was all he knew to say. He wanted to leave, or eat, or something. Maybe go back and stare at the wall again.

”Could we offer you some water, and, perhaps, get you out of the sun?”

”Oh, yes. That is what I want. Water. But not from an oasis. No oasis. Terrible little girls live there. Awful things. First the green monster, then that one…” He trailed off, muttering about aliens and suchlike.

@Orestes