Laios's Heart Game

[myhungryass]

It's dark, and you are not quite conscious. You have the sense that you are climbing; that you have been climbing for a long time. You can feel the burn in your thighs, the ache in your calves. You're a little too hot, and what you're wearing is a little too heavy. You have the sense of taking a last weary, heaving step onto a plateau.



You find yourself in a dark, blank place, dominated by a huge, dead monster, building sized, as big as a tower. Each of its enormous heads that you can see laid out before you is easily the size of a ballroom. There is blood on its lips and nostrils, blood crusted around its empty eye-sockets, but there is a feeling of hollowness about it. On second thought, you're not quite sure if it's a corpse or a moult.

There is no sign of the stairs you vaguely remember climbing. You are standing on the surface of some opaque black liquid. It feels almost completely solid under your feet, springy, but your footsteps leave ripples spreading out in rings... all around you is a velvety, impenetrable darkness. The only thing you can see is the vast, lifeless beast in front of you, illuminated as if by spotlights, though no actual light-source can be found.

Its orifices are mostly clogged with blood, but somehow, as you stare at it, one vaulted nostril on the wolf's head begins to seem like an archway... the lolling tongue hanging out of the rhinoceros's head like an entry ramp... the exposed, hollow eye-socket on the eagle's head like a portal...

Of course, if you're not quite ready to step inside a monster, you could keep walking around its body and see what you find.

Comments

[aluminumfoil]

[look at him, he's such a cute kid...]

Do you know where we are?

[myhungryass]

He huffs, a little cranky. Not at Kabru so much as with the answer to his question. "In the middle of nowhere, as usual."

[aluminumfoil]

Why are you in the middle of nowhere? Where's your family?

[myhungryass]

He scowls. "Who cares! Back in their stupid boring village, probably. They were going to send Falin away, so I left first!"

[aluminumfoil]

[his eyebrows raise...]

What's the plan?

[myhungryass]

Defiantly: "I'm going to go to school and figure out a way to get rich so she and I can go live on our own together and nobody can bother us ever again."

[aluminumfoil]

[ohhh that does not go well does it...]

For Falin, huh? Why were they sending her away? Because of her magic?

[myhungryass]

"Yeah, because they're stupid. Magic is cool. She's going to become a great travelling exorcist, and we'll go all over the world together. And we'll never go back to the village again, and they'll all be sorry. I hope monsters eat them."

[aluminumfoil]

[lol. kids are brutal]

I know someone who lost her family because of stupid people being afraid of magic too. She got really strong.

[myhungryass]

"...really?"

He shuffles over on the seat to make room for Kabru next to him.

[aluminumfoil]

[he climbs out to sit next to him.]

Yeah. She's shy, but I bet she would be good friends with someone who gets that magic is cool.

[myhungryass]

Laios glances at him a bit warily. "I don't have any friends."

[aluminumfoil]

I didn't either, except for her. I guess she's like my sister.

[myhungryass]

"Your adopted sister...? What kind of magic does she do? Is she smart?"

[aluminumfoil]

All kinds, though her favorite is elemental. She's really smart, smarter than I am.

[he leans in, conspiratorial]

Don't tell anybody, but she even knows a little black magic.

[myhungryass]

"Really?!" Too loud.

[aluminumfoil]

Shh, really.

[myhungryass]

He lowers his voice hastily. "Wow..."

[aluminumfoil]

We're going to travel the world too, looking for all the secrets in the dungeons that are hidden from us. Maybe we'll run into each other.

[myhungryass]

He nods, thinking about that in silence for a long time.

He stares down at the reins, lost in thought.

Eventually, he says hesitantly, "Maybe you and your sister could be friends with me and my sister."

[aluminumfoil]

[... Kabru smiles gently at him, his chest aching.]

I'd like that a lot.

[myhungryass]

Small Laios gives him a tentative smile back that blossoms suddenly into a big, cocky grin. The sun is coming out from behind the clouds. It feels a lot warmer in here...

...Kabru feels a sudden weight in his pocket. A quiet chiming sound emanates from within.

[aluminumfoil]

[ohhh, his heart feels soooo --

--?? reaches into his pocket?]

[myhungryass]

There's a small compact mirror inside. It chimes again.

"What's that?"

[aluminumfoil]

I don't know.

[flips it open?]