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[Rindo follows Silvally's lead as it sits. Shoulder scratches (or the closest approximation to scratches you can safely give when you have claws instead of fingernails) it is.

Of course feeding takes a while. Plenty of time to think about what it is you're doing, exactly. Can't have any even the scavenging monsters get away with having an easy time of it. Perhaps it's only fair.

…A deep breath, then a shaky exhale. If not resolve, it's something like resignation. Rindo does not turn toward Gladion when he replies. The steadiness of his voice sounds forced.]

I… haven't tried to use my roots before, because of the rain. And… I thought I'd have more time.

[And that just sounds like excuses.]

[Gladion receives this silently, grimacing at an angle to the wall. It's really just confirmation of what he suspected, because it makes sense. A very normal pair of assumptions that both turned out poorly - he can hear the hindsight in Rindo's voice.

Good old Ryslig.

His urge is to just keep talking at the wall, but Gladion turns in place as if taking himself by the shoulders to do it. Leans back against the wall again, taking a slow breath in through his nose. Last-minute deliberations over the elephant in his room, as if thinking about it further will change anything.]

Feeding was the first time I used mine. It was more or less automatic. After some settling in.

[Just say it. Just...warn him and get it over with.

He's staring at Silvally's tailfin for lack of anywhere better to look.]

...The first time, I wasn't fully— fully conscious for the whole duration. It wasn't a frenzy, but it was a type of—dissociative state. Something to do with the roots. Every time I use them—

[Running through Fugo's interpretation in his head holds the shame just behind the line. He can pretend this isn't a horrible thing to admit, that he's just doing his due diligence as a monster. But he still runs up against the sheer indescribability of what happens, and how does he finish that sentence when he needs to describe some part of it?

In the gap, Gladion chances a glance up at Rindo. A short one.]

—it's like being in...two places at once. [It's not enough like that to explain it that way, but it's something and better than just freezing up about it. Whatever. The tension in Gladion's chest settles in, just heavy instead of actively straining.] And it ends when it ends.

[...]

I don't know exactly how common that is. But instincts, of some kind, come along with a lot of this.

[Focused as he was on his own fears and inadequacies, Rindo forgot to consider for a moment that Gladion, too, must be struggling. The halting cadence of his voice makes it obvious. Having the one he looks to for guidance show this kind of vulnerability feels like it ought to be scary. But… maybe it's easier, actually, to be lost with someone else. Easier than to watch another's back, so far away, failing to catch up no matter how many times they turn back to offer their hand to hold.

Gladion's experience with his own roots may not be exactly the same, but…

…it really helps, to hear it.

Rindo's done nothing but take and take some more. From Gladion. From everyone. If there's even a small chance to finally give back… If all it takes is talking…]

I… When I got my roots…

[He starts on impulse, but pauses. She really doesn't bother to make it easy to talk about, does she? How do you explain something like this? Even with the similarities, it's still up to him to build the bridge.

He has to try.

Rindo turns toward Gladion, one motionless hand still on Silvally's shoulder. Looks at him, with new eyes. And when he speaks again, it's not with confidence—not quite. It's something else. Resolve, perhaps, like he's found a path to follow.]

At first it was just… pain in my feet. Just pain… dull, constant. There was no other sensation, at all. And I couldn't even move them anymore.

[He frowns.]

Then one of them… split, into this shape. And it was still— it was the same exact pain as before. No… blood. I didn't even realize what happened until I saw it, after the fact.

[Deep breath, uneven exhale.]

So I paid attention to the other one, and I was able to catch the split. It was— …surreal. I thought… it should hurt more, or— or differently, or something. But the sensation didn't match what I was seeing.

The pain went away when they turned into actual roots, but even now, I still don't feel anything in them. I know where they are without looking and… I can move them, I think. But they don't feel like a part of me.

[The next part is wrapped in shame.]

One time, I got upset at someone and… the roots grew, just a little. For a split second. I wasn't doing that. That might be… another reason why I haven't tried to use them. [Because I'm scared.]

…So… I think I kinda get what you mean. […Presumptuous?] Maybe.

[Rindo's gaze falls to the ground. It's done, for better or for worse.]

[Once again, Rindo surprises him.

Gladion looks up again, and looks slightly caught. Not wide-eyed, but not truly as calm as he clearly wants to; his ears pin out to the sides just a little, shouting tension and attention, whatever else his posture might suggest.

He wouldn't dare interrupt. Out of respect, or else just out of desperate curiosity.

It was— …surreal.

Gladion nods absently. And finds that, at the end, he wants to nod again and again instead of saying anything. His gaze jumps up to Silvally, who's watching the back of Rindo's head with a somber sort of contemplativeness.]

[Heavily:] ...Yeah. [He draws in a deep breath, thinking in circles. Reaches up to his shoulder and over it, and touches a spot right under the back of his neck, where the stem along his spine starts. Yeah. "Maybe". He can agree to that.

. . . ]

I've done it three times. [He shouldn't be spacing it out so far.] Plus...once just for water. It was less. Of an effect.

[But that's beside the point. Gladion presses his lips together in a thin frown, mind visibly racing, trying to find a way around the natural place to take that. Failing to.] ...I got some advice about how to handle it that, [wry whoof of breath that would be a snort of laughter if it were a couple steps to the left,] I haven't taken. [Eyes dart up to Silvally again. It looks away from him and back down at Rindo when their eyes meet.] Part of it was just to take someone along. Another was to focus the senses on something.

[...He feels as if he's getting too far down one train of thought. Trying to find a single, simple problem to solve. Flinching away from the point. He shakes his head, mentally shakes himself out.] Something else I was told— by a reliable source— is that if you...go under, you can expect to come back up. Instincts aren't...irreversible.

[There is a certain lack of steel in the way Gladion says this. It is still something he has been promised, more than something he can promise.]

[Having been this open leaves Rindo feeling raw, exposed. He wants to shrink into himself, hide somehow. Battles the urge, because it seems that he's hit his mark… so as far as he's concerned, it's been worth it.

Three times is so little. He hadn't expected Gladion to have much experience with it, given the timeline of his changes as he understood it, but hearing an actual number goes a long way to explain Gladion's reaction. Now Rindo has that much more respect for him going so far out of his way to help.

So, Gladion's received advice from someone. It shouldn't be a surprise—it isn't, really. But that, too, puts them on a more even playing field. They're both figuring it out. Gladion may have a head start, but it's not an unbridgeable gulf.

As for the actual advice, Rindo has no trouble guessing why Gladion hasn't followed it—the part about bringing someone along, at least. Rindo… may be doing that, but the thought of being watched, or even just seen during the actual process, fills him with shame. If it's by Gladion, who looks like he feels the same, then… it may be tolerable. May.

Finally, the thing about instincts… puts words to the fears he's been carrying at arm's length. With them so named—described—he can face them. Confident reassurance would be easiest, but he suspects that such a thing is not possible in Ryslig.

Well. He'll take what he can get.]

That's… good to know. It helps.

[The hunger, of course, remains. He hates it, and everything that it represents. Satisfying it is giving in, but… stripped of other choices, it's the best option available. He's made sure of that.

There's something about the way he's standing now, just a little straighter, less like he's trying to sink into the ground and disappear. He's turned more fully toward Gladion, his hand no longer on Silvally but hanging by his side, his gaze on his fellow Nymph, though not making direct eye contact. As ready as he can be.]

[If it helps...

Gladion looks up after that, with a too-firm expression. The resolve in it isn't quite genuine, but there's a current of energy behind it that is; he's heartened enough to pretend he's prepared for this, if not to actually be prepared.

Rindo looks a little less like a Pokemon that Gladion wouldn't consider letting onto the field. A little more like what he imagined Null would look like under the helmet when it all came down to one final, do-or-die showdown, back when he told himself those stories. Out here in reality, instead of being vindicating, it just kind of hurts to see.

Gladion nods once more.]

Okay. [Steps away from the wall, and towards the corner of the house.] I'll be right back.

[And around it. After a few seconds, the sound of the back door sliding open and then closed follows him.

Silvally heaves a long sigh and stands up again, moving around Rindo and ducking its head to peer at him on eye level. Its face is pretty close to him.]

[Rindo watches Gladion pass the corner, and echoes Silvally's sigh. When the creature moves into his line of sight, he stares at it for a moment.

He wonders again what it is, exactly. Clearly not any animal that exists on Earth, and not a monster either. He still can't shake the feeling that it may be the same kind of creature as Junior. And the way it's eyeing him seems very deliberate. Does it… understand what's going on?]

…What's up?

[He watches its strange, metallic face, as if trying to read its expression somehow.]

[That metallic face doesn't give it too much room for facial expressions. They're mostly in the eyes. Which, after a few seconds, it slowly, deliberately closes.

...As if to signal gentle intentions, because then it drifts its head towards Rindo. If he doesn't move, it'll softly bunt its face against his temple, leave it there for a few seconds, then pull back and open its eyes to watch him again.]

[Rindo allows it. After all, he has no reason to think Silvally means him any harm.

The coolness of the metal against his temple startles him, just a little, as do the droplets of rainwater now sliding down his cheek and the warm breath brushing against his skin. Silvally stays like this for a moment, gently pressing its face against his, in a gesture that Rindo can only interpret as… comfort.

When it pulls back, he's almost surprised to find that he's blinking back tears. In reaching underneath the fragile shell of resolve Rindo's built around his heart, it appears Silvally has hit the soft center of emotions inside, the part of him that desperately craves and misses… so much—the familiarity of home, the welcoming warmth of his parents' voices, their shielding him against the world.

An impulse overtakes him as Silvally pulls back, and with it the certainty that it understands, somehow. He wraps his arms around the creature's neck, loosely, and buries his face in it, eyes shut tight.

…Sometimes, you just need a hug.]

[It makes a little clucking noise in the back of its throat, without surprise, and tucks its chin over the top of Rindo's head.

And perhaps nibbles at his hair a little.

(Crunch.)

They have about two minutes like that before the back door audibly slides open again. Whether still being hugged or not, Silvally makes a buzzing pssshh sort of noise, and Gladion's footsteps stop.

It bumps Rindo with its nose. Stares down at him again. Ready?]

[The weight of Silvally's head resting on his is pleasant; the crunching, less so. The slight vibration as his hay hair gets nibbled on is reminiscent of a haircut. Rindo makes a weird little sort of sob-laugh about that, shaking his head slightly to dissuade Silvally from giving him a bald spot. No more chewing, please. Or if you must, spread it out.

He does in fact keep hugging Silvally until he hears the door open, at which point he lets go of it with a sniffle, wiping his face. His hair looks somewhat ruffled where Silvally messed with it, and his eyes are shining just a little too bright.

…Did it just… tell Gladion to wait? It sure sounded like it. Normally he'd wonder if he was reading into things too much, but… a weirdly intelligent creature wouldn't be the least believable thing he's seen in Ryslig. (Gladion had called it a friend.)

The nose bump directs Rindo's attention back to Silvally, a question in its eyes. He nods at it with a grim sort of determination.

Can't turn back now.]

[It nods up at the corner of the house. Lead the way, then.

Gladion is crouched by the door, what he retrieved at his sides: a small cooler and two tools, a shovel and a cultivator.

He can guess why Silvally had him hang back. There's a pang there. Pride, aching. Guilt, prodding. It can do what he can't, and that's something to be in awe of, always.

At movement around the corner, he stands, gathering the tools up as he goes. He gives both of them a short, utilitarian glance, now steeled for the next step.]

Climb on and move out?

[This time, with unwieldy cargo in hand, he really won't be riding.]

[Rindo's blood runs cold at the sight of what Gladion's brought out. He'd not expected anything different, of course, but it's evocative in a way that makes his skin crawl.

He merely nods in response, not confident that his voice won't betray him. He climbs onto Silvally's back once more, readying his vines (slightly faster this time), then glances back at his fellow Nymph.

Rindo doesn't look okay, exactly, but that hug helped to vent out some of his emotions. It'll take a moment to rebuild his veneer of resolve, which had felt so much more genuine before Silvally nudged its way through the armor he'd unknowingly put up. Perhaps there is no being prepared for this—not truly. Leaving only one thing: getting it done in spite of that.

Nothing left to do but wait for Silvally to depart.]

[A nod in return.

Gladion takes point, leading Silvally down the hill behind the house and across the tree line. The woods very quickly become thick and wild, mounded roots hiding long drops into ravines that he veers around without a second glance.

They take a gentler path than that down into the stream between hills. Gladion hops up onto a fallen tree trunk to cross over it; Silvally simply walks through, water splashing around its ankles.

Then they pick their way up another slope, past lichen-streaked rock faces. There, where the slope levels out, the underbrush surges up into a wall of tangles and thorns. Gladion turns to follow the length of the wall, and slows his pace, looking for something.

Finds it, and pauses. Silvally stops too, a few paces behind him.

When he raises a hand, there's a chorus of answering creaks. The wall sighs; canes of brambles arch away and clear a path, as if pushing back a tent flap.

Gladion glances back, then enters. Silvally sighs, doesn't move further, and twists its head to squint back at Rindo. This is as far as it goes.]

[Rindo sits in silence as they depart. There's nothing more to be said.

On the way to their destination, his mind flitters unfocused between thoughts of home, of Swallow, of Nanami, of the person—or people—he's about to feed on. They all hurt.

The trip to the patch feels at once like an eternity and like it's over in the blink of an eye. He watches, awed, as Gladion parts the foreboding wall of brambles with seeming ease. Wonders briefly if that's something he will be able to do, at some point.

When Silvally turns its head, he leans forward, giving it a brief but firm hug. For courage. (Mutters a quiet "thanks" into its neck, too.)

He slides off Silvally, wincing as his roots sink into the mud. Is it just his imagination, or are they sucking up the moisture in the ground with… eagerness?

…

He casts Silvally one last glance before he enters the patch, very slowly. Though it's clear he has difficulty walking, lifting his knees high with each step to free his roots from the mud, it isn't enough to justify his downright reluctant pace.

But, nonetheless, he catches up with Gladion eventually.]

[The brambles fold themselves up again behind Rindo.

The patch is maybe twenty feet from end to end, and nearly circular. The bramble walls climb high overhead, draped from tree to tree; there's a round patch of sky overhead, dappled with branches.

Between the cloud cover and the canopy, the grove is dimly lit. And in that dim light...it's unassuming. The earth has been recently disturbed in spots and streaks, but there's nothing else on the surface to indicate what this place is for.

Gladion has planted the tools in the mud and set down his cooler, crouching by it with a grim expression. He turns that expression on Rindo once he catches up, peering up at him...sort of searchingly. Wanting to see how he responds, for both their sakes.]

...This doesn't need too much explaining. [They're here to bury human remains. Gladion is keeping his gaze from darting back and forth for the most part, but his isn't the face of someone who really wants to be doing or saying this. He opens the cooler and takes something out of the top, stands back up slowly, grabs the shovel, and offers it over.] It works best to spread it out horizontally, but it doesn't have to be too...precise. A few spots in a ring is fine. [And handing over the something from the cooler...it's a pair of garden gloves. There's a faint stain on the left wrist.]

[Rindo's eyes are practically burning a hole in the ground. Or in his roots, perhaps? It's hard to tell. (It's both.) The sound of Gladion's voice reaches his ears, but he doesn't process his words. Restless worry is crawling around his brain like so many skittering bugs. Eventually he blinks up at Gladion, who's handing him… a shovel and some gloves. They're stained.

He does not like this.

Even not having heard what Gladion said, it's not difficult to imagine. Formless fears congeal into one nagging thought.

Are there… remains here? From Gladion's past feedings? If yes, can his roots sense them? Will they…

Reactively, he clamps down on his roots with a mental iron grip. They haven't so much as twitched, motionless as ever, but he can't risk it. Especially not here. Even then, he's not confident that they won't just stop listening and spread and—

One strained word spills out.]

I-If… [Finishing the thought is a visible struggle.] …I lose control. Would you and Silvally be able to get away?

[He's not meeting Gladion's eyes, nor taking the offered tools.]

[Maybe half a second before Rindo gets the words together to reply, Gladion realizes: I can't make him do this. There's the script of this he had ready, and some half-baked convictions about confronting reality.

And then, tearing at those, there's the plain horror of the circumstances. The question of how he'll remember this after it's done; if he handled it properly, or if he made some kind of sick initiation ceremony out of it to satisfy his own...something. The jab to an already-raw spot, hearing in Rindo's fear something he doesn't have to imagine because he knows this...

Gladion stops, and— and plants the shovel back in the ground, stuffs the gloves in his pocket.

And steps forward.

And reaches out, and puts his hands on Rindo's shoulders. Grip just a little less than firm, no demand in it. If Rindo wants to look up, he'll meet Gladion's eyes in their complicated expression, deeply serious with shadows of concern. If he doesn't, then he doesn't.]

Silvally would run immediately, and I would subdue you.

Edited 2023-05-20 04:02 (UTC)

[Rindo startles at the sudden contact, and at the oddly foreign sensation of touch filtered through his shoulder leaves. This tears his focus away from his roots for a split second. They stay put. It's only a fleeting reassurance; he clamps down again.

He looks into Gladion's eyes, briefly, long enough to read his expression before he averts his gaze. Gladion understands. Something about being perceived right now is… more difficult than usual. Perhaps it's because there is no buffer—no room for it in this place. Two Nymphs facing the reality and consequences of being what they are, alone. Like looking in a mirror.

There's a confidence in the way Gladion speaks that Rindo wants to believe in even as his overactive mind protests—would a frenzying monster be so easily stopped?

He takes some of the vehemence with which he's holding his roots back and directs it at his own fears, creeping vinelike through his body. Pushes them out, the same way he's been trying to push out every other negative emotion, because—because there's no choice. It's that or breaking and you can't break here.]

I—… okay.

[Rindo's voice comes out shaky anyway. There's no world in which doing this isn't fraught.]

[Gladion is, in fact, completely confident that he could restrain Rindo if he had some kind of episode.

There's plenty of other things to waste time not being confident about.

For example: he's still concerned, and it's as if the closer he is, the harder it is to accept his concerns. Surely there's something he should do to address Rindo's obvious distress before he steps away. Surely, with a problem like this right in front of his nose, he's supposed to be able to do something about it.

But it's just wishful thinking. There's no fanfare when he lets go of Rindo's shoulders; he doesn't have anything he can hand over to make up for turning away. He has to just nod and trust Rindo to himself, while Gladion takes care of the last few steps.

Gloves on. He'll start with the contents of Rindo's bag: take out the parcels, set them on the cooler, and pause kneeling over them. For his own satisfaction, close his eyes and spend a few seconds mouthing some words to a dead audience.

Up again. Out into the center of the patch, driving the shovel down, bringing up a wedge of sodden loam. Repeat. Break open the first parcel. Take half of the contents (pink, slimy, visceral) and feed them to the soil. Cover them. Try very, very hard not to feel a weird little buzz of anticipation analogous to hunger. Move a few feet away, and do it again...]

[And just like that, Gladion lets go, and takes on the burden that rightfully ought to be Rindo's.

"Let me help," he tries to say, but the words die in his throat. He swallows them back up, where they settle in his stomach as guilt and shame, heavy, sickening. That quiet protesting voice cannot overpower the fear that's keeping him planted in one spot with an iron grip on his roots.

When Gladion begins to take out the parcels, he crouches, hugging himself, head buried in his knees and eyes scrunched shut, as if closing up could help him stay in control. Wound up tight, mentally and physically. Trying to go elsewhere in his head, to pretend that his hunger isn't stirring at the thought of what's being buried around him, awful foreign feeling, a parody of normalcy.

He can't even face what he's about to do. Can't even honor the lives lost for him to keep living. He really is a monster.]

[He's so focused on what he's doing, and on...not...drifting off, that Rindo's movements don't register to Gladion until he's nearly done. It's clumsily done, but...but with the ground this saturated, and with the pressure of the circumstances, it's not going to be done any better.

(Stay present. Focus on breathing. Hold off that itch at the edge of consciousness...)

He looks up. His heart jumps into his throat for an instant. But Rindo isn't moving, and neither is anything from his back, or his feet. Is it a loss of control? Or just...

Feeling vaguely lightheaded, he covers the last pit and crosses the patch again; drops the shovel and approaches Rindo, cautiously.

Crouches down slowly.]

...Rindo?

[Rindo blinks at Gladion's approaching footsteps and voice, then lifts his head to give him a bleary look. He seems lucid, but also a little haunted.

…Gladion, meanwhile, sounds worried, which makes Rindo realize he should probably say something in response.]

…Yeah?

[Quiet and strained.]

[Okay. He's still here. Even as Gladion's senses start to wander.]

It's ready. [Wander, and slip out of time, as if - as if this time is every other time he's come here. It's not the same, but it feels the same, like the woods swallow up the differences. He's not hungry, but he's tethered to something that lifts its head in interest, and sniffs after the smell of blood...]

Don't rush it, though. [If it's anything like his, he won't need to. Once it starts, it'll just...go. Or maybe Gladion just can't bring himself to goad someone into doing it, when push comes to shove, and he'll accept any reason to not have to? His ears are pinned; his hands are lifted like he can't quite decide if he wants to reach for Rindo's shoulders again.]

[Well, here it is.

A few seconds, then Rindo stands up, slowly. He's stayed in this one spot the whole time, so his roots have sunk into the earth a little. A foreign part of himself finds this comfortable, even as it turns his hungry stomach.

At this point, after all that was said and done, just getting through it is the easiest option.

He looks at the other Nymph. There are many things he wants to say to him.

"Thank you."
"I'm sorry."
"Don't look."
"Please stay here."
"Keep yourself safe."

Rindo opens his mouth a few times as if to speak, but no words come out. Eventually, he averts his eyes. Vulnerability is difficult at the best of times and this is… well.

One heavy, mud-drenched step after another, Rindo moves into the center of the ring, where he stands still and silent. His eyes are trained on his roots with single-minded focus, pointedly nowhere near the freshly-disturbed soil.

He stays like this for a while, occasionally taking deep breaths as if psyching himself up, his roots twitching ever so slightly. Nothing comes of it.

Some minutes pass.]

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cw: freaky transformation stuff

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