"Yeah, yeah," she says, huffing tiredly. Her endurance is reaching its end for the day, and she doesn't want to go. Being lost in her own mind is one of the most sickening, powerless feelings she's ever experienced; it makes the gun feel all the more tempting.
Wait.
"Would it... want me to kill myself?" She knows it's a she, and she has some inkling of its name, even, but Joan refuses to give it such clearance and respect.
He could lie. If he said yes, maybe Joan would stop talking about it. He brings the lie to his lips and then he can't take it further.
Instead, he grips her shoulder, rolls her onto her back, and sits down by her. "It wants you to give in," he says. "So it can take over permanently. But it can't do that unless you tell it to. It'll try and trick you, and push you, but unless you say yes it can't go that far. But you ain't gonna do that, so it's gonna get mad. Then, yeah. It'll probably try to kill you. Maybe it'd want you to kill yourself."
It doesn't need a gun to end her life. It could starve her out, or snap her neck.
"It won't come to that. I'm telling you it won't."
"Okay..." All of that makes sense, to a point. Joan understands vengefully wanting something so badly that no one else could have it, coveting possessions and feeling the sickly pull of greed and envy. She knows she's not a good person. Those grooves within her soul are probably easiest for the demon to slide through.
But there's something she doesn't quite credit.
"But why does it want me?" She's useless. Even if she wasn't a horrible bitch with a rotten soul, her place in life is minimal at best, an existence barely scraped out.
Because Joan's angry and chaotic, maybe. Because she has a rich mine of things she doesn't talk about (murderer, she'd said). Because the demon was desperate and she was there.
He exhales and says, "I don't know. Opportunism. Maybe it just wanted a challenge, huh? Maybe that."
"No, that's..." it's not right. It's not the reason she needs, something to focus on, something to hold onto. She's so tired, she can feel herself fading, falling, lost in a dark little room in her heart.
The creature, the demon, the fallen angel, she has endless sources of energy. She is an eternal being, waiting and watchful. She looks up with Joan's eyes, slow and careful, trying to imitate that tiredness. She is older than the desert sand, but not a terribly good actor.
Not a terribly bad one, either. "Maybe it's... because of you? Because you weren't doing your job."
Joan's voice slips like a knife under his ribs, and Marcus twitches back, hurt and guilty: yes, perhaps it's that. Perhaps he didn't protect her well enough. But —
But Joan doesn't want to be protected. Marcus exhales, as he realises, and actually relaxes. At least he knows what to do with demons; how to act with friends is far more mysterious. His upper lip hitches up in a sneer.
"Wondered when you'd come out to play," he murmurs, getting slowly to his feet so he's no longer perched on the bed beside her. "Sure this is a good idea?"
Her laugh is cruel and high pitched. "Concerned for my welfare, priest?"
She leans forward on the bed, pulling at Joan's wrists against the cuffs. They didn't actually tie her to the bed in any meaningful way. She could use that later. For now... "The truth is, I did it because I could. So obsessed with reasons and meaning, mankind wails about it endlessly like spoilt children. You have no idea the world you miss, the true meaning, stripped from you for the sake of will and choice. God has abandoned you, too, but you never see it that way."
Marcus manages to roll his eyes so hard that his whole body gets involved, stepping back another little bit and finishing Joan's holy medal out of his pocket. He tosses it idly and catches it and says, "Yeah, yeah, you're very clever. What is that, is that from The God Delusion?"
His grin splits wider as he keeps toying with the medal. "Sort of funny, innit, how you know all about true meaning and you're still scared of a little bit of metal. Guess you ain't keen on St Margaret."
"Daniel read that book, you know. Terribly droll." She rolls her eyes right back.
And then anger flares up, and her sweet honey voice catches a scratch and hiss. Joan's face is made for frowns and scowls, and the look of rage in the demon's eyes suits her well. There's no strange dissonance, just an angry creature wearing an angry glove. "I don't fear some dead apocryphal whore. I am cursed to bleed because my cruel Father wills it. He holds a grudge and sets us upon each other like wild beasts, and now you prey upon me."
Marcus snorts, soft and furious and unimpressed. "You had your chance," he says, catching the medal and squeezing it tight in his palm. "You got greedy. And now you wander about looking for someone you can scoop the insides out of, so that you can huddle inside. You're pathetic. St Margaret, pray for us; St Agnes, pray for us; St George..."
And that certainly has an effect. She uses Joan's face to grimace and hiss, curling up on the bed. Her legs aren't secure, though, and she uses them to kick, attempting to get a good one in anywhere she can on Marcus. It's not strategic or organized, certainly not any volley Joan would ever throw; it's the attack of a cornered animal, angry and desperate.
Marcus laughs. It's not a nice sound. But he can't linger long on taunting, as much as he wants to, as much as he wants to really hurt the thing torturing his friend — there are better ways, better avenues.
And he has a job to do.
"O God, who didst grant to Saint George strength and constancy in the various torments which he sustained for our holy faith; we beseech Thee to preserve, through his intercession, our faith from wavering and doubt — "
She makes Joan's lungs throw out another angry, inhuman scream, and black bile rises up in her throat, spraying over the bed. Another kick, this one more forceful.
A neighbour bangs on the wall, and there's a muted shout to 'keep it the fuck down'.
"Shit — " He lunges for her, tries to wrestle her back down and cover her mouth with his hand. It's a stupid idea, he knows as soon as he does it, but he just carries on: "Preserve our faith from wavering and doubt, so that we may serve Thee with a sincere heart faithfully unto death, through Christ our Lord, Amen!"
He's dropped his voice to a hiss, trying to quiet her down.
Of course she bites him. Joan has a fascinatingly detailed knowledge of how to fight, though the creature inside her doesn't have the muscle memory to make it half as effective. Wearing a human body is always a little like a rotting glove. But she's delighted to find that Joan Dority is sure, without a doubt, that the human jaw is strong enough to bite off fingers, though Joan has no memory of doing this to back the idea up.
"Ngh — " Her teeth sink right into the meat between thumb and forefinger, and he almost swallows his tongue trying not to cry out.
His own instincts roil, telling him to yank her lower jaw out of place, but that's more than he wants to do to the body that the demon's inhabiting. Instead he brings his open palm colliding into her cheek, metal between his hand and her face — a slap to try and startle her into letting go, the medal to burn her. "St Florian, pray for us, St Dennis, St Giles, pray for us — "
She has no qualms about making noise, and now that she knows people are listening, she opts to put on a show. She screams and howls before the idea occurs to her to cry for help. Which she does, then, screaming if anyone can hear her, oh God-
The medal has made an impressive welt on her cheek, already boiling over with blood and bile.
Shit, shit — if he has to deal with getting arrested, the thing inside Joan is going to either kill her or become her.
"O God, grant us through the intercession of Your holy virgin and martyr Margaret, the graces necessary to undauntedly confess the faith — "
He grabs for his bag with his bleeding hand and comes up with the purple stole he's stopped wearing now, just like he doesn't wear a collar anymore. He balls it up and tries to stuff it in her mouth, pushing thick, musty fabric between her teeth while he scrabbles with his other hand in his bag for the duct tape he's sure is somewhere there.
" — carefully observe chastity in our state of life, and — and overcome the temptations of the world, the devil, and the flesh — "
Joan's body continues to thrash, the creature inside of it howling. The screeches are muffled, though, by the thick musty fabric, even as it burns Joan's mouth and face. Her eyes roll back in her head, the demon making her body convulse, kicking wildly and without particular skill. There's knowledge, somewhere in Joan's mind, of how to get out of situations like these, how to use all her advantages, how to win fights you're under-prepared for. The demon doesn't access it. She just screams.
When Marcus comes back, he'll find bloody tears and eyes devoid of pupils, the creature inside of Joan trying to push them both to the limits of endurance.
" — and thereby escape the punishments of eternal damnation, amen," Marcus gabbles on the last edge of his breath, then heaves an exhale as he comes back up. "You shut up or I'll turn the water in your goddamn cells holy."
He has to shut up, though, to tug at the end of the duct tape with his teeth, his other hand trying to keep the fabric in her mouth.
Joan's body goes slack. After a seeming eternity of thrashing, she manages to get control back, though she's not sure if that's good or bad or how any of this works, really. She just knows that she's tired and hungry and for the first time in her life, she kind of wants to die. For tactical reasons, of course.
She lays there, panting on the shitty bed, and looks up at Marcus with heavily lidded eyes. Somehow through her exhaustion she's doing her best to communicate annoyance.
With a ripping sound, Marcus gets the end of the tape free and is about to start wrapping it around her mouth to shut her up...when he sees her eyes. Stark and green and glaring at him. He's not sure he's ever been so relieved to be glared at.
Fuck it. He yanks the stole out of her mouth.
"Hey," he murmurs. "Look at you, lucid and everything. 'S alright. You're doing fine."
She spits and coughs when the thing is out of her mouth, and gets green-black gunk on the bed, which she notices and immediately reacts to with visceral disgust, inching away from it in wormlike movements hampered by handcuffs and general fatigue.
"I didn't know laundromats had a taste," she murmurs wearily. It's the cleverest thing she can dredge up at the moment. "How-" her eyes flicker to him. "How'm I 'doing good'? How does this even work?"
"Patience," Marcus murmurs, wipes her chin with the corner of the purple stole: an automatic, perfunctory movement. "Patience, prayer, faith." He glances up, trying to take stock. They can move into the ensuite bathroom, perhaps. More walls between them and the angry neighbour. But if someone comes knocking, there's no way to get out. The alternative is that he can chance driving Joan somewhere isolated. They're outside of town. If he floors it (and he can, thanks to the engine), they could find a layby easily. But that means being trapped in a car if the demon resurfaces, and it means she could more easily escape again...
He looks back to Joan. "We're making it angry," he says quietly. "That's when it gets harder to hold it back. So you ain't doing anything wrong when you can't fight it down, that's what we want. Get it angry enough, it makes mistakes, it loses its grip, it's more vulnerable to what I'm doing." He gnaws his lip a moment. "What we're doing. Do you — Joan, listen. Do you know anything about it? What do you...if you had to say what it looks like, what it's scared of, what it's called?"
It's gotten into her. Maybe she's gotten into it too.
"Yeah, but I mean..." She frowns. "What makes it leave? We convincing it or kicking it out? I skipped that bit of Sunday school."
But his question dredges up a memory of the creature's twisted mind, and she flinches from nothing, reacting to half remembered images. Burning pyres, snow and prayer, sacrifice... She squares down, forcing herself to think. It's all she can do, and she's stubborn and determined to win.
"I'll tell you," she says, "but you gotta promise me something first."
![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
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Wait.
"Would it... want me to kill myself?" She knows it's a she, and she has some inkling of its name, even, but Joan refuses to give it such clearance and respect.
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Instead, he grips her shoulder, rolls her onto her back, and sits down by her. "It wants you to give in," he says. "So it can take over permanently. But it can't do that unless you tell it to. It'll try and trick you, and push you, but unless you say yes it can't go that far. But you ain't gonna do that, so it's gonna get mad. Then, yeah. It'll probably try to kill you. Maybe it'd want you to kill yourself."
It doesn't need a gun to end her life. It could starve her out, or snap her neck.
"It won't come to that. I'm telling you it won't."
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But there's something she doesn't quite credit.
"But why does it want me?" She's useless. Even if she wasn't a horrible bitch with a rotten soul, her place in life is minimal at best, an existence barely scraped out.
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He exhales and says, "I don't know. Opportunism. Maybe it just wanted a challenge, huh? Maybe that."
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The creature, the demon, the fallen angel, she has endless sources of energy. She is an eternal being, waiting and watchful. She looks up with Joan's eyes, slow and careful, trying to imitate that tiredness. She is older than the desert sand, but not a terribly good actor.
Not a terribly bad one, either. "Maybe it's... because of you? Because you weren't doing your job."
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But Joan doesn't want to be protected. Marcus exhales, as he realises, and actually relaxes. At least he knows what to do with demons; how to act with friends is far more mysterious. His upper lip hitches up in a sneer.
"Wondered when you'd come out to play," he murmurs, getting slowly to his feet so he's no longer perched on the bed beside her. "Sure this is a good idea?"
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She leans forward on the bed, pulling at Joan's wrists against the cuffs. They didn't actually tie her to the bed in any meaningful way. She could use that later. For now... "The truth is, I did it because I could. So obsessed with reasons and meaning, mankind wails about it endlessly like spoilt children. You have no idea the world you miss, the true meaning, stripped from you for the sake of will and choice. God has abandoned you, too, but you never see it that way."
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His grin splits wider as he keeps toying with the medal. "Sort of funny, innit, how you know all about true meaning and you're still scared of a little bit of metal. Guess you ain't keen on St Margaret."
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And then anger flares up, and her sweet honey voice catches a scratch and hiss. Joan's face is made for frowns and scowls, and the look of rage in the demon's eyes suits her well. There's no strange dissonance, just an angry creature wearing an angry glove. "I don't fear some dead apocryphal whore. I am cursed to bleed because my cruel Father wills it. He holds a grudge and sets us upon each other like wild beasts, and now you prey upon me."
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And he has a job to do.
"O God, who didst grant to Saint George strength and constancy in the various torments which he sustained for our holy faith; we beseech Thee to preserve, through his intercession, our faith from wavering and doubt — "
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A neighbour bangs on the wall, and there's a muted shout to 'keep it the fuck down'.
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He's dropped his voice to a hiss, trying to quiet her down.
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Well, time to find out.
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His own instincts roil, telling him to yank her lower jaw out of place, but that's more than he wants to do to the body that the demon's inhabiting. Instead he brings his open palm colliding into her cheek, metal between his hand and her face — a slap to try and startle her into letting go, the medal to burn her. "St Florian, pray for us, St Dennis, St Giles, pray for us — "
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The medal has made an impressive welt on her cheek, already boiling over with blood and bile.
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"O God, grant us through the intercession of Your holy virgin and martyr Margaret, the graces necessary to undauntedly confess the faith — "
He grabs for his bag with his bleeding hand and comes up with the purple stole he's stopped wearing now, just like he doesn't wear a collar anymore. He balls it up and tries to stuff it in her mouth, pushing thick, musty fabric between her teeth while he scrabbles with his other hand in his bag for the duct tape he's sure is somewhere there.
" — carefully observe chastity in our state of life, and — and overcome the temptations of the world, the devil, and the flesh — "
http://bfy.tw/Jb7r ????
When Marcus comes back, he'll find bloody tears and eyes devoid of pupils, the creature inside of Joan trying to push them both to the limits of endurance.
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He has to shut up, though, to tug at the end of the duct tape with his teeth, his other hand trying to keep the fabric in her mouth.
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She lays there, panting on the shitty bed, and looks up at Marcus with heavily lidded eyes. Somehow through her exhaustion she's doing her best to communicate annoyance.
There's a musty rag in her fucking mouth.
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Fuck it. He yanks the stole out of her mouth.
"Hey," he murmurs. "Look at you, lucid and everything. 'S alright. You're doing fine."
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"I didn't know laundromats had a taste," she murmurs wearily. It's the cleverest thing she can dredge up at the moment. "How-" her eyes flicker to him. "How'm I 'doing good'? How does this even work?"
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He looks back to Joan. "We're making it angry," he says quietly. "That's when it gets harder to hold it back. So you ain't doing anything wrong when you can't fight it down, that's what we want. Get it angry enough, it makes mistakes, it loses its grip, it's more vulnerable to what I'm doing." He gnaws his lip a moment. "What we're doing. Do you — Joan, listen. Do you know anything about it? What do you...if you had to say what it looks like, what it's scared of, what it's called?"
It's gotten into her. Maybe she's gotten into it too.
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But his question dredges up a memory of the creature's twisted mind, and she flinches from nothing, reacting to half remembered images. Burning pyres, snow and prayer, sacrifice... She squares down, forcing herself to think. It's all she can do, and she's stubborn and determined to win.
"I'll tell you," she says, "but you gotta promise me something first."
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i thought i replied to this fucking tag omfg.
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