Wheeling Gull Isle The Apocryphon of John

Hope it's okay I tagged you both! I don't mind if this thread is with either one or both of you guys :)

He has gone back to the place from whence he came

was how the apostle John had responded to the barbed question of the Pharisee: where is your savior now?

But that question then planted a seed of doubt within him, which grew as does any parasite that has found a host. He agonized as the branches cut into him, tender at first but hardening into splinters, drawing blood and sustenance through its abiding veins.

There were many times in history where the earth turned a shearing path along a new axis, tilting into a new world and shedding customs once thought to be immovable. Recall that the Oracles all over Ancient Greece used to deliver their prophecies in rich verse; in Plutarch's time all but one spoke in undecorated prose; not long after that, they ceased giving any prophecy at all, and so began decades of lamentation across civilizations: why does God no longer speak to us?

In his quiet way, Abraham carried the torch shared by John and these lamenters. He found himself wandering back, not to the place from whence he came, but a place he had coincided with, briefly, long ago. A place he associated with his father so strongly, that to him Wheeling Gull Isle seemed to be a mere manifestation of Bartholomew's stewardship on earth, even if the man himself was long gone and his prayers were no longer spoken there.

He gazed upon the pane of the sea, which glimmered in spades of @Blue: there was @Cobalt, and there was teal, and there was the occasional facet of pure sky, as if it had been scattered upon the water via osmosis, across the vast straight-edge horizon.

He was a man unlike any she had seen before — and from where she lurked among shadows, Blue felt herself grow warm at the ears and filled with some odd frenetic fluttering just beneath her breastbone. Suddenly shy and unsure of herself, she lingered. He was pretty. And Blue, she was only a plain girl, too thin and too pale and lacking any luster to her fur.

But this island is mine, she reminded herself, slipping from the shadows in silence. His back to her, the man watched the sea. Her own indigo gaze lingered at the dark curls round his nape, passing over him and finding, lower, that beautiful brindling at his — !

Ears hot now, she averted her gaze. All plastic-made poise, the very picture of cool and unbothered, Blue drew up alongside him with eyes turned to the ocean. She thought of trying to greet him, but the words caught in her throat all dry and thorny before she even knew what words they might be. So she kept her own counsel, hoping that it might read as mysterious rather than socially inept.

As she approached him he readied himself to greet her, but he saw that the look on her face was distant, as if she had come here on a mission and he was an irrelevance unseen in her original design. In fact it was unclear if she was even aware of him.

He did not attempt to parse the cipher of her bearing, instead letting the silence become denser and denser, the seaside ambience lending it significance. Gulls screamed; the tide groaned.

Finally, he spoke. I can leave, if you need space, the flap of one ear laid flush to his cheek as he tilted his head, half out of respect and half in self-deprecation.

But please let me ask one thing of you.

The angle of his muzzle revealed more of the man's face, and Blue's stomach lurched with sudden recognition. She had seen a man like him before, hadn't she? Yet even as her guts churned with the knowledge, she was struck again by the sheer prettiness of him.

She certainly didn't want him to leave — but the words were still stuck to her tongue, so she only shook her head slightly, mute as he went on. He had a question. Blue swallowed, wondering at her fading capacity for speech. After a moment, she managed a soft Yes?

Her gaze remained on the sea.

He only perceived her answer by the movement of her mouth.

Does a man by the name of Bartholomew—

and to call his father by that name felt so wrong; he repressed a grimace but its waylaid tension flickered across his forehead; he tried to finish his question but his voice failed him again and again, a car engine in midwinter. Does—Does he—

He laughed, sheepish, an excuse for him to breathe slowly.

I'm sorry, I meant to ask—does he still live there?

Why did he ask her, when he could go to see for himself?

The dissonance was unbearable. Here he stood as a so-called learned man, a man of letters, a man of God, unable to utter his own father's name. For a moment he thought he glimpsed a lanky shadow ghosting the edge of the island, and he could not help but avert his gaze, heart pounding.

hope you don't mind me popping in! Can ignore and I'll delete if so.

Bartholomew. The name carried with the sea-salt wind. He remembered the name spoken to him when Heda gave her lessons. How he had taught her all she knew of the word of God. It was a prophet that Malakai would have liked to have met, to learn from, to simply listen to as he preached. 

That name is what propelled Malakai forward, who otherwise was content to watch the newcomer and the woman who know claimed this land as hers from a distance. 

I know the name. Malakai called out, leaving the slop of the green land and onto the sandy shores towards the pair. He paid the woman little mind, for it was he which caught Kai's interest. My mother spoke of him quite fondly, though his teachings of our Holy Father has sent him far from here now. And for quite some time.

Blue nearly flinched to hear the name she'd held so carefully away from her thoughts. They looked so alike, she could see it now. Solemnly she shook her head, finally turning to let her gaze settle fully on his face. Bartholomew. Of all those who had come and gone from this island, his still lingered; the loudest whisper in the wind of those souls whose imprints still echoed over the sands.

I knew him, but -

But he's gone now, she might have said. The arrival of Heda's boy cut her short. Blue hid her displeasure behind a display of wariness, stepping around the pretty man's pretty behind so he wouldn't see the glare she shot toward the pale youth. The malice left her eyes just as quickly, and she arranged herself safely on the man's opposite side.

He's been gone a long time, Blue added softly, determined not to let the little shit throw her off. I'm sorry. Longer than you've been alive, she thought bitterly in his general direction.

yay, thanks for joining!

"teachings of the Holy Father"!

and what did it mean, that this boy's mother had spoke of Bartholomew with "fondness"?

something inside of him curdled at those words, if only because he could see his reflection in Bartholomew, now.

as a boy standing at the bedside of his dying mother, the thought of parting had been unbearable. but now he knew that if God had called him to part ways with that sickbed, crusted with the detritus and the excretions of a body falling slowly, inexorably apart...

he would not cast a backwards glance.

and yet, this talk of a mother, and her fondness! he could not help but search for traces of familiarity in the boy's face, and he hated himself for it, hated himself even more for feeling relief in the wake of nonrecognition. he couldn't be Bartholomew's.

his mouth hardened into a line, but his voice remained soft as he spoke.

don't be sorry.

i didn't expect him to... a full-body sigh.

to be there.

the landmass hovered on the horizon. an aberration, a clot, a singularity fashioned out of the sedimentation of his own fears.

who lives on the island, now?

they did not seem to be friends.

Her hard gaze was met with one of disinterest. Malakai did well at this, having pretend time and time again that his sister's bullshit (even the actual blood one) meant very little to him. Inwardly, he raged. He would like to rip her look right off her face, but, alas, that likely was not the will of God. She had still only just returned to the island, after all. There was still time to see if she would open her mind up to something, someone, far greater then she believed her own self to be. 

I've lived here my whole life... Yet, a soft, remorseful smile and shrug of his shoulders. It wasn't saying much, given his age. My parents and siblings too, once. But they were gone now, as it were. @Judah would be back, he knew. Soon, soon... When he realized there was nothing for him on the mainland. 

He straightened. We called this place Sweetharbor. A haven for God's people. Where we could worship and practice our teachings without disturbance or judgement. So far, most of those which came from the mainland had only polluted his family's perfect little world and ripped them apart. Malakai wouldn't give up so easily.