Ravenshook Cliffs stage 4: depression (m)

Mature Content Warning

This thread has been marked as mature. By reading and/or participating in this thread, you acknowledge that you are of age or have permission from your parents to do so.

The participants have indicated the following reason(s) for this warning: Suicidal ideation.

Everything began with a scream. Why not let it end the same way?

He had been here before — for a moment he recognized the scent of the sea and the rumble of the waves far below. As he climbed the world's end, the tide beckoned and boomed, crashing against the cliffside with an urgency he was afraid of. Everything felt disjointed.

This wasn't where he was meant to be.

Hadn't he died here? No, but close.

That memory tugged at his mind but Titmouse refused to look back to it. He refused to relive his greatest hits of failures. No. He was done.

Not runnin' no more, he murmured against a backdrop of rumbling. He perched himself upon the edge and considered his options.

She'd followed him. Lurked in the shadows (though refused to follow his progress into Blackfeather Woods, where she would never set paw again—she swore it so). Waited for him to emerge, then floated over the all-too familiar flatlands.

And ahead, there he stood. Muttering to himself. 

Nothing had changed.

Death had been a great release for Maegi—the breaking of the shackles that bound her to this terrible life. Far eclipsing even the happiest days of her life was the moment of her last breath.

Now, as she watched the love of her life in senile contemplation, perched precariously on these cliffs. . .

She felt the desire for Mou to live this same freedom ripple into the depths of her soul.

Let him go, by Jaes, she thought, ghostly tears pricking hot at the corners of her mismatched eyes.

vague based on our ongoing thread!

He didn't know what to do.

He wanted it over; hadn't he suffered enough from the start?

Had Galaxy been his fault?
One eye, paid in full.

Had he ruined his family?
His voice for Raven.

A broken leg had brought him to Maegi; a good trade, finally.

Love had brought him Blueberry, Miseria, Hypnos; but fire had ravaged their home — had he deserved that? Had they?

Titmouse watched the sea. He did not know he was being watched in turn. This time his focus was entirely on himself. He didn't feel the winter wind tussle at his coat, or the salt in the air burning his eye.

Hell, he barely saw over the edge for all the tears gathered there.

Maegi, he gasped, looking down.

All alone now. It's not fair.

No, it's not, she replied, barely forcing the words past the aching thrill she felt at his saying her name for the first time in. . .how long?!

The way he said it—it felt right.

She moved to sit by him, positioning herself alongside the intact eye, so she'd sit in vision and not darkness. All the while expecting him to bolt as he had in the alpine forest.

Life's not been fair to us, Maegi continued, shrugging. Probably why we made such a good match.

And a bad one, forbye. Broken children; drugged-out misfits. A miracle they'd even found each other—but were they better off for it?

Didn't matter now. It was done.

Titmouse didn't look anywhere else, just down at the dark ledge that met the sea. He felt it rumbling beneath. He thought he could see her in the periphery of his good eye, and was afraid to look; afraid and tired, really. She said what he imagined she would say. It was almost a comfort.

I shoulda let 'em kill me. A childish sniffle came from him then. Blinking through tears, although that clarified nothing.

So many times. So, so many times. But I'm still -- silence came to him as his tongue became weighted, and he couldn't finish. Weeping. Wishing to be free of the pain of it all. Why was he still here? Obviously the universe didn't care for him.

It had wanted Titmouse from the start. Then it wanted to devote Screech. He'd been safe for a while when he'd fully dissociated as the Body, but — Mou, finally. The happiest he had been. Still, he was shattered.

I... I died here, once. He remembered bits and pieces: Towhee throwing him over the edge, and Undersea. Maybe, a breath, maybe it's where I'm meant to be.

So many times.

Her mind flickered over all her close calls, too. So alike, they were. It was almost too crazy to believe, how each of their lives had been steered so haphazardly here and there. Tempting fate.

But you didn't die here, she reasoned. And I followed you into the sea, once, too—just up the coast.

And they'd both lived, still.

You're meant to be with me, Maegi went on, looking over at him. Here, there, anywhere. I—

She glanced away, sucking in a breath. Or the appearance of one, anyway. All I wanted was for us to be happy. Together.

He was quiet while she spoke. While he thought. And when she said she wanted him to be with her, he loomed over the edge and felt the wind finally upon his neck, his cheeks, caressing.

Maegi... He said her name like a prayer.

They had been happy once.

Her image shimmered beside him, and still he would not look. Tears coursed down his long face and dripped off his nose and chin; in to the dark, the raging beneath.

The void. He'd carried it with him ever since Hydra. He stared down at it now, his tears spent.

Finally, he turned his head and looked to see her there: nothing scarred, nothing crooked; beautiful, as he had always seen her.

Wordless, Titmouse took a step, and the void below swallowed him up.

Sated, finally.

The fire of his remaining eye matched her left side, like a mirror. How had she never realized that? Only now did it dawn upon her, as the orange orbs locked into something that felt like finality. So alike.

He fell away.

With a sob, she slipped, too, and sought to take the spider-limbed man in her arms.

To hold him close, feel the waning beat of his heart.

However, wherever, whenever he landed, she'd be beside him. 

Let me take him with me, she begged each and every god she'd ever known.