twibeast: (true 37)

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-04 02:38 pm (UTC)(link)
[ He braces himself through that whole silence and when she lunges in he holds up his shields, blocking her from actually reaching him. ]

Brynhilde! Snap out of this, dear...!!

[ She has to be somewhere still in there, right? She's reminding him of what happens when a sentient life form succumbs to mana corruption - but that's not possible here. So if he just speaks to her... ]
twibeast: (119)

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-04 06:16 pm (UTC)(link)
[ The sight of her eye is enough to tell him everything. It may not be mana corruption exactly but it's close enough that he knows: Bryn really isn't in there anymore. All he can think of now is poor Artemis in her youth, futilely begging him not to kill a dogsheep she had befriended but had fallen to the corruption, only for the same "friend" to mindlessly attack her as she did. And what had he done?

He'd done what he had to. He put the monster down before it could even reach her, and held her small, sobbing body afterwards.

Bryn isn't in there anymore, and he knows. And he cares for her, even if he doesn't really know how she ultimately felt about him, if she thought him overbearing and annoying in his attempts to try and be there for her. And because he cares for her, for Hubert, for Somnus, for everyone else, he has to do what Somnus couldn't--

"But if this situation should arise again, I will put a stop to it however should be necessary."
"That's fine. I would do the same."


--and put down this monster wearing her skin.

In an instant he combines his shields together into one large one. He pushes her back with a burst of strength and then in the next second brings it down hard on her head, harder than he even did that first motive all so long ago.

It'll be easier once she's down. ]
Edited 2022-05-04 18:17 (UTC)
pegasinister: (3)

[personal profile] pegasinister 2022-05-04 07:03 pm (UTC)(link)
[It's so suddenly quiet, and even barely conscious Hubert grieves. But what's done is done, and with a grunt he struggles to his knees, peering over the pew]

Bryn...
twibeast: (136)

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-04 07:09 pm (UTC)(link)
[ Orthrus is about to move to crouch down and finish the job but Hubert's voice gets him to stop and look at him, taking his eyes off the downed monster that was Bryn for just a second. ]
twibeast: (126)

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-04 07:43 pm (UTC)(link)
[ He should have known better. He really should have known better.

He doesn't always feel pain the way humans do, but this he does. The way the metal digs in and crushes his leg, and then rips through the skin as he's thrown. The way he eventually lands, crashing through the pews on the other side of the room, wood breaking beneath him.

He lays there in the wreckage, completely still on his side, in the perfect position for Bryn an Hubert to still be in his line of sight-- ]
Edited 2022-05-04 19:43 (UTC)
pegasinister: (33)

[personal profile] pegasinister 2022-05-04 08:24 pm (UTC)(link)
[He realizes his mistake almost the instant it happens. But an instant is still not fast enough. If he was of sound body and mind he oculd have warped away. Could have attacked her with a spell. But he's not. He's down and eye an arm and a large amount of his own blood.

He's killed enough men to know, at this point help would not come fast enough, he was going to die. The next time he passed out, mostly likely. If he used any magic it would just come faster.

He told Karl before that he knew he was never leaving this tower. Spoken over Bruno's corpse like it's own dark prophecy. So like Bruno he closes his eye... and accepts it.

'Bryn... I am... so sorry.']
twibeast: (true 42)

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-05 07:00 am (UTC)(link)
[ He’s powerless to do anything but watch as the monster (he has to keep thinking of it like that to remind himself to not think of it as Bryn anymore) finishes Hubert off in the most horrifying way possible. Ah. He’s failed both Hubert and Somnus now. How many more will die now? How many will he fail by sunrise?

For a moment the life goes out of his pitch black eyes. What does it matter now? He wanted to die, didn’t he? That’s what all astral beasts should want. Freedom from their endless curse. He should have died as a child, and now he’s lived too long - it’s only right he dies. He had tried to go so far as to even offer his life to Heisenberg, won’t this be enough?

No. You can’t die like this.

A voice that isn’t his keeps yelling in his mind. Just as it did at Stella’s trial, when it told him to keep the details of his own power, of the effects of his mana on others, to himself.

You have to get up! You have to get up right now!

Strange. He doesn’t recognize the voice at all, and yet somehow it’s familiar and comforting all the same.

If you don’t have the strength to get up then you will have mine!

He can tell his earring is getting hot. Hotter and hotter like a furnace.

I’m not going to let another one of you just die…!

Shakily Orthrus begins to move, pushing himself up with his arms, fueled entirely by his father’s fire and love for all of his children. ]
twibeast: (true 37)

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-05 07:33 am (UTC)(link)
[ He can’t quite stand, he can tell his leg hadn’t fully recovered yet, but he’s sitting up at least, supported by both arms. He looks up just in time to see the monster vault at him and so quickly he throws his arms up in front of himself and with it a new shield. ]
twibeast: (true 45)

It’s time

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-05 07:45 am (UTC)(link)
[ He keeps the shield up but starts to feel it push back the more she punches. He can’t let it down though - for not just his sake but everyone else sleeping just a few floors below.

He only has one chance at this. And he has to make it count.

Once the perfect timing arises he reforms the shield into a lance and puts it right through her rose eye. ]
twibeast: (116)

1/2 cw: dissociation

[personal profile] twibeast 2022-05-05 04:51 pm (UTC)(link)
[ As soon as the monster that was once Bryn is down and, more importantly, stays down Orthrus crumples into a heap. Like a doll being dropped he lands with his back against the wrecked pews, his eyes pointed at the ceiling.

Everything is quiet now.

He lays there for what feels like an eternity, before his body starts to finally move independently of him. He watches it as it manages to correct whatever was done to his leg and starts to limp across the chapel (Don't worry, your leg will be fine in a few hours, it'll be fine before the trial). Dragging itself to Hubert's body (Don't look at it) it finds the harp still hidden under the pews (You can't leave this here, they'll know it's you) before leaving the chapel entirely.

Clean up. You have to clean up.

So much of Hubert's blood is on him now, and in the back of his mind he notes a trickling down his leg. The restroom is just a floor below, it'll do. He watches his body stagger in there, surely having tracked more blood with it, and remove all his clothes before collapsing onto his knees under the running shower head.

It's so cold. The room is so cold. And yet he himself is running so hot, like a system overheating. He wants to cry, it's so uncomfortable.

Then cry. But no matter what you must survive.

He sits there under the water as the voices get louder and louder until it drowns out everything else.

Survive.

Survive.

Survive.


Someone is sobbing. Someone is wailing their heart out. Sobbing and crying and wailing and cursing and-- ]