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Post by lilywilde on Oct 16, 2016 19:52:12 GMT -6
Sol's words to Lily caused her to recoil as if she'd just been slapped with tangible anger which radiated from Sol. She had already pursed her lips, quivering slightly after the rebuke.
It made sense, really. Her little speeches almost never actually worked. In reality, people weren't so quick to forgive as she was. Her ears flattened on her head, she stood there silently, recalling Kelly's words. This kind of thing just needed to be worked out. He would calm down when he calmed down. She should have been more careful about what she'd said. His arm was not a topic she'd be likely to broach again any time in the near future.
As she stood in the water, dejected and afraid of what else might be said, Lily found herself recoiling again, taking a step back as Sol began shouting for her to shut up. She could feel tears beginning to well up in her eyes. She didn't want this, she hated being the object of Sol's anger, but if she were to be his friend, she imagined she would be on more than one occasion.
Before the first tear could roll down Lily's cheek however, Sol's shouting was punctuated by a terrible screech that shook Lily to the very core. Her ears started dancing atop her head before they singled in on something awful. If the screech hadn't been proof enough, the telltale beating wings certainly were. She could hear them well before Sol, and already she was clutching below her chest as if she'd just been stabbed there and was trying to stop the bleeding. She fell to her knees in the water, her whole body numb. The cold didn't even register as her eyes scanned everything wildly. From the tips of the cresting choppy surf, to the tops of the trees, she scanned everything frantically. Muttering incoherently under her breath as she knelt there. She could hear nothing except for beating wings. Feel nothing except for the debilitating pain in her midsection that left her weak. She began taking shallow but rapid breaths. Tears began streaking down her face in earnest.
All thoughts of the former rebuke were gone from her mind now. In fact, everything was gone from the wild girl's mind except for the instinct to run, and the awful inability to turn that instinct into willful action. All she could do was kneel there clutching at her midsection with the hope that the pain would fade soon.
The beating wings didn't cease. They drew nearer and nearer. Shakily, Lily finally turned her eyes skyward. Her eyes met the blood red orbs centered in the porcelain bone mask. She could swear the gigantic bird was staring straight at her. Whether that was her fear at work, or whether her downward spiral was like a beacon that proclaimed her presence, she would never know. It hung in the sky for a moment before letting out another loud screech. Another flap of it's wings sent a flurry of razor sharp feathers toward the girl in the water. Through some miracle, all of them narrowly missed her. One feather did graze her cheek, opening up a red gash that leaked a small drop of blood. It trailed down her face before dropping off of her chin like a crimson tear.
Lily screamed.
It wasn't something she realized she was doing at first. In fact, she hadn't truly noticed the scream until she felt her throat beginning to hurt. She tried to stop herself, felt the shrill sound emanating from her throat more than heard it. The sobbing, wretched noise. Her midsection began to hurt anew, much more intensely than when she'd first noticed the nevermore's presence. This was because without realizing it, her claws had extended themselves unbidden. She had given herself eight shallow cuts in her abdomen surrounding her scar tissue. She tried to pull her hands away from where she was clutching herself to prevent further damage, and wound up shredding her toga dress in that section. Her hands found their way to her head, which she held as she screamed. Tears were pouring down her face and her claws began to dig into her scalp. She wanted to run, but she couldn't will any strength into her legs. She wanted to hide, but the only refuge available to her was under the icy waves. She wanted to do anything, be anywhere but here.
She was alone now, alone with the nevermore. Sol could have fled for all she knew. He would have been wise to. However, Lily wasn't thinking about him whatsoever. She focused entirely on her impending doom. On the pain that ate away at her core. Memories of sharp beaks and terrible screeches filled her head. She remembered all too well what tragedy these giant birds could bring. The sharp beak that had given her the massive scar in the center of her being was a memory she wasn't too keen to relive, but it came.
She had been sleeping in the ruins. She lay atop a high tower thinking herself safe from the grim below. She woke violently with a piercing pain in her center. One gigantic bird intent on making a meal of her, another four circling overhead looking with envy at the bird who'd landed first.
She was not conscious for the ensuing battle, not was she conscious during her healing, but when she came to, there were people. People who didn't want to kill her, or sell her. They were nice people. The first and only she'd met in a long time.
Her thoughts were also on a younger version of her. A version of her that'd known no fear. Fool hardy and stubborn, thinking her and her parents invincible. She'd not shown the proper respect.
This had gotten her parents killed. Her own fool hardiness. To think that she'd actually had the courage to fight one back then. What a fool she'd been. She came as close as she could in that moment to reflecting on her past, and realized that all of the tragedy in her life was her fault. If she hadn't already been screaming herself hoarse, she would have been.
Her speech was a muffled cacophony of "Not again not again not again" with the occasional "please please please" thrown in. Gibberish words also found their way into the mix, words spoken so softly underneath her breath in rapid succession that neither her nor Sol would ever know what they represented. It was slightly better than screaming herself hoarse, but only just.
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Post by Solomon Moon on Oct 17, 2016 1:45:43 GMT -6
 world seemed to clarify around Sol, as a brief moment of sanity broke through the savage haze that lingered upon his mind, and everything seemed to sharpen until the very sight of it could draw blood. Brutal understanding crystallized before his mind's eye, a single unarguable directive that state in no uncertain terms that the options were, "Act now, or perish.". Whatever else might be said of Sol, indecision simply was not in his nature. However, the nature of his decisions was a topic better left undisclosed for now. He yelled until he was hoarse, and he could taste blood at the back of his throat, and he continued to yell as his voice, even at the peak of it's volume was swallowed in the piercing shriek of the approaching bird. Judging distance was impossible without a point of reference, other than to say that the beast was close. Too close, Sol realized at the same instant that he realized Lily was not listening to him. The girl was looking straight past him, over his left shoulder and into the eyes of an eternal evil whose kind had already been a perfect killing machine in ages that predated written history. Sol did not need to turn to see what she was looking at, as her gorgeous grey eyes, wide as saucers reflected the scene like pale mirrors. The crow swept back it's unholy wings, and with a sharp swipe of both colossal limbs it unleashed a gust that turned the air into a gale of razor blades. Sol staggered forward, driven towards the faunus, as a two razor sharp feathers found their marks in his back, and made unpleasant crunching thuds as their points were driven into his breastplate. A third feather scored a slash across Lily's cheek, leaving behind a red streak that hung in the air. She didn't even seem to feel it, though truth be told, Sol was so terrified that he barely felt the couple that had penetrated his back either, and he had no way of telling how deep they had gone without glancing back to check. It was then that Lily began to scream, first clutching her mid section then her head, as she collapsed to her knees and wailed in fear and confusion. It was possibly the most horrible noise Sol had ever heard, not in the least because even a shriek of mortal terror still sounded sweet and musical when delivered in the cat-girls soft tuneful voice. He decided in that moment that he never wanted to hear such a sound ever again, but if it meant escaping with his life, he would gladly endure it a hundred times over.
It was a sound that filled his veins with cold lead, and it took all of his will to urge his bones and muscles into motion. The effort lasted a moment but was so great that he worried that his frozen veins would shatter from the force of it.
He lunged ahead, bounding through the sand and regretting every instant lost when the grains shifted beneath his weight. He heard the beast rearing up again to unleash another volley, but he could not verify it this time because Lily's eyes were shut and his only means of viewing the creature was lost to him.
Sol's body crashed against Lily with the desperate strength of a man trying to outrun death itself, and the pair of them tumbled through the sand just as another wind of razors laid waste to the beachfront. Sol let out a single scream in anticipation of the inevitable pain as feathers like daggers cut furrows through his silhouette.
He would only realize later that what he'd screamed was Lily's name.
A million thoughts appeared half realized in his mind, and then evaporated just as quickly. He knew that Lily was fast, but she couldn't run. He'd seen her clutch her stomach. Had she been injured? What had happened to her between when he'd baited the barghests and she'd saved him from being ambushed? She had been covered in blood when she reappeared, grimm blood, but what's to say that some of hers wasn't mixed in with all the black.
He remembered her clutching at her stomach as she buckled following the first barrage. Dark possibilities invaded his mind and he let out a low moan of despair as he cinched his arms tightly around her form. There was no time to check. They had to get away, assuming it wasn't already too late for that as well.
The bird swung around in another circle that took up most of the visible sky, content to wear down it's prey with showers of sharpened black feathers, rather than risk landing to engage. Sol would have admired the intelligence of such a conservative tactic, given that he and lily, limited by the weaknesses of their respective kit, had no means of enduring a protracted engagement against a flying opponent with ranged capabilities.
Stripes of white hot pain flared along all of Sol's extremities as he forced himself to a kneeling position over the supine form of the catatonic faunus. He ignored the blood that covered them both, ignorant of what was his, hers, or the remains of grimm, and collected the girl into his arms. He cradled her as tenderly as he could manage, head propped up against the left side of his clavicle, her right arm slung across his shoulders, and his left arm beneath her shoulders while the other supported her legs.
"Never leave a soldier behind." He growled to himself as he surged to his feet and twisted towards the trees.
The massive crow was making another approach, and talons like a fist of scythes snatched at the sand as Sol sprinted towards the treeline. Sol sprang to one side, his legs screaming with the effort of trying to move quickly through the shifting dunes. He huddled up around the girl, protecting her form with his armor as another scattering of sharpened feathers struck around them.
The bird squawked, at a volume usually reserved for bullhorns as it pulled up and swooped out over the waves before banking to make a fourth pass.
Sol expected he could protect Lily, or try to ward the bird off with his weapons, though none had sufficient range to actually threaten the crow, but he certainly could not accomplish both. That left only trying to flee. Checking on Lily, calling for help, those would only matter if he could get away right now.
Growling in frustration he forced himself to stand again with only the use of his legs, his balance severely limited by his cargo, and even his mighty muscles laboring beneath the strain at this point. He did not risk using his aura, because it had drawn the grimm out in the first place, and the last thing that anyone needed was another nevermore showing up.
Lily was muttering something as she reclined against him like the world's saddest sack of sand. She was pleading for something, and the sound of it twisted Sol's charred heart, whilst simultaneously urging his body to the absolute peak of its capabilities. No pain yet inflicted could equal the tragedy of Lily's voice, and while that didn't actually make him stronger, it did make his injuries seem much less significant.
Sol limped at the pace of a leisurely jog, each stride inching him closer to the trees, and that much closer to safety. He knew he would not be safe in the woods, but at least he could hide and rest in the shade of the fronds, and hopefully recover enough of his strength to make it to the crags and caves that dotted the foot of the extinct volcano.
The nevermore made another pass, spraying Sol's path with black blades in an attempt to keep him on the sands. The young lord shifted Lily's small body so that he could cradle her weight with just his left arm, a feat achieved only due to his notable physique. He held her tightly until her face was pressed between his cheek and his shoulder, as he wound up with his right arm and swung for the fences.
A shrill tone rose into a sudden percussive scream as a huge vent behind his shoulder unleashed a jet of flame that reduced the remains of his blazer to a fine ash, as a spearhead of fire sprang from his right scapular. The pair were launched like a rocket across the last stretch of sand, passing through a cloud of bladed plumage as they went. The flight was clumsier than it would have been had Sol been unencumbered, and being pelted by knives didnt help. At the last moment he was forced to twist his body to protect the girl from the impact.
A gnarled bough of some mangrove tree that matched none of the Atlesian plants that Sol was familiar with, shattered into a cloud of splinters as he and his cargo crashed through it. Sol's breath was driven out in a single ragged gust as all the air was forcefully ejected from his chest. He clung desperately to his precious bundle that had been spared the worst of the crash by the combination of his armor and his arms encircling her.
Through blurry eye, wracked by pains in parts of his body that he'd almost forgotten he had, Sol spotted his sanctuary. A small cave, eroded into the foothills by streams that fell from the top of the larger peaks, sat a short run from where he and Lily had landed.
"Hang in there..." He whispered, his voice hoarser and thinner than usual, as his left hand squeezed her to him.
For the final time, (Sol knew he would not be able to rise should he fall again), the one eyed swordsman struggled to his feet, every part of his body, pierced, bruised, or broken. He limped, dragging his right boot awkwardly, over stumps and logs, inching towards the welcoming mouth of safety. A shrill caw pierced the silence, moments before a gigantic talon tore away a massive chunk of the forest canopy nearby. Sol ignored it.
If the next talon fell above him, he and Lily would die, and nothing he could do would change that. He just had to play the odds, as he had a dozen times before when marching beneath mortar fire, and hope that today wasn't his unlucky day.
Another chunk of the ceiling was snatched skyward, and then dropped unceremoniously in another part of the wood. Sol clung to his nerves as desperately as he clung to Lily's limp figure, his face a study in grim determination, enhanced by the streaks of fresh blood, as apposed to diminished. The cave was so close now that he could feel a cool draft of air rising from it's damp depths.
Just then the canopy immediately overheard was shredded by huge claws, and Sol yelled and sprang the last handful of feet just as the entire bird crashed through the treetops behind him and alighted upon the forest floor with a deafening crash. The crow cried in a unholy siren that made Sol's ears ring as he skidded to a halt on his back, golden eye finding red as the titan's cruel beak stabbed into the cave after it's prey, like a finch rooting for worms.
"YOU CANT HAVE HER!" Sol declared as he held out his right hand towards the red eyed giant, and unleashed a gout of red flame in's direction.
The bird squawked in surprise and confusion as it's awful lashing tongue was scalded by the pillar of fire, and there was the sound of more crashing and splintering wood from the cave entrance as the great beast turned to take flight once more.
Sol, breathing heavily, wide eyed, bloody, exhausted, and well beyond terrified, kicked along his back towards the furthest rear wall of the cave and planted himself there. He just stared at the entrance to the cave, at large black feathers drifting in the breeze and leaves as they fell from the recent hole in to the forest canopy untill he was absolutely certain that the bird was not going to jam it's beak back in. Then finally he decided to check on Lily.
Without any sign of modesty or care personal space, as he was well beyond the point where either concept even made sense to him, and using the sharpened claws of his right hand, he tore open Lily's dress from just about the waist to just below the bust. His eye grew wide at what he found.
A gruesome scar, as long as his forearm, stretched from her sternum right down her stomach, and razor sharp understanding exploded in Sol's brain like a grenade made of barbed wire and scalpels. Suddenly the girl's reaction at the sight of the crow made sense to him.
He squeezed his eye shut and wrapped his arms around the girl, and held her as tightly as he dared, while he buried his face in her hair.
"Oh god... I am sorry..." He said, his voice overcome with an emotion somewhere between relief, sympathy and sorrow sounding thin and hollow in the empty chamber.
tag(s): lilywilde ━ words: 000 ━ notes: Color code 7319e6 made by ira of stf and ww |
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Post by lilywilde on Oct 18, 2016 8:27:19 GMT -6
The world seemed to be a haze for Lily for some time. She had vibrant flashes of reality, but it was mostly dark. Terror gripped her mind in it's icy claws. She heard her name from somewhere far away, shouted in desperation. It was followed by a passing warmth that only numbed the terror momentarily before her form was chilled once more.
Lily was a being composed entirely of terror and tears, her eyes leaked onto Sol as she buried her face in his arms, seeking refuge from the terrible reality of the world. She was totally unaware of this burrowing. She was disconnected from reality entirely. Her whole world was black feathers and blood. She shook violently, even though she couldn't so much as feel the cold water which had soaked her legs and the bottom of her dress.
Her ears could hear the sound of wing beats still. They had keyed in on that noise, and each time a new volley of feathers found their way towards them, she let out a soft cry. Tears continued to streak down her face. She was vaguely aware of being shifted in some way, but again, the awareness was distant. Something far away that didn't concern her in her dark place.
The feathers, the blood. Those were all that she could feel. She smelled blood vividly. The metallic scent threatened to drown her. If it did not, the feathers would surely suffocate her anyway.
She could hear something again. Someone familiar, someone shouting. Warmth, much more intense this time. The blood she was drowning in began to bubble at the heat of it. The feathers caught fire. Though the warmth began to fade, if only momentarily, the blood never stopped it's boil. It was receding, steaming away into nothingness.
Suddenly, fire and ice invaded her world. The fire burned away all of the feathers in one fell swoop, and the ice shattered her very world. As reality snapped back into focus, she let out a sobbing cry. She realized she was being held, and her arms found their way around her savior. She squeezed as tightly as her thin arms were capable of squeezing, sobbing and shaking. The sound of wingbeats echoed off of the cave walls softly. Cave walls. She realized that they were no longer out in the open.
Caverns and the deep places of the earth were familiar to Lily. If the forests and jungles were her home, these subterranean caverns were her backyard. A place of familiarity and safety. She would take refuge in the caves during the worst storms, or the coldest nights. In the cavernous walls, the movements of grimm could be heard echoing for miles within their walls. It was impossible to sneak up on her, or to surprise her with an ambush in a cavern. The feathers and the claws could not reach her here. The beak could never pierce the stone above her.
She didn't know how she'd wound up here, but she was certain that the one who embraced her with arms of fire and ice was responsible. She remained there, crying until she could sob no more. Her hand shifted slightly up his back, and she could feel a protrusion that should not have been there. She didn't even have to look to know what it was. A feather of razor.
"You're injured..." She said worriedly, squeezing tighter. She buried her face in his chest as she squeezed. "I'm so sorry..." She said sounding like she had more to say, but trailing off. She knew that he'd saved her, that he'd gotten hurt doing so. Just like her parents. She was helpless, relying on the assistance of others. If the tears weren't already streaming down her face, she would have been crying at that thought alone. "I... I was a burden to you. I'm so sorry, I couldn't do anything. I could have gotten you killed."
She squeezed again, glad that her face was hidden so he couldn't see the pain there. She'd never wanted to be the reason someone was hurting. She longed to protect people, to shield them from pain.
"How bad is it? I... I'll get help. I'm sure there are herbs on this island, I can make some medicine." She offered, the sound of daunting wing beats still pierced her down to the core, but her voice promised courage in the face of that. She had grown adept at treating her own injuries while out in the wilds. Her father had shown her all he knew about which herbs were poison, and which were medicinal. He'd taught her all about creating salves and applying tinctures and poultices. She was confident though, she wouldn't break down again. They had the cover of forest to hide them, and the girl wasn't going to freeze up while someone needed her. The initial surprise had passed, she could function again, if only that. She wouldn't let the fear take her again. Her arms never grew slack. She was unwilling to let him go yet. She still shook, and tears were still flowing, albeit at a diminished rate, but she would let him go in order to help protect him. Though she had no desire to leave him alone like this, it might be required.
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Post by Solomon Moon on Oct 21, 2016 1:07:01 GMT -6
became the shadows as they slowly shortened in the noon day sun. Sensation became the warmth of Lily as she whimpered in his arms, while the scent of drying blood filled his head like a metal haze. Thoughts became thin and indistinct, occasionally punctuated by fear, and rarely by a more complex impression that defied description.
Sol did not dare move. It was taking all of his remaining stamina to remain awake, and every motion sent cool vibrations of agony rattling away from his injuries, which seemed to multiply with each moment. He could not spare the energy that it would have taken to do anything but fix his gaze on the entrance as his right arm stuck out rigid as a post, a dull glow filling it's blue core. Each moment was dominated by a single directive to remain vigilant for a stabbing beak of snatching talon.
To say his field of view had been tunneled would fail to account for how he was actually in a tunnel. It made Sol feel as if he was squinting through a keyhole, and as if all his pain and weariness existed on the other side of that hole, along with the cruel motives of the black bird that was doubtless waiting patiently to ambush anything that left the cave. It would have been the easiest thing in the world to just close his eye and have a nap, and he knew with the certainty of daybreak that he would never wake if he gave in to the temptation. Whether he was right or not did not change that he was perfectly convinced that to falter for even a moment would mean death.
Lily' stirred in his grasp, occasionally speaking, but often only murmuring in a voice that sounded as weak and pathetic as he felt. Her hair smelled of wild flowers as he rested his cheek against her crown, his eye peering between he laid back ears at the treacherous cave entrance. The way that scent mixed in his head with the smell of blood seemed unjustly profane to Sol. She cried sometimes, and that was worse, because it only made the young soldier with an old soul feel even more helpless than he did already. Whatever demons tormented her were well beyond his ability to challenge, though in a perverse way he felt he knew them well enough.
He didn't know if she was awake, and the only clue that she was alive was the continuous whimpering and sobbing that soon became the score to underline Solomon's entire world. He had squeezed her at first, trying to sooth her, but his arm had long since lost the strength to do anything but hold on. As broken as he was, flayed and pierced from head to toe, muscles depleted, blood retreated, the girl, with hair as black as fine sable, eyes like the moon on a cloudy night, a voice like the whispering of snow, and skin as soft as a kiss, was the only anchor that continued to hold him to this awful world. Somehow he felt, in the way that broken men's minds alight upon fanciful notions, that she was a beacon of light that was keeping the darkness from swarming in and consuming him. How amusing it might have been to him had he even suspected that lost to the vistas of her own mind, that he was the same for her. Amusing, if tragic.
He could not begin to imagine what compulsions had paralyzed the unfortunate faunus, but going by the nature of his own experience, Sol pitied her. Though he had only a general understanding of how his own demons demanded a toll, he had seen the affect that trauma could have on a shell shocked soldier, and this catatonia was nothing that was beyond his imagination. Some never recovered from it. Sol certainly hadn't.
When her crying ceased, it was as if a third of the universe had whimpered out of existence, and though it had only been a few minutes, Sol felt as if he'd spent a lifetime judging time by the frequency of Lily's cries. He would have been startled, but in a strange way, he mourned that new silence. Then the girl moved, and before he could respond to this unthinkable development, she touched the jagged remains of a sharpened feather that jutted from his back. It was only a slight thing, but the disturbance of a few millimeters felt like a continental shift taking place in his upper back, and it sent an earthquake of mind obliterating suffering spiraling up his spine.
Sol's voice escaped in a gasping sob that left him feeling hoarse and light headed, as the finger nails of his left hand dug into the girl's shoulder. The shock of pain made other parts of him move, further disturbing a platoon of unhappy hurts that existed across what felt like every inch of his body. Ragged walls of fresh ravines incised into his skin rubbed together, and Sol felt the individual textures of a hundred unique agonies.
Lily's voice, when she spoke, seemed to rise like light from a mist of murky anguish, and for a moment it was just noise to his reeling ears.
Sol coughed, and his deep voice seemed dull like tarnished steel, thin, weak. It rose in a sardonic laugh that sounded neither happy, nor healthy. Within the sound which would have passed for gravel on a slope, lurked a nugget of golden relief.
"Told you to shut up with that foolishness... Too late for all that.."
He wasn't angry, as his wrath had been one of the first things to escape along with the pint or so of blood that he'd spilled on the stones around them. He was just happy to not be alone anymore. He wasn't as afraid of anything as he was of being alone at that very moment, and he'd feared that more than anything when Lily's weeping stopped.
"It's bad..." He replied, coughing again, a ragged, bloody sound that filled the air with the scent of copper. He continued to speak between the fits of coughing, words used sparingly as if he could only afford a finite supply. "Getting hard to breath. Punctured lung, thorax filling with air. Gonna suffocate... Need to get out of armor. Latches on right side."
He laid his left hand on the small of her back, and would have pushed her away if the strength was there to do so. He was forced to give up, and his hand fell to his hip and with the popping of fiction buttons he pulled free a small canvas bag with a white cross stitched upon the tongue. He tossed it weakly, into a shallow puddle of blood that had formed around where he sat.
"Need rubber sheet, tape, knife, bandages. Quick, before lungs collapse."
tag(s): lilywilde ━ words: 000 ━ notes: please keep it short made by ira of stf and ww |
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Post by lilywilde on Oct 21, 2016 18:20:21 GMT -6
The speed at which Lily's hand recoiled after brushing the razor feather was impressive, even for the mach two girl. Sol's cry was unlike anything she'd heard from the boy, and it brought a new level of guilt into her being. If she'd never wanted to be the focus of, or cause of his anger, then the same was doubly true for the pained gasping noise that he emitted then. She felt powerless, her impotence to make it any better was killing her. As his fingers dug into her shoulder, she felt his strength, and winced slightly. The small amount of pain though was nothing compared to what she felt she deserved in that moment. If not for her and her crippling fear he would not be in this state.
As she left his embrace, she allowed her hands to linger for just a moment on his chest. She looked at him with sad eyes, and she finally realized the sort of care she'd felt for this boy since the first day they'd met. She wanted to always be by his side, to protect him, to care for him, and to keep him from harm. She was never the sort to consider romance or how it might play a part in her life, but in that instant she understood the couple's she'd seen occasionally on the campus of Vytal. How they stared longingly into each others eyes, shamelessly displaying their affection for all to see. She felt the appeal of that then, and as her hand left his chest, she felt a little emptier for it.
Lily felt the urgency of Sol's words, and as much as she hated letting go of him, she did in order to help preserve his life. She'd treated her own wounds plenty of times in the wild, but having to take care of someone else's injuries brought with it a new kind of anxiety. She retrieved the small white bag with the cross emblazoned across it. It was a symbol she'd only seen once before, at the medical ward of the school. When she opened the bag a wide array of tools were present that could help in all sorts of situations. She didn't take any time to take stock however, retrieving only the items that Sol had asked for.
"I'll need you to walk me through this," She said as she fumbled for the latches that Sol had described. They were easy enough to locate, and as she released them and pulled away the heavy piece of armor, her eyes widened. Though she had her fair of scars, Sol easily had her beaten. The sheer volume of scar tissue that littered his muscular form horrified her. What had this poor soul been through? Not to mention the strange bulging veins that seemed to be unnaturally bloated. The site where the artificial joined the organic was particularly interesting to Lily, but she spent no time examining this as deeply as she'd like to. She had a task to complete and she needed to keep herself focused on that.
She arrayed the aforementioned tools around her, making sure not to let the blood staining the cave floor to contaminate the equipment. She saw the individual pieces and wondered how they would all fit together to save his life. She looked desperately at Sol, hoping that he'd be able to stay strong long enough to explain to her exactly what she needed to do. She would have gladly plowed through a thousand nevermores in that instant if it would leave Sol rejuvenated and capable of standing tall and proud once more. As an afterthought, she allowed her aura to blossom forth. The white light illuminated the boy before her, bathing him in calming rays and allowing her to see clearly the full extent of the damages in the dim cave light. She was thankful for her father's meditation training now more than ever. She could hold her glow indefinitely. She prayed that the soft light might bring some modicum of comfort to the gravely injured boy.
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Post by Solomon Moon on Oct 22, 2016 3:18:56 GMT -6
the kit laid out between them, Sol drew in as deep a breath as he dared to, balancing the negative pressure in his thoracic cavity as well as he could. He was quite literally laid bare to the girl, because were he a book then the story of his life would have been written in the shadows of the claws, blades, fangs, and bullets that lingered upon his hide.
Upon the left side of his chest were three parallel ridges, the flesh puckered and pink with the tell tale deformation of cauterization from a wound he'd taken in a fight with a canine faunus who had slipped her katar through his guard. He'd had to seal that wound mid fight before the blood loss could slow him down, as the girl already had him beat in agility. It turned out that the girl hadn't the stomach to see a man scorch his wounds shut, and in her shock she'd left a gap in her defense.
Upon his right flank, beneath his right armpit, was flesh that was smooth and somewhat misshapen. The evidence of the blunt force of being struck with a great-sword remained even years later, and Sol still lacked much tactile sensation in that general area, likely due to nerve damage. His gourget had protected him from being cleaved in twain by the blow, but the heft of the sword had broken several ribs and pulverized the soft tissues terribly. That foe had mistakenly believed that Roar relied upon the biological component being intact in order to function, a misconception Sol ended up correcting by crushing his windpipe.
In the center of his back was a shallow crater of flesh that looked like running wax. Sol had received that when a particularly cunning opponent had exploited his blind spot to unload a full magazine of high intensity fire rounds into his back at nearly point blank range. Sol's aura and his armor had saved him from being cored like an apple by the assault, but neither had survived. The resultant tumble down an igneous mountainside ended the fight. He had two pins in his left arm, one in the radius and another in the scapular, as a result of that defeat.
Each scar, many intersecting or otherwise obscuring themselves like the worlds most gruesome quilt, told similarly violent tales of varying degrees of honor or glory, victory and defeat. In a way, Lily seeing them was something of a deep personal and intimate significance to the broken swordsman.
He knew how it must appear to the girl. One could not paint a flattering picture of a man in the strokes of swords and scourges. He wanted to look away when he saw her eyes grow wide. Somehow that expression was worse than a gasp of shock or disgust. It stung like a slap, as if the girl was reciting a list of his crimes in prose. The fact that she couldn't know which wound meant a victory and which a defeat, which a virtue, and which a sin, did not stop Sol from imagining that she saw only the ruin that his life had made of him.
He did not look away however, instead he defiantly fixed her with his gaze, daring her to judge him for what he was, for what he had done. It was a matter of pride, of dignity.
As she appraised the wreckage of his flesh, he appraised the security of her mind. He plumbed the depths of her grey eyes, probing for cracks or weakness that would betray another lapse into fugue. He found nothing, or perhaps he simply decided that he would risk it anyway. It wasn't as if he had a choice, the location of the wound meant he couldn't treat it himself after all.
He met her gaze, and for a moment a link seemed to connect them. It was grim determination, a matter of fact moment that looked at the worst case scenario and simply rolled up it's sleeves and prepared to get it's hands dirty. It was a subtle as a sunset, and as profound as a thunderclap. It was the unspoken, impossible to utter trust that could exist only between the desperate.
He trusted her. He had no choice. It was that simple, and that complex.
He recalled the training that he'd received for treating wounds in the field. The doctrine was focused on stabilizing casualties for medical evacuation. His field kit contained all the components to accomplish that goal, but long term care was not something that could be carried around in a compact hip sack. Those problems belonged to the future, and it was up to him and Lily to solve what problems could be solved in the moment.
The first step was the most important and also he most easily forgotten.
"Don't panic..." He told her, his voice terse with frugal use of syllables to limit the slow rise of pressure in his chest cavity that was slowly squeezing the life out of him, "Talking... Means airway clear. Sucking chest wound, breathing compromised... Treat that first."
He groaned as he levered himself away from the wall where he'd been reclining and slumped forward to expose where the feathers had penetrated his back. Luckily the dagger plumage had come out cleanly along with the breastplate, and had not managed to inflict any further damage in transit. Twin stripes of slick red fell from a pair of inch and a half wide gashes. One had struck a his seventh rib on the right side and broken bone could be seen in amidst the separated flesh, but the structure seemed mostly intact and apart from profuse bleeding, it hardly seemed life threatening. The second feather on the other hand had been lodged between the fifth and sixth rib on the left side, it's point puncturing the chest wall, and when Sol inhaled it muttered softly as air was drawn into the chamber beyond. It was surrounded by a film of reddish froth as mucous and blood bubbled in the steady ebb and flow of passing air.
"Pink foam... Pnuemothorax. Press water proof bandage to wound. Tape along top and sides, leave bottom open. Wrap with tensile bandage..." He explained without looking, as he pointed to a small square of green elastic with the word's "Non-permeable" stamped on it's surface, followed by the rolled up gauze bandages and medical tape, "Wrap it tight, cheap one way valve."
Lily's aura did indeed comfort Sol, despite reservations he had about attracting more grimm. The nevermore might be unwilling to risk sticking anything vulnerable into the cave, but if something smaller came by in large enough numbers, then he and Lily would be trapped. He was happy for the company. He was perfectly content to live alone and afraid, but he hoped that he wouldn't have to die that way too.
tag(s): lilywilde ━ words: 000 ━ notes: Color code 7319e6made by ira of stf and ww |
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Post by lilywilde on Oct 23, 2016 9:59:16 GMT -6
Lily's hands moved with such speed and precision that one would have difficulty believing she'd not done this before. Her hands were steady, and her eyes focused. She executed each of Sol's directions with clinical efficiency. Though she didn't understand the purpose of leaving the bottom of the bandage open, she complied with his command.
"Sorry if this is too tight," she said as she began wrapping the tensile bandage around his chest. His chest was wide, and her arms were short by comparison. She pressed herself against his back, leaning forward as she threaded the ribbon around him several times to ensure that it was as tight as it could be. She took a moment to wipe the sweat from his brow after the bandage was in place, and looked down at his scars once more, sadness in her eyes. She would never forgive herself for how close her weakness had come to killing yet another person she cared about. It still might, there were no guarantees that Sol would survive this day, though he would if she had anything at all to say about it.
"Once this is all over, once you're healing up, I'd like to tell you a little more about me... If you're going to bear some extra scars because of me, you should at least know why." Her ears began twitching as the sound of claws in dirt echoed ever so softly off of the cave wall. She doubted that Sol would even be aware of the sound, she could only just discern it with her superior hearing and her extensive history having heard exactly that sound. The enemy would give them no respite. She made a soft 'shh' sound, urgency in her voice as she stood. She had at most a minute before they assaulted the cave. She used her last few moments to lightly squeeze Sol's shoulder reassuringly, and moved to stand half way in between the cave mouth and Sol. Out of range of any potential claws that the nevermore might attempt to reach into the cave with.
She could hear the beasts drawing nearer now. There were four, no, five. One was larger than the others. She extended her claws.
"Just hold tight a little longer," she said gritting her teeth. "I promise that I'll be back in just a moment to fix you up alright?"
His kill count was higher than hers, he had fended off so many of these things at the beach. She couldn't be put to shame so easily.
When the first of the barghests entered the cave mouth, she gritted her teeth, anger flashing through her for a moment.
Two more showed up behind that one, followed by a fourth. They were moving in a diamond pattern. The fifth seemed to be stalling outside. She didn't know what it was waiting for. She'd never encountered a grimm that would stall for something or another. Though this made her curious, but not enough to divert her attention from the four advancing grimm. She would not wait for them to meet her in the middle.
There were four words that perfectly described Lily's fighting capabilities. Mobility, speed, agility, and speed again, simply because that one is so worth noting that it bears mentioning twice. She was upon the group of four in an instant. Sending a nasty slash across it's yellow hate filled eyes. The next instant, she was springing high into the air. She twisted herself mid-jump so that she was upside down. As her feet touched the cave ceiling, roughly fifteen feet in the air, she bent her knees, courching so to speak on the cave ceiling. She then sprung down, impacting a second grim with such force that it's legs buckled from underneath of it. If it wasn't the force of the fall that knocked it prone, it would have been the fact that her claws were wedged into the back of it's neck. In the same instant as the second grimm's form buckled to the floor, the first let out a howl of pain, suddenly realizing it's vision was badly damaged. It began to reel in pain.
As the first grimm howled, she could hear the sudden thunder of claws impacting on dirt just outside of the cave, followed by stone as it entered the cave proper.
In that instant she looked up to see a barghest twice the size of the others. In that moment of distraction, the third and fourth barghests sprung at her. She had been careless, and each sunk it's teeth into an arm. They were working together to bring down the super speeding faunus, or perhaps to hold her in place as it's leader entered the cave. However, the leader bounded right past Lily, heading straight for Sol.
"NO!" She shouted, as her aura's brightness doubled in intensity.
Her semblance kicked in the same moment as the fourth passed beyond her. She spun with such force and ferocity that any onlooker would simply see a white vortex with black blades spinning.
The grimm were anchored into her flesh by their teeth. Dub in just above the wrists as they were, she gritted her teeth. It wasn't long before they gave out, she was only happy that they did so without taking her arms with them. She wasn't spinning at her full mach two, in fact she wasn't even performing at half her speed. With two grimm on her like this, she was performing just under her half speed.
Still, one of the grimm impacted the wall at just over six-hundred miles per hour, the other impacted the recently blinded grimm, taking the three out of them permanently out of commission.
"HE'S MINE!" She screamed, paying no heed to the words that escaped her mouth. She charged with the full speed of her semblance. As she jumped at the comparatively statuesque creature of grimm she dug her claws into it's side. Her grip on it was weak, her arm half useless after the damage it'd taken from the twin strikes meted out by the two grimm who'd just fallen. The two of them tumbled into the cave. Lily's aura defense protected her, but only just. She found herself atop a badly beaten and battered grimm. It was still breathing, but only just. Her first instinct was to start shredding it slowly, to let it suffer, but Sol was still bleeding not twenty feet away. She grabbed it by the throat, and extended her claws once more, before pulling. The black paint sprayed her, staining her face and her close with a gout of blood.
She stood weakly, wordless making her way back to Sol. She grabbed the bandages, first wrapping her left wrist, and then her right. The two limbs were weakened, but her aura defense had saved her from far worse damages.
After a few moments of silence, her aura blossomed once again. It had faded at roughly the same time as she'd slammed into the alpha barghest earlier.
The peaceful white light brought with it clarity, and helped to lift the dark shadow of anger and hatred from her guise, but staring down at Sol just now helped it to return. She would have felt excellent about protecting him, if it weren't true that the only reason he was unable to protect himself was because she'd failed him.
"Let's see about those other wounds," she said weakly, her hands now much shakier than they'd been earlier, the bandages already stained red.
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Post by Solomon Moon on Oct 24, 2016 20:25:27 GMT -6
wanted to say something, but the small matter of his lungs slowly being squashed by the excess pressure in his thorax, Sol was limited in the areas of conversation to grunts of varying octaves as Lily patched up his primary injury. He was struggling at the same time to squash the rising sense of helplessness and panic that was slowly insinuating itself into the cracks of his broken mind, choking his thoughts like ivy creepers. He knew that it was a common symptom of his particular ailment, as was an elevated heart-rate to compensate for the shallow breathing, but knowing why one was starting to panic was not much help against panicking.
Strangely, Lily's arms as they encircled his broad chest, a gesture that reminded Sol of protestors placing themselves between chainsaws and the trunks of great trees, actually comforted him enough to retain his nerve. He allowed his entire world to narrow down to the sensation of her slender limbs working around him. His eye slid shut, and his breathing slowed, and for a moment he even felt less cold. He was happy to not be alone.
The patch felt cold, and distressingly squishy as it was set against his wound, and it pressed painfully into the divided flesh whenever he breathed in. Once the bandages went on it felt like a cube of slick ice pinned resting right against a raw nerve, but Sol could finally breath again without crushing his lungs. He coughed purposefully into his left palm, and inspected the resultant mucous for chunks of clotted blood, as that would tell him if the feather had reached a lung. In a rare stroke of luck for the day he found it empty of the usual blood that he could expect after using his mouth to channel his semblance. Still he was not comfortable to risk strenuous activity, because a careless impact could finish any internal damage that the nevermore had started.
He groaned as he straightened up, Lily offering an apology for the snugness of the dressing.
"Tight is good. Tight stops the bleeding." He replied, his voice already sounding less labored now that he could take in enough air to fill his lungs, "I've already lost too much blood..."
As the faunus finished wrapping his chest, Sol's right arm gave a loud click followed by the sound of something rotating inside the bicep, and the gentle glow that filled the core went from faintly red, to an bright blue that slowly turned white. He covered his mouth with the palm of the mechanical hand and drew in deeply as the sound of rushing air rattled through him. The wind dust usually served as a catalyst for the red dust that fueled the limb, but in a pinch it could also provide up to five minutes of oxygen.
Lily was saying something else, but Sol was only half listening as he held the fresh air in his lungs while his arm gave another ratcheting click as it switched back to it's usual fuel supply. He was almost offended by the implication that Lily needed to spell things out for him as if he were some sort of dullard, and it showed in his expression. He was far too exhausted to be actually angry and offered a non-committal grunt in reply. The sound withered off when he noticed the sudden shift in mood that came over the girl. The sudden distance in her gaze told Sol much, and he was not surprised when she rose to her feet and promise that she would be right back.
On impulse his left hand shot out and grasped hers, still able to apply crushing pressure despite his overall weakness. He nearly asked her not to go, suddenly terrified by the thought of being abandoned, but when he opened his mouth, what came out was, "Be careful..". He punctuated his words be squeezing gently a second time.
As she left, through much pain, effort and general stubbornness, he levered himself to his feet and supported his weight against the cave wall as he advanced towards the entrance. As he adopted a method of locomotion that was part limp, part lean, and part crawl, he drew the sword from the scabbard that was still affixed to his left wrist, exposing four feet of pitch black steel that crawled with ruby red glyphs, that pulsed from hilt to point, matching a similar pulse that had started to flow from shoulder to hand of his false arm.
He could hear fighting outside the cave, but his top speed seemed to be little more than that of a one legged dog, and all he could do was grit his teeth and leave blood smeared on the stones.
The shape of a massive grim and a less massive faunus tangled and tumbling through the entrance came as too much of a surprise for him to react until it was all over. All the same, he did contribute by way of causally placing the mouth of his scabbard to the beast's skull and unloading two deafening reports of twenty millimeter dust blanks into the creature's armored mask. The creature, as apposed to bleeding out slowly, instead was gripped by a full body spasm before laying twitching in an unnatural position. The recoil was enough to completely overcome what little balance he currently possessed, and Sol unceremoniously plopped back on his rear and slumped against the cave wall once more.
He groaned, more in frustration than pain, though there was plenty of both to be had. That was when he noticed the state of Lily's arms and his gaze narrowed on the beast. Out of spite he fired another round into the creature's carcass, reducing a hemisphere of flesh just below the ribs to a spray of pulverized matter that withered to smoke moments after splattering across the floor.
"Idiot. I told you to be careful." He grumbled as she crouched beside him, and with the mouth of Whisper's scabbard still trailing smoke, and allowing his sword to clatter to the floor, he grasped either of her forearms with both of his hands. His golden eye locked on hers and it was a gaze that brooked no argument, at least if one overlooking the pleading worry beneath the sternness. "I won't forgive you if you leave me like that again. If we fight, we fight together."
He broke his gaze away abruptly, surely worrying that he might reveal too much of his actual intentions if he didn't.
"I don't blame you for this, you know? The bird was after me, I rang the dinner bell for it." His eye was screwed shut, but his hand still managed to release hers and effortlessly find the hole in her dress and the scar beyond. His palm was cold,, and broad as a sixteen ounce steak cooked blue rare, and each finger chilled like an icicle as they pressed against the old wound, feeling the texture of it. It felt a lot larger than it looked, and he could only imagine what it had felt like to receive such an injury. It surely made his aching back seem like a joke.
"I don't blame you for being afraid either. It was a nevermore that gave you this... Wasn't it?"
He did not give her a chance to answer, and exercising a strength that could only come of mechanical assistance, he gave a strong yank with his right arm. As she struck his chest with much of her body, likely a lot harder than would be advisable given his wounds, he released her wrist and wrapped her in a one armed hug. His left hand continued to hold flat against her scar, and he bowed his head to rest it against her bust.
tag(s): lilywilde ━ words: 000 ━ notes: Color code
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Post by lilywilde on Oct 26, 2016 0:12:30 GMT -6
Lily nodded slowly, her arms throbbing in pain from the assault. Perhaps it would have been better to have fought them in front of him, so he could have taken pot shots at the grimm with that scabbard gun of his. Still, she was incredibly uncomfortable letting them even get close to him while he was still in such poor health.
"I tried to be careful... I was just surprised at all. They moved in a way that I'm not used to," she said in way of explanation.
It brought a fair amount of stress off of her shoulder, knowing that Sol didn't blame her for what had happened. Still, she blamed herself, that wouldn't change just because she'd been forgiven by him. She would still need to forgive herself, which wouldn't come easily.
Lily's arms tightened around Sol's hand as he held it against her scar.
"Y-Yeah. Two months ago," she said as the first tear streaked down her face. "You'd never know by looking at it. It looks years old. But this happened only two months ago. I still feel the beak piercing me. That moment has haunted every dream I've had since then. I remember looking up. Seeing four more of them circling. I found it so odd that the one was pinning me down. Well, I did in retrospect. I didn't really think much of anything in that instant. I just remember blood and feathers." She said squeezing his hand tighter against her scar. Doubling over as if she were feeling the pain again.
She shuddered as she continued, "Goes all the way through, in case you were wondering." she said almost nonchalantly.
"I... I should be dead. I was dead. A total stroke of random chance. If not for a passing group of hunters and huntresses, I would be. Among their number was a huntress with a particularly powerful healing semblance. She knitted flesh and bone back together. I remember... I remember not being able to feel my legs at all, and then as she worked on me, a sudden explosion of agony in my legs. I think the bone growing back in was almost as painful as the actual impaling."
Her grip on Sol's ice cold hand hardened as she shook.
Afterwards there was a short pause. More tears flowed down her face when she said in a soft voice, almost too quiet for Sol to hear, "That's not as far as my history extends with them though," she said, hoping Sol would be content to let her keep talking. Her voice was beginning to crack under the weight of her tears though, talking was harder. "Three years ago, I was a stupid kid. I... I didn't respect the world like I should have. I wanted to prove that I could fight, but really, I only proved that I was a foolish little girl. I wound up stuck on the back of a nevermore, unable to do anything but cling on as my parents gave chase below. I must have been up there for half a day before it finally touched down. My parents caught up to us, but they'd had to take a lot of stupid risks in the process. They saved me, killed the nevermore, and scolded me for a short time before.." She stopped and sniffled, rubbing her eyes before her hands closed over Sol's once again. "All it took was a few Beringel, their aura was so low... They couldn't fight anymore, and I couldn't save them. I ran. That's all I've ever been good at. I'm a coward, with a coward's semblance, and that's all I'll ever be. I might get better outwardly, y'know? But my soul doesn't lie."
Her head was hung low, ears drooping, and her tears were flowing freely now. She knew Sol wasn't much of one for long speeches, but she was glad to have finally told somebody about all of that. She'd never shared it with anyone, she'd never given out more that breadcrumbs. Not that she'd even had anyone to share it with until very recently, but it still felt nice to finally get it off of her chest.
"S-sorry, I don't mean to ramble," she said muted, sniffling. She continued to keep her iron clad grip on Sol's icy hand. Her bandages were turning a deep crimson the longer she gripped him like that. "A-Anyway, we should get you patched the rest of the way up, you've lost a lot of blood." she said, every other word punctuated by a sniffle. She felt like she was burning, ready to burst into flame and whither away into ash all at once. The cold hand she was holding at her core seemed to be the only thing that was stopping her from immolating on the spot.
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Post by Solomon Moon on Nov 1, 2016 17:03:47 GMT -6
had never been a strong point for Sol, but all the same he listened as patiently as he could manage. He achieved this mostly by relying upon Lily for warmth, being that between losing a lot of blood, and the moist stone of the cave sapping his thermal energy like a giant heat sink, he was quite literally freezing. The only thing to distinguish the living tissue of his left hand from the unflinching metal of his right was a slight difference in texture and tensile strength, otherwise the two limbs matched each other in temperature so closely that the difference was indistinguishable. The fact that his skin was slick with cool sweat did not improve his appearance of overall health.
If Sol had to guess, something that he was incapable of accomplishing through the fugue of confusion that hung across his brain like the half lowered curtains of a stage play, he would have put the total of his remaining vital fluids around 80%. This would have been based mostly upon the assumption that had he lost any less he would not be suffering the detriment he currently was, and any more would have meant loss of consciousness. While not life threatening on it's own, complications of his current condition could easily lead to numerous other undesirable consequences down the road. Hypothermia was one such possibility, given that his body was hoarding blood close to his core in order to conserve what little body heat it retained. Luckily this meant that he wasn't losing any more blood from the numerous injuries along his extremities, but it also meant that his heart was laboring at well above it's resting rate to keep the reduced supply of blood flowing to all the vital organs. Likewise it meant that he was fast burning through his store of chemical energy and calories as his blood vessels constricted, demanding a constant supply of sugars and proteins in order to continue their work. In short, while his condition wasn't critical, it was in a state of homeostatic balance that could tip at the slightest nudge, kicking off a chain reaction of unpleasant failures that would result in a sudden deterioration in overall health.
Luckily, Sol wasn't worrying about any of this. He was just worrying about staying warm, and Lily's body provided a convenient and quite pleasant space heater to donate some thermal energy to his current deficit. Sol could come up with much worse ways to meet his end, without any imagination at all, than in the arms of a pretty young woman who seemed to actually give a damn about his well being.
"Survival is all that matters. You just have to pay the price and try to not let the debt define you." He replied, his eye sliding shut as he rested his frigid cheek against the crook of Lily's neck, a slight tremble infecting his words along with the sort of weightlessness that came with quickly slipping into unconsciousness, "It seems like it won't stop hurting, but every day it gets easier to bear... Until one day, the pain is so much a part of you that you barely feel it at all."
Perhaps without meaning to, he punctuated the last part by pressing a fingertip against the scar, his touch barely registering through the tortured and insensate flesh. Whether or not that comparison between physical and emotional trauma was something he'd intended would remain unknown, because his eye slid into the back of his head, and he collapsed, his strength finally departing entirely and leaving him little more than two hundred pounds of meat and steel in Lily's arms.
tag(s): lilywilde ━ words: 000 ━ notes: Color code 7319e6made by ira of stf and ww |
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