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+----- Thread: nonchalant [ gabriel ] (/showthread.php?tid=7600)
nonchalant [ gabriel ] - adomania - 11-03-2018
[align=center][div style="borderwidth=0px; width: 55%; line-height:115%; text-align: justify;font-family: calibri;"]I dun diddly did it [member=1479]GABRIEL[/member]
He never bothered coming back to his past. It had a funny way of haunting him wherever he went, and sometimes things that were left behind were easier to forget than those he continued doting on. But whether it was because he was an idiot or because he had a rather unpredictable habit, there were a few things that Des couldn't care much about forgetting. He wasn't a man who held grudges easily (they faded away almost as quick as his smokes) but memories were far harder to let go.
In reality, there wasn't really much for him to go off of. He was sure he didn't know Gabriel half as well as his clanmates did, and that Gabriel didn't know half as much about him as he thought he did, but there was something about the man that made the silence so much more bearable. His mind inevitably returned to the past no matter how much he ran from it, and Gabe's face was there with mounting frequency every time he closed his eyes to rest.
Yet there was something about the Ascendants that didn't quite rub Desperado the right way. He didn't hold grudges, but he did sure hold regrets... and this place was full of them. That, among other reasons, was why he had left without a word, and why he hadn't bothered to come back. He only just returned to the Typhoon, and he hadn't spent long enough for the scent to rub off on him yet. No, all he smelled like was the wilderness, smoke, and blood. It hadn't dried off yet from his time away from civilization, although we was happy to admit it wasn't because anyone had died. He couldn't promise someone didn't have a broken nose, though.
He had left without a goodbye because he figured that it would hurt less. It was always hard to run when you had something to fight for, and separating yourself from it made it easier. That was, until he had started to think back again like he always inevitably did. Gabriel wasn't the only one who haunted his memories, and the lion had hoped that it would somehow convince himself that he shouldn't come back because the man, in the long run, wasn't special. He was just another face that would settle down once enough time had passed, until he forgot the man's name and he was nothing but a sour taste on his tongue whenever a particularly violent nightmare ripped him out of his sleep. He had promised himself he wouldn't come back.
He was starting to go back on those promises a lot.
A deep exhale left Desperado's lungs, this time void of smoke. There was nothing but the fresh oxygen filtering through as he tried to clear his head, hoping he wasn't opening some box he shouldn't have been touching. Gabriel could have been dead. That, or the first person to meet him would be one of the other members of the Ascendants, and then he'd have to explain just how pathetic he was. Or maybe it'd be both. He'd have to find out from the mouth of some stranger that the man was dead, and there was nothing else left for him here.
It'd hurt less that way, maybe. He'd never have to deal with the sight of Gabriel's dead body like he had to deal with in regards to previous people he had befriended.
Yet the thought itself was enough to freeze him to the ground, claws digging into the soft soil beneath them, teeth gritted and mind begging for a cigarette. He still waited, though. He was starting to become soft, and running was starting to become a lot harder.
Re: nonchalant [ gabriel ] - GABRIEL - 11-04-2018
[align=center][div style="width: 500px; text-align: justify; font-size: 9.4pt; line-height: 1.4;"]//you did im so proud
It might have been better for everyone if Gabriel were dead. He was barely living in the first place, more of a specter than a man, haunting these grounds purposelessly. So often he merely went between Laz and Moon's graves, wearing the figure of his curled body into the mounds of dirt blanketing them. Gabriel had considered a shrine, a few days ago, for Dia de los Muertos, but he couldn't bring himself to do it, not when the days were meant for light remembrance fully accepting of grief. Gabriel had never been any good at acceptance, though they were both gone regardless, so he brought the graves flowers: primroses for Moon, firewheels for Laz. And he slept. Lost time. Couldn't remember why he woke up in different places, couldn't bring himself to care about it. He knew he should -he wasn't completely disconnected from everything- but when did Gabriel ever do what he should?
He should have worked harder to clear Lazarus' name, should have hid his own weakness better than he had. Should have propped Moon up, doted like a mother hen and force fed him so he wouldn't die because of a fucking fever. But he hadn't, and he would live with the consequences for however much longer his body could hold itself together. Maybe a day, or maybe he'd limp on for a whole year.
Things were simpler once, and it was hard not to spend so much time in the past now that his present barely existed. He thought of seeing Laz for the first time, fighting over a bone, and then of killing the people he'd respected in front of him. He thought of Moon at the border, mistaking lune and luna, ridiculously defensive over something so innocuous. He thought of a small child nibbling on his talons, barely verbal, later able mostly to insistently say "help." There was Des, too, grin loose yet sharp, a stash of alcohol locked away in a shack, and how he'd died, but came back after a little while. Hadn't seen him since he crash-landed and lashed out defensively, as any cornered creature would.
He thought of the days that felt so long ago, too. Ana brewing tea, humming, so at peace with herself. Jack, with his too blue eyes and stubborn jaw.
It only reminded Gabriel of how alone he was. He was convinced he was hallucinating when he saw the familiar figure among the grass, smoking leisurely. It was the tension he could feel that made it a little more real, though still, the hybrid glanced with sunken eyes at the path he'd worn into the ground from going back and forth between graves. After a moment, a great breath bled from his lungs, and Gabriel slowly approached the silhouette, wings leaving lines in the dirt where they dragged.
"Des," he started, the first word he'd spoken since "requiescat in pace" at Moon's burial. "Either I've lost it officially, or you're here. Good to see you haven't keeled over."
[align=right][i]——INFO
Re: nonchalant [ gabriel ] - adomania - 11-11-2018
[align=center][div style="borderwidth=0px; width: 55%; line-height:115%; text-align: justify;font-family: calibri;"]// im seriously debating making des live again,, like the moment I get rid of him I instantly have muse for him again ffs
There were many people that Des considered mourning, but the only problem was that he couldn't remember them good enough to make it sincere. His pain was sincere, but he couldn't help but know that if he had no names to utter in his prayers they were hardly good enough. Some would say it was the thought that counted, but he knew different. If he had forgotten the people he needed to mourn, then he was never fit enough to say their names to begin with.
And so instead of wallowing in sadness, the lion continued on with his life, either drunk out of his mind or smoking to get his head out of the darkness. The faces occasionally passed through his head or memories, faintly outlined in his dreams or full on lamenting in his nightmares... but beyond that, he didn't set up shrines, nor did he waste time uttering some semblance of respect for the deceased. The dead gave him more problems than they did solutions. Each body was another brick in the wall.
He wasn't sure if he'd even mourn if Gabriel dropped one day. A better part of him said that he would, but the more rational part said that he'd already forgotten many who he had called friends before, and so the chances of Gabriel being different were less likely than he'd like them to be. As much as he tried to pretend he was a good enough person to change, and he hadn't had anyone die recently to prove him wrong, there was just no denying his past and the mistakes that tied into it.
What he did know, however, was that the moment the man's face showed up out of the shadows instead of that of some other Ascendant, a sigh of relief escaped his lungs and the strain in his shoulders melted away, if only slightly. The man's own exhausted disposition didn't fly by his attention, but besides one quick glance he didn't point it out, giving him the same respect he wished for himself. Everyone had demons but right now wasn't the time to talk about them. That wasn't why he had come here... although in reality, Des wasn't sure if he knew why he was here regardless.
A lopsided grin crawled onto his features, but it seemed even less sincere than it had been a few months ago back in the Typhoon. He wished he could give the old man something better, to not make him think that he was the reason... but no matter how hard he tried, Des couldn't will himself into anything more heartfelt. His heart ached, and even this was more than he expected to be able to give.
"Maybe its both, and if so then it makes the two of us," a brief silence spanned after the words, but it was broken with a tired sigh and an exhale of smoke that had started to build up in his lungs. "Not gonna lie to you, Gabe, I don't really know why I'm here right now," and here wasn't just here, on the border of the Ascendants, still too hesitant to step past it despite Gabriel being right there. He didn't know why he was alive again, why he was still going, why he hadn't just keeled over.