[An infection. A corruption. There's a feeling in him then, the dizzying lurch from stomach to throat the moment before a fall. The strangers words ring heavy in his mind, and suddenly he's alert, sharply focused. Mismatched eyes narrow down to dangerous slits, the angle of his jaw showing hard.]
Like a plague.
[The words are clipped and matter of fact, none of stutter-start uncertainty that had been there before. Something settles into him like the feel of a heavy bolt sliding home, iron bars around his chest, constricting him. Hemming him in. If this isn't a dream, if this is as the other man says, and he ends up waking in some other place, riddled by some monstrous infection--
--suddenly, he thinks he knows precisely why he's here. A plague doctor. Brought to a world inflicted with plague. There's a cold and ugly sense to it.
He doesn't want this. Not again. Not when the words - a corruption - fill his mind's eye with bodies piled high in the streets, the stench of rot and decay so thick it can almost be felt, and out across the open water, dark on the horizon...the lazaret. Black clouds billowing from it, all those bodies, burning.
He takes a slow breath. In-out. One-two.]
I'm not worried about defending myself. Pain doesn't worry me one little bit.
[His smile, there's something in it now. A little hard. A little sharp. Though in less than a moment that hardness wears away at the edges, reveals - once more - the true shape of him underneath.]
But I er, I suppose I ought to know how best to defend someone else. It seems like Monsters are meant to protect Witches? I'll gladly place myself in harm's way for the sake of someone who needs it.
no subject
Like a plague.
[The words are clipped and matter of fact, none of stutter-start uncertainty that had been there before. Something settles into him like the feel of a heavy bolt sliding home, iron bars around his chest, constricting him. Hemming him in. If this isn't a dream, if this is as the other man says, and he ends up waking in some other place, riddled by some monstrous infection--
--suddenly, he thinks he knows precisely why he's here. A plague doctor. Brought to a world inflicted with plague. There's a cold and ugly sense to it.
He doesn't want this. Not again. Not when the words - a corruption - fill his mind's eye with bodies piled high in the streets, the stench of rot and decay so thick it can almost be felt, and out across the open water, dark on the horizon...the lazaret. Black clouds billowing from it, all those bodies, burning.
He takes a slow breath. In-out. One-two.]
I'm not worried about defending myself. Pain doesn't worry me one little bit.
[His smile, there's something in it now. A little hard. A little sharp. Though in less than a moment that hardness wears away at the edges, reveals - once more - the true shape of him underneath.]
But I er, I suppose I ought to know how best to defend someone else. It seems like Monsters are meant to protect Witches? I'll gladly place myself in harm's way for the sake of someone who needs it.