reallybadeggs | Test Drive for September 2013 Apps

Descry wasn't a hugging person by nature. He had become one out of the necessity of living with Larrikin for any length of time, at least as much as any of the Dead Men had, but his natural inclination for comfort didn't run toward hugs. It was just that a hug was his only option in Skulduggery's case, because he couldn't read Skulduggery's mind to stabilise his own thoughts.

It wasn't often Descry wished he could read Skulduggery's mind, knowing just what memories were in there. Right now, he did.

Those moments were enough to at least regain his footing, though Descry didn't really try to hide the fact his eyes were damp and he didn't really release his grip on Skulduggery's sleeves. The redhead laughed, quiet and a little ragged. "Wear gloves. Or wait for you. You've been dying to ask me that for a century, haven't you?"

And then he smiled, a tight, lopsided smile not completely mirthful.

"Quite literally," Skulduggery nodded. By any technical definition of the word 'dying,' anyway. He'd never found a satisfactory way of describing his current state. 'Undead' was much too clumsy, and reminded him too much of zombies. 'Dying' was as good a word as any.

All of which was putting much more thought into a lighthearted pun than Descry probably intended.

"And here's another one," Skulduggery added barely a second later. "Why didn't you wait for me? I learned who he was, and how he was connected to you. I learned what you were trying to do. What I never learned was why you threw all caution to the winds."

There had been many, many times during their tenure as one unit in which Descry and Skulduggery had frustrated the others by being on one wavelength and leaving the others behind, even taking to account Skulduggery's immunity to Descry's magic. They were simply the most alike in thought process.

This was not one of them.

Descry's smile faded into that expression he so often wore, the one of quiet resigned weariness. "Skulduggery, it took me nearly two years to stop forgetting you even existed. In the year since Rover died I was constantly surrounded by the burning urge for revenge. What makes you think I had the capacity to remember how to be careful?"

Because he hadn't. Because there were times, when he was alone, when he realised how reckless he'd been getting. The problem was that even when he was alone and could recognise it, he'd found it hard to care. It was hard to care when there was a Larrikin-shaped hole in their lives, and even harder to care when he had to grieve for him seven times over.

"Being careful isn't something you remember," Skulduggery disagreed. "It's instinct. Ingrained by a good teacher. And since I'm an excellent teacher, either you paid a woeful amount of attention during our lessons, or something went terribly wrong in that apartment."

Constantly surrounded by the burning urge for revenge, robbing Descry of the capacity to be careful. It was a scenario that sounded all too familiar. But in Descry's case, it only led to one tragic death. In Skulduggery's, it led to a tragic lapse in judgement that left thousands dead. Here, at least, Descry would have the opportunity to regain himself again.

Speaking of here... "You wouldn't happen to know where we are, would you?"

"I almost feel like I should be flattered by your faith in my ability not to ever make a mistake." Almost. If Skulduggery weren't taking it as more reason to feel guilty for not teaching Descry well enough. The skeleton may have made it into a joke, but Descry knew Skulduggery, and there was a grain of truth to his reaction.

Descry still hadn't forgotten what Skulduggery had said before, about Vile being his choice. And he wasn't going to forget it, let alone forget to ask about it. But for the moment, Skulduggery had curtailed the question.

"Isla Empieza," Descry said promptly, lifting an eyebrow in a 'really?' fashion nearly identical to the one Corrival wore. He leaned back against the fountain. "It's a small colony, but it's been here for a while. The fountain has been here longer. Folklore says the ruby used to reside here, but it went missing--I haven't met any of the townspeople who know how, at least in any fashion that seems solid. Mostly they think the fountain is cursed or patronised by a deity."

He pointed down toward the residential area. "All the townspeople live in that area, but any public housing is off this way. They're worried, Skulduggery. They don't quite know what's happening, but they can guess, and they know people like us are strange. They don't want to risk angering whoever brought us here by treating us badly--public opinion is Davy Jones--but that doesn't mean they want to make friends. They'll give us a place to stay for a little while, but the last thing they want is for us to make it permanent. Probably why their ships are such reasonable prices."

His direction shifted toward the road leading out of town, toward the woods. "The southern part of the island is covered by woods. I don't know anything about it; the locals don't go there. They're afraid of that, too." Descry dropped his arm and gave Skulduggery an exasperated look. "If I didn't know any better I'd think you'd think I've forgotten how to gather information, Skulduggery."

Even Descry couldn't always tell how Skulduggery's words were meant. The question itself had been flat, but there was a touch of amusement to Skulduggery's nonexistent face as he asked it, almost like he was teasing Descry.

He hadn't been, exactly. It wasn't that Skulduggery thought Descry had forgotten how to read minds. It was that, to be brutally honest, after a century of no one to rely on but himself, he'd almost forgotten Descry could read minds at all.

"Just testing," he murmured, taking all the information in. Descry's efficiency was something Skulduggery could easily get used to again.

"Davy Jones," he mused, "isn't surprising. It's written right on the fountain. But whatever or whoever brought us here, they expect us to become pirates in search of the missing shards of this ruby. If the poem didn't make that obvious enough - " he held up the leather-bound journal he'd woken up with, which bore a faded skull and crossbones on the cover, " - there's this."

He paused, then shook his head. "I've never been fond of rubies. I'm much more interested in why the woods are so frightening. What do you think?"

"It is," Descry agreed with a faint smile, shifting the sweater over his arm to reveal his own leather journal. It looked, actually, a lot like one of the ones he'd made himself, except he'd never imprinted one with a skull and crossbones. "The poem is interesting, though."

He knelt by it, tracing the words. "Look at these, the first two lines of the final stanza. 'Stangers listen: take heed, take care.' This is a directive. 'Mayhap the chance to flee.' There's an offer here, and it's a specific one, for all the window dressing. This fountain is old, Skulduggery. We're not the first ones to have been brought here, not with such specific address on a monument this age."

The redhead looked up. "This is a game. Or a trial, or possibly a challenge, or a quest. Davy Jones may have something to do with it, but I doubt he's the only one involved. Jones is meant to be a spirit presiding over the dead at sea; we're on land. And while he's implied to have a mischievous or cruel streak, it's usually involved in shipwrecks. So who's responsible for this island?"

Descry frowned down at the words, that tiny crinkle in his brow he wore when he was thinking. "The final stanza is a clear warning against Jones, but the poem as a whole still bids us to go onto the ocean--his domain. How much do you want to bet that we're being sent by someone else to gather the shards of the ruby because they can't go onto the ocean themselves?"

It was almost a rhetorical question, because Descry certainly didn't wait for an answer. "It's not even any guarantee we'll be able to use the ruby ourselves. 'Mayhap the chance to flee.' Mayhap because it may not have that power, or we may not be allowed to have it?" He shrugged and straightened back up again, brushing off his knees and picking up the sweater and the journal wrapped in it. Then he glanced over at Skulduggery with a faint smile. "Which is all, of course, my way of saying that I want to know what else is on land before we start dipping our toes in the water. How much did you miss me?"

Skulduggery didn't answer the question at first, his expression inscrutable within the visage of his grinning skull. When he finally did, there was a certain tenor to his voice - one part exasperation, one part impressed. "Valkyrie was right. It does get annoying, listening to someone show off."

Because of course, he'd thought of the same. Within moments of examining the poem in greater detail, he'd made what to him were the obvious connections. Skulduggery just wasn't used to anyone else making the same connections without a helpful prod. It was ego-boosting, in a way, always being the smartest person in the room; but it did get frustrating on occasion, particularly when nothing but obvious questions were asked and time was of the essence.

He'd forgotten how often he and Descry left the other Dead Men in the dust.

"I'll admit, I missed the convenience." Skulduggery put a hand on Descry's shoulder as he passed, already heading for the southern part of the island and the woods. "Since you're dead, can I assume you don't need to eat or sleep, or would that be making things too easy?"

Descry laughed, and though quiet it was a true laugh, not a bitter one. Just a tad sad, perhaps, that he'd missed out on nearly a century of his friends' lives. That Skulduggery had forgotten what it felt like to be in accord.

"That would be too much to ask, I'm afraid," the redhead admitted as he followed Skulduggery, falling into step beside him. "I'm already feeling a bit peckish." Which was true, although part of him also didn't want to eat. Skulduggery's words still rang in his head.

"It was my choice."

Those words were making Descry feel a little too sick to his stomach to eat.

"Skulduggery," he said, looking straight ahead to the road, "why did you choose to become Lord Vile again?"

It couldn't have been too peckish, since Descry didn't stop and demand that they find a tavern first. That was perfectly fine with Skulduggery. Many saw food as a potential for luxury, but since his death, Skulduggery hadn't seen it as anything more than a mildly distracting and annoying necessity. It was amazing how many more hours in the day there were when no physical necessity held you back.

Descry's question was so unusual as to be surreal. Only Valkyrie had ever known the truth. Valkyrie was the only one Skulduggery had ever discussed the details with - and even then, he held back far more than she was aware of.

"Because the Necromancers found their Death Bringer," he answered, and if the subject matter hadn't been so serious, you might have thought he was making a remark on the weather. "She grew too powerful too fast, and there was no other way to stop her."

It wasn't often that Descry simply didn't know what to say. Most of the time, he chose not to say anything because there was no need, or the other person in the conversation wouldn't have been served by his speaking. Right now, it was because he had no way to articulate what he was feeling.

One part anger, one part incredulity, one part grief, one part acceptance. Skulduggery knew what Lord Vile had cost everyone. He wouldn't have made that choice unless what he was saying was accurate: that there was no other way. But he was also holding back from details, and while Skulduggery had always been one to hold back details if he felt they were too personal, irrelevant or obvious, in this case that wasn't a good sign.

He hadn't held back details from Descry. It had taken a while to get to that point, but he'd stopped, save the big one, and even that had been obvious in Skulduggery's own way. Obvious enough that Descry hadn't felt the need to mention it.

"Ghastly still doesn't know, does he?" Descry said quietly.

And that was from where the anger came. Descry just wasn't sure if it was all for Skulduggery.

Skeletons may not have needed to breathe, but Skulduggery exhaled a long breath from between his teeth anyway. "No," he answered simply. "He doesn't."

Nor had Ghastly ever suspected. Not once. To Skulduggery's knowledge, none of them had, apart from perhaps Saracen due to the nature of his magic. And Saracen was young enough that his not asking was understandable. Justifiable, even.

Skulduggery didn't mean to add anything else, because there shouldn't have been anything else to add. But before he could think about it too thoroughly, Skulduggery turned his head toward Descry. "Why didn't you ever say anything?"

Of course Ghastly didn't. Of course he didn't, because throughout the century Descry had known, he had never once given Skulduggery cause to believe he wasn't alone in having to struggle with his burden. The redhead exhaled slowly and pressed his hand over his eyes, and rubbed the bridge of his nose with his knuckles.

He couldn't have told anyone in the beginning. Descry knew that. But he should have told someone afterward, after Skulduggery had had the chance to recover his equilibrium. Now Skulduggery was a century later, and still alone the way he should never be.

"It wouldn't have helped you," Descry said simply, with only the crunch of their footsteps and the whisper of distant minds as their backdrop. "If you'd known someone knew, your guilt would have driven you to leave again. That's not what you needed, to come back properly. You needed to know you had an anchor to stop you from wanting that power all over again."

Now he wasn't even sure it had worked. Oh, it had for a century, but Lord Vile. That kind of power--it was an addiction. Descry had wrestled with addictions once or twice in the past, before the war, when he'd finally had reason to train his magic instead of deny it and all the minds in the world had grown too much. Even one lapse, for a former addict, could be dangerous.

How much was the memory of that power, and the fact that this time he'd controlled it, weighing on Skulduggery's mind and soul?

"Dexter knows," he said, with just enough of a pause to make it seem like an afterthought. "He found out after that mission at the pass, the one you insisted we should undertake in spite of Vile's threat. I had a nightmare and said some things I couldn't help. He agreed to wait, to let you find your footing."

The redhead didn't exactly look over, but he turned his head just enough to look at Skulduggery sidelong. "Saracen knows too. He came to me during that wild goose chase when someone claimed they'd seen Vile on a battlefield and Meritorious sent us to confirm the truth. I asked him not to say anything either."

Descry had a very unique perspective on the way the human mind worked. That was why Skulduggery didn't generally question decisions Descry made regarding someone's mental health - never had, and never would. But the idea that Descry had known about Vile, and couldn't have known for sure that Skulduggery was stable, and still decided not to tell anyone?

Objectively, it made practical sense. It was what the Dead Men always did, dismantling threats before they even became threats. Objectively, it had less to do with Skulduggery himself and more to do with making sure Lord Vile never entered the picture again.

So why did he get the feeling Descry's reasons were much more personal than that?

Skulduggery froze, digging one foot a little deeper into the gravel than he meant to and accidentally kicking a stone a short distance up the slope. Dexter had known since the pass? Known, and done nothing? For close to a century? Saracen, at least, had gone to Descry - but he hadn't been there when Ghastly's mother was killed. Dexter was. Hadn't he promised Ghastly revenge? Hadn't he been just as terrified by the prospect of Vile as the others?

Dexter and Saracen had each called him separately within a few days after he killed Serpine. Skulduggery had found it strange at the time. Now, he knew why.

Skulduggery didn't stumble. He was a skeleton, he had far less weight than anyone had to worry about, and perfect control over his form without any hiccups to be caused by biological processes. For Skulduggery, kicking a stone across the way without meaning to was a stumble.

Descry didn't pause, or even look over. The skeleton's silence said more than his evasive chatter could. That was okay. Descry didn't need him to talk.

So he talked instead. Quietly, but in that steady way he had when he knew things no one else could.

"We're a family, Skulduggery. You can't go through the things we did and not be. Of course I wasn't going to say anything. You spent five years as Lord Vile and then you came back. Our family had a hole in it, and then it was filled up again. If I'd thought it would help, I would have told someone, but it wouldn't have."

If he'd had to feel Ghastly's anger and betrayal, or Anton's fury, or Corrival's cold purpose, Descry honestly wasn't sure if he'd been strong enough to stand in Skulduggery's defence. Not so soon after everything had happened. Dexter was the only one Descry could have trusted to maintain the secret, and even then the mind-reader knew how close Dexter had gotten to telling Corrival.

"But that was a century ago," he continued. "A century is a long time, Skulduggery. Even for us." A century was more than long enough to see sweeping social changes. Even sorcerers noticed the passing of a century.

Now he knew what he was feeling. Not just anger, not just incredulity. He was disappointed. He never thought he'd have cause to feel disappointed in one of the Dead Men before; they'd saved his life and sanity more times than he could count. How could he be disappointed in people to whom he owed everything?

He stopped and laid a hand on Skulduggery's arm to stop him as well, looking into the skeleton's empty sockets. "You should have told him by now, Skulduggery. He's had enough time to grieve, and enough time with you back as you were before your death, to handle it. You owe it to him."

A family during the war, maybe. But Descry died before that war ended, and he had no idea what happened since then. Ghastly was the only one Skulduggery still kept in regular contact with, and that was generally only when he needed something - like a new suit, or an extra pair of fists. No one would take a sudden confession of horrific war crimes well.

Then again, it wasn't a matter of taking anything well. Descry had a point. It had been a century. Most sorcerers already knew Lord Vile was back in some capacity anyway; if the Council knew the truth, there would be a measure of relief knowing that one potential threat wasn't as much of a threat as they were fearing.

The fallout, among old friends, would come later.

Descry's disappointment didn't come as a surprise. At this point, it barely fazed him. Skulduggery was just surprised it wasn't anything worse - anger, rage, flat out rejection. "Tell you what." He broke Descry's eye contact and kept walking. "If we manage to find a way out of here, I'll give it some serious thought."

Skulduggery obfuscated with words. When he said he'd give something serious thought, it usually meant serious thought into refusing advice--whatever that advice was. But right now, there was nothing either of them could do. Ghastly wasn't here. None of the other Dead Men were here. At least, not as far as either of them knew. And there was a note of sincerity in Skulduggery's voice which allowed Descry to accept his words--for now.

"That's quite a condition," Descry murmured, following. "What if he arrives here first?" His tone, initially, was the same mild tone as before. "What if we establish a multiversal link between universes? What if someone discovers the interdimensional phone service?"

He glanced sidelong as Skulduggery, not exactly smiling--at least not in any fashion with his mouth. But his eyes had a faint twinkle. "What if you, God forbid, lose your brain?"

An interdimensional phone service? That wasn't a bad idea, but it still amused Skulduggery that Descry knew the term. He must have read it from the mind of someone else brought here against their will for this game, this challenge, someone with a phone on their person that wasn't getting a signal. He'd often wondered what Descry might have made of things like mobile phones, or the internet - the ability to communicate with someone before knowing their minds inside and out. He'd assumed he would never know, but maybe that conclusion was a bit premature.

"I've already lost that," Skulduggery countered with a faint amusement of his own, "so that's one down. If any of those others happens first, you can rest easy in the knowledge that you'll get to chaperone again. You believe we're in a different universe altogether, rather than just an alternate reality?"

"Oh, good." Descry's humour came more strongly now, still in his eyes more than anything else. "No guarantees that I'll stop Ghastly from breaking something, but I'll try to make sure it isn't your bones. Or at least not too many of them, anyway."

He might have to get punched once or twice himself, as if that was going to be worse than having to feel Ghastly's fury and betrayal, but it would be worth it. A century. Skulduggery had held Lord Vile at bay for more than a century.

"Yes," Descry said with that absolute certainty. "I've spoken to one or two of the others brought in, and gotten close enough to read some more." He looked at Skulduggery with something approaching bemusement in his eyes once more. "One of them was a pony. A sorcerer pony. Who could talk. And another one was apparently some kind of demigod." He shook his head. "There are too many differences. Mentality might be similar, general circumstances might be similar, but the hidden and unhidden societies, the way magic works ... they don't match ours."

He looked ahead again, and even though he'd been disappointed not long ago--and still was in some ways--he couldn't deny it was the only thing he felt. "If you're a century after my death, then you've rejected Vile for upwards of a hundred and seventy years." He let that sink in for a moment. "I'm proud of you for that."

"I'm glad someone is."

It wasn't a bitter tone, or an entitled one. Not after everything that happened, not after everything Skulduggery had felt and done. It was more of a resigned tone, a subject-ending tone. Resignation with the idea that of course Descry would be proud regardless of how undeserved that pride was, that nothing would change his mind, and that maybe - when all was said and done - he had a point. After all, he usually did.

"Talking sorcerer ponies and demigods." Skulduggery shook his head as he walked. "That stretches the point of disbelief, even for me. But, fair enough. This means we have no way of knowing how we were taken, or by whom."

Far from his voice growing bleak or his attitude drooping, Skulduggery almost seemed to grow brighter with the words. "It's been a long time since I struck out with such little information. I'm looking forward to a challenge."

"Someone has to be," Descry said simply. Skulduggery had earned more than he believed he did, because he had resisted and he was taking responsibility in the best way he could. It was just that, after that span of time, what he was doing wasn't enough. He did owe it to Ghastly, at the very least, to tell him what had happened. There was only so many years he could wait before the needed distance turned into a plateau.

And he needed to know it was worth coming back from that guilt.

"You didn't have to read their minds," Descry pointed out. "You didn't have to feel firsthand what it's like to be a magical pony. A magical pony unicorn." He shook his head. "You know, I wouldn't be surprised if this was the afterlife and it's just God's way of keeping me entertained. I'm probably hallucinating you. You're the only person I've never been able to read."

"True," Skulduggery nodded. "And hallucinations are always a distinct possibility. There's one flaw in your theory, however, and that's me. I'm impossible to hallucinate. I cannot be recreated as a simple figment of anyone's imagination."

He slid easily past the comment about magical pony unicorns with only an invisible Look at Descry. He wouldn't put it past the mind-reader to be exaggerating for effect.

"Of course," he mused after only a second or two of silence, "my imagination is easily brilliant enough to handle the complexity. I could be hallucinating all of this. Better yet, I could be dreaming."

"You're impossible to hallucinate?" Descry lifted an eyebrow at him. "You're aware you're talking to a man with countless people in his head, including the one who knows you best of all?" That's what it amounted to, over time. It was necessary to Descry's sanity to compartmentalise the thoughts of each person into some kind of mental box.

"I think you're underestimating me again, Skulduggery," he said. "I think I should be insulted. I also think you've spent too long without someone around to burst your swelled head." He reached out and prodded the side of Skulduggery's skull, far less exuberantly than Rover ever would have and yet in an echo of his mannerism.

"See? I can practically touch it from a foot away. We'll have to work on that." He dropped his hand, and didn't stop walking.

It was such a Larrikin-esque gesture that Skulduggery had to laugh, his head tilting forward in an admittance of Descry's point. An admittance, of course, that didn't stop him from arguing. "Or," he said, "if I can offer up an opposing theory, maybe the people I currently associate with recognise my genius enough not to try and burst it."

He had saved the world no less than seven times, after all. And that wasn't including all the minor arrests of evil people who could certainly have gone on to threaten the entire planet, if he hadn't put an early stop to their ambitions. Maybe people were just finally starting to listen to him.

"Just because they recognise your genius doesn't mean they can't burst your head," Descry pointed out. "Especially if they want to try and gain some themselves. Why wouldn't they burst your head? Maybe it would carry some of the genius over. And at the very least it would be entertaining."

They were coming to the edge of the town now, close enough to the woods that the buildings began to peter out into dusty road. Descry hadn't really meant to ask anything specific, at least not at this point, but there was still one thing Skulduggery hadn't explained. "Who is Valkyrie?"

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skeletonenigma - 2013-08-31 13:33 (UTC) - Expand