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[open] apples and quinces, lemons and oranges
Who: Ned, open to all
What: Here be species-swap logs involving Ned the unlikely fertility god.
Where: Anywhere (preferably outdoors).
When: Duration of the event (58 - 61); put date in header, please.
Warnings: Blood, kidnapping, creepiness and general Ned-terrorizing? [will add more as necessary]
Ned wanders the town barefoot, leaving a path of fruit and flowers and vegetation behind him. There are daffodils and bluebells, hyacinths and crocuses, irises of all colors, primroses and poppies and periwinkle in profusion. When he stops to sit quietly under a tree, by the edge of the woods, the vines spread out from his body like paint creeping through water. They slowly wind their way up the trees, or else sprawl across the ground, swelling with strawberries and blackberries, grapes and kiwis, passionfuit and cherries.
He doesn't understand why it is happening, but from the sound of the messages over the communicator, everyone has been going through some strange changes. As far as Ned's concerned, being some kind of plant conjurer is better than some options.
Since he can't think of much else to do with his time, Ned lounges in the dappled shade and makes bouquets. All he needs to do is rake his hands through the soil and a few minutes later, up come the snapdragons, up come the cala lilies. He finds that, if he focuses on a particular kind of flower as he does it, sometimes it is mixed amongst the others. As he sits the hydrangeas are bubbling up around him, shielding him from view.
Ned isn't worried about resting in the woods, despite all the dire warnings he's heard in his short time here. He is at the very edge, just in the shade of the first few trees; the lions and tigers and bears can't possibly have any objections. So he lounges in his cozy bower, hazy, half-awake (he hadn't exactly slept well, the previous night), weaving crowns of camellias and garlands of gladiolus.
What: Here be species-swap logs involving Ned the unlikely fertility god.
Where: Anywhere (preferably outdoors).
When: Duration of the event (58 - 61); put date in header, please.
Warnings: Blood, kidnapping, creepiness and general Ned-terrorizing? [will add more as necessary]
Ned wanders the town barefoot, leaving a path of fruit and flowers and vegetation behind him. There are daffodils and bluebells, hyacinths and crocuses, irises of all colors, primroses and poppies and periwinkle in profusion. When he stops to sit quietly under a tree, by the edge of the woods, the vines spread out from his body like paint creeping through water. They slowly wind their way up the trees, or else sprawl across the ground, swelling with strawberries and blackberries, grapes and kiwis, passionfuit and cherries.
He doesn't understand why it is happening, but from the sound of the messages over the communicator, everyone has been going through some strange changes. As far as Ned's concerned, being some kind of plant conjurer is better than some options.
Since he can't think of much else to do with his time, Ned lounges in the dappled shade and makes bouquets. All he needs to do is rake his hands through the soil and a few minutes later, up come the snapdragons, up come the cala lilies. He finds that, if he focuses on a particular kind of flower as he does it, sometimes it is mixed amongst the others. As he sits the hydrangeas are bubbling up around him, shielding him from view.
Ned isn't worried about resting in the woods, despite all the dire warnings he's heard in his short time here. He is at the very edge, just in the shade of the first few trees; the lions and tigers and bears can't possibly have any objections. So he lounges in his cozy bower, hazy, half-awake (he hadn't exactly slept well, the previous night), weaving crowns of camellias and garlands of gladiolus.
Late evening, day 60, I think
What he wants is there, flowing in tiny, secret channels hidden with the flesh of others. He wants it so badly that his teeth, razor-sharp for piercing the flesh and ferreting out its buried treasure, ache with it, and the remembered taste sits heavy and tantalizing on his tongue: thick and electric, with the coppery tang of the tiny bits of metal.
Metal. Always metal. Like the metal he wore and the cold, useless thing in his chest that he still hasn’t pried out. It’s like an heirloom, like a reminder, and the tiny, infinitesimal part of him that hasn’t given up on hope knows that he can’t take it out. There’s no telling if or when they’ll regain their true forms, and without it, he’ll be dead.
Dead like he is now. Dead like his prey will be when he reaches them. And soon he shall, for he’s circled ever closer to the unsuspecting town, each wide, sweeping arc of his thoughts drawing him in until he’s close enough that he can leave the trees for the town proper. He shouldn’t be here. He knows he needs to go back. Go away. Before he loses control. Before he kills.
But Tony isn’t listening to that quiet, fading voice of reason. He’s listening to the hunger racing through his body and turning his veins to fire. He’s listening to the grating of his teeth and the predatory thoughts slowly overwriting his mind.
He’s hungry. So very hungry. And dinner is about to be served.
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He is a sitting duck.
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The man’s content. At rest. The perfect easy prey for a predator that’s never hunted before.
But there’s another man here, hidden in the depths of the predator’s mind, and Tony’s aware of what he’s doing. Not entirely in control, but he’s watching from eyes that no longer feel like his own, and he knows that he must stop this. The wrong step is deliberate, a hard-won bid for control that allows him to step down on a small branch and snap it. As he hopes, the sound is loud in the quiet of the night. Enough, he hopes, to alert the man of his presence.
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Ned had glanced at Tony's message to the network - something about his skin sparkling in the sunlight? - but he'd been rather busy with other matters at the time and, if he's honest with himself, avoiding thinking about how badly he'd bungled his last conversation with the man. It was simply easier for him to avoid the issue, rather than dwell and feel bad and wonder how he is going to apologize, and if it will matter. He told himself he was waiting for the opportune time.
But apparently, that time has come now, with or without his permission. Ned pulls out of the trance, smiling at Tony, hesitantly. "Tony, hi. It's good to see you." He cringes internally, thinking, too obvious, too fake, he's already screwing his apology up and he hasn't even started. "What brings you out here at this hour?"
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He blinks, shakes his head once, almost viciously, and stops a few feet away. The tension practically radiates from his body, holding it straight and almost painfully stiff.
“Stay back.” It’s a low, grudging growl, every word hard won from the instinct that urges him to leap forward and attack. “Stay back. You need to get away from me, but don’t—” That word comes out a little too sharp. “—move fast. Don’t run. Whatever you do, don’t run. I’ll chase you if you run.”
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Now, though, he's tense and serious, with his grave warning and his look of intense concentration. Ned knows - or at least he's nearly certain - this isn't a prank or a joke. Tony is a threat to him, knows it, is trying to hold himself back. Heart hammering with sudden fear, Ned hastens to comply. He tries to make himself move slowly and steadily, but his body has other plans. It is telling him to run, to get out of reach as quickly as possible. He gets to his feet, knees shaking, and takes a step back, slowly, not taking his eyes off Tony. Another step. No pursuit as of yet.
But he can't just run without saying anything. So, hands raising in an unconscious pacifying gesture he asks, taking another little step back, "Are you gonna be alright? Do you want me to get help?" Ned isn't sure who he'll ask, but there are a few people around who he thinks might be able to handle a predator on the loose better than he could. Ned takes another step back, doesn't realize there is a wicker basket in the way. He tumbles back over it with a short cry, adrenaline spiking through him at the surprise.
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And his heart, oh but it’s like music to Tony’s ears and his ears focus on its rapid beat, hearing only that as he watches his mouth move. He’s talking. Tony knows that he’s talking. But it may as well be gibberish for all he understands it.
He meant it, though, when he told him no sudden movements. Because he stumbles, and Tony’s on him so fast he doesn’t even register the movement. One second he’s standing there, too attentive, too prepared to strike. And the next he’s on top of him, knees on either side of his hips, palms planted next to his shoulders, pressing him down against the ground as he leans forward to sniff at his throat, his lips skimming back from his fangs. Stop it. Stop it. Stopitstopitstopitstopit.
“Didn’t I tell you? No. Sudden. Moves.” But he doesn’t bite. Even though his body’s practically screaming at him to do it, he refuses to give in to it.
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This is now the fourth time in a handful of days that Ned has found himself caught by some malevolent creature, stronger and more vicious than him, which appears to have every intention of making him dinner. Damsel in distress indeed, he thinks, remembering his conversation with Jesse. It would be hilarious if he weren't certain that he is going to die any second; in his fear, all thought of his healing powers has left Ned.
When Tony leans in close to his neck, breathing in as if he were an aromatic home-cooked meal, Ned goes completely still, his face white with fear. "S-s-sorry," he says. Maybe an apology will do some good, will remind Tony of his humanity. Ned doesn't think it's likely. He bites the inside of his cheek, trying to keep from screaming, which he thinks may only egg Tony on. Predator instincts, and all of that. He tastes the tang of his own blood, knows he's bitten too hard.
"Jesus, p-please just let me go." He screws his eyes shut. The plants creeping up around him now aren't jasmine, but briars and burrs and stinging nettles, nameless weeds with thick thorns and bright red poisonous berries.
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To wit: while he could probably have never moved silently enough to keep a vampire from hearing him, on a good day he might at least have had the element of surprise going for him, could have thrown something metal from a distance and run in after it--now, although the crunch and crush of flowers underfoot and snapped branches at broad shoulders paves his lumbering way and obliterates silence, it was that lightness and flight that would have worked against him before. Given the choice between unstoppable force and immovable object, he'd have chosen the former every time. But now he doesn't have a choice; he has to work with what he has.
He has a strange sense of doubling upon actual entrance to this scene of impending violence, which is the only way he codes it: he wasn't even sure what he would find, or who, he just--knew. Had purpose, was pulled by the marks above his eyes. It's not so different than before, he's been aware since he was eleven that there were more kinds of monsters in the world than he could count.
But then he grew up, and since then he's known the only way to deal with monsters is to be a bigger one.
That has perhaps never been as literal as it is now, which is in the moment blackly funny at least to him. He makes the clunky clay bars that are his fingers form a rough fist (they're meant more as melee weapons than for bladed work, if you will, and you should) and sinks it into the back of Tony's shirt (it's a name he has in his head although it doesn't mean much right now beyond the vague memory of a clever mind and quicker mouth), lifting him bodily off of Ned and tossing him with one long arm.
It's not pretty, but it is effective, so there's that. Tony's never seen him off of the network, and like this, this strange living statuary someone cobbled together and left unfinished, a tower of rough clay and silent presence, there's no reason he ought to recognize him now either, especially not with Ned's blood in the air. Erik angles his shoulders in the space between the two men and...uh. Looms. He would raise his eyebrows if it weren't so much effort, but actually it's pretty difficult even to move his mouth, so this will have to do.
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Tony doesn’t heart the lumbering footsteps of the strange creature approaching. He doesn’t smell it or notice the way the air flow has been displaced by its arrival. He’s too far gone, too close to finally sinking his fangs into flesh and blood. Mouth opening wider, he leans in for the kill—
—and then it’s gone.
It takes him a second to register that he’s been yanked away from the man’s body. It takes another to recognize that the rush of wind and the weightlessness is himself flying through the air. Like a splash of cold water to the face, it snaps him out of the frenzied bloodlust enough to figure out that he’s just been pulled away from—from – name, he has a name, what’s his name? - Ned. Ned. Agent Jay. The guy who plays the resurrection game with a touch.
The information returns with the onset of sanity, and while he’s been mentally absent from the situation, his body has taken over, twisting in the air and landing on his feet like a cat. It’s just as well. If he’d tried to do it, it’s likely that he wouldn’t have been able to.
He looks from the giant… statue thing - what the hell is that? - to Ned behind it. The hunger’s still there. The scent of blood’s still in the air. It would be so easy to slip back into it and attack again. Part of him wants to, urges him to dart around the big thing and rip Ned’s throat out. The rest of him, appalled, refuses.
“You okay?” He doesn’t come any closer, forces himself to take a step backward away from him. “I didn’t bite you, did I? The blood—” Focus, Stark. “—it’s not from me?”
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But then there is that strange crashing, those heavy footfalls ever-louder, coming closer. Ned can't see what it is, doesn't have room for any more dread in him, when suddenly the weight on Tony is gone. Ned sees him flying through the air and the enormous clay man who threw him interposing himself between Ned and Tony. He doesn't stop to wonder what kind of creature it is that has saved him, or why. He draws in a long, shuddering breath of relief, scrambles to his feet, getting ready to run if he has to, if the clay man tells him to.
Ned doesn't know how he knows, but he knows that admittedly frightening creature it is here to protect him. Maybe it's something about the way it holds itself, something about the way it is watching Tony, something vaguely familiar about it that he can't yet place. This isn't one predator fighting off another for a chance at its prey. It's easier for him to answer Tony, with that other body planted between them as a shield.
"You didn't bite me," he confirms, breathlessly. Perhaps later, when things have settled down, Ned will have time to feel bad for Tony, for the distress in his voice as he asks how much damage he's done. For now, though, he's still a danger, and Ned wants him far, far away.
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His mouth does--something, mostly of its own accord, corners pulling. It's not a lip-skinning predator's grimace, but it's not something he thinks his features were meant to do much of anyway. Like speech. "Could throw you again. If that helps."
It is not easy to affect mock-solicitation with this face, by the way, but Erik makes a pretty good job of it anyway, turning his head on massive shoulders to look around at all the trees. If he could helpfully diagram a pinball in a machine for Tony, he would attempt to do this!
He, of course, has absolutely no knowledge of the correct films and can't imagine Tony zigzagging from trunk to trunk on creepily nimble feet, but as viewers we ought to enjoy the imagery anyway.
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He may be hungry. He may be starving in a way he never has before and his veins may feel thick and scratchy and too tight in his body. But he doesn’t want to drink Ned’s blood. He doesn’t want to drink anyone’s blood. Humans don’t drink blood, and he’s been a human too long to easily succumb to this.
The garden gnome’s right. He should go. Just like he should not have to drink blood to sate the hunger. But he can’t go. The smell of Ned’s blood holds him rooted to the spot and all of the demands that his muscles obey him go unanswered. It leaves him with the most idiotic of undignified suggestions. Unfortunately for his dignity, it’s the only one they have.
“Do it.” It’s strong, whatever it is. Even if it had used its full strength on him, it’s still strong enough to get him a little further away, and a little further might be all he needs to get himself back under control again. “Hard as you can. Do it.”
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Then he has to actually deal with the fact that Tony isn't departing under his own power, or can't; perhaps under the circumstances he ought to feel more charitable, considering what he knows of the absolute erosion of any human dignity. Then again, that's never been a virtue he's ascribed to anyway. It's such an inelegant solution, brute force, but that's this body, that's what it does. He's just traded one weapon for another.
The broad plane of his shoulders creaks as he turns a glance over at Ned, still clearly positioned uncertainly somewhere between flight and--well, between flight and flight, actually; he wouldn't have much idea how to convey reassurance if he wanted to, so the fact that he's present will have to serve. They've had this conversation, and Erik only ever says what he means. He's putting more distance between the two of them, which makes him a less direct shield, but as the drag of one foot in front of the other takes him toward Tony, he's also advancing on the prominent threat.
Already crushed flowers smear further along the ground under the soles of his feet; an iris here, a patch of daisies there. The environment Ned has created, festooned with trees as it is, would be something on any other day he'd appreciate aesthetically. Now all of his focus is occupied by Tony.
The stance he takes up in the aim of .......throwing him is not the same as the hold he used to lift him away from Ned: that was more or less a discus throw. This has more in common with a hard shove, a straight shot that when Erik pushes, drawing back back impossibly long arms so that the blocks he has for shoulderblades touch, should send Tony flying backwards on what amounts to a linear plane.
Thus at least avoiding the pinball aspect of the trees around them. One hopes.
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Yet again, he finds himself in the position of stuttering fervent thank you's to someone who has saved him from a messy, horrific death.
"Thank you," he says, even as he's walking over, wiping the blood from his bottom lip with the back of his hand, "thank you, thank you so much. How did you know-" then he breaks off. Ned gets his first proper look at the man's face and it is familiar. After a second or two, the resemblance clicks into place. "Erik? It's you, isn't it?" Yes, he recognizes the eyes, the set of his jaw, though it's blockier and stonier, now.
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Once again, the irony of the phrase is not lost on him even if his features don't reflect it much. Ned may observe it's the first real sentence Erik has managed since his heavy footfalls fractured that potential feeding frenzy, but because some things will never change, he's as dry as ever even through the gaps between words.
Like this it's easy to be impassive, in fact the real effort comes from trying to be anything else. He inspects Ned's general sense of being and finds that aside from the blood he's wiping away there appear to be no other injuries - not that he'd know what the hell to do if there were, it's not as if he can even call the person he'd reach out to for assistance - and relaxes minutely, as much as his bearing is capable of that. "All right now?"
There is the sense that if this is the case Erik will just move on to the next instance he can fix just by standing in its way, but--even though he doesn't sleep like this, he's still tired, and it's beautiful here in a way he'd wish he could feel, if wishing were something golems did.
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Because now that Tony has gone the shame starts to creep up on Ned, slowly and steadily. This is the second time Erik has seen him completely helpless. What must he think of Ned? Battered and terrorized by everything bigger and stronger than he is in this place? The fear is receding, but it leaves Ned shaking like a leaf in its wake. He crosses his arms tightly, fingers digging into his arms, willing his body to stop.
There's something fascinating about Erik, in his current state. Something solemn and still that Ned doesn't understand. He does his best not to stare. "I really can't thank you enough," he says, rubbing a hand across the back of his neck, "I owe you. Again." Ned doesn't know why he feels the need to justify himself to Erik in particular. He has an innate desire not to let him down, not to seem beneath his notice. Like there's much chance of that, now. "He just came out of nowhere."
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The rest of Ned's gratitude he doesn't shrug off, exactly, it just seems to soak into that dry clay and vanish under the skin. There's something--he can't pin it down and it's too frustrating to try, but something about Ned as he is now sets prickles at the back of his own neck, makes everything sharper, and in a time where he feels as dull as dust, that's hugely compelling. "Why should you thank me?"
A beat where he seems almost to blink, and then cracks - in a very little sense - a smile. "Money where the mouth is. What's the expression."
That takes it out of him for a second, shoulders visibly squaring. "You're American, you'd know."
He is ...referring to his straightforwardness in regards to being exactly the tank that he currently is when it comes to Ned, but if it takes a minute for him to suss that out Erik won't hold it against anyone except his own stratospheric standards for himself.
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It clicks for Ned, then, that Erik is referring to his earlier offer of protection. He feels his face flush with a mixture of gratitude and embarrassment that he had cause to back up that offer so soon. What Erik doesn't know (or at least, Ned hopes he doesn't know) is that not so long ago, River was making good on her promise to keep him safe. He's somehow, in this time and this place, become a burden to those around him.
He doesn't want to think about this anymore, doesn't want to dwell on his own uselessness. If he does, he's worried that all the leftover adrenaline and intensity from his encounter with Tony will make him weepy and fragile, and that's the absolute last thing he wants right now.
So with a force of will he focuses his attention outwards, on Erik, on his rather fascinating new shape. "Do you mind if I...?" Ned, rendered strangely tactile by his own transformation, reaches out towards Erik with one hand. He watches the other man, gives him every opportunity to move away or shake his head if he wants, before resting a hand on his forearm. Ned starts the first time he does it. He hadn't expected him to be so warm. But then, getting past the shock, he repeats the motion. It's not a trick of the light - he really does feel like clay, rather than flesh.
"Do you know what you are?" Ned asks, simply. After all, he doesn't have a name for what he's been turned into, so Erik might not, either.
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It's like having it back, just for a second, and it's like feeling that light-accented voice in his head where it belongs, like--it's just like being warm, on the inside as well as the outside that Ned can feel himself. That memory that Charles had coaxed out of a place he hadn't even realized he'd forgotten stays with him; it's paralyzing in its loss at the same time it loosens everything, makes his limbs almost like they should be again, and there's an instant where he doesn't know what to do with himself at all.
Ned's question lets him recenter himself; if his voice catches it was already doing that anyway. "A golem," he returns, just as simply. He knows his folklore, but it's too difficult to explain, so he summarizes as best he can: "A protector. A monster. Brought to life by faith."
Since they seem to be having a conversation now, even if Erik has moved his arm out of Ned's reach, letting them hang at his sides not loose, but ready, it seems like in polite company they ought to sit down. But he hasn't, really, since the change; his new height is strange, but not horrifying. "Some irony, I don't have any. What are you? Besides edible."
....sorry, Ned. Erik is, uh, still the same jerk in many respects.
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A golem. Of course - he should have realized. Ned is familiar with the concept from various science fiction incarnations, though the precise details escape him. It seems fitting in some way: the two times he's interacted with Erik, he has been protecting people or else offering future protection in the future. This is just an extension of one aspect of himself, in the same way that Ned's power is an extension of a certain aspect of himself, too.
The remark about being edible stings, but Ned knows he deserves it. He answers sarcasm with more sarcasm, "Very edible." After all, what hasn't tired to eat him, these last few days?
"I don't know what I am. Again," Erik will perhaps be able to see the bitter humor in that. Just as Ned, who'd spent most of his life looking for a name for what he is, had found one, he'd been turned into something different. "But all this-" he gestures all around them - to the rows of fruit trees, to the blanket of bluebells and buttercups and a hundred other kinds of flowers, "is me. I make things grow, and heal things."
In demonstration he bends down, straightens out some of the mashed and snapped patches of flowers where Erik's feet had been. The stems knit together again under his touch, the petals straightening and becoming whole, the leaves that were torn regrowing from the stem.