snowblindrpg | [log] Event: Metamorphosis, Part Three

[What... the ever-loving hell. House backs into the room. At least Room 02 is one of the bigger ones in the Bunker. If he can just keep space--and beds--between himself and that monstrosity that sounds like Beckett, looks only a little like him, then maybe he can get out and escape to another room.]

Yeah, I'm sorta booked up right now. Rain check?

[But as Beckett moves closer, there's a prickle up House's spine, a twist around his gut, and then it hits him. Every sin. Every regret. The walls around him are turning to the white of the twisting maze where they'd found Winter's body and that thing he'd found with Steph. That thing that he couldn't look away from.]

What...?

[He can tell that he's having an effect, and it's as satisfying as anything can be right now. Which isn't much at all, but everything inside Beckett aches so badly, the physical and the mental and the spiritual, the knowledge of failure and loss and centuries of mistakes that come to nothing. This is the only satisfaction he can ever get and by God he will take it. Isn't he a leech? Doesn't he prey on lives?]

How do you like it, doctor? This is death. This is what it feels like. This is what you wanted!

[He takes a step with every stressed word. The miasma rolls along. It can snuff out life eventually, but not before he squeezes out all he can of someone else's misery.]

[No. No, he doesn't like it at all.

He's screaming abuse at Stacy as she's standing in their bedroom doorway, suitcases packed, tears rolling down her face. He's calling her every horrible thing he can think of, slicing through her with words, picking apart every defect, telling her to leave, to go, to do whatever the hell she wants. He doesn't need her and like hell he loves her after what she's done to him. He wants to grab her, to hold her close, to beg her to stay, but he doesn't. He just pushes and pushes and pushes until she's out the door.]

Don't. Stop...

[He takes a step back.

His father stands beside him, cold fury in his eyes. House had talked back again. He'd pressed his luck too far. There's an ice-filled bath. He knows what he has to do. House turns to his father, tears in his eyes as he begs forgiveness. He's told that men don't cry. Get in the bath. If he hadn't been so stupid, if he hadn't tried to defy. If he'd just come home on time.

House flees to the back of the room, trying to get as far from Beckett as humanly possible. There are tears streaking his cheeks, and he's not sure when he started cry. He's wanted death for a very, very long time, but not like this, not when he has no say, not when he's just a victim and it won't matter.]

Newsflash, asshat. I've died ten times. This isn't what it feels like!

Edited 2018-10-30 20:51 (UTC)

You've taken ten naps! [And another step, and another. By God, it feels good, even as he's aware that his eyes are leaking just as much as House's. Filthier stuff, bloodied black. But he isn't alone with all those lost chances and causes. That is as close to salvation as he'll come.] It's not death if it isn't final. Not if there's another chance to make right!

[He's looking at Lucita and then he's looking through her and into her soul. Invading her. Betraying her, then judging her for what he had no right to see. He never made it right. He never will. Why should he have another chance with House? He's going to burn it to the ground.]

You can't heal this. Can you? Can you??

[Wilson is there. Wilson from the first time. He's leaving the man in Hsioake Pass, going his own way so that Wilson can be with Amber, away from House. And then death. Away from his friend. Powerless.

Wilson is here a second time. A second chance! And then he's dead again. Dead and not coming back. Dead in this place, dying back home... six months to live. Maybe four good ones. And House had pushed away from him in some ways, anyway, until the words had been ripped out of him by a death price. The affection he feels, the bond. And it still hadn't been enough. He hadn't dragged Wilson back to safety with him. A procession out of the Bunker, a cold burial in the snow with no words from House. What is there to even say?

He can't protect anyone here. Even the people he wants to protect. Even the people he tries to help. There's more yelling at Rhys, berating him to just feel better and stop wallowing. House has lived with depression for decades, lived with the pain, the bitterness, the loss. Everyone else should be able to push through, to deal with it and just focus on the goddamn puzzles. Why can't they focus? Why can't Davesprite focus? Clint? Frisk? Freya? Clayton Goddamn Epps? There is a trail of bodies he didn't mean to be dragging behind him.

Too many had died for the puzzle, for his proposed experiments.

Kid, Amber...

But they had died for a reason. They hadn't been pointless. Dying now to Beckett? That would be pointless.]

Who the hell-the hell wants to heal death? [He's heaving breaths as he can't help crying.] That's what sucks most about this place! Don't you get it? The only thing that makes life worth living is dying, you moron. And this place takes it away. I don't wanna heal you, I wanna put you out of your goddamn misery!

[He's going to have to just go for it. House runs to the opposite corner at the back of the room, then up along the wall, a row of bunk beds between himself and the anomaly.]

Don't talk to me about what makes life worth living! [That utterly tiny human perspective, a mind in the vast ocean of the world, flailing for something to hold onto. That's all it's ever been. It's all he's ever been.] Don't tell me about living while you can! All my life has come to nothing! And all you've ever done is prolong blind suffering with false hopes!

[How dare House say otherwise to him. House of all people, as Godless a man as Beckett has ever known, who still insists that he wants to know how to stop being miserable, and Beckett had believed that - had told him that it was possible. He doesn't want to hear from House about reasons, about anything that gives life meaning or worth.

There's nowhere for the man to run. No denying that, whatever else House tries to deny. Beckett is in no hurry. He can walk around the bunks, careful to keep himself between House and the door. Slow, deliberate, implacable. An unavoidable fact, death.]

Is that the best you can offer this town? Put us all out of our misery?!

[House is curled over in the snow, wrapped in tin foil, waiting for a third death. This leg is useless again. Alphonse is alive, but so, so badly injured. Armor isn't supposed to bleed. Why did he bleed? How could the chemicals have hurt eyes that don't exist? How could they have gotten it so damn wrong? How could House have gotten it so wrong?

He rips himself out of the memory and keeps changing directions to try to lead Beckett far enough to one side so that he can run around him on the other.]

Let's go with just you. You're special and all. The guy who "lived" to see the apocalypse. Congrats on being around for a second one, buddy. You haven't been alive for a long time. You don't remember what it's like.

[Maybe none of them are really alive now. Not in the physical sense. Strong AIs? Yes, almost certainly. But in their original forms? No. Beckett's certainly not like that.]

[Beckett is an experienced hunter, of animal and human prey alike. Being led by his quarry is a trick he'd stopped falling for decades ago, and that shows in the way he continues stalking, herding House back toward the nearest corner. But at the same time there's a growing unevenness to his movements, a slow slip of the cold design. The rage is building and pushing reason away. It's always been this predator's weakness. If the prey can stay alive long enough.]

I remember. It's miserable. It's empty and senseless and ignorant. I chose damnation. I thought it would be more. [And for the first time in three hundred years, he regrets that choice. The realisation is absolutely crippling in the depths of despair it plunges him into. He chokes out something like a sob or a howl, a gale of putrid, toxic air pouring out of the ruin of his body.]

You think you'll do better? You're exactly the same! You've damned yourself, and that's all you'll ever be!

[It is all of those things. House can't deny it. Life is as Hobbes described it: solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short. He's reaching towards Ecks as she tries to fight off the Joker. She's terrified, desperate, stupidly trying to defend him. He watches the poker go through her, then it's in him, darkness edges at his vision. How many times has he gotten someone else killed because he had to keep pushing? Couldn't shut up? Couldn't bend?

House shoves hard on one of the bunk beds, trying to topple it over onto the anomaly.

And he forces himself to picture the grin of Robert Miller's face if he gave up. Fuck that guy. House is not letting him win. Or this goddamn icebox. He's told Alphonse and others more than once: hope isn't what motivates him. Beckett can strip what little there is out of him. Hope is never been the driver. Taking it away makes things more miserable, but it doesn't extinguish the flames. He's an electrical fire that just found more salt to burn through.]

Damned if you do, damned if you don't, bro. You're seriously whiny about it all. You're just a cowardly little bastard who tried to outrun death and got pissy when you couldn't!

[The bunk bed comes toppling down indeed, and Beckett might be ready to chase but not to be fought back against. He's not fast now and not steady either. He has no hope of dodging, and when he goes down it's hard. A mess of wet impacts and a hideous rattle as the air is forced from his riddled lungs. Just more pain. It's just more pain. This damned mortal who thinks he understands what despair is, who calls him a coward when he'd chosen death with open arms -

The opposite. It's always the opposite. It's life he'd tried to run from. Keeping his distance, never involved, digging through the past, giving up on the future. House is desperately unhappy but he's alive and trying to stay that way, and Beckett can't tear that will out of him. And there goes the tipping point between reason and wrath. There comes the beast, old loyal friend, to sweep away the shards of his broken mind.

His struggle to rise is savage, but at the same time pathetic, wounded animal written all over it. He'll be a while. House can escape if he hurries. If he chooses escape. If he thinks there is anywhere to escape to.]

[House is ready to bolt. He does making it to the door. But when Beckett doesn't actively pursue him, he turns back to look and sees a pitiful, raging creature. Is this what he's really afraid of?]

Death's a lot more pathetic and whiny than I expected.

[Beckett can't seem to get the bunk beds off of himself, and House takes a few tentative steps in his direction, pulling his tablet out. Okay, so, it's clear that objects don't pass through these anomalies. House wonders what they might look like on film. And if they'd react poorly to the Eye App like many of the anomalies did when they first acquired the thing.

As he edges closer, though, the tears start again and his mind turns back to the last memories he has, that dream he'd been trapped in, understanding that he doesn't want to be miserable, that he wants to live, and then coming back here and having so much of that stripped away again and again and again. House bites his lip and soldiers on. This is for science.

He gets behind Beckett and turn on the Eye App. His battery is running extremely low.]

Edited 2018-11-03 00:56 (UTC)

[Fortunately, Beckett is too far gone to be enraged any further by the comment. Even frenzy only goes so far when all it has to work with is a rotting parody of a body. He keeps struggling but doesn't get far as House films. To the camera he's just like any anomaly. Maybe that's all he's ever been. Just another piece of the puzzle. Just another creation of the town. What has Beckett ever been, anyway?

He doesn't manage to get up or move the beds much. But as House comes closer - closer - within a few steps - he manages something else. His head snaps around on his neck, full on Exorcist mode, hideous hissing included. Dead things can do that. Especially angry dead things.

He hack-spits a flood of black foulness all over House's feet. It pours itself into any crack or scratch in House's shoes it can find and squeezes in for the flesh. It is unspeakably disgusting, and within seconds it burns.]

God damn-!

[House staggers away, trying to kick the... whatever the hell it is, off. There's a small break in the seam of his right shoe, though, just enough to let a little seep in. It chews straight through his sock and House is falling back against the doorway, swearing.]

What the hell did you just- freaking bastard! I hope your lungs fill up with mold!

[He needs to leave. Now. Because he doesn't want to be trying to examine his foot with Beckett right there.]

[That's not much of a curse when those lungs are already rotten to collapse, House. Even if it could penetrate the frenzy. But what does evidently penetrate it is his shout and fall. The prey is down, however briefly. The Beast gets its shot of satisfaction. Lucidity gleams to life in Beckett's eyes.

It's not the normal post-rage exhaustion and frustrated regret. It's a gleeful spark. The anomaly doesn't turn its head back around as it starts squirming from under the beds, still weak, but now methodical. It grins, a red and black mess.]

Run, little man.

[He runs. While he still can, House will always run.]

[log] Event: Metamorphosis, Part Three

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cw: suicidal ideations; child abuse; partner verbal abuse

oh no this hurt me good

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