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apocalypsehowcomm2022-07-06 08:49 pm
landing_lights) wrote in apocalypsehowcomm2022-07-06 08:49 pm
my eyes like butterflies [OPEN + closed prompts]
Who: Ade Bennett + various + maybe you?
When: Throughout July
Where: Near ADI headquarters, at Dogtown, and possibly other locations
Summary: Ade deals with an unexpected change to his eyes + various catch-all prompts
Warnings: Freaky alien eyes
[ When Ade first feels it, he thinks it’s allergies.
He is at a pet supply shop after all—there must be all kinds of dander and dust in there—so when he notices the faintly stinging heat in his eyes, he ignores it for the first few minutes... At least, until he remembers that it shouldn’t even be possible for him to have allergies. At that point, he hastily finds a restroom with a mirror to take a look at what exactly is going on—
—and promptly has to suppress a shout of surprise. His eyes are no longer those of a human—they’re those of a wess’har, dominated by a golden iris and alien, four-lobed pupil. When he stares, those pupils abruptly snap shut, forming the cross shape he saw so often in the eyes of particularly inquisitive wess’har back on Bezer’ej. ]
Shit, [ he whispers. Of course this happens when he’s outside of ADI headquarters, with no psychic disguise because he hadn’t thought he’d need one.
He needs to get back. Fast—and without any civilians seeing his eyes.
What follows is a painfully extended trip back to ADI headquarters. Ade keeps his head tucked down, moving as quickly and purposefully as he can while barely being able to see in front of him. Still, he fares surprisingly well for most of the trip, letting his feet retrace his steps. At some point, he even realizes he can make his bowed head look more natural by holding his phone as he walks, pretending to be engrossed in something on the screen. He begins to feel almost hopeful that he might be able to make it back to ADI without incident—
—until he walks headlong into someone in the home stretch.
He jerks back, heart pounding, remembering to close his eyes at the last second. Unfortunately, that leaves him not knowing who is standing in front of him—or how to step around them. ]
Sorry, [ he says. ] I’ll just—
[ Cue him very awkwardly trying to side-step someone he can’t see. ]
When: Throughout July
Where: Near ADI headquarters, at Dogtown, and possibly other locations
Summary: Ade deals with an unexpected change to his eyes + various catch-all prompts
Warnings: Freaky alien eyes
[ When Ade first feels it, he thinks it’s allergies.
He is at a pet supply shop after all—there must be all kinds of dander and dust in there—so when he notices the faintly stinging heat in his eyes, he ignores it for the first few minutes... At least, until he remembers that it shouldn’t even be possible for him to have allergies. At that point, he hastily finds a restroom with a mirror to take a look at what exactly is going on—
—and promptly has to suppress a shout of surprise. His eyes are no longer those of a human—they’re those of a wess’har, dominated by a golden iris and alien, four-lobed pupil. When he stares, those pupils abruptly snap shut, forming the cross shape he saw so often in the eyes of particularly inquisitive wess’har back on Bezer’ej. ]
Shit, [ he whispers. Of course this happens when he’s outside of ADI headquarters, with no psychic disguise because he hadn’t thought he’d need one.
He needs to get back. Fast—and without any civilians seeing his eyes.
What follows is a painfully extended trip back to ADI headquarters. Ade keeps his head tucked down, moving as quickly and purposefully as he can while barely being able to see in front of him. Still, he fares surprisingly well for most of the trip, letting his feet retrace his steps. At some point, he even realizes he can make his bowed head look more natural by holding his phone as he walks, pretending to be engrossed in something on the screen. He begins to feel almost hopeful that he might be able to make it back to ADI without incident—
—until he walks headlong into someone in the home stretch.
He jerks back, heart pounding, remembering to close his eyes at the last second. Unfortunately, that leaves him not knowing who is standing in front of him—or how to step around them. ]
Sorry, [ he says. ] I’ll just—
[ Cue him very awkwardly trying to side-step someone he can’t see. ]
no subject
[He tries to imagine it. Any part of that story, really. Being in space, fighting a war among the stars, getting infected by a space parasite - handing himself over to the enemy, to aliens. It's impossible. It's like thinking about the plot of a movie, its narrative moving but completely detached from any experience he's ever had.]
And the wess'har - they never explained anything to you? About what's happening in your body, how the symbiosis works?
[He rubs his head, his headache increasing. And Luka had that thing in him. Maybe still has. Unless it was replaced with something worse now.]
... Did they treat you well?
no subject
[ The irony of saying that to Carter, someone whose friend had been infected by him, isn't lost on Ade. He'd just really thought things would be different here—that, unable to survive long-term in a host, c'nataat was now something that could be controlled and used for the greater good.
Evidently, he was wrong. ]
One of them did: Aras. [ There's a softness in Ade's voice when he says the name. ] He was one of the first of their soldiers to be infected—and the last one still alive by the time we humans arrived on the scene a few centuries later. He's the one who told me what I was in for after I was infected.
[ Christ, Ade misses him. Aras and Shan—it's better for everyone that they aren't here with Ade, but there are times Ade catches himself wishing one of them were, despite everything. He's never been good at operating alone.
The next question gets a soft huff of laughter. ]
Yeah. Treated me a hell of a lot better than we treat POWs on Earth. The wess'har aren't usually the type to take prisoners, so I guess they never got the memo about keeping us good and demoralized. Felt less like being a POW and more like being a permanent guest.
[ He wasn't allowed to leave, sure, but the wess'har did what they could to accommodate his needs. Certainly none of them had ever treated him with cruelty. ]