( typing. stopping. shaking thumbs realizing they're traumatized mid-sentence — the laugh of the century. nat does laugh, a little hysterically. how fucking stupid is everything? )
a fucking heart at the center of the house. beating. like it's a living thing. like we're living inside it. it's in this big room full of fucking arteries like. i don't know. connected wires to a tv. it's just suspended. the walls are like muscle. that reverend guy told me it controls the barrier around the woods. he said if you damage the heart, it might take some time, but the boundary will go down, and we can get the fuck out of here. so i lit it on fire. with a lighter and hairspray. and it kinda roasted. like cooked meat. i figured that was it. but then when i woke up the fucking house was burning down like it spread from that thing. the heart.
[ Heart the size of a deer in a room full of arteries that's mysteriously gone poof sounds apocalypse-adjacent at minimum to Spike, but he's going to save that particular insight for Buffy, who's already seen an apocalypse or three. ]
Easy. Take a breath, Nat
You're not gonna have to do this alone, okay?
D'you know a girl named Buffy? Pint-sized but packs a punch?
Don't think we should holler about all this in the town square, but she's dealt with more than a few big nasties in her time. Knows how to delegate and how to keep people out of danger.
I'd trust her with this. Cross my unbeating heart.
nobody's gonna believe it. who would? that i lit a piece of shit heart on fire that conveniently disappeared so there's no evidence of it now. everyone's gonna look at me and decide i lit the house up on purpose because THAT makes more fucking sense than whatever the fuck DID happen. i'm fucked if we tell anyone. buffy isn't gonna trust me. why should she? spike
i lit the fucking house on fire. with people in it. probably including her i only told you so you wouldn't keep defending me on that post. you're making yourself a target
( braver than all them. the words never fit nat — a jacket that's a little too tight, or a pair of jeans that pinch. she doesn't feel brave, she feels inevitable. someone was eventually going to have to do something. that it was her is just the way of things — natalie climbs the mountain, natalie takes on the cold. the bravest thing about her is that she doesn't care what happens to her one way or the other, so it might as well be the girl with nothing who does the thing that makes the change. she has nothing to lose. )
okay. if you trust her talk to her.
he said a lot of weird shit. we don't need to prepare for what comes next, he said. what we are is fighting what we'll become. and uh what needs keeping will be kept. and what needs breaking will be broken. some other shit too probably.
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i'm the anon on that old guys post
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Anyway. Not the point.
Want to tell me what happened?
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( that dates emmrich more than the number of years he's been alive.
anyway. a wait. three dots indicating typing showing up and disappearing a few times. eventually, )
look dude it's
it's a trip
i wouldn't fucking believe it if i didn't see it
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Try me.
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( typing. stopping. shaking thumbs realizing they're traumatized mid-sentence — the laugh of the century. nat does laugh, a little hysterically. how fucking stupid is everything? )
a fucking heart at the center of the house. beating. like it's a living thing. like we're living inside it.
it's in this big room full of fucking arteries like. i don't know. connected wires to a tv. it's just suspended. the walls are like muscle.
that reverend guy told me it controls the barrier around the woods.
he said if you damage the heart, it might take some time, but the boundary will go down, and we can get the fuck out of here.
so i lit it on fire. with a lighter and hairspray. and it kinda
roasted. like cooked meat.
i figured that was it. but then when i woke up the fucking house was burning down like it spread from that
thing. the heart.
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[ Give him a tick while he tries to think of any sort of demon-y thing he's heard of like this, but in the meantime-- ]
How big was it, exactly? And how roasted did you get it?
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the size of a deer. not a deer heart. a fucking deer.
i saw maybe half of it go up? the veins were snapping. it was hard to tell.
spike i can't find the fucking room again.
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Easy. Take a breath, Nat
You're not gonna have to do this alone, okay?
D'you know a girl named Buffy? Pint-sized but packs a punch?
Don't think we should holler about all this in the town square, but she's dealt with more than a few big nasties in her time. Knows how to delegate and how to keep people out of danger.
I'd trust her with this. Cross my unbeating heart.
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i lit the fucking house on fire. with people in it. probably including her
i only told you so you wouldn't keep defending me on that post. you're making yourself a target
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You're braver than all of 'em. And I'm gonna protect you.
I can talk to Buffy. I'm a vampire, remember? She's seen stranger things than this spooky shapeshifter house.
Did that reverend bloke tell you anything else?
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okay. if you trust her
talk to her.
he said a lot of weird shit. we don't need to prepare for what comes next, he said.
what we are is fighting what we'll become. and uh
what needs keeping will be kept. and what needs breaking will be broken.
some other shit too probably.
no subject
Love a creep full of philosophical riddles. Can't say I'm looking forward to seeing him again.
You been out to the boundaries yet?