mycursedface

She flew in from the north-east, taking a short-cut through the desert skies, but even so she could still see the town when she approached her home. A fishing town, small but not a village, with boats out in the ocean and Romanesque buildings.

It hadn’t been there when she left.

A swerve to the left and there were walls, a gate and a beaten path from the road. Some buildings, too, above where the caves are, and an encircled garden and it’s on the garden wall that Medusa finally settles.

Settles, crouches, stares at her sister as the other Gorgon weeds.

It is a strange sensation, moving from air and land into a wall of sea, and for a moment Medusa is completely disorientated. Upside down and cool and salty and the Gorgon takes a deep breath. In, out, watch the bubbles for a moment and then she swims to the surface.

It is a bay that she doesn’t remember seeing, with a jungle that she thinks she remembers all too well. No sign of Artemis, and she isn’t sure if she’s glad or not.

But there is someone else here.

Someone sitting on a rock in the sun, idly trailing her fish's tail in the water. Someone with flowing dark hair and eyes that Medusa knows are sea-blue. Someone who tastes and smells like family and sister…

Someone who is doing their nails.

Aquilaris is where we set our scene,
a planet of cities few and oceans serene;
a glitzy resort for the rich and famous
and those attempting to be glam’rous.

In his favour, it should be said that Atton is neither
but in his present circumstances a mere fiver
would make him appear to be quite rich
(it is not his fault that they left him in the ditch.)

Of course, his companion is something different
through no fault of her own; if she is now content
it’s due to her fame and fortune being of another world
and making men’s heads turn never did grow old.

And Medusa Gorgos, rightly called snake-haired
(for to go among mortals with her head bared
would be foolish to say the least), has the exact
kind of mind to wreck havoc with Pazaak.

Her teacher Atton Rand is no slouch at the game,
using it as he does to shield his mind, but today his aim
is not quite so moral. There are stories of a treasure
and with distracting Meda he plans to steal for his pleasure.

Now Aquilaris may be a ritzy pleasure garden but it is still a planet
and all planets have cantinas where different folk can be met;
a cantina is where the duo are, he disguised by name and she by sight,
playing cards against a pirate whose pride is his intellectual might.

“You’re good, little girl,” and in return Medusa smiles
(the Gorgon is not above using her considerable feminine wiles)
as she places nine cards on the table without going bust;
a move which the pirate’s former players would think just.

Tension rules the table, a long moment frozen by Cil-Who-Ate,
who fumes and snarls and growls. When he speaks, his voice is a grate,
“You’ll pay for that,” and in the same breath he grabs her slender arm.
“Now, now, don’t be hasty,” Atton drawls, “you’ll come to some harm.”

(to be continued...)

Medusa and sleep are two things that often do not get along. Even if her dreams are free of nightmares now (and isn't she glad of that - even when she didn't wake up screaming, she'd be whimpering and moaning and causing a scene) it's still...
I walked beside the evening sea
Strange.
And dreamed a dream that could not be;
She mostly sleeps during the day, when it's safe. She sleeps with her arms curled around Sam's pillow when she can't get Sam himself, face buried and snakes lying this way and that. Tangled up in the sheets, wings out, and for such a small person, Medusa takes up a lot of room.

The waves that plunged along the shore
And she dreams. She dreams of the ocean that is her home, of the cliffs and clouds. She dreams of the waves giggling with the voices of her sisters and she dreams of her triplets in the new and empty world in which they'd been born. She dreams of babbling in their own language and trying to pull Stheno's hair as Euryale aims for her feet and-

Said only: "Dreamer, dream no more!"
And when she wakes up, blearily shoving the pillow onto the ground, she can't remember anything. Dreams are like that, sometimes.

from here:

The door slams behind Medusa, but she doesn't stop running.

(need air needair need to breathe)

Instead she, like any other bird would, uses her momentum to jump, to launch herself in the air with her wings pulling back and slamming against the air as hard as she can to leave the tug of the Earth.

(the sky is cloudy when she leaves the bar, the air warm in the late afternoon.

she doesn't notice)

thecrackalsorises

It had been good when she first came to Milliways. Curled up in Lucifer’s bed, in Lucifer’s arms, with the devil between her and the door, she could sleep. Oh, could she sleep. Damn straight she was good in bed, she had slept for days. Dreams, yes. Nightmares, yes, but…But it was sleep. It was good, too good, almost.

Too good to last, certainly.

As the nightmares began to increase, as they began to get worse and worse, it was too easy to fall into old habits and fall she did.

Lie awake for hours, staring at the door. Lie awake all night and if some of it is just due to her being used to a different sleep-pattern, most of it is just due to the fact that, well. She can’t get to sleep.

She doesn’t want to go to sleep.

Sleep means being unaware, sleep means being vulnerable, sleep means waking up to being murdered all over again. It feels the same, it always feels the same. Sometimes she’s drifting off, sometimes she’s drifting awake, but it’s the same; a sickening gasp, blind panic, and then her heart beating, beating, beating so hard with terror she is convinced that it’s going to break her ribs.

And if she does fall asleep, then it is either oblivion or nightmares. The oblivion is disconcerting; the nightmares are horrifying. Mostly, they are of being insane again, of seeing the world lawless and strange. The sky is purple, green, the trees lunge towards her and her mind is being eaten by rats. Sometimes, it is her murder; sometimes, it is her rape; sometimes it’s a strange mixture of the two, with Athena and Poseidon fighting and trampling her body underfoot (if she can scream, they never hear her, but being able to scream is rare). Mostly, though, it is memories of being crazy, and that is quite enough.

She doesn’t really need to sleep, anyway.

So, today Medusa stretches on the bed, rubs her eyes and then the cat (Shredie isn’t entirely sure what to make of this stranger, but the feathers are fun to play with), and gets to her feet. Jeans, sundress, bangles; kohl around her eyes because even if she hates looking in the mirror, even if she isn’t living in a desert, some things are habit.

And then her wire-framed glasses, and with a called goodbye to the boyfriend in the shower, she’s out the door and heading down the stairs.