[CLOSED] Are you ready for the power of God?

[pummelgranite]

WHO: Persephone, Frederick Chilton, Sam "Borf Borf" Merlotte
WHERE: Room B-121 at the Maurtia Falls rec center
WHEN: Slightly predated to January 10th
WHAT: Exposure therapy
WARNINGS: Themes covered may include depression, suicidal idealization, sexual assault, and other related Bad Stuff.


[ The room that had been reserved (rented?) for them was small: barely large enough to hold a meeting table and a number of wobbly-looking plastic chairs. The place smelled distinctly of the generic cleaning solution that all unpleasant basement spaces had in common- one that had no specific association with any fruit or flower or spice, but simply brought to mind an unpleasant shade of pink. In the corner of the room one of the ancient halogen bulbs flickered almost too quickly for the eye to catch.

The young woman they had come to see was already there when they arrive. She's cross-legged on the table, alone, under the unpleasant flicker. Cool, I guess? ]

Comments

[slightlyoffchilt]

[Unconventional. It was all unconventional -- that was how Chilton liked it. Something slightly jagged in its unpredictability, the sharp taste of a surprisingly tart thing on the tip of your tongue, it was all a reminder of this immediate fragility.

It was what Persephone inspired.]

Hope we didn't keep you waiting too long.

[He had been sure to step a few feet ahead of Sam, ever insistent on his own hierarchy. Ever ready to provide the leash. Chilton spoke only to Persephone.]

Ready?

[shifting]

[an aesthetic which might have served both Chilton and Persephone's tastes, but Sam's step faltered the moment he crossed the doorway. He'd hesitate to call himself claustrophobic, but limited exits and a lack of windows weren't exactly a comfort.

And there she was, sitting like a carved idol on the world's cheapest dais. Fine hairs rose on the back of Sam's neck, his posture and stare stiff as that ammonia smell raking uncomfortably against his sensitive senses.]

- Hey now, hold on. [he protested, stepping around the doctor to find equal footing. His gaze shifted back to the goddess, wary but hard. Insistent.] You hold on. I've got somethin' to discuss with her first.

We've got boundaries to set. Regardin' privacy.

['The bull' was what Persephone called him, the first time they spoke face to face; a card Sam had never shown but she'd known regardless. If rifling through a person's deck would indeed be part of this, if this would in part be a game of memory, then Sam aimed to make it clear this would be a game with only two players - and one of them wouldn't be Chilton.]

[pummelgranite]

[ Seeing him unsettled calmed whatever nerves she may have had. It was a good start, that he had descended out of his element, and away from control. The Underworld doesn't make house calls. There is decorum to keep, after all.

He expects her to be dangerous. He expects her to have him at the advantage. Easy enough. Callous as it might seem, in the end it was better for everyone if he came in a little rattled and disarmed.

She regards him with her inscrutable green gaze. ]


You want a safe word?


[ It doesn't sound like a joke. ]

[slightlyoffchilt]

[Chilton glanced at Sam, a smirk on his mouth. Sam was the waxy candle that fed Persephone's flame, the wick and the fuel -- but Chilton? He was the very oxygen that enabled this combustion. Like the very air they all breathed now, he knew how to slip in and deep.

And sometimes that meant keeping acidic remarks behind a smirk. He watched Sam, allowing his patient to discuss whatever boundaries he wanted to root.]

[shifting]

My safeword'll be me leavin', if it comes to that. So no. Just - I don't know how this works, but if you see things, get things from my memory or my thoughts while you're doin' this, you need to know those aren't yours to tell. I want your word as a -

[Sam paused, distaste curling his mouth, and tried to ignore Chilton's smirk in his peripheral.]

- as a goddess. That those'll still be mine to share or not.

[Sam slipped off his coat and hung it on the back of a chair, left in jeans and a shirt he didn't mind losing if it came to it. He hoped it wouldn't. He rolled the sleeves up his forearms, keeping distance and making no motion to sit. He would get through this, he told himself. He'd get past whatever she managed to sing out of him, and he'd learn to keep a handle on it, resist her influence altogether. That was the goal.

He was here to use Persephone, not the other way around.]

Past that, we can get this started. [he glanced between them then, struck by a thought. A nervous one. ] Only last thing is don't try to hold me down or in place. Nothin' like that unless you have to.

[the space felt too much like a cage as it was.]

[pummelgranite]

[ She watches him impassively as he lays out his demands and limitations. Her look is so neutral, he may wonder if she's actually listening. Whatever she'd find in him was only as relevant as it was to their own relationship, but his request not to be held down betrayed an unfortunate underestimation of her power. Well, no need to spell all that out. She would leave the door available for him as long as she could. He'd figure it out after that.

That was the trick to godhood: in the end, she existed only to be used by human. A tool for them to better themselves, then evolve past. Eternal, unknowable, indestructible, yet in the end disposable. This was not to say that she was not dangerous either to him or to others- obviously she was. But so is a gun, or a knife, or a car. It didn't make them any less of a tool either. He was right, he was here to use her. The trick was letting him do that when the power and control were all in her hands.

She neither agrees nor disagrees to his demands, just hears him out and then blinks mildly. ]

What have you come here for, Sam Merlotte?

[shifting]

Control.

[Sam swallowed, blinked. Her silence and stare were unnerving, something old and alien looking back placidly from a young face, but he couldn't look away. Wouldn't let himself. This was what he fucking came for, and he didn't plan to do this twice.]

Havin' to fight for it is normal, that's just bein' human. And it's... one thing when it's life takin' it away from you. Circumstance. Then at least, even if everything else is noise and chaos, you can still keep a handle on yourself. Even if you have to fight for that too. But what you sang that night -

[he blew a harsh breath through his nose.]

I didn't even have the chance. So that's what I want - that's why I'm here. The next time you or anyone who can do what you do tries to spook my horse, I want to be able to keep hold of the reins.

No matter what song's bein' sung.

[pummelgranite]

[ She wonders, not for the first time, if the details of their meeting had escaped him. What did he think was going on, if he did not realize that he has descended to the underworld and is petitioning a goddess for her favor? Did he expect that she would open up an abyss beneath his feet, for him to gaze into safely form the surface? ]

Control.

[ Her head tips as she considers it. All the lights in the room flicker for a long moment. When they settle again, there is something different about the layout of the room. ]


I don't offer control. What makes you think you can find it here?

[shifting]

[silence dragged. Sam's brow furrowed, eyes casting a moment at the corners and few shadowed places in the small space. At Chilton. Fearful instinct shivered down his back, distrustful. Truth be told, he wanted his gun. He'd been careful to leave it at home for just that reason.]

...You don't have to offer control. I'm not sure you could, and anyway I'm not askin' for it from you.

[the shifter licked his teeth behind closed lips, squaring his shoulders like a dog with something to defend.]

It's somethin' I mean to take for myself. What I think is you're gonna give me a reason to need to.

[the struggle would be Sam's; it would always be Sam's. If he failed again, even with warning - well. Hopefully Chilton knew enough to keep out of the way.

Or at least had also worn clothing he didn't mind ruining.]

[slightlyoffchilt]

[Chilton returned the look; in truth, his eyes had never left Sam. Precise and focused, he observed. His role was that of psychopomp, of guide and enabler. He straddled both worlds, a man always on the brink of death and yet never quite succumbing. Because of this, he possessed unique perspective, and he was certain of one sterling and immediate fact: Sam Merlotte needed this.]

You want agency.

[Crisp, bright words from a no longer smiling mouth.]

You want to own your narrative again. [Again. That word alone was debatable, Chilton doubted that Merlotte had ever truly owned his life sequence of events.] And Persephone is willing to help you.

[pummelgranite]

"To own your narrative."


[ She repeats the words again, seeming to taste them as they pass her lips. ]


Maybe. The people on Earth tell the stories of the Underworld. Not the other way around.


[ She finally slides off the table and begins slowly closing the space between them. But- something's wrong. Hadn't she been the first one in the room? Hadn't Sam been careful to watch his exits? So why is the door behind her instead of him? ]


Sam Merlotte. You're . . . alone. You're alone in the dark. I know. I can hear you. What you really want right now is to prove you are stronger than me, than the darkness. But unfortunately you can't, because you're not.


[ She leaves just a little more than an arm's reach between them. ]


You're living in my kingdom whether you like it or not. Whether I like it or not. You and I, we're in Hell. But I rule this Hell, understand? I'm not nice, but I'm not a total dick either. If you're really ready for it, maybe I'll show you your way around.

[shifting]

...More or less. [an uneasy agreement with Chilton's assessment, aware now that both were watching with expectation. Sam steeled himself, still watching Persephone. He gave himself credit for not reacting when she slid down to stand.

It lasted for the three seconds before he noticed the door. Sam startled. He glanced over his shoulder and back again, his heart jolted into a faster tempo. When had that happened, when had she done that? Had Chilton noticed?

Oh, but alone. There was a word to sink claws into his attention. A child's protest jumped to his tongue, defensive in the face of her assertions and approach. He swallowed it down. Persephone encroached on his space and Sam forced himself to stillness, held only by a glue of grit and will and denial.

There ain't no Hell, he remembered telling Tommy, to ease his brother's guilt the night he helped him dispose of the bodies of their parents, the night he'd let Tommy in on the secret of the blood on his own hands and the lack of any devil ever come to claim him for it.

He remembered how his brother corrected him, the night he died on Sam's pool table: There ain't no Heaven, but Hell's a dogfight.

Persephone looked small for a pit bull.]

...I'm ready. If you've got somethin' to show me - then come on.

I'm here.

[pummelgranite]

[ She closes the space between them. The lights all begin to flicker, more darkness than light now. This close, she smells like- Pomegranates, blooming, rips, rotting, all at the same time. And she smells like earth: wet, dead, old, living. It's overwhelming, not just that it's a strong scent, but that it is too complex, too real, like his shifter senses are trying to pass in too much data to his conscious mind at once.

Even as she has to look up to meet his eyes, there is still the overwhelming sense that she is too big, too much to be anything like small. She scrutinizes him for a long, long moment, before the lights flicker back on and she takes a step back. ]


No.

[shifting]

[Sam's mind buzzed, nostrils flared and goosebumps raised over his arms. Her scent surrounded and confounded him, and the quick shift of light and shadow played with her features, threatening to twist them older, with darker hair and sharper features. But there was ultimately no room for Maryann's memory in the space Persephone filled, overwhelming even the maenad's ghost.

Sam held her gaze even as he felt it threatened to swallow him, waiting for her to open her mouth and sing.]

- "No"?

[he parroted the word before he fully understood it. The lights hummed contently again, the tension swept out from between them. Sam glanced from the goddess to the doctor for an answer, then back to Persephone, lost.]

"No" what? "No", you've got nothin' to show me? "No", this is over?

[slightlyoffchilt]

[He anticipated a little granite resistance. It was to be expected from the stronger personalities -- pit them against each other in darkened room, watch the fireworks. Chilton narrowed his eyes at Sam, his sensibilities a moth to that neon burning fire of indignant emotion.]

Make an offering.

[Persephone was a goddess, after all.]

A peace offering.

[He clarified, for Sam's prickled, snarling ego. And at last, Chilton turned his gaze to Persephone. The neutral expression he wore bore no imploring sentiment; he didn't think she wanted that. The hell he knew was built on blood and bone and truth. It was a wicked awakening, not an inherently wrong one.

So why not respect that?]

He is trying.

[pummelgranite]

[ Ah, yeah. Here's why she puts up with this nerd. He's quick. She lets her head tilt towards the good doctor. ]

Trying to what?

[slightlyoffchilt]

To swallow his pride. It isn't easy -- he has since learned to rely on himself too much, to question the aid of others who understand him a little too well. To question their intent. [A light shrug followed. No judgements were passed; this was simply fact and analysis.] He has been betrayed. A few times.

[They all had. That was the thread that wove them together, that's why they were all intended for the Underground.]

Still stings.

[shifting]

[Make an offering, Chilton suggested, and Sam had to immediately turn and pace some distance away, trying to burn off the swell of indignation. An offering? That's all of what this was, him coming down here in the first place. Wasn't that enough? He was already offering himself, to submit to her powers for a time. And she -

...Had agreed to help. The taste in Sam's mouth soured. He rubbed at his face, staring into the dull plaster of the wall while Chilton and Persephone conversed behind him. She'd agreed to help, he remembered, because Chilton had asked her. On Sam's behalf. And he was treating her like she'd dragged him in by the collar.

Fuck.]

...He's not lying. [Sam turned back around. He clarified:] I'm tryin'. I will try.

[not that Chilton was lying about the analysis either, but honestly the shifter would as soon pretend the doctor hadn't just said anything. Chilton talking about Sam's insecurities like he was making an textbook introduction wasn't exactly flattering. Downright mortifying to even be on the spot like that.]

I hadn't meant it before. You were right. You probably saw that. You scare the shit out of me.

[there - something raw and true. His offering.]

And the road to hell's not exactly one I'm eager to follow. But if I'm on it already... then I could use the guide.

[pummelgranite]

[ Chilton knew exactly what button to push. It's hard for her not to feel a pang of possessive care, knowing that someone was sent to her hell by a user and a liar. She chews on the inside of her cheek a long moment.

It wasn't so much that she didn't care for the man. That he disliked her was hardly personal. He wasn't wrong to fear her; she was a goddess of destruction and suffering and death. It seemed dishonest to correct his apprehension.

But as awful as she is, there is still this. There is still companionship to the lonely damned. Still a light for those unfortunate enough to be stuck in the darkness with her. Still a scalpel to unwell flesh.

After what seems like basically forever she speaks again. ]


It sucks. All of it. You actually get it much better than most fans.


[ And then another long pause while she searches his face, and finally nods and holds out a hand to Sam. ]


A little privacy, Doc, if you don't mind.

[slightlyoffchilt]

Do your thing.

[Not that he knew the details of her thing, but he had never known the details of Will's thing, and Chilton had adapted to working with that. He took a step back from them -- more symbolic than anything else, a physical indication of the privacy they both deserved.

Chilton could wait alone, in the dark. He was a creature who knew darkness well.]

[pummelgranite]

Thanks.

[ She snaps her fingers.

The lights flicker again, and a number of tentacle-y shadows wrap around Chilton's ankle and torso. Their touch feels like a slight itch where it brushes bare skin. ]

[slightlyoffchilt]

Son of a--

[Crap. As his heart thundered, as his muscles twitched with the instinct to kick out, he clenched his teeth with one goal in mind. He struggled to get his hands free, his palms exposed, maybe the shadow tentacles were flesh enough to be sedated, maybe he could ease out with a little chemical dependency --

Or maybe they were too tightly bound for any real struggle. Chilton was caught. Embalmed in shadow.]

[shifting]

[Sam didn't return her comment, opting instead for a grimace. He was a private man, and even this roundabout discussion of his past rankled. Spilling his metaphorical insides to her was going to happen either way, no need to get ahead of himself.

And there was her hand, offering the operation. Sam stared, then nodded slowly, respectfully. Trying, as he'd promised. He slipped his fingers around hers, his normally feverish skin running all the hotter for the excited, frightened heart pumping beneath it.

Here we go.

Focused as he was, Sam nearly missed what happened next. The flicker of lights and Chilton's soft curse turned his head in time to see the coils wrapped around the doctor's vulnerable middle, snared around his leg. The shifter jerked in surprise, darting a wide-eyed look from Chilton's struggle back to the goddess.]

Hold on -

[pummelgranite]

Won't be a minute.


[ The shadow is shadow, and now the floor is also shadow and tentacles and sinkiness. They writhe around his legs and arms as they pull him under.

She tilts her head so that her hair blocks her face from Chilton's view entirely, and then gives Sam a conspiratorial little wink.

This was absolutely a good idea and everyone here is in for a good time. ]

[slightlyoffchilt]

[It was all darkness. It was void. No light, no scent, no sound (save for his own heartbeat) -- this was sensory deprivation in its purest form. All Chilton had was himself. All he had was isolation. Bleak. Loneliness.

Midnight.

Familiar, he thought. Just like home.

Chilton wasn't uncomfortable in the darkness. He was uncomfortable in his own skin. He did not belong, he was not welcomed, and he knew it. He had always known it. At least the eclipsed blackness hid the stench of rotting flesh, at least he couldn't see the bloodstains. He didn't have to listen to the single noted music of squished gore beneath his feet -- the slippery entrails that once belonged to fathers and mothers. Daughters and sons.

Company brought cruelty. People were hell.

He didn't mind the isolation.

He didn't.]