Chapter Text
Avery
Avery's breath caught. Here he was kneeling on a cold damp stone floor, on New Years Eve -He was sitting in his gaming chair, his right hand on the mouse, his left guiding his slime man through a pre-made cave, the computer shows the inventory of the chest as he clicks on the book and quill- hands hovering over a book and quill, frozen in place for who knows how long. He wasn't sure what time it was anymore, maybe mid morning? Late afternoon? It doesn't matter.
"Irrelevant" he murmurers quietly to himself, his low voice bouncing off the walls of the cave -His bedroom-. What does matter though, is that something life-changing was about to happen. He didn't know how he knew that. He just knew that once his hand touched that book he would never be the same, his LIFE would never be the same. With a hand he didn't know how wasn't shaking, his fingers touched the worn cover -He clicked open the book.-
Derek: Who encrypted your dark gospel in body language?
Derek knows everything. He knows the birth of the world and he knows its ending. He knows the first word ever spoken and what it meant - Ngalindi, it means moon in the language of the The Yolngu people of Australia,- Not quite this version of the word, but the version with the letters of the language he knows the best. Not that he doesn't know every language ever spoken or written now, but modern English will always be the easiest for him to understand, instead of having to shuffle through his now massive Rolodex of information and he knows the final words whispered into an empty dying world -I am Alone.- In a language that is a combination of English, Spanish and Mandarin. He knows the age of every living creature on this world and his original. From human to hoglin, warden to whale and he knows how he will die. -Alone and bleeding from every orifice he had, his mind tearing apart at the hands of an enraged Godking. His pained screams echoing in a void with nothing to hear his dying cries, no one to soothe him as his hands try to claw out his ey....-Derek shakes his head forcefully. Banishing the dark fact of his death, his breath catching in his throat.
"No more" his voice cracks "No more." He says again, voice gaining strength as he closes his eyes and takes another deep breath. His self pity helps no one. What he will become is inevitable, but he can help Avery, he can save Avery. He takes strength from the vision of him in his mind. Infinite knowledge is pretty useless to him overall, what with his impending doom but learning everything there is to know of Avery? Well that was priceless. Derek heaves his aching body upright, leaning heavily against the rock behind him as he stands. The quiet broken only by the gentle clanging of his armour as he moves towards the exit. He looks down, attention drawn by the noise, at his beaten and scuffed arm guards trying to remember how he got so dirty.
~He was running, his brain was m
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He had to hide, he had to regroup. Avery, Avery, Avery, Avery, his mind whispered over and over, he had to warn Avery, save Avery. Avery was his reason to fight, his sunshine, his heart. His life didn't matter, his sanity didn't matter. Protecting Avery from the King mattered. His heart clenches at the image of his sweet, kind, beautiful Avery being taken over by Him, his lovely green eyes once filled with life and joy changing to a sickening yellow, overtaken by malice and contempt. His soft loving smile twisting into a foul mockery of what it once was. Split, bloody lips revealing razor sharp teeth and bloody claws ripping from his fingertips, limbs cracking and reshaping..no no nO NO NO! It wont happen, he wont let it! Trusting his now all-knowing mind to guide him somewhere safe Derek runs, tripping over rocks and crashing into walls as he searches -He is sitting in a chair, scaredscaredscared beats like a drum in his heart as his eyes remain glued to the screen. Fingers cramped as he guides his pixel character breaking blocks in his way. He is a human, on planet earth playing a video game. He is D3rlord3 a man in spartan armour running through dark caves, weighed down by gold and weapons and he feels the exhaustion deep in his bones as he escapes an eldritch being.- The cave is difficult to spot if you aren't really looking, but Derek was looking. Hidden in the pitch black blocks is a small gap, shadows cover the entrance and if he didn't have access to every single part of this place he would have missed it. A hole that slopes down into an open cave, a small round lake nestled in the middle of lush green grass and walls overgrown with moss and glowberries. Stalactites -From the Greek word "stalaktos," which means 'that which drips.'- his mind adds effortlessly and Stalagmites -From the Greek word for "stalagma, " which means 'a drop' or 'dropping'- litter the cavern. It's all rather beautiful and he could probably appreciate the almost unnatural safety of it more if he wasn't literally trying to save the world but as it was, his brain was pulsating, his body ached from his mad dash away from the King and his terrifying, all consuming knowledge. So he does the next best thing, he drops to the ground. His body protesting at the mistreatment and gets as comfortable as he can. Avery wouldn't be here for another 3 weeks, 4 days, 6 hours, 42 minutes and 19 seconds, he had time. As he closes his eyes, endless colours, numbers, memories and facts danced behind his eyelids and Derek groaned, it seems sleep would be a while yet.~
"Ah, well I was half crazy, a dinged muddy chest-plate is the least of my worries right now" he huffs out a laugh at himself and pushes the bone deep ache from his mind. He had things to do, a Prince to save.
Avery:Tell me you met me in past lives
Avery is standing in a bloody puddle. Bodies lay strewn across the muddy field, the sound of steel clashing against steel surrounds him, the cries and screams of dying men add to the overwhelming cacophony. He throws his gaze around, eyes searching desperately for HIM. For golden armour and a crimson plume. His chest heaves as he sucks in the smoke laced air. Where where wher..there! Avery runs, sight narrowed to nothing but his Soul. Leaping over broken bodies and sobbing men, he drops to his knees, sinking slightly in the muddy earth, sword dropping next to him as he lets it go, landing next to a shattered golden bow. His hands shake as he grips the golden helmet, pulling it off sharply and oh. A sob tears its way out of his closed off throat, oh his Souls beautiful eyes, blood drips from them, his irises (oh gods his EYES) once they were a rich chocolate, now they drained of colour, a lifeless cloudy white. The broken capillaries staining his eyes with blood. Blood that now stains his cold ashen cheeks until all Avery can see is red red RED RE... A cold laugh breaks the screaming in his head and when he looks up all he can see is yellow.
Avery throws the thought? Memory? Vision? off just as thousands of whispering voices, layered over one another crash into his mind. Thrown off balance and back into the physical world as he falls to the floor of his room and curls into a ball, groaning from the onslaught of information. Memories of kissing the most gorgeous man he's ever seen, of his hands caressing silken arms. A hand, an unforgettable deep ebony, entwined with his own. Flashes of the same hands, the same unforgettable shade now covered with cracks of gold. Branched like lightning over knuckles, twisting up forearms and wrapping around muscled biceps. The visions overlap one another as he sees HIM in every form he's every taken. Always with beautiful dark skin, though the shade changes. Sometimes lighter, a warm umber. The warmth and glow of which easily eclipsed the beauty of a sunrise over the Mojave desert. Or sometimes his skin was as dark as the night sky without a moon. A deep black interwoven with blues and purples.
Beautiful
Hair in dark brown locs pulled back and framing his face like a crown. A short utilitarian look, hair shaved close to the scalp, even dyed a deep red that falls in waves down his back, mimicking the plume on his helmet. Whispered declarations of love and devotion spoken long ago in the dark, in the early dawn, in the final moments of peace, life after life, every reincarnation shared with HIM. With the keeper of his heart, his very reason to live, his soulmate. Derek. His name alone fills Avery with a newfound strength and he stands up, his hand gripping the back of his chair as he stares at the screen again. Groaning lightly once as he assimilates the new memories. In every lifetime he and Derek are torn apart. Derek dying at the hands of that monster over and over, for millions of years and Avery, cursed to continue on without him, but no more.
"Save him" The thousand voices suddenly speak from behind him. Avery spins, his brain wobbles at the sudden movement and his eyes take a second too long to focus on the boy?man?slime? in front of him. The form shifts constantly, as if unable to maintain one skin for long. Avery is shocked certainly but weirdly unafraid. He knows who this is, its entwined with his sinew, carved into his DNA over a millennia. This is him, Avery. Every Avery to have ever lived, every Avery who suffered the loss of his Derek. He can see the heartbreak in every flicker of incarnation. The unending sorrow etched into his face, weighed down by the cruelty that is being unable to save the love of his lives. Avery doesn't bother questioning how, doesn't bother with wasting his time on trying to deny the reality that's staring at him, not 2 feet away. Instead he asks the only question that matters.
"How"