(no subject)

[ashtreelane]

...







-- LIGHT --

It's not the labyrinth. It's just a house like any other.

Carpeted floor, upholstered furniture, curtained windows -- it's a perfectly ordinary living room. A living room; a room for living in.

The door they've just stumbled through is gone.

Comments

[truantjohnny.livejournal.com]

And my pulse is thrumming, desperate, frantic, caged-bird breaking its wings, its neck, its heart at my ears, my neck, my fingertips, urging me on, crying to me, praying, all the prayers and pleas there ever were, all madness and desperation and frevrent hope.

There must be something.

My fingers, still frozen from the dark, fumbling at my body. A belt? A belt.

I don't think I could have undone it this fast for Thumper, not for all my yesterdays, all this, light glinting on the buckle, one merry jangle as I toss, a thread, an umbilical cord, ball of twine to find my way back home. Our way. Our way or none.

It is this, or no more mirrors anymore.

[ashtreelane]

The end of the belt arcs out towards Brian, seeming for a moment almost to float in the air between the two, a tether, a lifeline, a hope.

endings are heartless

It happens blindingly fast: the walls snap shut like the teeth of a bear trap on Brian's outstretched hand, splintering every bone in it like a handful of twigs, and spring open again too fast for the eye to follow.
The color that flashes in bursts behind your eyes
The severed end of the belt falls to the floor at Brian's feet, and starts to fade into it. The remaining half trails limply from Johnny's hand.
behind the pain
Blood is dripping -- no, blood is running from Brian's mangled fingers, broken bones protruding through the flesh. Red drops fall toward the swirling dark maelstrom of the floor, and vanish into it as though into liquid.
just before you die

[grimy-brian.livejournal.com]

Brian's face - Brian's expression is indescribable.



There aren't words for this because there aren't expressions for this because no man should feel this no man should know when he's going to -




- his face is blank. This is the easiest thing to say.



calm, no real panic, just acceptance



"Hey, Johnny."


He says it with his voice a little slower and a little duller and a little like he can't believe he can't think he can't feel he can't know (no man should know when) -




- his voice is blank.

"Come and see."

"Look out for Ads for me."



knowing that this was where I was supposed to end, knowing it was right.

him.
and the floor op             ens up beneath













(my beginning is my end is my beginning)

[truantjohnny.livejournal.com]

And just like that

there are no more mirrors anymore.

And I watch, and maybe I scream, and maybe I fall, but I fall back, instead of forward, instead of where I should fall, should have fallen, where he fell, and it's utterly beyond my control, as it ever was, as it always (hallways) will be.

The Minotaur, loosed from the Labyrinth. Atoned? Absolved? Have I earned that? But at this price?

I do not have a brother.

[ashtreelane]

Falling back.
Tree of trees!
Remember (when time comes) how chaos died
To shape the shining leaf. Then turn, have courage,
Wrap arms and roots together, be convulsed
With grief, and bring back chaos out of shape.
Falling slowly, as though through water, though fog, through light.

Through
my end is my beginning is
the door.