pestilicious | [Log] [Open to Pestilence and Angelo]

He had felt the Force approach, of course. It was his library after all, an extension of himself. None could enter unless he willed it, and any addition to the energy within would be noted immediately.

Had it not been so, he still would have known he had company. Not because the Force's particular way of walking was louder than others though that was certainly part of it. No. Angelo would always know because old habits such as hyper-vigilance did not die hard at all. They were as immortal as the Forces themselves.

Still, he pretended to be unaffected, continuing to work at his desk amidst stacks of memories and the accompanying fragrance of recently peeled oranges. His eyes veiled by his spectacles did not look away from the page as he spoke.

"Death is not here."

A soft chuckle escaped Pesti's lips. "Suppose that would be problem if was coming to see him."

As the library had shifted to help him find his target easily, Pestilence tripped towards a chair near the desk, catching himself from crashing into it and sitting down instead.

"Is your particular solid conversation am seeking right now."

A single eyebrow betrayed him and lifted, but he managed to keep his eyes on his work.

"I'm both flattered and concerned. I assume there must be something very wrong for you to solicit my company?"

"'Concerned'? Have ever given you reason for that?" Pesti gave a playful smile, batting the lashes of his single eye.

"Is nothing for concerning, just think you are probably one of the few people who..." He pursed his lips in thought. Would emphasise? Have been through similar? Are approachable enough? Would be honest? No, definitely not that. Everyone was always pretty honest with him. "No one else is you," he decided. "And could use a break from War's insistence."

Angelo felt his lips curl in fondness before he willed them back into a frown. It was more difficult than it aught to have been.

"No one else is you, either," he said before finally lifting his head and looking at his company over the top of his glasses.

Angelo mused to himself that if there was more than one Pestilence, it would likely be well received. The other horsemen could have one each perhaps.

"Would you care to sit down? Perhaps take tea with me?"

He hummed a happy sounding noise, "A tea would be nice, thank you."

Sitting would equally be nice for his balance, but he didn't take the invitation just yet. It was likely that Angelo might not want to talk when Pestilence opened the actual topic up.

"I heard," he began slowly, trying to choose the best words, "that recently you had met someone who reminded you of your husband?" He didn't think he needed to clarify the first husband, or dare speak the name alive in the room.

"Was wondering, if that was true, how you were feeling?"

"... Well fuck," Angelo uttered at length, standing from his desk to approach the petite Force and escort him to the drawing room.

It seemed too far a distance between that question and the time to answer it. It was a good thing that the tea was already brewed and there would be no additional pause while he pottered about with tea leaves. There was no doubt in his mind that he would come up with several answers in the space allowed. It was excessively frustrating. Now that he had been asked, there would have be an answer whether he chose to say it aloud or not. He had been asked how he was feeling. Now he would have to think about it.

Perhaps it would be better to divert his mind to another question rather than abandon his well practiced avoidance so readily. Indeed, a man had to wonder why had he been asked? He hardly thought Pestilence would be concerned about his feelings any more than usual. More likely there was some more personal reason he was seeking his council.

He offered the blonde a comfortable seat which was both soft and lower down than the others to suit his tiny stature. Once he was seated Angelo lifted the tea pot and paused with the spout above the cup to give Pestilence a look.

"Orange blossom and Elder flower. It's hot. Will that do?"

Settling into the chair, Pesti slipped off his clunky shoes and curled his feet and legs underneath him.

"Will be careful, won't spill." He promised with a smile, carefully accepting the cup with both hands.

He gave Angelo more silence to think, just the time it took the other man to settle with his own drink. He knew it wasn't a light question but even he couldn't sit in quiet forever.

"If will forgive me saying the f-word, War thinks if I forgot everything would be better overall." Pesti gave a little curl of a smile, "Even if tell him would make having a daughter confusing."

He sipped a little of the tea, letting the warmth of the flavour glide over his mouth. "Still, suppose I wonder about if it would be better sometimes. So now think I wonder what being reminded is like."

Ah. Yes. Those thoughts.

He had mused over those very things many times only to be met with the same frustration each time. Gods, he hated not knowing. A tight smile took his lips for a moment before he sipped his own tea. The taste did not assist the bitterness he felt about the entire affair. Though a chance to be of some assistance to Pestilence would have been nice, the usual sinking feeling within him was a cruel reminder that he had no wisdom in him to share.

He set his cup down, and looked upon Pestilence with sympathy wearing scrutiny.

"Speak as you like, Pestilence. You wont offend any more than a discussion about feelings already does."

He took a breath, his eyes drifting to the tea cups as he remembered...

"Being reminded is... Complicated. Disgustingly complicated."

Pesti gave a knowing smile. There was definitely no way that these things couldn't be complicated. Under his hair on his neck was a bite scar he could never let fade and he slid his hand there, letting the heat from holding the tea burn there gently.

It was difficult for him to put his feelings into words, and he had come expecting to speak. He could only imagine how complex it was all for Angelo.

"As much a form of self-harm as a nice reminder?"

Angelo sighed deeply.

Avoidance of his own feelings was fine when it affected him alone, but when was that ever really the case? His children certainly felt it, as did Force Death. While he could quite cheerfully make his husbands life harder, and even his children's to some extent, could he allow Force Pestilence the same disregard?

It seemed not. Pesti was not someone he could willingly let down, despite how difficult an honest conversation would be.

"This stays between you and I," he clarified before continuing. It was as much for Pesti as for himself. Such vulnerability was a crime and no additional witnesses was a paramount requirement for disclosure.

"I did indeed meet a person who deeply reminded me of Lucius. So much so it was almost as though I was able to be with him again."

He exhaled another breath, already feeling worn out from the drain such honesty honesty had on him.

"The whole affair felt utterly despicable. I say affair, because being with him was an emotional betrayal despite my devotion to my status as an antisocial being, let alone as a married man. Even the most innocent of conversations felt unsavory, and yet... I couldn't distance myself from it. There was no real wrong doing, you see..."

He gave a wan smile.

"I was utterly powerless. That was the feeling. Certain that every moment spent with that person was wrong and yet completely unable to detach. How I feel about it now is a shameful sense of relief that this person has been removed from my path without me having to lift a finger in opposition."

Nodding, Pestilence pressed his fingertips to his full lips as he listened, as silent acknowledgement that he would tell no one.

He had tried not to expect an answer, but even so he felt a little surprised by it. He had been focused on the Lucius aspect so much that he hadn't even given Death a thought.

Wasn't that just how Death wanted things though?, he had to think wryly. Plus it had taken eons long enough to not think of him.

"Didn't consider that, but of course it would feel that way. Are not really in same situation..." He trailed off thoughtfully taking a slow sip of tea. "Am sorry to hear that was so distressing," he doubted the sentiment was what Angelo wanted but he had to offer it.

"But... you knew it wasn't him? It wasn't his soul cone around again or something, it was just a reminder?"

Angelo nodded.

"Yes, I knew. It was utterly impossible that they were the same being. A fierce reminder, and by the true Gods, that was enough to draw me out. That longing in me burns as it ever did for Lucius, I loathe to admit. Having lost him so utterly and completely, I doubt I shall ever recover. Not because I lost him, you understand. It's because I... Lost a great deal of myself. The years of my life in which I discovered my sense of self were completely unraveled."

He pushed his fingers from the bridge of his nose down toward his cheekbones and took another breath.

"As for Arden... They were a pleasant person, I believe. Authentic and persistent, mischievous and captivating. They made no effort to hide their feelings toward me which I found flattering despite myself. Whilst I had no desire to reciprocate those feelings, there were moments which I felt... Uncomfortable and unwelcome reactions within me. A sense of fear perhaps, I'm unsure really what it was."

He frowned, setting his tea down in order to focus his eyes on the cup and steady himself.

"In any case, that is my experience. I don't suppose my weakness in this case will support any strength in yours, will it?

Tell me, have you recently met some echo of your former life?"

Shaking his head, Pesti gave a quiet, almost self-conscious laugh. "No, no. Nothing like that, am as stuck in place as I have been all this time. Almost makes me feel badly for all the times we tried to talk Desth out of mourning Birth." He said that easily, but there was still an undisguised hatred that rolled over Birth's name.

"I just," he paused, closing his eye and trying to consolidate everything he had heard and every thought he had into one solid sentence. "Just wonder where that line is, between respecting Jenii and I but moving on, or staying a shell, stuck in place.

"What if I choose to stay but he never comes back? What if I try and move on and he suddenly does? Or his soul at least - and in that event, in that slimmest of chances what if he isn't how he was?" Pestilence listed the options in almost a sing-song way to dance around the turbulent emotions in the questions. In his hands the tea trembled in thr still cup regardless, a small storm.

"If they had been Lucius anew--?" He shook his head again. "Do you wonder about that? Do you want that?"

"I do not," Angelo answered. It covered both questions. He did not wonder about it, nor did he want it. What he wanted seldom entered into his thoughts. He was more in tune with the things he did not want than those he did.

When he had Lucius it had been everything. He had wanted him, despite any belief that he was deserving of him or would ever have him. Fate had surprised him, and then done so again with the Reaper. In that sense there was no point in seeking anything else. Whatever was meant to come would clearly come all by itself and leave just as freely.

"Force Pestilence, have you ever heard this concept: A question which starts with what if is not a question at all, but a fear?"

"Don't think have heard it quite said like that, but I know that they are fears," he agreed with a sigh. "Sex would simplify it to just not to worry."

He took a drink of the tea in his cup. "I got a message from Jenii after quite a lot of time had passed. It simply said he loved me, but I didn't respond at the time. So many other forces and opinions telling me what to do or not do and so it... slipped by."

He didn't want to cry into Angelo's teacups, but he knew better than to hold in emotion. He ignored the fat, wet tear that formed under his eye, letting it do as it wanted. "Maybe that was my only chance at getting him back and I missed it. Regardless of if I move on or stay still, if he comes back on some form or not; that regret is going to be there with the fear forever."

Angelo nodded, both in acknowledgement and understanding.

"Forever is a long time, despite what certain song lyrics might imply," Angelo said gently. "Though I imagine you are right when you say that this regret and fear will never leave you. There may be resentments toward the others for that as well, and toward yourself for the way things occurred. All of these are delightfully heavy burdens to carry, however... I believe that there are likely steps one can take to oppose the pain, as I understand not everyone enjoys wallowing in a state of misery. Is that not so?" A note of humor entered his tone as he passed Pestilence his handkerchief.

"Thank you," he refolded the handkerchief slowly and then dried his cheek.

"The pain seemed as... gone as it would ever be, but can't seem to move regardless." Pestilence sighed, "Not like I haven't lost lovers before, but," he shrugged. It was different. Angelo knew that as well as anyone.

"Told Death I don't want to wallow like him, which is true. Equally I can't. I just can't close off like him or War or Famine... or you are so good at."

He ran the handkerchief under the edge of his eyepatch, salty blood staining the edge. "At least if could move forward, War would stop being so smug about me being single."

He gave another big sigh, bigger than he felt the library could even hold. "I just don't know what to do or where to go."

Angelo huffed. It was upsetting to see Pestilence's confidence had receded so very much as time had passed and passed and passed some more. He wondered if the very thing the other Horsemen adored about Pesti was the very thing that was holding him back. The fact that he could not do as they did. He was not them. He could not proceed in any fashion other than one befitting of him. Emotional, powerful, sensitive, and unsure. Merits which were so easily perceived as weaknesses by so many beings, himself just as guilty as the rest.

"War is the last person in the universe who ought to advise you on such matters, if we can even call it that. The fact that he loves you so disgustingly is not a credential which qualifies him to direct in what manner you move through something as colossal as this. It is a thing which he could never comprehend in his very small mind, so next time he's smug give him a good punch in the nose."

He rolled his eyes, attempting not to let his own temper get the better of him as he responded.

"I wonder why you feel you must you do anything, or go anywhere? If you must do something, at the very least be sure to be true to who you are. Frustratingly as eternal beings we seldom have the luxury of rebirth. We keep these same bodies, these same memories, and are forced to move forward despite how uncomfortably slow we may feel we're going. It's near impossible to come alive again just because we want to, we can't even stop when we want to. We only have the illusion of stopping, as far as I am concerned.

It would certainly be easier to remove the memories and arise again, blissfully ignorant of the years past. How wonderful to return to an unmade self while the rest of the world kept secrets from you and knew more about your life than you did. I don't believe you would ever be truly ready to do such a thing, do you?"

Edited 2025-04-19 20:16 (UTC)

Pesti couldn't help but smile at the barrage of frustrated words and anger because he knew very well how much care that emotion came from.

"Removing the memories was what happened once before," he quietly remarked. "There's too much there now to do that." A deep scarred mark, a grumpy teenage demon, a growth of his soul.

He gave Angelo a warm smile, despite the teariness of his eye. "Don't worry though. Am not seeking the elusive answer from you. And am not going to give up in any way like Fear did or Agape did.

"Just... maybe I thought I'd gain insight, or inspiration." He dabbed his cheek and eye, refolding the handkerchief to hide the blood. "Or at least can be told not to try and write a letter to a probably dead man who might be very happy off in a new life."

"Actually, I'd recommend writing it," Angelo replied honestly. "I can't advise sending it, of course, but writing is a powerful tool. There is magic deeper than conscious understanding in the written word. I can't say how it works, only that it does..."

He frowned, leaning forward to offer his hand to Pestilence. He wasn't really comfortable with displays of affection, and yet... Sometimes they seemed appropriate.

"I appreciate the resolve that you will neither give up, nor count on me for answers. While I understand deeply the nightmare you are facing, sadly I am as lost as you are when it comes to waking from it. For that, I feel very sorry indeed."

He'd recommend it.

Well of course. That made absolute sense. He should do that. It had been a long time since he had done anything close to that.

Taking a deep breath, Pesti smiled warmly and put his hand into the offered one.

"Thank you, and am sorry for you. Even if is a little different."

He wondered just how much less it might hurt if he had another love to dampen the pain. Or even if he could have Death too, only back the way he once was.

"Can only be ourselves at the end of each day. Me tripping and smiling, you distinguished and rude."

Angelo clutched the offered hand for moment before releasing, hoping to convey that he truly did care somewhat, perhaps even quite a lot, with that small touch.

"You at least are much more than tripping and smiling," Angelo said, leaning back in his chair. "For my part, distinguished and rude are aspects I have worked hard to cultivate, so I shall take it as a compliment that you have summerised me so very well."

He smiled a little, thinking more on Pestilences own summation of himself. Tripping and smiling. Falling and getting back up again, all with grace and a positive nature that few could boast.

Perhaps tripping and smiling was a fitting description of who the force really was after all. He did not know many others who could stumble so and continue to smile none the less.

He felt perhaps he understood a little more why Death held him in such high esteem. It was, from his current point of view, a truly reasonable regard.

Pesti smiled, glad his assumption had worked. Few people wanted to be known as rude, but Angelo was certainly one of rudest and proudest of the fact.

"Hope that if I offended you with my questions, you can put that anger somewhere. Somewhere not at me.

"And do hope if am overwhelmed by these lost soulmate thoughts again can impose on you." There were probably no end of beings who he could talk to, but Angelo's opinions and ideas were unique. Pesti could never quite guess them like he could with Forces he had known eons.

"Likewise, should I anger you, please be so kind as to spare the library. I haven't the motivation to repair it should an unfortunate incident occur."

He his eyes offered clear amusement behind his default frown.

"Of course, you can impose upon me whenever you wish. I can hardly say no to the most amiable Horseman when I've allowed the others admittance often enough."

"Have heard that War has an all day pass," Pestilence teased. "Perhaps one of those will secure your library's walls..."

He supposed it was true, that misery loved company. That ache that had overwhelmed earlier was receding as husband tears dried out. Back into that low ebb.

"Where did you hear that?" Angelo smirked. "That's Charon Logic."

[Log] [Open to Pestilence and Angelo]

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