My spirit aches...

[the_marshal]

WHO| Wyatt and all the insomniacs.
WHAT| Avoiding sleep.
WHERE| The Lounge
WHEN| One night, so late one might call it early, before the crowning.
WARNINGS| Some talk of nightmares, but nothing too terrible.



Night time was the worst. While the sun was up, while he had people and things to distract him, he could push the bulk of his troubles to the back of his mind. But at night, once things had gone quiet and he was alone with nothing but the sound of his own thoughts, they would all come rushing back.

Alcohol helped - took off the edge - but there wasn't a drink strong enough to stop the nightmares. The images that haunted him once his eyes finally closed.

Faces taunting. Sometimes Dora, sometimes Neeshka. Howard. Max. Sometimes a combination. At once beautiful and terrible. Dead and alive. Screaming. Whispering. Blaming and crying. 'Why didn't you do more?' 'Why didn't you save us?'

Sometimes, trying to put sleep off, he would pace for hours, to and fro across the floor of his room. Others he would flee into the training room, throwing knives until his arm burned and his back was sore. Tonight...

Tonight, he sat in the Lounge, a cup of black coffee, steaming gently on the table beside him. His chair turned out so he could lean over a trash can. In one hand he held a lump of dark wood, vaguely familiar in size and shape. In the other, was a small dinner knife.

Painstakingly, he worked the latter against the former. The point digging and turning, putting the finishing touches on a pair of tiny eyes.

Comments

[the_marshal]

It didn't.

"A 'grue,'" he echoed, testing the word for himself, eyebrows raised in a silent question, checking that he'd said it right.

With the movement of the middle eyes, he focused on them, feeling a little better about bein' curious now that he could look Some in the 'eye.'

"I don't think we have them where I come from."

[gruesome]

"Are you human? Of Earth?" Human, he was fairly certain of, by the man's scent.

[the_marshal]

He nodded.

"Wyatt Earp's my name," he offered. "Kansas - United States, I where I come from." And, leaning forward, he held out a hand, as he would to any man with hands to shake.

[gruesome]

Some shook, well familiar with the gesture, though his hand was too long to make it a comfortable one. "Some ovMennet, or simply Some. I am from River-Eaten, in the caverns of All-Falls-In. I believe it's on Earth, but I've never been sure."

[the_marshal]

Wyatt chewed over that for a moment, mentally trying to place Some in the myriad of places he'd traveled. He'd seen most of what the United States had to offer, from majestic purple mountains to dusty flat plains to shining blue seas and he'd been in and out Mexico more than once, but he had no recollection of any place by those names.

"Can't say as I've heard of it." He settled back, head tipping consideringly. "But then the world is a big ol' place and I don't expect I've heard even half her secrets."

[gruesome]

"If humans had heard of it, I would be surprised." And a little horrified. "We do our best to keep being secrets, I know. And it's easier, in our little tribes. No cities to hide."

[the_marshal]

"I reckon I can't blame ya for that."

He'd had some time to get used to the idea of Some, and he'd never done anything untoward to Wyatt personally in that time, so as such didn't find the prospect of secret tribes of spider-man all that troubling anymore... but he could imagine how most folks would react if the lot of them were just swing by the house by dinner one night.

But he was still curious.

"But do ya mind if I ask what it's like? Yer life... yer people, that is."

[gruesome]

"What it's like?"

Some mulled on the question for a few moments, unwinding the red ribbons from around his arms and rolling them up into a single coil. "Slower, is the most of it. We don't measure time like you do, in days or hours. The hunters know time in nights, but no one else bothers. We mark icings, what you call winters, and measure time by that...

"My time was always full of children. There were fourteen younger than me when I left, siblings and cousins, and I had most of the care of them. Not alone, ever, of course. But that was life for me. I imagine a hunter, like Ele, might tell you about the things hunters did or the gatherings her tribe held, but mine was about children and my mother's storytelling."

[the_marshal]

Wyatt let out a low, impressed whistle.

"And here I thought I came from a big family." Smiling gently, he nodded at Some. "You enjoy it? All them little ones runnin' 'round."

[gruesome]

"I loved it. I lived for them." He rubbed a hand under the row of eyes, and gave a sheepish little chuckle that sounded something like a sneeze. "A lot of them will be grown up by now, and some married away, and there will be new ones... Some even old enough for names.

"What about you? Your family?"

[the_marshal]

"Not as impressive as yers," Wyatt admitted with a low chuckled. "But still a mess'a brothers though, three older an' two younger."

He smile shifted, a flicker of sadness crossing his face.

"I didn't see 'em as often as you were with yers, by the sounds of it,... but I still miss'em somethin' awful."

[gruesome]

If he'd been another grue, Some would have touched him then. And his hand twitched towards the human's shoulder, but he restrained himself.

"I do not think we've traded names. I am Some ovMennet. Or just Some."

[the_marshal]

"Some," he nodded, head dipping down, hat hiding his face as he smiled again. "That one I think I can manage."

"I do hope you'll forgive my earlier forwardness," he said when he looked up again. "It is a pleasure finally meetin' ya. I might wish we'd done it sooner."

[gruesome]

"I've been asked in ruder ways," he said easily, with a little smile. "I don't ever really mind answering questions, when they're earnest."

[the_marshal]

Another chuckle.

"Good to know, friend." He nodded, smirking teasingly. "Given time ta think about it, I'll likely have more."

[gruesome]

"And you are Mister Wyatt, aren't you?"

[the_marshal]

"Just Wyatt'll do," he nodded, gesturing with his knife hand idly, waving away the title Some used. "Ain't no need to get fancy about it."

[gruesome]

"I am never quite sure what to do with human names. You don't have..." He gestured to his two mouths, tapping the upper one with a bony knuckle. "An air-mouth, and so you cannot know what inflection that puts in a word." That mouth dropped open for a moment in a tooth-baring grin. "So to me, it looks like you are treating a name just like any other normal word. Which is how grue children insult each other."

[the_marshal]

His head pulled back, blue eyes blinking in surprise.

"I..." his brow furrowed uncertainly, his mouth quirking sheepishly. "I apologize fer that. I don't mean it, I promise."

[gruesome]

"Oh oh, no!" Some held up two hands, alarmed at what he'd implied. "I know it isn't what you mean, it is just a way we are different. And I have always asked humans to call me only Some, and not Mister Some, which I know is something similar of respect. I was only musing."

[the_marshal]

His eyebrows lifted, teeth flashing as he chuckled, low and amused.

"I ain't upset, iffen you aren't, I promise."

But he did make a mental note. Some, no Mister.

Somehow he didn't expect it would be a name he'd be forgetting.

[gruesome]

Some returned the chuckle, a little sheepishly.

"What is that you are cutting?" he asked, as much for a topic change as anything else.

[the_marshal]

Truth be told, he'd all but forgotten about the carving and he looked back down now, expression almost surprised.

"Oh, uh, well," he opened his hand, set the wood down on the table, pushing it out a few inches so Some could see it. "It's a buffalo. They're native, where-" when, "-I'm from."

[gruesome]

He leaned down, hands all folded behind himself, to peer at it.

"You made that? It is very clever. I don't think I have ever seen one in the caves, though I might mistake it for a small mole."

[the_marshal]

For a heartbeat, Wyatt just stared, blinking once, twice... then he laughed. A rich, full sound.

A sound he didn't have much cause to make here.

"No, no..." he waved a hand, struggling to regain composure. "They don't live in caves. An' their much bigger than this. Bigger'en me even. This is jus' a miniature like."