CALL ME OUT 2020 EDITION

[blitzbrained]

ACTUALLY MADE AT THE START OF THE YEAR THIS TIME

1. check out my muselist (or dont)
2. pop a character on here u want me to tag
3. optional: pick someone you want tagging with
4. PROFIT

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[valkenhound]

Rachel always tells him to go out, to stop fussing, that she'll be fine without him for a little while. She wants to be alone with her thoughts, she says, or she needs something that he should fetch as soon as possible.

He obliges, of course, but he can't help but feel that she's planning something reckless again. Something that will, yet again, shorten her time. She is her father's daughter, after all, and her father could never stay away from things they were supposed to dispassionately observe.

So he goes for a walk in the fields beyond the mansion, if fields they are. Possibly they are there because someone feels they should be; they are dark, strange things, not rooted in the normal laws of the universe. But Valkenhayn, even in his old age, moves easily among them; it's simply within his nature to thrive even in places that defy human understanding.

But these places get no visitors, unless someone comes with purpose. So the fact he's found someone twitching on the ground is unusual.

They seem wounded, however. And not someone he recognises at all, though he supposes that there are many people he doesn't recognise nowadays. He errs on the side of caution, however.

"You, there. What is your business here?"

Saying 'are you well' or any sort of greeting to that effect seems futile when this person is clearly the furthest thing from well. But if this person is a threat, he'll have to deal with them quickly, wellness aside, and so he's all business.

[wanderingdoctorfaust]

The strange disruptions in the air rip the former good doctor out of his thoughts, and it takes him several seconds to place the pang of familiarity they create - they sound alien at first, but he starts to recognise the patterns, rippling rhythms passing around him like...

He remembers. The surgery table. The tiniest snippets of consciousness between bouts of death-sleep. The strange machinery prying his remnants apart like a child dissecting a frog, the backyard's influence thick in the air...and the voices dancing around him. It's like a tidal wave crashing down upon his brain, whispers of forbidden rituals and immoral practices, echoing inside of his skull and drowning whatever is left of him entirely.

He's standing, now, all nine-and-a-bit feet of wiry corpse staggering around with his hands desperately trying to clutch his head through the bag. He's screaming, maybe - what comes out from his mouth is garbled and broken, wholly monstrous in nature. It's all he can do to violently shake his head back and forth as if to rip it off entirely, everything drowned out by the screams only he can hear - the patients he butchered, the pleas of the innocents he swore to protect, and he's falling again, falling into the pits of his decrepit mind and he's scrambling to stay afloat but he can't and if he could just silence those damned voices-!

The creature before Valkenhayn lets out a gargled roar, voice choked on splintered bone and rotting blood as the entire thing's body seems to twitch and crack under its own weight. Two pairs of gangly limbs claw at the dirt, casting the earth aside as the monster rapidly closes the distance between itself and the old butler on all fours, the singular eyehole in the beast's paper-bound head glowing a bright scarlet as it lunges for him...!

[valkenhound]

If it's a fight this being wants, it's a fight they'll get, then. Valkenhayn doesn't bother with further pleasantries or to attempt reason; this creature has made intent incredibly clear.

The butler moves far quicker than his visible age would suggest, snapping his leg out into a kick that's aimed directly at Faust's ribs to knock him backwards and following up his first attack with a sharp-edged uppercut, fingers lengthening into claws as he does so.

Whether the attacks connect or not, he ruthlessly closes the distance between him and his much taller opponent, gambling on the fact that his height will mean his ability to respond at close range is far weaker than normal.

[wanderingdoctorfaust]

Two firm strikes are rewarded with two clean hits - the sickening crunch of the creature's ribs splintering and its jaw dislocating reverberate throughout the thing's entire body, sending it staggering back on its twiggy limbs and desperately flailing about in an attempt to regain some semblance of footing. It's completely vulnerable to a continued assault, and yet...

(The voices stop for too fleeting a moment. He remembers how frail he is, that its almost unsurprising to him that his bones would give way that fast. So why doesn't he feel any different? The dull, icy thrum of discomfort throughout his form remains the same as it has since he woke back up, and he's beginning to realise that his entire ribcage could be flung outside of his body right now and he wouldn't take any notice. He'd ponder on this further, if not for the fact that whoever is so intent on destroying what little intact bones he has left is already on him - he has to defend himself, has to use his new discovery to his advantage...!)

It won't take many more attacks for Valkenhayn to share in Fauzt's alarming revelation - that whatever this bizarre entity is, it's only recoiling from the raw force of the old butler's blows alone. If the creature can feel pain, it's doing an extraordinary job of not being slowed by it - enough so that its eventual response to the onslaught is to rear up like an enraged bear in spite of any further strikes, shriek like a banshee, and then proceed to wildly swing its hands in clawing motions, spidery fingers alight with...mystical energy...?!

[valkenhound]

It doesn't take long for him to pick up on the discrepancy. If this creature can't be stopped with pain, then brute force will have to do; he'd be a poor fighter if he couldn't pin or subdue something (someone) who doesn't feel conventional injury.

At the scent and sight of magic, he nimbly backsteps, keeping just out of range (though the first few swipes tear at him with a pain he can't quite shrug off, in his old age). He keeps an eye on his surroundings; he wants to keep his opponent at a range that means they'll be focused on him, and nobody else.

Once Faust stops his onslaught, Valkenhayn drops to deliver a swift leg sweep, aiming to knock him over. Despite his age and new injuries, he's no slouch in speed or power.