Dante's Abyss -- Spectator Thread

[Gildarts]

Gildarts gasped and his eyes bulged open, he’d been suffocating in his own darkness for so long, it felt good to take a breath of fresh air. Sensations flooded him. Sounds. The taste of stagnant air mingling with swamp and blood abruptly confounded him. His hand had shot upright and latched itself on Tearen’s human shoulder. Gildarts felt the putty of flesh and fabric and after inhaling a few breaths, he appraised the room. Fatigue that had once worn so heavily on his shoulders had evaporated, the wounds were still bloody, and eventually would make new scars for his skin.

Nealaphh looked at the strongest prime with a glare, he was trying to decipher friend or foe? A swirl of dark energy surrounded Tearen and his mind readied, prepared to smite the prime who could have succumbed to the Malefactor’s submission once more.

“What are you doing!?” Dust exclaimed, outraged. “Hey, creepy guy, stay back!”

Tearen was quite frankly preparing to kill Gildarts. Or worse. However, there was a glimmer of something that the Malefactor would never have in Gildarts’ eyes. Friendship? Maybe that was the word. Could the god-mind fathom it? Freedom was there too, he’d been emancipated by the chains that had bound him, Gil had thought and assumed, forever.

Now however, the prime stood. No crackling of energy, no chaotic power below the surface of his skin. Gildarts stood tall, wobbled a bit and leaned on Tearen’s shoulder again with his steely grip. Then, the mage smiled, patting Tearen on the back and loosening the god-mind’s suspicion. Still, Gildarts had yet to speak, and since Tearen had been blocked from his mind, he had to go on phrasing, calculating and remembering how the old Gildarts had spoken, and how or whether or not he had evolved.

“You saved my life,” the disheveled man smiled, smacking Tearen without the fear of hurting him… And still with enough force that would leave a bruise there tomorrow. “Thank you.”

The two men shared a moment. Tearen’s eyes glimmered into Gildarts’ and then the God-mind nodded in acceptance, still suspicious, however he would keep tabs on the powerful prime. It was hard to appraise after just a moment, just how much Gildarts had truly been “freed.” Hard to, but not impossible.

Tearen allowed a small smile to crack his stony expression before striding off.

Dust looked at Gildarts, “What the… I thought he was going to kill you and you thanked him?”

“Oh ha, about that, I told him to,” Gildarts admitted, a hand finding itself behind his head and pressing down on his mud-caked hair.

“You told him to?” Dust’s jaw dropped.

“Yeah,” Gildarts blinked as though it were common knowledge, “Hey did you see Illidan?” It seemed his once jumbled thoughts were more coherent than ever and it was quite remarkable. “This is where the entrants are sent when the leave, though I guess Illidan could’ve died, I didn’t see it on the Dataverse…”

“No, you’re right…” Dust looked at Gil like he was more insane than usual. “Yeah Illidan passed by, I suspect everyone is going home now.”

Home. What a hell of a word.

“Well, why haven’t you left yet?” Gildarts asked the youth.

Dust’s face flushed, “I uh… Don’t really have a place to go back to.”

The Ace nodded, recruitment time. He’d encountered homeless and lost younglings before. He’d invited them to Fairy Tail.. And Ambrosia. Yes.. That was where they’d go next. “Alright then,” Gil said with confidence, “You can stick by me, you’ve got a lot of potential, kid. And I think I’d make a pretty good teacher.”

A teacher. He couldn’t do it before, however now… Now he had no fear. Dust was a prime. And Gildarts had control once more.