abraxaslogs | [ CLOSED ] death is no man, death is no wraith

I'm remarkably full of wine.

[Wait.

Alucard definitely can consider something like a danger bell going off. Maybe. It is faint.]

I am also going to trust that you don't intend to do anything, or if you did, you'd be good enough to ask. Because if you're still overthinking it, I'm at a point of entertaining a bad idea.

[ Wine does not make one accept dismemberment without a blink. Or. It shouldn't. Perhaps Geralt at three jugs of ale in maintains a modicum of restraint that others do not.

A stitch forms along his forehead. He takes another drink, then huffs. ]

I will not be responsible for explaining to Jaskier why his architect is short a hand.

[ He should have never raised the topic. Now Alucard is thinking about it, and inside Geralt exists the boy who was as keen on trying to leash a wyvern and ride it as the rest of his brothers.

But he was barely eight summers old then. He's over a hundred now. He will not enable bad fucking ideas. ]

You don't even know if you'll be grabbing a hand.

[They're doing this, aren't they?

Alucard leans back in his seat, letting out a low and considered noise.]

There's two parts of this. The first is counting all of the bats. Then taking one, weighing it, and multiplying that weight by the total number of bats to see if they all match up to my actual weight. That's...probably easier?

[Can a tipsy witcher count bats? Who knows.]

The second is just taking a bat and seeing if I can even resume my human shape. And hoping you don't grab an organ or anything else vital.

[ A hand would be one of the more ideal appendages to unwittingly grab.

They are not doing a damn thing. Alucard possesses a glint in his eye that says they are, but Geralt prefers not to be complicit in this level of absurdity. He takes another drink as though this might erase the past ten minutes.

Alucard is looking at him. Geralt sighs for what must be the third time. He puts the jug down with a clink. He's too fucking full of ale to argue why they shouldn't proceed. ]

Fine. We will weigh you. Nothing more.

[ They've a scale somewhere in the unpacked crates downstairs. He rises to retrieve it, returning with a pewter scale typically used to measure alchemical ingredients. It should weigh a few bats easily. ]

[Ideally, it won't be an organ.

Alucard can sense that there is at least some resistance here. Unfortunately, being full of alcohol and in a good mood means that this is happening, and then Geralt gets right on up to get the scale. It is enough time for Alucard to put his own wine down on the table (using a coaster, of course) and transform.

So what if some of the bats are flopped on the sofa instead of fluttering about in an Alucard shape when Geralt gets back with the scale? A few of them flit over to the scale itself, and one manages to land riiiight where it should be.

This is absolutely normal behavior, thank you.]

[ The fact that they have a coaster says several things about who's responsible for the decor. Geralt didn't even know one existed until Alucard pulled it out.

At least with the cellar downstairs, the scorpions are no longer being butchered on the kitchen table. Which he'd like to point out is rarely him—he often goes after much larger beasts—but he likes to give Ciri a hand when he's around.

In any case, the scale goes on the table next to his near-empty jug of ale. He does not take another drink. He's both too sober and not sober enough for whatever the fuck Alucard has managed to convince him to do.

His gaze tracks the single flitting bat. He nudges it gingerly. A genuine researcher might record numbers, but Geralt does not write things down. He's never needed to. So he simply notes the weight and picks the bat up, ready to release it back into the cloud in exchange for another.

He's beginning to feel like a mad scientist of a mage, and this is not a sensation he appreciates. ]

[The bat is the calmest bat as it is picked up. Sure, the ears twitch a little, but that is it. The soft furry belly presses against Geralt's hand, and it is paired with a soft squeak of acknowledgement.

So it goes with the next bat. It flops around a little more, but it remains calm. And it weighs exactly the same as the last bat, suggesting that, perhaps, all of the bats weigh the same.

A few more bats flop onto the sofa, the idea of flying a bit exhausting to them at the moment.]

[Like any normal person, when Jaskier returns home, he believes, fully, that it will be exactly as he's left it. All the furniture where it should be, and the lights off -- or on, if Geralt or Ciri are around, but he didn't hear any sawing from the basement, so he isn't entirely sure. Sometimes he walks into the kitchen and Geralt is just there, sitting in silence, drinking ale and waiting to scare the shit out of him.

But that's the worst that's happened. A home is a man's sacred space.

Which is why when he opens the door, juggling a new wreath he's made from extra succulents from the shop, the last thing he has ever expected to see in or near his home is a cloud of bats.

He screams, throwing the wreath on pure adrenaline, pure primal fear, without thinking of his dear friend who is also known to turn into bats. He also adds a small bit of poetry to the violence:] AHHHGETTHEFUCKOUTOFHERE

[Whether he even noticed Geralt is up for debate, but considering Geralt is not a threat and a bunch of bats is, that's absolutely where Jaskier's attention lands.]

Edited 2023-10-16 18:09 (UTC)

[Alucard's bat cloud does not like being disturbed, even if it is currently in a gentle state of disarray. The fact a whole ass wreath suddenly breaks into the cloud sends the bats into a shrieking, scattering mess, only to reform quickly.

No more sofa bats, no more chilling on the scale bats, only a drunken dhampir who looks definitely unsteady, and more than that, short something very important: his hair. Because right now it is only chin length, and there's no even cut either. The pattern of where hair starts and ends zig-zags.

There's a single bat shrieking in total panic in Geralt's hand, and Alucard manages an outraged cry of:]

Jaskier! Did you really need to do that!?

[ The sole indicator that Geralt has lost some of his edge to liquor is that he doesn't hear Jaskier arriving. More accurately, he hears the footsteps and the creaking, but fails to make the connection that one, Jaskier is walking up the stairs and thus towards the roof where he and Alucard are conducting the experiment; and two, the cloud of bats would likely startle the bard and Geralt should preemptively warn Alucard to prevent...

This.

His head snaps up, bat still clutched in one hand. With the other, he snatches the flying wreath before it sails right over the ledge.

Shit. He stares at Alucard, a deep frown marring his forehead. It's. All right, it could be worse given their previous conversation about dismemberment, but he has to wonder if Alucard might've preferred to lose a limb as opposed to chunks of his hair.

His gaze cuts back to the squirming bat in his hand. That answers that.

He sighs. ]

[Unfortunately the bats reswarming makes Jaskier scream again, diving behind a chair as the beasts go absolutely mad, ready to tear him apart or -- or drink all his blood! In his own home! What sort of horrible cursed night this turned out to be, after he'd accidentally spilled wine on his boots --

He pops his head up.]

Alucard? What the fuck are you doing? [His eyes slowly turn to Geralt, holding both bat and wreath, looking as if he wished he were absolutely anywhere but where he is.] What the fuck are you doing? [And back to Alucard (he is still hiding behind the chair.)] And where's all your hair gone?

Geralt, may I please have the last bat back? I can feel the heartbeat coming from it and it is very scared.

[Alucard then turns his attention to Jaskier, a little slower than expected. Oh. The whole world is slower than expected.]

Testing bat things. Because it was on someone's mind for a while.

[ Ciri might have just gone to her room upon coming home, none the wiser, if it wasn't for Jaskier's blood-curdling screams as she approaches their house. She even saw him go inside, a ways up the road from her, so the fact he came home half a minute ago and then immediately started screaming (in fear, not for other Jaskier reasons) can't bode well. There's a flurry of motion just barely visible on the roof through the foliage, and she's pretty sure the shouting came from there.

She reacts immediately, ready to defend their rooftop garden and the bard in it. This close, and not knowing how time-sensitive this threat is, she doesn't bother going through the front door and all the way up the stairs.

She dashes forward and Blinks from the side of the house directly up onto the ledge of the roof. Momentum carries her the rest of the way, tackling Alucard about half a second before she realizes who it is. ]

Shit! Sorry--

[ She was expecting a thief. Or maybe an unusually large rat. ]

What?

[ Alucard is right. The bat's little heartbeat is thundering, and Geralt doesn't know how that makes any fucking sense if it's an entity that's shifted as a part of Alucard. Why would it have an independent physiological response?

Furthermore, he had questions. He did not insist on experimenting with potential dismemberment. Geralt is not one to bother defending himself from accusations, though, so his sole response is another sigh. He's about to offer the bat to Alucard when his medallion hums. Before he can react (the amount of bullshit happening all at once is truly highlighting how much he is not sober), Ciri barrels across the roof. One of Alucard's empty wine jugs tips off the ledge and smashes to the ground. On the street two stories below, a woman shrieks.

Jaskier stumbling upon this chaos is one thing. His own daughter is another. She's already witnessed him vomit on a cactus a few weeks ago (during a...complicated hunt, but), then heard him fall out of bed (also complicated).

Geralt breathes in and does not exhale. His fingers curl against his knee from where he's crouched over the scale. He refrains from pinching the bridge of his nose. ]

[There is too much happening at once. The tiny, terrified bat squeaks as it tries to make it's way back to Alucard, wings flapping madly. It knows where it needs to be, but in a moment, where it needs to be is gone. There's shattering glass, there's a yelp from a dhampir whose response time is seriously delayed, and now where the bat is supposed to be is on the floor, having crashed from momentum and--

--Alucard glares up at Ciri. The bat crawls underneath him, and suddenly his hair is as perfect like always. No more bats. No more noise. Just a dhampir who does not appreciate the chaos, and frankly, is going to have a splitting headache once he sobers up.]

Is there anyone else who would like to make loud noises about the present state of me?

[Testing... bat things? What on Melitele's ever-loving green earth does that fucking mean?

Jaskier gives another shriek (perfect in timbre with the woman below) when Ciri appears out of nowhere to bring Alucard to the ground, so fast that he only barely registers it was Ciri at all. He ducks behind the chair before his brain can catch up, peeking back out as his heart rethunders for the fifth time in what feels like two minutes.]

You're the one who was bats in my house! [Alucard is so lucky he wasn't wearing that robe. He may have tripped on it and died at this point. Or worse! Torn it!] Are you both drunk?

[He sniffs, slowly drawing himself out from behind the chair. There is definitely a smell. That isn't a rhetorical question anymore.]

[ He is not drunk. He can't speak as to the state of Alucard, but Geralt is satisfied with his ability to catch flying wreaths out of the air. He is, however, somewhat more suggestible than usual. Which—he'd like to point out it's not as though he agreed to feed Alucard to a nest of a wyverns. They were quietly taking measurements up until the...disruption.

This small activity has obviously exceeded its reach.

He reaches down to help Jaskier off the ground, where his friend has been taking cover for the past two minutes. His gaze flicks to Ciri, dishevelled but unharmed.

It's fine. The only casualties are a vase and Alucard's dignity. (Geralt will not address his own because it does not matter. He's moving on. As for Jaskier, the bard has long transcended quotidian concepts such as dignity.)

He tucks the wreath under one arm, picks up the scale and the (empty) jugs of ale, and nudges open the rooftop door with the heel of his boot. ] Dinner's in an hour.

[ Alucard is welcome to stay if he's willing to look all three of them in the eye over a pot of rabbit stew. ]

--I'll clean up the broken glass.

[That seems the easiest thing to focus on right now. And the least embarrassing. It gives him enough cover to exit the room in the name of looking for a broom, as well as the chance to break the all encompassing tension in the air.

This has very much been An Evening, he'll say that much.]

[ Bewildered, Ciri removes herself from on top of Alucard quickly enough, and awkwardly offers him a hand up while mumbling another confused apology.

Well. At least no one was actually in danger. ]

Three of us are about to be drunk. [ She answers Jaskier somberly, and quickly makes her escape trailing after Geralt to help him with dinner.

Jaskier is welcome to thank her appropriately for so valiantly defending him sometime in the future. ]

You're all absolutely mad! [He says while raising his arms to the heavens themselves, then dropping them. Somehow Geralt is making this seem like his fault. Perhaps he should have not come home! Not brought a decoration back to the roof to fit with his nice lighting!

And since neither of them said no, he's taking that as a yes.]

And you're lucky you saved that wreathe, Geralt! It coast as much as three of those bloody scorpions!

[ CLOSED ] death is no man, death is no wraith

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

drive-by interruption

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

🎀