2 Wet 2 Furious

RP Date: 2026-11-07

Location: Lake of Life

Participants: Aries, Lettie

Summary

Lettie finds another familiar face, Aries, or rather he finds her in a clearing within the woods by the lake. It is a reunion, not the expected kind. (Is anyone ever going to be happy to see the cat?) One that ends with two returned to the deep belly of the Lake.

This archive was published after approval by all listed participants.

Roleplay

Aries had long since been dismissed of any trace of the man he used to be. (You know, the beautiful God that everyone knew we and loved.) Days, no weeks, had passed in the unending existence beneath the Grimwych forest canopy. He moved through darkness not as a man, but as a shadow detached from the trees, a silhouette of muscle and intense anger. His newest attribute, his beard, was matted with dried mud and the coppery scented remnants of past hunts, blending into the untamed and unknown wilderness around him. ?The forest, usually alive with a symphony of crickets and rustling prey, had gone dead silent. They knew better?. ?Up ahead, a small clearing broke through the gloom. And bathed in the light of a half moon, stood Lettie. She seemed entirely unsuspecting, and looked so fragile, so hopelessly out of place in this new domain. The Wolfman crept forward, silently. For a man of his size, he was a phantom. Branches that should have snapped beneath his weight seemed to simply part for him, bowing to the monster that had claimed these woods. ?He stopped just inches behind her, so close he could see the pulse fluttering at the base of her neck. Slowly, he leaned down, his frame blotting out the moonlight and casting Lettie in complete darkness. From the shadows of his bearded face, his eyes opened wide. They burned like twin coins of molten gold that cut through the darkness with luminescent malice. The man, it seemed was almost gone. ?He lowered his mouth directly beside her ear, breath hot and damp against her skin. ?"Boo."

Lettie stood barefooted in a small clearing within the woods, staring up at the light of the moon, the nightlight glow reflecting off her singular green feline eye, with tri-colored locks falling in tangles down around her still too small frame. Grimwych hadn't made her any taller nor any bigger, as if stuck in a stasis of the young feline woman that she was moments before sucked into and spat from the lake. A place she'd often frequented, just enough to have caught a trace of a scent, familiar and foreign all at once, near the forest beyond. Only near that wooded space had her feline nose found it, never beyond into the town proper. The moon tonight was nearing its fuller status and what better way to lure out the crazy beast in your imagination than to wander alone into the woods where it lives. A basket full of burgled and owned things -- sandwiches, forks twisted into sculpted people, a half empty bottle rum, a blue sketchbook with embossed fern, various pencils, tin of needles, and bandages-- sat just off from the woman next to her boots. Carefree and waiting she stood, listening to the world beyond waiting for the shift to occur. The chorus of night life ceased into silence when the beast came out to play, that was her only indication he was here. His steps moved like shadows that consumed her when the feline broke free, silent and deadly with the world bending to him rather than him to it. Darkness came as the light vanished under his shadow, the lynx standing perfectly still, minus the twitch of those fuzzy ears. One word, a shiver ran down her spine and she had to withhold a smirk, "Big Cat" she whispered out on a single breath in greeting.

Aries would usually be slightly amused by the appearance of his much younger and troublesome counterpart, Lettie. 'Big Cat' was a term of endearment that he genuinely accepted as the time that he had known her passed. She was young and troublesome, much like he was in his earlier prominence. Tonight, however, he stared down at her, his glowing eyes tracing over her bare feet and the trinkets gathered at her boots. The briefest flicker of genuine surprise broke through his blood drunk glaze as his head tipped to the side in curiosity. But the surprise did not bloom into his customary warmth. There was no teasing, no brotherly punches to her shoulder, and certainly no hugs offered. Instead, an eerie stillness settled over his chiseled frame. The Beast inside him was restless, a churning ocean of hunger and unnamable grief. The whispers scratching wildly in his mind told him how easy it would be to snap the tri-colored lady before him into pieces. Those whispers though, are quieted for the time being. The Wolfman shrank back a half step, keeping the worst of his monstrous proportions veiled in the shadowed depths offered by the forest. ?"You should not be here, Little Cat," he finally voiced. The voice was wrong, stripped of its usual teasing lilt. It was much darker, almost guttural. Rather than smile at her greeting, he only stared at her singular green eye, his own gaze reflecting a strange weariness. "And neither should I."

Lettie was slow to turn about to face the beast she had purposefully come to find tonight. There was a chance this was her mind playing tricks, that scent not truly the person she thought it belonged to. Mismatched gaze, ocean blue-human with the feline-slit green reflecting light, studied him over. Familiar-stranger summed up the twist to the smell. The hair though matted with forest debris was the same dark locks, the tattoos lost to the grime of living in the woods were the same, and those eyes though the wrong hue of golden were familiar. Somewhere, buried deep into that feral transformation, was her Big Cat. She took the first step nearer after his retreat. The shadows he moved into slowly drifted away from him in the presence of the lynx, leaving him to be exposed by slivers of the moonlight once more. The scent of that younger, troublesome counterpart was different here. That previous underlying second curse of fangs was no longer present, nor was the feline scent of lynx underneath, it was shifted to something empty and dark. Stepping closer as he shrunk back into the shadows the lynx reached with a small hand for a piece of white sticking out from his beard. She should be afraid. No fear showed at all in the little cat, her heart beat and breathing were all perfectly steady. It was curiosity that she suffered from, a fate worse than death. Just a flinch of hurt into the singular blue eye, that unwanted response to seeing her, again, betrayed any emotion. If he allowed it, she'd pluck the little bone from his last hunt free of his filthy beard, "No, we shouldn't be here?yet if everyone keeps telling me that I'm going to run out of places to go. Might as well then offer up to be that sacrifice the town is talking about to let everyone go home."

Aries did allow Lettie's much smaller fingers brush away the little piece of bone lodged in the blood matted hair of his jawline, but the reaction thereafter was a just a complimentary hair trigger response. ?Faster than a human eye could perceive, his hand snapped up, moving to wrap completely around her wrist. If successful he would hold her suspended, his grip a vise of unyielding strength. And no, he's not going to break her fixed bones. If his action fails, he's still going to loom over her, leaving the slivers of moonlight she had forced upon him to reveal his more bestial features. ?Her mismatched eyes are the sole focus of his stare as he listens for the flutters of terror in her heart. Even if she tempers her heartbeart, fear still had a scent. And gosh dangit, there's nothing?at all. Her pulse remained a drumbeat of calm curiosity that felt like a mockery to the beast that wanted her to bleed?break, fuck?fear the dark like the rest of the world. ?"Sacrifice?" ?The word tore from his throat as a jagged smile split his maw, peeling back his lips to expose his trademark silver canines. The golden eyes that bored into hers were entirely devoid of the man she was looking for. These were endless pits of cruelty and starvation. ?He leaned in closer, his features darkening all the while. "Do you truly believe your little life is currency, Lettie?" he almost whispered, "Do you think spilling your blood in the dirt will satisfy this place? That if I choose to tear you open right here, a magical little door will swing open and let those pathetic fucking cattle back in town return to their warm beds. Their perfect little storybook lives that no longer exist." He laughed in mockery of the sheer stupidity of it all. ?"I can kill you right now," he breathed, his mouth now lowering inches from her neck as his eyes counted the pulse within her jugular. "I can sink my teeth into your throat and rip it out before your lungs can even draw a breath to scream. I can paint these fucking trees with you. I can scatter your pieces for the scavengers to mull about for the next millennia." The Wolfman tilted his head, his smile faltering into a look of chilling emptiness. There was no mercy, and certainly little hope to be offered. ?"Say the word, and I will do it. I will end you right here to prove miserable truth of it all. Your sacrifice buys nothing. No one is going home, Lettie. Because there is no home left to go to. It's gone. All of it."

Lettie blinked twice. One moment she was brushing bits of bones out of blood matted facial hair and the next she was dangling off the ground by her wrist, held firmly in the larger grasp of the beast. In that one moment from feet on the ground to in the air there was a single spike in heart rate, not of fear. It was that adrenaline spike, like the moment one leapt off the edge of a cliff and started to freefall. It lasted just a beat or two before settling back into normal rhythm once more. The little feline is still not afraid of the beastly man that had taken over the man she once knew. Or perhaps, it was the man she knew that was the guise and the beast was the real creature always in charge just subdued. He could break the wrist he held, she'd never know it, that had yet to change for the lynx, no pain was ever felt. Not the physical anyways, emotional things were different, weren't they. Neither man nor beast spooked a fear into the young woman, not even as he offered to rip her into shred to coat the forest with. She listened, appearing to be paying attention to his words without any struggle to being dangled like a fish before his hungry-starved gaze. Little legs swinging as he leaned to bring lips near her jugular, aiming to wrap themselves around his waist and tugging herself closer to him, if he let her in his distraction with her pulse. What on grim was this crazy cat doing? Free arm, moving with feline grace to attempt to ensnare his dirty locks into her fingers, a small yank to pull his head backwards if she was lucky. Mismatched gaze almost a mimic of his feral golden ones, "I'm broken in many ways, but I ain't stupid. I know these bloody lands have a mind of their own and that there isn't an escape to this reality, except perhaps death and even then I doubt it lets anyone go. I tried to tell them spilling blood on rocks won't do anything, but clearly, I'm just the dumb feral cat from the woods, they don't listen." A parted lip snarl, as Aries managed to get some emotion from the lynx that wasn't a naive airhead.

Aries growls lowly as he did anticipate a struggle, but wasnt privy to the sheer audacity of the little feline. As her legs clamped around his waist, a jolt of pure shock rippled through his body. She was very light, yet her brazen confidence felt much, much heavier. ?Before the he could snap his jaws shut around her throat, those little fingers of hers plunged into the mess of what was once glorious hair. It forced his skull backward, baring his own scarred and heavily veined throat. And just like that, the machinery of his mind stalled, leaving him staring blankly into her mismatched eyes. She wasn't prey, but a fractured mirror reflecting the same inescapable doom. Ho-Hum. ?In the moments of his surprise, the beast and the man collided in a single beat of nihilistic understanding. "You don't fear my teeth, and you have no fear of the darkness that surrounds us." The grip on her wrist tightened as he brought his free hand up, tracing the razor sharp fingernail of his index finger down the curve of her spine. The caress was a mockery of the lethal promise he was currently keeping in check. Yes, he could rip her spine out in a Predator-esque style. If you dont know, watch the damn movies. "The earth here is poisoned?," he growled as he leaned his head back down, resisting the pull of her fingers just enough to even his features with hers. "You know the stones drink the blood and give absolutely nothing back. We are damned to this cage." Golden eyes narrow, dilating their pupils until they nearly swallowed their own irises as they searched the depths of her gaze. He stepped away from the shadows, carrying her weight effortlessly as he made a few strides toward the lake. ?"Why seek to be the martyr for those pathetic cattle when you know there is no salvation? What exactly is it you want?"

Lettie knew her size and muscles against the beast would amount to nothing, easily a snapable snack in his hold. What was that saying about facing a wild bear? Freeze and hold your ground. He wasn't exactly a bear, yet the feral creature seemed close enough. Hold her steady ground without a single fear for the situation she'd gotten herself into. The lynx should be down right afraid, screaming for help, or smartly trying to put up some struggle not dangling like a fish. His distraction to her pulse was when she finally moved, some form of a fight back, however oddly done it was. Little legs wrapping around him as fingers found a hold in dirty tangled locks, ones she was once envious of. Mismatched gaze just stared intently into those golden ones as she held him back, for now. He could overpower her if he wanted. "I don't fear your teeth. I don't fear you. I don't fear the darkness. Fear makes you weaker." She retorted keeping that gaze locked on him, her heart beat staying just as steady as ever. She had fears, smaller things that she would not voice. Unable to help it, her body reacted with a shiver that followed the phantom feeling of his finger nail that traced along her spine. Her bare feet locked behind his back as the beast started to walk with her. She was light weight, hardly noticeable if it wasn't for the firm grasp of her fingers still in his hair. Her other wrist was trapped in his vice grip, not making any attempt to free herself. "I don't know what that word is?martyr?" She grumbled in a half whisper, why did people have to use big-litter words on her. "This is a poisoned cage? a twisted prison and someone's theatre to watch for pleasure." The lynx never looked away, only leaned her face in closer to his, resting her little forehead on his if he let her, while never loosening her hold on either his hair or waist. "If I'm stuck here, I'm not going to be someone's puppet on strings to dance." What exactly did she want? Not to be a play toy for an invisible hand.

Aries 'hmms' along with Lettie's answer. Fair enough. The intimacy that she offered thereafter was so crazy, yet tender. Cute. As her brow came to rest on the blood flecked ridge of his own, he sighed and closed his eyes. ?She clung to him like a burr on the hide of a wandering buck. She was entirely at his mercy, dangling from his chest and anchoring herself there with a defiance that was solely her own. ?"A martyr, my dear, is a fool who dies believing their blood will buy a miracle." ?He could pry her off, but chose not to. Instead, The Wolfman turned and stepped further onto the muddy banks of the lake. The water that lay before them looked like a slab of obsidian glass that reflected the moon?the very eye of the theatre she spoke of. ?"If you don't wish to be a puppet, then don't," he mused. If you refuse to dance. Then don't dance. But I'll show you why none of that matters." He stepped off the bank. The icy water swallowed his ankles, and yet, he didn't stop. He walked deeper into the darkness, the freezing depths creeping up his shins, then his knees. Because her legs were wrapped tightly around his waist, the glacial shock of the water would inevitably bite into her bare feet and calves. ?"But look at us, Lettie," he whispered into the space between them, his head tilting just enough so his razor sharp teeth grazed the shell of her ear. The water rose higher now, lapping over his thighs. "The strings are already pulled tight. The earth rots around us. The moon?" He looks to the heavens. "....she mocks us from above, and the invisible eyes watch every little twitch we make." He stopped only when the water reached the bottom of her spine, suspending them both in the churning mist that made them both look like phantoms from the shore. ?The glow of his gaze cut through the night like hellfire as he stared at her. ?"If the stage is a prison, then perhaps the only way to spite the audience is to drown the actors." And then, he stopped. He knew this part of the lake well. One more step ahead was a ledge that led to depths that would allow him to prove his point. He didn't wait for answer, because there was need for one. Those silver fangs flashed in the moonlight as his head sprang forward, sinking the pinnacles of those daggers into the juncture of her neck and shoulder. The bite offered was bereft of the normal frenzy that would tear flesh away from bone. This was something else. He was turning himself into an anchor. A step forward. ?The muddy shelf beneath his feet gave way, dropping them both into the fathomless chasm of the lake's belly. Gravity and his own weight claimed them both. His tattooed arms wrapped around her body, crushing her to him as they plummeted. Down, down into the lightless deep he dragged her, his fangs still firmly embedded in her shoulder, holding her exactly where he wanted her. The icy currents whipped her hair around his shoulders, their tangled forms sinking like a stone cast into the abyss. There was a point to be proven and that point was that no matter what death they had been dealt, the lake would bring them back. No cat lady, this has nothing to do with having nine-lives. There was something other than 'strings' keeping them here. And when she awoke again, she'd see.

Lettie held tightly, each step closer to that lake that had spat them up from the depths of its mysterious belly. The cat could not swim, the lynx within the were-curse was broken, and once upon a time he threatened to throw her into water for calling him big cat. This beast of a man that her legs locked around was not the person she knew from the previous world, he would absolutely throw her scrawny ass in and walk off, she could hardly recall if one were to ask her. Left now with a fuzzy memory, a faintest echo of the blood doctor 'negative on both samples' one of the last things she remembers before waking up in the mud. Of course, that only screamed louder in her head with each step he took into those chilly waters, as if it held some importance she would need to remember, again. "I see? only a fool would think blood would buy a miracle, but then why do they want a sacrifice so badly?if it will solve nothing?" a tiny question left aloud after the definition was given. She did not break her gaze from those burning golden orbs until he'd told her to look at them, and she did. A barefoot runt of a creature clinging onto a filthy feral beast of a person. Two lost souls trapped in a world that would refuse to give them up now that it had them. Previously, she was the messy one with tangled locks and who knew debris in them. Presently, he was the distraught one in a coat of blood, mud, debris, plus who knows what else. Those silver teeth against her ear sent a shiver down her spine, the lapping of the chilly water at her bare feet hardly noticeable, the wet feeling was there while the stinging pain she should feel at the chill never registered. Just as she'd not feel his anchoring jaws locking into her flesh. The beast would find the least satisfying bite of his life. Those razor sharp silver coated teeth slicing down easily into flesh, a scar would find itself present down the line. The little lynx held perfectly still, heart still beating without any changes. Still, no fear showing itself. Why be afraid of something she needed to experience, to see to understand? He wouldn't really do it if neither would wake, surely. The little cat, for all the right or wrong reasons, trusted Big Cat. Turns out, werelynx isn't affected by the silver of his chompers, no reaction formed. She did taste of feline mixed with something dusky and cold without flavor, a darkness of shadows filling his mouth before drifting out like a mist back into the night. He stepped and then began to plummet, his heavier body crushing her little frame against his tattooed torso dragging them down. Little arms shifted, wrapping around the top of his head, forming the oddest of hugs between two dying people as they drifted into the darkness. This death would give Aries something new to see, those shadows leaking out of the girl from nose and ears forming a bubble around the duo, keeping some captured bit of light around within that small bubble. A small twist-turn of her head to bring her lips nearer to his ear, a whisper that sent the waters rushing into her mouth, "I love you too, Big Cat." He'd get to witness, if his mouth let go of that bite he had on her, the light faded from mismatched eyes, while on the off chance neither would wake knowing he was loved with her last words. Silly lynx. She never screamed, her heart beat only shifting by natural instinct when her breath could no longer hold and the world around them started to go fuzzy. It didn't hurt, nothing ever hurt and perhaps that was why she never developed fear like a normal person. It would be a painless thing to drown with the beast, simply slowly going limp in his arms.