hadriel_logs | [closed] This endless night, this funeral dirge

Entry tags:

gren,
wade wilson

[closed] This endless night, this funeral dirge

Who: Saltmonster (

murderpotato) and Your Friendly Neighborhood Deadpool (

ishotyouuu)
What: Gren wakes up from The Big Death, deaf as a stone.
Where: Hope's temple
When: Forward-dated to 12/10
Warnings: Contains Gren's potty mouth.

When Gren wakes up from his deep slumber-- the deepest kind anyone can ever have, really, and that generally people don't wake up from-- everything is very quiet. Not just very quiet, but silent, still as a goddamn grave, and it's never been so quiet in this place before. Not ever, there isn't a single other time in Gren's long life that he can remember being unable to hear

anything.

He takes a breath and realizes that he doesn't hear that, either; not just because the sound of his own breathing is basically the white noise of living and his brain just doesn't notice it after a while, but because he actually can't hear it. There's just aching silence in his head.

Gren sits up, too sudden for how long he's been laying down, and his vision swims for a few sick seconds. He's back in his glamour, naked as he died, and when he feels at his face, it's clean and bloodless. He's not bleeding from his eyes and nose anymore, everything seems to be fixed up, just like when he died the first time. Except he snaps his fingers next to his head and there's nothing, his breathing gets quick and shallow and there's nothing, his heart starts racing in his chest and he can feel it but there's nothing.

There's nothing.

Gren had seen the world through his ears more than he ever had with his eyes; he doesn't know if anyone's in the room with him or nearby without being able to hear their heartbeats. He knows that he's in Hope's temple, because that's where dead people go, but he could tell where he was in this stupid cave by where and how distant the sound of the river is and foot traffic and other ambient noise. Now it's all blank and he hunches in on himself, draws his legs up and hides his face in his knees and kind of feels like he might actually be dying again.

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Wade, on the other side of the spectrum, had gotten barely any sort of sleep at all. Standing vigil at Hope's temple was all he could find energy to do, and it was only when his body fully and completely gave out on him after the third or fourth night (he'd lost count right around the time the lack of sleep started causing him to hallucinate) that he was afforded a few hours of sweet, dreamless oblivion, far away from the brutal ache in his chest that no healing factor could ease.

The reprieve doesn't last very long.

In the depths of his subconscious he hears a sudden sharp, repetitive sound, similar to the cries of a wounded animal, and Wade forces his heavy eyes to open; forces his sluggish and weary body to move toward the source of the sound. It doesn't take him long before he finds him-- Gren, lying there naked as the day he was born, his body drawn up tight and close in the fetal position as those horrible animal sounds come bursting out of him. Wade isn't even sure if he's aware he's making any noise at all, and truth be told, it doesn't matter.

Wade doesn't even realized he's moved until his arms are suddenly around the other man, holding him as if he were a child to be placated and not a lover who'd just come back from the dead. His fingers find themselves in Gren's hair, stroking gently, the act as much to confirm the fact that he's well and truly alive as it is to comfort him.]

"It's okay, Gren. I've got you. Ol' Wade's got you. You're okay. Everything's okay."

Gren is in the middle of what's probably a full-blown panic attack when there are suddenly hands on him, and he fights against it until he sees the familiar black-and-red spandex, the mask. He can feel Wade's chest rumble when he talks but he can't figure out what the words are; not when his mouth is covered and Gren's deaf as a goddamn post. He's still freaking the fuck out, but having Wade here with him is immediately better. Safer? At some point amidst all the fighting and fucking and other bullshit that makes up their weird relationship, something in Gren's head labeled Wade as safety and it stuck. This weird motherfucker who hit him in the head with a can of goddamn Spaghetti-Os when he first met him is somehow synonymous with security. Being with him is like going home.

He says Wade, or at least thinks he does, and the other man's fingers are gentle in his hair, running through what's probably a wild mess without all the pomade to tame it. A moment later, he flings his arm around Wade's neck and pulls himself in, leaning into his solid chest. His fingers trace down the side of his throat, searching and pressing in until they find the steady thump of his pulse.

He thinks that he says Wade's name again, he can feel the vibrations in his throat but has no way to tell if the syllables came out right. He feels his heartbeats, and that's comforting even if his fingers can't give him all the little details of Wade's heart that his ears could. It takes time for his shit to calm down, but having Wade there helps.

Gren croaks something that sounds like Wade's name, and Wade feels himself relax a little bit. He doesn't know whether coming back from dying is like it was in Haven, where parts of you were left behind sometimes when you were resurrected, but at least death hadn't robbed Gren of his senses. Wade makes a mental note to offer up thanks to his ex for that.

"Yeah, Gren. It's me. I'm here. Just relax, okay? I'm not goin' anywhere."

His hand doesn't move from its spot, fingers massaging Gren's scalp in small, gentle circles, and though the situation might seem somewhat embarrassing and awkward-- a spandex-clad man currently cuddled up with a man naked as a jaybird-- he knows that this is what Gren needs right now. What they both need-- feeling Gren warm and solid and real in his arms again causes his heart to clench; causes a lump to form in his throat that he has to swallow hard to force down.

He'll have time to ruminate on these feelings later, he supposes; time to figure out what they mean for the two of them. But right now, all of his attention is focused on the man who's just come back from the dead, the man who-- despite his efforts-- has become a very important factor in Wade's life.

Wade rumbles again, and this whole not being able to hear thing is really getting in the way of his ability to communicate with this guy. He assumes it's something reassuring, because every aspect of his body language seems to indicate that; the way he's curled around him, the gentle fingers in his hair. It's been a long time since there was anyone in his life who would hold him when he was hurt, and it... helps.

But everything is still so silent, and no amount of Wade's kindness is going to fix that.

He's going to have to deal with that at some point. Gren doesn't want to, he doesn't want to try to parse out the ramifications of what's happened to him. It's going to suck. He stays there for a minute or two longer, hiding in Wade's arms, before he slowly pulls back and looks up at him.

"Wade."

He hopes his voice is stronger than he suspects it is. He can't hear how he sounds, though.

"I can't... what did you say?"

Wade knows that something is wrong even before Gren asks him to repeat himself. Gren's voice comes out strange, faint and a little nasally, so unlike his usual tone. Unconsciously Wade's arms draw more tightly around him, as if to brace himself against the uncertain dread that's just now stirring in the pit of his stomach. He doesn't want to know. He has to know. It's not enough that Gren's alive-- he has to know if Gren is okay.

"I'm right here, dude," he hears himself saying. "What, can't you hear me? I've been talkin' to you this whole time."

The words come out as flippant as ever, but that doesn't help the cold feeling suddenly settling over his spine, causing his mouth to run dry. Had something happened during Gren's resurrection? Wade knew things were kind of pear-shaped right now, what with the huge clusterfuck with the gods and all, but those were just surface mishaps and property damage... right?

Gren's not looking at Wade's eyes when he talks-- he's looking at where his mouth should be, at the movement of lips underneath the fabric. It's hard to make out what exactly his mouth is doing underneath it, and Gren's brow furrows from how hard he's concentrating on it.

--right-- ere--. What-- ca-- -- hear --? -- be-- tal-- -- -- who-- time.

He can barely make out enough of those sentences to make any sort of sense about it. The reality of it is hitting him hard, just in that moment; he can't hear Wade. He can't hear Wade's voice anymore, he won't ever hear him whisper or yell or laugh again. He hadn't realized before how much he liked Wade's voice and his laugh and the little noises he makes when Gren kisses him in the morning before he's fully woken up. Singing Cyndi Lauper in the morning while he's making pancakes and waiting for the coffee to perk. The way his voice gets warm and rough when he says Gren's name after they've been necking like teenagers.

Gone.

"I can't hear you." Creeping panic. He can't hear him. "Wade, I can't fuckin' hear you."

That low, nasally voice unsettles Wade, even before he registers the mounting panic hidden deep within his words. He's heard that sort of voice before, in a movie or a documentary or something, about a woman who'd been deaf since childbirth until she'd gotten one of those implants that would allow her to hear for the first time.

Wade feels an icy chill travel down his back as he looks down at Gren, his arms subconsciously tightening around the other man as if the truth was something he could protect him from. Those fucking machines must have done more damage than he'd initially thought-- the sight of blood seeping from Gren's ears and eyes is still something that haunts Wade's thoughts-- and apparently it was damage that the gods of Hadriel were unable to rectify.

"It's okay," Wade says, largely out of a need to say anything rather than anything he actually feels. "Everything's gonna be okay. We'll get through this, I promise."

Wade's mouth is moving again and his chest rumbles and Gren still has no goddamn idea what he's saying. It's frustrating, and it's not going to get any less frustrating because it's like trying to talk to a brick goddamn wall. He can assume that Wade's saying something that's supposed to help or comfort him or something, but he doesn't know. Gren leans into the tightened embrace and tries to let that make him feel better.

He'd heard someone say once that blindness separates people from things, and deafness separates people from people. There's some truth to that, probably, and it feels a little like this silence is a wall between himself and Wade. Or maybe like one of those two-way mirrors.

"I..."

He trails off. Gren doesn't want to keep saying it, I can't fucking hear you, Wade, but it's true. If Wade wanted some kind of particular response from him, he doesn't know what it is. He doesn't know what Wade wants from him.

"I wanna go home. Let's just fuckin' go home."

There is no feeling worse than seeing the suffering of someone you care about and being unable to do a goddamn thing to comfort them. Wade's mouth had always been his biggest weapon, his shield; his blockade against the slings and arrows of the world, but what use was a voice when the person you intended it for had no way of hearing it?

"Okay, Gren. Okay. I've got you. I'll take you home."

More of those insipid fucking platitudes that probably do more harm than help at this point, but he's got nothing else. He feels a helplessness he's never felt before; the door he'd always used whenever the going got tough was now closed and locked against him, separating him from the one person who needed it the most. There's no longer a point to any of his words now, and yet he can't stop them from escaping; from pouring out of his mouth in a steady and useless stream because that's the only way he can stop the panic from closing up his lungs.

He shifts his grip on Gren, sliding one arm around the back of his thighs, so that when he stands the other man is easily and effortlessly scooped up, cradled like a child in Wade's arms. He taps a rhythm against Gren's skin with his fingers-- three, two, one-- hoping that that'll at least prepare him the way his words cannot.

"Bodyslide by two."

A brief, sharp feeling of vertigo as they wink out of existence, and seconds later they find themselves back in Gren's bedroom.

It's not difficult for Wade to pick him up; Gren's not particularly heavy when he's glamoured, and he wraps his arm around the other man's broad shoulders when he's lifted. Wade's carrying him like he's a bride that's going to be brought over the threshold or some shit, except with none of the good connotations of that.

Gren rests his head in the crook of Wade's neck and focuses on the rise and fall of his chest as he breathes. He absolutely does not think about the fight with the Null, or the weird weapon they deployed, or the awful, nauseating feeling of his own brain getting liquified in his skull. He counts the seconds between each inhale like he's measuring the distance of a thunderstorm.

"My legs ain't broke, you know," he says, even though he's well aware that Wade doesn't care if he's fine to walk.

He'd felt the sudden vertigo of bodysliding before, when he'd been badly injured by a stalker and Wade had bailed him out. He hadn't known what it was then and had assumed that he'd passed out and woken back up later; he doesn't have blood loss to confuse him this time, and he makes a miserable, displeased sort of sound at the twisting feeling in his guts. He lifts his head enough to see where they are and recognizes the familiar landmarks of his bedroom.

"Jesus." Bodysliding may be quick, but it's a rough way to travel. "Don't fuckin' do that."

"Sorry, sorry--" Wade murmurs, more out of habit than anything else. It's hard exchanging discourse with someone who's only recently become deaf, especially when that person still speaks as if they haven't had a loss of hearing. He knows that Gren is frustrated, and frankly, he's beginning to get a little impatient as well. How the hell is he supposed to communicate with Gren like this?

Wade shifts his grip, walking Gren over to the bed and gently laying him down upon it. He's not really sure what sort of things you do for sudden deafness and a slight care of death, but bed rest wouldn't really hurt, right?

He's lowered down and his bed's underneath him and Gren reluctantly lets his arm slide off of Wade's broad shoulders. He doesn't lay down, though; he sits up and reaches for a pair of jeans that he'd tossed at the foot of the bed days ago. They're probably supposed to go into the wash, but he'd rather have something covering his bare ass right now.

He sits at the edge of the bed and starts pulling on his pants, standing to get them all the way up. He's... okay. Physically, anyway, other than the whole deafness thing. He feels steady enough on his feet, doesn't feel any lingering weakness or fatigue. Maybe he shouldn't. Does death count as resting?

Gren reaches for one of his beater shirts and shrugs it on. He doesn't look at Wade.

"...Thanks for getting me."

Like he'd just given him a lift, not waited for him to come back from the dead, a whiskey-soaked Lazarus.

Edited (Consistency and typoes ) 2018-01-22 09:57 (UTC)

Apparently bed rest is not one of Gren's needs right now, and Wade feels a surge of frustrated helplessness as the other man silently gets his clothing back on. The fact that he refuses to look at him merely enhances the feeling, and Wade finds himself on his feet and gripping Gren's shoulder, indicating that he should turn around.

"Gren, I--"

His mouth works, struggling with the words he needs to say and that he knows Gren won't be able to hear. Wade blows a frustrated sigh from pursed lips, finally digging out his phone from his pocket and typing a message on it.

He holds it out for Gren to read: Do you need anything? Can I get you anything right now?

He turns at the pressure from Wade's hand on his shoulder and reads the question typed out onto his phone screen. His mouth pinches a little, because it's not really an easy question to answer. What does he need?

Gren doesn't know what he needs most of the time anyway, and it's not any different now. It had been nice, though, when Wade was holding him-- up until the whole bodyslide thing-- and he wouldn't mind a little more of that. But who just goes and says 'I want you to hold me'? It's fine, there's more than one way to get around to that part eventually. And it's not like going the long way is bad or anything.

"Yeah," he says, and steps in close, chest to chest. He slides a hand up to the back of Wade's neck, exerting a little pressure to urge him to lean down. "C'mere."

...Ah. And here Wade was worried Gren was going to ask for something complicated. He doesn't consider himself much when it comes to situations like this-- especially with someone as abrasive as Gren-- but this, at least, is something he knows how to do.

He allows Gren to guide his head down, but if Gren is expecting Wade to once again demonstrate the talent of his mouth, he's in for a disappointment. With a soft, shuddering sigh, Wade rests his chin on Gren's shoulder, his arms instinctively coming up to wrap themselves tightly around the other man's wiry body. He can feel the rhythmic beat of Gren's strong and stubborn heart through the thin shirt he wears, and he wills himself to focus on that sensation; of the warmth of Gren's body.

"Heh. Thought I'd lost you, pal."

The quip lacks the humor he was hoping it'd have. He's trembling, and that burning sensation has sprung up behind his eyes again, but he doesn't let Gren go.

This should have been simple-- it should've taken nothing more than Wade putting him back down on that bed to spend the next couple of hours reminding him what being alive feels like. It should've been the same kind of thing that they've been doing for almost a year now, since they've been basically exclusively warming each other's beds.

Instead, Wade's chin comes to rest on his shoulder and Gren's basically enveloped in his embrace. He's big and warm and his grip is tight, but... it's the way that he's holding him that makes something go strange in Gren's chest. He doesn't know the right word for it; not possessive, but like he's holding something important. Like Gren is something precious.

Gren's arm wraps around his shoulder and he pulls himself tighter against Wade, as though he could hide entirely in his arms.

"I have no idea what the fuck you just said."

Honestly, though, he's not entirely sure how much it would really take to keep him dead for good. That's one of the weird things about being a Fable, he doesn't always stay dead, even when he's killed. And there's no certainty about how that whole thing even works in this weird universe, either, so it's doubly weird. If the gods just left him be for long enough, would he come back on his own? Does he have to have Hope do whatever bullshit voodoo that he does? Questions that he probably doesn't want to find an answer to.

Edited 2018-02-21 03:20 (UTC)

"Heh. Sorry."

It's so easy to forget what price Gren has paid to come back from the dead. Wade tightens his grip on the man, as if shielding him from any further pain with his own body. After all, isn't that what having advanced healing properties is supposed to be good for? To take the pain that others can't? To shield the ones he cares about? Then again, it's not like it makes any difference. On a long enough timeline, everyone eventually leaves him.

Wade doesn't voice these rambling thoughts aloud. He doesn't say much of anything-- for once the Merc with a Mouth is silent. He merely holds Gren close, allowing his heartbeat and his body heat and his general presence to say the things that he can't articulate right now.

This is... this is okay. He can feel Wade breathing even if he can't hear his heartbeat, and that's a comforting rhythm. He's being held close, and he probably needed this, the comfort of someone's embrace-- or, rather, this someone. Everything about this sucks and the loss of his hearing is strange and frightening, but it'll be okay. Wade's got him and it'll be okay.

God, he has it bad.

Gren closes his eyes and rests his head on Wade's sternum and just feels his slow breathing for a few moments.

"Stay with me."

The comforting weight of Gren's head upon his chest squeezes Wade's heart so painfully that it's a wonder that the other man can't feel it. He wouldn't be able to hear Wade's words even if he could think of any words to say, so in response Wade merely holds him tighter, swaying slightly as if in a prelude to a dance to music only he can hear. His hand rests gently in the center of Gren's back, massaging in tight little circles, and through it all Wade focuses on quelling the suffocating feeling rising in his chest.

"Don't worry, buddy." Said to no one in particular, but he hopes that Gren will get the message all the same. "I'm not going anywhere."

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[closed] This endless night, this funeral dirge

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