Post by skyeknight on Dec 8, 2016 21:36:52 GMT
After his fight with Aqua, Terra had been released from Vanitas’ control. Too little too late. He lost his badge. He lost the love of his life. He lost her trust. He hurt her. The thought of that, sent his blood boiling. This was Vanitas’ fault. He had caused all of this. Terra had been useless as Vanitas used his body like a marionette and controlled his every move. Terra was able to struggle to the surface from time to time, but Vanitas would remedy that just as quickly. At this point, he was helpless. All those things Vanitas made him do. The people he had hurt… The Sapien, Vanitas forced him to help distribute to those fanatical Humanists.
They were the same types of human purists who wanted his partner and people like her dead. It was horrifying the things they planned to do. The things they wanted to do to Others were ghastly all because they were different. After having two partners, who were both different species, he could say with absolute certainty that they really weren't that different from humans. Aside from a few appearances, which Aqua was so self-conscious about that she covered with magic and his other partner had to adhere to the monthly lunar cycle.
They were just as human as he was, perhaps even more so. Aqua would hug any child they came across, involved in a case. She would gently hush the people who cried. She would reassure the worried parents or chide the children who were staying out past curfew. She gave good luck charms and smiles as easy as Terra's elderly neighbor baked him something to eat. This was often. Because she said he needed good food for his growing bones and he stayed out too late. He had silently hoped he had finished growing by his age and he only worked late because that was his shift but he would take the food regardless.
His partner Leon had been older than him. Wiser. He was a seasoned cop and former marine. He had a patient touch with the rowdier arrestees. And a somewhat dark sense of humor. He might have touched the drink a little but never once did he let it impact his work. Even with his lunar cycle determining every little thing he did, Leon had been well adjusted to his life as an Other. At least until he was killed in action. He supposed that’s how Leon would have wanted to go, but it still hurt to know he hadn’t been able to do a thing to save the man who had helped make him into the officer he was before Vanitas interfered.
Terra knew he had only become a better person by meeting them. To think that someone wanted to eliminate Others and that a demon was helping them no less! They probably didn't even realize they made a deal with a literal devil, like Terra had. But Terra’s saved Aqua the night of the fire. Now Terra had to stop that maniac before he released his untested drug into the city. Who knew what it could do? Vanitas only cared about making the city as weak as he had been at one point, revenge served up on a city wide platter.
So he grabbed his gun and after some deliberation, his badge. He was still a BPD officer even if Vanitas had gotten him kicked off the force and disavowed by Aqua. He took a vow to protect and serve so he would. He left his apartment. His shared apartment. The home he had made with Aqua. He could just imagine Aqua coming home that night, crying herself to sleep on the couch, possibly waiting for him to come back even though she told him not to. Her loyalty would cut his heart. It was already making him feel like the scum of the earth. Vanitas had ruined everything. His life, his career, his love…
Being alone was one of her greatest fears. Faeries were naturally social creatures, unused to being cut off or separated from other fey. But Aqua's parents chose to live like humans because they disagreed with the faery code that love or friendship was like a form of slavery. They especially did not like faeries associating with other species, so they lived ‘off grid’. After their death, the Faery community would not take her in because she was ‘too human’. But humans hadn't wanted her because she was ‘too faery’. Terra was the first human to stay with her. She grew attached to him even if Faery code dictated she not. Aqua's affections had been hard earned but a happy accident all the same.
He already missed her.
Aqua had been a shy thing. She hadn't really had a lot of positive physical contact at the orphanage. So their first hug was a little awkward to say the least. Mostly with Aqua standing there, too shocked to move. She opened up eventually. Once they started dating, she would blush if they held hands, stammer after each kiss, shyly lean against him when they sat next to one another. She had surprisingly been very affectionate once she was certain that he wasn’t going to leave her at the first chance he got. Terra hadn’t particularly minded. It had been a pleasant surprise.
If he wanted any chance to make it up to her, he was going to have to get rid of Vanitas first, stop this untested drug, save the city and clear his name. Nothing too big, he thought vindictively. He knew just where Vanitas was going to be. He had to be quick about it if he was going to do any of that. So he left the apartment and hustled towards Vanitas’ hideout. He was going to get a shipment of Sapien to start distributing on the streets. There was no way that Terra could let that happen.
When he got there, the place was silent like the grave. It didn’t bode well for the officer. A place like this, right before the drop off of the drug, it should have at least been a little active, what with either Vanitas or goons (if he had goons) crawling all over the place. But not even a light was on in the building. He drew his gun, keeping it at the ready and taking the safety off. Emerald bullets sat in the barrel, waiting to claim Vanitas’ life once and for all. He had a full clip, but he had to make each bullet count. Stop the drug. Save the city. Clear his name. Stop Vanitas. In that order.
Terra slipped into the building through a cracked door. Also not a good sign, but he pressed onwards. A lone cop with no backup. Correction. A lone former cop with no backup. Even he had to admit that was pretty gutsy. But after all the things that Vanitas made him do while under his control, he had to redeem himself somehow. Stopping all of this before it caught any momentum would have been good enough for him. Save the city. Save Aqua. It became his mantra.
He had been forced to help in the creation of Sapien. Others were tortured under his watch and Vanitas’ control. Vanitas then forced the ones who weren’t experimented on to pay Terra protection money, so they would not be whisked away in the middle of the night. A lot of Others had died. They were high-risk targets for these sorts of crimes – people who wouldn’t be missed, the homeless, the runaways, the troubled ones with difficult lives, the ones who had run-ins with the law. Vanitas may have been pulling Terra’s strings, but someone else was running the Sapien operation.
Vanitas only wanted a cut, because he was a former test subject.
Terra had seen a few of Vanitas’ thoughts and feelings while the demon poked through his head. Enough so that Terra could put two and two together. Vanitas had been a kid, in the labs, tortured like some of the Others taken off the street. He had been hurt and helpless and now all he wanted to do was to make the entire city feel the same way he had. Terra might have felt sorry for the demon if it weren’t for the fact that the demon had ruined his life and hurt Aqua. His hands were still burning, as if remembering the feeling of grabbing her throat. All he had wanted to do was hug her close, try to soothe her and tell her it wasn’t him that did those things, but instead, Vanitas tried to make him kill her.
The hideout was dark. A few lights flickered on and off. Not like he should have expected the place to have electricity at all. It was just Vanitas’ hideout. The guy wasn’t exactly the type to pay for his electricity. It was probably bootlegged or stolen electricity or maybe the guy had rigged up a power generator. Those were all things for Terra to figure out after he arrested the weasely demon. One lone light swung back and forth from a single bulb overhead. He crept closer into the darkness. The inky blackness was all consuming. Terra felt like it was devouring him the longer he was there.
"Just had to be the hero, didn’t you?"
"Vanitas…" Terra growled. "Show yourself!"
"Why? So you can try to take me in?" Came the sarcastic reply. "Don’t think so."
Terra cautiously looked around, trying to pin point exactly where Vanitas’ voice was coming from. There were just so many places for Vanitas to hide. The darkness was a second home to the demonic creature, only natural that he knew how to use it to hide himself and his shady activities. Terra only had so many emerald bullets and he couldn’t waste them firing it off at random voices. The bullets were precious few as it was. The seasoned officer took a deep breath, slowly stepping further into the hideout.
The only sound Terra could hear was his own footsteps and his soft breathing. His eyes darted to every shadow, trying to discern Vanitas’ shape from each one. It was a waiting game or a game of cat and mouse. However, in this instance, he did not know if he was the cat or if he was the mouse. He had to be patient, wait for Vanitas to flush himself out, and then take the shot. He would end this. Return home to Aqua and –
Pain.
Terra’s hand reaching for the pain. He looked down to see a blade jutting from his chest and his breath caught. A shuddering breath left him. He could almost feel the smug smirk that Vanitas was giving him, one reply away from laughing. The pain brought Terra to his knees. He winced and looked ahead of him. There was liquid Sapien in the barrels. Terra knew this was his end, but he could at least slow down Vanitas’ plans.
"Nice knowing you."
As the blade came down, he lifted his gun one last time and pulled the trigger. Terra’s last thought was of a smiling blue haired woman.