Re: Michie || Characters & Concepts
Sid Nolana - Cupid's Reaper
Sid Nolana
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Sid stared out the window of the cozy lounge where other Lost mingled and socialized. Not many were bound to speak directly with him as he wasn’t really one for conversation unless someone had an “in” with someone who Sid care to banter with. Not that he wouldn’t offer advice if the right status of Changeling called for it. No one could deny that he wasn’t a contributing member of their weird society, but he certainly wasn’t the friendliest.
He sipped at a glass of whatever the fuck the barkeep had given him this night; by his taste, a mild Chardonnay. Certainly not his first choice, nor second or third.. or even on his top twenty, but still, anything would do. It was either holding the glass or fiddling with bits of bones left from victims of The Red Crown in Arcadia that Sid couldn’t seem to part with.
He turned, finding a cozy armchair nearby his position and took it, keeping his head turned slightly so he could avoid eye contact with others and keep looking out the window. His long dark hair was braided tonight, and as his head was turned, it fell over his shoulder, laying gently against a pale pink shirt in stark contrast to the rest of him. He quietly cursed into the glass as he lifted to his lips for another taste, damning the turn of events that he had to stay late at work as he tried to feel integrated into a normal human lifestyle. He would’ve preferred to change into something more appropriate to fend off any stupidly brave souls here. Something red, dark navy, black, dark gray. Not that Sid was totally a bad guy, but just didn’t care to waste his breath on irrelevant words, or more appropriately, those not worthy of his time. But still, this was a special favor being here. He didn’t know who was supposed to meet him exactly, but the Lost he was waiting on would know.
“Mr. Nolana?” Came the shy, quivering question of a young lady, “Miss Myra sent me.”
Sid turned his amber eyes shifted, falling immediately to a frail young woman, barely in 20s if that old. Medium length blonde hair tied back and held with plain black clips, bright blue eyes and a waist length down jacket with faded denim jeans and brightly colored gym sneakers. He wasn’t even subtle about eyeing her from head to toe before he downed the rest of the Chardonnay and stood to his full height of six foot two.
“Come on.” Even though he spoke quietly to her, his voice was deep, reverberating in the girl’s mind long after the notes faded into the bustle around them.
Sid led her out of the lounge, stopping to leave the empty glass at the end of the bar with a generous tip, signaling that he did indeed enjoy the beverage. He grabbed his jacket from the open coat check without slowing in the least and led her outside. The two walked for sometime in silence. It seemed she had been lectured about following orders. Sid thought himself lenient with the newbies, but he could be off putting when they asked too many questions. He was a fucking babysitter after all. He brought her to his shady motel, nodding to the clerk behind a barred window at the front desk, who scribbled something down in response. Sid couldn’t hide his grin as the girl grew more nervous, her fear climbing at a rapid pace. He led her a grimy employee lounge that was empty of any state of being used.
“What do you think is about to happen here little girl?” Sid asked as he turned to face her, still grinning and instantly captivating her.
“I thought you were going to help me?” She squeaked fearfully.
Sid didn’t miss the opportunity to feed off her terror, licking his lips at her particular taste, “Don’t worry, I am. And thus far, you’ve been quite a good child. Tell me, who was your captor?”
As he spoke, he slowly approached her and she backed up until she was caught between him and the wall. Even though he wasn’t touching her, he towered over her smirking, but somehow tugging at her heart.
“The Red Crown.” She squeaked again, watching him with unblinking, tear glazed eyes, “But he wasn’t really my captor. You were.”
Reality hit Sid hard as his smile disappeared in an instant, “You were the last, Mia. You were the only human I brought him.”
Mia burst into tears, her head lowered and hands raised as she sobbed into her palms. She tried to speak, but her sorrow was heavy; something Sid had opted to twist into a hard shell that few were allowed through. By default, he owed penance to this girl because while he had used her to escape, she clearly had endured her own terrors.
The Red Crown was a looming humanoid shape of a man with no distinguishing features, just pure blackness with a glowing stark red crown hovering above his hairless head. When he spoke, it was as though a thousand voices of force came from every angle possible and impossible. His domain was dark with muted colors and there was no landscape, only the trappings of what could only be described as a tower inside the earth. Windows looked into stone and earth, yet doorways next to them went into more sprawling dungeon-like rooms.
“I had been brought in from an orphanage the day before I was to be adopted for a charming couple from upstate New York. I couldn’t of been more excited.” Sid began as he turned and paced across the room, “I was packed, with only the clothes I would sleep in that night already on, and my best clothes for the following day laid out. They weren’t even nice clothes, thinking about it now.”
He turned back again and walked back to her, offering a handkerchief from his pocket, which she took, calming enough to listen to his story.
“In any case, that night I went to bed, but before falling asleep, I could hear footsteps coming down the hall, but they were heavy and slow and almost felt almost thunderous. I panicked when they stopped outside my door and the knob began turning. I hid under the bed, and when I turned my head to see what was there, I was overcome by pure blackness.” Sid continued as he paced back to the window.
“When I came too, I was in a dungeon cell, naked, scared. It was pitch black except for a single candle at the end of a long hallway.” He sighed, “After however long, a scrap of bread and a bowl of water was left. It went on like that for fourteen meals. I don’t know if that meant two feedings a day or one or what, but I kept count of the meals. I never saw anyone or heard anyone during that time and I didn’t make much fuss because I didn’t know if anyone was ever actually there.”
“Sometime after that last meal, I saw lights reflecting off wet stone, like something out of a movie, and a bunch of men came down the stairs holding torches, but none of them had faces, just holes where a noes should’ve been and weird gray splotches all over whatever skin was exposed. One unlocked my door and I was ripped unwillingly from my cell. They wore robes but I caught a glimpse underneath one and they were just heads with necks and some dozens of arms just protruding out from their necks.” As Sid sat down at the plain lunching table in the room, the chair creaked, making him wince a bit, “Those things, the Tower Keepers, brought me through the place, carting up upstairs and downstairs and across the walls, over ceilings until I couldn’t tell which was up anymore. Eventually we came to a plain room with a large circular light that had no source and a metal slab. They bound me to that table and left me. I cried and screamed and called for anyone, but no one came. I remember looking around the room, trying to find anything to occupy my mind, but there was nothing else. Nothing to count, nothing to see, just the light and the table and me.”
He continued as Mia came to sit with him,but cautiously opposite, “Again, after some undesignated amount of time had passed, I had visitors. One was the Red Crown and the other was the Doctor, wheeling a drawer of instruments. I remembered being absolutely terrified of the Doctor, but that was nothing to what the Red Crown made me feel. However, I made the mistake of looking at his face. He grew enraged that a lowlife like me would dare look upon his royal divinity and ordered the Doctor to thread me.”
“At first, it was ticklish. The Doctor drew lines across my body, everywhere on my front and sides. He flipped me over and continued with his strange patterns until he was done and then flipped me over again so I could see what was going to happen.” He paused for a moment, looking at the girl as she listened in horror, “If you’re squeamish, now is the time to stop me.”
“No.. I mean, I am, but you’re telling me this so I understand why you destroyed other lives, right?” She spoke with the most ferocity Sid had seen from her all night.
“Yes I suppose. But seeing as you and I are both Lost, you know how much choice we had. But because you are what you are because of me, I’m not going to harbor any secrets from you. Of course, this comes with some rules as well, but I will explain those once you get introduced as you are now.”
Mia nodded and dabbed at her unending tears with the handkerchief.
“The Doctor brought a knife to my chest, and not just any knife, but a Chef’s knife. He cut into my skin and I screamed, struggling against him, but he only told me to hush. He stopped only the once to tightened my restraints before he kept on cutting until my chest was peeled back and my inside were exposed. He had three sets of arms, two sets going about slicing and pinning back folds of my body, while the other two kept injecting me with something. I don’t know if it was to dull the pain, keep me awake, or keep me alive or what, but none of it was as bad as when he began to thread me.”
Sid pushed form the table and stood, unbuttoning his pink shirt and revealed his Mein to her, showing patches of different skin stitched together and vampiresque teeth and pointed ears. Hanging from his arms and dragging across the floor and even a single strand hanging loose against his dark hair were threads of silver that had been severed, “He wove these threads through me, like a marionette puppet. It offered me a glimpse of other worlds in Arcadia, and even sometimes I stole away to this world to see what became of my would’ve been family. It offered me a false freedom, because the Red Crown always had access and could rip me back to him in an instant.”
He sat back down and relaxed in the chair, readjusting his Mask and rebuttoning his shirt most of the way, “After the Doctor was satisfyied that my whole front half was properly threaded, he left me opened and flipped me to my back and continued the process, sewing it through muscles and organs and bones. I passed out before he finished.”
“When I came to, I was sore, at the very least and I was hanging by my new threads in the center of the throne room, suspended above the floor high enough that I thought I’d die if I fell for certain. The Red Crown was there and when he noticed I was awake, he lowered me to the floor, letting me drop just far enough that it was excruciating. But he ordered me to stand before him and I did so because he frightened me so. He explained that if I was bad, he had ways of punishing me that I couldn’t begin to fathom, which I knew to be true based on what he had the Doctor do to me.” Sid turned his gaze to the window, “And he told me that if I was obedient, I could be part of his private council.”
“He.. he didn’t tell you what that was, did he?” Mia asked softly.
“No.. I doubt he tells anyone.” Sid replied without moving his gaze from window, “But of course, I didn’t want be in trouble. However knowing what I know now, I probably would’ve preferred the punishment. But in any case, I worked hard to be good, doing whatever was asked of me and after some years of sleepless nights and days and endless mentoring sessions of how to be stealthy, the Red Crown inducted me into his private council. I was probably about 17 at the time? It was truly impossible to tell, but that night... Well, that I’m sure I don’t need to explain what happened since you know. But after that, he rather liked having me as a plaything. He told me that he enjoyed how I squealed. But... but eventually he yearned for a different touch and he came up with a new mission for me above simply spying on others of Arcadia for the sake of spying.”
“He started sending me out to other realms to search for a bride for him. But he kept careful watch. He’d tug on my strings and if I came back with anything he deemed as foul, he’d beat me. Several times it was bad enough that the Doctor had perform his operation again to fix the threads. It started with him picking out those he thought he’d fancy. So I would sneak in and isolate whom ever the Red Crown had fixated on, and when the time was right, I’d grab them and he’d yank me back with the target in tow.”
At this point, Sid covered his eyes, rubbing them as though he was in deep thought, “The worst part was when he decided he didn’t want them, or was bored of them or whatever was going through his sick mind. Because he made me play executioner. I was puppeted to killing them, until eventually I knew it was easier for me to do it of my own will, than being forced to do it. It became my new punishment for having brought him back something he didn’t want long term.”
“But, didn’t he pick those poor souls for you to bring to him?” Mia asked, better understanding Sid’s plight.
“It started that way, but he figured out that his choices were wrong for him, so he started leaving that decision to me. He would send me out and sometimes I could wander for weeks in search of someone and sometimes it was just a day. If I didn’t bring back someone he liked or anyone at all, he would bring me to his throne and force me to service him and he’d keep the poor girl to add to his own menagerie. Those he did like, he’d wed, and then after a few weeks, grow bored and send me into rid his domain of them and I’d have to go out and hunt for another.” He explained, “It wasn’t until one day when I went to check on my would’ve been family and saw my replacement walking home with a beautiful young lady.”
Sid turned his full attention to Mia at this point, “Before I could act right then, I was pulled back by the Red Crown. He was already furious with me for not even looking for a new bride for him, but I avoided his wrath for once in my miserable time with him because I explained about the lovely girl I saw for him. When I realized that he was growing infatuated with the mere thought of you, I saw a way out for myself. I know you must think me a monster and you’re entirely justified, but I couldn’t take any more. He let me work without any more interruption, unless he was desperate to hear about you in some fashion. And I had stopped thinking about others long before you so it wouldn’t scar me so much when I had to kill. It was unfortunately easy for me to take you back to his lair.”
“One of the many I had kidnapped back to him was a charming girl who lived in a world made of moonlight. It was one of my favorite places to go because it was really magical. Her name was Millie and she was kind and innocent and had a knack for painting. She was one of those whom the Red Crown wasn’t interested in as a bride, but he kept her for her obvious talents. She enabled him to create entirely new Changelings because of her artistry, and that’s how you came to be.”
Sid carried a hint of red to his cheeks as he cast a sidelong glance at Mia, “I gently laid you out on her canvas, positioning you as she directed and then I watched her paint and shape you. I may have talk you up, but Millie created such a visual masterpiece, doing all she could to preserve what you were while adding details and whimsical touches to make sure that the Red Crown would know you were his. We tried our best to make sure you didn’t suffer as we did.”
“Was Millie the girl made up of paint with brushes for hands?” Mia asked in her quiet voice.
“Yes. When I brought her to his lair, she was a vibrant oil painting of a full moon with a starry night and at her knees down was a silhouette a palace with tiny glowing windows. After, she became the only vibrant thing in his world, becoming a painting of a darkened rose garden with hints of purples and yellows where the light might’ve touch the petals had it been real, and her hands became infused to the very brushes she used. Millie and I had actually grown close and I had intended to take her with me. I’ll find her one day and get her out of there.. What’s wrong?” Sid asked as he watched Mia’s tears come back full force.
“She’s gone...” Mia blurted, “After he realized that you had left, he took it out on her. He threw her into a pool of mineral spirits and she thinned out until there was no more screaming...”
While Mia sobbed, Sid sat, staring in disbelief. He held no fear for the Red Crown, and was contented to never see him again- until now. He had no idea what he would do, but surely he would make the True Fae suffer for Millie had remained innocent and didn’t deserve to die for Sid’s transgression.
“Come on. I bet you’re hungry.” Sid stood, fixing his shirt completely and held a hand out for Mia.
Confused, she took it and he led her back out to the streets, but not before nodding again to the clerk at the desk behind the bars, who nodded back. Sid led her a hole in the wall pizza joint where there was a couple speaking in Russian as they goofed around and laughed, but the girl was the only one eating. Sid ordered a pizza for him and Mia to share.
“I’ll tell you later about how I left and why I didn’t get Millie to come with me.” Sid explained slowly, his words and mind heavy with thoughts of his only friend, “But because tonight didn’t go exactly as I had planned, I don’t have time. What I do need to talk to you about now, are the rules that you and I are now bound by. And I don’t want you to think it’s normal- this is just for us.”
“Aren’t you worried about other people?” Mia glanced around at the owner and the Russian couple.
“No. Those two aren’t regular people over there. I’m sure you can see magic acts differently around her than it does us.” Sid subtly indicated the blonde woman with the slice in hand and long dark trench coat as she smiled at the man speaking to her, “And he’s not human... And the owner there is just like us. We’re safe here.”
“Okay... So your rules?” She seemed unconvinced.
“You are going to stay with me at least until you and I have a run in with the Huntsman. Besides knowing that Millie is gone changes things for me...” Sid contemplated aloud, “I know you must hate me and I cannot fault you for it, but you staying with me is the safest place right now. I’ve dealt with his bred of insanity before. Next, you are not to tell anyone about anything I have told you tonight. And the less you speak about the Red Crown, the better off you are. If you need to get anything off your chest about him, you come to me. I may have already misdirected the Huntsman to myself just because I’ve said the name so many times.”
“What’s a Huntsman?” Mia asked as she picked at her slice.
“The one who’s hunting for you to bring you back there.” Sid answered bluntly, “There are brutal and come about in many forms. Trust no one. Look what happened the last time you did. I stole you away to a horrible fate... and I’m glad you were able to escape, but now we need to keep you out of there. Once we’ve had our encounter with him or it or them.. Provided all goes well, you’ll have free reign to do whatever you want after that.”
“So why should I trust you now?” Mia questioned.
“Because I’ve done so much wrong with my life, even if it wasn’t my own choice.’ He sighed, hating having to let someone see through his facade, “But now I have choices, and I want to try and make up for it all. I want to protect others so we don’t ever to go back and I will never be afraid again.”
“Why didn’t you take Millie?” She asked, seemingly satisfied with his response.
“I... I couldn’t remove my threads. I couldn’t even cut them myself because it was so painful. I asked her to do for me, which took some talking. When she finally agreed, we planned it out, but... the day she cut my threads, the Huntsman was already searching for someone else that had escaped into the Hedge. As she severed the threads, I cried out, and he heard it. We had little time, so Millie told me to go and she’d find a way out. I...” Sid rubbed his eyes again, “I promised I’d go back for her. She pushed me into the oil painting she had made a gateway into the Hedge with.”
“And the Huntsman?” She asked with worry.
“Millie I guess deterred him because I didn’t encounter him until I was just about out... But the one he was originally hunting hadn’t been far behind me... He was probably the one who told the Red Crown about my escape.”
Mia and Sid were both quiet as they ate some pizza in earnest, both deep in thought.
“What happened to your replacement?” Mia broke the silence as she sat with her plate empty.
Sid smiled down at his plate, “Only one of you two left that car wreck alive. How do you think you ended up as you are?”