Gregzilla's Scrapbook

Here I will be assembling any one-shot scenes I have thought up and decided to write out. Any characters used will be with the permission of their main authors.

Please offer feedback, negative or positive!

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Blood. Slick across the landscape, across the deck, across the surface of the satellite. Across the blades around him, on his young body.

So much chaos it was nearly blinding.

Mad laughter melded into sobbing, which itself turned toward screams of rage and the begging of terror.

A crackle of thunder.

More screams, this time with a higher pitch, overshadowed by a far deeper roar of absolute rage.

The flash of lightning, this time piercing the dark in far greater capacities, showing something within. A black sphere, covered in red markings he knew all too well.

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"GET OUT! GET AWAY!"

The screams pierced the night as a hand pulsating with silver light curled into a fist, its owner turning to face the being that had shaken him by his shoulder in the hopes of waking him up.

The knuckles met with hard bark before he could see what he was aiming at. They stayed there, with him shocked, but nonetheless shaking as much as the rest of him, the man sweating profusely.

"Naito, it's me," said a soft, concerned voice that was a bit contorted by residual pain from the strike, light green eyes looking toward his wild blue ones, her green skin a comparison to his fair complexion. By the look of her, with her relatively unkempt black hair, she had just woken up from her time on his bed, and come over to him on the couch.

The white-haired young man's crazed expression melted into fear, then into sadness and shame as the light faded away.

It was the dead of night. The young woman with him wore a black, short-sleeved T-shirt with a design on the front, that of a robotic arm that was entangled in vines, a bright light for a cannon in its outstretched palm. Despite how he did not like to be around people, he did find her rather good looking, and enjoyed her presence, from her appearance to her inventive mind. He did not look further, but knew she likely was not sleeping fully dressed, and would not look in his state, though he himself was shirtless to sleep.

"What's wrong?" Kara Newton allowed the magic of the barkskin to dissolve, the armor to disappear alongside it. She had experienced his reactions before, his intense responses to being startled. She had decided to sleep at his ship due to working on a project together late into the night. While she had been invited to take the bed in his room, he had slept on the couch, owing to his tossing and turning, not to mention muttering in his sleep. As it seemed, he hadn't had much concern for comfort one way or the other.

Rather than even move, the Moon Tribesman had met her question with silence, seemingly not having responded at all. Kara knew that he was a quiet man, mostly keeping to himself. She found some comfort in that, odd as he was. Sure, some may see him as worthy of fear, from his behavior to the mismatched wings on his back that he usually kept hidden, but she just wanted to help, seeing the pain behind those eyes, the haunted nature. She knew something had hurt him, and wanted to help if she could.

It appeared that he was more comfortable talking with her than with other people. Be it due to their mutual suffering in their own ways or due to their bonding over their work, he appeared more willing to talk for extended periods around her alone, longer than the short sentences or one-word responses he gave to others.

Even so, she knew that there was something he hid from her, something that he did not like to explain. She had her problems with fire, and he had issues with something else. They each had their demons to deal with. She just wished that she could help him to be less sad all of the time, at least in avenues beyond their engineering and magical work together.

The engineer sighed, and turned to go back to sleep. She knew he needed his space in times like this, or in the least he did not argue against having it. She couldn't help him unless he wanted it, anyway.

"... need to be more careful."

The words gave the nature-bound engineer pause, and she turned back in his direction. First, she looked over her shoulder, then turned back around, taking a step in his direction. "Careful about what?" Her words remained soft, but mostly because she did not want to upset him again. "About who?"

He did not answer for a moment, trying to collect his thoughts. After that, however, he kept looking down, not meeting her gaze. "... I like traveling with you, but I don't want to take unnecessary risks."

In spite of her concern, Kara thought this was an important element to get across, one he seemed to be intentionally hiding but she needed for him to just spit out. "But what risks? Who are you talking about? Is someone coming? Do you need me to do something to help?" She knew that he tended to talk in his sleep, to draw out odd elements of things happening in other places while dreaming as a form of his species's inborn clairvoyance that he could not intentionally access. Was something coming closer?

A shake of his head. "I'm not telling you what to do. I couldn't tell you what to do, even if I tried. But if--" He paused again, trying to find out how to say this. "For me to stay with you, I can't keep poking my head up and looking around at random. If I go to the wrong place, someone is going to cave in my skull. I don't know when, I don't know how, but it will happen. And... and if you are with me when that happens, you are going to die with me for..." He trailed off there for a moment, then continued again. "There... there are people... are things, who would spread my guts out on the floor if they could get their hands on me now, if they knew where I was, how to get to me. I factor that into everything I do, all of my thinking everywhere we go. Everywhere I've been as long as I can remember, I've been looking over my shoulder, so it's not fair to you that I have this target on me because we are linked like this now."

There he paused, as if waiting for an answer. Kara took the opportunity to step a bit closer, slowly approach once more. He did need help, and maybe if she could sit with him, he could feel better, and perhaps go to sleep again a little calmer. She knew it was a pipe dream, that he never slept well, but maybe she could give him some comfort for at least a little while. She wouldn't deny what he was saying was beginning to cut deeply into her, though. Annoyance was turning to something worse, slowly but surely.

"I know I don't talk much, but... I just need you to understand me a little better." He sighed. "I don't... I don't people very well. I know this. It's been a long time since I've had a lot of practice. You help me, but I have to be careful about who I talk with, what I do."

"Naito, just tell me. What are you saying?" Her tone was admittedly a bit more biting than she intended, but he did not seem to react much, still not even looking in her direction.

"As much as I can have friends, I like you, alright? I like you a lot." What did he mean by that? How much was he talking, just best friend material? Well, if he was talking about something more, it was very... him in his style of admission.

Then he finished his thought. "But if we can't be careful enough... I have to go."

A torrent of emotions began beating at a dam within Kara's heart. Sadness at the idea of him leaving. Despair at feeling helpless to stop him. Aggravation at how hard it was to get a word out of him about any of this before. Concern for his wellbeing. Anger at him for pushing this on her. How could he not trust her to help him? How could he treat this all like she couldn't help at all, like there was nothing she could do, when he wouldn't even explain himself in full? Was she such a weakness, some damsel in distress?

"Do you have to go, or do you want to go?" The venom in her words was much more evident, brought about by her worry. "'Cause from what I'm hearing, you aren't just having trouble with communication. You blatantly don't understand the idea of friendship, of people willing to go out and defend you, to kick some a** and beat back whatever it is that keeps you up at night. If you don't trust m--"

"That's not my point!" Naito's head shot up, his face looking straight at her, his eyes narrowed through bloodshot eyes long done with crying.

"Is it, though?" The young woman crossed her arms under her chest, eyes narrowed in turn, tears welling up there as well. She hated feeling like this, like she couldn't do anything at all.

"Yes!" A clenched fist, knuckles starting to lighten from the pressure, slammed down on the back of the couch, even as his tone softened from the shouting. "If I care for you at all, others will know where you are, and they can get to me, to us. If they find us, you'll just be put down alongside me."

The green-skinned woman breathed in, then out, trying to calm herself down before things got violent. "Nai," she said in her softer tone, using her nickname for him to try to show how she felt. "Unfortunately, you don't get to choose who cares for you. It's not a choice you get to make. I know you're new to this, but you can either accept it or--"

The Moon Tribesman threw his hands up in frustration. "We're talking around each other. That's not what I'm arguing. All I am saying is that if we do stick together, we have to be more careful about who we talk with, who we let know about us."

"What do you want?" Her hands dropped to her sides once more. "I don't like not knowing about things either, just like you. It's part of why we work together well. But if we don't talk to people, we won't learn what they know, how to move forward." She sighed as well, getting more upset. "I thought you said you liked hanging out, that we were friends."

"The problem with friends," he said, looking down at the couch again, "is that you have to care about them."

"Wow." Finally, Kara had had enough of this conversation. "Just wow. Real cool, Naito!" She turned around, stomping off toward the bedroom without another word.

The white-haired young man just buried his face in a cushion, screaming into it to muffle his voice. He had no idea what he was supposed to say, what to do. It wasn't that he didn't trust her.

He didn't have faith in anything.

This is being written at least partially as a birthday gift for Adri. Hope it's a good one!

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Coliseum Lobby
Olympus

Gregory Zivaku could hear the soft sound of crying as he walked into the vestibule, putting down the package he had in his hand and walking over quickly, his staff turning to a small rod as he did so to make maneuvering easier.

His most recent student was sitting on a bench, head in her hands, hunched over. Her brown hair was partially over her face, though it was mostly held back by the black headband. Being who he was, the runesmith could see more than this, including the sparkling, pink energy rolling throughout her entire being, as well as the emotional triggers, at least on a surface level.

His smile faded to a neutral expression, though not quite a frown. He knew he had to get something for her, and had left a sequence of alarm runes in place if someone had intruded upon the location, so he would have known if there were some attacker. The blindfolded man had been well aware that leaving in the middle of practical training would have been a bad idea, so he had her looking over some notes he had for simpler tasks, smaller things to use her skills on outside of a fight. She knew he was going out to get something, as well as what kind of item he was going for, but he did not clarify much beyond the amount of time he would be gone.

As for what he had been teaching? While there were lessons he could make with forging and ones with weapons, but he had been asked for a different element, one which he was rather intricately qualified for: magic. While Greg was not exactly capable of using all forms of magic as a matter of course, he did know theory and applications, and did make it his business to know how it all could work together, including even the oddest of combinations. And given this one, someone who had a theoretically extremely powerful ability but perhaps not enough training in its use to see all of the things that she could potentially do, he saw it as a trial for himself as much as her. He did not teach just anyone, but she seemed the type who could use it, or in the very least encouragement.

... or so Húxiān Niángniáng - the one named Huli Jing the Matchmaker - told him, and he was not one to think she would be lying to him in that instance.

"Pasithea," he whispered, his voice audible enough for his student, but not overly loud so as not to upset her. "What is it?"

"It... it's Audrey," she replied, looking up at him from her position. Her dark brown eyes were bloodshot from crying. "You don't have to... to call me that."

"A habit," he admitted, his voice still soft. "You are the mother of dreams, so it seems the best name for you. But if don't want it-"

"N-no, it... it's fine." She remained quiet for a few more moments as he stood there, letting her compose herself. The books he had brought her were scattered on the floor, having been either thrown or left open, or in some cases never opened at all.

"... Can I sit with you?" To a slight nod, he took a seat beside her, bringing the package alongside and putting it on the ground on the opposite side from her. "What happened?"

"I... I tried a little more," the Dreamweaver told him, seeming both sad and embarrassed. "I had Phil-" She probably saw a slight hardness to his expression, so she corrected herself. "It wasn't his fault. I just wanted to try things, to see what I could do, and the Coliseum is there, so..." She just sighed, the sound shuddering a bit from recent tears.

"... I'm not mad," her tutor told her. "Are you hurt? The creatures we agreed on weren't too dangerous."

"N-No," she admitted. "But... but I saw him." She seemed almost to tear up at the thought, out of fear. After a moment, she continued. "I couldn't stop it. It just happened, and I froze up and I ran and I couldn't stop him and he stopped anything I-" At that moment, her voice cracked again, her head falling back into her hands as she started to break down, but a hand on her shoulder helped to steady her. Instead, she looked up at Greg. "I... I can't do this, can I? I can't face him."

"No."

His voice was not dispassionate at all, but those were not the words she wanted to hear. They caught the breath in her throat, her eyes looking straight to him in shock, her sadness all but forgotten for an instant.

"You... agree?" That shock instantly turned into fury as her eyes narrowed. "That was your big revelation? That's how you want to help? You want me to accept that I can't do this?"

"That's not-"

The woman stood up in her righteous indignation, turning on him and practically spitting venom at her teacher. "You say you're different, but-"

He raised a hand quietly, which helped to quiet her down, even as she glared at him. "Please sit down. I want to tell you a story, if that is alright. Just a moment of your time."

"Fine," she replied, sitting down with a huff, arms crossed. "But this better be good."

The man with the blindfold had an even tone as he spoke. "There was a young boy, an orphan, who wanted to learn the ways of magic. He was very bright, but unlike many in his world, he was never born with the gift, be it naturally, through a path of study, or otherwise granted power by another source. He wanted nothing more than to be a caster, a mage, whatever it meant, as he had been teased for so long by his fellow children and given no opportunities, as he lacked the apparent intelligence, innate power, and precision necessary.

"To accomplish the three tasks, he went to individual people around his village. From a traveling scholar who was in town for several months, he learned all manner of languages at a speed that impressed the sage, though the lessons ended when he had to leave to go on to another location. From the town's mechanic, a technomancer, he learned of practical applications for power, hoping to find out how to direct different manners of energy. Here, he built various devices, including a few inventions of his own. When he was not working with those two, he took archery lessons from a guard, and while he did not have the strength to pull back a bowstring well enough due to his studies, he did learn to spot various items in the environment, especially from a distance, and how to hide from incoming threats to strike for the best impact, including by moving from place to place.

"However, no matter how hard he tried, he endured ridicule from the masses for his attempts, seen as a failure who would never live up to expectations by all but his mentors. He could speak, build, see far distances, and run away, but using magic was forever beyond him. As such, he was overall distraught, and ran away on his own, only to realize that he had no means to reach another town, be it through sorcery or money. Upset, he returned to his town dejected, only to see it in flames.

"Running back in horror, he saw that a lone bandit was torching the place, having been in prison but escaped He had heard of this bandit, one who no-one could speak with due to being from another land, and had been imprisoned for breaking the laws he seemed to be ignoring.

"This bandit appeared to be rather prideful in spite of everything, and had set up to shout to the populace on a stage used often for public announcements, with a technopathic speaker system built in. Unfortunately, he still did not speak the common tongue, and so nobody could understand his demands. Or, nobody except the orphan, who had been taught, among the languages, that of the bandit. Apparently the 'bandit' was a pyromancer who was afraid and unable to truly show it well, and did not even know what he had done wrong. He had been shouting to the populace that the homes were in flames and to escape them due to an error on his part, one that had been part of an accident that had led to the cell being opened and collapsing after he ran out of it. He was not trying to kill anyone, but to save everyone he could, though he was frightened of the people there and reacted hostilely due to his imprisonment without cause he knew.

"Hidden away, the orphan realized that he could see a small device, a way to hack into the speaker system from a distance, that he had applied to the speaker as a test for security purposes, not to mention a bit of a prank to try and fit in with his fellow children. It was small and handheld, and if one did not know what to look for, they would not see it. What he knew was that, using some equipment from the mechanic's home, he could make a method to speak through that very system, which did not require magic of his own. Sneaking into the mechanic's home and managing his surroundings by picking out which areas were dangerous or not or too loud, he put together a small handheld transmitter from half-constructed inventions, and sent out his own messages to the speaker system, making sure not to be seen while trying his best to not be crushed by the collapsing building he was still trapped within.

"The orphan told of the true nature of this 'bandit' and for others to try and be calm as they exited their buildings, even helping to find out where they were in the most danger, saving all of the remaining people who had not made their way outside. Speaking to the 'bandit' himself, he tried calming him down, eventually convincing him of the pointlessness of his screams and his lack of control over his powers. By the end, he had the accidental criminal crying, on his knees begging for forgiveness, eventually voluntarily walking back toward the prison to be locked up once more if they could solve his problems.

"However, by the time it was over, the roof of the mechanic's shop had collapsed, seriously injuring one of the orphan's legs. He was praised by all, even the once-bullying children, as a savior once they had found him, with the mechanic noting his invention as it was on the speaker. In fact, the mechanic even adopted the child, bringing him into his family as a son and apprentice both.

"Despite it all, the orphan remained upset. He knew his dream was pointless. He would never be a magic user, and it was unlikely anyone would ever train him as he had only ever learned things that were not connected directly to mana. He was a failure, then and always.

"The end."

"... What." Audrey's expression was completely blank as the story ended, outside of her wide eyes. "What kind of ending is that? Is that supposed to make me feel better?" Her eyes narrowed once more. "Do you even realize how little sense that makes as an ending? He didn't learn anything at all! He was accepted, he learned so much, and he saved everyone! He was a hero! He was just making his mentors worthless by not acknowledging how far he had gone! He... Oh."

There was a moment of silence, as her outrage faded into a blank expression of annoyance, the blindfolded man's own turning from neutral to a small grin.

"... That was about me, wasn't it? You want me to think about what I can do, not what I can't."

"Acknowledging your failings is important," the runesmith answered, removing a glove. After he did, he showed the white bandages underneath, and unwrapped a bit of them, showing the blackened, papery skin beneath. The process was slow, but he did so deliberately, both to show her something and to avoid too much harm to himself. Once she got the idea and showed as much by her evidently disturbed expression, he began to wrap it once more, continuing to speak as he put back on the glove. "It is not a sense of never being able to accomplish anything. Knowing your limits is good, better than assuming they do not exist and hurting yourself by forcing yourself beyond them without proper preparation. Of course you would not be able to face your demons, be they literal or figurative, as you are. But there is no shame in weakness."

"I heard others talking about it that way, too. Villains, mostly. Or at least the worst people to hang out with."

"Like...?"

"You know exactly who I mean."

The divine young man sighed. "He exploits weakness as a matter of course. It is the nature of his being, especially given he is entirely devoid of mana. It is... not the greatest, to put it lightly, but I can understand it. Still, I take a different stance. Being weak is not such a bad thing, as it entices people to work together to achieve what they cannot by themselves. Working on your strengths while mitigating your weaknesses is a different school of thought than some others may go by, but it is all I need, and all you should need either, unless you have another idea in place better geared toward how you think."

As she thought on that, calming down, he picked up the package he had brought at last, opening it, a clay bowl, up. It was a bowl of lentil soup, a small one from down the street. "I thought that you could use some extra energy."

Audrey was not exactly a fan of that kind of soup, but was not exactly going to turn him down. She let him place the bowl down on the space between them, and allowed him to step back so she could lean over it, a bit confused. "... You didn't bring a spoon. Or anything for yourself."

"I already had a pita at the cart nearby. Thought it would be better for you to have this instead."

"You only answered half," she replied. "Don't tell me you forgot to get a spoon."

"I didn't."

There was a pause due to her confusion, before she just grumbled to herself. "I can't eat with that. Whenever I try, they aren't real. They just collapse when I'm close, since I can't concentrate enough."

"Well, by one measure of philosophy, nothing is real," Greg shrugged. "I may be the imagined voice of a creator from beyond time. It's probably for the best that you enjoy eating with what you seem to be able to grasp your soup in, and not argue over the thaumaturgical specifics or bother yourself with such things."

The dream user concentrated, holding out her hand... and a stylized spoon appeared there, almost appearing to be an element from a cartoon. "Don't say it."

"Don't say what?"

"... Never mind," she conceded, not wanting to give her teacher ideas. She attempted to lift the soup broth and lentils... and they collapsed through the bottom, splashing in again and making her wince out of reflex... only to realize that due to their talk, it was at worst lukewarm, and would not hurt her. She tried again, this time trying not to concentrate on anything but the soup itself, which also failed. Finally, she settled on nothing in particular, letting her mind wander a bit, calming herself as she raised the soup toward her lips. The spoon actually seemed to stay solid this time as she brought it in...

... and coughed, eyes bulging, just barely keeping from spitting it out. This was terrible. She beat her chest, trying to breathe, and finally forced it down into her stomach, grimacing.

"... Yeah," Greg admitted. "It... wasn't that I said it was particularly good. Sorry about that. I do not have a lot of money, and the chef did not try particularly hard to get me any of the better material as I seem to be from out of town and unlikely to pass through again. I also did not make any real attempt for my sight to be known, so he thought he could get the better of me for paying less as being a beggar or something similar. Rest assured, it was not rotten."

Eating the rest of the meal took several minutes, even in silence. She did not hate him for what he had gotten her, but she did not recommend this to anyone else. Finally, she spoke up, her mouth full of the last swallow. "Whuh ah oo ans-off?"

"What was that?"

She swallowed once more, pushing the bowl away and only barely keeping from throwing it, letting the spoon disappear. "Why are you so hands-off about training me?"

He thought on how to answer that, then responded. "What was the first thing I instructed you on? What did I tell you?"

She thought for a moment there, then a pink mask appeared over her face, one that looked somewhat like a caricature of him made quickly, along with picking up one of the books on the floor, using a very deep voice in an attempt to pretend to be his, albeit far off. "Hit these!"

"..." Greg just stared at her, then palmed his face. "... No, not that part."

The student laughed, letting the illusion fall, the book put down on the floor again. "I know, was just messing with you." As he groaned, she spoke over it. "You said a lot of things. But that was pretty memorable."

He stopped the groan as he let his hand slide down his face before dropping it to his side, looking up at the ceiling. "Another one..." Still, he chuckled. "Your power revolves around imagination, around dreams. If I were to teach you how to use it directly, tell you what to do with it, would that not be my imagination, and not yours, at work? You need to make this power your own. I can give you tips, but nothing beyond what you would call vague."

Audrey smiled a bit in return, nodding in agreement. "Can I ask one more question?"

"Go ahead," he allowed. "But first, if you were wondering, no, the pita was not good either."

She elected to ignore that. "What was the actual ending to that story? About the orphan."

The blindfolded man smirked as he realized she had figured that out. "The boy went home with the mechanic, yes. But he stopped caring about what others thought, be it praise or ridicule. He became a beloved mechanic in his own right, even better than his adopted father, doing what he could to help others, even if he could not easily walk on his own."

"But I'm not like that," she protested. "My life isn't a fairy tale. I'm not going to just end up with a happy ending like in storybooks."

"Of course not."

"Buuut...?" she motioned for him to continue the thought, knowing he wasn't going to end it there.

"Knew you were a quick learner," he chuckled. "Things do get worse. They can be unbearable, or at least seem that way.

"But that's life. They also get better. Every day, you have to decide for yourself how you want to go about it. Is it going to be a good day, or not? Are you going to be worried over things you can't control, or try to moderate what you can? It doesn't matter what goes on, what your circumstances are. What you make of it, that's what matters. Being the author of your own story, your own saga. Your weaknesses, your strengths. When you need to call for help, and from whom.

"Who is stronger? The fearless warrior who has never known defeat, or the one who persists in spite of their losses? A muscle is strengthened through use, and that could include emotions, the mind, magic, and whatever else. That's why I can't tell you how your power works, not entirely. You're able to handle imagination, dreams themselves. I can't describe that, and I can't define it..."

"... But I can," Audrey Crowe finished for him, feeling rejuvenated in a way she had not been for some time. "Did you use some magic with that speech?"

"Why would I tell you a straight answer now?"

She just laughed, realizing how silly it sounded. "Alright, you have a point. So, one last thing. I went through the books, so there's just one thing I want to know about combat training."

"Yes?"

"When do we start?"

"Right this way, Pasithea," the man stated, motioning to the door toward the Coliseum itself with his small, mystical wand-like item.

"I'm not--" She stopped herself, considering it. Mother of dreams? She could try that. If she was going to use this power, she had to own it, to make it a part of her, not just something she used or thought about too much. And so, she walked toward the entrance, just looking over her shoulder as he followed. "Thanks."

"No need," he denied her as she passed the threshold. "I didn't do anything."