Goennec Pen #:
Reborn Name: Merc.
Past Name: "Deathmark".
How would you use him:
I am sure you have heard this mantra again and again from me, and yet it never changes. <3
Merc will be a highly beloved character, and a companion to Delirium. I know that Deli has begun to lose his mind since the years have passed in where he lost his best friend, and to reclaim that parternship would mean the world to the Sand Man.
I have tons of plots in store for this little guy if I do win him, mainly adventures with everybody else. xD My herd is shaping up well, and when Alabaster is forced to take him on when Merc's adoptive mother dies, he will be integrated into it. Delirium, of course, will not allow himself to be separated from his friend again and so he will accompany him, effectively stepping into the herd as their own personal dream catcher. :3
Backstory:
The hazy images have plagued me ever since I can remember.
Sometimes when I dream I feel like it’s real. I’ll be walking through the tightest of human alleyways, which makes no sense since I live miles from any civilization. Fog rolls out of the uncomfortable grates that line the cracked cement; the faintest snoring draws my attention to a young homeless man in the corner.
There is nothing exceptional about him. His head is tipped back and his Adam’s apple bobs with the force of his breath, but he does not stir at my approach, almost as though I am ethereal. I stand in front of him, for some reason waiting. During these dreams I can never move. Sometimes I’m convinced they’re memories.
Then abruptly, spontaneously, there is another ram standing beside me. He seems to have cantered out of the human’s head, but that’s not possible, is it? He sees me and his eyes brighten; there is a smile instantly across his face especially for me. “Deathmark.” He greets me like some old friend, and I cannot seem to stop the grin that forms over my own muzzle. “Nice to see your handiwork again, Delirium.”
The weirdest thing is, is that in these dreams, I have an accent. I mean, a different accent from what I have now. It’s like some thick Irish bluff and it draws a laugh from this companion who apparently doesn’t know my name, or knows me by some other title. I know somehow that we are best friends.
He turns and leads me out of the alley and I am compelled to follow. I trust him deeply, wholeheartedly; not even the tiniest eon of my soul wants to stop. For some reason, I know this “Delirium” would never hurt me.
Every time I wake from these dreams, I cry. I don’t understand why my heart hurts so bad to be reminded of a stranger I do not know.
Other times I’ll have dreams of a bizarre and twisted death, but in some impossible way, it’s my own that I’m seeing.
I know that I’m dying. The edges of my vision are blurry, as I’ve heard that they get when blood loss is taking the body away. I know that the same ram from before crouches beside me, and that he weeps for me. He tries to hide his sadness behind impenetrable grins, but for some reason, I know him too well. I can see that something is wrong; I will not be getting up from this adventure.
He speaks some hazy words to me that I can never make out. His face touches my shoulder and he seems to lay there even though there is no physical sensation. I wonder if maybe I’m too far into this weird passing that I can’t really get a grip on reality.
I close my eyes with a soft breath and the pain begins to disperse. It makes me relax into the cooling floor and I breathe once more again before I let my tight grasp of life go. My spirit floats back, but I realize that I exist on a different plane then this painted male does. He doesn’t see me anyway, so that’s what I figure. He yells something at me, something about an astounding number of years. I haven’t even heard of something that could live that long. I blink, but here is where the dream starts to cave in. The pieces that are hesitating on falling into place fall off the table instead. The last things I see are the tears that are sliding down my friend’s face.
I’m used to waking to darkness, but sometimes my blindness still catches me off guard. All of these vivid things I see when asleep… well, occasionally I’m tired enough that I expect to see the same things awake too.
I’m only a year old, and I am completely and utterly blind. My mother tells me that I used to be able to see when I was first born but that, for some undeterminable reason, it started to fade. Once I was a month old, I couldn’t see even the largest item right up against my nose.
I never really remember my childhood though, so when I’m really angry I’ll sometimes tell her she’s lying to me. She really means no harm, I suppose, but telling a completely blind guy that he used to be able to see does not help his self confidence. I am never getting my ability back, and I think we both know that. She just refuses to accept it; I accepted it months ago.
This morning is what I assume would be a bright one. There are disgustingly cheerful birds in the trees over to the side, and I’m working up the extra spit to fire at them when my adoptive mother trots back in and scares them off. I’m disappointed that I didn’t get to throw my weapon at them but I dissolve it as she approaches me. Even as the year passed, the female never gave up on me. It was pure luck itself that I had stumbled across a young mother just producing milk who had lost her kid.
I don’t remember my real mother, and I guess I don’t really want to. If she was the kind to ditch a few hours old baby, then she probably wouldn’t have made much a parent had she stuck around anyway.
“It is wonderful to see you awake, baby.” She greets softly, and her velvet muzzle strokes my forehead as she passes by. Although I flick one flopped ear, I ignore her. I don’t have time for her silly games, and absently, I remember that I didn’t have floppy ears in the dream. Interesting.
“I got us some healthy breakfast.” She added, and I can hear her swing around to face me. Either that, or her rear end is tragically in my face. Sometimes being blind has its drawbacks, and this is one of them. I can never tell if somebody is insulting me with their mere body language.
I snort my reply to her and flop down on the grass. Absently, I wonder what I look like as I crop at the grass. She sighs faintly and steps closer. “Look, I know you don’t like me… but I’m trying to help, I swear.”
My thoughts keep returning to the mystery ram in my dreams. I wonder why I can even see in my dreams. Maybe other blind people do too; I’ve never met anyone besides my adopted mother, so I suppose it’ll always be a mystery until I get away from her. After a long, silent minute, I shrug. “Fine.” I guess I might as well try to make her a little happier while I have the chance.
Every evening I pray for night to come. My mother doesn’t understand why I am always so eager to go to sleep, but I can’t explain it. She wouldn’t get it if I said that I could see in my dreams, so I merely feign tiredness and crawl into the ferns for slumber. Sometimes she’ll come and tuck me in; she says it makes herself feel better, so I usually let her.
This night there is fog rolling in, and I can tell because the humidity is soaking my coat. It makes me rather antsy and annoyed, and so I focus on quickly sleeping this night. If I pray hard enough, perhaps I will find something good in my dreams tonight.
“Oh my God I’m losing my mind.”
I think its weird that the first thing I hear are words. There is rarely ever sound in my dreams, let alone speech. I blink as the landscape settles around me. I am in a familiar place, the alley I visit almost every night. I yawn, bored already. I was hoping that I would get to see something a little different.
That’s when I realize, abruptly, that the colorful, tattooed ram is standing right next to me. For a minute I’m confused. Every time I remember this he is always stepping out of the man’s mind, never here. The homeless man still sleeps in the corner. The foul belches of sewer gas still drift out of the grates. We still stand in an alley.
“Why do you look different, Deathmark? Did I lose it finally or something?” His voice is exceptionally heartbreaking. I blink at him and cock my head, finally recognizing that he’s speaking to me. Like, the physical, real me. I just stare for a second. Well. I’d never seen this route before.
“I hope you didn’t. ‘Cause if you’re crazy then that means I have to be too, right? Sane people just don’t see crazy people in their dreams.” I can’t help the lopsided grin that crosses my muzzle, and from the pained expression that fixes his face, I know that he has seen it many times before. He is my friend. In some weird, impossible way, this Dreamwalker is my best friend.
He smiles softly and for some insane reason, I don’t want this conversation to end. I am already dreading for when dawn comes and steals me back to reality. I know that I’m just being delusional again, painting a picture of a best friend in replacement of the mother who left me, but it feels nice to know that somebody loves me. “How did you recognize me anyway?” I inquire, just something else to try to regain his attention.
The ram eyes me as though I’ve just said one of the silliest questions in my life. His eyes are dancing in laughter though, and a small chuckle escapes his mouth. “Come on, Mark. Nobody has that same color of purple eyes as you do. Even reincarnated I guess she couldn’t bear changing them.”
Most of his words confuse me. I blink slow, letting the words dissolve into my skin, trying to sort them out. She? Who was he even talking about? Reincarnated? The word caught me off guard for a minute, because I couldn’t remember what it meant. I think my adopted mom mentioned that sometime… although I had thought it was some sort of religious experience.
[this is taking place way later; I just wrote a little excerpt to show their changing relationship. ;3]
I sighed, took a deep breath for courage, and said, “Delirium, I think I’m in lov-“
The sunlight blinded me when I blinked open my eyes. My pulse still beat in my chest like some trapped, frantic bird, and I flopped back on the ground. Great. I had woken up just as I’d been about to spill my biggest secret. Maybe it was a sign.
[WIP]
