[DoTW] - A Little Scrap of Normal by Lachtaube on DeviantArt (original) (raw)

Greenery was just beginning to creep back to life, tentative and hopeful. A gentle spring rain fell to earth, nourishing the new growth of Aryn’s territory and releasing the scents of the topsoil and fresh wood into the atmosphere. Mother Nature was abound and life was beginning anew.

Small drops clung to delicate, white buds of an apple tree. Underneath, Robin could already smell their sweet scent, even with her face buried in the wet bark of the trunk. She had nearly dozed off, her energy completely spent. Her legs were curled up beneath her like a doe, covered in specks of dirt and detritus from flicks of raindrops as they hit the earth around her. Slowly, she craned her neck back to gaze up at the white flower buds, waiting for the rain to overcome her and just wash her away. But she couldn’t even pretend to marvel in their beauty; her eyes were too puffy to see through, her vision blurred more than usual.

Something within her had shattered. It pierced her heart, it traveled through her legs and made every inch of her ache in roiling, shredding horror. It hurt so much she couldn’t move, could hardly breathe, she was falling, she needed something to hold onto--there. It was the tree that kept her afloat in her flood of grief, the monotonous knocking of her head against the bark as she tried to drive the pain to the single point between her dense brows where it chipped away at the wood. It did nothing to quell the pain; even in her blackout she felt it screaming through her nerve endings down into her toenails and through every fiber of her fur.

For a brief moment, she felt nothing but sadness for the naked truth of the news, and in the instant she began to wonder what had come over her, it returned in a splintering surge. The guilt.

Robin searched her surroundings but couldn’t see more than five feet in front of her nose. She remembered she was still in Aryn, but she couldn’t be there, not now, she had to leave. Quaking legs lifted her shakily to her feet and she instinctively took three steps westward. Wait. Her pace slowed and she instead swung her head around to instead move in the direction of the designated meeting spot where she was promised to find Lazarus later. She couldn’t leave without… without telling him. Couldn’t leave without… him.

Fresh tears welled in her eyes at the thought of leaving him, and she stumbled blindly onward.

Lazarus was sheltering beneath a young tree as the spring rain fell, though it had long lost its use as the drops began rolling heavily off the leaves and plopping into his fur with the force of five raindrops in one. He tolerated it for a time, but at some point the black wolf finally got to his paws and shook off. He was supposed to meet Robin here, but she seemed to be late. Lazarus was the last one to care about someone being punctual, after all he himself was rarely that. But maybe she had just forgotten. Either way it wouldn’t hurt to take a look around and see if he could find her.

He hadn’t gone very far when he saw the black-and-silver she-wolf’s distinctive form some ways away. Ah, so she was just running late after all! He perked his tufted ears and stopped to wait for her. “There you are, Robin. I thought you’d forgotten!” he said, his tail wagging in greeting. Though it quickly became clear as she got closer from her stooped posture and unsteady gait that things weren’t right. His tail dropped mid-wag and his ears fell back. He felt that awful feeling that was becoming all too familiar to him… something was wrong. “A-are you okay?” He decided to close the gap between them, lowering his head and moving slowly as he assessed her. She was soaked through and dirty, her lovely amber eyes seemed smaller and swollen, bits of bark were stuck in the fur of her face, and her forehead looked rubbed nearly raw. “Hey…”

Through her fog, she hadn’t even registered he was there until he spoke. Attempting to hide her tears, Robin lowered her head further, but to the opposite effect. She did not want to worry him, he had done nothing to deserve the full brunt of her grief, but she couldn’t wait for it to subside. Not looking up to greet his face, she felt him draw near to her.

As Lazarus looked her over, worry drawing on his features, she fought to compose herself. But the befuddling combination of embarrassment and gratitude for his concern welled quickly inside of her, spilling out in deep, choking sobs. It made what she had to tell him all the more difficult. Already, she mourned their brief but deeply bonded friendship, she grieved for their future and what might have been, as silly a thought as it might have been, all extinguished in mere moments. But at the forefront of her grief, as thick as the lump on her forehead, what hurt most of all was the cause of it.

“L-Lazarus--My father is dead!” she cried and her back legs crumpled to a weary sit. “I have to leave--I have to go home--to Highvalley.” She hadn’t spoken the name of her homepack to him, nor anyone since leaving Heyl, an effort to distance herself as far from that place and its inhabitants as possible. There was no need to hide any more.

Her domed head found the thick fur of his neck and rested against him. She could not bring herself to meet his eyes. “I can’t… I can’t stay here... with you...”

Lazarus stared at his friend helplessly as she broke down before him. She tried valiantly to contain her grief but without avail. He felt his chest tighten with dread. Whatever it was, it was bad. He hadn’t know Robin for very long, but still he felt like he knew her inside out by now. And he had never seen her like this, never imagined her capable of being like this. It was painful for him to see and he wished so much that it would stop.

Robin dropped the bombshell; her father was dead. All Lazarus could manage in return at first was a crestfallen, “...oh.” Lazarus knew about Robin’s father, she had mentioned him when she spoke about her past. But he hadn’t know that she… well of course she should be this upset about her father dying! But Lazarus didn’t get the sense that she really cared much for her parents. Now it seemed that was not at all the case. He had never seen a wolf so devastated. “Highvalley?” he echoed in surprise. Another bombshell, nearly as shocking to the black wolf. He hadn’t known Highvalley was the pack she had left so long ago… that was so far away.

She leaned her head against him, and he felt her bury her face into his tufted black fur. He realized then how rock-solid tense he was, and with a breath he forced himself to relax against her, so to be a better support. He draped his slender head over her, trying to comfort. “I-I’m so sorry…” he said.

“I can’t … I can’t stay here… with you…” Now he was fully registering what would happen next… that Robin would be leaving. It was no question that Robin had become a necessary support for Lazarus. She was closer to him than any of his siblings, even. She was even closer to him than Seven, whose relationship with he was still working to repair. And in all honesty, he had all but assumed by now that Robin would be staying in Aryn forever. It was quite an upsetting shock that that was no longer the case. But of course he couldn’t protest, her father had died! If she wanted to be with her family, then she had to go be with them. But there were reasons he was upset about this besides his own selfish reluctance to let her go. His voice was tentative as he went on, “Are you gonna… be okay? Highvalley is really far…”

Robin’s stomach knotted at the faint ‘oh,’ from his lips. It was a deafening reminder of all she had told to Laz on their journey together. She had confessed the reason she left her pack in the first place, the tale of a childish tantrum at its core, but followed up with smug, self-justification that her father was a brutish oaf, il-bred, that he cared nothing for her and could do nothing to earn her respect… The stories of Thallo and her mother that Robin fabricated--decorated with elaborate bias and childhood naivety--fluttered carelessly from her mouth to litter the earth, the sky, to tarnish his name. It fell back upon her now like ash, choking her. It poisoned her.

She knew she deserved every ounce of the pain of her guilt and regret for her pettiness. Beneath the apple tree, she had hoped it would kill her, but it only left her with a splitting headache. The thought again crossed her mind, and in Lazarus’s embrace now, her skin crawled.

The silver-caped wolf pulled away from her companion when he asked if she would be alright. Genuinely, she did not know. Considering for a short moment, she finally replied flatly, “I’m... closer to it now than I was before… thanks to you, I guess,” she tried to illuminate the silver lining, but the smile she offered was more repulsive than comforting. They had only known each other for a short while, but she felt she could read him like an open book now: his words merely scratched the surface of what he was getting at. It was not the distance that concerned him. Fresh tears stung her eyes, but this time they were not for her father.

She knew from her own flighty inner-workings that she couldn’t promise him she would be able to return, nor could she extract him from his pack so soon after she brought him all the way here. Ruminating, not wanting to lose him, not able to make up her mind, a soft, subconscious whine escaped her.

Lazarus watched her when she pulled back, his silver eyes fixed doubtfully on her agonized smile. This was just the worst. He had been all ready to spend a fun day with Robin and now… “Yeah, that’s good… I guess.” His voice was similarly unconvincing. Though it really was good, actually. If Robin had to travel in such emotional turmoil the closer the better. But in this case closer was still not at all close. He waited for her to speak again, lost for words himself. Did they just… part ways now? Robin seemed conflicted too, as Lazarus could imagine. How daunting the world must seem after losing someone so important… But how important? Robin’s been a loner for so long, and by all her accounts she didn’t really like her dad… if she’d been fine all this time without him, happier even without him, then surely this isn’t… THAT big a deal, right? One would think, until one looked at her. And Lazarus realized that perhaps, now that her father was gone, Robin recalled things about him a bit differently. Maybe she was feeling a bit… guilty about it. Sounds familiar, huh?

It was a jump, a risk of a subject that Lazarus probably wouldn’t have touched with anyone else. But since the silence was growing and she wasn’t saying anything else, and since it was her, who was so important to him, he was compelled to try. So nervously, tentatively, he tried to offer understanding, in hopes to assuage the guilt he figured she might be dealing with… “When I chose to leave Aryn… everything about this place was terrible. I wasn’t happy. But then, when I was sure I would die... when I knew I’d never see Aryn again, I realized I was wrong about my family, and my pack. It sucks but… it took that to realize…” Like it took his death for you to realize… The difference, of course, the massive difference was that Lazarus had a second chance. Robin didn’t get a second chance. But Robin was why he had his… did that mean anything? It might not to a heavily grieving daughter, he realized deep into this verbal hole of his. But maybe the fact that he had closed his eyes in the same stupid way, only to open them right when all was lost, maybe that could offer some solace… even if her version of the story was much more tragic, she wasn’t the only one who could be that way. “Sorry… I was just trying to say... if you feel really crappy, I understand. And I don’t want you to…” his eyes lingered over her battered forehead, “Beat yourself up too much.” He looked down at his paws, “I wish I could help you talk to your dad again, like you got me back to my pack…”

The weight of the silence that hung between them crushed her. Robin grew desperate for something to say, for a decision on whether or not to ask him to come with her to arrive, for her mind to change about going at all. Still, none came, and while the quiet was made awkward by her heightened state of emotion Lazarus had never seen before, it was somehow… comforting. Just to sit near her friend and grieve--_in the rain, of course, how cliché_--she almost allowed that to stop her. But at least now she wasn’t alone. And she didn’t want that to end, either.

Her dripping ears twitched slightly when Lazarus spoke up and related to her situation with his own similar anecdote. Robin knew he would feel badly for her, but she hadn’t expected him to try to put it into words, to try and make her feel better. It wasn’t exactly his nature to talk about Difficult Things, and she wouldn’t have asked him to in such a painful situation for both of them. She looked up at him, forever grateful for his company.

‘I wish I could help you talk to your dad again, like you got me back to my pack…’

At that sentiment, she braced for the pain to roll over her again, but something... new was blocking it. Realization slowly etched into her somber features as she considered the history of their relationship, playing it backwards through her mind. While she was on her own and fending for herself, her memories hardly ever returned to her own parents; everything she had learned for survival, she learned from others. But when she was traveling with Lazarus, parents and origins were a tacky subject they somehow kept sticking to. And although she spoke of them bitterly and with resentment, to do so seemed to bring her great cathartic relief, as those times were also a reflection of herself and how she turned out as a wolf.

“You know,” she offered a more genuine smile as fresh tears rolled down her ample cheeks, “I think in a weird way... you already have.” Her front paws shuffled as she searched for the words to describe the vague yet comforting feeling. “I’m a lot more like him than I ever thought. I didn’t realize that, until I met you, really. And, I mean you know, no matter how far apart we were, he’s… still a part of me.” A freshly fallen tear darkened her fur, its path broken by her smile. “Thanks for that, Laz.”

She lifted her head to brush the side of his cheek with her brow in a gentle, albeit brief, nuzzle of affection.

Robin’s tears continued to flow, but there was a smile on her face that gave Lazarus relief, and hope, that maybe he hadn’t made it worse at the very least. He perked his ears, listening attentively to her answer.

“You already have.” Never the deep thinker, Lazarus was rather baffled at that conclusion. In what weird way did that make sense? When she explained herself Lazarus was able to somewhat grasp the concept. No, he hadn’t unwittingly channeled the conscious spirit of Robin’s deceased father to converse with her. But he had unwittingly reveal to her that her father would always sorta be with her through what he had passed onto her when she was young. Sorta like how his family was with him through everything they’d taught him… plus they were literally physical offshoots of their parents. He gave a small smile in return, lowering his head to return the nuzzle. “Yeah… no problem.” It wasn’t often he was helpful in situations like this, he always found them so hard to deal with, but when he managed to help somehow then he was always glad he had stuck around.

As she withdrew Lazarus heaved a sigh, his smile fading as he just looked at her. He didn’t want to say goodbye… but he didn’t feel had had a choice. “Alcatraz wouldn’t let me go with you to Highvalley… he knows everything, it turns out...” Lazarus hadn’t mentioned this fact to anyone yet, preferring to forget about the meeting with his father shortly after his return, where Alcatraz informed him that he was grounded. Seven had told him… and he won’t give me another chance…not for a while. It was certainly crossing his mind to push his luck anyway, though. Surely his dad would give him another chance. Especially since this wasn’t some stupid mislead misadventure, this was important. Though his pack might not see why, since a wolf like Robin, able to care for not only herself for extended periods of time but also support an injured Lazarus all the while, well, she needed no help from anyone. And leaving Aryn again… after everything... even if he felt he couldn’t, the conflict was immense. “I can walk you to the border at least… maybe a little past it.” The one thing he could offer to the wolf he owed everything.

The light, spring drizzle did not slow, but a ways away the clouds parted to offer a glimpse of the sun and shy, blue sky. Although she had been in Aryn’s borders for a reasonable time, Robin had found she had trouble orienting herself among these new mountains and forests, and she hoped Home was that way.

She looked up to Lazarus to ask guidance, but his smile was already gone. Her head tilted as he began to speak of his father, but the crook in her neck craned her head low in mild horror. He knows everything, it turns out... “Oh, Laz…” She knew exactly what he was referring to, but didn’t know Alcatraz nor the rest of Aryn well enough to predict an outcome. Robin’s jaws clenched slightly at the thought of yet another Highblood deciding for another, restricting his son’s movements outside of the pack. But here Lazarus would be safe… wouldn’t he? Having little to no knowledge of his pack’s customs or laws, she couldn’t be sure what would become of her friend for his transgressions, but if the consequences were severe enough, surely they would have been carried out by now…? But still, he was allowed to escort her to the edge of the territory. She clung to that.

“You’d better,” she muttered, some of the old humor that bore their friendship finding its way back to her.

“Yeah…” Lazarus sighed, resigned, when Robin acknowledged the distressing nature of his situation. He watched her reaction. Half of him sorta wanted her to be angry that he was not accompanying her, or even ask him to come anyway. That likely would have been all he needed to defy his father and just go. He really did want to, both to spend more time with his friend and to experience the adventures that would lay in such a long and exotic trip. And besides, he was the Alphas’ son, deep in his heart he truly believed that he would always have a home here, regardless of his wanderings.

But no, Robin reacted reasonably and with respect for the difficult position he was in. And though slightly crestfallen the new “responsible” Lazarus knew that it really was for the best... “You’d better.” The black wolf cracked a smile at that. It was so strange and upsetting to see Robin like this, so grief-stricken. And it felt strange to have their dialogue so serious, and so full of weight as could only be felt when faced with trying to console a heartbroken friend. Even if he seemed to have done okay, he was still happy when the spark of Robin’s usual spirit crept back into her tone. “If you can keep up, that is.” He chirped in reply with a mischievous grin, trotting in Highvalley’s direction (which, being a Ranger, he knew) and flicking his tail tip under her chin as he passed. Perhaps it was too soon after such news like the death of a father to try and go back to their old antics. But soon Robin would be gone, and who knows when he’d see her again? Why not try to enjoy the precious little time they had left together, and send Robin on her way with a smile, and one last good memory.

Although her heart was still sick with grief and poisoned further by regret, it flushed with love and gladness at that silly smile of his. This conversation had been a new turn for them, down one of the darkest and dreariest of paths that Robin would not have liked to share with him again. Now the tone was returning to humor and competition. Another wolf might have given them both an incredulous stink-eye, especially considering the circumstances of the bereaved. But their exchange, his ‘If you can keep up, that is,’ were the fleeting slivers of normalcy for which Robin hungrily grasped.

His tail touched the underside of her chin, a mere playful gesture, but it sent a shiver down her spine.

For the moment, the world revolved around them once again. She wanted to kick her feet up and bound ahead to match his mood and exceed his pace, but the weight in her chest was still too great, and slowed her down. Her paws dragged like heavy stones; she knew that every step taking her inches closer to the pack’s border, inches closer to the moment they would part ways, and inches closer to the moment she would face her pack. But Robin did not stop smiling after him as she followed his lead, her expression of gratitude for those little scraps of Normal.