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lisynearchives · 2 years

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lisynian folktale #1

Legend has it that Lisyne was created because of a terrible squabble in the heavens. Nobody remembered what the argument had been about, but it grew to be so large all of the heavens divided itself into two sides and fought day and night.

Eventually, one side gathered scraps of material from all across the universe and created a patchwork little land. "Here," they said. "This will be our neutral ground. When any of us are here, we can speak civilly."

As a response, the other side sank Lisyne deep into the sea.

Lisyne passed by all the fish and seaweed, all the coral and sand. It fell and fell all the way to death's doorstep.

When it landed, a corner of Lisyne struck against the gateway to death hard enough to dislodge its entrance. The reapers rushed to fix it, but the damage was done: swarms of the dead had seen their chance and fled, hiding in the corners and crevices of the strange sunken land hoping for a second chance. The reapers couldn't find all of them.

Millennia passed. Some say infinity. But slowly, bit by bit, Lisyne lifted up and floated back towards the surface, taking up its original position above sea. Despite that, it was never the same again—it had been touched by death, its first inhabitants escaped from it and current residents borne from it. It would never again be fully alive, yet it had not truly become one with death. It floats in-between the two, and its inhabitants live the same way.

The edge of Lisyne that struck death is the very tip of the North, where it is bitterly cold and bleak. They say if you wish for death before your time, there is a way to reach the underworld from there. They say there's a way, but of course, you may get more than you bargained for.

#lisyne #my writing

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lisynearchives · 2 years

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BITE//BULLET early canon, citrine & roulette, 891 words previous | next

Citrine keeps to his route the next day. He doesn’t want to make any more of a scene - people talk about anything, after all. Besides the identity of mystery gunmen, apparently.

Bzzt. His phone jolts to life in his pocket.

[UNKNOWN NUMBER: Look up.]

The old, crumbly building where Citrine had met the gunman towers above him. The mid-afternoon sun shines through the clouds, obscured enough so Citrine can catch the person waving down at him from the roof of the building. The sun catches on their red hair, making them impossible to miss.

Bzzt. Bzzt.

[UNKNOWN NUMBER: Heard you were looking for me.] [UNKNOWN NUMBER: Let’s chat.]

Citrine doesn’t reply. He climbs up the stairs two at a time, his heart ginning to pound from adrenaline. The gunman is here; he can see them, he can talk to them. The fire escape to the roof is unlocked, once again, and the gunman turns to meet Citrine’s eyes. There’s an amused glint in their own.

“Hello again.”

Citrine doesn’t bother with greetings. After all the questioning and wondering, it tuns out the fi thing he really wants to ask is: “Who are you?”

As soon as the words leave his mouth, he realizes that is the question at the forefront of his mind. Who the hell is this person, slinging guns at mysterious black-suited individuals and maybe earning the loyalty of Lisyne’s civilians? Enough loyalty for the civilians to report Citrine’s snooping back to them, evidently.

The gunman might be grinning; Citrine can’t see anything besides the crinkle of their eyes and black mask obscuring their mouth. “I’m flattered to have made such an impression.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

The gunman spreads their hands. “Ah, well. How about I cut you a deal, officer? If you forget you ever saw me, I’ll offer you a little something in return.”

“Are you fucking bribing me?”

“That sounds bad. What do your friends call it? Accepting a gift? Helping out a civilian? Think of it that way instead.”

“They’re not my fucking friends,” Citrine says, maybe more venomously than he’d intended. “And I don't take bribes. I just want to know. Then I’ll decide what to do.”

The gunman leans back against the railing. “How lawful of you, yet not. What if I told you the little something is a few hundred grand? Enough to pay for any luxury you want. Are you a car man, officer? Surely a few hundred could buy you whatever sports car you might be eyeing. A true thrill at the casino. Any electronics you might want.

“Or perhaps you’re a more practical man? It’d be enough to pay off a good chunk of any debt you might be in. A mortgage. Your student loans. If anything, it’d keep you fed and housed quite a while. All it takes is a yes. How does that sound?”

“I don’t care. I said I don’t take bribes.”

The gunman’s voice takes on an edge, beginning to get irritated. “And if you’re such a law-abiding citizen, then why haven’t you taken me in yet? Surely that’s what your precious law would say.”

“Just because it’s the law doesn’t mean it’s right,” Citrine says, and almost regrets it the second he does.

The gunman’s expression twists into the same one as the other day - as much as Citrine can see anyway, their eyes narrowing in fury or something else, Citrine can’t tell. “Why the fuck are you a cop if you don’t believe in the law?”

It pays the bills. It was the first route I had. I got in. A thousand different practical reasons that might work for any other job, but how could Citrine say that when his job required a real belief in what he was doing? An unbiased enforcer of the law, protector of the innocent and punisher of the wicked. But what could he do when the so-called wicked were victims, the so-called innocents dishonest, and the enforcers selfish? How could he believe in a system like that? How could he continue to enforce it when it made him sick to his stomach?

He’d said he didn’t take bribes. Then surely his salary isn’t reason enough to tie him to his current path.

“I don’t know,” Citrine says honestly. “I don’t think I should be allowed to be.”

The gunman pauses. The fight seems to leak out of them a little. Just enough so they don’t look like they’re about to rip Citrine apart, but clearly still guarded. “Why? ‘Cause you don’t believe in the law, or something else?”

“Yeah. ‘Cause a cop acting on their own is abuse of power. But a cop obeying the law is -” Citrine smiles a little wryly. “Pretty fucked too.”

The gunman raises an eyebrow. “So what are you gonna do? Quit?”

It almost feels like the gunman is speaking honestly too. They’d seemed so glib before, a showman’s grandstanding, but now they’re only leaning against the railing watching Citrine. Sizing him up.

“I think so,” Citrine says. “Once I figure out what I’ll do with money and stuff.”

The gunman seems to consider this, though it doesn’t even actually concern them. They push off to stand properly, their crinkling again. “How about this? Before you quit, we can work together on this little project I have.”

#BITE//BULLET #citrine #roulette #excerpts #my writing

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lisynearchives · 2 years

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BITE//BULLET early canon, citrine, 921 words previous | next

The next day, Citrine uses his patrol time to search for them. More reasons why he’s a bad cop, he supposes.

He has no excuse. Theoretically, he should report this to a higher-up; a skilled fighter threatening people with a gun is definitely a case that should be escalated. But somehow he can’t bring himself to. He knows what’ll happen next. The gunman will be dragged in for questioning and shown little mercy - especially if they keep up their attitude. Citrine doesn’t care that they fought him. They just want to know who they were threatening, what kind of mess they’re wrapped up in, and above all, who they are. Then you’re not a very good cop, are you, they’d said. It could have easily been a wisecrack and nothing else, but it’d struck deep. They’d said out loud what Citrine had been wondering for weeks. He isn’t a very good cop. And neither are his colleagues. And if he really wants to enact justice, he has to break out of what he’s been doing.

He’s never really cared about enforcing the law, but he does care about fairness. He does care about the countless people living the way his birth family did: his mother jailed for petty crime, spat back out, no place willing to hire someone with a criminal record. As a child, he’d always thought the three of them would have been fine if she’d just obeyed the law. As an adult, he can see the law isn’t anything so benevolent.

He wants to leave the force.

The thought pops into his head unbidden. It appears with such vitriol he almost marches into work to hand in his badge, but he stops himself. As much as he hates to think about it, he still needs to pay rent. He still needs to eat and wash himself and commute, and all of it costs money. Just being alive comes at a price.

Citrine takes in a breath. He can bide his time. He can find this mysterious gunman first, sate the strange need to know, then figure out how to leave. Call it one last hurrah. But how does he even begin to find the gunman? He doesn’t know anything about them besides the way they’d fought. He can’t imagine it’s common knowledge. Their hair colour had been memorable, at least - a bright red streaked with yellow. At the very least that would be a start.

There are a handful of businesses on Citrine’s patrol route; it is NAEON, after all. Not that he’s actually...friends with any of the people on his route. Citrine operates on a strictly no small talk rule, which earns him a world of convenience, but total backfire on connections.

Still, at least a handful of people recognize him, and some might be willing to answer a few questions. There have to be subtler ways of doing this, but again - no connections. And asking a coworker might as well be leaving a marked trail to the gunman.

A bell jingles when Citrine steps into the first business, a little cafe-slash-bakery. The guy at the counter lookks up and freezes when he sees Citrine. Citrine hasn’t even done anything yet.

“Officer,” they manage to squeak out. “Can I get you anything?”

There’s a tag on theri apron, mercifully, that reads RO. He may have introduced himself to Citrine before, but Citrine’s no good with names either. It sort of comes with being bad with people.

“Uh, no thanks.” Though their pastries are pretty good. Citrine’s partial to the bacon cheese pocket and cinnamon scrolls. No doughnuts. No more doughnut jokes, god damnit. “I’m actually looking for someone.”

Ro pales even further, if that were even possible. “Oh yeah?”

“Yeah. Uh.” Citrine’s really not good at this shit. “Red hair, yellow streaks. A little taller than me - like, here?” He waves a little above his head vaguely. “Ponytail, but not a long one.”

Citrine has heard his coworkers talk about interrogating detainees before. That sometimes after a question the detainee would swear they didn’t know anything, but you could tell they were lying. Citrine had never believed them; figured it was just what enough self-conviction got you. But as soon as Citrine describes the gunman, he swears he sees Ro blink in recognition, and their jaw sets with a sureness that wasn’t there before.

“I don’t remember anyone like that,” he says.

It wouldn’t be hard to press them, but Citrine’s instincts tell him to stop there. “Sure. Thanks for your time.”

Ro’s expression turns openly surprised, as if he’d been gearing for a fight. “That’s it? I mean - uh, sorry I couldn’t help.”

Citrine gives a wave goodbye as he leaves, passing by a few scattered customers on the way to the door. One of them has cat-eared headphones that turn towards him as he walks by. He supposes that’s what you get at trendy cafes.

As he continues, the waitress next door swears she’s never seen anyone who matches the description. Same for the convenience store clerk. The clothing store manager. The barista. Either the gunman really is that elusive, or so dangerous nobody wants to associate with them, but it doesn’t seem that way. Rather than confusion or fear, when the citizens they had had the same look as Ro - as if the gunman were someone to protect.

Citrine goes home that day without a single new lead, but at least he has this much of a hunch.

#BITE//BULLET #citrine #excerpts #my writing

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lisynearchives · 2 years

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first meeting (BITE//BULLET early canon, roulette & citrine, 789 words) previous | next

Patrol is boring, as usual. The fact of the matter is that nobody’s going to be doing anything in broad daylight, and Citrine can only walk so fast and keep an eye on so many corners. He doesn’t mind the walking -- he likes it, actually. It’s just the part where he has to stay vigilant the whole time and look busy in case he runs into any of his coworkers. Citrine’s always been bad at pretending.

Which probably contributes to the dwindling satisfaction and growing discomfort he has in his job, honestly. He’s never been particularly passionate about law enforcement, but there’d been few places besides the military that took in runaway teens, and joining the force had seemed like an obvious choice. Citrine hadn’t cared much to begin with, but the longer he stays -- the more shit he sees, and the more he itches to do something. But there’s only so much he can do without getting fired, and just protesting and watching the world go by feels no better than being a cog in the machine. He understands full well that sometimes people break the law to survive, anyway. He can’t even pretend he gives a shit about shoplifting or parking in the wrong spot. Yesterday he turned a blind eye to a kid with a candy bar up their sleeve. Does that make him a bad cop? It makes him the kind of authority he wished he’d had growing up. But if he turns a blind eye to all the crimes he doesn’t care about, he’s no different from the officers who let their own favoured crimes slide.

It’s shit like this that makes him question his job.

The streets are empty in-between lunch and rush hour, so Citrine figures he might as well take a little detour. Just up one of the roofs of the older Naeon buildings, the kinds that still have back doors to them. The building these days are all shiny and tall, with roofs locked behind fire safety exits and alarms that wail if you push them. Not like this one, the kind Citrine grew up in, that gives way easily.

He doesn’t expect to see anyone on the roof. A loiterer or two at most, a teen or office worker slacking off. He certainly doesn’t expect to see an all-out brawl. Someone in a trench coat has a gun trained on a man in a black suit, approaching as he struggles to stand back up. “The fuck is happening here?” Citrine says.

The gunman breaks focus for a second, and the man takes the split second of distraction to scramble to his feet and run for it. The gunman turns on their heel, seemingly torn between chasing and not, but ultimately stays put. The hand holding the gun falls to their side, and they turn to Citrine instead.

“Gonna drag me in for questioning, officer?” they sneer.

“How did you even know I was a cop?”

“You stink of one,” the gunman says, giving him a derisive once-over. “Everything about you.” For some reason, the thought makes Citrine’s skin crawl.

“I’m not taking you in,” Citrine says, doing his best to shake off the feeling.

“No?” the gunman says, their eyes glinting. “Then you’re not a very good cop, are you?”

At the last word, the gunman lunges. Though they must still have their gun, they don’t use it on Citrine -- they seem to be aiming only to attack, rather than kill. Their fist comes fast towards Citrine; he blocks and they drop to the ground, sweeping their leg out in a wide arc to trip him. They’re good. Better than Citrine expected; certainly more challenging than any other patrol Citrine has had so far. Their foot connects with Citrine’s and he stumbles, but manages to keep his footing as he takes two steps backwards. The gunman is already back up by then, but the split second they take to moment again allows Citrine’s reflexes to kick in. He grabs them by the arm when they throw another punch, parrying so he steps out the way and throws them forward. The gunman stumbles, caught off guard, and Citrine holds them in an arm lock. Almost suspending them.

“Tell me what your deal is,” Citrine says.

The gunman laughs mockingly. “I don’t talk to cops.”

“Who was the other guy?” Citrine presses.

“Gonna have to do better than that,” the gunman says. They twist an arm out of Citrine’s grasp and fires a bullet next to his foot, making him jump. They take the opportunity to escape in the same direction as the man in the black suit, and waves at Citrine with a smirk before disappearing too.

#BITE//BULLET #excerpts #citrine #roulette #my writing

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lisynearchives · 2 years

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christmas lights (routrine, 1.3k, post-canon. implied not sfw at the very end)

It is, by all means, a strangely sunny leadup to Christmas. Sunshine is nothing new down in Solyeung, but a sunny Christmas in the rest of Lisyne, not so much. A good omen, or a bad omen, depending on who you ask. Or depending on the mood. Citrine's mother had been more of the mercurial sort.

No reason to think about her, though. Citrine shakes his head and takes the stairs two steps at a time back to the ROB2NS office, forgoing the old, rickety lift. His sneakers make an unpleasant plap-plap sound against the concrete steps, and the cheap supermarket bags he's holding rustle against his jeans. He cringes at the sound.

The ROB2NS office is on the third floor -- a respectable lift ride, but a small hike on foot, especially going up, and with baggage, nonetheless. Citrine seriously regrets not taking the lift now. Fucking mom angst distracted him.

He leans against the wall by the office door fo a moment just to find his keys, but the door opens abruptly from inside. Roulette sticks xyr head out, xyr eyes alight.

"Did you get the lights?"

Wearily, Citrine points to the bags on the ground. Roulette lights up further and brings them in, leaving Citrine to catch his breath outside. Tell-tale signs of having been an only child most of xyr life, Citrine supposes. Even now, with Sage in the picture, Roulette and Sage really act more like members of an extended family more than siblings.

Citrine wonders how his little brother is doing. Yet another thought to banish.

He's taken a moment too long. Roulette comes back out without the bags, xyr hand reaching out to ask if xe can touch him. Citrine nods, and xe touches him on the shoulder gently. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah." Citrine pushes off the wall and heads inside, Roulette following. The bags have been deposited onto the coffee table. "Just remembered some stuff."

"Do you want to talk?"

Roulette always asks, even though neither of them are much for talking about their feelings. Only late at night, when the bustle of Lisyne has simmered down into white noise and it's only the two of them sitting in it. Shoulder to shoulder on the office couch, a blanket each because Citrine gets annoyed when they share and Roulette moves. Eyes cast somewhere else, so it's easier to confess. I keep remembering her. I wish I didn't.

It's still broad daylight, so Citrine just turns to the bags. "Not right now."

Roulette accepts this. Xe snatches up the box of Christmas lights that Citrine had bought -- the crown jewel of Citrine's shopping -- and peels off the tape from the opening. "We can put away the rest later," xe cajoles, maneuvering Citrine's hands away from the depths of the bags. "Come here, I want to put these up first."

"There's like, twenty four meters of the shit," Citrine says, as nothing more than a comment. He stands back and watches Roulette pull out a tangled mess of lights, knotted around itself both wire and tiny lightbulbs. Xe continues to pull them out, a magician with xyr scarves, until the box is finally empty and the veritable birds'-nest of wire sits on their floor instead.

Citrine looks at it and immediately surrenders. "You're better at this than I am," he says, holding his hands up. "And I went to buy them. I can put the other stuff away."

"Sure," Roulette says. "I was the one who asked for them anyway. Thank you, Citrine."

Citrine shrugs. "Wasn't a big deal."

A hum. "I'd still like to thank you."

"You just did."

Roulette can make a conversation go on forever about nothing at all, so Citrine turns his back before xe can go on and starts to put away the rest of his so-called spoils. It's all mundane -- granola bars, instant noodles, refill for their diffuser. He would have restocked on tea too, but Roulette had given him a gift pack of the stuff last week. The good kind, too -- the kind Citrine is too cheap to buy himself. A bunch of loose leaf teas all packed into a pretty box.

It's not Christmas yet, Citrine had said when xe gave it to him.

It's not a Christmas present, Roulette had said. It's just a present.

I don't have anything for you back.

Roulette had flopped onto the couch by then, started to reach for xyr phone. You don't have to. Xe started grinning. Actually, how about this? You're not allowed to get me anything back. You have to just accept it, no strings attached.

Pu'er, chamomile, lemongrass and ginger, more Citrine can't recall at the moment. He's only brewed one pot from the gift pack so far, though he usually blitzes through his grocery store teas.

He's trying to savour them. That much is easy to guess. But it's not just the teas; it's the token of Roulette's affection too, there to remind him every time he looks at the box.

He might brew another pot after they get the lights set up. Just to get Roulette to stop teasing him about hoarding the teas. And anyway, it'll be nice to drink together. They usually have their own drinks each morning -- Citrine with his tea, Roulette with xyr coffee.

With the groceries -- "groceries" -- put away, Citrine wanders to where Roulette is. For a split second he considers perching his chin on xyr shoulder the way xe does to him, just to see xem surprised for once, but decides against it. Roulette stands next to the coffee table with a much smaller, but still significantly tangled knot in xyr hands. Xe attempts tugging and slipping the bulbs through this way and that, xyr eyebrows knitting into an uncharacteristic frown.

"Can't figure it out?" Citrine asks.

"No." Roulette grumbles. "I have most of it undone, it's just -- this last part."

"Good luck with that."

That gets a laugh out of Roulette. "You're not going to help?" xe says mock-plaintively, as Citrine sits down on the couch.

"Nah."

Knots annoy Citrine. Knots especially. Replying client emails and humid weather also annoy him, but there's something extra frustrating about knots. The fact that you can do something about them, feel like you're getting somewhere, ultimately get nowhere, but you can't stop trying anyway. He gets stuck in it too easily.

Roulette is the one who's had to pry tangled wires out of his hands, so xe just laughs again at the flippant rejection.

A moment later, Roulette drops the lights, knots and all, onto the floor. "We'll just deal with it later," xe decides. "No point blowing up about them."

"Sure."

Citrine helps Roulette drape the lights even though xe hadn't asked, until the floor is outlined in a rectangle of soft, glowing lights. Roulette tucks the mess of knots next to the coat-stand, somehow arranging it so it might pass for a quirky decoration rather than a ball of hell. Xe winds the spare meters around it, turning it into a strange, makeshift mont blanc dessert. Night has fallen, and the lights illuminate the darkness warmly.

"This is great," Roulette says, looking over their handiwork with a soft, satisfied smile. "Now we're ready for winter. I'd like to keep them all year, even."

Citrine shrugs. "Sure."

And it is pretty. Cozy, with the teas Roulette got him sitting on a cabinet, Roulette's coat hung up on the stand, Citrine's cardigan tossed over the back of the couch. The gentle yellow glow makes the place look homey instead of messy. Well. Maybe just homey as well as messy.

Roulette turns to him. "This light is nice and dim for sex, too," xe says, all pretend-musing with a hand on xyr chin, a new mischievous glint in xyr eyes. "What do you think?"

Citrine gets up from the couch and kisses xem in response.

#routrine #my writing #offscreen #trying out new pronouns for roulette!

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