#dubbing this segment “the blinding of isaac”

[twothpaste]

fic snippet. lucas & isaac boating hours, feat. worldbuilding, flashbacks within flashbacks, and layers upon layers of remorse.

Lucas' kayak was carved from red cedar. Gold in the morning. Vermilion by sunset. Thread it deftly through any tide, like a needle mending a torn shirt. He learned to paddle when his arms were still made of sticks n' twigs, n' his scars were still cleft in crimson. As were Nowhere's. Weaving the channels between ruptured cliffsides. Dodging grisly swaths of surfaced bedrock. Perilous was the word after - at least, upon first glance. 'Til the Dragon's shadow draped down, to temper the waves. Kid grew into his strength. Sturdy biceps, sure. Muscles not so lean. Ain't your arms that get ya there, though. You row from your core. This vessel was - and still is, in his lonesomest hours - his home away from home. It's his heart that carries it.

Bronson did the bulk of the handiwork. Whittling away the chilly mornings, while kiddo slept off tears n' terrors. "But really," he'd insisted, come Christmastime, "It's a gift from all of us." Jill had beamed her best ear-to-ear grin. Abbey n' Abbot, in their matchin' holiday sweaters, gave meek waves. Tessie'd done a fine job wrapping the goshdarn thing. Leder, from his mile-high vantage, had picked the perfect tree. Lighter lent his axe. And so on.

A hero's greatest thanks, apparently, take the form of smiling sobs.

"It's wonderful. Really. Th.. Thank y'all."

To his left strode Isaac's big ol' canoe. Beige as could be. He'd mentioned need of it, offhand, the spring after. Gruffly resigned himself to the task. Takin' clumsy bites out of a fallen trunk, with an unsharpened carving knife. While jetsam surfaced, and shifted about, in his aching head. Again - the guy was indeed a woodsman. Friend to the trees, n' creatures that be. His role was aptly set. But he was no lumberjack. N' far from a shipwright. In his dreams - to this day - he roams the desert-dry creeks and lakebeds of Appalachia. Searching in vain, for survivors of any clade.

Lighter found him there (or rather, not there at all) on the Sunshine Forest floor. Chipping haphazard pieces. Tree rings laid bare. Scattered about, in choppy chunks.

"… Yer goin' about it all wrong, y'know."

And Isaac leered up at him. Squinting through the crack in his glasses.

He could growl back, if he wanted. Proclaim otherwise. Or shrug it off. Say not a damn thing, n' wait for him to leave. The hermit could tell his forsaken neighbor to go to hell, for all he cared. Made not a lick of difference. His protests were for less than naught. Before he knew it, Lighter n' his boy were at his side, salvaging his wreck. Showin' him the craft. Teach a man to fish. N' all that.

He didn't deserve it, then.

Maybe he does, now. Who's to say.

The vest he had tailored was snug to his chest, and almost familiar. Lucas' was all but identical. "Mm… Maybe make it a size up, if ya could," kid told Tessie. "I'd prob'ly outgrow it in a few months, otherwise." And he'd've been right, by his next birthday. 'Til then, his vest hang slightly loose over him, ruffling in the breeze. Such thoughtful foresight had always distinguished him from the rest.

Isaac wore a badge, as well. Courtesy of Bronson, n' Fuel's apprentice metalwork. It weighed him down. Like every other ounce of generosity. Perhaps this too was an exercise in penance.

They made another for Lucas. He kept it at home. Stowed away, in a little bedside drawer. Ranger or not, never again would he dare pin anything of the sort to his vest, nor jacket, nor any breast pocket.

Call it what you will.

Both boats twined the Murasaki-Highway border, upon this fine 11 AM. Both Rangers kept their eyes peeled. Roving the myriad islets which splattered the Mapson's handiwork, in search of their quarry. A cluster of pink snouts. A ragged, weedy sprout.

Got a tip from the locals, see. An ex-militant encampment, takin' up residence in the asphalt ruins. The Pigpen, they called 'emselves. Proudly. Colonel Hox used to reign as their Napoleon. Three years prior, she n' they had stood in rebellious opposition to Tazmilian civility. Like a gang o' rowdy Lost Boys. But with Peter Pan in prison, and their winter stockpiles dwindling, separatist resolve seemed an increasingly fleeting fantasy. Offers of aid, a less damnable prospect.

"We're overgrown with the little hellions," Hox's guys told Isaac. Barkin' up at him, like tin toy sergeants. "Can't hardly breathe, what for all the spores. You can bash 'em all ya like, but they just puff out more of the shit! N' then five more sprout in their place! If you bleedin' hearts think you can help, be our guest. Here."

Neither soldier would even grace Lucas with a glare. A pair of hoggish masks found their way into Isaac's hands, instead. Battered to hell n' back. Calamine pink. In contrast with the cobalt blue that stared him down.

"Don't get it twisted, now, private. Colonel's only lettin' ya borrow these 'cause of your service history. If it were up to me, though? Heh. I'd let ya both choke to death."

"Noted," answered Isaac . His frown unwavering. "Thank you, Tyson. We'll be back by sundown."

And Tyson froze, for a sec. Sputtering vaguely. Surprised the craven hillbilly oaf had remembered his name. The Rangers took his hesitation as an opportunity to skedaddle. Head back shoreward, n' get to work.

Thus, their first outing had 'em relocating Pigtunias off the sundered Highway flats.

Their latest has 'em on a pontoon. Layin' out a crescent of netting, 'round the Harbor's periphery. Catch whatever garbage may float astray, before it's lost to the wild blue yonder. The motor revs n' rumbles at their ears. Lucas is a stiff, peculiar, not-quite-Lucaslike kind of quiet. In for four counts, through his nose. Out for eight. Teeth barely ajar. Eyes kneading the horizon line. Just as dirty nails knead calloused palms.

He bore the same silence then, too.

Isaac, the selfish prick he'd always been, would carve any quiet into klutzy splinters. Bustling banter was his bane. Small town gossip n' coworker rapport drove him reeling back to the shade. Lips curled, head spinning. A stark reminder of un-belonging. But quiet? Oh, he could hardly hold the peace. Find a clearing, and barrel right in. Fashion a goddamn therapist's couch, on the spot, with his gruesome carpentry skills. It's why he'd said such awful shit to the kid - made a total ass of himself - back before. Why he found himself rambling like a maniac to a goddamn fourteen-year-old, fishin' by a ripped-to-shreds river, about ye olde Forest Service. How his whole pitiful life story had to precede his apologies. And how, therefore, Lucas of all people was the only hapless sap who got to hear either.

"It's alright," the kid had told him. And meant it. At the time, how could he not? With everything that'd drifted up from the depths, in lieu of Leder's bell? Most everyone had lost a mother. A brother - for real, n' for good. N' a few undeserving billions besides. So, who was he to wield a cudgel? To bear grudges down upon clueless traitors, and their countless burdens? "Nah," he'd said. "It's fine." It was fine.

Even though it wasn't.

On the canoe, Isaac broke the silence with a story. That one from the Bible. His namesake. He'd carried it with him since he was small. It tumbled outta some tangential pocket.

Lucas said, low and brittle, he was glad to hear it at sixteen. As opposed to six. The nightmares wouldda been ceaseless.

On the pontoon, Isaac breaks it with a request. Not for his own sake. Someone else's. Progress comes in increments. ...