A short ZADR one-shot dedicated to the boy who inspired me
Disclaimer: I don't own Invader Zim or any of the characters because I am not that genius known as Johnen Vasquez.
PORCELAIN
You break so easily. I know. I've seen pale skin splattered with dark, thick, red liquid. I've seen purple bruises where I've left my mark. White scars where I've cut you deep. You always try so hard not to scream but I know you want to. Scream blue murder and run to someone for comfort. But you can't. There's no one to run to and, even if there was, I've left my mark. You are my territory.
It's dark and I'm walking alone. Along the bridge, the sound of rushing water beneath my feet. I try not to shudder as I imagine the stone crumbling away and suddenly falling towards jagged rocks and foaming death. I shake my head and bring myself back to present. I must stay alert. Invaders do not let their guard down. I've been waiting for a long time. I thought you'd be here by now; it looks like you're going to be late. But you'll come. You always do. It's late. I think I'm cold.
It's started to rain. The water burns, covering my skin like a fiery mist. I'm listening but I can't hear your approach. No sound at all. No footsteps. I've been waiting so long. But I know you'll come. No matter what it takes, you'll be here.
I won't admit I'm lonely, waiting here in the dark and the wet and the cold. I can't; Invaders need no one. Where are you?
I think I hear something. No, I know I do. I turn. You're standing there, pale and defiant in the lamplight. The wounds I gave you last night have almost faded away. Almost vanished, leaving a clean slate, ready to be marked again. I want you. You know I do but you won't let me have you. It's never that easy. I always win the fight, leave you bleeding and torn but somehow, I always feel so empty, as though I haven't won at all.
I'm making a mess of my mission. It's not right, these strange feelings you evoke in me. You don't mean to, it's true, but you do it all the same. You bring out in me things I never knew I never knew. I know this is wrong; it's insane. Like you. Like you, like me. Two lunatics lost in a world that sanity fled a long time ago. I want to go too far. This isn't right but I've fallen too far now to care.
Too much. I think too much. I should have attacked you by now. Or taunted, shouted some insults or something. Instead I'm just looking at you, worshipping your fragile form in the pale light. You know I can't move and I know you can't either. It's as though something is pulling me towards you but my feet are buried in the earth, the mud. I hate this planet. Why can't I stop hating you? I can't, but I hate you so much. You made me betray everything I believed in; myself, my mission, my planet, my existence. So now, because of you, I have no purpose, no reason to justify my life. But without you things would be no different.
You stare at me, amber eyes unfazed by the loathing in my own. My eyes. Blood red orbs. I know their colour now. Why can't you just put me out of this misery? I can stand pain but this is a kind I don't understand. Why can't you triumph? Why can't you just raise the scalpel and cut out this agony, replace with another? Move.Move towards me. Close the distance, narrow the gap, I can't stand this torture.
Your hair is glistening faintly; crystal clear droplets. I knew you'd come. You always do. And now I'm supposed you break you, shatter you into pieces, but when you finally walk towards me, eyes ablaze, mirroring the hate in my own, I can't. I can't even touch you. I'm not afraid. I can't be afraid. I'm not allowed to be afraid. And this hate isn't just aimed at you but at myself. How could I be so weak as to let you do this to me? I hiss softly, the first sound I've made in hours. It comes out as a stream of grey condensation in the air; a silver warning. You smile lazily and I lash out, finally able to touch you, hold you, hurt you. I grasp your wrists so hard you turn white with pain. You try to throw me off but I'm too strong. I've always been stronger than you.
You look at me and I see no fear, just anger and hate, and I know you can see the same in my twisted face. Sometimes looking into your eyes is like looking into my own; somehow, every time I look into them, they betray exactly what I'm feeling. And I can feel it, trembling through every nerve in your body, a longing, a desperate, urgent desire to have me clutch you to my body and fall together. And so I do. Your mouth is soft and warm and my hard kiss bruises those flushed lips. You cling to me, as though afraid to ever let go, as if I would vanish into the drizzling rain like smoke. I don't want to admit it but that's why I'm clinging to you. I'm afraid.
I don't know how we got back to my base; all I know is that we are there and it's pleasurable pain. Your body; so warm. Soft skin, pale golden white. Scarred and marked. My territory. My human. Mine to break if I choose. So smooth, so fragile. Porcelain.
You're beautiful. You look into my eyes, an intense loving hate, and I know that this is the end of everything; the end of all that I have lived for and also the beginning because I have a new thing to live for. The games are at an end. Now we live. We live simply for each other and for the dark, star splattered nights that burn hot and vivid.
We leave behind the broken pieces of our old lives. We forget the world on the other side of the glass. We've shattered that into a million pieces and now we move on to a new world, where blood and metal mingle with slick naked skin that burns to the touch. It's such a fine line. I mark and bruise, rip and tear, but I cannot break you completely. Your body is easily broken, like porcelain, but your soul burns strong within.
I don't know if I have a soul but, if I do, you have touched it. Reached out and twisted it around your fist and every night you wrench it from me and rip it apart. A forbidden darkness and we love it just as much as we hate it. A tortured, dark, sadistic love where the pain is as essential as the pleasure and neither of us would exchange it for the world. And coming from us, that means everything.
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