By Kay
Disclaimer: I own Everworld! That's right, it's mine, all mine! (cackles madly)
Warning: David/Jalil implications; Post-End of Series
Just thought I should write something and try to revive the EW kingdom. (chuckles) Trust me, it's still my baby...
Jalil knows all about heroes.
He's read about them in books during class. He's seen them in action, gallantly striding forth to their deaths, only to be buried, pathetically, in a mound in a forest with nothing but a rudimentary cross and a trembling song for their funeral rights. He's seen them in the pictures, the legends, in the flesh—altogether, Jalil knows, he's seen too many heroes. And he knows about them all. He's turned the pages, looked up the names, until his head was so crammed with the history of these faceless warriors that it feels as though he's cheated in some manner, denied them their humanity, and this is the point in which he stops reading when he meets them.
He knows, though, about heroes—they always die in the end.
Brave, pure Galahad, the perfect knight (but they don't speak of him anymore because of April). Beautiful, mysterious Ganymede, who may not have been a hero, but was certainly a good man (but they don't speak of him anymore because of Christopher). And then there is David, clumsy and awkward and furious—David, who swings a sword as though it were a baseball bat. David Levin, who stumbles in the face of danger but always follows through. Davideus, who has holes in the knees of his makeshift pants, and tattered threads on his tunic, but shines with an inner force as brilliant as any knight or god Jalil has ever met.
He is empowered with the ideal sense of justice, of need to prove himself, that every hero has. And he is a good man.
(But Jalil doesn't speak of him anymore in this sense.)
Yes, Jalil knows all about heroes. He knows that they always die in the end, in some glorious, victorious battle against evil or debauchery. It is in the very nature of a hero to sacrifice when they've burned themselves out. It is in every movement they make—the creak of their knees when time has long weakened their strength. The dull flash of a sword flung too many times. The weary grimness that begins to grow in the hero's eyes, as they finally realize—too late—that it is a never-ending cycle, that this justice and goodness they fight for will never completely vanquish the darkness. When they finally let themselves go, they cling to the false and empty hopes that their deeds have shown the world at least a glimmer of this nobility, this kindness.
David is very close to becoming a hero.
At first, he doesn't say anything about it. Only watches their General, their Napoleon, their leader—observes the motions as they follow through. The late nights in the stables practicing with his sword and newfound daggers. The straight lock of his spine as he begins to find his place in the world. The quiet steel in the brown of his eyes, the calluses on his fingertips, and the purposeful grace in his strides. He has bothered to learn everything possible about the places he's been to, strived to become stronger, faster, more well-known. He takes challenges and burns three lamps a night staying up over maps, plotting, thinking, muttering.
Jalil wants to be irritated with him. He wants to scold, snap, and explain. Show him that he is only a man, not a hero, not a god—and he will burn himself out much faster because of it.
But there is a burning, a scorching, in David's eyes that refuses to be quenched. And it is what Jalil knows about heroes, has seen and read of them, that makes his lips purse shut. Neverending cycles. Desires. A laugh in the dark. Plots.
So he watches, patiently, and waits for the moment. Waits for the opportunity to find a loophole, a weakening in defenses, so that he may right everything again. Because there are few things in the world worth protecting with your life, but it's nothing when you don't plan for anyone to loose it. That is how he justifies it. How he can quietly wait and tell himself, arrogantly, determinedly, constantly, that he's still doing this for himself, still looking out for number one.
He tells himself that he'll pull away before he burns himself out for a stupid wannabe hero. If the argument grows quieter, he does not think about it.
And when David says, 'I'm counting on you for the plans. Make them work. Be my mind and eyes,' he only takes a deep breath. This is what he waits for—and without pausing, without thinking, drenching up the reserves of a long existing loyalty that he's calmly accepted over the years, he agrees.
Jalil knows all about heroes. They always die.
But they've never had Jalil Sherman before, either.