monolike | IC CONTACT

[Sorey didn't even notice the ache at the back of his head until Lailah's healing arte washes it away. Must've been when he was tackled.

Mikleo backing off should be a good sign, but all Sorey wants to do is follow after him. They've been nearly inseparable ever since he came back, almost always within arm's reach whenever Sorey was in the room and whenever he left, he checked his comm for messages obsessively. It's surprisingly not unusual; whenever one of them was feeling down (or sick, in Sorey's case), they were never very far from each other.

This is just- just more of the same. It's more of the same. If he tells himself that instead of fixating on how Mikleo must be remembering what it was like to be a dragon, with Sorey ordering him near and far, burn this, destroy that, Mikleo, it's all right, I've got you-

Sorey shakes his head hard and pushes himself up on his elbows, pushing back until his own back hits the wall and dragging his legs up to hug them and keep himself from scrambling over to Mikleo. Let Lailah handle it. Let her calm him down. He'll only make things worse-]

-for now, just for now, [Sorey whispers to himself. Don't fall back into that hole. It's his duty to stay pure, now more than ever. Keep a grip on himself, don't deny his feelings but don't wallow in them. Mikleo needs him to be strong and steady. Mikleo needs him.

Mikleo needs me.]

[He feels that soft touch against his hand, and he inhales sharply and jerks it away at first; he hadn't seen it coming, and it frightens him once he realizes the implications. He knows something's not right, now. He can feel the malevolence swelling around him, his limbs sinking into it like quicksand, but his legs are pressed against solid ground, and when he leans back, he can recognize the sensation of a wall resisting his push. The contrast is both jarring and disorienting. Even the hellion- no, Sorey- even he's disappeared into the mist now, and while the image seizes him up with terror just like before, when Sorey had fallen, he struggles to keep himself from panicking about it, mentally clinging to Lailah's voice, Lailah's words.

Sorey is okay.

Sorey is pure.

We're both--]

I can't... I can't see anything.

[Cautiously he lifts his trembling hand, reaching out towards her instead of pulling away. Maybe- if he has some connection- if he can feel instead of just using his eyes-]

Wh-what am I looking at?

[It's not real. It's not real, it's not real.]

[Lailah feels her heart clench when he jerks his hand away like that, but it confirms, along with his words, that he just can't see her. When Mikleo reaches back, instead of taking his hand immediately, she gives him warning.]

I'm going to take your hand in both of mine, okay?

[Gently, she follows through with her words. One hand is in his and the other clasps the back of his hand.]

You're looking at me, in your room. Sorey is here, too, and he's okay. If you need to close your eyes, then do so. There's no shame in that.

[Lailah gets an idea on helping to calm Mikleo's rising panic. Perhaps helping him focus on a fond memory will be beneficial.]

Tell me about the first seraphic arte you mastered.

[With her word of warning, he braces himself for the inevitable touch, and while it's still a surprise when it comes, he doesn't flinch away this time. He allows his hand to rest in hers, letting it go limp so her hand is all that's holding it in the air. It doesn't fall, so that means it's real. The malevolence swirls around his arm, dark and foreboding, but there's a warmth enveloping his fingers that hadn't been there before.

Drawing in a slow, shaken breath, he follows her advice and closes his eyes. Maybe, if he doesn't have to see it, he'll forget that any of it was there.

Instead he lets his thoughts drift to Lailah's question. His first arte...? His brows scrunch together, eyes still clenched, and he thinks back. Twin Flow had been his first real combative arte, and of course he'd learned to heal because Sorey couldn't keep himself out of trouble, but... the first time...

"Mikleoooooo, I'm so hungry..."]

When we were little... Sorey just turned five... I was starting to find my power, but I didn't know how to focus, yet. Gramps said to take my time, but I was so impatient.

[It had been so exciting, feeling that thrum of energy in his body come to life, something that had always been there, but mostly dormant until his mind was ready for it. He'd loved the feeling of strength moving through his limbs, at first wobbly and weak as a trickling stream, but over time, as he grew, it became a steady brook, a flowing river, a gushing waterfall--

He remembers the joy and wonder in Sorey's eyes, back then, each and every time he pressed his hands together and made them come alive with light.]

We found the ruins by accident. We weren't supposed to be playing there... the ground wasn't steady enough, and the walls were falling apart. Mason said there were too many prickleboars, and they were always aggressive that time of year. There was a hole in the wall...

["Sorey, be careful!"

"I just wanna look."

"You're gonna fall in."

"I am not! Hey, come here, I can see--"]

We fell in.

["I told you."

"You fell, too!"]

It was too high up... we couldn't climb it. And the sound wouldn't carry- all it did was echo through the chamber. We thought we'd find a way out if we explored it, but every path just took us deeper and deeper inside.

["We already came this way."

No, no, that glyph is different. See? It says go left."

"That's because we're on the wrong side of the room this time..."]

We were lost. It was hours before anyone found us. I was fine, but Sorey... it was too musty under all that stone, the air was dry... we didn't have any supplies. I... I don't think I really understood how different the needs of humans are until that day.

["The air smells kinda different this way... maybe we should try here? ...Sorey? Hey, Sorey!"]

[Lailah listens to him attentively. It's nice to get a story about his and Sorey's childhood, if she's perfectly honest. She gets to learn more about them and gains a better understanding of who they are. They're stories that Lailah never gets tired of hearing.]

He needed water, didn't he?

[Her tone is gentle. That's a lesson that not all seraphim find easy to truly understand.]

[Mikleo hesitates, debating whether or not to try opening his eyes, then decides against it. What Lailah is doing, it's working. The warmth is spreading slowly from his hands down the length of his arms, the chill of malevolence that he knows isn't real fading slowly over time. But if he focuses on it, if he breaks the spell of peace that his closed eyes are creating within himself, it could undo it all in a second.

So he nods at her question, swallowing back his fear, and continues.]

He needed water. And he didn't ask, not really. He knew I was having trouble with it. But I thought... this is something I can do. I couldn't break the walls down, like an earth seraph. I couldn't keep him warm, like fire. I couldn't help him breathe with the wind. But this...

[His shifts his hands within Lailah's, forming a small cup with his palms and fingers curled.

"Don't push yourself, okay? I'm fine!"

"I can do it. I can do it!"]

I don't even remember what the words were. I don't know if they mattered. I just kept saying it, over and over. I asked the water to come, and...

["Mikleo..."

"Shh! I'm trying to concentrate!"

"Mikleo! There's water!"

There's warmth all around him, winding around his chest, soothing his trembling limbs, dragging his fear gently from the depth of his soul. Suddenly he exhales, the sound halfway a gasp, and he feels it: the light in his hands, rising to life so briefly and then bursting like a shattered lightbulb. His hands are cold, wet.

There's water.]

...S... Sorey?

[It's barely a whisper. He lifts his head, eyes still cautiously closed, but he's facing the direction where he'd last seen Sorey, rather than towards Lailah.]

[Sorey remembers that, though not with the clarity Mikleo does. He remembers falling in and he remembers that incredible mural they found, but toward the end there things get hazy. He was thirsty but he'd just told himself just a little further, they're almost out, they could make it...and then his footsteps got more and more sluggish and he'd sat down suddenly, sure he couldn't walk anymore.

Mikleo had insisted. His face had gone red; he'd even gotten kind of sweaty, just trying to make it work and Sorey was worried he'd hurt himself, but there, in his hands, was water.

And now, in his hand, is water.]

I'm here, [Sorey calls from the wall, though he doesn't move closer. Mikleo's eyes don't fix on him so he's probably still hallucinating, and Sorey is reluctant to make things worse by triggering something bad. He does unfold from his seat and push himself up, back against the wall, waiting for a sign that it's all right to move closer. His hands twitch with the desire to go to Mikleo's side, to hold him and make sure he's all right, that his skin is still cool, his heart isn't racing.] I remember that; Gramps said you saved my life.

[Mikleo starts at the sound of Sorey's voice, his breath catching, and the water spills from his hands to soak his knees and the floor below. He doesn't notice. He'd heard Sorey's voice. Sorey's voice, not distorted by malevolence or missing entirely. He's there. He remembers.

It wasn't real. It's just as Lailah said. Everything's fine.

He still feels cold, so he doesn't trust his eyes yet; he leaves them closed, too scared to risk a glance lest the hallucination drive him deeper instead of allowing himself to be drawn out of it. His hands clench briefly into fists, and then he lifts one of them, open and reaching out to Sorey. His other hand finds Lailah's again, holding it gently but firmly; she's still his center, here, but he needs Sorey, too. If they're both here with him, if he can feel them instead of going only by what he sees, then surely his eyes will come around as well.]

I hear you. I can hear you.

[The relief in his voice is palatable, at the same time overwhelmed and urgent. He's almost there.]

Here... come here...?

[Sorey's already moving by that first syllable of Mikleo's request. He stretches out his hand, touches his palm and fingertips to Mikleo's, then turns them so he can lace their fingers together. Sending Lailah a worried sidelong glance, Sorey kneels down beside her and clutches Mikleo's hand as tightly as he dares.

He doesn't want to tell him 'I'm here' or 'It's okay.' Not when they were some of his last words to Mikleo, not now, while he's like this, suffering. He doesn't need to say it anyway; Mikleo's hand is in his and that's all they need, right now.]

[Lailah will hold his hand in both of hers. She doesn't miss the worried look Sorey gives her. Her response to it is a reassuring smile, silently telling him it'll be okay.

Although, it's also clear to her that Mikleo isn't out of the woods just yet. At least he isn't panicking anymore.]

Did either of you have a favorite fairy tale when you were younger?

[The feel of Sorey's hand against his own is familiar; he'd known it as a child, been raised alongside it, held it more frequently the last several days as they'd grown accustomed to one another's presence again, to being together, to being alive. By now he knows every callus, every old scar. His body knows this hand, and his heart knows it as Sorey's.

His fingers curl around Sorey's, exhaling in quiet relief, and he lets their company drape over him like the comfort of a warm blanket. Lailah's presence and Sorey's domain push against the malevolence he'd felt cloying at his soul, and slowly, he starts to relax again.

He allows Lailah's question to distract him, focusing on the memories of home, of their childhood, instead of the nightmare he'd let himself fall into. A fairy tale...?]

There was one I remember... a water seraph who lived by the sea grew up watching a human boy who played on the beach. He had a little resonance, but only enough to hear her voice, so she sang to him every day. Over the years he became a man, and she fell in love with him. The seraph loved so deeply that she was afraid malevolence would ruin her if she lost him, so she forged an oath within herself to become human, to live and die by his side. But the price of her oath was her voice... so the human never knew it was her.

[Even reciting it now, he couldn't say for certain what had drawn him to it. There were some parallels, but they were weak at best- he, a water seraph, growing up with Sorey, but as a child he'd never feared that Sorey wouldn't know him. The loss of his resonance hadn't become a real danger until they'd faced Heldalf that first time.

He could sympathize with her plight, so perhaps that was it. He can recognize the ache of knowing that humans are mortal, finite, and that loving someone isn't the same as saving them. Life has never failed to remind him that he's immortal and Sorey is not.

And yet, here they are, holding hands and soothing his fears because he'd been the one to die first.

"It was supposed to be me-! I’m the human!"]

...Gramps said an oath like that was impossible, though. He never liked that one.

["A human should strive to become more like the seraphim, not the other way around. Be careful with stories like that, Mikleo."]

Ahhh, I remember that one! [Sorey doesn't have to inject the cheer that enters his voice by force this time, because he'd been hoping Mikleo would mention that one. It was a sad story, so he hadn't quite liked the ending as much as Mikleo had, but they'd been so excited to find a fairytale where a human and a water seraph that it hadn't mattered.

Sorey squeezes Mikleo's fingers again before slowly unthreading them, then turning Mikleo's hand between his own to start massaging his palm, gently pulling on his fingers to stretch the muscle. Mikleo did a lot of delicate work with his hands and while he didn't really hurt them, sometimes they would stiffen up. He didn't let Sorey do this often but Sorey knows, can tell by his face, how much he loved it when he would.]

We would act out different endings to the story sometimes, remember? We had to go do it in the woods because if Gramps found out we'd really catch it. But there was that one time where we became good pirates together. We saved art and books from bad people who took them away and delivered them to museums. And it didn't matter if you couldn't talk, because we were still happy together.

Oh- and there was that one time, where you wanted to play the human and I played the seraph. But I can't sing, so we had to change it that the seraph would recite ancient texts because that was what I could do. [Sorey smiles more to himself than for Mikleo, thumbs pressing gentle circles into the heel of his palm.]

Edited 2016-10-24 04:47 (UTC)

[Mikleo frets for a moment or two when Sorey shifts their hands, thinking he might be withdrawing, but once he recognizes what's actually happening he relaxes again, feeling foolish. Of course he wouldn't let go- not now. Not with them still sorting each other out. He leans in as Sorey gently pampers his fingers one by one, not objecting for once, just accepting the kindness for what it is. He listens, his lips curving into a tentative little half-smile, and slowly nods his head.]

I remember. I remember all of that.

[It's easier to think of it now, with Sorey here and audible enough to be the same reassuring presence he's always been once again. It's easy to let the memories override his fear and help him forget the feel of malevolence. He thinks it might be safe to open his eyes again, but... still, he hesitates. He doesn't want to break the safety of what they have right now.]

That was the time we spent days on the same version of the story, piecing it together like some elaborate play we were writing. Melody didn't mind the story, so she tried to teach you how to sing, but you had trouble hitting the right notes... she said you were better with your hands, anyway. That was when she found that old poetry book for you, wasn't it? Your first one.

Oh man, I was so excited. Getting new books was the coolest thing. [Since it was difficult to come by them in the village and all. Occasionally someone from the village would go out and come back with supplies that Sorey needed but couldn't get from the wilderness around them, and every once in a while they'd return with a book he and Mikleo hadn't yet read.] We were so worried about breaking the bindings whenever we shared them, but we didn't want to read alone so we always squeezed together on the floor.

[Sorey rubs Mikleo's hand, then presses it between his own, folded as if in prayer. He closes his eyes and feels out his bonds with Lailah and Mikleo, stronger for their immediate presence; Lailah, flickering and warm, a banked fire pouring comfort into him all the way to his bones. Mikleo's cool, calm serenity, a feeling Sorey had always thought he'd had around him but had never been able to pinpoint until he made the sublord pact with Lailah. Seraphim. Personifications of the great elements of the world.

His friends.

His loved ones.]

I'm okay, [Sorey murmurs, and takes Mikleo's hand to fold it over his chest, above his heart. His heart had beat as a hellion, he's sure, since underneath it all he was still alive, but it had been a distant and unimportant thing. Sorey hadn't realized how important his heartbeat was until Mikleo fell asleep to the sound of it.] You're okay too, right?

[Mikleo doesn't move or respond for a long, long moment, breathing in, breathing out, allowing himself to at last feel the difference between what he'd experienced since Sorey walked in the room and now. He can feel the gentle thump-thump-thump of Sorey's heart under his palm. He can feel the soothing warmth of the domain surrounding him. He can feel the familiar, calloused touch of Sorey's hand over his own. He can feel the weight of Sorey's words, the hope and support in his quiet question.

There's no malevolence. There never was; it was all a cruel illusion, and he fell for it. Maybe he ought to feel foolish, but... in truth, all he feels is relief.

He holds his breath and opens his eyes, and the room is his own again. Sorey's in front of him, holding his hand, his eyes full and bright, his body whole and pure, just like always. A tremor passes through his body, and his hand clenches beneath Sorey's.]

I'm okay. I'm okay.

[Yeah Sorey can't really hold back anymore. Sorry if this is startling, but Sorey is going to lunge forward and tackle Mikleo, wrapping his arms around his shoulders and burying his face in his neck.

This can't be forever. Mikleo can't suffer from this sort of thing forever, he won't survive it, he won't survive Mikleo being afraid or in pain like this for the rest of his life.]

[Whether it's startling or not - and it is, a little - Mikleo doesn't flinch or pull away. He's just as glad as Sorey, and it's only due to his physical weakness that he's slow to return the embrace. He clings back as tightly as his hands can grip, closing his eyes and carding his fingers through Sorey's hair, trembling but grateful.

If this is his fate, then as unfortunate as it might be, he'll endure. It's enough that he's not alone.]

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this notif fell off a cliff and briefly died, sorry

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