[PRP][PLOT] So...uh...yeah.... [Anatolio + Turin]

[Menelie]

"And what was I supposed to do with them?!" demands Toli, his voice raised and his fins flaring. "A girl who barely remembers the night we shared, calls on me months later, bearing two little boys with little wings and little fins, and what was I supposed to do? Should I have immediately dove back into the lake and never given them a second thought? Should I have tried to drown them like the 'abominations' you so clearly think that they are?" Not that that would have worked. "What should I have done?" he demands. "What would you have done? Because even though I know I made a mistake, I owned up to my responsibility to these children, as their father, and I've done the best I can with them."

Toli raises himself from his sitting position, as if to leave. His voice is softer now, but no less harsh. It's almost dangerously soft. "I thought that maybe, once you were feeling better, you might like to meet your grandchildren. Their names are Anxo and Dysmas, if you even care." He's obviously hurt, but anger still pulses against the back of his eyes and in his temples. "Anxo has your hair, and Dysmas your coloring. Mother's told them stories about you, about how brave and faithful you are. You might as well be a ghost to them." His words are barbed, meant to sting. Meant to inflict the same pain he's feeling.  

[Teigra]

Turin winced visibly. Is that how he sounded? He...he hadn't even really thought about the kids yet. He didn't know what to think. He didn't even know what they were. He'd just heard 'angel' and suddenly he'd seen red. He wasn't even sure why. The incident in the swamp with those teenagers harassing the Queen was fresh in his mind, but was that all? He couldn't blame an entire race for the fault of a few delinquents. The destruction of their home was a raw wound, especially having just seen the ruins with his own eyes only a few weeks ago. Yet, could they even be sure that had been deliberate? They had no proof.

There was still a stigma about the court regarding land Pae, at least among the Aernyn from the sea, those few who remembered. Turin was worried for how they would take this, how they'd treat his son for sleeping with the enemy...but had he come across so harshly in his concern? "Toli, I...Toli, please!" Thinking the boy was about to leave in anger, he made a lunge, albeit a weak one, and managed to grasp his son's arm in desperation. "Wait...please."

Half out of the kelp bed now, the Naiad Captain hung his head in shame, unable to meet his son's eyes. "I'll tell you what I'd have done, Toli. I'd have done exactly what you did. What I did all those seasons ago. Try to make it right. I gave it my best, but maybe my best wasn't good enough." He hesitated, then deciding he'd had his say, withdrew, releasing his son's arm.

"Trying to be a father to baby Naiads is hard enough," he said in a quiet voice, still looking down and away. "I can only imagine the additional trials when the children are...something else." He winced once more at the quiet barbs, digging deeper than perhaps his son knew. Brave. Faithful. Right. I'm a damned coward, he thought bitterly, stomach clenching. From the sound of it, Kelebek knew and accepted the children, despite whatever they were. And here he was, alienating his own son...for the sake of his own mistakes.
 

[Menelie]

He's about to turn around with a flat "What." when he sees that his father had chased him halfway out of bed. "Gods and little fishes, Papa!" he exclaims, scuttling back to catch Turin before he fell, using his mother's favorite oath. Once he'd shoved his father most of the way back into bed, he settles on the floor next to it, his heart pounding in his chest. He'd been really afraid there, for a second.

"What do you mean, 'all those seasons ago'?" He asks. As he and Moana and Zoran had gotten older, their father had spent less and less time around the house. These days especially, Toli was beginning to get the feeling that something strange went on between his parents before he was born. It was clear to him that Turin no longer harbored the same feelings for Kelebek that perhaps he once had. But perhaps....perhaps those feelings had never existed? "Did something happen before we were born?" he asks.

Maybe he'd hit a nerve. Well, he'd sort of meant to, but he'd meant to appeal to Turin's sense of duty and fatherhood, not open an old wound. Maybe that's why he'd reacted so violently, so negatively. Suddenly he has more questions than when he'd come in here.  

[Teigra]

Accepting help back into his sickbed wasn't lessening Turin's shame. Still, he had little choice, accepting his son's help quietly and settling back into the kelp bed. He wasn't doing as well as he'd thought, apparently, if so little counted as exertion. He took the time to catch his breath, chest heaving, to also consider what he was about to say.

When he'd recovered sufficiently, he still couldn't look at Toli, not until he explained. Not until he'd come clean. If the boy even decided to stay that long. But, noting the way he'd settled beside the bed, Turin held some hope that he'd at least hear his father out.

Did something happen? Yes, but not what the boy was thinking, most likely.

"Toli," the Captain started in a quiet voice, looking down. "You see...your mother and I...we weren't exactly...together...before you kids came along," he voiced awkwardly. He could barely remember her name the night of the party. The night they...

"Your story was a little more familiar than I'd let on," he admitted, interrupting his own thoughts before they could stray further. "I lived it. Substitute me for you, and your mother for your angel," he said pointedly, daring a glance upwards. How would his son react? They'd agreed never to tell them as children, keeping the details of their birth a secret as they grew. But now?

Turin prayed that the son who'd followed in his father's wake would understand.
 

[Menelie]

Toli takes a few moments to process this new information. He lets his head drop back against the wall behind him with a soft thud. So that was the big secret. The thing Mother had hinted at for a while, hidden behind a veneer of a smile. The reason Father had been around increasingly less often as he and his siblings had aged.

"So...you never loved each other? We were just a....a drunken mistake?" he asks, staring at the ceiling.

He clenches his hands into fists in his lap, trying to control his reeling emotions. It's a lot to take in. Suddenly he wonders about his relationship with Trager. How often had he come to visit her? It had seemed like they were less and less interested in each other as their own children had grown up. Like they knew in their hearts they were incompatible. But it was different with them, he tells himself. At least they'd been honest with each other. And with their sons. Anxo and Dysmas knew that their parents hailed from two different worlds, could never be together. And though he considers his night of drunken revelry with their mother a mistake...he could never think of his sons as mistakes. They brought so much joy to his life, especially since they'd both taken to the ocean like little fishes.

Suddenly he regrets what he'd said to his father. "I...I didn't mean that..." he says apologetically.  

[Teigra]

Internally, Turin cringed, hearing exactly what he'd dreaded, seeing the rage and pain play across his son's face. Sensing the storm of emotions yet to come, he reached out to place his hand on Toli's shoulder. Even as he started to calm, the elder tried to offer reassurance with a gentle squeeze.

"Is that what you think of your own boys?" he asked pointedly, tilting his head to meet Toli's eyes. He already knew the answer. Even if he hadn't defended them so heatedly already against his own father. He squeezed his son's shoulder weakly again.

"I know you didn't. And I didn't mean to imply it either. My mistake was my own irresponsible actions; not you kids. Never you kids. Though maybe I had a secondary mistake in how I handled things afterwards as well," he mused aloud. He'd been thinking as such for a while now. The strange distance between himself and Kel ever since that scene in the courtroom...well, it hadn't helped matters. Even if they'd never been the ideal parents, they'd tried to at least be good to their kids. Give them a good home to grow up in. He'd done his best to make allowances for them, make sure that Kel and the kids were well taken care of.

Only too late had he started to question what he'd done for Kelebek herself.

Reaching up to lightly ruffle his son's familiar shaggy hair, he sighed. "Toli...your mom is a wonderful, sweet, understanding woman. Don't you ever forget that. But," he paused, shaking his head. "We barely knew each other back then. It's just...complicated," he finished lamely. How could he explain? How, over time, he'd grown rather fond of her...but that his heart had belonged to another. One who would never...could never know it, because it could never be. And yet, he still couldn't give up all hope and just let it go...
 

[Menelie]

"Complicated," repeats Toli, letting his head drop back against the wall. He sighs. He knows how that is. Complicated. This would all be so much...well, more pleasant if not easier...if Trager weren't so averse to the water. He'd barely seen her himself since the boys began to come down here regularly. She lived so far from the water's edge, and she'd always seemed nervous down by the shore.

It's difficult to admit, even to himself, but he's beginning to wonder if he still had feelings for her. She was lovely, to be sure, but...he barely knew her. And they were just...incompatible.

Shaking his head, he tries not to think about her. "So what do I do?" he asks. "The boys may have wings, but their hearts are more naiad than land-dweller." He runs his hands through his hair again and then pulls them down over his face. "Do you think they could ever have a place here?" He glances up at his father between his fingers.  

[Teigra]

Yeah, 'complicated' was one way to put it. Though, his feelings and standing with Kelebek would have to wait for now. Now, his son needed advice. Advice that Turin wasn't sure he was in any position to give.

"I...really don't know, Toli," Turin admitted, shaking his head. "The lake Naiads don't seem to have the same stigma so much about land Pae as some Aernyn do, but...as far as I know, this hasn't happened before. Not to my knowledge. There's no predicting how the others might react." He knew he wasn't being the most encouraging, but he was trying to be honest. At the same time, this was his son...talking about his grandsons...maybe he was being biased even considering this, but...

"You said earlier...maybe I could meet them sometime?"
 

[Menelie]

Toli looks over at him and grins, nodding. "I figured once you're out of this place...wouldn't want to give off the wrong impression, right?" he says, elbowing his father gently and smirking boyishly.

"I know I should have brought all this up earlier," he adds, sobering. "I just...didn't know how. And the boys were still learning to breathe underwater--they're pro at it now, you wouldn't believe what kind of swimmers they are, even without tails--and I just...I was so scared you'd make me...I don't know, put them back or something." He shrugs and laughs nervously. "I figured that now that they're grown...it's too late for any of that."

He smiles again. "I know you'll love them, though. They already love you. Dysmas looks a lot like you. Your hair color, your skin color. Anxo is a little lighter. He looks like his mother. And my mother, now that I think of it. Yellow hair like the sun, though, no idea where THAT came from..."  

[Teigra]

"Hey, quit trying to add time to my stay here," Turin protested, making a face and a show of grabbing his side to show he was teasing. It was still a lot to accept, but he was trying. He really was.

"Kinda' hard to put 'em back," he agreed, only half-serious. He understood what 'Toli meant though, and reached to place his hand on his son's arm. "You're old enough to be a father, Toli. You're old enough to make your own decisions. Even if I am your father...when it comes down to it, your life decisions are your own." Even if the temptation was there to help with those decisions, given his own experiences. He'd just have to try to lead by example...perhaps with a bit more honesty.

He leaned back, finally relaxing for the first time since this conversation began. No, he hadn't quite come to terms with all this yet, but maybe with time...and meeting these boys. He couldn't help but be amused now that Toli seemed to be relaxing as well and shifting into doting, proud papa mode. Amidst the rambling, Turin picked up on one comment with extra amusement. "Yeah...no idea where that came from," he mused, reaching out to muss 'Toli's hair with a smirk.