Welcome to Gaia! ::

Everytime he heard those words—

“Just a moment love,” spoken softly as he bought himself precious seconds of time. Just enough that he could steel himself against whatever subject the new ‘talk’ would broach, it could’ve been anything. It helped that he wasn’t really doing anything on his phone, at least nothing that required his actual attention; just pursuing doordash in hopes of finding something palatable late at night. He thought of Indian food, of baklava and honey, of naan (not naan bread, that apparently was redundant!).

He realized he would’ve rather taken Matt there personally, abused their abilities a little more…Except even with Matt as in his home as he had ever been, there was a feeling of distance, as if a bubble had formed between private and public – humm-drum civilian activities and late night ventures – and when the hell it was Syrus had begun to make that separation in his own mind? To think of then, and now, and before – the great divide of his work, his studies,
and everything else he got into.

It was strange to have a part of his mind relegated to ‘civilian’ anything, to use the word at all! He swallowed the strangeness down, put the phone away, gave his love his full undivided time and attention. “Alright, now, which def-con level are we at for this particular talk?” aimed for teasing even as he aimed for touch, to close the divide of inches, because he’d vowed no words would ruin them.

Oh, he knew Matt could leave, grow bored, dump him, and yet? That was some distant fear because this one – this man – he knew was mature enough that even if the kindlings of love cooled, that there would still be some hope of continued friendship. He told himself that, over and over and over—

Hoped this was just about what they’d get for dinner….
.

“You know how much I enjoy food with some shareability to it, there’s just something about pulling apart garlic naan…” Syrus chuckled, mostly honest, save for the fact that the only person he liked sharing any sort of food with was the man in the room next to him. He oft made Waru eat his own servings of anything, who knew where the man had been, whether the hulk of locs had washed his hands or not was negligible! It was the principle of the thing! The fact that Waru got so distracted between one bite and another sentence and…

And now I’m the one getting distracted? How ironic is that.

“So, we’re getting naan and a small army, since your life is currently on fire – nuclear levels of fire. Which, if that’s the case? Should we leave and get it to go, rather than wait for the delivery man to bring food and the next apocalypse to my doorstep…” Syrus laughed softly, flipped his phone to tap open the app, left it level for his and Matt’s pursuing both. In case the man wanted more than just bread to suck on for the remainder of the night, maybe some nice basmati. Had to have the rice! “Now, while we’re putting this in, tell me how I should look at it? Which hat am I wearing tonight – boyfriend hat – Senshi hat – the blindfold in the bottom drawer of my boudoir? Context clues love…” reaching to pat Matt’s cheek gently, to thumb a stark cheekbone that felt more sharp than it should have given everything. He wanted to pull him into a kiss, to hug him and tell him to nevermind his secrets if he didn’t wish to share them.

Syrus didn’t work that way though, he liked his facts flayed open in the stark of daylight, even if that daylight looked more like moonlight and was done quietly during the deadest parts of the evening–he wanted them pale, bone, sinew, bleeding. He wanted everything Matt would ever give him. Hadn’t he always said as much?

“I’m not going anywhere.”

Maybe he simply needed to say it again, to say it firmly, to steal a brief press of lips and *mean it* before flicking his attention back absently to a screen with words he could still only somewhat properly pronounce with any authenticity.

“I like saying it, you know? The way it feels familiar every time I say it, now! With this naan we’re getting…perspective..and…what else? No man can live on bread and kisses alone–we’re not succubi..”

It was just him, only ever him, at least when he shared Matt he knew whom else he was sharing the man with. Had everything established with nice clean lines, guideposts, detailed cartography on neat lanolin that showed every valley, river, and bend. It took the guesswork and worry out of things. It made Matt easy to go to— mentally at least, for Syrus was not about to bet on there being anyone easier in the world than Waruhiu on a physical level, but mentally?

Matt won that contest, hands down.

Syrus kept that to himself, some private bit of golden nugget he could hold onto until later, a bright thing to share when Matt looked more — Ah — well fed and rosy? More with it, maybe? It was hard to gauge sometimes if it were simple tiredness or more than that, what with the types of lives he knew they both led.

“You should give me *everything*, with every bit of wit and wile you possess, because ‘charms’ will only get you halfway with me,” easy but if banter as he laughed at the idea — laughed for it — the way Matt told him to simply be his boyfriend, as if some side of his Senshi self could be off-put by anything anymore — maybe another near massacre and the thought of all those closest to him ********, what if Matt’s dying!? No, no, that couldn’t be it! That was insanity…wasn’t it? The thought was unsettling, nauseating, and Syrus quickly put it quickly out of his mind frowning only briefly at hearing the refusal for an offer of more food, got himself the rice anyways, got enough bread for two — dips included. Sometimes the sides were simply enough to snack on, light, starchy, full of carbs.

He out the order in and swiped away from the distraction — let the little car drive across the screen in time to an order loading bar —

“Luckily for you, darling? I’d love you even if you were the least charming man on the planet. You’d still manage to be more charming than everyone else,” charming to him simply by being himself, no games necessary, no extra magical flair. He’d long since realized he enjoyed Matt without all the trappings of a glamor. He didn’t need him to be the most built, or the wealthiest, or — he simply loved him as he was, “and there..Now that’s finished and my boyfriend hat is secured. You know I never mind putting the Senshi one away for you, or on for you..I’ve probably a work hat around here somewhere too.” the words full of patient expectancy, a tone that said he could wait an age before some sense of urgency to push for answers set in. Truthfully? Syrus could’ve entertained himself with watching Matt and little more, something about the shadows beneath his eyes, little lines that belied stress. Maybe the issue was something family related? That certainly would’ve made sense enough.

Syrus listened aptly, grinned, because he liked it when Matt put his writers hat on, grinned wider at the mention of yet another princess! It felt like there was a new Princess every other Tuesday at this point; some infamous new monster of the week that reared up. Only these ones were graced with angel wings and the light of stars. All seeming to be innocent or betraying in nature. Syrus tried his best to keep off the radar of them — of Ida, Lysithia, the rest. Anyone who hovered in Jupiters hemisphere, one of Albites enormous star-sisters that he insisted upon calling as such even though Syrus was sure space didn’t work that way!

Though who was he to say? He’d never been, was unlikely to ever dwell in Saturns orbit and decide those things for himself. The driving need to know simply wasn’t and so he didn’t…

But Matt was asking, and hadn’t there been a team brunch? Ah, yes, Faustites undeadening — his celebration of life and the others celebration of heist —

“Ah—Albites deer! I heard—half heard—that she’s a princess now?!” His surprise genuine as his intrigue, it could’ve been she’d always been a princess, Albite seemed to be as unaware of these things as anyone else- who did or did not have ‘royalty’ hidden away behind basic Senshi guises. “I heard it went south — rumors and gossip, and of course the general temperature of our team mates, which has nothing to do with its leader! I’d assumed that it was fine to be absent for awhile — I mean, if ever there was a time to take a break from everything? After what happened with Faustite, and I’m glad he’s alive, more than — a sovereign at that — but getting into anything else so soon after just felt beyond stressful.”

Flippantly easy for Syrus to admit, there was only so much he could handle between that and his other earthly responsibilities — only so much he could watch fall apart before he needed a breather. Besides, the bank program had seemed to have enough high ranking officers and internal support to go on without a hitch!! Hitches had happened it seemed, half a dozen of one successes and half a dozen others that ended in failure. It wasn’t his problem though…

Which made Matt bringing it up at all strange.

“I—and now I feel like I’m missing something. You took a bigger part in what? Taking out a loan — I doubt you’ll have to repay — planning the mission? They can’t pin a princess’s worth of problems on you. You're eternal now, you can delegate some of that blame off onto someone else if they try.” he would draft the report that would get Fulgurite off of any perceived hook. Knew it was easy enough to do even as his brow creased with worry, searching Matt’s face for clarity, searching his words for clarity too. He couldn’t imagine the team pinning any fault of their grand schemes mishap on Matt! Surely he hadn’t played that big a part in their operation….

“Faustites always been greedy, a trait him and his bevy of partners seem to share,” soft scoff and it’d been so long since Syrus had asked for an update, gotten in touch with the General in a more personal level, the check ins had not been what they once were. Not once Syrus had realized the man was sick and dying, and then alive and recovering, and then alive and aiding and abetting an entire new takeover headed by the newly minted General Jadarite and her stunning under-team.

“It serves him right, getting rejected in the most spectacular way possible. I’m sure Albite has some strong feelings on the matter...” his dearest himbo had never liked empty vessels, he liked his cups full to the brim so he could watch them overflow as he poured in more and more and more…

Waru liked youma, power, transformations. Liked death and rebirth in cycles. Syrus wondered if Faustite had truly meant to try and corrupt Cybele, or if he simply wished to end her once and for all? It would’ve been interesting to have been there, just long enough to learn the answers to such things. To witness one more princess flare up for a whole different circumstance than what had happened with Ida; for who really knew what made princesses?

But Matt was going on and Syrus took the time to lean into him, intrigued and invested in his beaus words as the situation at hand — the details of it — were metered out, guidelines and handrails trying to lead him to some grand conclusion.

It took far longer than it should have to click, for Syrus’s long pause of pregnant silence to bear any sort of thoughtful fruit.

“Well, yes, of course. Clearly something went wrong…” the next pause held tension, a breath, and Syrus realized exactly why Faustite was so suddenly on his mind. Syrus didn’t want to ask himself anything, couldn’t help it, running through the many possible answers. What lost them the one but kept them the other. “….very wrong…traitorously wrong. You know?” spoken quickly as he was turning to stare better at Matt’s face, to search his expression sharply. “Once upon a time—months ago, now. Faustite came to me with the usual check in, only with more time and more wine than we’d had in the past. He was sweet enough to buy me a ‘b***h Red’ — it was nice of him and nice to talk without pressure since I’m always busy and he’s always busy, and so it seems there’s never time to connect more than at passing meetups, but?”

A clench of nails into palms became a splay of fingers, tension and release, as he walked them out of his own space and into Matt’s, found ways to touch enough to distract himself even as he followed his own long winded line of dialogue.

“We found the time—and in all the talking we did he alluded to a concept,” and hadn’t Syrus been eager for the uptaking! For all that Faustite had sounded frustrated while in his human skin. Eion all but chomping at the bit of Syrus’s loyalty, nigh questioning it, they both rubbed each other more wrong than right at times. Yet in those few hours they’d found a commonality and he had agreed to bring Eion a head — and to find him a pike wielder — so something could be done with that head.

“He asked me to find a mole — *The Mole* — said that they’d tried and failed, and maybe if they had more eyes to spot one they could? If one even existed! You can’t be saying……It doesn’t have to lead back to you—-if you knew. If it’s someone you’re trying to protect?” Syrus would tell him to throw whoever it was under the bus. That they could, together, protect Matt from any concerning connections if it came down to it! Nikki wasn’t the only one with power or sway—who could be helpful and strong…

It was brilliant, worrisomely so, the idea that Faustite had gone to each of them, one after the other, and fed them differing lines of information, missions, tasks. Some far greater, grander, and more demanding than others. What was it that Faustite thought of Fulgurite where he’d ask such a thing? Could’ve been anything — information in files Syrus couldn’t read, the past connection of sylvite and the implications of being under her and so possibly aligned with her?

Could’ve been albite too— Sy’s mind readily supplied the idea. He didn’t know how deep things ran one way or the other between Fulgurie and pickamember of the team…If Albite would make suggestions to his *husband*; that man’s shadow and ear worm in one. The pair were so entwined with the concepts of lust and violence that it would’ve been easy. Even if those tactics didn’t make up the pair's core? They were certainly always a paper thin thought away——

“I’m assuming his near brush with death delayed that particular mission…..” Syrus tsk’d roughly, a swallow followed by an uneasy sigh, a tension that coiled round his heart as he asked, “And what about protecting yourself, Matt?”

“You are technically on our side, part of this, I don’t—“ it should’ve been blindingly obvious, shouldn’t it? That he’d long since found the very person he’d been tasked to look for. Syrus didn’t want to see it, to believe it, even though behind Matt stood the visage of the most orderly woman of order Syrus could ever imagine knowing.

That doesn’t mean anything though— Matt’s feelings for Nikki, his entwinement with her. He was no more ‘mole’ than Albite unless it was unwittingly!

“I don’t know if I want to know who you're trying to protect, but I get the feeling that it’s something I should know, shouldn’t I?” better to ask the question, chase it with a shaky laugh, and reach for Matt’s face as if he wanted to see more than that distant, blank, detachment in his eyes. Syrus wanted answers, but more than that? He wanted Matt’s honesty, his feelings…

He remembered, cataloged and clipped every bit of information Matt ever deemed to grace him with – like he was scrapbooking precious moments. Leaving them all laminated and bound to be viewed later at his leisure. The chase of death that so often snipped at the heels of those with any sort of seniority. Syrus would never say he worried, because the people he loved most were so damn strong— because Waru went on ad nauseum about the eternity of senshi! Why should he worry?

Looking at Matt’s face now, feeling the divide grow and stretch as the man he loved turned away. Syrus could feel the pit of that worry, rough stone fruit and how it sat heavy and irritating in his chest. An ever deepening sorrow that threatened to suck tears out of him, he would give that sadness time *later*, because right now? He had a man on his side to save!

“Oh, sweet irony–here you’ve been all along, right in front of me! And I’ve no pike for your head. What a shame, Faustite will surely suffer..Unless of course he’s too busy being bedded by every boy and burdened by new responsibilities. He might forget he asked for any heads at all, let alone the amount he asked for.” sardonic, whimsical, at play with all his words as he reached more firmly to grasp Matt’s face and *tug*, with long slender fingers and nails digging ever so slightly. An entire point to be made, because he would not be denied his lover's eyes.

“Matthew–I dearly do remember every word you’ve ever told me, however? I can also do a very good job at *forgetting* the sorts that would get you messily murdered. If Albite, that absolute hunk of a shitheel, could keep Nikki under wraps? I can certainly keep you under the table..all the things you didn’t do…” he wanted to shake the despair he caught in snippets loose, to freeze it off and slough it free of Matt’s features.

They blew up a bank – Matt gave up the goat, the ghost, the golden goose. No one important died, there was an entire princess to lay blame on even!!

“It’s far harder to protect people from themselves though, so I have to ask. Who all knows? No, who all suspects–there’s no one at your door banging it down and demanding answers. No one at mine, but it’s best to be prepared to manage the fallout if any trickles through thin cracks and back your direction like nasty, bloody little arrows.” a serious sort of plea, because he was no princess, or king, or eternal. Because he was deeply worried and he owned that now! The fact that Matt thought him so fickle that he’d turn him in at the first sign of treason? When there were so many others that could so easily be pointed too—

Syrus realized he had to be more clear about where his loyalties lay, the particular way he defined them; fluid things made to walk lines so barbed and deadly as these.