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 Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2025 11:34 am
Set early December.
Nectaris liked coming out at this time of year. She could chase around youma for a little bit, and it was all an excuse for sprinting through the crunchy leaves and watching them fly up around her as her running and her swishing capes and skirts made a little trail of wind around her. She could also loko at the jack-o-lanterns that people had set out on the front stairs of their apartment buildings.
Yeah. It was nice. It was nice. It helped get her mind off of things.
At least, it helped get her mind off of things until she felt a Chaos aura, and then it turned out to be Albite, and then her mind was very much back on things, like, yikes. She was already dealing with her feelings about one ex. She didn’t need another ex showing up and like complicating things.
Also, she was pretty sure that she had promised herself that next time she saw Albite, she was gonna whack him in the face with her moon staff. Her fingers tightened around the middle of it for a second, ready to just spring over there and go for it without even trying to talk to him, but then she stopped herself.
There was a pretty girl with him, a basic senshi, which meant that Nectaris had to worry about things like first impressions and the reputation of the White Moon.
She also suddenly remembered something, something about Fulgurite, that made her pause.
“Albite,” she said, carefully, lowering the staff again. “Are you gonna call the squad on me again? Try to get my head on a silver platter? Or can we talk for a second?”
There were things that he might know that she didn’t. Things that Cryolite might not even know, if she was being honest.
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Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2025 5:08 pm
It was a lovely night for patrol! Mira was finally making herself go out more often, getting the hang of things, learning all the new ropes of their ‘cause’ (if that’s what they wanted to call it?) in ways that wouldn’t get her ganged up on! She only needed her s**t wrecked enough times to pick up on the concept that packs and pairs were better to run in. Especially when magic worked the way hers did. Who better to run with than a beefed up bull of a body guard like her thought challenged friend? If she was gonna be in this to win this – and it seemed that she was – then she was gonna finally start making use of all of her advantages whenever she could manage it!
It’d be easy street—
Then unknown aura tripped her up and dragged her flowing steps to a pause, had her twisting to gape with wide eyes at all the pinkness as they were – as *Albite* was, specifically – called out onto the dance floor so to speak. Mira didn’t know what to make of it, clocked as being a strange interaction as the Knight’s Aura grew in proximity with her presence. She decided on hanging back behind Albite like a glimmering shadow, glancing between the two with swift narrowness.
*’A friend of yours—?’* cupid's bow of a painted lip frowning in worry as she mouthed the words in a whisper.
*’No, an ex—’* quiet for him, a curt, dry answer that seemed to encompass every sense of the word. The person he was looking at had revoked her friendship-rights entirely and he didn’t believe in pretty privilege when it came to punching things! All opportunists were equal in his eyes. No matter what they asked after, even things like this? And Albite did falter briefly as her question whisked by him like a stray bullet clipping his ear, the way he couldn’t for the life of himself figure out why?
Why does Nikki want to talk? What more is there to be said that hasn’t been already…
“I mean…..It would look real ********’ nice paired with the heart of mine you left there already, dont’cha think? Two cold, dead things on the one plate. Real economic portions, so far as servings go—” because he hadn’t forgotten her promise, or the way the last meeting had gone. How he’d felt provoked then, how he felt that same now. Staring Nikki down like she was *The Enemy*, well and truly.
“And we both know I never really needed them t’deal with you, Nikki. That calling them in was just a cop-out on my part, yeah? But I did do it. Could do it again. Which’s why m’surprised at the nerve you have wanting t’talk to me now.…” he wanted to tell himself he wasn’t still angry over things, a very sweet sort of lie. Because he couldn’t quite let it go, wouldn’t. The way he felt he’d spared her the one time too many and how that was all maybe enough? The way he knew she knew that — that things couldn’t go back to the way they were before — how it made her seem to him bold and brave and insanely fearless to bother *trying* to talk to him!
So though his magic itched in his veins and his stance spoke of unresolved seething in unremorseful tones. He was clearly also listening, with uncharacteristic stillness, even as his mouth ran marathons. Waiting, as always, for someone else to throw the first punch, even after they’d run up on him.
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Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2025 5:18 pm
“You think I’m the one who carved out your heart?” Yeah, Nikki couldn’t help but be kinda aghast at that one. Her free hand came down to her hip and her eyes narrowed at him in open-mouthed shock. “Yeah,” she half-snorted, “No.”
So much for the potential newbie getting a nice gentle first impression. All at once, Nectaris’s three million complaints about Albite were coming right back up to the surface of her mind, and the desire to tell him all about them again was winning out, hard.
“I’m not the one who had like fifty other lovers who you were never gonna measure up to or be equal to,” she said, driving the blunted tips of her moon staff into the ground as hard as she could. “I’m not the one who was not only okay with my allies trying to kill you, but kinda encouraged it as the natural progression of a beautiful and tragic fate or whatever.” She shook her head. That one was the biggest red flag of all in the end. “I’m not the one who started threatening people on my own side because of weird unprocessed jealousy issues or whatever.”
She rolled her eyes, even as she took half a step forwards. “But sure,” she said. “I’m the Heartbreaker. We can go with that, for the sake of your fragile little ego.”
The other senshi finally got another glance, as Nectaris gave her the tiniest little warning shake of the head. “If he ever tries to do that charming thing on you, let me just tell you real quick,” she said. “Not worth it.”
Ugh, just thinking about it now made her skin itch.
“So don’t worry, I’m not here to try to, like, come crawling back to you,” she told him.
Which, maybe that whole spiel wasn’t the best introduction when he might’ve had information that she needed, but she could only do so much when she was full of so much pent up relationship anger.
She still seemed kinda guarded as she added, “It’s Fulgurite. I’m worried about him. Like, so worried that I’m asking you if you have any idea what’s going on, which probably says something.”
Maybe he didn’t have any information either, but if there was anything there, Nikki wanted to know what it was.
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Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2025 5:25 pm
In her attempt to get utterly out of dodge of this – by the lord what should she even call this? A traitor's quarrel? Ex’s and Oh-No’s? Aramis very carefully side-stepped out from behind Albite; like gracefully hedging around the edges of a towering curtain caught fire. She didn’t want to be in the path of any of this, the bits of vitriol that were overflowing and leaving splash damage everywhere.
Oh no, not this miss, not she.
For her it was enough to watch under feathered lashes, to gape and gasp when the accusing bride that never was pointed at her and said ‘this one is toxic’ in so many ways without stopping to pause! Mirabilites fingers sat splayed over her chest, and she wished she’d brought popcorn to watch *Albite* of all people be dressed down – stripped bare – over his own relationship follies.
‘Next patrol I’m bringing a sitting cushion and a bagfullah edibles—my gods–Waru!?’
She didn’t know who this girl was to Albite, who she was to tell her where to place her thin-bodied trust, but? She also wasn't one to stop a sister from preaching, the two clearly needed to have it out and if it had to be around her like a river raging over rocks?
Then so be it.
She’d just – be right off to the side and out of the way for a bit—
***
It said several things, screamingly, like sirens going off amidst fourth of july fanfare—
There was no humanly possible way for him to have missed how absurdly *loud* her asking about *Fulgurite* of all people!! The library of goddamned congress didn’t contain the kind of volumes that specific as hell question broked an answer to—
Albite almost heard it too, all the words that came after everything Nikki had said. How he didn’t know if he wanted to throw himself at her and throw down or spontaneously combust just to get himself out of whatever this was! He chose a third option of neither – the ever present either or that lived in the sub-basement of his psyche.
“I didn’t think you’d come crawling back — never to me,” because even as he winced for the way she was right, the way her words cut deep and charred those wounds brutally at the edges. The same way he wanted to make clear his own words. He knew how tended to misspeak, how he might’ve intimated something other than what he’d meant before. “*We* broke up – I remember – A whole stadium of people remembers I’m sure! I’m just so ******** surprised that you’d, having said all that you just said? With that being ‘true’. Would ever want to talk to me again–– “ he huffed, and found it hard to keep from pacing. To stand his own ground, arms cinched across his middle, grinding an agitated heel into the rooftop as he glanced at Nikki and found it necessary to aim his glare just past her shoulders in order to look in that direction at all.
For everything that could’ve gone differently, for all the other ways it could’ve been if their paths had diverged one way or another. It hurt. The parts of his heart he had given, that he’d been handed back deservingly, and now here she was rubbing those glaring faults in his face.
“Since I want to kill you, right? Since the whole of the Negaverse wants you dead, yeah? As a princess freeing traitor.” The growl that slid over his teeth as he bit his lip and frowned. “And tell me – ********’ truly – when it’s my head on Lysithea’s chopping block – on *Enckes* – or Cybeles? That you would’ve, what? Come to my rescue against your own – killed them to save me – that you’d still do it now – or do your ideals only mean something if the person you’re ‘saving’ is also the person you’re ‘kissing’.”
It was stupid, and cruel, but he said it anyways. Aimed to lash out with words the way he couldn’t bring himself to do just yet with magic!
“I know what I stand for – I know that I should’ve been honest – and just because I wouldn’t leave for you didn’t make you someone lesser in my eyes — I risked everything — I walked off and let you have – whatever it was you wanted with *him* – ” and somehow he’d meandered his way back to Fulgurite. The man in the middle who suddenly *wasn't*, and who Nikki was, for some reason asking him about as if she hadn’t seen him in awhile?
When she had magical notes she could send, when Syrus – gods – Cryolite was in the mix? It was a bit of a reset button, the way his circling back staggered him and halted all his horses in a hiss and woah style of rein pulling. <********>.” and he hated this, he hated every second of it. Especially the parts where Nikki was right. “I just saw him recently.” He wouldn’t lie to her without reason, and Fulgurite had proven time and again to be aloof to him at best and hostile at worst. Almost always absent, always dodging, a curt ******** who’d pulled the people he loved away and by time the man had gotten to Syrus? Waru’d had to find some sort of acceptance in his soul, lest he ruin things with Sy the way he had with Nikki. Hell, the way he had probably already ruined them anyways?
Judging by how rarely he saw either man – the way Syrus had blown Aramis off for his own birthday — the way he couldn’t do that to Nikki again, not now, not when she’d come to risk him in order to ask after another.
His assholery had limits to it – and if he wasn’t killing her already then…..
“Have you—-” a deeply frustrated sigh, an engine cooling via steam offlet. He was trying—
“Have you tried asking his fiance? Did he at least tell you about Cryolite yet, or….”
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Posted: Sat Jan 04, 2025 5:29 pm
Wow. Albite, it turned out, didn’t know the least thing about her. Like, she was a Princess stealing traitor. That part was true. She had never once only wanted to purify people who she wanted to kiss, though. She’d tried to use the kissing to get people to like her, maybe, and that had probably been a mistake, but it had never been like she was picking and choosing based on that.
Never.
And she could stand justified in the fact that the one person who she had gotten out for real was the one who felt like something between a close friend and a cool uncle, the one who’s relationship with his husbands she’d had to help fix up and everything.
If Albite was trying to goad her on information about traitors, though, it wasn’t gonna work. She just sat there a little bit smug, letting his attempts at insults roll off her back.
“I know about Cryolite,” she said instead, although now that she thought about it, she remembered back at the beginning when she hadn’t known about him, when Fulgurite had told her he had a boyfriend but not who that boyfriend was. Had it been Albite who had finally let the name slip when they’d had their whole confrontation thing? She thought it might have been.
It had been a mess with the communication even back then.
Obviously Albite didn’t know a lot, but he knew that Fulgurite was alive. He’d seen him, and just that fact was enough to make some of the tension drop out of her shoulders even with everything else going on.
It was also clear that Albite didn’t know a lot of the details, which checked out, considering how Fulgurite was with telling people things.
“That’s why I’m worried. He broke up with both of us back in like September in this whole, like, really weird situation.” There it was. “And now he won’t even give Cryo the time of day. Best we can tell he’s, like, pushing everyone away. I’m, like, worried about his mental health.” She swallowed. “Worried he’s gonna do something drastic.”
She didn’t know why she was telling Albite this, but clearly despite his threats, he hadn’t ended up hurting Fulgurite ever. Maybe there was some way he could get through to him or something in the ways the other’s hadn’t.
There was a chance this was a dangerous thing to admit, but Fulgurite was in a dangerous situation anyway, and there was nothing else she could do to help him.
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Posted: Sun Jan 05, 2025 7:55 am
“Sorry, sorry, but to interject here, move Albite – “ and she did shove on the massive himbo hard enough that he budged to wobble on those too many inches for any man big as he already was kinda heels! That the universe had thought to gift the bull-headed b*****d with even more height than was necessary?
“Hi, dear, Nikki, yes? Good. Lovely to meet you. Sorry about the bad blood and – well – his tendency to stick his c**k in it like the world's thorniest bumblebee. He’s hiveless, this one, got no queens or manners. But— I’m Mirabilite, personal friend of the aforementioned icy one!” A swift intervention and smile like beaded pearls, her tone cutely-questioning as she played at dusting off her not at all dirty skirts and introducing herself properly. “And can we run that back a beat to where you said ‘Fulgurite’ – the fiance in question – has in fact ‘not’ been seeing Cryolite at all?” and her teeth were pearly white beneath her painted lips, the way they pinched at the edges meanly, like the look didn’t belong on her face but she had no room in her heart left for smiling right now.
“Because I – that is we?” pointing between them. “It’s Grapevine gossip of phone tag games at this point, but? We were told – very recently – something different. Weren’t we big-boy?” The look she fielded at Waru could’ve withered valleys and burnt fields asunder. “Yes. We. Were.” A well aimed trio of smacks across Albites bicep, slightly harder with every bitten off piece of the tiny little words that spelled someone's doom. “You know what? Summon him up — don’t look at me like that, Albite! This is – he’s our friend too? Whatever this heaped bull is? I want it ******** cleared. I want it cleared now.” The words hisst as she looked between Nikki, between Albite, forth and back and her mouth opened to cut the Eternal off before he tried to stop her – like she knew some excuse was coming – like Albite would deflect and defer to protect some sense of people's autonomy when, clearly? They’d lost the right to have one!
Not when lives were at stake.
“Because if Fulgurite is going to throw himself off the nearest high tower over – gods knows why? Who’s to say the person who's stopped seeing us – because he loves him so much – who is doing that same cloistered away, blanket fort, missed birthdays bullshit? I told you this. I told you it was weird, and wrong, and – who's to say he won't do the same too! That it isn’t some precursor sign!?”
“I’d expect this from you – not him – not my – our – ugh!!” And she realized she wasn’t exactly sure how Nikki fit into any of this, how the girl knew Fulgurite and Cryolite, and Albite (ex’s yes, traitor? Okay, but!?) She also knew she didn’t care in that exact moment, not for Fulgurite – a man she’d never met even the once because he was shy, or claustrophobic, and – gods the way that kind of thing made her think Syrus didn’t want them to meet because Fulgurite was a ‘bad person’ instead of the ‘right person’? For all that Waru had semi-vouched for the guy? Waru – in her personal opinion – would’ve humped a red flag pole if it waived at him nicely enough. The boy had no thoughts of self preservation within the marrow of his bones.
Syrus was not like that…..
And so now she worried more than she had been the weeks leading up to whatever this strangeness was.
”Make you a deal, Nikki…since – don’t hit me again! Jeezusss — vipress — Just — we’ll help you with Fulgurite, okay? We will, Mira. He’s ******** team and – the love thing – and ******** – if you help us with the Cryolite side of things?” he winced even as he was asking, the way this all felt taboo if necessary, the way he felt like he was going behind two very private peoples backs and just – shanking them under the ribs – but Mira and Nikki were right on all counts and the evidence mounting was too much for him to let slide under the rug anymore.
“Nothing says that we can’t work both ends against the middle for their own ******** sakes – and if I call him here now he can just keep leaving and — Maybe if Nikki talks t’him instead since she clearly has been, somehow, right?” It hurt, it hurt so much to say those words, to think that Syrus had turned to Nectaris about Matthew over all of them? Instead of them? It made a strange kind of sense too, the way it was well known that he and Matt didn’t vibe, the way he hadn’t been as welcoming as Sy’s lover as he should’ve been – of him being with Nikki – there was a ******** precedent that he’d set for it all to go wrong, wasnt there?
So the amount of sense it made in his own mind about the sudden cut off—
“For their sakes, you n me can help each other. Cause I didn’t know about the cut off, I swear, the both of them – n’Cryo wasn’t lying? He just – he’s been blowing us off without good reasons – Fulgurite tho? He made it seem like he’s been seeing Cry’ this whole time – like they were together on his birthday ********….” he wasn’t sure if he could’ve sighed more, or harder, or – and then he was looking to Nikki for ideas. With pleading eyes, with words that he couldn’t quite bring himself to ask.
He was asking though, what she knew best that he clearly didn’t, like begging for a map-path that would save a pair of very important lives.
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Posted: Sat Jan 11, 2025 8:15 pm
“I’d take you to the Moon if I could,” but she couldn’t, the Code up there got all weird about Chaos and everything, so instead she glanced over her shoulders, tried to figure out if she could feel any auras besides the ones next to her and decided that she didn’t. “But it’s fine, nobody’s watching us.”
She was pretty used to living on the edge in her interactions with the Negaverse, anyway.
“It’s super nice to meet you by the way, Mirabilite,” she said, doing her best for the good first impressions, as much as she could given the super messed up circumstances. “Your name is super cute, and your dress is somehow even cuter! I’m Nikki, yeah. Nectaris.”
A moment passed. She swallowed. “Cryolite’s girlfriend.”
Since there seemed to be some confusion about that, and where exactly she fit into the picture, she figured she could clear it up for them real quick. She did find herself wondering about this Mirabilite, and who she was, considering how, like, emotionally invested she seemed to be in Cryolite’s life. She remembered him talking about his amaunt, his pretty, gossipy bestie who he loved.
This girl seemed like she might fit some of those descriptions. Nectaris kept that thought in the back of her mind.
“So, like, yeah. I know a decent amount about what’s going on with him, and obviously I’ll see what I can do to help you cheer him up or whatever.” It was gonna be a long process, but it was already one she was committed to for Cryolite’s sake. “I don’t think it’s quite at the same level, I don’t think it’s at the point where he’s gonna hurt himself or something, but still. He’s taking the breakup thing hard. Really hard. I mean, they were engaged. It’s different than whatever was going on with me and Fulg, you know?”
Nectaris was okay. It sucked, but she could handle it with laughs with friends and bar jeopardy nights and throwing herself into her art. Cryo seemed to be having a way harder time even starting to process stuff, though.
“And yeah, we’re kinda in the same boat, figuring out that Fulgurite was hiding stuff from us and maybe not telling us the truth about some things,” she said with a shrug. “As far as I heard, Cryolite did see him in the sense of like, showing up and trying to work things out, but Fulgurite just kind of brushed him off. I don’t know anything about birthdays or whatever, though.”
Had they made up or something since the last time she’d seen Cryolite? Nikki puffed out her cheeks. Sounded fake. It was possible, though. This was why getting all your information second hand was terrible.
“Mirabilite’s right,” she decided. “We might as well just ask him.”
She would work with Albite again if it meant helping the others.
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Posted: Sun Jan 19, 2025 4:56 pm
He’d dumped them, the both of them?! It was certainly a revelation, one nearly as shocking as the reality where Nectaris — the girliest girl Albite could claim to have ever seen, ninja tactics aside! Was both Cryolite and Fulgurite's girlfriend?!! Cryolite’s current—-Fulgurites ex—- Fulgurite stacking up ex’s like quarters and then knocking them all down—- And the pair, eternal and basic combined, purple overlapping green. The way the two Senshi looked abruptly shell-shocked. Like Nikki had just dropped a sizeable bomb on them both— “C-Cryolite's girlfriend? A fiancé and a — a girlfriend? Him. And you don’t just mean ‘friend’ either, do you? Does she! You mean—“ and Mira pressed her hands over her mouth, the way she knew exactly what Nikki meant. The way she was feeling — there were no words — but that Syrus had been hiding all of this from them?! That he was dumped! And in pain! And dating Fulgurites ex somehow?! What had all this happened? Under what radar!? Why wasn’t she told!!!
“And this — this Fulgurite?! His fiancé. He dumped you both!!?” The look she leveled at Albite was some level of par-boiled simmer, the way she knew for certain he’d known something and for some reason hadn’t said!! Nikki had too many boyfriends who knew each other for Albite not to have known, even if he hadn’t mentioned it before.
But the list of things the guilty looking man at her side hadn’t been telling her, to keep her safe, because she hadn’t yet been a Senshi, and how he’d gotten Cryolite roped into it too?! This sudden trend of lying for other peoples sakes—-
“Well consider us a pair of sailors then, Nikki my dear. A whole boat crew—*you*” pointing at Albite with a fierce nail. “ — and Fulgurite? You two can be co-captains, I’ll get you matching dunce caps! The way you two do the same things as each other, keeping secrets?” Full voiced, hands on her hips, the picture of wrath. “And let me guess? For trying to protect ‘others’ is that the excuse? A terrible one, for how this all came about — how me and Cryolite are in this because *you* wanted to keep us ‘separate’ from your world and ‘apart’ from things, at least until it suited you not to, right? Until something bad enough happens and here I am! Always making decisions on your damn own without actually asking us — always. so. impulsive — “ she swore to herself that if she didn’t love this oaf?!
Oooh— why were so many good men like this!!Albite stood, looking small and thoroughly chastised, looking confused on top of the rest of it. Like he didn’t know any other way to be than silent and taking it. Like the pair of them dressing him down had brought him to heel enough to realize how far everything had spiraled out of his control. For Syrus and Fulgurite both— and in ways that made him *worry* about a guy he barely even liked!! But Syrus? Who deserved none of this— “If I could just call Fulgurite here n’then be done with it — but I pushed him t’become Eternal the same way I pushed Cryolite into — a lot of things—“
“And Nikki, ******** if it helps anything? But you should know his mother is dead, has died? I — it didn’t seem like something recent — but, ******** if we’ve ever been on good talking terms, yanno — me and Fulgurite, that is — Cryo’s never had —“ and Cryolites life wasn’t his to tell, not even to Nikki. Not when the man could do it himself if he so chose too. “And that doesn’t make any of this okay. I know, but still — maybe we just —” nervous in a thousand ways about what they were doing, and how best to handle this, and the way that Nikki wasn’t?!
How she seemed so calm when all he wanted to do was — to not be a part of this anymore — the complicated nonsense that he’d been parcel n party to. That he’d helped create beyond knowing he’d done it — ********, why couldn’t Fulgurite just have kept loving them both?!
Or would that be his fault too somehow —
“Mhm, very sad. I don’t care. You summon Cryolite here, Albite. Or so help me I’ll find someone who will!” Arms crossed in impatience, tapping her heel.
“You two…are going to get us all messily killed someday….” Against his better judgment, with it all feeling wrong, he did it. A snap decision made on the kinda of impulse he was so often known for. Chided for. Loved for. He didn’t wait, he didn’t think, he just did — Cryolite, looking dredged out of sleep, freshly panicked, rudely awoken — the way he appeared between the three of them — puffy eyed, shallowly breathing — unprepared as if he’d forgotten that this was something that could still happen to him without warning. The way he was still on the Negaverses time and tether —
Truthfully? He almost expected it to be Faustite, and when he saw the faces around him? Oh, how he realized he wished it would’ve been, that facing down the Greater General Soverign would’ve been less terrible than this.
Standing suddenly in the middle of —-
And what was Nikki even doing here?! And—
For a brief, gaping moment, Cryolite went ghostly pale, wobbled where he stood as though he’d faint. He was, well and truly, at a loss for words, for air, for understanding—
What horrid nightmare of a dream had he woken himself up into?!? One where Nikki was somehow there as well and —
He nearly bolted, the look was plastered on his face like he would in the next five seconds if someone didn’t say something! Words of staying execution— of nonsense if this really was some phantom upside down realm — something — anything!!
“You’re all here — t-together —“ it had to be a dream, he definitely needed to go!!
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Posted: Sat Jan 25, 2025 6:10 am
“Girlfriend,” Nectaris confirmed, honestly kind of enjoying the shocked look that flitted over both of their faces. “Yes, he’s gay. Yes, I’m ace. Yes, we’re making it work.” Maybe later she could tell them more about that part of the story. Mira seemed like the kind of girl who would appreciate a tea-spilling session about how they’d not actually mentioned their orientations until after they’d started kissing. She seemed fun to talk to in general, and she certainly had the right idea about Albite. Nectaris had to stifle a giggle as she started going off about his bad decisions. She hadn’t known that Fulgurite’s mom was dead, and she tucked that information away for later. “Maybe that’s part of what’s going on with him, but,” she squinted. On some level, she agreed with Mirabilite on that one, too. She had her own family tragedies. Maybe her sympathy wasn’t what it should have been. “I dunno. I don’t think that’s the main thing that’s sending him on this whole weird spiral thing.” Cryolite might not have known a ton about Fulg’s family, but he would’ve had to notice something as drastic as that if it was recent, right? She couldn’t help an eye roll as Albite went to summon Cryolite. “Oh. Us getting messily murdered by the Negaverse is suddenly a lot less beautiful and tragic or whatever when they’re also coming after you, huh?” She wondered if making him stare down her weapon would make him less likely to wax poetic about starseeds and destiny-crossed souls or whatever. Maybe that was something she could test out later, when they weren’t making deals. For right now there was Cryolite to worry about, and she was running over to him, reaching to his hand. He looked kinda sleepy and out of it, so she was pretty sure he was gonna need some emotional support before talking to a hot mess express and a very sassy lady. “They said they’d talked to Fulgurite,” she explained. “And then they said they hadn’t talked to you.” That about summed it up, right?
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:29 pm
The urge to faint or flee lingered, a glacial crawl of frayed nerves and ice along his spine. He felt dizzy with it, even as he found his hands in Nikki’s own. He looked at her, well and truly, expecting a lifeline to save him from his drowning and what he found instead?
A lovely pink anchor with his name written all over it —
Her hands were so warm, but her words? Oh, they sank him, pitted him to his core. He wanted to feel betrayed — a tiny part of him did — but then there was the reality of them all being together — looking at him expectantly. Like he held some grand key in his non-existent words, had some dawning new revelation to bear. He squeezed Nikki’s hand back so tightly—
***
“You might as well stay and talk it out Cry,” the way it didn’t sound like she was asking so much as telling him to.”Go on and listen to your new girl, mmhn? Because we’re here for you pretty boy — and so, apparently, is she.” The way Mira could only shake her head for how crestfallen Syrus looked, for how feelings landed in the strangest places.
For how she’d always thought Syrus was too smart to get himself caught up in something like this—
How she’d been wrong. Syrus was fallible, human, graceless when in love. A shooting star of a human being.
Their brilliant golden boy, always one letter grade ahead, always working so hard and studying even harder. And yet? All his brains had gotten him was heartbreak it seemed, a little pit of loneliness to call his own. It hurt her to watch — to know Syrus had someone he’d cared for that they’d never meet in person — not outside of this — the way Fulgurite? Might as well have been a fictional character in her mind. A faceless bit of gossip, entirely make believe, even if albite claimed to have met him and Syrus swore on the man’s name like a death bed.
Real friends let their friends meet their significant others — bad blood or not between them — and so she wouldn’t be the one to dig him out here, to save Syrus from himself when he hardly needed saving, and how the peanut gallery at her side had gone almost eerily silent in anticipation for what came next.
Was it really months ago they’d been on opposite sides of another just like this? Syrus mad at Waru over the suddenness with which she’d become a Senshi; a circumstantial mishap that she couldn’t be happier with! It was nobody's fault that it’d happened, robbed of soul at sword point was such a rarity.
Where it was her being on the receiving end of his encouragement then to hash things out— and they finding her irate at being lied to by them both under the guise of ‘protection’ slathered in ‘we love you’s’. A honey trap she didn’t care to fall for—
The way she wouldn’t budge for it now, not when Syrus should’ve simply told them instead of dodging their calls and visits and any attempt at socializing!
It all made so much more sense now—-
His ‘girlfriend’ was the enemy. His fiancé? A man Waru disliked when he disliked almost no one else — save maybe the blue bird General who had stabbed him and turned her — Was MIA. Mira’s poor, poor boy was in a right mess — she might have wanted to hide away too.
Had she been anyone other than herself. The way Syrus could only be who he was.
***
He had so many more questions now than answers — about how this had all come to pass and how he’d been caught out and how he never expected *Nikki* — but shouldn’t he have?
“I told you, Nikki — that I — that I stood them up for my birthday — that I stood — our amant up? I’m so sorry Mira, truly I…”
He didn’t want them to be here, he didn’t want to do this, not this way!
“And I’m clearly not happy that neither of you believed my very obvious lie….but you, you two actually managed to talk to him? When — how?!” Mira’s smirk told him she hadn’t, and the way she thumbed at Albite — and how that made so much more sense — Aramis didn’t know what the man looked like and Waru did and — and Matt hadn’t done him the courtesy of warning him they would be coming?! That either of them had grown tired enough of the brush off that they’d gone looking for Matt at all!?
All of a sudden, out of the blue!
Not that Matt could’ve possibly known, he realized, what story he’d told Aramis that night. How Waru wouldn’t know either, and didn’t that make him perfect to send snooping? To simply talk to Matt and relay it back and wait for Aramis to decide to make a move —
But they hadn’t yet, neither of them, not until right now – even though they’d dragged him here without warning. He knew it had to have been Nikki at the helm of this open communications plan.
“M—Fulgurite could’ve told me you know…warned me…” he whined and he couldn’t watch Mira’s disappointment or Waru’s storminess.
But Matt hadn’t, had he? No calls no texts no hate mail no heads up troubles coming — so much nothing for so long a time —
“I don’t…I don’t know what any of you want me to say? What you’re expecting! I don’t even know why you dragged me out here!? Either of you could’ve — you could’ve done anything other than this — summoning me —“ wry hisst, all defensive of his own self even as he slid closer to Nikki’s side.
“It can’t be that bad….this…and I’m just trying…” the defensiveness gave way to upset so quickly, to boiled over frustration. “I’m trying to get him back. I really, really am — I can — I will — if I have more time?” Like he was pleading but he wasn’t sure anymore who with. The belief that if he lied a little longer and kept all the chaos he knew Matt didn’t like very far away? If he parted ways with his fiancé’s enemies! If he made his world small and quiet enough that Matt could live in it — just the two of them tightly wound together into an inseparable little ball —- and then there had been Nikki? And he’d done the thing he’d learned to do from all the others he’d learned anything good from!
He carved a space out for her in his head and said ‘yes, you too’, heart of his heart and love of his love and so it was only right that he made the attempt?!
And if it became something more than friendship…
No more than he had already, similar enough, and Waru and Aramis weren’t some vapid practice round in the game of life, but they had prepared him to handle at least this much! Gods — and he thought about how they should’ve all moved in together by now — and planned a wedding — and — and ******** purified to be with Nikki all together at the end!!! He should’ve met Matt’s family and Matt should’ve met his friends!!
Even if it was just to say goodbye one last time before leaving them—-
“Because I don’t know what else to do anymore…I’m sorry, Nikki. But I just don’t —“ he didn’t want to go on without the man, anything but that, even into her loving embrace? To leave Matt the way he was and act like the man never mattered, like he still didn’t hold a sizable chunk of his heart?! To go, while thinking: ‘oh I guess he’ll just fade off into non-existence and die while I get to go on and be happy!’
He hadn’t exhausted every option yet — there were still things to try — he had hope! The hope that even from the other side he could convince the man he still loved so much to join him, if not in order, then at least in living more than whatever dismal, cloistered life he suspected Matt had now?
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:30 pm
As soon as Cryolite turned up, it seemed like the others were circling him like sharks, giving him dirty looks without actually asking any questions that he could give them answers too. That hadn’t been what Nikki wanted, either, not really.
She returned the squeeze to Cryolite’s hand, stepped close to him and just a little in front of him, like she could protect him if she needed to. For some reason, she didn’t think that magic and punches were the main things that she was going to need to watch out for here, though.
That wasn’t the kind of thing that broke hearts.
“Sorry,” she murmured. “I didn’t know that this random person I ran into on patrol was going to be amaunt.”
She paused, glanced at the way that Waru stood a little by himself, now, how he wouldn’t talk now that he’d done it and brought Cryolite into the picture.
Then she looked back at Cryolite with all of that adoration in her eyes. “I trust you,” she told him. “I do.”
She did. If there was anyone who could help here, who could cut through whatever was happening here and come through on the other side, preferably with Fulgurite in tow? It was him.
She wanted him to get out, though. She didn’t want Cryolite being Chaos to be Fulgurite’s only lifeline So, she was getting creative.
“I’m just, I’m trying to help, too,” she said. “Which means, like, trying to talk to people, whoe'er I can, since I can’t just, like, show up at his work the way you can.”
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:32 pm
His visage crumpled as he stared into hers. All the things he didn’t want to face, and here they were; standing before him, staring him down, demanding of him things he couldn’t even bring himself to come up with answers for — but hadn’t he brought this on himself in a way?
Syrus shook his head, laughing wretchedly to himself as he faced her, “It’s not your fault, Nikki. I mean —“ swallowing down his own jagged responsibility as he tugged her closer still. “This is our doing, isn’t it?” Slow realization laced with a sad smile, beaded with pain. “We forced you out of the loop — and without me knowing — he pushed you away — I — I haven’t been doing any better. I’m just as bad as Fulgurite sometimes...”
The proof was standing at his heels like nipping dogs, silently, the pair he could feel waiting with building apprehension for him to say something. For her to give them a task they could sink their collective teeth into.
“I’m no better at all — trying to cut the people I claim to love out. Not even to spare them, just myself…” the admission felt hard, the way he couldn’t quite meet the others eyes, the way Nikki held his attention because it seemed the safer space to land for all his falling and failure.
“Because I felt ashamed.”
“I’m supposed to be smarter than this, aren’t I? I’m — this clever prince — I have my life together — I should know better than to act alone, but I — I wanted to be the thing Fulgurite could depend on — to be enough for him and a friend to you. I pushed this on him, the ring? I thought if I did it my way I could fix it without—“ Without involving her, or Aramis, or Waru — and to realize they’d all be involving themselves anyway? That he’d gone soo far off the usual that those closest to him had noticed. That they’d gone behind his back to do something about it, finally.
That Nikki would too, not behind him, but directly. The way he felt she’d have this sorted out if he only threw open the doors and —
And burned Fulgurites world to the ground around him—
Cryolite didn’t know what was stopping him from doing it now? What sad, small hope he was holding out for when he knew he’d be leaving, that this messy reunion would be near his last.
But if he could leave Matt a lifeline in the dark? A way out of the tunnel - even if he couldn’t do it himself, not from the shaky ground he found himself on in the negaverse, but if they could push and pull from both sides?
“I’m so sorry…and you couldn’t have known…I’ve never called Mira anything other than my amant, have I? She’s demanding of titles that way—“ a soggy smile, deep breaths, and he did shift his gaze over to the others. Long enough to offer a small apology with his eyes before looking quickly back to Niki again. He could see Mira’s heartbreak, Albites tension. He didn’t want to press on either thing just yet, not out here in the open for all the world to see.
So — Nikki — since you can’t — and we can — what do you suggest we should do? Clearly they don’t mind barging into his work without notice —
And I’m willing to talk to his father. Sooner rather than later I suppose —” but how to broach the rest of the subject? To ask what he did with his leaving, to beg of the others to handle things when he was gone?
He didn’t know how well it’d go over with — gods — and the longer the silence loomed the more he realized that Waru was the one he was worried about more than Aramis —
“If any of you have ideas of how I could ******** this scenario…because I’m at a loss…and I know…Mira I know…I owe you..and Albite..we’ll…we’ll talk? We’ll fix this. But I need to try and save my ex-fiancé first…”
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:33 pm
“I wanted to be the thing that he could depend on, too,” whispered Nectaris.
The memory of their last real conversation came to her unbidden, and it hurt. It had been so long that she didn’t remember his exact words anymore, but she remembered his warmth, remembered the frightened look on his face that had broken into hints of a smile when he’d looked at her.
He’d said that she was going to be his rock on the other side, that she was going to be the thing that kept him going.
Then he’d vanished.
“I wanted to be the heroic one.” It was said to Cryolite, but she could still feel Albite’s gaze on her, and she took a shaky breath, because this moment was all about brutal honesty, wasn’t it? It was about admitting your mistakes.
“But I was actually being really, like, immature, and maybe a little bit manipulative, and not totally honest with myself, and I know I made a mess of a couple of different situations.”
Then she dropped the pretense and looked straight at Albite. “And, like, don’t get me wrong, I’m still not happy with you.” She’d given him the lecture. She still stood by it. “But. I might not have been the best person either, back then. Yeah.”
She took a deep breath. The tension here was awful. She squeezed Cryolite’s hand.
“And I do think you should try talking to his dad! I meant it. I think that’s probably the best way to get through to him at this point. But, with them,” then there could be something for when Cryolite left, she thought, but she couldn’t say that. She might have been all about the brutal honesty but even she knew better than to let that one slip. “Then maybe you wouldn’t have to do all this talking and worrying by yourself.”
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:36 pm
Syrus wanted to weep, for how Nikki should’ve gotten the chance to be the hero, the work he knew she’d put in to trying to save not only Matt, but also himself, and oh how he’d done little else than stall it all up and drag their progress to further halts.
‘You are dependable—‘ He didn’t yet say. ‘You are heroic—‘ He thought at her through misty eyes, wiping at his face carelessly before all he could do was — was cling — uselessly infantile, but he wanted her to feel it. He needed her to know all the words that weren’t for anyone’s ears but hers.
To write her poetry and tell her that she was enough, they it wasn’t her fault things had fallen through the cracks and shattered just this way. To be made of stronger stuff than ice and princely sparkles as the girl with the pinkest curls poured her entire heart out. The honesty of it all startling as he couldn’t help but hold his breath, glancing between Nikki and Waru, waiting for some other shoe to drop—
Albite stiffened like he’d been struck, statuesque beneath the weight of Nikkis gaze; the intensity which left no question in his mind as to who she was aiming her words at. He didn’t want to call it an apology, couldn’t bring himself to even try and begin disassembling into consumable bits of emotions; to pluck from this mess the kinds of feelings he could stand to speak on without sounding unnecessarily bitter and sharp.
Better to not say anything just yet, to bite his tongue and hold out as he scrambled his own thoughts for – ******** – something like an answer to any of this?! A genuine solution, because everything out of Syrus? Out of Nikki? It begged more questions than it answered, even as his anger bled out in a derisive, overboiled huff of a hissed breath; like he would’ve preferred to hold onto it rather than let go.
He wanted to ask an overwhelming number of things: how everything had gotten to this point, how Nikki and Syrus had in spite of themselves and how direct he knew her to be – how smart he knew Sy’ to be – gotten into this hell of a situation?! Why Matt’s head wasn’t on some neat little spike next to a fern in that pretty, inherited, flower store—
Ah, there was the anger again! Running warm and familiar in his veins, unhinging his jaw briefly. “It’s hard—-“ he swallowed, “to be better.” The words metered out slow, careful. “Whatever you think you weren’t then, Nikki? I’m still not now…” it was harder than he’d thought it would be, to find the correct words. To speak past the clot of needles in his throat and assuage whatever old wounds still needed lancing between them.
To face hee as an enemy and not tear her down. But the look on Sys face? Down bad, shredded apart, full of love. He hadn’t realized how attached the man was to Matt, let alone Nikki! For him, he could try, in the face of her brutal honesty?
He could try —
To help his friend by, ********, helping his enemies? Helping Matt, if that’d soothe something for the pair.
For Syrus, I can. I owe him that much—
“I don’t know if we’ll ever be ‘happy’ with each other. Not when I treated you like…and how I made you ********..” the wind don’t stay in his sails. His gaze didn’t stay locked on the pair; shoeing each other up and leaving him feeling greedy and cold in places for it. A messy mix — and how had Syrus not already met the man’s father?!
But no — no — this wasn’t about him, technically? Was it. He wouldn’t ******** pry at the obvious—- not with them looking at him like that and Mira gently scratching for his attention.
“Good job big boy, that was almost a proper apology there.” Mira sighed good naturedly, patting Waru on the arm like he’d done half a trick, but would still get patronizingly praised for it.
“All these feelings— it’s a right beautiful mess we’re in, isn’t it?” Her words lacked blame, it was a simple observation of facts and through Nikki’s words she saw a solution laid out clearly. Nails tracing Albites tats and the tension that stayed in the skin beneath them as she spoke.
“For what it’s worth, Nikki? I don’t believe in ‘try’ — he will to talk to this — Fulgurite? Tsk, ‘********’ father — no ifs, no ands, no butts! Cry will, or we will —“ She could imagine which Syrus preferred more, which Albite prefered more even, judging by the flinch like a horse's withers under her palm.
“And if it all falls through after that? After we’ve — exhausted these ultimatums — and committed straight up crimes to do it.” A stern sort of thoughtfulness to her tone. “In the name of your love.”
“Then he’ll leave him.” A single brow arched in challenge, a tone that brooked no argument, but she saw one coming anyways, from Waru who hated severing even the most toxic of ventures, from Syrus who looked like he was wilting on the girl's arms. But she wouldn’t hear it — not from the boys — not about something so serious as this!
“Don’t give me that look, love. You know that’s how this has to be. Even she knows it — look at her! Look at yourself! Love has its limits, Cry. You can love the man again after he's healthy — after he’s gotten some help — cause I’m sure none of this would’ve happened if you weren’t putting your ‘love’ first, hmm?” She tsk’d, foot put down, and she briefly looked sad, felt the hurt the pair before her was projecting tug at her brittle heart strings.
“Not the you I know. Acting like you’re alone in this — like this— uff —your unacknowledged ex is alone? When either of you are clearly anything but!”
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:38 pm
None of this was actually about Albite, not really. She’d said her piece. She’d admitted that what she’d done in the past might not have been the best, and if he was gonna be over there admitting to her face that he hadn’t learned anything from the past and that he was gonna continue to be a terrible person, then that was on him. If Cryolite was gonna cling to her and step behind her a little and be having a hard time answering these questions even though these people were supposed to be people that he cared about, she could accept that, too, and just squeeze his hand a little.
“He will,” she said to Mirabilite, who seemed like the most sensible person around right now. She seemed to have a handle on Albite. She wondered if any of that would extend to Cryolite, as well.
If it wasn’t, maybe she was gonna have to see what she could do.
“Talk to the dad, I mean. I know you’ll do that.” She let the sentence hang in the air for a second, glanced at the way that Cryolite looked a little bit like a dejected puppy.
It made her not want to be as brutally honest as she could be sometimes. She didn’t wanna break his heart any more than it was already hurting, but on the other hand? If nothing gave with Fulgurite in the long term, she couldn’t bear to lose Cryolite too.
If he kept hanging on forever, that was what it was gonna be, wasn’t it?
“And I know she’s right about the rest, too,” she said, quieter than she sometimes talked.
“It sucks.” She’d been mostly fine, but the tears started threatening again at that second. “It’s like ripping out your own heart, but there’s a point where, like, holding on isn’t doing anything but making it worse for both of you.”
She turned to look Cryolite in the face. “And in this case, a point where you have to help yourself before you can help anyone else.”
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