Welcome to Gaia! ::

With more pieces coming together and another trip leaving him with one more of those mysterious vials, Aloysius had more to think on. A folk tale, some sort of hidden box on another planet, and yet another vial that might show him something useful or at least another glimpse into a past he’d never had access to before.

Open books lay on his desk next to his notebook, some on folk tales and others on space. It had only been a few moments that the mirror had shown him something, not nearly long enough to have an exact idea of whether any of the photos he looked through might be it. There hadn’t been any symbols that stood out in that memory he’d had, fuzzy as it had felt with that wave of feeling that had come alongside it.

This time, he had an idea of what to expect, at least he felt like he did. This time, he was pacing, contemplating things for a moment as he looked towards his office door. A locked door wasn’t common when his husband knew he was home and in his office. It would be fine if he knew what might happen, the last time having left him out of breath for the moment and coughing the next.

Giving one last look at the door, he left it unlocked and walked back to his desk. Resting his palms on the desk, one on each side of the open notebook which held the current lineup of notes and theories he had, he scanned over them and the quick sketch he’d thrown down of the face he’d seen in that flash of a memory. Who were they? They felt important in a way, someone close to Hamelin perhaps…

Shaking his head, he looked at the vial as the liquid jittered with each tap of his fingers on the desk. It was simple enough, not something that had poisoned or harmed him before.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Picking up the vial, he uncorked it and threw it back, the action scratching an old itch in the back of his throat as he stood there for a moment with his head back and eyes cast toward the ceiling. In a brief moment, he almost thought he felt rain on his face, but that thought never got a chance to settle into his mind before something else broke through.

***

“Another one is missing, one of the newer recruits,” said the voice. The man before him looked tired, with dark bags beneath dim eyes. Their face looked apologetic, as if the report was already known to be lacking. It wouldn’t be the first one like this, nor would it be the last. Not everyone was cut out for this, and he had wondered if some of those missing had left of their own volition.

“I’ll look, it’s my turn to do the rounds in this storm anyway,” Hamelin responded. Pushing back from the table, the papers scattered over its surface had symbols from each of the visiting knights. Some were crossed out, their photos removed from the paperwork, and instead pinned up on a board that he passed as he left the room.

Behind him, his fellow knight just sighed and went off to rest in their room. The ones left were tired, meeting up before splitting back off to look over each of their wonders for those who were missing.

The sea raged, spurred on by the storm, sending waves crashing over barriers and flooding some places already. Something had been happening to bring more of these storms to the planet, but the cause hadn’t been discovered yet.

There was that sense of urgency as he scanned over the ground and buildings ahead, looking for anyone. The further he looked, the more he thought he saw movement in the darkness between each wave of pelting rain.

“Who’s there?!” he called out, yelling to be heard through the storm. No response came, just the continuation of the rain and crackling lightning. Even the movement he thought he’d seen looked to have stopped.

As his foot crossed into the shadows, he felt something hit him. With how cold he felt from the rain, it took him a moment to look down and see two hands and a blade. It was so quick, too quick for him to parse if they were familiar or not, only by their hands.

Grabbing at them with one hand, he felt fabric rip before they ran off. Part of their uniform stayed in his hand as he leaned against the wall, a familiar symbol looking back at him as he slid down to the ground and held pressure on his wound. It had been a clumsy attack, someone not used to where things were, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t bleeding any less. It didn’t mean he wasn’t any less shocked by the entire situation.

“s**t.” Wooziness overcame him, and the floor came up to greet him along with darkness.

***


Standing in his office, Aloysius couldn’t control the yelp that came out as the memory freed him, and his knees buckled. Everything was still spinning as he tried to make sense of it all. Vaguely, he felt sharp fragments in his skin, but it felt far away in the moment.

Everything still felt hazy as he heard a sound, leaving him flinching away from it as he pulled his arms in around his stomach for a moment. The rain was gone, he was home, but it had hit harder this time. Was it because he’d seen someone else there, or because this wasn’t the first time he’d done this? Would it get worse each time? So many thoughts about the risks and what information there might be about these vials had his mind spinning more as he tried and failed to take metered breaths.

Hissing slightly as he felt the glass under his side and arm, he finally looked up wide-eyed towards whoever had come in. Echoing the last words he’d heard in that memory, he pushed back away from his husband and tried to look for the vial. “s**t.”

Seeing the drops of gold on the floor and then the trail of glass, he finally managed to heave himself up to a sitting position as he backed into his desk. Looking up at Liam, he found himself at a loss for words and scrambled with them slightly.

“I can explain,” he said as he raised his hands up dismissively. Only now he noticed the tears in his sleeve and the small spots of red that started to stain the fabric.

It took another few seconds for him to realize why things were blurry as he pressed a palm to his temple and noticed his glasses weren’t on anymore. They’d probably ended up under his desk, something to deal with later, but with Liam reaching for him and pulling him up, he felt disoriented.

“Watch for glass, something broke, and I need my contacts or one of my spare pairs of glasses at some point.” Leaning on them a bit more, he squeezed his eyes shut for a moment as he tried to shake off the last bit of dizziness from things.

He could almost feel the fabric that had been torn off in that memory on his fingertips; it had been thick and more akin to the material from colder places. But it felt like it wasn’t something he knew of, not exactly, and that was what left him rubbing the pad of his thumb over the side of his index finger as if he was trying to feel for it again.

Letting Liam pull him along was easier than trying to stumble down the hall a few rooms to the bathroom, so he didn’t fight it.

Though when the light came on, he flinched at the brightness of it before leaning against the counter. Looking down at his sleeve and side, he frowned. It was hard to get clothing that fit just right, and fixing something like this wasn’t in his wheelhouse. Maybe Sakura could, he thought as he turned his arm slightly to look at where most of the glass had gotten him. Now he saw some of the gold liquid on it too, not more than a few drops, but it left him stuck with very few options of how to explain things.

Hearing something drop into the sink and connecting it to what his husband said, he only shook his head before moving to sit on the counter since he wanted to avoid moving much while things were getting looked at. The whole process of actually taking care of things, or in this case, having his husband help, still felt off in a way.

“With the sleeve, yes, I can manage the buttons though.” Which he started to do with his left hand, the one that wasn’t currently scratched up. A thought hit him as he managed to get the last buttons undone and slide his left arm out of the sleeve. Of course, it would be the one arm that hadn’t had any scars that got glass in it this time. Though he was certain that if he’d gotten glass where the burn was on his left ribs, then at least it wouldn’t sting and itch as it did right now.

“I was working with something related to the mirrors we saw earlier this year. I guess it could be said that shattered glass tends to come along with my discoveries when it comes to that,” he grumbled.

Just in case, he wiped the corner of his mouth and looked down at his thumb, glad to see he hadn’t missed a spot there at least this time. “I must have knocked my glasses under my desk, sorry if I worried you, darling.” Looking over towards his husband, things were fuzzy, but not more than how they usually were without glasses or contacts.

Tensing at the mention of the liquid, he tried to avoid commenting on that for now. “Not directly this time, just looking into some things.” It would have been easier if Portia had answered questions before corrupting, but things hadn’t been ideal. All the things she could have known were just gone now.

“Good, I hoped would could avoid going to Lorcan for something like this.” At least since it seemed small enough. That didn’t mean it didn’t sting, though, and as he looked over at the shards of glass, he groaned.

The disinfectant hurt more than the glass, leaving him holding onto the edge of the counter next to his thigh as they worked. Something shifted as his husband offered help again, as usual, and with their track record, it might end up with Liam going ahead and poking into things without him mentioning it much as they’d done with some of his team.

Reaching over with his left hand again, he ruffled his husband’s blonde hair. “If it could be done with a mirror, then of course. But I think it might be best not to look into things with me,” he said softly. It wasn’t as if he would be joining the enemy; he just needed to know more, and at this point, the questions were far surpassing the answers he’d gotten.

At the mention of the holidays, he flinched. It wouldn’t be long until the next batch of magical nightmares decided to come out to play. It meant that he would have to adjust his timeline accordingly if he wanted to avoid the randomness and trouble that came with the winter snow.

“I can help you if you would like. However, Melody and I never really decorated while we lived here. There were too many other things going on.” At least not after his grandfather had gotten sick; there were too many things to get in order on top of hospital visits and conversations with lawyers and accountants. All the while, his father had circled like a vulture.

“I can rest after we clean my desk off I need to put some things away first.” Leaning forward, without disturbing the rest of the first aid process, he pressed a kiss to their cheek in return.

With a slight nod, he was okay enough with those terms. “You know, the only time I get injured is when all that unaligned unpleasantness decides to come after me. But I will, of course, keep an earring with me as always and leave one for you if that will help.”

Leaning into them, he half-hugged them with his free arm. “More good memories are never a bad idea. You really have made it a home here for me again.” Smiling slightly as his husband worked to fix his hair, he already wanted to play with it just a bit more. Maybe later, but for now, he looked over his arm and then slid off the counter to turn and grab the pair of glasses from the medicine cabinet. Having a few back-ups scattered throughout the bathrooms in the manor hadn’t been a bad idea. While he normally thought that his husband might be a bit too quick to buy things in bulk, this was probably one of the better uses for that habit of theirs.

Now able to see clearly, he looked down at the bandages and then at his side. “I normally avoid breaking bottles; this one happened to break by accident.” Before they both left the bathroom, though, he placed a hand on the door to keep it shut as the mention of the liquid came back up.

“Not out there, I will tell you where I got it, but otherwise, I have only vague ideas as to the exact contents of it.” Leaning in close so he could whisper, he hesitated for a moment before thinking on that feeling of familiarity he’d had.

“I got the first vial on mercury, and another while looking into things during the storm elsewhere…” Pausing, he rested his hand on Liam’s shoulder and thumbed at their cheek. “You know my place is here, but… seeing Neptune in that mirror was the furthest from coincidence, I just know it.” Leaning back as he looked at them, icy eyes looking for if his husband thought him insane.

“There is still a lot I might not understand, but… perhaps I was Hamelin before.” Leaving that there to hang in the air, he pulled his hand back from the door and then through his bangs as he sighed. “Memories are what the gold liquid brings, and more questions than answers.”

“I am being careful, as much as I can be. I need to be here if I want to see how things get decorated or see what you can convince Melody to decorate with when it comes to the venue. I also have things I want to achieve, so I need to look into any viewpoints on matters.” While they were still two different sides, order and chaos, with the fact that there were ancient aliens around, it also meant that what might be lost knowledge is now accessible again.

“I trust it even less, but I would worry about you following along. I might be able to keep the fact that I am a general hidden, but you have wings, and those are not easily hidden.” With a light chuckle, he relaxed a bit more.

Fixing things was what Liam did best, and it made him glad to hear that they were going to keep making things better here. In part, the fact that his husband would be busy decorating or looking into things meant he wouldn’t be out in the thick of things and would be away from danger.

Feeling things click into place, each response fitting snugly within expectations, it made some of that worry about being found out by his husband fade away. The encouragement felt odd in a way, though, given he couldn’t exactly share his intentions with others without earning extra scrutiny.

“Mercury was far too cold, desolate, and at the time it was storming viciously.” It hadn’t been a high point of his explorations, but if anything, it solidified that he wasn’t as much of a threat to the knight at the time. There needed to be a level of understanding at least, to get one of them to let him go off planet, which could go wrong, as his husband said.

“I will let you know, only you, since I doubt it would greatly effect my ability to function as a general if they assumed I might defect.” Pressing a kiss to their forehead, he pulled them back away from the door so he could open it.

“Trust me on things,” he said softly as they encouraged his curiosity more. It felt good to hear, even better knowing that he had someone watching his back just in case.

“Back out to the living room now, just lock my office when we pass it, and we can clean up in there later. I am curious what sort of decorations you found in storage. They must be older than either of us.” Opening the door and nudging them ahead, he turned the sink on for just a moment to wash the last few drops of red and gold down the drain before following behind.