Welcome to Gaia! ::

The shiver was appropriate for this: in all their time on Gaia, Kians more violent tendancies were directed either at himself or at Yashima. The fox taunted him mercilessly on his appearance and relationship with Autsu. Iamel had teased him as well but it had always come off as jest. Jest was fine. Cruelty was not. Even then, even as Autsu pulled away, Kian leaned in just slightly, grazed fingertips down the dark arms so close to himself, still found comfort in warm skin and the familier feel.

"He won't believe a word I tell him. It is best that you do," Kian shook his head and gently pushed Autsu away even more so he could stand up. His tail flicked. "Perhaps it is best. I would lie. Do not tell him about her."

Orders. Orders, orders, order. He had asked/told Autsu what to do in the past, led him places, requested he get something, but they were never full out flat orders, never something that could be construed as fully taking grasp of what power Autsu had given him with an unspoken statement.

His fingers itched, twitched against his palm. Unconciously, they tightened to the point that nails dug into the swell of his his hand. A flash of pain, quickly dulled, and Kian gave a quick, white, dangerous smile. "To your house? I wish her to be near trees."

Patrick was, in fact, worrying over his alien son in the living room. There was a home-rolled cigarette dangling between painted fingertips. A stream of smoke twisted from his lips. Patricks eyes were half hooded as they slid up at the sounds of footsteps, however light.

Despite all of that, he was instantly on his feet when he saw that was Autsu. Those previously cloudy eyes had brightened into anxious upset.

"Yeah?" He said, as on edge spoken as he was seen. "He - Yeah, I saw you broke my door. S'allright. What about him? Is he alright? What's wrong?"

A pause.

"Did he kill Yashi?"

"Yashi's run off with his boyfriend. Kian might've hunted him down and skinned him?" He wagered with a heavy frown. Patrick let himself lean against the arm of the chair, his fingers pressed tight against the plush covered wood. "But he would've said something if that was the case."

Another hesitation and Patrick walked to Autsu, stared up at the young man. He never got the chance to know the other alien very well. All he had been privy to, in fact, was the knowledge that Kian relied on him heavily as several things, that he had been hurt in the past, and that he would tear off anyone's head who threatened the three-eyed alien. Patrick approved of him more than he had approved of, say, Diacyn.

Not hard to do, but still.

"Thanks, Autsu," Patrick said finally, before Autsu could move away. "I mean it. I - well, ********, I have no idea what's going on or what's bothering him - but he knows he can come to me for s**t. He usually talks to me, you know? This kind of freaks me out.

"You're the only one he really trusts. So - uh. Thanks. Doesn't mean much coming from me, does it?" A bright smile, quick as lightening. "But he probably won't ever say it the way he means it. He likes those weird strawberry candy things, the ones next to the fridge. If you all are leaving, you should take some of those. Okay?"

A vague gesture was made to the kitchen; Patrick hopped back. "'Sides, it wasn't like this was your fault. He would have told me. If it was."

"Yeah, it will be. Until then, don't guilt about s**t. Sometimes we can't help what we do, ya'know?Do what you gotta, when you gotta, and do it without regrets. Otherwise, you'll be damning yourself," Patrick called to Autsu. "And don't forget the candy!"

By that time, Kian had a stack of small papers and pictures on the couch. If Autsu caught glimpse of the top photo, he would see mounds of bodies with a single eye, just like Kians third, and skin as dark as their own - a race of peoples with six arms and agonized expressions, their flesh ripped apart by what would appear to be energy guns and crude knives. There were children amongst them. Infants.

Kian did not look at them. Instead, he had a figure as tall as Autsu wrapped in a pale blue blanket. The face that showed was feminine and delicate with slanted blue eyes. Ears like a kitten shaped two small tents, soft parted lips gave way to an almost wistful expression amongst the bruises and shallow cuts. Kian was stroking her cheek.

When Autsu entered, the dark man looked up, eyes hooded with something flat. He was shuttered off from Autsu save for the mildest of smiles, the faintest of twitches.

"I used to look like this," he said, looking back down at his mother, "But with harder cheeks and larger ear. Then again - we all look like this. I prefer how I appear now."

Big words from a man who had once attempted to mutilate himself. He took his mother in his arms and stood, held the thawing body to him. She was still stiff with cold and a small frost of ice melted down her cheeks in a mockery of tears.

"What did they say?"

Kian leaned into the touch, grateful, as his higher eyed dropped closed. The rest of them slid towards Autsu, fingers tight about the corpse even still.

"A pyre," he agreed. For another moment, Kian was silent, his expression contemplative. "I would ask Akuti, but she - It is probably best that I do not."

Akuti would cry. Kian knew she would cry if she knew of his mother, of his pain. She would try to hug or comfort him, and that was something he honestly wished would not come from the soft little woman. Autsu was one thing - Autsu knew everything. He could sympathize with the causing of your own Hell, with seeing it spread over your existance. Kian was everything he didn't want to be, she was everything he had tried to protect. The dreams had faded, finally, although he suspected that Autsus dreams had not. He had heard him, at one point.

So, he held the body closer, and shrugged. It my hve come to a cold comfort to his lover had he knew the utter gratitude that Kian was holding for him. Autsu was the steady thing in his life, his rock.

For now he was here. That was enough.

"Your car?"

It was so, and the trip was silent. Kian didn't speak during the trip and on the rare chance Autsu may have attempted, he did not respond. The alien just stared out the window, the quickly thawing body held close to him. He was growing damp - andd the sunlight as they got out didn't help any.

Kniene was met without the nod he would have usually given the older man. Instead, Kian just offered up his mother. "She's still frozen. Will she burn?"

'Wounded' would have been an accurate way to describe Kian. Once his mother was in Kniene's arms, he was back to Autsu. A tick on his friends hide, Kian kept close enough to snake his hand around one of Autsus arms, the one nearest to him. Fingers locked around an equally dark wrist, he didn't flinch even as Kniene wandered away with his mother.

He started towards that fire, the one that would be finishing the job the creatures had began. Poor Autsu, now the thing of comfort for his leader, was tugged along with him. Kian didn't look towards the fire, not when Kniene got ever closer to it with his mother.

"We have no words for the dead," Kian said, abrupt. "No one dies. They get old and they cease to be remembered. I don't what -"

Cut off, he squeezed against Autsus wrist. He wanted to hug his friendloversecondwhatever and lean and cry and forget the last four days had ever existed. When he had been first sent to Gaia, he hadn't mourned his family and what life he had lost. He had been angry, violently so. Kian had vented on his new father, his plastic blocks, anything he could until meeting Autsu and growing more attatched to Patrick. The violence had simmered to something difference, the anger into nothing of significance.

He was furious again, that violence steeped into him, made him tremble. Kian wanted to hurt and break things, he even had the brief flash of ripping the wings from Autsus back just for being there, but they didn't happen. It wouldn't help, not yet. On Autsu... Sparring was one thing. Hurting him with words was another, those could be talked through, forgiven. Unleashing such violence on him would be - forever. A loss forever.

So he squeezed just enough not to hurt, and leaned against the man who was too slim against the short and wide.

"Burn her," He heard his voice say instead of all the things he was thinking and feeling. "So she can exist as something more than a shell."

One eyes into those sharply emerald eyes had Kians head turned to the side, forehead pressed against his Autsus shoulders. Just enough comfort to keep him from completely freaking out and going on a rampage was as much comfort needed. The hand that hadn't already clutched onto the other moved in front of their bodies to drape around Autsu for the embrace he had previously refused to initiate. Didn't matter. Thumb hooked in the hem of Autsus pants, membrane stretched, Kian didn't speak immediately.

"Her name was Izzrah," he finally said. "And she had a soft voice and small ears. She listened. When I was tiny and upset, she would touch my ears and hug me. She let me keep a small toy I made once. After everything, she screamed when they took me.

"It's because of me she got herself killed." Kian stroked at Autsus wrists, careful not to scratch with those nails. Numbness would do no good today. "She fought for the abolishment of - she petitioned to bring me back. I think Izzrah was the only one of them that could actually feel anything akin to love."

Kian tilted his head, scrubbed one eye briefly against Autsus arm in a near childlike manner. No tears. Never. He'd cried enough in front of Autsu to last a lifetime. It didn't make the sniffle stay inside, though.

"Otherwise, Izzrah was no different than anyone else on that planet. Just different enough to count."

Oh, no. No, no, no. He didn't want to be there, didn't want to see his mother, parental, whatever, go up in flames or - or -

Kian broke. Little bits of Kian heart went fluttering off into the hot gusts of air the fire created like so many seed pods, his hands tightened and probably cut skin against the wrist he had been stroking so gently and Kian pulled back from Autsu, tugged at him as roughly as he could.

"We need to go, I need to leave. Can't stay here, can't do this, let them burn her, I can't stay here, tsu, we need to go, take me somewhere else." The words were mutterings, low and intended only for the other alien. Despite any breaking point he was at, Autsu was the one, the only one, that Kian would let hear that. He kept his head down, face clouded by hair, but he kept shaking it. The twinkle of beads and the bright flash of color hid his own upset. "I'm sorry, can't do this. Please. Please can we leave. I want to go. Let them take her away, I just don't want to stay here. Autsu. We need to go."