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 Posted: Sun Jul 28, 2013 9:18 pm
It was automatic: "You worry too much." She made the mistake of opening her eyes to give him a look, instead finding herself confronted with a soft, sad look that twisted a knife in her heart for a reason she couldn't explain. While Gale might think of the possibility, Stormy hadn't: it was possible for her, sure, but not for him; she had ignored the thoughts entirely for the bliss of ignorance it provided, for if she thought too much of death, awful things happened...
Taking a deep breath, Stormy sighed softly and opened her eyes halfway, content to gaze at her lap as he had been to look skyward. "I'm just...trying not to let it get to me," she began. "The--witch, it'd said awful things, and I'd said awful things, and it turned from simple to complex, and I really don't like complex when it comes to problems..." Did she want to say more? Less? She threaded her hands together with a wince, wishing she could touch and hold and grab without fear of pain making her feel constricted.
"But I also don't want to dump this on you when you just got back either," she added in a mumble. "I should be smiling and bright for Sunshine, not overcast. I should be..." Words, what were words. "I should be...grateful. Here." She turned her head to him with a bright smile, light on glitter rather than shining of its own accord. "That's what I should be. Let's start over: Hello, Sunshine, welcome back~"
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Posted: Sun Jul 28, 2013 9:33 pm
"I know," he answered, because it was true, and because there was really no changing that. He'd always been the type to silently concern himself over everyone else's well being while neglecting his own because it was easier not to focus on himself; it was easier to simply push away all of his thoughts and feelings, bury them deep inside and not let anyone else see them because it was too hard and too much to let them out.
Awful things.
Simple to complex.
Problems.
"You will never be a bother to me," said Gale quietly. "Don't feel like you always have to be something else for me. Stay exactly who you are, and tell me when you're feeling upset, or hurt, or angry, or frustrated. Tell me when you want to talk about something, or you don't want to talk about something. Tell me when things get to you, or when you don't want them to get to you."
He reached over and gently laid a hand over hers, very lightly holding it. "Just...stay Stormy," said Gale and smiled a little, tilting his head. He moved his hand from hers and lifted it to her face, trailing his fingertips across her cheek briefly.
"I'm home."
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Posted: Sun Jul 28, 2013 9:49 pm
Her smile faltered at the brush of his fingertips. Honesty. Wasn't that the best policy? Wasn't that what she had preached to Jake and Roland and Nevada, honesty and communication? Why was her own advice hard to follow?
"Being someone else is me," Stormy said cryptically, her thoughts wandering again. Friend, girlfriend, Mist hunter--most people could comfortably adapt them all into one person, but for some reason she couldn't. They were different people requiring different things, though one thing remained common between them: being a perfect and flawless image. She was just losing sight of one particular persona, that's all...a mask that needed to be either polished or refitted.
Gale knew he would never stop worrying. In turn, Stormy knew she would never quite stomp out that feeling of bothering someone too much.
It was also ironic: asking her to be direct about her feelings was, quite frankly, asking her not to be herself at all. Another conundrum wrapped in an enigma surrounded by mystery and tied up by paradox.
Stormy hummed a little, feeling her cheek tingle still. "Have you ever killed someone?" she asked at length, her eyes still trained on her lap. "From Halloween specifically, though...I guess anything else counts too." Was it even killing if they came back?
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Posted: Sun Jul 28, 2013 10:08 pm
"That's just going around the question," Gale admonished gently, his mouth still tilted upwards in a smile. He let his hand drop away from her face and linked his own fingers together around one of his knees, feeling the cold metal of Jinhai's ring pressing against his skin. "Well, regardless, I'll still be here, no matter what. Maybe, instead of you telling me exactly how you feel, I'll just have to learn to understand how you feel without you having to say anything at all."
He glanced sideways at her, slightly taken aback by the question, and then turned away, staring back up at the ceiling. She'd asked about Halloween, which was a difficult question, because truth be told, he had been responsible for the death of someone not in Halloween - though being told otherwise, being told it was not his fault only served to further his own guilt.
But I've moved on, haven't I?
<< Yes. You accepted it, and you moved on. Finally. >>
Finally.
"...yes," said Gale, after a long moment. "I have."
A pause.
"Have you?"
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Posted: Sun Jul 28, 2013 10:24 pm
Wouldn't that be something, she thought with a quirk of her mouth, a brief half-smile put out as fast as it was birthed, to cross a bridge that has no solid foundation? And she sat there with him, one gazing up while another turned down, and pondered his words, pondered not for the first time how she'd managed to get someone like Gale in her life.
"I have now," she answered quietly, surprised at how steady she sounded. "But it was...messy." The simplest word for the complex problem. She shifted a bit to bring her legs up, either by chance or by coincidence following Gale's example and pulling them up to her chest to hug. So much shown, she thought idly, half-lidded eyes following the bends of her legs, feeling like they were stretching out longer and longer, pulling her onwards until one more move would just reveal everything, bare skin and hair and eyes and mouth to he judged. Barely anything but essentials to the imagination, huh? Maybe the witch was right, maybe she was a--
"What was yours like? If I can ask, I mean."
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 8:43 am
"It tends to be," said Gale, absently fiddling with Jinhai's ring again. The metal felt cool and soothing against his skin, a familiarity he welcomed. He tilted sideways and laid his head lightly against Stormy's, gently nudging his forehead against the side of hers. "Death is never anything pleasant, and it's far more messy than it is clean."
He shifted a little, straightening, and gave a small sigh. "It was messy," he said. "There was...there was a lot going on."
The memories swam at him, ate at him. Gale closed his eyes briefly, exhaling a long breath. "It stayed with me for a long time. A very long time. In fact, it's still with me, but it's different now."
He smiled a little. "I've learned to live with it, rather than base my life around it."
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 11:01 am
She leaned her head against his at the appropriate time. "Death doesn't have to be unpleasant," Stormy said. "Sometimes you live a long old life and just pass away as you sleep. Or one little injection, one flip of the switch, and you're gone." She hesitated and then added more softly, almost to herself, "Or you close all the doors, park the car in the garage, and leave it turned on. It could be peaceful." But there was no such thing as a peaceful death here: Deus was visceral in almost every aspect, visceral and violent--things that were starting to change her in ways she didn't realize until much later, when they feared their ugly heads under stress.
Gale's smile wasn't returned; rather, she reacted by closing her eyes again, because it was like she was woken in the early morning by little rays of sunshine, not ready to get out of bed, not ready to face the day. "Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, acceptance," she recited. "The stages of grief." Where was she at? More importantly, why was she mourning at all? "Maybe...that's the not best way t-to put it. It didn't die, it just disappeared, dissipated, whatever the word is. They get to come back."
She hugged herself a little tighter.
"I didn't have to, I could've just left...I-I don't know how it happened. It just kept talking and talking and I just...The rubber band got pulled back, but instead of snapping forward I just--j-just broke instead." She ducked her head behind her arms. "I thought I was better, but I wasn't. I didn't win because I was stronger, I won because that thing thought I was the same plaything I was before, and toyed with me just the same and I guess...I-I guess I am, aren't I."
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 2:51 pm
"Most of the time it is," said Gale. "Though I do like the sound of passing away due to old age."
It was foolish to think that, however - a child's dream to have a death that was normal, that wasn't riddled with danger and destruction and mess and chaos. Being a hunter on Deus Ex was not exactly a prime spot for wanting to live to a ripe old age. He wasn't even eighteen yet, and already he'd seen more death than those twice his age.
She was starting to stutter, her words tripping over one another. Gale shifted on the bed, turning towards Stormy. He took one of her hands and drew it away, his fingers brushing across the bandages that covered her wrist and forearm.
"You are not," he said quietly. "A plaything."
Gale ducked his head and pressed his lips to the bandaged area, very very lightly, and then carefully and gently folded his fingers around hers. "It's never going to be easy here," he said. "There will always be those who think you're something different than what you really are - but it doesn't mean that you're like them. Hey. Look at me."
His fingers brushed along her jaw, to her chin. "Remember what I told you? When you were in the Infirmary that one time? 'You are braver than you believe, stronger than you seem, and smarter than you think.'"
He smiled a little. "I left out what comes after that, though - and that is, 'but the most important thing is, even if we're apart, I'll always be with you.'
"I know we're not talking about me, we're talking about you, but you are strong. And you're not a plaything."
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 3:34 pm
But aren't we? Stormy wanted to say. Aren't we all disposable toys in the end? Caelius's words from the desert mission came to mind, about how little disregard there had been to their fates, whether orders had actually gone through or not being of little consequence. Hunters were by nature replaceable, like any units of any army. If she harbored any weakness, any at all...Nevada was lucky Aria and Lance were merciful.
She winced again, not because of pain from being moved but from flinching instinctively at the request to look at him, as if she could do that without feeling three hundred shades of awful about it. What was wrong with her, that she couldn't greet her boyfriend with a warm hug and a kiss and offer him a chance to rest like normal people? That she had to drag him into personal business she had no idea how to resolve, miring them both in her problems? She should have resisted the temptation to lure him into that line of thought, should have just been a good girl and kept her mouth shut instead of being needy.
Nevertheless, one eye opened to look at Gale, prompted by the feeling of warm fingers directing her head. She was taking deep breaths through her nose, her jaw too busy clenching and unclenching to let her breathe properly.
"If I was strong, I-I wouldnt've lost it," Stormy mumbled, closing her eye back up. "I would've been in control of my emotions, but...but I never have been." Her hands began trembling a little at the quote, the fingers of the one he held pressing shakily against his. But you weren't there. Gale had come into her thoughts once, maybe twice that whole fight, because she had been consumed by...something. Passion, maybe. Unnamed emotions that lingered still and made her stomach turn. But Stormy was glad he hadn't been there, for he would have been disappointed in her, she was sure. Disappointed and worried and other similar feelings that would have broken her heart.
Her voice fell a little more towards neutrality. "When I broke her shield she tried to run away, but I caught her. I caught her by the hair and she screamed as I dragged her, screamed and screamed and cursed me and spat, all the way to the stump. And when I had her there she begged me not to, but I was angry, so angry I didn't know what else to do, a-and she gave me--she set some sort of curse on me, I don't know, m-maybe it was just more poison to scare me--but I keep hearing her shrieks in my ear and want them t-t-to stop, but she's pulling and crying and it makes me sick to hear." Her whole frame was quivering just the slightest. "And she won't listen to me, she's stuck and I'm stuck and we're both just lost in this gray area, lost in the fog and m-mist in the shadow of the old house, she won't listen, Gale, she thinks we're monsters and I tried to show her otherwise, but there I am with the sword at her neck anyway because maybe I am a monster on the inside, maybe sometimes you have to be one to keep going, and I-I've only ever killed something once what am I doing, why w-won't sh-sh-she stop--"
The rest of her words were cut off by a heave and a soft sob, her eyes scrunched tight and her hands curled tighter, the burns stretching and protesting almost audibly with each throb.
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 5:23 pm
He gently brushed a thumb beneath her chin and tried not to think too hard about how fragile she looked right now because she wasn't fragile, she was strong and she was beautiful and she was brilliant and everything and anything she did was magical to him, which was either very ignorant or entirely too foolish, but either way he didn't care, because he had never been so damned lucky in his entire life. And seeing her in pain, holding onto her shreds of confidence and of self-worth, hurt some place deep in his heart.
"Even the strongest lose it sometimes," said Gale quietly. "Look at Caelius. Prime example. But where he is a self-righteous p***k with a chip the size of London on his shoulder, you are a much better person than he will ever be."
He lifted both of his hands and placed them carefully on either side of her head, covering her ears. "Then listen to me," he said firmly. "Listen to me, Stormy. I'm right here in front of you. You are in the fog, but you are not a part of it, it's just around you right now. It's just a temporary place, it does not make you who you are."
Gale leaned forward, pressing his lips to her forehead for a long moment before he leaned back, setting his forehead against hers, his hands still against the sides of her face.
"What you see is not who you are," he said. "Granted, I am still learning who you are, but I at least know that a monster is not what you are. And maybe it's not who they are, either, maybe they think they're not the monsters ,that we are - but maybe we think we're the fine ones, and they're the monsters. We are two separate entities who are looking through distorted views of the other. But you, my darling, are not a monster. Not even close."
The darkness curled in his chest, settled in his stomach, and Gale swallowed back the urge to give in, to let himself sink back into that blackness that was always there, somewhere in the back of his mind. It didn't matter how long they were here, how short they were here, or what they had done - the blackness was there in everyone, with some part of them touched by it.
And Gale was steeped in it, whether he liked it or not.
"Whatever happens to you," said Gale. "Whether you kill again, whether you struggle with this, I will be right beside you the entire time. But just because you gave in once to whatever is inside you doesn't mean that you'll give in every time."
He brushed a thumb against her cheek. "Just because you're lost now doesn't mean that you won't ever be found."
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 7:23 pm
She'd wanted to duck her chin and hide more, but before the thought could fully form into action she felt Gale's hands hold her face. Strangely, it made her want to retreat more, to pull back and take a good look at herself and ask why she was acting like this, like some child come home with a new scrape for someone to dote over. Did strong people do that? She liked being compared to Caelius even less; the man was full of darkness and poison, neither which she needed more quantities of in her life.
Something inside Stormy trembled at the kiss, but she quickly sucked in a breath to bolster herself. Don't cry.
"I-It's not the first time," she countered. "It's the second." Was it three strikes and you're out? "First time was with Jake, but you weren't there. You didn't see." And how lucky she was for that. Maybe he would've called her a ******** idiot like Sherry had, and maybe she wouldn't have been allowed in this far. Maybe he would've changed his mind right then and there.
The rest of her breath was let out in a shaky sigh, only to suck more air back in so she'd stop trembling. But it was so very hard not to when the spotlight was on her no matter what she tried, that stage fright would grip her the longer Gale focused on her, eyes closed or not.
< < Calm yourself, > > Thane snapped. < < Or must you always need my help to do so? > >
She exhaled slowly, letting the pain in her hands draw her away from her thoughts.
"Are you saying it's okay to like it?" she asked quietly.
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Posted: Mon Jul 29, 2013 9:33 pm
As always, he was over thinking things, He wondered whether he was annoying her, whether he was saying the right thing, whether he was saying the wrong thing, whether he was just putting his foot in his mouth again and having everything come out preachy or messy or self-righteous.
Gale's eyes flickered. "You're right," he said quietly. "I wasn't there, so I didn't see it. But you haven't seen what I've done either. Nobody on this island is entirely free of what you've done. I..."
He couldn't quite finish the sentence. Gale took a slow breath, surprised at how shakey it felt.
"What I'm saying," he said, stopped, swallowed, and tried again. "What I'm saying is...you're a mess, I'm a mess. We'll just be messes together. I'm saying that if you honestly, truly, want to embrace that side of you, I will support you. But be sure that it's absolutely what you want before you take control of it."
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Posted: Tue Jul 30, 2013 12:49 am
That was not an answer either Stormy or Thane predicted. One took a small amount of amusement out of it, the other took a handful of uncertainty and fear. Everyone went through this?
Of course, stupid. You aren't special.
She grew cold and stilled, her breaths shallow but quiet. She was pretty sure there were visible goosebumps on her arms, and the prickling was uncomfortable, almost stinging. She was forcibly remembered of the last time someone had tried to comfort her, how Ms. Candace had offered ways to cope with the stress the job gave. But she had long since returned the iPod, and music was the last thing on her mind; her throat was so constricted at the moment she doubted any note would be able to squeeze past.
I don't want to embrace it, Stormy kept thinking. I don't want to. I don't have control, I won't have control, it'll go horrible, I don't want to . . .
< < Is that not what you thought when it came to my charge? > >
Thane's insight gave her pause. Yes, she supposed, this was similar. But--
< < Why is there always a condition with you? Must I break you of this habit as well? > >
Leave me alone. I don't need this right now.
Thane rattled and coiled. A snake preparing to strike but, for the moment, backing off.
With her eyes closed, every pause, every breath Gale drew, ever single little syllable seemed heightened, sharpened almost. Stormy was afraid to open her eyes and see what expression he wore, because despite the stops she couldn't tell how Gale really felt about this. He always sounded so calm regardless of the topic, it was uncanny . . . Maybe that too was something she could acquire with time, or at the very least learn from example. Maybe she'd get to a point where it'd not longer affect her or, more than that, not even appear as a blip on her radar. But was that the kind of person she wanted to be? She wanted to be herself, yes, but what did that mean? And what did it mean for Gale to say he was okay with whatever she decided?
He was giving her freedom, and it was terrifying.
"I don't know what I want, honestly and truly," she said, which was a terribly lame answer after the silence. Why couldn't this be a novel where surely the author would be giving her something wittier to spit out? But witticism required a certain sort of lightness, an aura that pervaded flexibility, anticipation, humor--she was stuck in a body that felt like it was made of lead, molded to have her clutching at what she could but feeling little comfort from it. And what was horrible was that this wasn't her worst: at least she was talking.
A corner of her mouth quirked, though Stormy didn't know if she'd tried to smile or if it was her stopping her mouth from trembling, the surest sign of incoming tears if she let it happen. "Th-That's a little lie again," she mumbled. "I do know one thing. I'm glad you're back safe and sound." The hand he had abandoned to hold her face was growing cold quickly, and she placed it atop her knee and squeezed tightly enough that it shot pain up her arm, but by God at least she remembered where she was. Who she was with, why that was so, why indeed always chasing her. Stormchaser, she thought, that's what Gale was. A calm stormchaser who had weathered storms far worse than this and sailed on his own strong winds: that was how he didn't get buffeted around in hers.
She really ought to sleep more.
Don't cry. Deep breaths. She took one and imagined it coating her insides like calming incense, like white smoke soft and curling, coaxing her to relax. It wasn't quite possible, but at least she wasn't shaking and at least her eyes weren't stinging and at least, thank God, he was still holding her head, because if she sank further the bed would swallow her whole and she might never want to come out. Not until she was a proper thinking human being again.
"I'm sorry," she apologized in a small voice, her eyes still closed but her brows knitted. "This isn't a proper greeting at all. I should've been more prepared. Please forgive me."
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Posted: Tue Jul 30, 2013 7:51 am
She was silent for a long time, long enough that Gale became slightly concerned that he had said the wrong thing and that she was upset with him. But he sat there anyway, waiting and thinking and wondering. He lifted a hand, smoothed it down her hair, and absently twirled one finger around a stray strand, curving it down her cheek before letting go.
"Well, until you decide," he said. "I'll wait right here."
His lips quirked upwards in a small smile. "I'm glad to be here safe and sound," he said softly. "And I'm glad you're back safe and sound. Maybe you came back a little differently, and maybe you came back a little broken, but the point is that you came back. You're here, and you're alive, and you're here."
Gale swallowed a little.
"With me," he added quietly, a little roughly, his voice somewhat hesitant, as though he wasn't entirely certain that with him was where she actually wanted to be. Gale slid his hands from her face, gently down her arms until he found her hands again, both of them, and gently wrapped his own around hers.
"There's nothing to forgive," he said. And then, after a moment, in a voice that was lighter, "Does that mean you're going to give me a proper greeting now?"
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Posted: Tue Jul 30, 2013 10:39 am
Deep breaths. One, two--
With him? Yes, with him. A very close and warm him with hands that felt like little suns against hers, Arctic or not, because it had been a little while. And he was here, he was here, so stop being so--
Deep breaths. Three, four. Her countenance smoothed as she calmed herself down, ignoring the pain in her hands from having curled them so hard. Maybe she'd irritated the skin too much, maybe she hadn't. Did it matter? He was back.
Stormy repressed a shiver as he slid his hands down to meet hers and eased her legs back into a sitting position--unwound herself, so to speak.--as she slid her fingers between his. Hesitating, she opened one eye first before the other as if to make sure it wasn't too bright, hoping they looked okay (there was a light pink tinge to them, sadly, from almost crying). And then she was seized with a small fear of looking at Gale after that, because how embarrassing, how childish she must look! For someone who professed being able to take care of herself, all it took was one little student to throw her off. And there Gale was just--just being calm. Steadying her even if he didn't realize it.
She wanted that. She needed that.
"With you," she agreed, remembering how to smile even if it was just small right now. But what was proper, what could...Hmm. She thought for a moment.
Slowly and purposefully she turned to face him, sliding her hands out of his so she could wrap Gale into a tight hug. And as she did, she raised herself out of her metaphoric and literal slump to meet him face to face, to draw shy eyes over his features with a better smile and re-remember how handsome he was. Then she bridged the gap between them and began to rub their noses a little.
"An Eskimo kiss for your return from the Arctic seems proper~" Or maybe she was confusing "silly" for "proper", but she didn't quite care for semantics this time. At the very least when Stormy pulled away a little to give him space, she looked closer to normal. "I hope you're ready because I'm not letting go for a whole week, like I said before."
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