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 Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:41 pm
It was every poignant, self-help analogy he’d ever learned, wasn’t it? Life lessons filled with cautionary tales about putting on one’s own oxygen mask first. It was the bitter sting of knowing everything they were still holding back from his friends. How he hadn’t told the others he’d be leaving yet. They didn’t know! Couldn’t! Not yet—
But at some point they’d need to. He’d tell them the rest of what could only be suspected, for himself. For them. For Matt most of all, because if the man wouldn’t answer him at his own front door? Then someone would have to pass the info along in 4K-HD reality—
Someone potentially not himself, who knew where the wheel memory loss would land. He knew he’d have to be fine with that, one way or another, with all the hard roads Nikki was laying out before him and the even harder ones still to follow.
Not impossibly hard though—
He had the proof of that in his arms, in the shine of tears unshed on her solemn honest face. He could look into her and feel it in his bones; the way she stared back into him. The way it’d all dragged out beyond an ending point maybe for too long. He’d done nothing but whine about it, hadn’t he? Copiously — without end — without thinking of her feelings on the matter. When she’d known Matt first and longer. When she’d let Albite go while on a winning streak. When she was waiting for him to make a move — any move at all!
He found himself nodding in agreement with her, the barest beginning of a smile cracked over a watery sigh, and he was just now realizing how almost comical it was that Nikki nearly never cursed; even when he felt the situation called for endless amounts of swearing.
Nearly as comical as the twilight zone situation he found himself in — facing the others down like this with hidden agendas in his back pocket and aces up their sleeves —- without Matt — but he obviously couldn’t force the Senshi of springs to drink from a well that must seem poisoned by his own hands…
“It really does suck in just the worst possible way, doesn’t it?” Easier to say after a few swallows, letting his gaze too from the others back to Nikki so she could hold his attention fully. The message was loud. It was clear. He’d heard it.
He’d honor it for her, himself, and Matthew. It was only fair to try the one last time before sticking to what he’d promised.
“To so badly want a happy ending for everyone and just —“ a clotted little chuckle, wet at the edges, and he eventually had to wipe his eyes before running a tired hand down his own face. “You really do have the best analogies, do you know that? The pointiest points—-and I couldn’t disagree with the logic of them if I tried…”
No matter how badly he wanted to, he shook his head for his own folly. Spared a glance for the others—
“Just this, please? This one more thing — I have to try, and then? And then—“ a rougher sigh as he smoothed his fingers over her hand, soothing himself while basking in the strength of her nearness. He almost wanted to steal her away — to blink out of this place and evade what more questions were sure to come later down the road. “And then I’ll be done. I swear it. I’ll put my own life jacket on. I’ll…I’ll leave him…” Not forever, not for good, he couldn’t promise that, but he could promise to finally cut the one distressed, frayed cord that kept him more firmly tethered than his dearest friends combined.
“You won’t think I’ve failed, will you, Nikki? If I save myself — if I lose him in the process—- ”And in his own sly way he was asking for help — for more nights of brainstorming — for her love to shore him up and her bluntness to feed him courage. He could already feel the sad, night putting looks from two other sets of eyes, empathy he hadn’t asked for, sympathy he didn’t deserve. Not when all he wanted was Nikki’s final okay for plotting one last fatherly mission — to endure a little more heartbreak alongside him so he could finally let Matt go if it came down to it in some worst case scenario —
Please not that — anything but that —
“You’ll help take care of him, even if — when — I can’t do it anymore? You have to promise.” Tossed at Aramis and Waru, the emphatic nod from one and hard, thousand yard stare he got in turn gave him at least half a cup more hope to go on. “He deserves no less than any of the other people on our team….even if it’s not with me…He’s just a person in a very dark place is all..and maybe I don’t have enough light to guide him out of it...maybe we weren’t loud enough? I don’t even know—“ he huffed a silent breath as his thoughts swirled.
But I love him — and I love you — and —
And I shouldn’t give that away to someone who isn’t in a space to return it, should I?
He could bottle it up and store it for another day, he thought. Love was like wine, it could age finely, dryly. It could be held onto and uncorked late, or maybe even buried at sea never to be seen again.
“But what I do know is that I’m sorry I let it all get to-to here, like this? Nothing should’ve ever gotten this bad, Nikki—” it was alright maybe, to drag her fragile seeming knuckles to his own lips and place a kiss upon them, like the debonair prince she so often claimed he could be, a vision as worth aspiring to as becoming an attorney.
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:43 pm
Why did it have to be like this? She was supposed to be the optimist, wasn’t she? Like, the ball of sunshine. The one with the unrealistic ideals that everyone else thought were dumb, that could never really happen.
Other people were supposed to tell her to stop, to give up, to let go. They did. They told her that all the time, and it hurt to hear them say it. It hurt to have to shake her head at them, to run away in secret and to not tell them about how hard she was working, about how she worked her fingers to the bone, about how she cried for people until she couldn’t breathe, until her eyes were out of things to cry.
And, yeah, maybe the people were right and she was stupid and useless and all those tears and all that work didn’t get her anywhere. Maybe she failed and she failed and she failed, and she didn’t know what she was doing anymore. Maybe a little of that optimism had faded, even if she did everything she possibly could to make sure that nobody else ever had to see that.
She didn’t know if she could be on the other side of the road, though.
It was one thing to be the practical one and send Fulgurite a breakup letter after everything that had happened. It was one thing to echo Mirabilite, to say that Cryolite should take a step back and save himself. She’d said it while crying, while her own heart was ripping apart at the same time, but she’d said it.
When Cryolite was looking at her like that and begging, though? Like, begging for her to find some other way out of this, a way where he didn’t have to give up on his perfect fairy tale ending where they could all be together, where they didn’t have to break up, even for a little bit?
She didn’t wanna crush his dreams. She didn’t wanna be that person. He wanted her to be decisive, but she shook her head as the tears spilled over.
“Talk to the dad,” she said. “Please. I want you to fix this.” She did. She would cheer him on in that, for as long as he needed.
There was another side to all of this too, though, a side that couldn’t be ignored.
She threw her arms around him, as she melted down completely. She couldn’t tell him to give up, but she couldn’t lie about this, either. Her heart wouldn’t let her.
And she was so aware, that even holding on to him and squeezing him like a lifeline, she didn’t really have him. She didn’t know how long it was gonna be until the Chaos corrupted tose ideals of his, and sunk its claws in, and she never saw him again, either.
The tears were running down her cheeks, and she was gasping. She was sniffling. She was sobbing.
“But I can’t lose you, too. I can’t lose you. I can’t. I can’t. I can’t I can’t I can’t-”
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:48 pm
Albite wondered to himself if there’d ever existed a time where he and Sylvite had craved each other like that; earnestly, with abject longing, with endless tears and clinging hands. If such a heart-rending love had existed between them.
Himself and Nikki —
Himself and Syrus —-
He thought not, understanding better what she meant now, maybe? While watching the pair and feeling her distant chastisement itching the back of his mind. It had never been like this. It never could have been. His love was endless but his *loyalty* was finite — that much was true. His belated realization for that, a bitter tang of surprise that soured his features briefly.
All the things he could’ve given to her and that?
This.
The display running on before him. He thought maybe he could only ever reserve for Faustite and Faustite alone—
That she was right to have assumed such, to have accused him of such — and his owing her a better apology did not produce one on his tongue; even if words did eventually appear to unslick it while he reached to wrap an arm around Mira; fingers cinching in her endless feeling skirt folds.
“He will.” A promise full of finality, like the sound of a closing door not even air could weep through. He wasn’t angry, not anymore. But he was indeed done here. He’d seen enough, heard enough, and what had before been a conversation now felt like an intrusion into others' privacy on a whole new level. Like spying on things he would’ve much rather stayed ignorant of—-
There was bliss in it, in not knowing those shared looks and how they would never be meant for him and his. In not knowing — for all of Sy’s begging — for more time, more people, more power! How far beyond that pale veil they’d already gone. That his friend was clearly lost to him, even if he didn’t want to admit it yet. Even if he wanted to do nothing more than pretend otherwise right along with the blond. That sometimes the doors to a good thing closed and never reopened. That in many ways theirs had already shut-—
He just hadn’t known it till now, staring on at something he couldn’t pretend away, or vehemently deny, or laugh off as an impossibility.
“And you won’t—-“ Only in death, maybe. But not to me. Not to Matt. You won’t.
A thought that ever looped back on itself and danced macabre; familiar yet ugly poetry he knew Nikki disdained with all of herself. Yet he couldn’t help but apply it here, to the way he thought of Syrus now, seeing the blond together with Nikki. Some inseparable meld of loving people, and not an invitation with his and Mira’s name on it in sight —
He wasn’t quite sure Syrus knew what he’d lucked into either, wouldn’t put it past the man to have missed the blaring signs and sirens with the same fashion in which he’d driven himself to slow, painful isolation. He wasn’t sure that it mattered either, not to him, not anymore. Syrus was already another's to love fully — and in the skewed scales of Warus views on Justice lay two souls; one willing to sacrifice all for the sake of togetherness — a greater bond — a greater good — and one who was not. It was easy in his mind to know the offender and direct what feelings remained *there*.
“Say ‘bye’, Mira.”
She’d squirmed in Albites hold as it tightened around her waist, shooting him a narrow look, hee gaze whipping back to Syrus and Nikki full of longing; hating the ache in her own chest, hating that they couldn’t be holding them together like friends were meant to do!! They should’ve been shoring Syrus up— they could’ve been — and if he’d let them in — and it’d been so easy before — and —
What had happened to group hugs? To movie nights? To their world together — when they’d been something good and easy and carefree!!
It’d always been so simple before —
“Wait! Cry, I’ll ca—“ she didn’t get the chance to do more than gasp out quickly severed syllables as she was pulled off through the void who knows where. Leaving the pair alone atop the rooftop, with no other obvious energy signals nearby.
He heard them go, but didn’t watch. As if he couldn’t bear to see what expressions might’ve been living on their faces; it wasn’t in him to weather the destruction this new layer of distress would bring for potentially seeing his world fall apart.
But only the one half of it —
His world had grown, hadn’t it? If it’d ever been so small as three people — if that was the limit he’d placed on himself back then? He couldn’t remember it now. Not when his everything, every last scrap of attention and beat of his soul was demanded elsewhere, held elsewhere. He wouldn’t apologize for giving into it this time, not even to himself.
Nikki deserved to have the promises made to her be kept for once.
It was an easy, shameless thing to squeeze her back and know it wasn’t nearly as hard as she deserved right then; the way in which her strength amazed him, even now. He wouldn’t chide hee for it, wouldn’t demand she let go, nor tell her she was wrong for wanting — for needing — this, this exact thing which he too so craved. His fingers found her curls and his palm the flat of her back and he bowed into her embrace, let his breaths run thin, he didn’t need the air in his lungs as much as he needed this; to hear it, and feel it, and —
To be wanted.
Wanted in ways where it felt like he’d not be let go, or shoved aside, or stepped over for others. He was not a second string scheming along pleasantly in tune.
He was only himself—
And Nikki?
“You won’t—“ an agreeing echo, whisper-warm and messy, he didn’t quite care how his voice cracked, even as he tried to bury the sopping notes of his words against her. To pull her in and hold her together for once! Because shouldn’t it be his turn? Couldn’t he do this too?
“Always— you try to fight for us…” the heave of her shoulders beneath his fingers broke something in him, made him wish for Matt’s tears — for something like this — and then he banished the thought and melted into the now. Dipping slowly under her weight till he could kneel atop a nameless rooftop and get her properly into his arms. “When it should be us fighting for you, too.”
“You deserve it—“
“I won’t leave.”
“I’m so sorry…..”
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Posted: Fri Jan 31, 2025 3:49 pm
Nectaris softened into a puddle on his chest as she felt the two needles of Albite’s gaze vanish from where she’d felt them on her back. She let herself lean into the way that Cryolite’s solid arms were holding her tightly. She let herself believe his promises.
It would be different this time. It would be different. None of the others had made her promises like this. None of them had talked so much about how she felt.
“Okay,” she murmured. “Okay.”
There was still going to be a gaping hole in her chest until they managed to go against all the odds and get through to Fulgurite somehow. They wouldn’t be right. They wouldn’t be, like, complete. With Cryolite in her arms like this, though, letting her cry on his shoulder? That gaping hole was a lot easier to deal with.
She just needed him to stay right there. He needed to do what he needed to do to make sure the Chaos didn’t steal him away from her. She’d made her points about that, though. She didn’t have to say anything more about it.
She could just hold him. She could just stand up on her tiptoes to press her tear stained cheek up against his. “I love you.”
She let her lips find his. They could lose themselves in this moment for as long as they both needed.
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