Welcome to Gaia! ::

"Nærøyfjord" was heard so often in dreams now, called to his ears as a title. It was hard to sleep years into days. There were specific tents sometimes. A pallet of rag blankets like a bed on the ground in the corner of one with person-sized cots. He never fit on cots. There was a weave of colourful thread waxed with lanolin through his hands, mitts really too large for weaving, but he persisted through three tries to make a bracelet of knotted cord with a prayer of words over each knot. Wishes are like prayers. Words are like spells. Not to ensnare, but to protect. Not to convince to love, but hope it be warmth in far places and long hours. If the hearts of others ever had the strength or chance to truly turn a blade at the last from mortal to just wounding.

One bracelet in berry reds and unbleached tan, the other in onion-dyed yellows and maple lavenders. Both could be fastened and unfastened by a loop around a pressed clay bead that shone the symbol of Earth. It had taken weeks in time to gather the materials, adding the strings to the dye baths with other more important pieces from the rest of the community. It was amazing that the people they had took to the crafts of pre-tech years to make life work when they couldn't count on supply from the cities.

The red and tan was left in the empty, somewhat ramshackle 'tent' (place of sleeping) of ...who?
A kiss to his own forehead, the swirl of a cape in a swift-sudden retreat, and helmet carried underarm of the other man. Horns, long and decorous. There was the sensation of a soft, private smile while watching him go.

Jeg lengter etter deg.

Titanlåvenite shifted, finally, drawing back the thin reins of thought from nightly runs and shades of memory to the present and definitive reality. The long roads branching off to suburbs, twisting overpasses and exit ramps all sprawled out around him. He was loping a pace that promised miles towards one of the delivery districts where truckers brought in the produce for the week to be haggled and bought by the city's restauranteurs. It wasn't a more likely spot that any other to find what he was looking for.

There just weren't that many auric signatures out in the winter chill. He remembered the man said Hvergelmir could message him, maybe any knight could since he'd received missives himself from knights, but he forgotten specifically what nights or times she'd said. He'd forgotten where he'd put his messenger bag completely, though it was probably accidentally kicked under the couch or bed at home. Since the man rode a bike around, starting on the roads in and out of Destiny City, and generally feeling around for a very fast moving Knight seemed simple enough.

Simple, but not effective. It wasn't like he could just take the bus loop.

What will you say to him, though, if you find him?
What are you hoping for, in looking for him?
I don't know, really.
Is it like others, trying to see if the dreams are the same? Will that make it more real? Less real? Do I prefer it more or less real?
What comes of it then?
Some traffic passed, not much given the pre-morning hour. The lights of the truck going the other way were more an annoyance than anything else.



I don't know.
There is so much I don't know.
But I need to find the Bull of Mars. It is no different then the bracelets- one cannot make later knots before the first. I will have to see what comes when I've found the road.

At long last, a knight aura ( or really any other aura at all) scratched at the edges of his thought. A full knight, bonfire of power in the dark still some ways away. The still air brought shouted words faint, clear words of impatience, but the tones and type unrecognizable.

They are eager for battle? And why not. They felt me before I them- they know I am a captain. They have some advantage in that. But a knight is a knight- maybe this one would send a message. To Hvergelmir at least, if Kairatos is not on good terms with them. Regardless, he opened his hand for hammer to cleave to as he kept his pace.

And came towering black, labeled with the inhuman skull for armor, out of the black night into the range of sight. He descried first the bike- it was a bike, lone rider. Did other knights or senshi ride motorcycles?

Closer.

The proud blazons of Bos taurus on breastplate and shaped in epaulet. Titanlåvenite slowed to a walk, hammer first brought to casual rest on shoulder. Don't be foolish. Don't send it away. They are dreams, are they not? He may not know such dreams- maybe it is some senshi magic? He will not run an leap so.
Do you remember?
Is it real? Or will be real? Memory forward and dreams backward.
Do you dream of Nærøyfjord?
I dream of you-

"Kairatos-" It was breathless, no end intoned to the name. Unclear if it was an observation to call the knight by name or something else. It was thick-said and soft, spoken as the captain's pace forward stopped at tilting length. Please run. You can't; we are enemies. Jump and I will catch you. We aren't even lovers.

The initial hurry, fumbling with the bike, the not-quite run, a name called and grin on sight- a grin seen most in shadow beneath a helm, or revealed in the sun as the same bull visage was abandoned as surely as Titan's own hammer slide from grasp and off his shoulder with a thunder on the pave.

His great paws lowered, open palmed as though ready to catch and stabilize someone in mid leap, then relaxed as Kairatos slowed, paused in gait at what would be hammer's reach. I dream. It wakes in life, walks, but it is a dream. Is it not?

His heart spoke of music there in the olive eyes and smile that had not been at the base of the tree. The argument came back, Why? What difference was there in burgers and tears, thenover a month of absence, to draw a heart to the lover's wants and pining hopes fulfilled on first reunions? He is just worried I would have been rash. Or some other fate to an enemy. I read too much into it.

In finding the Bull, the want of surety would not falter. If there was truth in the living body, that his mind could have no way to make up, of the feel and taste, scent and rhythm of a Royal Knight in the man before him.

"Kairatos, I'm sorry."
It was said as he stooped as Herger had in tens of times, hunting the man out in dreamed forests to pin against a tree with small token of affection- a kiss.

Same arms, with a bulk of muscle at bicep to press in pulling flex while drawn to him. Lips still dried and cracked of weather and wind, warm beneath. It is the same.

Younger, but the same.

Titan's hands moved all the same to cup each arch of hip beneath each rising crest at the bottom of the breastplate. He backed from kissing, straightening to stand slowly, uncertain all the more of what his heart was telling him against his head, against dreams or futures or any other time and place. He'd hoped it would become clearer in knowing sameness or difference. It hadn't.

He must have the dreams. "It is a liberty to take so much from you without permission. There..."

"Have been ...visions. Dreams. " He slowly let go, letting the knight's hips go-

"I am not Nærøyfjord. I needed to know if it was real. I could not have dreamed what kissing you was like with accuracy, if it was a dream. "

"Lose me? There was nothing that the Princely Bull in those visions did that caused the choices that were made. Hvergelmir and Nærøyfjord enacted their duty as members of the guard. The magic in their arms was made best for such purposes, covering the retreat a little to save the lives of more than there own. What greater hope can there be for a knight, Death being the fate of us all, than to do so in honor and duty. "

"Thoughts of you were in those moments. A sorrow to not ....hold you again. A wish that it could have been three together. Not all wishes are granted, where the all father has decided to end the skein of a life. There was no regret to die." Titan lifted a hand to cup the angle of Kairato's jaw that seemed so much fuller without hollowed cheeks and eyes to frame it.

If so much of it was true....am I a knight? Is there some power and title waiting for me? In the Nærøyfjord? Is it true then, what Metallia's aims are for the Earth- dominion and not succor? That will take thinking. But what of the Bull of Mars?

"Would you decide still to kiss Herger, when you did?"

I wonder if you would make that choice of Titanlåvenite. But you do not recoil from me now, even if he and I are different. This is the part that was remembered- my service to the throne of Metallia. Hvergelmir wrote there was no knowing how much would be lost- Björn Guildson. All of him. I've not thought of my time in either dress as different.



To the knight, the question may seem random, but it was impossible not to ask, "Do you remember your days as Realgar, or as Falco Marks?"

' I am not a piece of meat '

Is there a knighthood of the Nærøyfjord? Where could I find such things? Hvergelmir said the Rift was the training place. Surely such a place has a roll of houses and titles to which the young aspire. Or somewhere in the city surrounding it. Either shield bosses of arms displayed on wall, or arms carved on flagged stone. Something. However the Earth once displayed the arms to their high king or queen from their many houses, if all answered to one throne and not many as countries.

How much of the reality must I prove to myself? At some point, it remains a vision, a prediction. As he said, things do change as they are acted on. But at some point, it must simplify to the choice of faith and what is the right thing. Who I believe. Do I believe Metallia works for the good of this planet, of its people, in the interests of the land itself. Or do I believe she sees it as no more than a pillage, the last life and power in a universe that everyone says is empty and dead. Every single world out there- every star, every planet, every floating way station made of starlight and a well.

Titan looked at the ground between them for a long time, not saying more while considering. When he did move, it was to take Kairato's sword hand in both of his own. Not that the man had a gladius now, but the captain could see which it should be clearly in his own mind.

"Would you be there to greet Nærøyfjord....should I find the way to deliver him to you and to Hvergelmir?"

I am afraid again. I think I know why the General Titanlåvenite chose to convert at the end of a battle. It was helpful enough, to help the Mar Knights be rid of so many unsalvageable Lieutenants and Captains, but it was the death he'd wanted. It is different, accepting you might die in battle, and going out to face it. It is honorable, pointful. To him it was all chance, but he was still afraid in facing death just of its own. Björn Guildson will die.

Not in battle, just die. I have killed people, and I have to pay for that. No honorable death, but just kneeling to that execution. It is a hard thing. Can I do now what I couldn't then? I am no General, nor have the years to judge the men and women by who owe such debts with me. No one to drag with me in false bravery and full cowardice. Just me. Not even Realgar's anger and misguidance as excuse. I have served Metallia and Obsidian in whole faith. The fault of crime is my own.

If the knight didn't pull his hand away, Titan moved to bring it to his own lips to kiss the knuckles.

The invitation was noted and seized upon, hesitations long trained away from Obsidian's fickle moods. Uncertainty of life choices did not waver confidence in a lover's art. Titan offered answer strong, stepping forward and wrapping arm around the back of Kairatos' armored shoulders to pull-press the Mars knight securely to himself.

He backed when they were both breathless and winter far from cold.

"There is a paper trail to leave for any who will investigate of the branches. People to protect from my mistakes, including for he who will come after. I will talk to Hvergelmir if I can find her. "

"I am glad I found you, Bull of Mars."