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Prehnite dragged himself into some semblance of proper order. Dug dirt out from neath his nails, with the aid of copious amounts of soap and water that scalded *hot*, not that he'd felt it. Not that he was feeling much of anything at all.

That was the problem wasn't it?

The hot-cold, spine snapping, whiplash, of feeling and then not. Prehnite felt like he was going to be sick with it. Like he was losing his mind. He needed answers, and there was only one man worth going to at this point.

He no longer needed to play and skirt other Generals, Kings, Queens, Sovereigns. He could go to Jet, inexperienced as he was, maybe they could be each others learning experiences? Maybe -- just maybe -- he could teach the man a thing or two without lecturing him. He'd promised he wouldn't do that anymore. He wanted to hold to that promise, now more than ever.

So Prehnite laced his boots, and cinched his s**t tighter, breathed in black and out panic. Everyone looked fine in a cracked mirror.

He was neat with how he teleported to - ah - and what a nice door it was. He knew he should've called before hand, signaled his arrival rather than simply popping up. Sent a youma...

Sent a corpse with a note pinned to it....

Wait..no..not that. A text might've done? Yes, some sort of written missive. Yes, that was better. Writing things.

Prehnite sighed, the softest breathy thing, squashed all his thoughts into a ball as he felt for. The ping of an overwhelming aura, the soft joy of applause because *yes* - he still believed they could be better. Believed in Jet, so much so that he considered answering only to him after this - not that Lepidolite wasn't buckets of fun as a boss -- but....

But...

Rap of knuckles across the surface, gentle beg of entry with the back of his hand. Prehnite was poised to politeness, as he stood outside and waited to be offered entry by the occupant within. Yes, no, a denial -- anything.

Waited.

A brief surprise to see a Generals Kings office so - empty - much less in the strange beginnings and in-betweens that accompanied the spaces metamorphosis into its owners. Prehnite could see it, where changes would take shape. How the old would fall to the wayside; become so much food for a woodchipper. Future nutrients for the growth of mushrooms, and termite larva. He was sure it would fill in time, with trophies, secretaries, armies. It had potential, and in the moment? It hardly needed the things. Not when Jet's Aura filled it to bursting. Jet, a newly minted aid to rule. He was strong, and good, and he'd made it.

"The opportunity to do it was thanks enough, Jet. If I'm handed one more medal though, however lovely? I'll have to decline, I fear the bottom of one of my drawers may burst through." the smile became a tease that scrunched his nose, a lingering bandage - to hide burst skin. Little to do for it but let it heal and try not to touch it once it'd been set. Even less to do after the splint'd come off. Pain meds for the lingering ache that bloomed there every time he used the muscles of his face, but that was dull in comparison to the ache he carried in-general.

He could no longer tell - hangover - migraine - blunt force damage to his skull. If it was simply his *heart* that hurt, if he'd gotten the flu again?

"My nose will survive, luckily it's not a required feature for 'living'. Unlike, oh-say, your eye? I know you're not actively 'dying' - but how are you really?" silent kudos to Aquamarine, the blond was a good partner to Jet. Someone he surely needed, hell, should've had in his office as a staple friend at his side. For Jet? He seemed like a man who cared too much about all sorts of things. Who was young, fumbling and faulty -- who'd done the impossible, and netted them a Princess.

Who'd killed.....

The thought stuttered his steps as he approached, a brief glance to the obvious weapon in Jet's hands. Though he didn't ask about it's importance. It's obvious sentiment. Merely tracked that it was there as he stood before his --

His friend, were they friends? Teammates? Co-workers who shared a similar ideal?

Prehnite believed in him. Said it, meant it. Even as he searched Jet's injured face - tried to gauge 'how bad' it actually was compared to what he was sure Jet would say about 'how bad' it wasn't.

The gentle screech of the chair as he pulled it forth, before lifting it and setting it firmly before Jet. Face to face, like an equal, even though he was firmly beneath him in standing at this point. Probably in height too, but that was a minor discrepancy.

"Luckily for you? I've enough to drink for -- the next foreseeable lifetime. Fine alcohol makes a good office christening present." or so he'd heard, he'd never had the pleasure before. Not to welcome someone, not to pour one out and say a 'goodbye'. He'd only managed to do that insofar with Jet. It'd been -- it'd been nice - and that was the rub in the raw of it. Jet was nice at face value, through and through, down to his core. Prehnite ******** liked him, as a person, even.

Such a rare thing to like people who weren't also 'plants'.

"I'm glad you're not dead, I want you to know that I mean that. Sincerely. I was worried for you..." a bottle of - dark enough to be black - barrel aged - expensive. Something beyond Prehnites typical teachers salary. Something he hadn't made at home, but had bought - oh - a long graduation ago. Stored and saved for a special occasion. It came with a golden ribbon and trim, a glass stopper. Prehnite set it atop the desk that would likely soon be decommissioned for being a pestilence risk. "You took a grave risk, it cost you much, but the gain? I couldn't have done it. It took, literal years, for those particular types of nightmares to stop haunting me? Capture - the aloneness that follows you after? It's a horrible thing....." pause for pauses sake, so he could settle himself and breath around the dark clouding ache of a memory.

"You know what though? I think for you, if you'd asked anyone else to play bait -- well -- one, it would've failed spectacularly? So, kudos to your genius in this, but also? I think there would've been people lined up to do it -- for you. Specifically." He would've done it for Jet, if he'd asked, if he'd insisted upon the need. Prehnite ran on his mouth and finally took a seat before Jet, pulled it up enough to be close, so he could see him. Gauge his ache and watch his face - such lovely eyes, soft curls that spiraled in secretive little hearts; if one looked close enough.

"I'm proud of you. I'm glad I believed in you, this? This is all proof of our betterment -- except...." prehnite meant it, with a soft smile that fell into sadness, with the hitch of tears that threatened, then went dry. He really did mean it with every fiber of his being. Which was why it hurt him so much, to wind back with his right and take the back of his hand across the good side of Jet's face. No reason to aggravate already healing injuries. No reason to *not* slap the ever loving ******** out of him - just the once.

Just to make a point.

"Apologies for that --- no - that's a lie. You murderous piece of --- You killed Ochre, Jet? Jet! What The ******** were you thinking!?" single sentence that seared. Prehnite seethed quietly, hissed the words like a dagger. "I want to know why?! I want -- not excuses - but the whole damned story. Your side. I need it." and the back of his hand stung, not worse than his heart, not worse than being dead.

But he'd never cared much whether or not he died -- others -- ogh, the horrible care for others was what was killing him. Like root rot, caring ever so slowly churned his insides out. Caring for Jet, caring for Ochre, caring for his team?!

“For starters? I don’t hate you, you absolute a**. I’m *angry* at you — there is a very distinctive difference between the two. If I hated you? I would tell you. If I wanted you dead? We wouldn’t be having this shitty conversation over very expensive liquor.....” and his snarl was choked and clotted with some unnamed thing, some emotion. He hated that, surely, the emotion of it.

Hated it so badly that he was tempted to pour them glasses that very instant and — just —

He did not, however, hate Jet. Prehnite refused to be his predecessors, there would be no eyes taken for eyes. No tet-a-tets. If his slap had so offended? Jet had handled worse and could survive the sting of it.

“It’s not even for killing a ‘traitor’, Jet, honestly? Do you really believe me so sensitive as that…..” Did Jet even hear himself, what he was saying? Because Ochre hadn’t been just anyone, Prehnite would not amend how he spoke of his once friend. Of a kind person. He would stare at Jet in mild surprise, because, yes - he understood how the change over went. How it took - everything in the world took and took and hollowed a person out no matter what choices were made!

There was no escaping it. Only amending it, only putting it into context. Something Prehnite sorely required while questions hung heavy on his tongue. He didn’t even know how to begin to ask them

“..No, not it’s not precisely that. It is a domino effect of things. I’m going to assume, that in the midst of that, Queen Laurelite didn’t ask you to do this thing? You took it upon yourself to decide how best to serve our Queen — and when he was no longer Shkieh or Ochre - when after a decade of service and one, *one mistake*, he was dead? Right then — he was a human — you killed a traitor yes, hurrah, but you also proved orders point. I think. That our service is thankless — that there is no leniency or forgiveness. When there is.“

And Prehnite was, most assuredly, going to pull his little cactus shot glasses out of subspace. Because he would start to shake if he didn’t drink something — he was ever so ginger with how he set them out, his body a thing on automatic while his mind whirled.

“Better — Jet you are better. The fact I’m sitting here still breathing is godamned proof of this thing, but *better* means we don’t commit Public Executions - let alone beheadings! Better means private…means..……..it means we bury the people we murder, sometimes, but especially when they served us before? Saved us — were kind and nice! Like — gods — after the barracks fell, and did you know you can’t tell one from another? How many corpses littered that place. Which side were they on when their powers left them like their lives? It didn’t ******** matter, all the dead looked the same and we buried them all the same.”

There were small parts of him which understood jets shock tactic, it had, an astounding effect. It was, in the most brutal of ways? Efficient. To ending everything, to pulling Ganymedes taking to a bloody stop. Prehnite feared that effect rippled both ways. Feared..so many things, and his hands were better left to themselves than to pouring anything, to clasping in his lap until his knuckles went bloodless and white.

“Slate deserved that. Ochre deserved to be remembered as a hero - you can make Shiekh the monster you want. The traitor. They are different, by your reckoning? With the memories gone? Not the same person anymore — but Slate? The body that was left after, he belonged to both. Every last piece of him…..was just a person.”

Prehnite wanted his friend to bury, the memory, the body, a hole dug deep enough and a nice place to put him.

“I am — I’m so sorry I lectured you. That — that is not a promise I meant to break, at least not so quickly.” He had the ability to look sheepish whilst looking shaken. He hadn’t come to — to lecture — to tirade. He wasn’t a child.

He had been, once, hadn’t he?

He wondered what color Aquas eyes would be when he came to take his throat.

“But why did it have to be him?!”

Ah, and now he did sound petulant, didn’t he? Like a child. He could hear it even. The way the whine of his tone laced every word, and he hated himself for it.

“Why couldn’t it have been — anyone else - everyone else. There were worse traitors than him, weren’t there?! There’s that winged b***h who sits and lives and breathes..*still!!* Beneath us!” Prehnite wanted to shake Jet, bodily, as badly as he wanted to cry with tears that wouldn’t come. He wanted to express his concern that Ochre’d been too long alone waiting for *ghosts.*

Because Ochre had made a choice, Jet said. Except Ochre was always soft spoken with everyone. Timid. Caring. Prehnite wasn’t sure he was of sound mind enough to know what he’d been doing - talking to Ganymede of all things. The princess must’ve done something to sway his hand. To levy his choice in her favor, that was how those things worked. No matter what Jet said, there had to be more.

“I understand the tactics, Jet. I’m aware. Just as I am of the optics - what you heard and no one else did - what you saw up close while others looked on from a distance? Oh, how it looked from a distance.” and Jet was begging him to — he could listen -- he tried. Watched Jets words form a world through eyes glassed over and red rimmed with fatigue.

Understanding brought him no clarity and knowledge brought him no power. Only the shudder of grief, like pain hissed between gritty sighs.

“He saved me once, you know? I was a poor friend, I miss him, and it hurts that he’s dead. Knowing the why doesn’t make it hurt any less…even if it helps.” slapping Jet had done nothing either. Empty gesture of a thing. None of it brought anyone back. No more than it made it better, except for in that moment.

Then the moment was gone, and all he could be was *upset*. Writing a will in endless words to - the General King he chose. *One of their own.* Not some foreign entity summoned mid crisis, not a cruel predecessor of the past who’d raised them all up on the murder of civilians to fuel the endless war machine. Who’d had them fighting amongst themselves for scraps.

Jet was just — *Jet.*

“Even if all it means is that I don’t hate you for it.”

He wondered if Jet was going to kill him - now, later, when? He wondered if the brunette could keep being better - even in the face of adversity from his peers? And Prehnite’d so badly wanted to be his friend.

There was a moment where Prehnite felt for Jet, he had to do a double take — to — was this what Jet did with his free time? How he lived? Like it was his sole responsibility to cary the weight of an entire organization all on his own merit - to raise hell on behalf of a branch that wasn’t likely even his?

To protect the people he cared for. No matter the body count, nor the face. Jet was clean blacks and whites all the way through. Stark lines that had no way to be muddied. He really did make a very good General King. What with his well enforced convictions, his love of the Queen for the sake of duty.

For Aquamarine?

Prehnite hedged a sorry, held it, killed it - and ground the letters down between his teeth while he scrubbed the palms of his hands over his eyes, til they burned a little less at the corners.

There were things he was sorry for, things he was not. It wouldn’t be good to mix the two here. There would be separate conversations for that — apologies for Jet bearing the brunt of an impossible weight — bull full of spears facing down endless matadors, because he wanted to keep the herd safe. Even if they hated him for it. He wondered, briefly, if he should tell Aquamarine what he’d done — and then swiftly die, but not before demanding he snatch up his paramour on a vacation. To maybe smack some sense into his ‘significant friend’ about wearing too many hats labeled ‘someone else’s burden’.

Something…

Prehnite breathed. Raked nails through strands rough enough to pull, clutched a grip at the nape.

“If I talk to Laurelite, I’m only going to ask her to Kill Ganymede more *quickly*. Maybe wall her away in a tower like some Rapunzel…..to put her in a tomb…or..”

Oh, well - that had happened. Hadn’t it? Ganymede. She was the thing that’d changed. Prehnite wondered if Jet was searching for a way to call him a traitor. Dismissed that as himself being paranoid because he had to believe his loyalty was unquestionable. It had to be. Except for how he’d made it so. Was that his mistake in all this? That instead of going to everyone else first - he’d decided to go stare at Ganymede.

It had been months ago, and only after her — after.

“I went to see Ganymede. I had - not a damn thing to ask her. I just wanted to see…I don’t even know anymore why I went. It was pointless. Like maybe I needed to make sure she was actually down there in her little bird cage at all? That I hadn’t hallucinated the whole event,” It was a difficult thing to meet Jets gaze, but he did. “and I talked at her….and then I started thinking about the entirety of the last decade! The Hilltop. I didn’t realize then - in the midst of all that - that it’d been Ochre who’d died, because he’d become Shiekh? Because I was busy doing the same as you…Only, Sylvite confirmed it. So, at least I’m not completely un-sane?”

And he wasn’t the only one who’d lost somebody, or who’d been injured, or was in pain…

The dagger was there, not for stabbing him with - no - it told a story, old and familiar. Something he could sympathize with. ********, something Ochre could’ve emphasized with. In the way those with dead brothers did.

Prehnite looked Jet in the eye and he saw it there. Neath the layer of frustrated confusion for his own sake, the burning fire, the determination. Did it matter, truly, whatever ideas lay in prehnites mind? Did any of his words matter at all - in the face of what Jet believed to be entirely, infallibly, *true*.

“I’m sorry you lost your brother,” that was a given, that had to be said. Jet would forever be unapologetic for Ocher. For Shiekh. “and that you saw Aquamarine die, even if only for a moment……….” Not when Jet’d only done what had been deemed necessary and right - he took no pleasure in it - it was not some psychotic joy. No, only a mercy. Like putting down a dog with rabies as some form of self defense. There was some margin of relief in that, at least.

There was the gnaw of horrible ‘coincidence’ - the way one singular ‘evil Senshis’ deeds had forever twisted the pathways of Jets life. Into this.

“………..would you like to go dig a hole with me?”

A slightly unhinged plea, randomly loosed, and maybe he was very insane after all? But he needed something to do. There was no one else to be mad at - and nothingness was a death sentence, while downtime was a poison that worked far too slow.

He could be upset at - what next? Where did he aim that arrow? Himself, Jet, the whole of Cosmos and the Planet Earth. Ganymede. He didn’t want to touch Ganymede - he didn’t even want to look upon her again unless it was to see her as a corpse. But he had to do something?!

*Ohthankgod* - a page on which he and Jet could agree, and Prehnite hoped that it showed on his face. However briefly, the twist there, of gratitude for Jets understanding that Gamymede — every last one of their troubles - beacon to treachery - should be dead and buried *yesterday*.

Not a moment later.

It was something they shared, that line of thinking. There was such relief there, for it, knowing they could find a solid platform of exchange. Prehnite coildnsigh for it, even, as though hearing Jet say the words loosened a vice round his lungs'd made by stress and tension. Enough that he had to laugh wetly, for the idea of a database full of - 'killed bys' - assassination's tags so those who felt wronged could, what? Form up a que and air their grievances, laud their praise over wine?

There was a soft sort of snort "It wasn't the who...that's not the problem...it's...nevermind." was the entirety of his anger misdirected? Was Jet simply the easy stand-in to take it out on. Maybe. Though it didn't change the fact that it'd been Jet who'd dealt the blow. It didn’t change the fact that he’d had to learn it from — himself — Ganymede.

"I don't recommend it. Jet. Seeing Ganymede - or tagging on names like death notes on toe tags at the mortuary. No, that'd go very badly, very quickly indeed." it seemed like a recipe for bedlam. For them to turn on each other to the point of killing — which defeated the purpose of them trying to be better entirely.

No, it was better to focus on..to change the gorgons knot of a subject to…"Hmmn, I suppose in a roundabout way? It’s very much a plant thing..as much as it is a favor..a plea?" If there was any truth to life cycles, the hole one put a body in eventually fed the plants that existed above it. Nutrients leaked into the soil during decomposition, flowers and trees profited. That was how it should’ve been.

"How do I explain…Did you get the chance to bury your brother?" prehnite hoped he had. His eyes darted to — the glasses with the floral cacti patterns, the wood that he hoped would one day be mulch; the way Jets grip tightened on the hilt of his deceased brothers dagger.

There was some sort of softness in the acknowledging nod, a wince that begged apology for asking at all. It was good though. Even if burying people was hard. Jet's brother'd had him there to do it. Had someone who cared enough to bother. Bodies deserve the bother, even if it was only done to ease the ache of the living --- Ochre was no simple body though. He was a Senshi. Magical being who would someday be reborn again. In ten years, twenty, two-thousand. Prehnite couldn't give him his planet - his star - he could give him a bed to lie in on the place he'd been born though. On Earth.

“They didn’t.” he knew that much. He wasn’t sure what’d happened to the white moon after - between the explosions and the ceremony, he wasn’t even sure what was left on that field. Scorched earth, Shattered star pieces, alien bodies. It didn’t matter to him - if he’d known Ochre was there? If he’d registered him at all.

But he’d had a job to do, his team to protect. A Generator to manage while holding the line with Wolframite at his side. Maybe he would’ve done nothing, or stopped him, or wished him well?

He could’ve even helped Jet. There was no way to know what might’ve been.

There was only the *now* - rectifying what felt like wrongs. Even if it was just the smallest of them. Jet understood where he was going though, what he really, truly wanted his aid in.

Ochre deserved to be buried by a brother - a teammate - a friend...

If none of those remained? A person who cared whether or not he was buried at all would have to do. It was on them after all. Their fault that Ochre had strayed; wandering lost, alone, and hurt while waiting for someone - anyone, to finally come home to him.

“I don’t care how many pieces he’s in, or that he left us for ‘them’ - after a tenure of service mind you….He was ours first. They can’t have him in this.”

They didn’t deserve him, not to mourn, or to see, or to miss. What saviors were they? What good, even. How long had they taken? And to do such a thing mid battle — Ganymede should’ve known better then to put the nail in his coffin and the target on his back in such a blindly obvious way.

“I’ve a small plot of land purchased just outside the city, a nicely wooded area well off the beaten path -“ he’d planed to use it for Iolanthe - maybe a secret garden topside just for her to inhabit when she was in the mood to watch the moon through the trees? Somewhere far Away from white moon and agents alike. He’d thought to clearing a portion of it, building a greenhouse. He likely still would — he imagined she’d make a wonderful guardian, just as easily as an aid to beautifying the place properly.

“Sylvite is searching for — oh - whatever the county does with these things. The turnover in dropped bodies is high; luckily a beheading is unique enough to be findable. We have his name. Either he will be located via obituary--or..We're not without means of discovering him, is what I want to say.“ Prehnite trailed off with a shrug and a sigh, winced for every time he touched his eyes and how it reopened the ache that spread like icepicks through his temples - across his nose. Just behind his eyes again in a pinpoint.

Either they’d find him in the ground, or they were going to raid a morgue. Rob a grave.

It really didn’t matter anymore.

"I want the space ready beforehand. However long it takes her to find. He was her mentor, and unlike mine? He didn't simply disappear into he ether." Prehnite thought it would've been kinder maybe, if he had...It would've been kinder still if Ganymede hadn't lured him in with her magic, if Ochre'd had the will to come to his senses and said 'no'.