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It splits itself in two —

A migraine.

What does a migraine become when—

An aneurysm—

He wove himself spiteful puns about the sentient, buzzing horde; millions of smoky whatevers that comprised his boy's personal partner-pet. The remaining proof (by his own measure) that his boy was still living, breathing, just out of view. Telling himself the kind of jokes that would make Eion, cringe-laugh, roll those burning eyes, and slap him in the chest. He’d tackle him into the sheets — kidnap his wordy fingers — kiss them softly…

He’d crack open the sky and kill a captured god. Or whoever was actually keeping him from seeing Eion; currently nameless and faceless but he needed someone to blame! To expend all his energy outwards lest it collapse in like a black hole so suckingly deep that even his team couldn’t pull him from the depths of it.

Anger was safer, always. Even the quiet kind. Even the sort that kept him awake and wandering dust-smattered halls of the castle in the wee hours…

Driven out of the bed of a lover by his own too-hot thoughts and seeking somewhere less volatile than the streets. He couldn’t do any damage here! Not where he could pace guard-like, unbothered, while not asking his feet where they were leading him. Humming (if mostly to himself) wordless conversations that he’d never have in the waking, sunlit hours. Bringing up points for useless arguments that he’d inevitably lose if ever the arguments became real. He probably looked crazy. Good. Better. Best!!

Especially while he was daydreaming—-

About better days and brighter tomorrow’s; Cassian’s hair fanned out across the sheets, Ren's softer smiles when the man finally let his guard down. Emmy’s perfect beauty mark—

Faustite—

And the anger was back in blinding force, no baying of hounds could tree it. It only split itself up, multiplied, and became a tidal wave.He nearly walked face first into a door — ominous obsidian — black on black — stone on stone — the half second, last minute flinch he spared to teleport through it saved his face! And left him standing face to face with a new place to focus all his rekindled ire. A new being to vent himself upon—- Because he didn’t have to save face with this one, could let his reaction be genuine, on his sleeve, in his posture. A ‘how ******** dare someone leave this rotting corpse leaking in my hallway specifically because they knew I’d step in it!’, kind of obvious distaste.

He was taking it personally— everything — he knew no other way (a lie, such a goddamn liar), or at least? He didn’t care to exercise any other ways he knew..

“Headache—-“ He hissed, mock ‘heeeey buddddyy’ with the way he dragged the syllables that made up the creature's name out longways until they were distorted.

“Wanna hear a joke?”

His smile slanted off his face, rockslide heavy, carrying mud, ire, and undiluted belligerence.

'You don’t tell me what to do, you shitty pile of bugs. You don’t give ‘orders’ to ‘me’ while looking like him! You’re not him! He’s— '

An unexpected flash of an image forestalled his impending tirade, lips sealing airtight as the memory of peering through a tiny porthole twisted his features; stabbed his heart, soured his guts. The taste of something vile, of unexpected bile mixed with unnameable-worse. He couldn’t place the flavor the image conjured, his mind wouldn’t fondle the feeling long enough to let him give a name to it. Because some s**t? Decidedly. Didn’t deserve to be acknowledged. It was probably his own mind's piss-poor job at throwing up walls around the wound of an image, like it was cancerous and needed to be calcified ********’ immediately!

Except he was a poor stonemason, there were cracks in the mortar, the concrete was pitted with ever-more holes he could peer through even if it was only by squinting at this point.

If he really wanted to see? The cracks taunted, tempted, bade with sirensong—

Except he didn't. Couldn’t. Chose immediately the delusional break of sunshine through the gloom imagery that best let him cling with every fiber to *hope*!!

“Just my business, Headache? Awwh…c’mon…” Feigned pout as he scuffed his heels while drawing ever closer to where Headaches sat. Resisting the urge to slap the tablet out of the creature's hands by the thinnest of hairs. “Why, m’I bugging you? Hah – get it – cause see – you’re just bugs…” Explaining the not-joke to make it less funny while dragging the moment out for suffering's sake. Because being told to do something was as likely to get the opposite from him as being told to ‘not’, he was probably some psychologists worst nightmare and some dog-trainers future pedigree champ! Getting blue ribbons in exchange for positive reinforcement? He was so ******** in – getting blue ribbons because he was told he couldn’t ever rise to stand atop the first place pedestal as champ? He’d do it double-time and murder the judges afterwards just to ensure they never doubted him again.

“N’never in my life have I let ‘just bugs’ tell me what to do. How quickly t’do it.”

‘Mine to waste however the ******** I please!’ A rhetorical not worth saying for how obvious it was, how lame, in some sense? How telling in another, for his hand had long ago been called and spread on the table for the world to view. Any follow-up would’ve simply been more of that; rimmed in telling emotion, weakness, longing. Because sometimes the s**t that came out of Headaches mouth was arrow-to-the-heart true!

The problem with a perfect illusion, from Albites perspective? Was that knowing it was only that, an illusion, sure as ******** didn’t change his feelings over it! Seeing his boy, hearing him!

Wanting, wanting, please, please, please! You’re never ******** fair to me, I ******** miss you, there is no replacement! There is no amount of ‘bodies, bones, brothers in arms’ to soothe this ache! I lied!!

In fact? If it were any other time, if the circumstances of his coming into this office, the driving force behind it, were different by a hair? He might not have even known there was any illusion going on – not from a distance – not if *Faustite* was only standing, or speaking to someone else, or like this? Quietly working away the hours in a diligent way. There were no flaws in Headaches facsimile, no cracks in the seamless shimmer of bugs to person he loved—

At least? Not until Albite looked into its eyes for long enough. Got Headache speaking back for long enough that something felt off even if he couldn’t tell what? And there, for him, lay the break in his mind. Not one he could prove, or point out to others. Like tasting a cookie made without love and going ‘huhn’ over it before going right back to ******** eat it.

Because even a loveless cookie could still be a good cookie, and people all over the world bought dupes for the exact same reasons he was standing here…now….

Viewing a fake Mona Lisa hung up where the real Faustite would’ve sat, with the restoration of the real one secretly taking place behind thick, black curtains and walled scenes. An operating theater he was no longer allowed in to view the goings on from just off stage, above stage, behind stage. No, he’d been relegated to standing outside the front doors, in the pouring rain, glaring down bouncers and valets who could no longer be intimidated enough by who *he* was to let him in.

The ******** nerve of them all— I swear if it wasn’t Laurelites orders behind it? Her words…. I’d…

The break in the mimicry was a relief in so many ways, a cold slap of reality, the shininess of it new enough that he had to look more sharply at it, more closely. He couldn’t place the voice, didn’t know if this was Headache speaking for itself? Or if it was simply more intense parroting?

It drew him closer if nothing else, had him standing directly in front of the desk the way he never would’ve if this’d been with his husband. The way he’d erased those boundaries early; a tide washing out lines drawn in the sand. And he’d always preferred to sit side-saddle to Faustite. Within arms length, at all times, just in case his boy ever wanted to reach out.

He promised he wouldn’t flinch from it.

He didn’t flinch now, as he answered back with a cocksure grin, shaking his head like Headache had missed something important.

“S’where you’re wrong, y’see? It was his genius, not his mistake.” Blowing out a huff of a sigh, fingers trawling lengthy dreads back behind his shoulder, annoying things, his own cloak of hair nothing compared to a proper Generals, and yet? “I mean…Isn’t that how y’should want ******** cattle, bugs?” Tongue touched to teeth, the disappointed little kiss of sound so purely human, “Soft’n, n’sweet, n’eager t’put their heads on the block…” He would’ve done it too. Moreso because he knew Faustite would never ask it of him in that way, not unless he needed it, not unless he meant it with all of himself! Unless it was the last, last chance at the end of the world to save it.

I wonder if even then, he’d ask? All the times he’s dragged me down n’asked me to live for him instead. All the ways I keep agreeing, over and over, to do just that. T’live, and live, and live! With him, for him, because of him!

Even without him…

“Even if all you ********’ hunger for the organ meats. N’none of the s**t surrounding it…” Said like it was a shame that Headache had no taste, no imagination. That the pile of female-sounding bugs wearing his boys skin would disparage the Eternal army Faustite; their master, lover, King had made for himself!! “Y’gotta grow that bit first, yanno? In the vessel the Cosmos put it in…like vat meat in a jar….” Another flash of unpleasant imagery came with that, one he stamped down, heel on the butt of one of Eros’s worst blunts. He ground it into his mental baseboards and told it to ******** stay there.

“N’then? Y’gotta get your hands on it.”

“Without dying…..”

“N’without him? No offense. But we’d ******** kill you…” The WE he used had royal connotations to it, sounding like ‘many’ as it slid off his tongue. Carrying the odd energy he sometimes felt when waking from his most confusing wet dreams. The ones full of; fire, blood, ash. The ones where Faustite sometimes only had half a face, sat with him atop mountains of burned worlds. Where bodies and bones were piled high as the eye could see. But he was still next to his boy, always, oft kneeling when he wasn’t standing at his left flank. ******** confusing, really, with how fubar-crossed his wires had become.
With the way he didn’t question s**t and simply rolled over to cuddle up to his beloved instead.

If anything ever happens to him…..if ever he’s not around…

Waru wasn’t worried, per say, and yet? Faustites return was what was on his mind, ever and always, but even more-so now that his presence was met with denial at the door. That his questions remained unanswered – the way s**t was getting droll – annoying – repetitive!

If he had to hear ‘Sorry, Albite. But this is all I can tell you for now.’ one more time!! N’it set his ******** hackles off, off, off and he couldn’t pin down why!!

But maybe….

His eyes locked with Headaches own, the stare unbroken, happy to meet the kind of gaze he’d never seen from his beloved before.

Good.

‘Pretty—’ what a strange-a** thought it was to have when faced with a crystal clear picture of an enemy.

The Enemy.

Her ‘bleed-upon-me’ voice, polished perfection, whetstone fresh.

‘I wouldn’t even feel it if she cut me, would I? I’d be dead before I hit the floor…’

It was a feeling he felt assured of, wove into assumptive ‘fact’. It was with that same surety he knew Headache had gotten her image correct; every fiber of every hair, every stitch of every thread. The face he’d seen before, but never so picturesque, statuesque. Never staring him down like he was something even lesser than a s**t-stain beneath her shoe.

No, she wouldn’t even have acknowledged the stain of me in life, would she? She would’ve just stepped over my corpse n’called it done. Like swatting a fly…like paying taxes….this pretty c**t and her sharp little phrases…

He hopped atop the desk then, into a crouch overtop thick heels; lowering himself, apelike, curious. As near to studious as someone like Albite could come with another thing. Looking as though he wanted to caress the fine points of her high cheekbones, as he did strangle her with her own braid. Garrote wire could be made from hair, he’d read it, somewhere? He believed that as fact too! That her exact shade of blond lengths would’ve looked best not atop her head, but as a crude hand tool used to shape her throat into a smile.

“Never—” A shift in Albite's gaze, the magic held at bay roiled like hounds swarming over the fields of his arms. Flickers of it writhing across his knuckles, tripped by his anger over Headaches bullshit, unsettled by the deep-seated fear that there may be truth buried somewhere in the lying creature's words. Lies could be like that – littered with itchy grains of honesty – with pebbles in shoes, hard to swallow realism.

Headache has always been wrong— Schorl has always been wrong! Always, always, always! About Faustite, yeah, of ******** course. But what about me? Are they wrong about me – is Schorl — is this sack of s**t bug-pile —

“My flesh? ********’ maybe, but my vows? Nawwh, bugs…” Straightening his stance, keeping his hands splayed along the wide inseam of his thighs. Not touching the sharp, shiny, pretty thing. No matter how desperately his mind screamed at him to just ******** do it already! “Cause someday, you’ll cease – haah – just…stop…” Popping the ‘P’ like bubblegum, his grin a severe line dragging slow his cadence. "entirely. Become a pile of Rift-s**t for all th’other creatures out there t’step right over.” He told himself Headache was just ******** with him, that Schorl was an evil c**t, like a mantra! That they were ghosts and he was alive and without Faustite they’d all together be nothing!! “But even dead n’rotting in the ground?”

“I get t’be reborn, for time ********’ Eternal – n’so do my vows –” A part of him wondering if he could coalesce the memories he wanted passed on into vials of his own? If he could somehow leave specific instructions for all future Praxidikes to follow? Twist fate, manhandle time, give the middle finger to the autonomy of all his future selves iterations! Or, at least, encourage them to pursue with fervor every face-sharing version of his husband that would ever be, no matter what body, what alien form, what human face.

T’ensure that kind of bind?

“In this life? In every life. N’less n’untill someone feeds my crushed up starseed t’something bigger’n me and Hell, Schorl? Even then I might just surprise you!” To laugh in her face felt freeing, to look down on her even as her presence loomed imposingly large in the space. It was good s**t! “Stranger s**t has happened– like my having the right t’demand Faustites time, his presence, information about how he ******** is?” He fidgeted in a telling way, resettling himself, and yet? It was as if skirting the topic nudged a fear-laced wire in his mind. That he might not be being told something – that the dry – dull – practiced feeling pushoffs, and rehearsed platitudes he’d been getting of late were more to do with something having gone wrong and less to do with the idea that all these things took time!

“S’the….wholeeee….’till death do us part’...bit of this…r’it would be? If I was th’type t’ever let something silly as death keep me from what’s mine.”

Mine. Mine. Mine. Mine!! Dare. Dare. Dare. Dare!!

His impulses itched, the magic over his skin skittered.

‘Kill it kill it kill it kill it!!’ A caress of a whisper in his mind, inky dark, nigh-manic. The way the words ramped up to an unintelligible speed as the urge to give into impulse began to feel like an external pressure bearing ever downwards on all sides. Blurring the edges of Headache-as-Schörls repose.

‘This b***h, relaxing! Like she doesn’t even care…’

Like he never had been and never would be a threat.

‘This ******** thing—’

It was all in his head, mostly. Save the way his pupils blew wide with his rabbiting pulse, adrenaline surging with no outlet, as his mouth parted gently around words that wouldn’t quite come. He didn’t know if he was shocked into silence, if he wanted to laugh without end at Headache for pulling this type of ploy so ******** masterfully; like a flea doing a real neat circus trick!

The prize winning kind that left him with his spinning plates crashing all around, the tent of their performance catching fire at the edges. The audience slaughtered in their seats — no – invisible, even, an audience of one and he was performing for himself in front of a puppet wearing the face of a corpse.

‘A s**t talking parrot at best!’

But the bugs were making points, poking holes in his hatred, dangling carrots too juicy to ignore. Would it be worth it, really? To pour kerosene on the ashes of his and Headaches long-burnt bridge just for the fleeting pleasure of it all! Any other day the answer to that would’ve been a resounding yes!! But in the moment, the fleeting flicker of staring into Schörls loveless eyes, and ultimately? Blinking. The answer became a flat, monosyllabic – No.

“You’re wrong, yanno?” He grit out, wincing like he was deepthroating poisonous nettles whole and unchewed. A decision made, for better or worse, and there was no pleasure for him in making it. “About your fate being tied t’his. N’those two things bein’ anything like the same….” It hurt, not the act of sliding off the table and into Schörl’s personal space. Straddling briefly in the space directly above where she sat; still elegant, and devastating in Faustites chair.

Faustites chair. Not Headaches. Not Schörls. Faustites.

Making room for himself, as he always did, by force when necessary, by leaning back on the second-most imposing piece of furniture in the room. Palms and a** pressed to the lip of it as he shoved until something gave and the desk screeched ear-splittingly backwards. The tiniest grin flickered over Albites face for not upending the thing across the room and into pieces this time…..

“Because your fate, Headache?” It hurt, his pride, his ego, his spirit!! To breathe past all the ways he wanted to punch the creature before him to dust until his own flesh gave and muddied Headaches flakes into a wet slurry, till they were mixed through, and he would find a starseed to pop like rock candy if it meant he’d heal in time to do it the second the buggy little b*****d reapperated! To do it again. And again. Anddd—

“S’tied to mine.” Licking his suddenly dry lips, as his body gave, robotic in its motions. Like he didn’t own it anymore, like it was rusty to obey but he was forcing it! “He’ll get to rest…someday…” To kneel, at boots unfamiliar to him, at the ankles of his enemy. Licking suddenly dry lips and rasping bitter tasting promises past them. “You? I’ll get to dust you, n’yours, n’anything like yours…for uhhhmm…a thousand-fold pining iterations…was it?”

He dared to reach at the end, pressing a pair of fingers to the toes of Schörls well polished soles, staring up hatefully into eyes that seemed too intelligent to be a simple youmas. Telling himself this too, was for Faustite. That for his boy he could do anything, even this, if just this one time.

“Now…f’you’ve got anything t’say that isn’t ******** lies? M’listening…..”

Not just a mangled starseed in a jar, a monstrosity looking irreparable, terrifyingly so—–

Not just science fiction, smoke, mirrors and mending meat!!

Faustite was alive in a way that mattered, with them in a form that counted!! If that meant a functioning brain in a jar or a torso in a shell? His boys ghost haunting them through Headache somehow?! Albite didn’t stay sat on any of those ideas too hard, lest his morbid curiosity become a terrible reality purely via him thinking it. The barest drops of hope tasted so delicious. It helped that he was willing to buy this lie, to call it truth while bearing his throat to the creature he hated most in the moment.

Thinking happy thoughts about how they must have been repulsed in equal measure by one another. Thinking – ‘Good—’ and, ‘if my skin could literally crawl away? It’d’ve made it out the door n’left my screaming body behind a ******** age ago…’ even as he dug his own nails into the hard ground, inching them away from the recoil of crawling bugs.

Clinging to his delight at learning even a scrap about Eion, as Headaches discussion of bonds…of ‘us’...of daring to demand ******** anything more from him!! Like a b*****d— made his soul turn over, probably his ancestors too, but? The dead could twist in the wind for all he cared, his living self had to deal with the nauseating sensations of now.

“I’ll have to get it from him….” Tongue laden, his gaze flickered thoughtfully, he rolled his eyes as he made up his mind lightning fast. It was only one more small pain to suffer through, to hold his tongue, rather than bray sass about the bug’s possible hunger….or desire for power…or…whatever other horrible things he could imagine Headache wanting Helio’s stash for? <******** it…I’ll promise the bugs what arent mine to promise…n’if Helio says no? ******** it. I’ll go get more myself…’

“That is….I will…it’ll be yours…his stash..” Ground past clenched molars, hissed through a sigh. He kept telling himself that this was worth it, better than the silence, better than not knowing, living in perpetual dark!

A line too far.

“Praxidikes Exacting Justice—” Albite snapped the words he seldom needed speak anymore, the magic erupting from his flesh; a spill of chainlinked hydras, open mawed, starving. If only there was more of a form to latch onto. To anchor to himself and cinch round, and round, and round till something snap, crackle, shattered!

Wishing it were bones instead of dust—

Flesh and body instead of small-swarm youma wearing Schörl's chilling smile—

The answer to his standing issues, instead of a mistake made on his knees.

He yanked himself from the position so fast he gave himself vertigo, fleeing in a snap of void to do Headache’s bidding with shame burning on his face. His fears of having ******** himself warred with the rageful impulse, fleeting, damning.

‘Damn him—’

He told himself it’d be fine. Headache was greedy for power, for his humiliation? The theater of which he'd parade himself upon willingly, in the degrading sort of way that Helio needn’t be dragged into. Not for this. Not like this! Maybe….maybe if he asked? <******** get the ******** things myself and do it in my own damn time!’