When the Fire Works (14) : Innovation is expected in Destiny City, so seasonal commodities are always expected to sell well. This year, the hot new summer item includes some chemically enhanced logs: carefully modified with environmental and health-safe chemicals, these logs are guaranteed to burn bright, burn long, and burn beautifully. It’s not just a pretty flame: each individual log has several rings that will light up like a sparkler when the flame hits. Larger logs will even pop off small, colorful fireworks for several hours while they burn. Though the lightshow is beautiful, it’s also calm. The logs have a pleasant, earthy smell, and unlike the sounds of normal fireworks, these simply sound like a crackling fire. There’s something curiously nostalgic about these fires; they are able to elicit a sort of childlike whimsy, if only you let them. If not, it’s still pretty.
Things going well always started to feel suspicious after a while. Maybe Murikabushi needed to work on that in therapy with Dr. Mjoli……but on the other hand, maybe it was just the most reasonable way to feel about everything in Destiny City. Yes, after everything with Dr. Harold Darkstar, Tedious ********, PhD., Murikabushi had needed some peace and quiet—relative to the fact that he was still very all about the magical girl life, including in ways that likely meant he made himself a thorn in some choice sides, in ways that involved traveling to his world, and in ways that were ultimately neither peaceful nor quiet.
But peace and quiet never lasted in Destiny City. Nor did Murikabushi trust them very much as a general rule.
Out and about tonight, Murikabushi wandered through the sort of weather that threatened to rain, throwing in a drizzle here or there like Mother Nature wanted to tease everybody's assorted vegetable lawns and gardens but never made good on any of her promises. Neither cold nor particularly warm, even given it being June in Virginia. Exactly the right sort of noncommittal-a** weather that made him wish he would catch some Lieutenant getting grabby with people's starseeds. He also might have accepted the bitchy little blonde who'd tried to throw shade at him during that whole dust-up with rescuing Tama, and who'd then had been attached to Albite's hip when their team had come to rescue Heliodor back in December.
What? It wasn't like Murikabushi could punch the weather, but scruffing some grandeur-deluded bully like a disobedient kitten and telling them "No. Bad. Stop." might've done his nerves some good.
Then again, as Muri perched atop the gazebo where he'd met Aruna and Tempesti a few months back, when everything had felt a lot simpler, he also felt like……seeing Albite's naughty kitten wasn't what he really wanted in his life.
Wasn't what Murikabushi really needed in his life, either.
Looking out over the buildings and alleys around the park, Murikabushi thought of Elsa. The word for what they were now danced around his lips and tongue, unspoken but still potent enough to make him feel giddy……until he remembered a certain loose end, dangling there in a different corner of his life, perpetually unresolved.
Seemed likely to remain that way for a while, too, which only made things worse. Trying to sweet-talk Kaifeng into loaning out his signet ring to help arrange a meeting with Faustite had mostly been met with uncomfortable facial expressions and questions like "Do you really think you need to see him, though?" and "No, really, do you expect me to think that letting you meet up with that guy is a good idea?" and "I don't know, can't you hold him off until your planet lets you unlock the glowy transcended senshi anti-Chaos insurance? I don't care how much you trust him; I don't. If his hand gets in your chest again, then what's to stop him from dragging you off to the Negaverse because he doesn't care if it breaks you as long as he gets to say you're his?"
The feeling of a Negaverse aura appearing nearby attracted some interest. An Eternal or a General showing up always merited some (especially since Faustite, Jet, and the others on their level could go around, pretending to be normal-a** Generals, hiding the true extent of their power as befitted their purposes on any given night). Very few civilians seemed to be out and about at the moment, though, so Murikabushi had half a mind to just leave whoever-this-was alone……until he saw the smoke rising up out of an alley.
Moving quickly and gracefully, Muri was there in a flash. He peered into the alley cautiously, then darted toward the smoke. Not bright enough back here for Faustite and his furnace, but something did still smell like burning, and—
"Wait," Murikabushi spluttered, finally close enough to see someone familiar. "……Albite?"
Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2025 4:30 pm
When the Fire Works (14) :
Innovation is expected in Destiny City, so seasonal commodities are always expected to sell well. This year, the hot new summer item includes some chemically enhanced logs: carefully modified with environmental and health-safe chemicals, these logs are guaranteed to burn bright, burn long, and burn beautifully. It’s not just a pretty flame: each individual log has several rings that will light up like a sparkler when the flame hits. Larger logs will even pop off small, colorful fireworks for several hours while they burn. Though the lightshow is beautiful, it’s also calm. The logs have a pleasant, earthy smell, and unlike the sounds of normal fireworks, these simply sound like a crackling fire. There’s something curiously nostalgic about these fires; they are able to elicit a sort of childlike whimsy, if only you let them. If not, it’s still pretty.
The weather's nice tonight—
Nice enough to him, by his own terms n'standards. To be out walking, doing, moving!
He almost preferred it like this, even. The weather as ambiguously teasing as his mood. Not yet a full blown heatwave; the stifling temps of the day trying to seep off the blacktop and burning concrete edges like roaches fleeing the light the second the sun settled down. There were no impending monsoons on the horizon..
The first one was going to be a mess, he could feel it in his back molars, when natural lightning would light up the sky and he'd find a sudden reason to take a vacation somewhere away from here. An issue on his growing to-do list labeled lovingly as 's**t to handle'. However? Conquering potential new phobias was far enough down that it didn't vault his mission in this.
Finding Faustite; that was one, two, three. Four held space for peeling the banana he'd seen Mira chatting up out of her luminous yellow skin, but only because four-a involved the addendum of doing so until a said Earth Knight was offered up on a silver platter.
He didn't want to kill them…
Didn't want their starseeds…
But fair was fair, and if Helio had to spend the rest of his human days bearing their poorly made scars? <******** didn't even do it clean — that b***h put her teeth on Cass's throat — marked up whats mine — and whats mine – mine - mine - mine —
But whatever! Blah blah justice, blah blah retribution, blah blah moles fat in their mole holes! The 'paused for the end of the world' directives and frayed mission unaccomplished ends were piled high, inexorably tangled, unmanageably so! He wanted to take a sword to the knot of them, but he was swordless as a Senshi!!
I can only do what I can do and if what I can do is this?
Que him holding the literal smoking gun and accompanying matches in a back alley; gently cologned in the reek of gasoline that he knew Todd really ******** kindly hadn't asked about the last time he'd seen him. Because one or two cans weren't that suspicious and neither was the act of said cans being "stolen" by a giant (yet oddly familiar looking) bird– At least not so long as he dropped a large, brightly painted, riverbed ransom-rock. Said rock being tightly rubber banded with 'thank you for putting up with this' money onto the stack of green break-crates out back.
Sometimes he looked at the stack of pitted, green, plastic rectangles, and wanted to zip-tie together a nice crate-table and seat set for the guy. But there was something real…neoclassical working man? About Mr. Stick 'n Pokes sitting in a pose too low to be comfortable n'just enduring the graveyard shift grind to its bitter finish. In another life? Waru imagined himself stealing his ******** looking stock-bros last smoke out-between two nicotine stained fingers and putting it out with his tongue. Right before putting some life, color, and sound back into those 'seen too much for this world' eyes.
Not the sorta thing that would last, never that, not between them. Just the sort that would feel good for a fleeting moment without leaving any hard feelings or loose ends dangling about the next day.
He could've stayed back and done that instead, truly.
Instead? He was getting caught in a way no one had ever been caught in the history of being caught before. No one in existence was more red-handedly 'seen' in a moment than he, mostly because that was the most vibrant color of spray paint he could find, and the dumpsters obviously needed a message and a face or else who would understand the meaning?! But caught he was, unawares, whipping round at the sound of footsteps coming up on his periphery. The way his magic roiled across his flesh as the aura of Order hit him and he snarled over the interruption; a porcupine quilling up in warning, a diamondbacks rattle….
It took a shameful second too long for his liking—
"Muri!!"
Before it all dropped, magic, 'stolen goods', menacing gaze and don't ******** with me stance. All of it suddenly too hot to hold onto and so he let it all hit the street, unable to hold back his 'so ******** glad t'see someone alive' joy!
And it was the weirdest s**t sometimes, to feel in his heart like he'd be looking up into another person's eyes if he simply stepped out of his heels. That, powered or unpowered, Muri would always be 'bigger' in some sense. Maybe it was just the Order Eternals presence? The way Muri's billowing sleeves added length, and the shorter-than-the-sleeves skirts added leg.
"Holy, ********— Muri! How are you?"
You're alive, you're alive, I'm so glad your alive—
And in the background of his open grin and lowered palms as whatever else he’d he’d added into the bin finally caught well enough to do more than smoke. The sparklers were a touch of extra surprise!
Watching Albite shift from the guarded stance of a Negaverse senshi feeling an Order aura on the approach—more than understandable—Murikabushi almost let himself forget about the fact that he'd come this way because of the smoke. Not that he harbored any delusions about Albite being entirely helpless or a marshmallow fluff pushover (as Muri understood from Kerberos, one did not get to be an eternal senshi in Metallia's service without proving one's mettle and doing at least some ******** up s**t)? Still, whenever Murikabushi saw Albite, the latter usually came on more like a golden retriever who happened to also be a Negaverse senshi, rather than the whole looming with his whole height, ready to start a ******** fight thing Albite had going on initially.
"Hey, I—" Murikabushi started to speak, but the fwoomph! sound of something in the dumpster finally catching fire cut him off.
For a moment, he blinked at the flames instead of Albite, feeling more than anything a strange detachment from the situation. Oh, okay, Albite's out and about by himself, and decided to start a fire in a dumpster after spray-painting it for some inscrutable Albite reasons, Muri's brain assessed everything before him, from the fire to the rancid stink of gasoline and spray-paint to the other accoutrements Albite had dropped. I'm sure this is fine.
—except for all the ways it obviously wasn't.
Walking over closer to Albite—and the dumpster, and the dumpster fire, because this sure was a thing happening in Destiny City tonight—Muri gave himself a short, sharp shake of the head, trying to rouse himself out of dissociating about……whatever all he'd wandered into this time.
"I'm alright, more or less? It's been extremely 'Well, that sure was ******** up, but I now have to go to work so I guess I'll unpack it later' since that whole……" As he vaguely gestured at nothing in particular, Murikabushi pulled his lips into the tight-lipped frown of someone trying very hard not to get carsick. "All of that with the Calamitous Hoe-bag? I think it's been that way for a lot of people, though, so……at least I'm not alone in that, but……"
Brows knitting in concern, Murikabushi looked Albite in the eye as though that might reveal some clue. "How are you doing? And, uh……" He pointed at the fire. "Are you making dumpster s'mores or something?"
Muri asked the question with a gentle, but pointed, tone that said very clearly, I know you're not making dumpster s'mores. I may not understand what you're doing, but I do find it concerning.
Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2025 4:32 pm
"I'm starting a cult, actually." He smiled in a way that made it clear he was joking, mostly. In truth he was starting (with help, of course!) a new meme-driven, fire-focused sensation that would hopefully sweep the legs of the nation and lead his (potentially) wayward boy back home! It was hard to make headway in anything without proof – without photos – a room – bodies warm, cold, or otherwise.
But he rationalized that he'd done more with less before—
All he knew was where Faustite *wasn't* (by his side!) and that Headache was an untrustworthy, lying, bag of fleas, overflowing with puss-flavored vitriol and wordless spite.
"And we uh–we should step juuussst…a few paces back n'to the left, yeh?" He was starting to think further might've been better as something very glass-filled n'sloshy cracked, snapped, shattered with the growing heat. A nasty sizzle, n worse stench as the flames steadily grew. Whatever, all of that was fine! Exactly what he wanted, truly. So long as not a single spark of it caught Muri's fabulously flammable-looking form!
"Gods..The Harold? You were there! No, don't tell me, of course you were – anyone who gives a damn about anyone probably was…" Hissed in a way that matched the fire, "M'thinking 'alright' is about as good as anyone can be after all that. S'right up there with 'nice weather we're havin' and 'fine'...." He stopped to wonder if he'd lie to Murikabushi, if he'd tell a tale longer than his trailing dreads to…arguably…the one person he trusted more than some of the people he trusted the most. Not that the people he hung with weren't trustworthy! Everyone was true to their word as a sword in the gut, he prided himself on surrounding himself with the kinda blunt-force trauma honesty folk that made it easy to get by and be himself with. With friends who weren't snakes, but? Were also maybe murderers…traitors…moles. People who had more firm k.o.s rules n'he himself did…when they chose to have any standards at all…
Doesn't stop me from loving them all the same! But holy ********? M'fine…really…s'just…" There was a tactful way to handle this, there had to be! At least he thought so as he put his shoulder to the dirty wall adjacent the arson-in-progress, watching the sexier by the minute fire clip the rim of the metal tub (Was it sexy? Hestia had mentioned making it all – universally appealing? Was this a he-fire or a she-fire tonight? Whatever, he'd get pictures once it reached peak flammability!) "I…I maybe haven't seen Faustite in a hot minute? N'not in the way where he's on some secret mission I know nothing about while I'm also secretly corresponding with him n'not telling the others….n'not in the other way where he could've crawled off into the Rift….or died…or…okay….maybe he could've been dying?"
"But I feel like I would know if he did." Touching across the hole in his chest, his frown briefly severe, a rubber band losing its elasticity, before snapping back up. Looser than before, but trying to keep the shape it best remembered. Happy and here with it!
"My point is…people don't just get gone, yanno? No one actually disappears. Not in this city." Not ever, anywhere in the universe, did that happen. Not in his own less than wise opinion. Everyone went somewhere, no one became nothing, if a tree fell in the forest and that forest fell into another plane of being and there was no one around to see? It didn't negate the fact that the tree fell!
Or the fact that maybe if his boy weren't somewhere he could see him? Or talk to him, or —
Didn't mean he couldn't light Ei's way home, did it? That he couldn't' draw the kind of attention that would get him answers even if the answers were crickets chirping, deadly as the night, silence…
It always felt better to 'Do' than to 'Don't' so he was doing!!
Okay, the cult joke was pretty funny, and rewarded with a warm laugh. It did exactly ******** to soothe Murikabushi's nerves in face of the mounting evidence that Albite was extremely Not Okay right now, but……well. That was probably a tall ask from any aspect of the situation, in light of Albite talking the way he was and starting literal dumpster fires over whatever was going on for him right now. Whatever pain he was carrying around inside him that made him lash out like this.……
Oh.
Murikabushi paused, mid-shifting closer to the wall, and stared at Albite. Turned what Albite had admitted over and over in his head for a moment. Long enough that the silence got itchy, prickling along the back of Murikabushi's neck as the full weight of that admission dropped, cold and heavy, into the pit of his chest. Even shaking himself around enough to move away from the fire properly, he felt like somebody had injected his brain with a potent form of novocaine that simply did not want to let him understand what the ******** Albite meant.
"Yeah, I……I noticed you guys and your team at the battle with Harold," Murikabushi said softly, struggling to think of what he could possibly say right now. Wasn't often that he dealt with this problem. "Not that I could pay very close attention? I had a spike of my own to handle, and a bunch of people looking at me for leadership all of a sudden……" Elsa. Daedalus. Aruna. Tianyi. Tempesti. Harmonia. Madriu and the bunny-boy senshi who'd come there with him. Chillingham and Mönch. That Aberdonia guy who'd come out of the woodwork and used his magic to keep everyone safe. The senshi with the little faux-hawk. The two space-senshi Murikabushi hadn't recognized. "And, uh. Then, something I actually need to talk to Faustite about.… Pretty badly, and, uh. About us—the 'me and him' kind of us, I mean……"
But if he was missing so much that even Albite hadn't seen him.…… Had no idea what had happened to him.……
Leaning against the wall beside Albite, Murikabushi shook his head. "People don't just get gone in Destiny City, though, I agree," he said. Maybe it was delusional thinking on Albite's part. Maybe Murikabushi was enabling that. But on the other hand…… "Y'know, last year, I got a friend back after thinking he'd probably died ten years prior. All because he'd traded in one fuku color for another, and anybody who'd known him as he was before, he obviously couldn't tell us about it. And he was extremely emotional in different ways from Faustite when he went missing, but……" Muri sighed. "I have to believe you'll get your man back."
Arching a brow over at the dumpster, though, he added, "You and the team are investigating more leads than the signal fires, right? Also, uh. What actually happened? Before he went missing, I mean? 'Negaverse rules say I can't tell you' is a valid answer, by the way I'm just trying to think of possible explanations for where he could've gone and more detail helps.……"
Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2025 4:34 pm
"You've always been leadership material, Muri. Even I knew that. The second I saw you, I swear..…"
If you'd stayed? I'd have put you in a crown of your own. No…a tiara…but a real ********' prinessy one…something in silver n'purple to match?
Even if the idea had him smiling? Even if they were the words that wanted to fall off his lips? In some part of his heart it felt wrong, like it would've been a disservice to say those things to the worried looking, leggy boy before him. A piss-stream of a put-down to all of Muri's own hard won-freedom, the work he could only imagine the other man must've put in to change his stripes, stars, and colors! To have done all of that? And still, still, still helped them when they'd needed it most! Time and again!! Even now – maybe?
So he didn't say it, shut his mouth and shook his head softly, letting himself listen instead.
"But you're right, huhn? Too much goin' on t'keep track've anything…" His gaze jumped from where it'd wandered to examining the details of Muri's dripped out fit, they were always on the move usually, whenever they got these moments together? Always fighting, scrambling, trying to survive! In the glow of warm fires the whites didn't look so white and the purples popped even more. He could take the time to take the details in, distractedly…
Till the 'We need to talk' line snatched his gaze up tighter than Ilmari's waist in a bodice! His gaze wild and searching, for only a moment, for long enough that he held his breath waiting for the other shoe to fall. His shoulders only relaxing as he realized it wasn't going to drop right now, and that even if it did? It wasn't his to ******** chew on, not this time, not with Muri. The shoes were for someone else and he could save his pavlovian slobber for whenever his boy brought them back home to their bed – if Faustite ever so chose to discuss them – the shoes – the dropping – the…
If Faustite ever came home…
"M'sorry…I…." That Muri wanted to see Faustite and couldn't. That he hadn't known Muri'd had to go through such a difficult situation. That it was par for the course in all this, sometimes. That he still wasn't sure if revival was the better outcome than death in some cases? At what point should 'missing' have become 'stayed gone', when did 'better off dead' take the wheel? Was there such a thing for anyone? Were normal people able to move on from these sorts of things – or was Eternal hurt the other price they paid for being 'magical girls' with eons worth of ancestors' fractal memories, n'world ghosts clawing at their figurative doors?
"N'thank you? Really. For understanding. For believing in me when I know I sound just…plain ******** crazy..." A choked sort of laugh, too short to be happy, but the appreciation was in his eyes, the softness of his features. "He died, Muri." The sudden shift to deadpan, mirthless, rocks off the cliffside taking all the goats below along. Faustite had thrown himself on the sword of his fears. The spike had been placed, held, his boys' endeavors supported by them all. And then….
"But would you believe me if I told you it's not the first time he's done it?" There was a line of hope in his words, thin and worn, but present. "Faustite's tough…like…Frankenstein's cat tough? Th'one that's both alive n'dead in the box at all times..." He didn't know the cat's name, but he knew there was one, whatever he'd picked had to be accurate enough, both right and wrong, monster and man, dead and alive in its incorrect-correctness?
"But don't worry! Th's**t I've seen magic do? Even the worst kind of magic! N'maybe it should just be labeled 'science' at this point…for all that m'lacking in understanding…gods…any of what's going on? For all that I don't care t'really understand this s**t so long as whatever happens works in my favor…yeah?" Because there was no reason to lie about his own selfish wishes, not in this instance, for how he would happily wear the darkest blinders and rosiest glasses if looking past all that was going on around him meant achieving the one, singular, goal.
"But m'out here, doing this? Cause..." What did he say, what could he say, what should — nothing of vat meat – of closed doors – of tiny portholes and starseeds fractured beyond repair – repairable regardless, maybe? Some way. Somehow. Some— and he hadn't need to see anymore, the first look had been more than enough. That didn't mean he'd stopped going by, stopped asking more, and more pressing questions in sharper and sharper tones.
"It's off..somethings off…I can ******** feel it, alright? And apparently the 'Negaverses Rules' say that they can't tell me s**t either? That I – of all ******** people – am juuusssttt wild-card enough t'not be trusted with s**t this important. That the situation's all – fancy bullshit – delicate n'nuanced – n'they have nothing more t'tell me than what I've been told! Because he might be 'My Husband'! But he's 'Their King' –" was that a snarl? Had he just ******** growled at, wow, okay! N'reeling it all back in, swallowing it all down; the ever-looming, all-consuming, frenzied rage of it! Because crashing out in front of Muri was never the option!! There were, ugh, breathing techniques? Or some kind of bullshit, but yeah…..
Breathing—
"Haaah…sssssooooo…..y'see…." sounding nearly apologetic as he held his arms out, dropped them back heavily to his side. Looking like he knew what to do about anything now even less than he had before. "There isn't really anything more me'n the team can investigate internally, yeah? N'they've still got their hands full with figuring out how all that info about Helio got loose n'free…n'they've gotta do it in the aftermath of…yanno..th'world nearly ending? Time marching on…s'tough…" The team deserved downtime, time to adjust, time to live and breathe and have fun! It couldn't be all murder, missives, and mayhem! Not twentyfourseven, because people didn't thrive like that, even the most perfect of soldiers? Even if the stakes were dire…
And he had no proof that there were stakes. It was all smokeless fires, scentless bbq's. If something was wrong he couldn't find anyone who'd admit it. Not Headache (lying sack of bugs), not Laurelite (protective, stern, Queen), not…
"I've hit my end of where I can actually be helpful with all've that…" Truthful sigh, he shrugged forlornly, glancing at his kingdom of flaming trash, the little sparks of the dumpsters blazing innards flickering skywards, pretty as sparklers in July. "So m'out here, doin this? Because this is something I can do…becuase something feels ******** off n'like…the silence from the other end of this is deafening, Muri. It's maddening." The thought possessed him that he could be wrong about this, if only he had the sense to pay it any heed instead of chewing it up and spitting it into the dirt every time it reared itself like a shitty conscience he didn't need anymore.
"Maybe he's not out here? Maybe he's not missing at all…But if he ********' is? Well…mm'ah light his way home…n'burn these things up till somebody calls in having found him…even if it's not me...just in case, yanno?" There was a stark moment, a flash of true concern, the way he stared into Muri and asked, boldly, tensely, for reassurance of any kind. To be the other voice in his head, the louder clearer one. Because he was tired of the ones that sounded like his own mouth running, of Headache puppeting Faustites recordings, of —
Listening to Albite, even on a good day, was always a wild ride in the wrong lane of an iced over road with a lead foot on the gas, a student driver behind the wheel, and a cut brake-line. On some level, Murikabushi could never quite shake the notion that making friends with Albite had been some kind of karmic retribution because this was everyone else's experience of talking to him. So many different trains of thought, so much information to keep up on and keep in line with itself (something made even more challenging because Albite often expressed himself in such non-linear and obtuse ways), and then there was the content of whatever Albite had to say, once you picked that out from amidst all the odd word choices, difficult bits of phrasing, and outright malaprops like "Frankenstine's cat" instead of "Schrödinger's cat" (though, in fairness, the former did feel much more appropriate to Faustite than the latter).
But tonight, the story on Albite's mind more or less made sense, relative to the fact that he was describing something that sounded, much like the illness that had preceded Faustite's glow-up to General-Sovereign, extremely unprecedented. So many Important Matters to unpack and to discuss, Muri barely had time to blush about Albite telling him that he thought Muri would've made good leadership material. Not that Albite could possibly know about Aruna and how much she looked up to him, or about Tempesti and how Aruna had introduced them with the intent of getting Tempesti hooked up with someone who could function as something mentor-adjacent for her while she found her sea-legs as a senshi.……
But this was still an awful lot of people having similar opinions of Muri's capabilities, all in a few months of each other and with some magical destiny business all wrapped up in the spike he'd had to take charge of when it had decided to reject Blossom as its caretaker.
As he considered where to even begin responding to Albite's story, Muri carded his fingers through his bangs and caught himself wishing that Faustite could just, like, appear here right now, hale and healthy and himself, to please express the more realistic opinion that Muri was kind of a ******** mess actually and then go home with Albite, where he belonged. Of course, that didn't happen and the only source of fire remained the one Albite had started over in the dumpster. But "Do any of these people realize how much of a mess you are? Or do you really have them all snowed with the sparkle and the swish and the whole magical girl diva thing?" did feel like the sort of sentiment Faustite might have given voice to, if he'd had the opportunity.
"Albite, as long as I've known you, I've never known you to be a liar," Muri told him gently, still feeling like he was fumbling about where to start but needing to start somewhere. "Emotional, yes, and possessed of very Big Feelings—but so am I, and the fact that you're open about it all makes me trust you more." Not entirely disregarding the inherent danger that Albite could have posed, if he wanted to. Murikabushi knew that Negaverse Chaos could ******** a person up and make them—even someone as earnest and genuine as Albite—flip a switch to dead-a** murder right away quick under the right circumstances. But……trusting that Albite didn't want to let that switch flip inside him with Muri specifically, at least. "And let's be real: 'Faustite died but he can still get better from it and come back' would not be the most outlandish thing to happen in this town just this month, let alone its entire history. Nor do I think Faustite would willingly stay dead."
It wasn't always a choice, though, was it? Sometimes, people had all the desire in creation to stay alive, to make it home to their people, to survive, and reality had other ideas about it.
"On top of that, permanent deaths in this town are usually more conclusive," he said, both honest in his hope for things to not ******** suck so bad and admittedly looking for whatever bright side Murikabushi could find. "Not all of this 'Well, according to Negaverse Code, Chapter 17, Part Seven, Subsection Alpha-Beta-Omega-Three, we can't be telling you things because ********, absolutely head-a** reasons' s**t."
Which made Muri yearn to give Queen Becky With The Green Hair a piece of his ******** mind, like? Excuse you, ma'am, but Albite's loyalty—both to the Negaverse and to his husband—being paid back in dust like this? It rankled Murikabushi on a deeper level than the Chaos cannon Becky had trotted out ever could have. Sure, that one had made him feel sick and filled him with major existential dread, but this? This sounded like Queen Becky and maybe other members of the Negaverse brass (probably not Jet, Muri didn't think that blowing Albite off about something like this sounded like his style, but there had to be more of them) disrespecting Murikabushi's friend. Inexcusable. Unforgivable. How very dare she. How very dare the lot of them.
But trying to go give her a piece of his ******** mind likely would've caused more problems than not. Gotten Albite in trouble for fraternizing, for one thing, and probably Faustite, whenever he got back. Gotten Murikabushi either killed or forcibly Corrupted, since he sincerely doubted that Queen Becky had the same reasons Faustite did for not doing something like that to him. While Murikabushi didn't enjoy accepting such facts of the situation, he wanted to help Albite as much as he could.…… Pushing himself off from the wall, Murikabushi sighed.
"I don't know if I'll be able to find anything that might help," he said, pivoting so he was facing Albite. "If I do find anything, I'll find some way to make sure it gets to you.… Statistically, I think the odds favor me finding the little blonde one who really thinks he's doing something by making bitchy comments about everyone else's bodies, and nicely asking him to page you so I can tell you whatever I found? But in the meantime?" Eyes agleam with sympathy for all the pain Albite was clearly experiencing and dancing around, Murikabushi held his arms open. "Do you want a hug? ……It sounds like you need a hug."
Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2025 4:35 pm
He did laugh, he couldn't help it, the way he could tell how seriously peeved Muri seemed to be; with hairs out of place, smile gone sideways. How all of that warred in his mind with the idea there might indeed be dog-eared and highlighted sections of some ancient, prolific, nega-code he'd yet to have read! One that he would never read, truly. For all that manuals existed and he'd been to the chaos 101 orientation parties; while watching people make some amazing N.E.O pamphlets post alien landing!
Reading remained his safe word, trigger, allergy!
The sound that started as a trickle, muffled with a fist soft, his other arm wrapped protectively around his center. "s**t…maybe? Maybe there's some bylaw — maybe…" He shook his head before his mind wandered down ever branching trails of worst case scenarios. He couldn't allow himself to disassociate into blank stares and tangents here! Not when it was too easy to imagine the lost compass without its point, brink of near sorrow in Hestia's eyes. The look of disappointment in Ilmaris, and the way Jayce seemed more and more like he was one breath away from asking him 'what the ********' he was doing. Not in a playful way either. No, Waru knew, when the brunette eventually did ask? It'd be serious and he'd have to contend with that too.
He couldn't just say 'I'm sure they mean well.' He knew for certain his team did, he would never know for certain if the whole of the Negaverse did. It was easier to imagine there was simply some higher reason behind him for all of this!
For being in the dark — for the ever widening gap of unknowns — and —
He was afraid, maybe? To push too hard or climb too high up the ranks in search of deeper than platitudes and surface level answers. Worried, definitely, to pester them more than he already had. Just in case the news was truly bad and all they were doing was sparing his 'big feelings' while buying themselves time…
He might've done the same in their position, maybe? Though listening to Muri break him down into the most loving, honest, kinda of chunks? He supposed he wouldn't have, not about something like this, to hide it from that person's loved ones?
I couldn't…
But I could use the hug—
"I really think…gods..thank you? First off. I needed t'hear that. Second? Yes, I want a hug!! Third!? Ilmari, if nothing else, is a good secretary —" He grinned knowingly, that in his heart Mari had come a long way, was a super now! Rhr growing pangs seemed to be slowing and he couldn't help but feel proud over the blond. "And secretly? Between Litharge, Veauvian and myself..we'll get Mari out the sass-hole phase and into a better headspace…okay..Litharge's more likely to call bullshit, but you'll see!"
"And I'll take anything, Muri…"
I'm desperate.
"Anything at all…"
His words held both plea and gratitude, messily splashed across the pavement like old paint and spilt oil. It was almost surreal, in some ways, a subversion of their first encounter. To walk openly into Muris welcome arms instead of dragging the other Eternal into his own. To be *glad* that Muri was taller, even if only by an inch. It made all the difference to him, to be able to hug the one person on their side who could look out for any glimpse of their boy from across the fence…
A person he trusted to do so completely altruistically.
"Especially your help — and this — never thought so much fabric could make a hug better, yanno?" He dared to squeeze just a little, looking back out from where Muri had come in, his words muttered into lengthy cloth, chiffon, ribbon, streams of raven strands nearly long enough to rival his own. He'd apologize later for adding onto Muris pile, for leaning on the kind of man he saw as taking to leadership like a duck to a pond. He was sure the Eternal had a life outside this one, but if help was what was being given? He wasn't yet too prideful to turn any of it away.
As always, Albite put a lot of things out into the aether that merited a response. And truly, Murikabushi didn't want to ignore them. Albite accepting the offered hug, however, immediately shifted Muri's priorities away from throwing more verbal everything at each other, and toward catching Albite against his chest, then curling his arms tight around Albite's back and shoulders—something, Murikabushi could not help thinking, that several other people among his own magical girl faction might have taken serious issue with.
He couldn't honestly blame them, he guessed. Faustite did all kinds of atrocities, all the time, for reasons that didn't necessarily hold water to anyone else. Simply being married to Faustite wasn't, in and of itself, disqualifying from any kind of empathy or anything? But Albite did help in executing some of his husband's plans. On top of that, he could've been the sweetest person you might ever meet, someone too precious for this world who had genuinely never done anything wrong, and still earned himself a place on the Kill On Sight list because Faustite made the idea of Albite ever purifying a serious long-shot.
Plenty of reasons, by some people's metrics, for denying Albite anything that looked like comfort or friendship or support.
Well, those people could ******** off and go to Hell, in Murikabushi's opinion, and the thought that anybody would have thought less of him for comforting his friend made him squeeze Albite that much more firmly. With that much more conviction and desire to ease the emotional stress that Albite had been carrying around about all of this.
"For what it's worth, I sincerely doubt Ilmari's bitchy little twink phase will last," Murikabushi said, making a mental note of Albite's secretary's name. Briefly, he considered that he could be wrong, but also, there were probably worse fates for a Negaverse senshi than ending up a bitchy grown-a** twink like Aquamarine (whom Murikabushi could at least appreciate while not actively dealing with him because at least the man had owned what he was, up in the Space Hexagon, prior to everything really starting with Harold). "He might persist in it for a bit? He's young and he's pretty and he fits a lot of conventional gay beauty standards? Even him being kind of femme isn't disqualifying, since a lot of dudes will scream about how much they hate femme guys but then hit us up on Grindr because they're insecure about how bad they want to ******** us.
"But……y'know, give your secretary time." Murikabushi might have reserved the right to call the little s**t out or read him to filth for real, if he tried to come for Muri next time and didn't bother trying to be more creative about it. But they could deal with that if it ever happened.
"In the meantime, just……be kind to yourself too, yeah?" As if this somehow emphasized what he was saying, Murikabushi squeezed Albite again and rested his chin on the other's shoulder. "Finding Faustite is important. And anything I find, I'll get it to you ASAP. But you're important too, Albite. Not just as a leader for your team or as Faustite's husband. As yourself—both as Albite the Person and as whoever you are when you power down. Don't burn yourself out to ashes trying to keep everybody else warm, okay?"
Posted: Sun Jun 22, 2025 4:38 pm
The hug was everything, glue seeping between the cracks in his psyche, reassurance that something would be okay! Someday, eventually —
If Muri can stand to squeeze the air outta my lungs..to hug me at all? Then everything might just be fine, right?
"Okay—" A weepy at the edges answer, because he would at least take Muris advice about Ilmari to heart; he could agree to heed patience and let time takeover where he could arguably not. At least not without doing some major damage—
And he didn't want that.
All the rest? Solid as the shoulder beneath his chin, sound as the heartbeat under the flats of his palms. It hurt to think about all the ways Muri was too good for this world, deserving of larger wings. It wasn't a pain nearly as sharp as the thought of taking time away from anyone else to focus on *gasp* himself!!
Where one concept was an ache, the other was a blade between the ribs. The act of untangling what 'taking care of himself' would even begin to mean? For the others sakes — for his damn fool own! Especially when he wanted to pour his time into anything other than that!
But maybe I should…maybe I need to…I should at least talk to everyone else about this first, right? See how they're all don't , and what they know, and maybe then…
How much easier it was to preach self-care, safe-words and counseling than to seek it on his own, eh? Oh the hypocrisy…
"I'll try..I promise I'll try…" He murmured more firmly, steeling himself with one more squeeze before gently letting go. "And if I ******** even that up? You'll come t'remind me..I know it…" Clearing his throat and taking a solid step away. It was the harder thing to do just then. But he wouldn't lay the burden of him counting on Muri atop the Order Eternals shoulders, not when he'd likely asked enough of him already. Too much, maybe, for all that they lived in disparate places on either side of a line drawn by people who'd come long before them.
But ******** their lines and their boundaries. He would never reject one of Murikabushis hugs. Or his help…
