Open, Fleetwise, 001

[burnstoohot]

Who: Fëanor and YOU!
Broadcast: Fleetwide
Action: HS Marsiva
When: Morning

[A hand reaches out to grasp a mechanical limb before grey eyes even blink open to stare suspiciously. Fëanor feels rested, energized even, despite the most recent long hours spent over the forge's fires working on his masterpiece.]

Who dares...?

[Awareness flickers through him and the elf pauses. He sits up from the bed, though doesn't immediately move to get off, nor release the robot's 'arm'. An impatient hand reaches up and shoves a lock of black hair that had gotten free of the loose braid back behind a pointed ear and he studies the robot a bit more closely.]

Do you have a name? Are you a thinking creature? [A pause and he absently hums, head tilting a little in thought.] I think not in the ways of Arda.

['Bot, be glad he has no tools on him.]

Comments

[burnstoohot]

Any child of Fëanor would know his voice in an instant. Regardless of when or how long it had been.

But why was his second son's voice so tiny now? Affection and concern touch the fire that was Fëanáro and he frowned at the communicator.

"I am here, little one." He had some parental skills. Sometimes. And monikers just slipped out sometimes, when his sons sounded like they needed them.

[bythewaves]

He hasn't been called that in.... he doesn't remember. He'd almost forgotten that Feanor could be gentle, and he cannot suppress the sob before he masters himself, turning the video on.

(He looks old, does Maglor, worn to the bone, the edges of madness and desperation lurking in the edges of his eyes, the faintest of silver at his temples)

"You...you are truly here?"

[burnstoohot]

The sob seared him all the way through his heart.

Fëanor studied what he could see of his second son, worried frown clear. Silver of age. Old and exhausted. Those eyes had seen much suffering. Picking up the communicator, he slipped from the bed, suddenly restless.

"Yes. Where are you?" Touch was one sure way to prove he was real. Nothing else mattered.

[bythewaves]

Old habits, and obediently he reports (a military report, although Feanor asked as a father, not his commander)

"The Huntress, that is where I was assigned. Mae... Nelyafinwe and Findarato are here, they are on the Bishop. You will be on the Marsiva - in a few days, they will assign you to one of the fleet ships, wherever our kidnappers deem suitable. When they do, we will be able to visit with each other, perhaps ask to be assigned together."

[burnstoohot]

His eyes glittered a little, listening and hearing but not entirely understanding. And that frustrated him. He stood still, not immediately giving in to the urge to pace helplessly. He can't get to his sons when they need him.

It gnawed at him.

"A few days." A promise. Once they were able to visit, he would find both of his sons, and his nephew perhaps. But his sons took priority.

[bythewaves]

"Yes." Maglor nods.

"There...you can trust the Lady Beverly, James Kirk, Apollo, the Lady Misty and the Lady Syeira. Young Alphonse is ... he is his world's equivalent of a loremaster, you will like him. Anyone from the Huntress - my shipmates are good people. And... if Syeira speaks to you... be kind?"

[burnstoohot]

He nearly responded harshly before, for once, catching himself. There was something terribly fragile about Maglor. Old and mad and lonely and he found he could listen.

There were more important things than being told to be kind and being insulted by the insinuation he wasn't. That he could trust strangers.

So while his eyes remained narrow, there was a sense of restraint in the huff of a breath and shift of weight from one foot to the other. "You trust them... and think highly of them."

[bythewaves]

Maglor nods, willing his father to understand, not quite pleading. "Syeira...she's been hurt. I do not know her full tale, but... she hurts, and it was close kin who hurt her. She... she has been kind to me. She might... be angry at you. Please, she does not mean anything by it, if she is."

[burnstoohot]

A hurt child, by their own kin. It struck close enough that even if Syeria wasn't any relation to Fëanor, he finally gave an agreeing nod.

"She is important to you." Which was the closest Maglor would get to him saying he wouldn't immediately attack. That maybe he'd just defend himself, if it became necessary.

But why would she be angry with sweet, innocent old him?

[bythewaves]

"Yes." Maglor's shoulders sag with relief. His father's agreement means he will do his best, and Maglor trusts that he will give her a good chance.

"She is very young." And Maglor feels protective. But now that concern is out of the way.... he looks, truly looks at his father, and pales a little to see how young he looks.

"Atarinya... time here is suspect. What... what is your last memory?"

[burnstoohot]

It was really the best chance she had!

Ah, his son was protective of this youth! It was rather precious to see. Fëanor may not have spent as much time with all of his sons as he should have (though he'd insist he'd spent plenty!), how the elder two took to the younger children was always heart-warming.

A soft chuff. "Kano, I have been told as such already. As Nelyo has called them, I have not yet completed my Silmarils."

[bythewaves]

Oh no

Maglor flinches, eyes shutting against the pain and the fear, seals his lips against the cry of unfair! And frantically wonders if he can protect his father from his own madness.

"H-how much did Nelyo tell you?"

[burnstoohot]

His second had always been so very kind. Much like his mother.

Fëanor softly hushed Maglor, letting out a careful breath as he forced himself back to reclaim the seat he'd slid from.

"He did not speak of much. Only when he could not hide." He didn't let himself give voice to the flicker of bitterness. What had happened had hurt his children deeply, and the jewels he was in the process of making seemed to be at the heart of it. Somehow.

"He spoke of Melkor- newly named or name erased as it should be, and how he was tricked and tortured." The previous fire of fury returned, voice turning harsh with it. Why yes, he was pissed that Melkor had hurt his child. If he could strangle the Vala he would.

[bythewaves]

"Morgoth." Maglor spits the name, his gentle son's fire curling in remembered and carefully nurtured fury.

"He hurt us all. But Nelyo... Nelyo he took delight in trying to break. T...that was... m-my fault."

[burnstoohot]

That was not a fire easily roused. Fëanor's eyes flashed.

"I do not believe you would have abandoned him easily. Does your brother now hate you?" He thought not. "Do not continue to blame yourself." Seeing pain in his sons' eyes cut deep.

[bythewaves]

Maglor's hate is not easily roused, but once it is Maglor tends to nurse his hatred, clinging to it stubbornly. And he has had more reason than many to hate Morgoth.

But some days he hates himself more.

"He... told me he didn't." But then he left me.

"I...I will try not to. But we... things get...very bad, atarinya."

[burnstoohot]

"Then he does not." Firm and without doubt. "No matter what happened, he loves you."

Oh Maglor. Fëanor knew he would find his sons as soon as he could and not let go. They so clearly needed him. Now, more than ever before.

"Do you blame me for what has befallen you?" Fear wouldn't keep him from asking. He had to know.

[bythewaves]

"But he still...." No, that is Maedhros' tale to tell, or not. Maglor shuts his eyes and shakes his head, voice quiet and ashamed.

"Yes."

[burnstoohot]

"There are no buts," somehow gentle, but firm too. "He loves you."

And there it was. Fëanor touched the image of his son, lightly. "Yet still you speak to me. I will tell you what I told your brother.

"If I remember what I learn here when I return, the Silmarils will never be finished. Their fixings will be dismantled and flung far away. I will live for my sons and grandchildren."

[bythewaves]

"It wasn't your fault!" He says, pleadingly. "I know...you...it was hardest for you! But... but..."

But he cannot but blame his father, without whom none of it would have happened.

And then Feanor promises that and he bites back the cry.

"Thank you."

[burnstoohot]

Oh Maglor. How Fëanor loved him.

He accepted the blame. Accepted it. Hated that it was even there. And was resolved to do what he could to change it.

Love shone clear and deep and fierce. "No, little one. This is what a father should do. I am fortunate to have such good sons."

[bythewaves]

Maglor's cannot hold back the tears - this is the father of his childhood, the man he would have (did) damn himself for.

Lyë melinyë atarinya

[burnstoohot]

After what he'd learned he'd done to his sons, they still loved him. He'd done right in raising them. In loving them. In being so fiercely proud of them. It was a balm on the pain, and he was resolved to make them proud of him in return.

"I will find you, little one. You and your brother. We will not be parted for long here, nor far even if not on one ship."

[bythewaves]

Maglor nods, clinging to those words.

"Alright. I...I will wait for you."

Pretend bitty is Mags >>

[burnstoohot]

Fond affection touched his voice, even if it quieted.

"Thank you."

Fëanor slowly settled back on the bed, shifting back until his back rest against the wall. "When was the last time you rested?" He was loath to end this fragile connection when Maglor seemed to need him so desperately.