You can check out anytime you'd like.. [Hotel Corona Mingle]

[thespaceopera]

Who: The Fleet!
Broadcast: If you want
Action: Hotel Corona or Planet Ikke
When: December 7th onward



[After the mystery and isolation of their last destination, the Marsiva seems determined to head to brighter, busier territory. After a long journey through remote, nebula-painted space, speeding along at a brisk pace for the Host ship, the Marsiva brings her Fleet to a sudden and prominent point of traffic.

It seems that the Fleet has happened upon some sort of vacation destination! Maybe Atroma thinks that the passengers deserve some rest and relaxation... or just wants to distract them with something huge and shiny.

Welcome to Hotel Corona! Feel free to enjoy yourselves and enjoy the sites! If a hotel resort isn't your thing, you can head on over to the nearby planet and explore it's icy wonders.

In order words: it's a mingle!! Everyone get in! ]

[>> Plot Post]

Comments

[axiomed]

[ He waits. Charles doesn't expect anything else, but he'll wait. He wonders if this is it: the final blow. Perhaps a revelation that has come far too soon for Erik, when he's not ready to deal with it.

But he's said what he needs to. He's apologized. There's little else he can do at this point. ]

[exothermia]

[After a few splintered moments where he stares blankly into space, Erik gets up. He steps away from the table, needing a modicum of distance. The restaurant's faux-nautical decor swims in front of him as he wrestles with the ocean of feelings Charles has chosen to dump on him, without so much as a life raft.

Without turning around, he speaks, voice tight.]

That wasn't talking to me about it, you realise.

[axiomed]

No.

[ He exhales, folding his arms on his lap. ]

I didn't know how. I still don't. Those feelings - those thoughts. They're terrible and cruel, but they're also mine. It didn't feel right to give myself leeway.

[exothermia]

[Erik feels a spike of his own resentment, for a moment. That Charles has had opportunity to talk out his negativity about this so often with friends, and now feels it's the right time to throw it at Erik like a bomb. He curls his hands into fists briefly, before letting them go with effort.]

Of course.

[axiomed]

[ "Often" isn't the right word, but Charles isn't here to argue semantics. ]

The things I said in the past. About us, about wanting you back. They're still true. I never lied, but I wasn't truthful. Nothing I did was coerced or forced upon me.

[ He pauses, because there's a but. ]

But I've hurt you. I'm hurting you now. Even the truth can be that. You don't owe me an apology. You don't owe me anything at all. Everything I've given - I've given freely, with my own heart.

And I'm not letting go of the past.

[ Even the bad, the niggling doubts. There's more to their past and Charles remembers all of it. ]

[exothermia]

[He spins around and comes back, smacking his hands down on the table.]

I know I don't owe you an apology for that. I can't give you one, because of what it means. [What it would say about having had Magda and Nina in his life.] Do you have any idea what it feels like? To look back on a decision and both regret and not regret it?

[Because that's how it is. Every time he's thought of apologising for leaving, he would remember his wife and daughter, and know that he wouldn't have changed his decision. Only it tears him apart inside to know that he loves Charles just as deeply as he loves Magda, and leaving him had been just as hard then, no matter his reasons for doing so. Two right answers. None he could give. He's nearly shaking from finally saying anything about it, stepping near the brink of his deepest heart.]

I've been doing the best I can the last few months. I know it's not good enough. I can't do anything about that. But I've damn well been trying.

[And it stings to hear Charles say he hadn't been, even if Erik had suspected it at times. Even though another ache blooms at Charles's assertion that he still meant it, that he still wanted to hold on to a past that had healed and wounded them both.]

[axiomed]

[ Charles reaches out to place his hand on top of Erik's, the lightest touch, to be brushed off if necessary. ]

I know.

[ He knows what it means. There's no point in looking deeper. He knows. Distantly, Charles recalls his conversation with Aurae after she woke up, her trying to reassure him that Erik still loved him, kept the ring and how much it hurt to hear people talking about it until Charles was sick of the shame he felt.

He's deplorable. ]

I'm not asking for one. And I know you've been trying. My point was I have not been trying enough. It's on me.

[ Finally Charles removes his hand. ]

You are good enough, Erik. You've always have been.

[exothermia]

[Erik snatches Charles's hand before it can retreat, clamping it under his on the table. It's not the most gentle gesture, more of a reflex action. But it says enough.]

[axiomed]

[ He inhales sharply, his composure fracturing a little but he doesn't pull away.

He says instead. ]

You've always been good enough to me.

[exothermia]

[Erik has known that, though it's been buried under layers of trauma and guilt. It soothes him somewhat to hear it, even in the wake of his frustrated anger. That anger is going to lurk for a while, frayed around the edges. It's become nearly a foreign experience for him, where once he was fuelled by it every day.

But this goes deeper than anger and guilt, to the depths of his heart. Erik shuts his eyes and takes a steadying breath, fingers curling around Charles's a little. He fishes through the memory, still raw in his mind, to find the thing he most needs to say.]

You are not, and have never been, just some stopping point along the line for me.

[axiomed]

[ Charles doesn't say anything. As if he didn't quite hear it, but his face has gone pale. ]

Erik that's not — [ He falters because again, he feels the sting of his own feelings. ] — I should know that. You didn't do that to me.

I don't want to be something you regret. But I made myself out to be and I — [ He stops because Charles also doesn't know how to express it fully. ]

[exothermia]

[Erik shakes his head briefly, looking down at the table rather than at Charles's face.]

I don't regret you.

[axiomed]

[ He could feel himself cracking at the seams. With a shuddering breath, he tries to rein himself in because this wasn't the point, he didn't share this so he could get that answer, so he could put his fears to rest.

But his voice cracks. ]

You can be angry and leave it at that.

[exothermia]

[Things rarely go as planned between them. Erik is in dangerous waters already, far beyond the small steps he had been taking. Charles has pushed him there just as surely as he's pushed Erik at other times, even if this was for the purpose of revealing his wrongdoings. He grimaces at the thought.

He could turn around and leave right now. It wouldn't even be to prove Charles right, dash him to pieces right when it would hurt most. It would be to spare himself further frustration. Part of him wants to, smarting and bitterly unsurprised that this has happened.

But.

Erik looks back up, expression stony and thoughts stormy.]

I am angry. Make no mistake. But if you think that's the end of this story, then you're wrong.

[axiomed]

[ With a shaky exhale, he closes his eyes and nods. ]

I was wrong about a lot of things.

[exothermia]

[Erik knows there's a lot of second-guessing in his future. What steps he had taken feel shakier now, as though he hadn't realised he was walking on ice until he finally looked down. And yet, he thinks with bleak humour, it's nothing different from what he already expected. He had expected Charles to refuse him when he said he wanted to come home.

Eyeing him, Erik turns some of his bitterness aside and holds on to the fact that these things are in retrospect. Charles had held his heart out, knowing full well that Erik could plunge a dagger into it and be justified in the act. There's a familiar kind of symmetry in that.

He moves closer and wraps his arms around Charles's shoulders. It's a bit stiff, restrained as it is by the barrage of feelings they've been hit with.]

And now you've been told as much.

[axiomed]

[ The silence that descends is neither awkward or comforting. Quietly, he asks. ]

Will you still come home?

[exothermia]

Yes.

[It had never been in question for him. Had this been a revelation that Charles truly hated him, then - yes. He would not have returned. But that isn't what this was. What this was was a mess, just one that will take some untangling.]

[axiomed]

[ He smiles, teary-eyed as he places his hand on top of Erik's. ]

Then I'm satisfied.

[exothermia]

[He lets out a breath, resting his head against Charles's.]

[axiomed]

[ He leans back against him, just taking in the moment. ]

[exothermia]

[The moment passes, and Erik pulls away. He returns to his seat, looking down at the food he had forgotten was there and wondering just what he's meant to do with it now.]

[axiomed]

[ Charles gives him a shaky smile. ]

Dig in.

[exothermia]

[Erik doesn't smile back, but he does start eating. He feels so far distant from the start of this dinner - this date - that he might as well be eating a different meal.

But it's the same meal, and he does remind himself of that.]

[axiomed]

[ Charles tamps down on his instinct to flee. It would do no good and he's made his bed. His voice feels locked in his throat. In an effort to disappate his own tension, Charles lets his telepathy wander to the other clientele of the restaurant, letting their emotions seep into his own, draining them away. ]