Jan 3rd - Broadcast

[monolike]

Who: Sorey & y'all
Broadcast: Huntress & fleetwide
Action: n/a
When: Jan 3rd

[ Broadcast: Huntress only ]

Hey everybody, this is Sorey. I'm just checking in, seeing if everything's okay. Oh, and paperwork for new upgrades will be coming in soon, so if there's anything anybody would like to see upgraded, cast your votes now!

Oh also, we don't have any lab support personnel. I know Mikleo's been doing some stuff but if you know anybody looking to transfer who'd like the use of the lab, could you let 'em know? I'll include a call out in my public broadcast in a sec.

Okey dokey, that's all for now! If anything comes up, don't hesitate to contact me or Mikleo!


[ Broadcast: all ]

I'm kind of curious; so there are a lot of different kinds of forces or energies here that are a lot like the ones back on my planet, but they don't seem to behave the same way here. Like the rules are different. Is anybody else running against that?

And as an aside, if there's any potential lab personnel looking for a place, the Huntress has an unoccupied lab, for now.

Comments

[monolike]

[Without a moment of hesitation, Sorey does.

Mikleo's fits and visions haven't completely subsided; Sorey suspects they're more getting lost in his memories than anything, trying to chase down details and getting stuck (like Sorey himself has done once or twice) but hovering can sometimes just make Mikleo feel even worse so he's been making a sincere effort to keep his distance and give Mikleo space to work through things on his own. It's been terribly difficult.

So many things between them are so uncertain, and Sorey hates it. There's never been uncertainty in their relationship before- no, but maybe that's because they haven't spoken about these things before. Sorey being human, Mikleo being seraph...it was something they discussed lightly, for the sake of quips or abstractly academic. Maybe that was a mistake. Maybe they should've been frank with each other from the beginning, neither of them shying away from their differences, afraid to examine them for fear that they'll find something that will split them apart.

So Sorey sits beside Mikleo, but he also leans against his side, purposefully heavy and warm. He feels a little better that way, Mikleo's shoulder against his arm, sure and steady. There's no distance between them; they'll bridge that gap somehow.]

[nerdeology]

[Mikleo's quick to lean against Sorey in return, lightly at first, then eventually tilting his head to rest on the other's shoulder. His eyes close, focusing quietly on just them for a while: the way Sorey moves slightly as he breathes, the shared warmth of their bodies, the comfortable sensation of a recognized and welcome presence. It helps. It's almost always helped, and for a while he does nothing, says nothing. He lets the silence lie between them, and it's a soft blanket of familiarity rather than the choking thing it had been before, when they were the span of a single room and at the same time an entire world apart, or so it felt to him.

This is good. This is better. And eventually, when he feels more like himself again, he rediscovers his voice.]

There's... been something I've been trying to remember, from that time, but I can't. No matter how hard I try, it just doesn't come. I can't remember when I would've told you that you'd be okay.

[As he died; after he was gone, forever. Dragons can't speak, can they? They're not like the animal seraphim, with souls and voices and thoughts to share. They fly, they burn, they kill. Dragons are known as their own sort of calamity for good reason. Monstrous beasts that can't be contained, controlled, or befriended.

When, while dying, would he have found his voice enough to tell Sorey that he was capable of living on? It's true, of course- he'd never deny that- but how had that belief been conveyed through the fangs of a monster?]

The more I think about it, though, the more I realize that it doesn't matter how. You heard me, anyway. And I know what I must have meant.

[Tentatively his fingers slip sideways to find Sorey's hand, instinctively knowing. He hasn't reached out much in recent years but his hand has always known where to find Sorey.]

I forgive you as a seraph. But I'd forgive you if I were human, too. Or a dragon. I'd forgive you if I hadn't ever come back at all. It doesn't matter what we are or what we become... how I feel isn't ever going to change.

[A dozen years, a hundred years, a thousand years. These are the moments he'll keep.]

[monolike]

[Mikleo's head falls to his shoulder so Sorey's cheek rests on his hair, reflex, that automatic reach to offer and receive comfort from each other. It's always been like this; ever since they were small, when Sorey was still shorter than Mikleo by almost a full head, slow to grow and still weak from an early birth.

It...doesn't shock him that Mikleo doesn't remember telling him that. Mikleo's made allusions to it before; only barely remembering his time as a dragon in flashes, in scattered sounds and smells that he can't bear to look at more closely. On the one hand Sorey is intensely grateful that Mikleo doesn't remember those last few horrible moments; on the other, it feels so lonely, being the only one between them holding Mikleo's dying words in his heart. It's a burden he'll just have to learn how to carry.

Mikleo's strong, cool fingers slip into his hand, curl around the edge of his palm and Sorey automatically grips back. His hands are bigger than Mikleo's now; knuckles obvious and tendons sharp compared to Mikleo's smooth skin and clean nails, but Sorey likes the contrast. They've lived similar lives but still turned out so differently from each other.

I'd forgive you if I were human, too.

(I know,) Sorey thinks, fiercely and gratefully, eyes stinging again. Mikleo might hate worship but Sorey doesn't know what else to call this, this warmth, this huge swelling thing inside of him that threatens to take him over and eat him up from the inside out.

It doesn't matter what we are or what we become.

It doesn't, but it does, because they're together no matter what as Mikleo and Sorey, seraph and human, (dragon and hellion) and there's something fatalistic about that, about considering what they'll be decades from now if they even survive defeating Heldalf. If they'll live together, travel together, be together until Sorey's knees are too weak to carry him through ruins anymore, but at the same time...it's the most wonderful thing Sorey's ever wondered because there is no considering it. It's what they'll always be.

...how I feel isn't ever going to change.

Mikleo, gods willing, will be eternal. And, gods willing, one day he'll live in a world that Sorey is no longer in...but his heart will still carry Sorey inside of it, his whole memory. Not as a human he knew, or a worshiper, but him, clear as words on a page, tall as a relief carved into rock.]

I love you Mikleo, [Sorey mumbles, voice thick. He twists so he can wrap his arms around Mikleo and pull him to him close, so overwhelmed with thankfullness he can hardly keep his tears at bay.] You're my best friend. I love you.

[nerdeology]

[It's not really a surprise to hear those words, though idly Mikleo wonders if it ought to be. They've said it many times in so many different ways throughout their lives, not explicitly but through their actions and shared experiences, the way they could exchange a single look and know the other's thoughts or move in tandem, the way their secrets were few and their joys many. Love isn't something new or developing between them but simply is, a state of being that doesn't really need to be said but is, he knows, something that people hunger to hear. It's why he'd lamented, the day he'd turned, not trying harder for Sorey's sake. Why Sorey had responded through voicemails to a dead man that he'd never needed to.

He's always known. Sorey has always known.

"I love Sorey," he'd said as an infant, still learning to speak, rocking a tiny crib with an equally-tiny baby within, only a year younger but half his size. Sorey was too young to remember it but seraphim live by moments, not memories.

I love you, he'd said by following Sorey out of Elysia for a girl they barely knew, to see the world, to change their lives. I love you said Sorey's returning smile, relieved and overjoyed to not be separated.

I love you had been in their eyes as they renewed their partnership, as Sorey called to his soul and they joined together into the armatus form without hesitation or uncertainty, fighting as one like it was the most natural thing in the world, a thrum of power and bliss that left them both feeling, in sync, ah, this is how it's supposed to be.

"Love you, Mikleo," had been a voice in his ear that had left him gutted, devastated, broken and weeping on the floor for everything he'd lost and regained in such a short span, knowing Sorey was alive and safe and missing him, missing him terribly, loving him and still living despite his absence. "I want to live up to your belief in me." He hadn't wanted Sorey to make that his answer but his heart had pounded painfully in his chest to hear it, to have left such an impact on the life of one he held so dear. I love you had been the thought curled around his mind like a stormcloak as he fell asleep, listening to the sound of Sorey's heartbeat, feeling his chest move as he breathed.

I love you he had whispered softly into the wind near the ruins back home, his face close to Sorey so the words would be for them alone, and the wind heard "Luzrov Rulay" but his heart knew what he really meant. I love you had been in Sorey's voice when he gave his true name back to him after they found one another again.

I love you Sorey says, here and now, and Mikleo isn't surprised at all.]

...I know.

[He'd always known.]

Me too. Me too...

[Sorey had always known.]