driftfleet | (no subject)

Entry tags:

(no subject)

Who: Sorey, Zaveid, Dezel, Mikleo
Broadcast: Closed to those listed above
Action: Huntress
When: post Lailah's departure

Action. Huntress

[Sorey is just finishing up assembling their second engine when he feels it.

The abrupt lack of something, deep inside him, resonating like the strike of a gong. He smacks a hand against a bulkhead to keep from lurching forward and smacking his face into the wall, reaching frantically out for cords attaching his soul to his seraphim. Dezel, Zaveid, Mikleo-

Lailah.

She's still there, it's still there, but weak and distant. Like Edna's. The warmth of her fire has vanished, barely a flicker of what it was when she was here. Does that mean she's been sent home? Gods, Sorey hopes it does, prays that's what it means and not something...not something horrible.

To be sure he jumps to his feet and rushes out to check the ship for her. Maybe just- maybe something just happened, an augment glitch, maybe she just traveled too far from the ship for him to feel her (but he's pulled Dezel's wind across the ships before, it shouldn't have changed anything). He grabs his comm and hurriedly locks a broadcast; he has to check on the others, make sure they're okay, to see if they're still here.]

Broadcast. CLOSED

Guys?! Are you still here, is everybody okay?

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

BROADCAST

[ Zaveid doesn't feel it, not the way that Sorey does, but... Hearing the broadcast is enough to have him checking to see what's going on. He checks the list of people - Dezel, Sorey, Mikleo... Ah. For a moment all he can do is stare, and he even goes to see if he can call her, but... It doesn't look like he can even do that. No message, no call, nothing. Just blankness.

He quickly realises, though, he needs to reply. ]

I'm still here. You're not getting rid of me that easily.

ACTION

[ He makes his way over to the Huntress anyway - it feels more like home than the Bishop does and he slips in easily enough. There's still that awkward, odd feeling that he knows comes from the raider battle and all the aftermath of it, but he shrugs it off and walks through, ignoring it all and starting to try and track down his friends.

It's not too hard to find Sorey, at least. He can feel the tether between them like a warm balm on his soul, drawing him closer. He's not sure if he should see the Shepherd first or last, though, and he shakes his head as he stops, running a hand through his hair. ]

Gotta stop acting like this...

[ Like an idiot, mostly, but it's more mumbled to himself than said aloud. ]

Oh thank goodness. I knew I still felt you.

Are you okay? I know we were all fine before- [Okay he can't really just say 'before Lailah was here' like her arriving and leaving is just a matter of course. He amends himself,] ...I mean, I know the pacts were okay.

[Sorey's panicking, and Dezel isn't quite sure why, but he's already detaching from his usual place in the cargo bay. He can hear Sorey's pounding footsteps heading away from him.]

I'm fine. Ship's quiet. What's going on?

[He can feel Dezel in the halls behind him but he doesn't slow down, charging and taking corners too quickly to avoid hitting the walls to make it to the bridge.] I can't feel Lailah here anymore, I need to see if she's okay!

[She'd been quiet for a while, but that was fairly normal. Suddenly the wind sweeps through the ship, both for Dezel to see, and to give Sorey a boost.]

... She's not here, [he says after a moment.]

-she could just be out of my domain, [Sorey insists, a little desperate. He reaches the bridge but, as expected, it's empty, so he about-faces and starts pounding for the shuttles.] I'll go check the other ships. She might've gone to the Iskaulit, I told her about the shrine and that Fire Room, she could just be there.

Sorey. [Quiet, but insistent. If she's gone, then she's gone. That's just how it is.] You can tell that she's safe. Can't you?

[Sorey goes silent; he even pauses in running, catching his breath. Dezel's wind swirls around him, ready to carry him to the shuttle bay in half the time it would take him to run it.]

...maybe her augment malfunctioned, [Sorey chokes out, more than just a touch desperate this time.] I- she could be in trouble. I can't just assume-

[A pregnant pause greets Sorey on the other end, but it's replaced with a fwoosh as Dezel windsteps to his position.]

You're so stubborn, [he mumbles.] Come on. Let's go.

[Sorey rubs his hands down his face before nodding, breaking out into a run again. He'll scour each of the ships he can get onto, if need be, starting with the Iskaulit. He has to make sure she's not trapped somewhere that he can get to before he starts assuming anything, even if it does feel just like the distance he's had with Edna for almost a year now.]

[Dezel gives the Shepherd more than a little boost. The wind rushes around them as they zip down the ship's hallway and onto a shuttle. He can't do much about space, but when it comes to running through the corridors, there's only one person who can match him.

He could stay back, he could call Sorey foolish until he broke. But he doesn't. Not being here for Sorey before--

-- well, they all saw how that turned out.]

[One tense shuttle ride later they reach the Iskaulit and Sorey points to the left while leaning right.] Dezel, could you-?

[He nods.]

Meet you on the other side?

I'm fine. [ He's a little sore at the prospect of her just up and disappearing, but he knows it's not her fault. The Atroma are dicks, and - he's learning to accept that, one little step at a time. It just means he has to try and bear the weight of it as the eldest all over again. ] We were fine before she got here, remember.

[Sorey taps his fist to Dezel's chest gratefully before turning and hauling righteous ass down the hallway. There aren't many places she could be, and his connection to her never strengthens as he checks the rooms.

Dezel meets him just before the halfway and Sorey can already tell he's found nothing...but still, Sorey can't say it aloud. He just pauses to catch his breath, hanging his head, hands on his hips.

What if she's in danger? What if the Atroma took her somewhere? He can't just give up.]

...we really kind of weren't. [She showed up right in the middle of that hellion mess. Yeah, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to make the connection between Sorey keeping himself in check and Lailah's presence.

It's not fair to dump those fears on Zaveid's head though, not when their relationship is still so shaky. Sorey takes a deep breath before he lets it out.] Dezel and I checked all over the Fleet. I'm pretty sure she's gone back home; my connection with her feels like Edna's.

[Dezel looks down at his Shepherd-- his Shepherd-- and he doesn't need working eyes to tell that Sorey is losing hope. He's out of breath and desperate, on the edge of frantic. He needs an answer. He needs someone else.

The wind seraph who dedicated himself and Rose's body to revenge is probably not the best choice, but he's the only one standing here right now.]

-- Hey.

[He reaches out tentatively until his hands find Sorey's shoulders.]

If she's in trouble, she'll get a message to us somehow. Or she'll burn through everything to get back-- you know nothing can put her out.

I meant that we still had the pacts, Sorey. [ Zaveid isn't going to go out of his way to make either of them relive the weeks they hadn't had Lailah around - it hadn't been good, not really, and she had turned up just in time to see just how badly she had been missed.

This time, though... This time he thinks things will be better. Easier. He hopes so, at least, and he knows he's going to have to be careful to keep a watch over Sorey, to make sure he's alright. Mikleo and Dezel, too. ] Maybe she just had somethin' she had to do back home. It happens.

[She would never voluntarily leave them here like this, Sorey knows, so it's hard to accept Zaveid's 'it happens' stance. Arguing over feelings and semantics won't do any good though, so he bites his lip.

Regardless of how worried he is, of how helpless he feels, Lailah going home it's necessarily a bad thing. She's a seraph and her element is in their world; maybe it wasn't as obvious with her but he knows she must have suffered, being trapped in the vacuum of space like this, just like the others do. Wrenching seraphim out of nature like this- it isn't right.]

...I know.

I'm just. I'm worried about her. And if she remembers what happened here I know she'll be worried for us.

Sorey. I'm sure she's okay.

[ Zaveid believes in that - because he's sure Lailah can handle herself. He believes in her and he believes in the bond that she and Sorey share - and if something was wrong the Shepherd would definitely know about it. The idea of Lailah somehow suffering or somehow being sad or uncomfortable... There's nothing he can do because he doesn't want to think about it.

Instead, he focusses on the person that's still here, his voice softening ever so slightly. ]

We're gonna be okay too.

...I know. I do. [Sorey smiles a little to himself; Dezel's so awkward with this, open affection and reassurance, but he comes by it so honestly. He really must sound terribly worried if Dezel can pick up on it.] You're right, of course. Lailah's so powerful, I just... I don't like the idea of us being apart.

It won't happen again.

[Dezel can kind of guess why Sorey doesn't want to be apart from Lailah. He doesn't trust himself after last year.]

It won't. She knows that, too. That's why she trusted you with the pact.

[Dezel and Mikleo too, though that goes unspoken.]

[omfg give him a heart attack why don't you]

I'm here, what's going on!?

[Right. If Lailah can't be here- then he needs to be strong. He needs to remember what she's said to him and he needs to be supportive of everybody in her place.]

...yeah. Yeah, I know. We've all come too far to make the same mistakes, so. We'll be okay. [That doesn't mean he doesn't already miss her, already miss the way she would give him that gentle smile when he'd come in just to chat or be in her presence, the way she'd listen to him and treat him like everything he said mattered, so intensely. He'll miss the way she gets so excited over the strangest things, he'll miss the way her soul felt in his when they armatized, the way she carried herself with such grace and surety that it bled over into him.] I should focus more on getting the rest of us home, instead of being sad she's made it back. It's something to celebrate.

[Count on Dezel to cut right to the heart of matters.

Sorey doesn't quite have his confidence, but it's not like he has a choice. Allowing himself to fall again simply isn't an option.] She told me as much as she could, about her previous Shepherds. [Sorey sighs and leans back against one of the walls, sliding to sit down and hang his head.] How she's had to say goodbye to so many Shepherds in the past. Losing them to malevolence, to their own broken wills, or because they died in battle...I don't know where she found the strength to trust me again, honestly.

She just seemed...grateful.

Threaded | Top-Level Comments Only

Page 1 of 5

(no subject)

no subject

voice

voice;

voice;

voice;

voice;

voice;

voice;

voice --> action;

action;

action;

action;

action;

voice

action;

voice

action;

voice

voice

voice

action;

action;

voice;

voice

action;