Fu re ru

[apassingafternoon]

Alain was having none of their shit and that was just by the mere virtue of being completely and utterly out of it. Kaine had thought it would be alright to use an extra drop or two but ... Well, it was that or his own exhaustion that kept him out of it. For as much as Kaine wanted to lie around and ignore everyone, tend to her house and hardly the people inside of it Nariko had a point. They were to rest for a week before moving on. The quicker they dealt with the out of the way errands the sooner she could sit in her room for as long as Nariko would allow before inevitably dragging her back out.

Which explained why they were on the road to The Village, or Arpagio as it was now known. The name changed was ridiculous (Aelious must have somehow gotten his way) but Kaine accepted it with a shrug. The journey was a boring one for her, she stuck to Nariko's side a bit tighter, more anxiously than usual but otherwise kept her words to a minimum. She didn't feel like talking, didn't even feel like going anywhere near town and the last thing she wanted was to even heart Cuthbert's voice, which she had already spent the morning blocking out. And yet he somehow felt well enough to come along. Fantastic.

The doors pushed open in their rhythmic fashion and her first question of the day was directed at Roland even though she didn't bother with looking over at him.

"What are we here for again?" They had barely taken two steps in and she was already quite tired of everything, and it showed in her voice, and the fold of her arms over her stomach. If her oversized sweater and skinny jeans didn't make that just as clear then nothing else would.

Comments

so in other news apparently my notifications aren't working :|

[askthelookout]

He held her hands tightly, his thumbs stroking gently over his skin in lieu of anything more comforting he could do. "Tried, but failed," he pointed out at last, his face close to hers, his eyes holding hers. "And we all say thankya. But I didn't feel anything. If it was going to attack either one of us, I would have thought it might have done better to try and kill the one of us who can die. And who was shooting it at the time."

It was impossible not to sound just a little petulant. The entire point of doing things this way had been to try and spread the load, and he found he was more than a little angry that it had hit her full-force nonetheless. For a moment there, he'd been genuinely scared of losing her. And after everything they'd been through in the last few days...

"You're alive," he said, as much to himself as to her, and squeezed her hands lightly. "Can you stand, or should I carry you?"

DW you have one job why are you messing it up

[apassingafternoon]

"I can stand." Probably. She didn't let go of him even as she coaxed her legs into working. They felt odd but she knew that was the result of whatever process kept her from dying. It was a nifty, helpful trick but not without its drawbacks. Even on her feet and mostly back to normal Kaine didn't appear to realize how close they were or that she just wasn't ready to let go of him yet. "That it didn't actively go after you, though …" Didn't that mean that it was possible it was meant to mess with her, specifically? Maybe it didn't have any form of consciousness like the pink thing or Maggie's book.

Kaine looked over at the useless chunks but no matter how hard she concentrated nothing else happened. "I guess it doesn't matter. It's broken, so we can throw one end in the river, and bury the other. It can't work if it's split into pieces." She wasn't entirely sure of that but it felt like a vaguely logical though so there was no reason to not go with it. "Besides, if it really becomes an issue then we know who to ask. It'll just be a while before we get back to her."

That nameless thing had managed to bring a dead person back to life (although with a nasty fine print), and the more Kaine thought about it she had to wonder if Claude had been the prisoner in their situation. If that was really the case then that thing had to know everything about this world and by now Kaine was long overdue for some answers. "Hey, Bert?"

ah they're back now all is well

[askthelookout]

"Hm?" He had let go of one of her hands, but only to grip her elbow instead, to support her better as she stood. He wasn't particularly ready to let go of her, either - not until he was sure she was all right. She still looked nastily pale, and he didn't imagine she was completely recovered by any means. Add her to the list of people with magic bashing in their skulls, sighed a voice in the back of his head, rather sarcastically.

[apassingafternoon]

"I know you hate talking about feelings and all and I'm not going to try and get myself killed for it but I just want to say that I really like it when you actually worry about me because it makes me feel important and you are important and don't be a jerk and start making fun of me again because I said this!" For someone who still looked like shit Kaine did a hell of a job getting all of that out in one breathe while simultaneously avoiding oxygen deprivation. But she added, a little quietly, "... Or at least wait two minutes and then do it."

Because fake-flirting with her right after she went and said all of that would just be cruel and unusual. But it still needed telling. He wasn't the exact source of her recovery but he had helped her focus. What should have taken a half hour took minutes and the only difference was Bert's presence. "We should really figure something out and get back."

And also avoid these implicative emotional pit falls since he didn't seem to like them very much.

[askthelookout]

"I worry about you all the time," Bert said, after a moment, looking mildly disgusted at his own frankness. "Don't tell me I'm important, though, I'm big-headed enough already." And, surprising himself a little, he leant in and kissed her - not a lover's kiss on the lips, but a kiss just above the temple that was at once more chaste and more intimate. Gods, he was going soft. Worse, he didn't even have it in him to mind any more.

"I'll pick up the shards," he said after a moment, clearing his throat. "You shouldn't touch them, I think. Not if they can do that to you. But they can't get through my head, it's bone all the way through." He rapped his knuckles against his head, and laughed a little. "Ro' might know better what to do with them. But if it's broken, for real and true, then we may as well head back anyroad."

[apassingafternoon]

Whether she had accurately communicated her point or not wasn't the real question here. What counted was that hearing that, maybe the inevitable, had a greater and more resounding effect than any lighthearted flirting (joking or not) could hope to achieve. And maybe that wasn't the type of kiss that occasionally flooded her day dreams as if to spite all of the grief and pain they'd been through but it felt just as good.

"Sure." Never mind that in its whole state the thing hadn't so much as buzzed at her touch, which only made its reaction to being 'hurt' that much more unsettling. Even if it was some weird defense mechanism it just didn't explain why it only went for her. She tried to clear her mind of it but the concern wouldn't scrub off. "It looks pretty broken from here."

The guts of the thing, a richer purple than the inside, glittered over stones, but the two bigger chunks stayed right as they were. In just a few hours those littler pieces would be left alone and the thing would never be entirely complete again.

At least they pulled it off.

[askthelookout]

It did look pretty broken, but Bert still approached it with some caution, skirting around most of the glittery innards as he leant down to pick up the two halves. One went into the pocket of his jeans; the other, after a moment's thought, into his jerkin. He wasn't going to risk them being too close together, even if they seemed inert and dead.

Straightening up, he looked down at the shining purple stuff spread out over the rocks, and took a deep breath, closing his eyes for a moment. "Well," he said, with a little sigh, "I guess we'll never know."

And that was all the grief or regret he was going to let it cause him - or at least going to let himself show. Shaking his head, he turned on his heel and started back towards Kaine. "Let's get back, before we give Momma and Papa a heart attack. Shall we?" He offered her his arm, with a sidelong little smile.

[apassingafternoon]

"A little late for that." At least when it came to the former, it seemed as if they finished right on time! "… But certain people could do with a little heart attack." That little bit of dialogue out of the way Kaine took his arm easily, and with a tad more confidence than usual. For the second time in as many minutes Kaine waved to the gatekeeper and was spared from confirming who they were and where they were going. In truth they'd never really left Maverick's gaze as it was.

Maybe this wasn't the right decision. Maybe they should have left it as it was, asked Roland and Nariko to deal with it and simply reigned them both in but there was something quite satisfying in having dealt with it on their own!

Maybe-heroes indeed! And whatever the outcome the gates were opening again and it wasn't be much of a surprise to find their friends on the other side.