between two points

[apassingafternoon]

The journey was largely uneventful.

They passed some angry yaks and Kaine's 'skirt' fell off and she squealed before she fumbled it back on but that was about the extent of things. It took the entire afternoon and the sun had long fallen by the time her home/little compound made itself known, even against the mountains. Just as she had thought the lights were on inside and her animals made their familiar, happy shuffling noises. Shivering, Kaine didn't bother to explain a damn thing just yet, no matter how many questions might linger on Alain and Cuthbert's tongues. She undid the strings to her gate to let them in and then quickly closed and retied it from the other side to help keep the wolves out.

As they traveled up the little stone path to her door Kaine could smell dinner and suddenly she knew with frightening clarity that Roland and Nariko hadn't gone anywhere. Maybe into town but returning to Roland's world wasn't currently on their mind. That didn't bother her but she knew it would only further aggravate Bert who was already in a shit mood and poor Alain who was in pain and shouldn't have been traveling at all.

Kaine opened her door and sighed even as she heard a gun unholstering and knew from its soft whistle that it was Nariko's.

"You're not shooting me in my own fucking house," Kaine said, raising a brow at her best friend. Her ex-lover. "... How did you even find a dress that tight?"

Because it was certainly that, a rich blue and figure hugging, paired well with her dark hair left down, too genuinely Nariko-ish for Kaine to believe this was some odd dream she was still having in the corners of her brain. They were here and Nariko was alive. Roland was alive. Kaine couldn't see the telltale ring on either of them. That crazy bitch-god had kept her word and brought her back, let Roland go find her. Kaine had never believed in anything but even though her expression remained deadpan she suddenly wanted to praise any God that might listen to her.

"Wei." Nariko answered but her voice was thin and uncomprehending. "Why are you - how?" Her eyes darted to Alain and Cuthbert as if unable to fully understand their existence, Kaine could clearly see her friend trying to puzzle out what the hell was going on but she gave up halfway through. Her gun went back to the table and Kaine gave up before she started and let herself be pulled back into those familiar, warm arms, the protective grip.

"I'm home." She didn't know if anyone heard it, didn't really care. Shit was going to hit her own fan, but Kaine earned these few seconds.

Comments

[atouchofka]

He could have pointed out that it hadn't been for her sake. She had been a destructive force at that point, and saving her - if he even had - was really the last thing he could do towards protecting Gilead. And protecting Bert, too.

But he wasn't Roland, so he didn't say that. Instead, he looked down at his hands for a moment, then said with wry humour, "Well, I could hardly unleash Bert on this world without someone to box his ears once in a while, could I?" Closing his eyes, he tipped his head back, taking another deep breath in through his nose. "It wasn't your fight. You shouldn't have been there. That you survived it is the only thing just and right about this whole mess."

[apassingafternoon]

"You think that, too?" No wonder Nariko always felt so left out and moody over all this ka-tet business. Even at their worst there was no ... Well, she didn't have the words for it, but the feeling was there. Wiping the look of pain off of her face Kaine stood and opened one of the drawers of the armoire, retrieving the pill pack.

"The only thing just and right about any of this is that Roland and Nariko have apparently managed to act like a genuine married couple, and you, Bert, and Yonah lived. Everything else is just unfortunate and painful." She ripped the packet open and motioned for Alain to open his hand. "Can you take these dry? They should get rid of your headache, and you won't have to deal with any adverse effects."

Well, it would deal with the headache that resulted from physical stress. The rest of his aching had little to do with physicality, and it wouldn't help that.

[atouchofka]

Alain looked down at the pills in his hand, blinking. "I... guess? What are they?" They were entirely foreign to him, and, given everything that had happened today, he wasn't particularly keen on the idea of swallowing them without asking. He didn't believe for a moment that she would try to poison him, but that didn't mean there wasn't an edge of suspicion when it came to the pills themselves.

Then again, what was the worst that could happen? Shrugging, he tipped them into his mouth and swallowed them, grimacing at their bitter taste. Wiping his mouth, he looked up at her.

"It isn't because we didn't want you at our side," he said suddenly, almost apologetically. "Or because we don't appreciate what you did. But nobody who's fought such a war would want anyone else to get involved. However noble their reasons."

[apassingafternoon]

"I know. It's just that I -" She stopped. "I wanted to ..." The words clogged up in her throat and felt impossible. Now just wasn't the time. There might not ever be a good time. "Everyone has to do what they need to, right?" She smiled at him and gently squeezed his shoulder. "That's how things are. You all need to rest, and I need to help you all get back." While she stayed here.

"Anyway, does tea sound good? I think I still have some. I don't know what else would really do any good. Usually when Nariko is upset about something I just hug her a lot and eventually everything is fine. Neither you nor Bert want hugs, so I am at a loss."

This was her humor (somewhat, she really would hug them both into submission if she thought it might do some good). It was terrible.

[atouchofka]

Alain opened his mouth to say that she didn't understand, that the very fact that they were all here meant something was at work. But being told she was wrong again hardly seemed like something that would help her, so he closed his mouth again without saying a word, giving her a very tired smile. "Tea sounds wonderful, thankee. And I never said I didn't want hugs."

He laid his hand over hers, giving it a reassuring little squeeze. "It'll pass, anyroad. Grief doesn't leave us, but the pain that comes with it will fall into an ache before too long."

this icon is too implicative but nothing else fit

[apassingafternoon]

If there was anything that could help her it was far beyond Kaine's reasoning. But there was nothing she was wrong about. They were speaking two conversations, halves missing from each. She turned her hand up to squeeze his in return before working up a smile. "I hope for all your sake's that it's true." Because Kaine had never experienced an ache, only the constant absence of a piece of herself.

But now she had permission to reach around and wrap Alain up in a hug, holding him for a good, decent amount of time. Hugs were a mutual affection that never seemed to do any harm, and for as much as she meant to comfort him and give him a little refuge it couldn't be said that she didn't get something out of it, too.

a common problem, i find

[atouchofka]

Alain was undeniably a good hugger. He pulled her in close, resting his face against her shoulder, and rubbed her shoulders lightly, his eyes closing for a moment.

"He would have died for you today, and thought nothing of it," he said after a moment, in a low voice near her ear. "Remember that, for he's like to forget it. On purpose, if I know him." Pulling away, he gave her a tight, watery little smile. "You mentioned tea? And I hate to ask, but have you anything in this place to stop me dreaming?"

[apassingafternoon]

Yes, Alain was an excellent hugger and she could have remained in his arms for the next few hours, an idea that hardly bothered her, and she would think on that much later. Right now it was a good thought, a relaxing one, there was something to be said about mutual comfort. For as tempting as it was, though, she could only intrude on Alain for so long (in other words, Kaine was still as shy as ever), and there were leftover tasks to consider.

"Cinnamon tea, to be exact. And something to keep the dreams away, yes. I won't give you anything I haven't used myself." That went for the pills, as well, and though there was clearly a degree of trust between them by default she would understand if he was still suspicious. Considering how foreign this world was, that was the right way to be about it friends or not. Kaine took a step back to go, half turned, but then paused, looking back at him with a mixture of caution and mild embarrassment. "I can stay with you until you fall asleep. If it pleases you." And while the irony of picking up the language just a tad wasn't lost on her, Kaine meant it quite literally. She only meant being near, because there was a lot to say about that, too. "… You're always paying attention to everyone else, Alain. It's possible to let someone else do the same for you."

Because he was too kind to have gone through all of this, to withstand Bert's anger on top of Roland's grief. Kaine would ultimately shoulder Nariko self-destructive tendencies, but right now, in this little pocket of time there was an opportunity to look out for him. It just seemed terrible to waste that.

[atouchofka]

Alain's smile was something heartbreaking to see. He looked, just for a moment, as if he might cry. Instead, unbuckling his gunbelts and setting them aside, he only said quietly, "I'm not uncared-for. But if you'd stay with me..." He shook his head, rubbing the back of his neck. "I'd be glad of it."

Because the alternative was to be alone, and just at the moment, that was the last thing Alain wanted. Bert and Roland might deal best with their grief in silence and loneliness, but Alain was of different stock, and if he was left alone too long, he feared it would consume him. He wouldn't have asked her to stay if she hadn't offered. But there was a deep, powerful relief in him, that she had.

[apassingafternoon]

"Alright, in that case just give me a moment." For as much as she didn't want to leave, that part was necessary. Kaine squeezed his shoulder briefly but then stood and quietly left the room. She traveled downstairs briefly, vaguely acknowledging Roland and Nariko but she had no desire to talk with either just yet, something Nariko picked up on easily. The electric kettle was boiling within a literal minute and she found the drops that her grandmother had always used when Kaine's nightmares had still been a pain in the ass.

She left just as quietly, and still knocked on Alain's door before peeking through the door with one steaming mug in her hand. "Hey. One express ticket to Sleep Land. Just know that it'll work quickly."

[atouchofka]

He'd taken the opportunity to strip off his muddy, bloody clothes, so when she returned - rather earlier than he'd expected, since he had been accounting for the time it took to boil a kettle over a flame - he was down to his drawers and undershirt, in the process of getting into bed. If he was going to sleep, then he had no plans to ruin the sheets with the mess of battle when he did so.

He looked over his shoulder as she opened the door, giving her a rather weary smile. "Probably for the best," he admitted, settling himself in against the pillows with the blankets pulled up to his waist. "Thankee-sai. It means a great deal to me."

[apassingafternoon]

Well, as mildly self-pitying as it was at least she was being useful to someone around here. It gave her a kind of satisfaction that might not have been at all appropriate for the moment or their situation. Which was exactly why she trampled that feeling and, from the other side of the bed, handed it over. She had done her best to hide the slightly bitter aftertaste that came with the medicine, with sugar of all things, but only Alain would know how successful she had been.

"It's the least I can do." The absolute least of all the least. Kaine sat on the side of the bed, still in her awkward blanket-skirt, and Bert's shirt. It didn't bother her so much now, "He was right. If I had said something before, your friend would be alive. There's nothing I can do to make up for that, so everything from now on, until you all return home, will just be the least of it." It was something she had clearly resigned herself to, without anger or real upset.

[atouchofka]

He took the mug, breathing in the steam, and closed his eyes. Cinnamon tea. His father had always liked cinnamon, had steeped it in his tea as well. Strange, how smell could be a shortcut to memory. He welcomed it now, though, that smell of winter nights and childhood, the smell that had hung on his father's shirts some nights. He could use that anchor.

He took a little sip, opening his eyes again, but looking into the mug rather than at Kaine. She wasn't the only one who was sometimes shy. "If you'd said something before," he said at last, "then we would have relied on you alone. You would have pushed yourself too hard and too fast, and you would still have fallen as you did. Then we would have had an army oncoming, and a Spectre there to kill us besides. Or you would have died, and we would still have lost the war. Jamie would still have died, and so, in all probability, would we." Now he looked up at her, wrapping both hands around the mug. The line of his mouth was soft, but his eyes were almost as piercing as Roland's for a moment. "You didn't start the war. You didn't destroy our walls. You didn't take our lines of defence from us one by one. And you didn't kill Jamie. Farson and the Crimson did."

[apassingafternoon]

The benefit of the mutually shy, those less immediate and burning such as Cuthbert and Nariko, was that Kaine understood. She settled against the pillows and didn't mind that he didn't look at her just yet, but when he did she suddenly found it impossible to look anywhere but at him. When her lip trembled she bit it, ducked her head down for just a second and breathed out slowly, and then laughed thinly, with something close to relief.

"You're smart in that way that stops me from being an idiot." Because he was right. There was no combination of unearthly, crazy powers and strategy that would work. Not without Nariko. Not until Kaine had her sword back. "... Thank you. I know you're only telling the truth, but still."

[atouchofka]

"It's the least I can do," Alain replied, in gentle mockery of her earlier response, and reached out to pat her arm. "What you did, whyever you did it, was worth a lot. You bought us time, and you made a dent in Farson's forces that he won't forget in a hurry. That's more than we could have hoped for from that battle. This has never been a war Gilead could win."

Withdrawing his hand, he took a long drink of his tea, and closed his eyes again, his forehead furrowed a little. "As for Bert... he's angry and upset, and before too long he'll remember himself. But I think sometimes that he feels things deeper than any of us. And he took a lot on himself, and even knowing it was hopeless from the start, that's a heavy burden to bear." He gave her a little smile. "But he'll bear it. And when he remembers what Cort always said about blame, he might even learn to live with it."

[apassingafternoon]

Her lips quirked in a sarcastic but oddly loving smile at that. Oh, the gentle one had a sense of humor, too! Even better. It felt nice and weirdly normal. Was she allowed to feel normal with everything that went on? Who could say.

"I wonder if there's really any 'sometimes' about it." To her it seemed he always felt everything very deeply, like he could never turn himself off and it made him react in many different, often damaging ways. It was really no wonder that he reminded her of a certain someone. "Makes sense that he would time, but I still need to know where he is before I can even dream of getting any sleep." She might not even dare to try and speak with him, just knowing if he was at least on her property would be enough. "What did Cort say?"

[atouchofka]

"Fault lies in one place; with him weak enough to lay blame." Like Roland, Alain recited the words almost by rote, smiling a little sadly as he said them. "If he were here, I do believe he and Bert would have come to blows by now."

What he didn't say was that, for Bert, that would likely come as a relief. Alain knew his friends. Roland dealt with grief in quietness and in ever fiercer devotion to what he had left, but Bert was of a fierier breed. What he needed was to rage and hate and strike out, and that he wasn't doing that concerned Alain more than anything else.

But he said none of that. That was Bert's own business. Instead, he just took another long breath of the cinnamon-scented steam, and sighed. "Be careful when you go to find him. A gunslinger on edge is a dangerous thing."

[apassingafternoon]

Cort sounded like a very hard man, one Kaine wouldn't have gotten along with at all.

"I will be. But anything is better than him having stayed. It wouldn't have been a two person fight by any means. She's too protective now." And that would have been the worst, most unbearable position for Kaine to be in. Nariko protective over everything that had occurred, protective of Roland just as much as whatever they had created together in this not-space, and Bert, just angry and pained.

"Better that he hits me than anyone else here. At least I heal quicker." She meant that to be funny but as she said it ... Well, it came out as anything but that.

[atouchofka]

Alain looked almost physically pained. "You've healed from too much today," was all he said, very quietly and mostly into his tea. "If he hits you, hit him back."

That, too, might be what Bert needed. Someone to hit him. Otherwise, he might just keep doing all the beating up himself, and watching him turn all his anger and hurt inwards was awful. It was like watching a man burn up from the inside.

He drank down the rest of his tea slowly, making it last. After a few moments, he said, "Someone ought to be protective of Ro'. It's been a long time that we've had that job to ourselves."

[apassingafternoon]

She had yet to heal from much of anything just yet, but since his eyes were elsewhere, she nodded. Why he looked so hurt all of the sudden ... She didn't know what that might be, but it passed and nothing else mattered. If Bert really was that upset, that prepared to blow, then Kaine would handle the situation as it happened.

At that, Kaine laughed gently. "I would almost say the same, but four years isn't a very long time." Nothing compared to the near twenty Bert and Alain had with their dinh. Their Roland. "It makes me happy, to be honest. In truth I always knew it would." And, here, she began near comical imitations of things said to her, "'You're just upset because you don't have a man', and 'you don't get to keep a foolish crush for so long'. It was never even that. I was just scared for her. It's not like anyone gave her the time to be. But now it's," She tilted her head towards the door but her eyes remained fixed on the wall. "... It's better. I thought it would be if they could be alone. At this rate, she'll probably die before she let's anyone even touch him the wrong way, let alone the two of you."

Kaine leaned into the pillows but her eyes closed as her head tilted up a bit. "I guess it'll still be a little sad for a while, but ..." Her sudden desire to talk disappeared, a not-so-proverbial roadblock. "Were you ever worried about it?" This marriage.

[atouchofka]

He didn't ask for an explanation. Instead, he just shrugged, sipping at his tea, his eyes closed and his head resting back against the head of the bed. "Of course I was," he said at last, frankly. "I feared it with everything in me. That she would be someone he couldn't love, and that she would be someone he could. That she would distract him, that he would abandon her. I did nothing but worry about it from the moment she came to Gilead to the moment she left. I've seen what women - what love can do to Roland. And to all of us."

For a moment, he lapsed into silence. Then, looking at her, he said suddenly, "It reflects, you know. Bert feels it too. With Susan, and now with Nariko. We're an-tet, and both of us have the Touch besides. When he loves, I love, and even reflected it's a fierce flame." His look changed, turned almost apologetic. "When Bert loves, I feel that, too."

[apassingafternoon]

All of that was very fair and, really, the best answer that she could have expected. And yet Alain somehow wandered into territory that was utterly foreign and Kaine found herself lost. She wasn't entirely without situational awareness - he looked upset again so obviously something about what he'd mentioned was the cause - but she very obviously wasn't grasping half of this.

"What?" Kaine frowned a bit. "Alain, you've lost me a bit, here. It sounds like you're saying that when Roland falls in love with someone the both of you have to feel that, too." He was also heavily implying that Bert was in love with - with -- Fuck that. No. One issue at a time. "Which would sort of mean there's a really weird, vaguely unsettling love four-way going on here."

[atouchofka]

"Feel it. Not..." He struggled with the words, and finally gave up, sighing and starting over. "I'm not in love with Nariko." Or with you, he thought, but didn't say. Like her, he had decided it was best to deal with one issue at a time, especially when his head was starting to feel rather cloudy. "But I can feel his love for her, especially when I'm near them. Bert..." He frowned. "I don't think he realises that's what's happening. He doesn't feel it so strong. There's just a comfortableness around her that wasn't there before. It's hard to explain."

To say the least. Sighing again, he wrapped both hands back around the mug and tipped his head back, looking up at the ceiling. "I don't feel it," he said at last, "I just touch it. Like sitting by the river where he's swimming. But for a while, just a while, he actually seemed happy." And that hurt worst of all, to see it ripped away.

[apassingafternoon]

"They were. I mean, Nariko sees things the way she wants to sometimes, but that was hardly the case. Apparently they babysat. It's a little cloudy because she's upset, but when Bert said that ..." An unbelievable sharp pain slithered down to her stomach. "Well, unfortunately it's gone now."

Kaine slid down on the bed to lie down, her hands clasped over her stomach. She didn't feel the same nervousness that might have come with other men, the pressure for something that would have been ill-timed and frankly wrong. "But I understand. And, really, love is about the most terrible thing, Alain. I almost wouldn't recommend it." Almost. "In any case it's good that you only feel it offhandedly, in a sense. Then we'd end up with some weird five way and everything would be an even bigger mess, especially since Roland scares the shit out of me."

She paused, and looked over at him, eyes piercing, she opened her mouth to say something, and then forced it to close. "Is it working?" That was very far from tell me Bert isn't in love with me, tell me you don't feel that from him at all.

[atouchofka]

Alain answered with an unfeigned yawn and a smile. "Hard to say, as I was already close to falling down from tiredness," he replied, rather wryly. "As for Roland, you'd be mad not to fear him. He's the truest gunslinger I've ever known. And at our heart, what gunslingers are is still killers."

He said it simply, as if it could be no other way. And, really, it couldn't. What they had always been taught was to make themselves weapons. Bert's silliness and brashness, Alain's own quiet kindness... those were really just the covers that the weapons wore. He would never consider anyone less for fearing Roland, who wore no cover over the gleaming steel underneath. Roland had never scared Alain - even if he'd made him worry endlessly - but that was only because they were of a kind.

If he was honest, his only doubt about Kaine fearing Roland was that she didn't fear him and Bert too.

Finishing off his tea, he set the mug aside and settled down under the covers, closing his eyes. "Anyroad, I don't think you'd have to worry about any crossed links. Nariko and Roland only have eyes for each other, anyone can see that." He yawned again.