3 o'clock things

this world is a wasteland where nothing can grow

"Very much without." Niki's voice has slipped into a rough whisper despite his attempts otherwise, his hand clenching into a fist over his chest, jaw feathering as if to keep anything else from leaking through. Alcohol has gotten its fingers into the cracks in his composure to prise them open; the necromancer doesn't remember ever speaking this aloud. The closest he'd come is with Flora some seasons back, and even then he'd not been able to say much more than this.

"I was... eleven, I think, the first time it happened. Almost seventeen by the last time. Anatolii died that year." And before Sunjata can even consider asking, Niki glances across at him, eyes quietly pleased but without anything darker in them. "I had nothing to do with it." But he'd wished he had.

Inhaling a sudden, trembling breath, the necromancer seems to notice the changes in the room for the first time, scowling and shaking his head like he can get rid of them. "Sorry," he mutters. "This can't be helping - I'll talk about something else."

Niki

i used to have strength but i ran out of hope

relive who i've been at my worst,
every single night, looking for a distraction

The answer is the perfect one for the Heartless to inflate that other emotion running through his body. It replaces the nausea and hurt with anger that he can direct onto something – unfortunately something no longer with them. And while he hears just how many times it had happened, he decides then and there that they were two times too many, and that Niki should have absolutely had a hand in his demise. “I’m sorry that happened to you.” He offers into the quiet, finding himself shifting where he’s sitting to no longer stare at Niki but to start to unfold.

He moves just enough to sit closer to Niki, facing him still kind of curled up but close enough that their legs can touch if they move ever so slightly. “No, it’s okay.” He’s thoroughly distracted by it now that the memory of the bloodstained manor is long in the past. “I didn’t really get a choice in what I had to do growing up back home, either.” He starts off, testing the waters in a way that’s away from the manor. “I was the first born son in a family of nobility, so, everything was kind of written for me so long as I could survive everything that lead up to it.” Which, he supposes, might relate to Niki’s situation in all the ways of how they both are survivors from very different backgrounds, both at the hands of people that had to right to raise or handle children.

the flood

waiting for the sun to rise
pretty sight for some hollow eyes

totally sniped from odd ilu

this world is a wasteland where nothing can grow

"Yeah, me too," Niki says quietly. He doesn't say it's okay because it isn't; not that first time, not the last, and not all the times in between. Swallowing hard, he glances sidelong at Sunjata as he starts to shift and move closer, feeling a cousin of his usual awkwardness try to churn up in his stomach. "I wish you hadn't seen them," he admits of his scars, slowly dropping his hand away from his chest. "I didn't realise I'd pulled my shirt off."

Glancing back at the other man as he continues, at least Sunjata's memories also serve as a decent distraction for Niki, the necromancer wrinkling his nose at the unfortunate parallels between them. "Like the trial, and the test you told me about?" he assumes; the Heartless had never said as much, but Niki assumes those are things he very much had to survive.

"Isn't it funny how you still act the way you were taught, even though you know it's wrong?" he says suddenly. "I do, anyway."

Niki

i used to have strength but i ran out of hope

relive who i've been at my worst,
every single night, looking for a distraction

The admission is met with a quiet contemplation, the slow understanding that flickers in his chest and gut at the idea that Niki hates that he’d seen them. Sunjata doesn’t look at him or the scars again, just quietly settles there and rests his head on his propped-up leg again. “I get why you talked about them like you did.” Back forever ago when they’d talked about scars – how Sunjata’s were badges of survival, how it was cultural for him to boast them with pride even if they came from the worst things that happened to him.

He thinks about trying to replace the anger and hurt for Niki with humor, but he’s still feeling too raw to make anything sound right in the mental confines of his head let alone getting his tongue to actually work the way he wants it to. So he chooses on bypassing it, like pretending it doesn’t exist is better for the both of them, because he can’t sit there and explain just how he doesn’t mind the scars – gods knew the Heartless was a walking slab of scar tissue at this point – but he figures it matters little when Niki very much does mind them being there.

“Yeah. The swim test and the trial.” He pauses, nibbling on his lower lip. “The manor was right after my trial. I was seventeen when I won it. Got shot in the leg and covered in mud and I was so cold and I didn’t really realize what I’d done until they dragged me in to get looked at.” He hesitates, not sure whether or not to dwell on the manor and all the blood again, but is quietly grateful for Niki’s follow up.

Sunjata hums low and quiet as he considers it, choosing to be blunt rather than anything else. “I hate it.” He hates the way he still feels like his father’s around to fuck with him. How he feels like he should act. How terrified he was to do anything of his own volition because he wasn’t allowed to have anything in his youth. “I hate how even though you know it’s wrong, it feels even worse to go against it.” It's a horribly vicious cycle.

the flood

waiting for the sun to rise
pretty sight for some hollow eyes

totally sniped from odd ilu

this world is a wasteland where nothing can grow

Niki nods gently in response to Sunjata's comment; the acceptance of it is better than any platitude he might not believe, and though the other man might hate it, the necromancer is more than comfortable in the silence that stretches between them. His hand lowers from his chest at last, fingers lacing together around the knee drawn up towards him. "...Shot? Like with an arrow?" he asks automatically, wincing no matter how Sunjata opts to clarify.

"Is that what your nightmare was about?" He assumes so, based on the bloody manor that had appeared or the way the Heartless had checked his leg to make sure he was alright.

He both does and doesn't expect Sunjata to understand his last point, quietly surprised at the conviction and vitriol in his agreement. "And sometimes," he adds, "it even feels good. To do what you're 'supposed' to. Because it can't get worse if you're following the rules." Niki scoffs suddenly, rubbing his eyes. "Gods, that's fucked up."

Niki

i used to have strength but i ran out of hope

relive who i've been at my worst,
every single night, looking for a distraction

“Uh.. No. From a gun.” He realizes that means fuck all here in Caido and he clears his throat to clarify. “It’s.. basically a metal tube with another metal piece inside. That’s the bullet. There’s a lever you’d pull and it starts a little spark and the powder in the tube ignites and sends the bullet out way faster and harder to see than an arrow.” His brows pinch together and eh finds himself staring at the pillow resting against the headboard as he tries to figure out if that’s a good enough explanation, before he’s shrugging. “So kind of like an arrow but faster.” Maybe that’s the best way he could explain it, or maybe he’s made up more questions by simply explaining it the way he had.

At the question of his nightmare, Sunjata nods quietly. “Yeah. That’s where I grew up. It’s how it looked when they brought me back. We had doctors on staff and my father wanted it all contained so I didn’t get looked at by the trial crew.” So it made sense he’d be left to suffer and continue to bleed out on those pristine white marble floors. And nor would it be the first time he had the opportunity to paint his father’s floors in red.

Unfortunately, both times had been his own blood.

He nibbles at his lower lip as the conversation shifts toward the things they should and shouldn’t do, and as Niki continues, Sunjata can’t help the quiet humorless laugh that leaves him, pausing to take a deep breath before he adds his own little two cents. “It’s really fucked up.” He agrees, staring stubbornly at the headboard and away from Niki. “And it’s so fucking hard to break out of and stay out.”

the flood

waiting for the sun to rise
pretty sight for some hollow eyes

totally sniped from odd ilu