[Training] boy drama is sillier than a drama llama

Zavien

Kai's shout draws the eyes of the people around them but Zavien's too focused on the injury, the festering wound that's being debrided for all to see, the hurt that seems to bounce between them in mounting strength. 

His sword connects with Kai's, the battle of wills mismatched by purpose. He doesn't press an advantage or try to shove again for fear of further maiming, simply holding his ground through the onslaught of reasoning, looking for an opening to heal. "A threat is a threat, Kai - whether you planned to act on it or not. How was I supposed to know you wouldn't? You didn't tell me that." He'd just found out that Kai had betrayed his best friend. The fiery temper could have easily burnt away reason, leaving only malice and anger in its place, willing to turn everything to ash in its fury - friend or not. Nothing about their interaction had given Zavien any reason to think he'd spare his or Lena's feelings when Koa had been his first victim. 

Like a tension cord finally overextending itself, the force of it all snaps. The lesser sword shatters, the sudden lack of resistance attempting to pull him into Kai. It takes every bit of strength to pull against the momentum, and he nearly stumbles back on his ass to keep from making a Kai kabob.

When he regains his balance a step away, his breathing is shallow, wanting desperately to reach out again to take away the pain he'd caused, to fix what's been broken. But Kai doesn't invite him forward, and his eyes - though lined with pain - are clear in their rebellion. 

It's a rejection that stings, the fight quickly dragging his sword tip into the sand, his voice becoming a near whisper. "It was never something I didn't appreciate, Kai." He'd told Flora as such. Zavien understands wanting to protect someone he loves - it's at the very core of his being. And yet, he can't deny that he hadn't understood the lengths Kai had been willing to go, the lies he was willing to spread. 

Lowering his head, he sheathes his sword, unwilling to brandish it again, to risk more wounds when there's already so much hurt. His eyes linger on the charred laceration, shame coloring his mood darker. "I'm sorry you thought you needed a threat to convince me to do something I already planned," he shifts his feet, resisting the urge to reach out again as he asks, "but can you really tell me it was an empty one?' When he looks to Kai, it's not with pain or anger, but with a deep disappointment for having misjudged a friend.

We wear our scars as proof

that we are still alive.

I'm never gonna quit, got my legacy set in motion

His hands are aimless without a hilt to encircle now. They flex and then curl in at his sides, grappling the air like he could squeeze the old frustration from it. Somehow, he keeps standing on the wrong end of an argument, routinely misunderstood for all his attempts to do things right. "What good would the threat have been if I told you it was hollow?" He lifts his head, chin angling up, resolve his last shield now. "I was up there to help Stormbreak. To settle things with Koa. I was not asking you to do anything more but wait, but you wouldn't even spare me that, touting honor in place of sense." He swallows, mouth suddenly dry as the memory of it curls unwelcome and clear in his mind. Perhaps he should call Flora here, play it out for each of them. Maybe he'd been more monstrous than he remembered, and he'd be served by the sight of it, but equally, Zavien should see how stiff he'd been about the matter.

The doubt continues, even now, and that settles like a fresh wound alongside the older ones. That a man he's grown up alongside for his later years can still believe the worst of him is telling, the distance between them no longer seeming suitable to measure in seasons. "How can you hold Koa in such high esteem and me with so little?" The words come out more plaintive than he'd intended, something young and raw exposed beneath. It's a childish sense of injustice, of longing, writhing alongside the hurt. All his life spent trying to fit his feet into the shoes of others, only for it to fail this spectacularly.

"You know me, Zavien!" One of his hands cuts out in front of him forcefully. It hangs in the air for a moment before it curls in on his chest, breath heaving. Wherever Koa had gone, Kaisel had not been far, chasing his cousin's shadow like he could eventually catch it. The years that separated them meant Kaisel was always behind though, and maybe Zavien would only ever see him as the immature tagalong, even still. "Especially now." The amber of his stare blazes upon Zavien, molten with the outrage of being found wanting time and again. "Can you really stand there, having done the exact thing I did, and claim you don't understand?"

Kaisel

So welcome to the fire, I'm the one with the lighter

Zavien

Kai seems determined to avoid admitting that he would have told Lena a lie if he believed Zavien had betrayed him, and that - along with the blatant misunderstanding of his intentions - grates at his composure. His empty hands clench at his side, jaw sharpening beneath the force of his frustrations. His voice rises in answer to Kai's accusations, control shredding beneath an argument that he'd thought over. "Why do you keep making it sound like I was going to find and tell Koa everything?!"

By this point, a few people are leaving the sparring ring, deciding that it might be best if they're not here for this discussion, especially as Zavien appears to lose some of the guilt that had kept his anger at bay. "I didn't want to lie to him, but that didn't mean I wasn't going to take every other possible step first. Me telling him would have made things worse, not better, and I already apologized for not making that clearer!" And yet, Kai continues to shove it in his face like it's a valid reason not to own his threat.

The quiet question gives him pause, anger stuttering as a laughing kid overlays on the image of a man who's hurt him. It's like a mocking picture of how they used to be, the jovial visage of someone he'd thought would never be cruel or heartless enough to intentionally cause harm - even if he managed to pull it off unintentionally with impressive skill. But that kid has been replaced by someone consumed by love, a wild, unpredictable man backed into a corner, showing his teeth and roaring of all the ways he plans to use them. Nothing about this beast is familiar to Zavien, who thought Kai would rather take a beating than hurt those he cares about.

Shaking his head free of the illusion, Zavien lets out a sad sigh, conflict straining the sound in his chest. "Do I? Love changes people and you didn't even hesitate to start throwing threats around. You don't even seem to care now." That his threat hadn't been hollow, that he'd sew chaos just to prevent some of the damage on his pride. 

He purses his lips as Kai throws the comparison at him again. It's not lost on him how similar their situations are, and he reiterates that. "I do understand - why you fell in love, why you were worried about Koa, why you panicked when you thought I was going to risk that." His voice grinds out, emotions thick as he tries to get Kai to grasp the crux of Zavien's issue. "But I wouldn't have hurt a friend's relationship over a misunderstanding." He swallows, an imploring hand raising from his side as he explains, "How do I know the next time we argue, you won't go to Soh and tell her some absurd lie just to get back at me?"

We wear our scars as proof

that we are still alive.

I'm never gonna quit, got my legacy set in motion

Somehow, every explanation feels like another stone dropped into deep water, swallowed before it can reach the bottom. He keeps reaching for understanding only to find another accusation waiting in its place. Zavien's voice snaps out with more force than before, and Kaisel's head jerks back a touch. It lands no differently than another swing of the sword. The weapons have changed, but the rhythm hasn't; every sentence feels like another strike to catch, another opening to search for. "I hear your apology," he sighs, one hand flopping back to his side while the other scrubs at his cheek and chin. "I told you it takes a lot to say. But back then, I didn't have that yet, so I'm trying to explain why I said what I said."

"What you said, was you couldn't lie, and if Koa asked, you'd tell him. That sounded like a threat, so I answered in kind." His hands chop up the air in front of him, as if his voice needs the specific compartments to fit into in order to be properly received and digested. "Just like I didn't say then the threat was empty, you didn't say then that you telling Koa would be worse. That you would do most anything to avoid it."

When Zavien speaks again, Kaisel is startled into a fresh silence. The frustration sets between his teeth like a particularly tough strip of jerky, and as much as he works at it and works at it, it doesn't seem to be breaking down any better than when he'd started. "What the hell does caring look like to you then?!" he demands, holding Zavien firm with his gaze for a second. "I'm here, aren't I!? I'm wounded, but I'm talking to you!" The words leave him almost breathless. He can't think of another way to prove the point. He could've limped away the moment the sword bit into him, could've let the pain be an excuse enough to leave the rest unsaid. Instead, he's still here, aching while he's trying, apparently in vain, to convince someone he once admired that he isn't the monster they've decided he is.

Shaking his head sharply, Kaisel scoffs. "I didn't hurt a friend's relationship over a misunderstanding," Kaisel mutters, tone souring beneath the constant villainization. "Only you did that." Because if they'd been friends once, Zavien has made certain they aren't any longer.

Growing weary of being misunderstood at every turn, something inside him finally slackens. Every explanation only seems to return wearing a stranger's face, and he's running out of ways to say the same thing. Unwilling to endure more than he has to when it isn't appreciated, Kaisel slowly starts to shuffle and limp back towards his bag and his healing water. "How can you trust anyone won't do that?" he demands back, one shoulder lifting and shrugging away the implication that he's out to dismantle every piece of Zavien's life. How quickly a single mistake could become the only portrait someone bothered to keep. It doesn't seem worth comparing their taste in art any longer.

"You're asking for proof the threat was empty, but you're the only one that's filled it up. I didn't tell Lena shit." He glances back over his shoulder at Zavien, gaze darkened with the fierce certainty he sets down. "And if I meant to, I would have." Not sure anyone on Caido could accuse Kaisel of keeping his mouth shut.

Kaisel

So welcome to the fire, I'm the one with the lighter

Zavien

The exhaustion of Kai's response drags down some of his angry outburst, but he can still feel it beneath the surface, simmering and reaching a heat that's stronger than the day they first argued. This is born of more than heightened emotions and initial pain, but a deep-seated hurt of needing to hear that Kai is still the person he thinks he is - and being denied that at every turn. It's a frustration at trying to reconcile what's being said with what he thought he knew - of what he still wants to believe deep down.

"I know why you said what you did, but I did say that I wanted to avoid it, that I wanted you to be the one to tell him. I might not have said it well, but I did," he reasons. And yet Kai had been too worked up to hear him or care. Zavien understands being hotheaded and hardheaded and bullheaded and all the manner of indecipherably illogical reactions, but why can't Kai seem to get that understanding doesn't make it hurt any less?

He falls silent under Kai's gaze, the fire of his anger banking when he meets his eyes, reminded again of the wound he's inflicted. And yet, Zavien can't argue that Kai is still here, even if he flips his words back on him, casting shade like he has a vendetta against sunlight. He doesn't argue how it took two people to screw things up, or how it hadn't been their relationship he'd been referring to. It's a vicious cycle with no relief, an ongoing battle that's fought with questions rather than answers, ones that he can't always answer because how can he trust someone if not by their actions? Kai didn't tell Lena, he didn't withhold help when it mattered, he's here, trying to be understood. Other than the words he'd said in the heat of the moment, Kai hasn't given him a reason to believe he's actually a bad person.

"You're right."

The words land on Kai's back where he's turned away, where he can't see the slow decompression of the tension he holds. "I just - " It's hard to explain why seeing their interaction had felt like betrayal, but he tries, nonetheless. "It hurt, Kai. You've always been like a kid brother, someone I didn't think would ever say something like that. And now..." he shakes his head, still trying to reconcile the harmless, impulsive kid he used to know with the man before him, ready to protect those he cares about. He's always seen a lot of himself in Kai - maybe too much.

His head hangs, his voice quiet as he releases any lingering animosities. "I guess we're just two idiots with big mouths and too much to lose," he lets out a sigh that's heavier than the weight of the world, containing all the grief and unspoken frustrations, "and I'm done losing people."

We wear our scars as proof

that we are still alive.