// Can we pretend that airplanes in the night sky are like shooting stars //
A breath comes easier when she admits it, proof that she hears, that he’s not spiraling over nothing. He does not want her small or defeated or wrong, only awake to the risk, however much it hurts to see it. When she pulls herself flush to him, comfort and closeness all at once, it keeps everything contained between them so that when she lets the vulnerability show, it belongs only to him—not even the wind’s allowed to touch it. His arms shift around her waist, locking over each other behind her, snug with the one certainty he’ll never lose—that holding each other is what always rights the world.
Wreathed in each other’s arms, she begins to offer up all the truths, shaping them so easily it’s clear she’s traced the outline more than once. There’s no avoidance, no fantasy, just the raw reality of edges she'd tried to smooth over to keep them both from being snagged by them. An explanation she likely didn't think he needed, or just one she preferred not to put voice to, because things said aloud are always made more real, and it's better not to give hurt that kind of power if you don't have to.
He's grateful then that she sinks, pulling him with her, the weight of all this a struggle to keep upright and balanced. He shifts into a sit, quiet as he turns it all over and over again, trying to remember breath amongst breaking. He scooches to remain close to her, an arm looping through hers and both hands folding and locking against her fingers. Now it's his turn to admit to things he'd rather keep quiet. ”I know," he sighs through his nose, the discomfort of recognizing that there's no easy way to know Jack, for better or worse, and that he’s not the only threat in the world. Keeping everyone they care about safe would be much easier if they were orphan hermits. ”If not this, I’m sure he could find some other way to do damage if he wanted,” he admits with a low grumble, reminded of what Flora had told him back in her house, that Jack’s telepathy is not the only thing that makes him deadly. It’s just, this is the only way Jack can really erase Flora, and she’d agreed to it. Fuck, so had he.
Blinking up at her after the gentle press of their foreheads, a warmth and a reassurance that reaches past the slow creep of terror at long last, he frowns at what she extends now. His grip pulses against her, insistent, like a heartbeat fighting to remain in a body that’s failing. ”Your life is worth everything to me.” It’s not a numbers game for him, and if push came to shove, if he was Spiderman faced with losing MJ or a train full of innocent citizens, he would absolutely make the same mistake of trying to save everyone. ”This is so much worse too…because if I lost you, I wouldn’t even know it with this.” It’s what he means by keeping her dead. She’d be alive, but not really, not gone from everyone who mattered, and no one would know to save her. If she actually died, her fathers, him, they could do something. If they all forgot, no one would care, and that possibility crushes him with the weight.
”I wish you had told me, before we called Safrin. I could have bargained for something that would have kept a part of you alive in some way.” Her gift, the one where everyone has poured their love for her into it, revealing the impact of her on their lives, it could have been a loophole he begged for. It would not have kept their memories of her, but the orb could have served as a reminder of what they once knew, and maybe they could have found their ways back to her in time.
Glancing away as he mulls that over, wondering if he could ask Ludo or Safrin for some manner of safekeeping now. His attention flicks back instantly as she lays more blame on herself. ”No,” he says quickly and almost harshly, the meaning so intentional it comes out forceful. ”None of this is your fault, and I’d rather share this burden with you than have you suffer alone. That will always be true, no matter the problem.” He nods, content at least that they aren’t bound still when the other side falters. ”We’ll make sure,” he slips in, because she would not fight this alone. ”And I could take a death or two.” A small way to keep her from the full brunt of the torment, but he knows what she means, the conviction there echoed through him, but gods does it mostly belong to her.
That steel, more than any warmth, is what presses certainty back into place. ”No matter what,” he agrees, ”we’ll win this.”
Wreathed in each other’s arms, she begins to offer up all the truths, shaping them so easily it’s clear she’s traced the outline more than once. There’s no avoidance, no fantasy, just the raw reality of edges she'd tried to smooth over to keep them both from being snagged by them. An explanation she likely didn't think he needed, or just one she preferred not to put voice to, because things said aloud are always made more real, and it's better not to give hurt that kind of power if you don't have to.
He's grateful then that she sinks, pulling him with her, the weight of all this a struggle to keep upright and balanced. He shifts into a sit, quiet as he turns it all over and over again, trying to remember breath amongst breaking. He scooches to remain close to her, an arm looping through hers and both hands folding and locking against her fingers. Now it's his turn to admit to things he'd rather keep quiet. ”I know," he sighs through his nose, the discomfort of recognizing that there's no easy way to know Jack, for better or worse, and that he’s not the only threat in the world. Keeping everyone they care about safe would be much easier if they were orphan hermits. ”If not this, I’m sure he could find some other way to do damage if he wanted,” he admits with a low grumble, reminded of what Flora had told him back in her house, that Jack’s telepathy is not the only thing that makes him deadly. It’s just, this is the only way Jack can really erase Flora, and she’d agreed to it. Fuck, so had he.
Blinking up at her after the gentle press of their foreheads, a warmth and a reassurance that reaches past the slow creep of terror at long last, he frowns at what she extends now. His grip pulses against her, insistent, like a heartbeat fighting to remain in a body that’s failing. ”Your life is worth everything to me.” It’s not a numbers game for him, and if push came to shove, if he was Spiderman faced with losing MJ or a train full of innocent citizens, he would absolutely make the same mistake of trying to save everyone. ”This is so much worse too…because if I lost you, I wouldn’t even know it with this.” It’s what he means by keeping her dead. She’d be alive, but not really, not gone from everyone who mattered, and no one would know to save her. If she actually died, her fathers, him, they could do something. If they all forgot, no one would care, and that possibility crushes him with the weight.
”I wish you had told me, before we called Safrin. I could have bargained for something that would have kept a part of you alive in some way.” Her gift, the one where everyone has poured their love for her into it, revealing the impact of her on their lives, it could have been a loophole he begged for. It would not have kept their memories of her, but the orb could have served as a reminder of what they once knew, and maybe they could have found their ways back to her in time.
Glancing away as he mulls that over, wondering if he could ask Ludo or Safrin for some manner of safekeeping now. His attention flicks back instantly as she lays more blame on herself. ”No,” he says quickly and almost harshly, the meaning so intentional it comes out forceful. ”None of this is your fault, and I’d rather share this burden with you than have you suffer alone. That will always be true, no matter the problem.” He nods, content at least that they aren’t bound still when the other side falters. ”We’ll make sure,” he slips in, because she would not fight this alone. ”And I could take a death or two.” A small way to keep her from the full brunt of the torment, but he knows what she means, the conviction there echoed through him, but gods does it mostly belong to her.
That steel, more than any warmth, is what presses certainty back into place. ”No matter what,” he agrees, ”we’ll win this.”
Kaisel
// I could really use a wish right now //
Wearing a watery blue, faded and stretched-out sparkling hair tie on his left wrist
