cinders and smoke

remi The higher I climb the farther I fall when I do "I suppose I just...I thought of stars and her laughter and I just...I kept wondering why. Why I didn't make a music box that captured her giggles. Why I washed her clothes instead of cherishing the sticky messes on her sleeves...Because now I'm sitting here realizing that I've nothing of her and all of this—" He gestured vaguely at the feathers, the pretty shells. "—and I hate it. It isn't her. It doesn't capture anything at all about her. I'd have to pull all the stars from the sky and even that wouldn't be enough." His voice had grown thick with emotion, and though there weren't tears in his eyes, he blinked hard as if there were. "You would cope." He said gently. It wasn't meant to be some sort of plea for reassurance, nor disrespect for Ronin's love. He was just...a survivor. "That's exactly how it feels." Remi agreed, of being dead in his own body. "But it isn't just so you aren't lonely. I do still want you, love you. It just feels..." He didn't know the word. "..I do love you." Remi repeated, looking honestly at Ronin now. "As best I can with what I have left."

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "...There are things," Ronin said softly, quietly, like it was a secret that might escape if they spoke them too loudly. "At your shop... There will be things. I didn't go in - I couldn't. But I imagine it looks just the same as the day we left." His fingers tightened around Remi's shoulder, as if even the hint of emotion in his voice was like a lifeline in the dark, something he could catch at and tug, like it led somewhere. "I took one of her pictures once, to Safrin's shrine in the Fields. She made it part of the shrine... it's there still." He shrugged. Evidence, at least, that their daughter had lived. Snorting softly at being told he would cope, Ronin begged to differ, but in truth he didn't know. He had coped with Vanya because of Remi. He was coping now because of Remi. Without him... would he really just be adrift, a ship with no anchor? Some deep, scared part of him begged the world not to make him have to find out. Leaning in, Ronin kissed Remi's temple, his lips warm and his cheeks wet. "I love you too," he said roughly. "Whatever you can muster, however much or little, it's enough. You're enough for me."

remi The higher I climb the farther I fall when I do It wouldn't look the same, but that didn't matter now. Remi's throat closed painfully as he squeezed his eyes closed. "I've never regretted much in my life Ronin. Or at least, not like this. But now?" Pain prickled the back of his eyes and if he could have, he'd have leaned into it. "I could have saved her tears, made them magical drops that would always last. I could have recorded her laugh. Her voice..." His teeth clicked together as his jaw tensed, looking down into the feather-lined hole. Surprised by the wetness against his cheek, Remi turned to Ronin with a look of distant awe. Reaching instinctively to wipe his husband's cheeks with fingers made rough by the sand, he tried to smile though it was weakly done. "You deserve so much more than that. More than just enough." He whispered apologetically. "More than just a hollow anchor if only I knew how."

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "You could have. And we could have kept them and coveted them, and played those recordings over and over and over again, and it would kill us in the end," Ronin half whispered, his eyes closing as Remi's fingers brushed across his cheeks. His free hand came up to touch his chest, over his heart. "This is where she'll stay for me. It's where she lived from the moment she took her first breath, and that will never change." A grave had been a nice idea, Ronin blinking his eyes open and gazing into the hole; his fingers brushed absently across smears of blood along Remi's arm. Tutting his husband and his apologies, Ronin shrugged his shoulders. "Oh, you'll figure out how," he said, a soft and certain kind of knowing in his voice. "We can figure it out together. Every day you're here is a day when you didn't walk away into nothing. It's another chance to figure it out. So just focus on being here for now, okay?"

remi The higher I climb the farther I fall when I do "Yes. But something will kill us eventually." Remi interrupted gently. "I would rather it be that." Though that was easy to say now. Were he to be handed a shell that he could press to his ear and hear her laugh one more time, he wasn't sure he was strong enough to do it. Not without a knife in his other hand to cut out the pain when it came. His free hand came up to touch his chest, over his heart. "This is where she'll stay for me. It's where she lived from the moment she took her first breath, and that will never change." A grave had been a nice idea, Ronin blinking his eyes open and gazing into the hole; his fingers brushed absently across smears of blood along Remi's arm. Not wanting to beat a dead horse, still Remi turned towards Ronin and reached for his hand anew. "I won't be the me you met all those years ago, ever again. Not even the one you married. Life changes us all, but this...I'll understand if this is too much. " Softly he squeezed Ronin's fingers, the touch as gentle as he could make it. "If you ever want something more, if only for a night or an afternoon, I would understand."

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving Ronin’s hand closed around Remi’s easily, though he only glanced back at his husband as he began to speak. Surprisingly, his words drew a soft, sad laugh from Ronin’s throat, the hunter shaking his head and squeezing Remi’s hand back. ”And you don’t think I have changed?” he asked, his brow furrowing. ”Remi, you are my husband. You’re not some asset I can just discard because parts of it don’t act like they used to.” That in itself was insulting, to both he and the alchemist. ”This is far from too much right now. I don’t want anything or anyone else but you, so please, stop trying to make out you aren’t good enough.”

remi The higher I climb the farther I fall when I do Sighing wearily, Remi shook his head. "I'm not trying to fight with you Ronin or make this into a competition about which of us is worst and where the line of shitty-husbanding begins." Running his free hand up the side of his face, he frowned sadly as his fingers pressed against one of his eyes. "I only meant that...well. I suppose I don't believe you." Remi's voice was soft and defeated. "I don't think I am enough, or at least, I won't be for long, not if you and I continue on like this." Like this being Remi's stroll down the way of madness whilst Ronin started to course-correct. "Just...don't love anyone else. Whatever happens, wherever we go, that's all I ask. Everything else I'll understand, but never that." Pulling Ronin's hand and cradling it against his chest, Remi's gaze was pleading despite Ronin's insistence that all of this was unnecessary. It might have been, but since their first day on the beach they'd not held their punches with each other, and this felt like it needed saying.

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving ”I am never trying to fight you, Remi,” Ronin said softly, giving his husband an honest smile that bore more sadness than it ought to. ”No competitions, I swear. I just wanted you to know that change goes for both of us. I’m not the plucky ex-soldier back from the dead anymore, and I can handle a lot more than before.” That all but went without saying. Still, the near grief in his expression at those words - I suppose I don’t believe you was hard to hide as he took everything about Remi in. Did he plan to continue on like this? Absolutely not. But he and the alchemist currently walked two different paths in the same direction; Ronin was just trying to find the route that let them meet up again. His eyes widened as his hand was pulled against Remi’s chest, fingers splaying to rest, warm and calloused, across the other man’s heart. He held Remi’s gaze with eyes like steady blue fire, and his free hand came up to caress his cheek. ”Never,” he vowed softly. ”Believe anything else you like, but I will never love anyone else. You’re it for me, I promise.”

remi The higher I climb the farther I fall when I do Remi snorted at that, a brief flicker of real joy alight in his eyes as he shook his head. "The only day you've ever been plucky with me, was that day on the beach." He said with a fading smile. "But that's the thing Ronin. I don't want to be something you handle, someone who is just enough. A necessary paperweight. I feel ruined Ronin. And not in a way that's fixable." And really, that was the truth of it all. That's what Remi had been getting at this entire time: I'm broken, and i'm so fucking sorry that you've bound yourself to me. With sudden strength Remi returned Ronin's grip, his expression one of deep pain and fear. I love you so gods damned much that look said; the last words of a dying man lost out at sea. But if that sea was just the blue of Ronin's eyes then perhaps there was still a chance. A way back. If not, if perhaps Ronin was strong enough to drag him along—anchor and all—perhaps that would be enough. Reaching forward his free hand to tangle it in the back of Ronin's hair and draw him near, instead of stealing a kiss he merely pressed their foreheads together, Remi's eyes squeezing shut. 'Only you for me." He agreed, the words just a whispered breath over his lips.

RONIN if there's one thing i'm good at, it's surviving "I suppose I would have to agree with you there - that was the day some ruffian stabbed me, I believe," Ronin said; it was not the sort of thing that generally merited amusement, but the hunter honestly looked back on those memories with fondness. His thumb grazed across Remi's unshaven cheek; while his partner's smile faded, Ronin's remained, genuine and quietly confident. "Not handled, not a paperweight," he said warmly. "Ruined, not fixable - as long as you can talk to me about it, Remi, I'll never feel like I'm just towing you along. Okay?" Even if the words didn't come out right at first; even if they had to talk into the wee hours. As long as his husband was trying to communicate that meant there was still something there. And it slipped out in those brief expressions of joy, in the roughness in his voice, in the way he clutched his hand; each one a reward that Ronin had not been expecting. His forehead resting against Remi's, the simple warmth and affection in the gesture was enough to bring a stupid smile to his lips, one that his husband likely wouldn't see. "Let's go back to the wagon?" he asked; suddenly this beach reminded him much too much of the first day of their arrival.

remi The higher I climb the farther I fall when I do Remi too grinned into the memory. Everything had been so easy then. Weightless. But he was not so naive as to wish away their lives together to get back to simpler times. "The same for you." Ronin's quiet smile was grounding, and the alchemist felt himself sinking back into something he felt he understood; a place he did in fact want to be if only because of the man before him. "I know that this.." He tilted his head towards the grave, "..isn't what she deserved. But I don't know what is. So if you do, tell me. And if you don't? Tell me that too." Nuzzling forward, his nose brushing Ronin's in one last grasp at affection, the alchemist hummed a note of agreement under his breath. As they stood and began walking across the sands, the tide finally stretched up to reclaim the section of the beach Remi had sequestered himself too. Feathers and shells were washed away, the empty hole filled. ~FIN