Ain't No Sunshine When She's Gone

He had seen the panther and orca in action, of course, and seen partially-shifted pieces of the macaw and antelope before as well. "I saw," he said quietly, remembering the hunt and the piece of flapping leather that had fluttered into a feline shape during introductions. He had not known Pete well enough to realize he had shifts until Deimos had revealed it to him, much less which shifts the timid Launceleyn man claimed, and it was for that reason alone he didn't bristle with annoyance at Sunjata's temerity. If it had been Adam it would have been a different story. As it was he simply shrugged, wondering how the General would have taken such a statement, given Sunjata's role in Peter's death.

"No... not really. You either have it, or you don't. One day there are limits and the next they've expanded. Like a leak in a dam that's a trickle at first, and then something just... shifts. Breaking through a wider hole so that more water - more energy of whatever type - rushes through, faster and stronger than before. It's different for everyone though." As he had learned from talking to Evie and Deimos and Loren before.

"Why a dragon?" he asked abruptly, the question Deimos had been unable to answer. "Of all the rare creatures you could have hunted and killed for their heart... why a cousin to our companions? Why one so far from the Temple you were rebuilding and the people who pray there? Why not a landshark or a banshee?" A veritable cascade of questions that had been simmering too long, released all at once like one of Quanil's outbursts.

don't you know i'm no good for you?

He’d forgotten that Jigano had been there during the hunt, too distracted by the wound he’d sustained from the attack from Deimos to recall much from that day. But he nods, gaze flickering back to the daggers in hand, nothing else to add until Jigano speaks of magic. And he supposes it makes sense, in whatever little amount of knowledge he does know. Was it similar to the way he could call creatures close versus how he’d adapted to try and get them to do things and watching as they did?

It’s the only experience he has.

But those thoughts falter when Jigano brings up the dragon and his jaw clenches. Hard. “I spoke with Amalia before we went. The goal wasn’t to kill the dragon, it was to see if it would be willing to come back. All Safrin said she needed was a heart — didn’t specify its death, and so… Dragons, I had read, Attuned could speak to them.” He sighs, having not realized how large these creatures were. “So we initially had gone to try and talk to it, convince it to come. Only, obviously, that’s not what happened. I didn’t know how large dragons were, nor did I think we’d stumble across a white one.”

His gaze lifts to the coastline again, attuned bond coated in the feelings he can’t damper down. Pain, sorrow, shame. “I didn’t do enough research on it, and those I talked to imagined it would be fine. My only experience with dragons at all are the companions here, so I was blinded by that mostly.” Blinded by other things. “I never meant for it to happen. And if I could redo it, I would absolutely go for something like a banshee or anything else closer. But I can’t.” He frowns to this, muscles clenching again. “But by all means, if you want to take out your anger about it on me like Deimos did, I won’t stop you.” He hadn’t really stopped Deimos either, fully believing he’d deserved every moment of it.

i've learned to lose, you can't afford to

SUNJATA

Ahh. He hadn't known that they had wanted to beg the dragon for assistance, but he held back his bitter, humorless snort of disbelief. "And when have the gods ever not used every piece of what they've sent us to get for them?" he asked softly, thinking of his own tasks for Ludo. Safrin was a far crueler god in his own experience, though he knew Remi would say differently.

And then Sunjata's words drew Jigano's full attention, his stare incredulous as he looked upon the other man in wonder at the bald-faced lies. He set the lily gently down, and as he did his form rippled and shifted, becoming larger, scaled, winged and a thirty foot silver dragon looked down upon the bartender and breathed the odorless, colorless gas that sat in a chamber within his lungs, one that would paralyze those living creatures that breathed it in and make them easy prey for his powerful jaws.

You knew damn well, he hissed through the Attuned bond. Don't play the innocent with me, Sunjata, when I gathered stones with you at the Whispershore in this form and you knew just how big a dragon might be then. You didn't think to ask someone who perhaps had some personal experience with what a dragon was capable of? Who might have been able to make a difference, had he been there? Jigano's grief and pain spiked through the bond, bitter and laced with frustration.

I would take you up on that, if not for Maea's sake. He growled, the sound a low rumble in his deep chest that echoed the distant thunder. Her memory protects you. Remember that, in the arms of your new Ascended lovers. She'd be so upset, he knew, if he injured Sunjata. His last gift to her would be leaving her beloved unharmed. Deimos's retribution would have to suffice for him as well, and he was pettily glad to hear that the General had not let the Flood escape unscathed from his mistakes as he settled back on his haunches to let the other man recover from whatever gas he might have inhaled.

don't you know i'm no good for you?

His lips twitch with something akin to a frown as Jigano speaks of using every last bit. “I thought so too when Amalia had offered Jyoti as the rare heart.” And he had denied her, for the attempts to go and speak with a dragon, to convince it to help — only, only it hadn’t worked. Still, the anger makes way for something else — perhaps a bit of panic as Jigano shifts to a dragon, gleaming in the light that could appear white if looked at just right.

He remembers the ice, the chill, the cries. The hollow sound of gunshots and more ice, and he tries to move, to stand, to do something only to find himself completely immobile. And that’s when the fear begins to set in, the inability to move, to be trapped. At least his mind is still working, racing as it is. Believe it or not, Jigano, you’re not my first thought. He snaps, frustrated as the fear continues to coat his end of the attuned bond. And who was I to know that the dragon we sought wasn’t of a companion size. Before that, you were the only one I saw. How was I to know those things might be the same here? His attuned voice drips with the hints of a snarl, body still as can be.

But then, then it only seems to get worse at the mention of Ascended lovers, wanting nothing more than to laugh in the face of it all. Pins and needles beginning to start uncomfortably in his feet and legs, arms and hands. Oh, so now you finally choose to listen to her? He snaps, shooting Jigano a glare. She loved Halo, you know. She nearly didn’t go because you had been disappointed with the idea of her going and training. But you know what? She got better. Stronger. Made new friends and lasting relationships that you would have kept her from. God, he can’t stop himself now, but at least his lips feel less numb and he can speak normally again.

“Go ahead, Jigano. Paint me this picture of how I’m supposed to cope when I’ve lost someone I love not once or twice, but three times.” He growls, a sneer crossing his face, feathers ruffling along inked tattoos.

i've learned to lose, you can't afford to

SUNJATA

The bard winced internally at hearing how Amalia had offered her companion first, knowing that the pious woman's faith in Vi often painted Safrin as rosier than the tempestuous goddess had ever appeared to him. Sunjata would have had no reason to doubt her, though; if he hadn't had his own experiences to the contrary, he would have believed in her Natural expertise, too.

No, that would be yourself, the dragon thought back, cold and angry but taken aback a bit by the sheer fear in the Attuned bond. Part of him had wanted to startle Sunjata, yes, and a dark, angry piece of him drank that fear in, but the rest of him recoiled from it. Who, indeed? he asked, drawing away with a rumble of discontent. Ingrid had told me about them. I had some sense of their size and how inhospitable they are to intruders, thanks to her. Any Halo native could have told you of them, even if you didn't want to come to me. Not a first thought, no, but perhaps a fourth or fifth. Anything, if it would have saved Adam and Peter.

Lasting relationships? he repeated softly, as he looked out over the sea. She thought you were going with her, you know. To Halo. Thought you would support her. But instead you came... here. How long did her friendships from Halo last before she chased you to Torchline and into the sea? He heaved a dragon-sized sigh, shaking his horned head fiercely. He settled his length full upon the ground, shaking the nearby earth as he stretched out, the broad vanes of his tail flatterning along its length. No. I made my choice. You made yours. And she... made hers. I told her that I trusted her to spread her own wings, and that's what she did. Not I, nor you, nor Zariah could do that for her. It was just Caido's damned murderous luck that she had flown too close to the sun with those wings before she had been strong enough to survive the heat.

A sideways glance at the sneer, a note of how natural it looked on the Korofian's face, and an idle speculation on whether Sunjata more resembled his father or his mother... I don't know what works for you, he agreed, frustrated with the shattered emotional wreckage Sunjata left in his wake; first Phoebe, then Maea, now... whoever had the misfortune to fall into bed with him next. But you've got two examples in your very recent history of what hasn't worked before. Thank the gods Phoebe was still alive, or he'd worry that Sunjata had gotten himself cursed. Not an idle possibility on this world.

don't you know i'm no good for you?

He’s heard these arguments before – and gods, if he could paint out how much he regrets it for everyone to see, he would. But he can’t, and instead is forced to remain there in a way where he can’t help but to wait for the needles to subside, hissing against the discomfort. “She knew the entire time that I wasn’t going to Halo. I told her I’d come and visit, and I did. I made a bar where she could hide away if she needed some time away. Her and Weaver worked together to make things for it. Do not pretend she lost her friendships when she came to visit me here.” He nearly growls.

“She did make her own choice. It was about time she did rather than worry about what everyone else had to say.” He stares at the silver dragon, pangs of anxiety and still that fear deep within, masked by the fury of his words, the shift of a sneer on his face. The mask to hide what he’s truly feeling deep within. “And the result of that is this. And we have to live with it.” Muscles feather in his jaw as he glares at the dragon, heart thundering and pounding in his chest and his ears.

And then Jigano speaks of his track record, and he scoffs to that, tearing his gaze away from Jigano to shake his head and run a trembling hand through his hair. “The first time, I was blighted and drunk. The second time? Yeah, I was looking for an out. I was manipulated into that marriage, so I took the chance I could to get out.” He snaps, gaze flickering back toward the dragon, hardened steel and shadows hidden and dancing within. “I asked Maea for space because of that. Of needing to figure my shit out so I wouldn’t hurt her worse. And she understood, Jigano. She understood when she came back to my house weeks after the initial argument and helped me fix parts of it up before going back to Halo.” He shakes his head again. “You know, I didn’t even know that she was here when she came back for the whale hunt.”

i've learned to lose, you can't afford to

SUNJATA

She didn't like Torchline, Jigano thought back, tone cold. She said the sun here hurt her. That she felt trapped here. She only felt free in Halo... Can you really say that you weren't the reason she was here when she... when she went on that final venture? On her way to see you when she stopped to help others? No, she didn't lose her friendships the first time she came to visit Sunjata, or even the second. But all that mattered was the last time. And all the friendships left broken in the wake of the ghostwhale that had swallowed her.

Hardly the first time she did so. There was more steel in her than that. Jigano glanced over at the glaring sneer, the fear and fury in it, and he fought the dragon's instincts with the control Remi had helped him find. It was a form that lent itself to temper and violence and righteous fury, and there was a cruelty in playing on Sunjata's fears that he didn't care for in himself. With rumbling growl of frustration that changed pitch to a rough croak he rose and started to stretch his wings even as scales shrank and feathered, leaving a white raven fluttering up to perch high in a tree branch, glaring at the gulls.

But yes. I suppose we do. There were other alternatives, of course, but Maea wouldn't thank either of them for pursuing those paths.

She'd be annoyed enough that they'd gone down this one.

It was just as well that ravens couldn't snort, but they could certainly scoff. I was at that wedding. You had ample opportunity to just walk away. Phoebe was practically clinging to Harper while Hotaru was laying her mark on you. The only one who forced you to that altar was you, Flood. And the same went for her. But you were the one who chose to end things by hurting her. Though from what he'd heard, her rampage in the VlamVloed afterwards had been a petty tantrum, too. Neither of them were saints in that fiasco, but it was in the past now - or it should have been, if Sunjata hadn't moved on so swiftly to Maea and twisted her up into such knots as he had Phoebe.

Did you know? he asked, mental voice gone quiet as he cast back to looking at Wonder Puddles in the Greatwood. That she felt as though her life, her choices... they were all pointless, without you? That she was afraid that she had done things you wouldn't forgive her for?

is this heartache we can fix?

in the morning when we wake?

A muscle feathers in Sunjata’s jaw at the insinuations, of how he hadn’t believed that he could be the direct result. Besides, there was the sunscreen she had, the return trips to Loren to get healing if something happened, how he had tried to keep her in the shade as much as possible, the moonlight dips in the water because the sun wasn’t around to hurt or harm. “She did not come and see me before she helped them. All I know is that she left me a letter before she went on that voyage. Had I known, I would’ve tried to keep her from going.” But they don’t know how that would’ve turned out, they don’t know any number of other reasons she might have felt the need to go.

He sighs heavily, watching and feeling very much like a cornered animal with the dragon before him – flashes of fear and sorrow and pain shooting its way through his body like sparks of electricity. Perhaps Jigano realizes it, because soon enough he’s shifting to his pale raven form and Sunjata shifts too – to his panther form with a large scar from a gash on the side of his dark onyx body that went from hip to his front leg.

His ears remain pinned as he hovers over the abandoned daggers beneath him, paws and claws flexing into the grasses and sands beneath his feet, steel eyes keeping the white raven in sight. Oh, you were there. So you obviously know more about the circumstances of it than I do. Sure. There’s a slip of a growl from his throat, steel eyes narrowing.

He had hurt Phoebe, but there was a large part of him that felt like she deserved it. Perhaps, just as Phoebe had thought Sunjata deserved whatever came for him when he’d cheated on Lusea with the midwife.

But Jigano’s voice grows quiet in his mind, and his tail flickers uncomfortably at the words that he can hear. I never once made it that way. I wanted her to do what she wanted, regardless, so long as she stayed safe. He cant help the clenching of feline teeth. She only ever did one thing I almost didn’t forgive her for. One thing, among everything we did together.

when i'm sober, would you stay?

SUNJATA

Tried to stop her? As you berated me for trying to stop her from going to Zariah's Academy? he asked quietly, finding the parallels too painful to be gloated over. She had gone over his objections, but it was true, as desperate as she was for Sunjata's affection he might have won her over from making the choice where Jigano had failed. But they would never know, now, and the dragon shed scales for feathers as he relocated high above, on a slender branch that bent and swayed in the wind off the sea.

There was a parable there, he was sure, but he didn't have the heart to go looking for it at the moment.

A panther's growl was more intimidating than a human's sneer, but from his perch above Jigano only croaked a tired scoff. Run from it, race it to the bottom of a bottle or a woman's hips or an Ascended's fangs, but you won't be able to run forever, Flood. The pain we cause comes back to us in the end. It always does. He had his own experience with that harsh lesson.

Gods least fortunate, he was tired. Grief and rage and frustration made for an exhausting combination, and the latter two bled back to the former, round and round in an endless circle.

Not so different, you and I, the raven said, remembering, too, how he had tried his damnedest to keep Maea safe from Zariah, when in the end it had been a creature of Torchline that had killed her. He went silent after that, though. Curious? Of course. But whether Sunjata shared what was clearly a painful memory was entirely up to the panther.

is this heartache we can fix?

in the morning when we wake?

There’s a difference from her going off to train and her going on a hunt. He snaps back suddenly, despite the quietness to Jigano’s words. He can’t help the frustration and still simmering panic of before coating every word. He feels like he wants to claw his way out of his skin, that shakiness still remaining within him – certainly Jigano had to know it would get a response like this, right?

He can’t help but to feel the pins and needles begin to subside again, acutely aware to their stabbing sensations as he snaps his panther’s maw shut tight. You act like I committed this unthinkable act for her when all I wanted, Jigano, was space. And she understood that. I didn't do anything in that time other than break a hand and get fucked up by Deimos. Don't portray me as the villain in this story. He growls again, tail twitching and shooting more of those pins and needles through him, but at least he can relatively feel his feet again. And he hisses under his breath, as Jigano mentions that they’re not so different.

And Sunjata thinks that’s quite the opposite of the truth. A snarl slipping from Sunjata’s feline maw as he moves to turn away, to gather the daggers within his jaws. We’re quite different from one another. He finally answers, turning to leave.

when i'm sober, would you stay?

SUNJATA

Loren said that their 'training' consisted of having an Ursur unleashed on them, and Zariah limiting them to using their weakest magic to defend themselves with, Jigano pointed out, feathers ruffled in frustration. The Notice Board for the whale hunt... it was led by Remi and Ronin. I would have trusted them to keep her safe over Zariah, any day. But his flash of rekindled anger faded swiftly back to grief. But... I was wrong about that. Never an easy thing for him to admit as he watched the lightning flickers grow more distant as the storm moved off across the waves to wash some other shore.

He hadn't realized how upsetting his form would be to Sunjata until he had turned back into his raven form, but the damage was already done. Still, he looked down again at the vitriol in Sunjata's voice, blue eyes focused on the scar along the panther's side. Deimos did that? he asked, genuinely surprised. When last he and the General had spoken of the Flood, Deimos had been his usual terse self, but had refused to place blame on Sunjata's shoulders.

We both wanted to protect her. To stop her from making what we saw as choices that would hurt her, the raven disagreed, following the panther with his eyes at first, and then physically as he hopped through the branches above. Though in all other ways I would agree.

is this heartache we can fix?

in the morning when we wake?

Maea told me it was controlled. He snaps back, the fact that there wouldn’t be too much danger involved if that were the case. At any rate, it’s the next comment that has Sunjaya stilling, steel eyes narrowing up at the raven. Why would they have? Between Remi’s mood shifts and Ronin’s own experience with having a child dropped into his lap, he doesn’t blame them for Maea’s death. The only one to blame was herself for going out there.

Still, the frustration is palpable, and he gathers his daggers to leave, ignoring the comment from a Jigano about the scar on his side, a brief pulse of irritation sent to Jigano that likely could be taken as a yes, before Jigano’s next comment stills him again. And he looks over his shoulder back at the white raven in the tree with his ears flat against his skull. I never once wanted to cage her. That is the difference.” His tail flickers in his annoyance, heart thundering in his ears as he tries to calm himself further, waiting because he’s sure Jigano has something else to say.

when i'm sober, would you stay?

SUNJATA

She wouldn't play down the dangers, wouldn't want you to not worry? the bard responded, thinking of how she had wanted so badly to be considered strong enough to be able to take care of herself, to prove that she could handle whatever came her way. Sunjata's swift suspicion earned a croak that was the equivalent of a shrug. Ronin isn't the type to let people under his command die now that he's come back to himself. No matter what he's lost or however else he's changed. And it could be argued that those who had faced him in the Temple had been his enemies at that time, not his comrades. They had certainly been opposed to his deconstruction project, quite vehemently so.

Not exactly a confirmation, but close enough for the raven to clack his beak thoughtfully as he was forced to reexamine Deimos in a new light once more. Sunjata's more focused words drew his attention back, though, and he rattled his feathers in exasperation at the other man's blindness. I told her that her choices were her own, that I and the Guild would be waiting for her when she was ready to return, and then I let her fly where she would, he corrected tiredly. I was not the one who caged her, Sunjata. And you may not have wanted to, but she locked herself in willingly and gave the key to you alone.

is this heartache we can fix?

in the morning when we wake?

His gaze narrows further, a hiss slipping from a feline throat. He’d heard it had been controlled from Loren as well – the one who actually told him about the Ursur. But Jigano has a point in the fact that Maea hadn’t told him, and it only adds to the irritation that floods the soon to be Arbiter. The comment of Ronin, however, has him barking a mental laugh to that. I wouldn’t be so sure, Jigano. You don’t know the kind of shit he’s dealt with lately. Add to that a number of things that occurred after Maea’s death – another star child appearing out of nowhere.

But it isn’t until the fact Jigano does have more to say that Sunjata can’t help but to let his ears pin back a bit further, maw tightening around the daggers that nearly hurt his teeth at the insinuation. Do not blame her death on me. He’s had enough of people blaming him for everyone’s deaths. Still, Delphia’s claim of him being an incubus sticks with him, and it burns in a sore spot in his gut. She made her choice. And it had been disastrous.

Still, with that being said, he doesn’t stick around to hear whatever else might come from Jigano’s beak. And he takes his daggers, still tight within his maw, and begins to slip away back home as a dark speck against the grasses and shadows that peek around his form.

when i'm sober, would you stay?

SUNJATA