Court of the Fallen was created in October of 2018 by Odd, Honey, and Crooked.
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"More or less." Remi replies, though Mateo's tone has him wondering if it wouldn't be better to use the compass to take him home. Where had the days gone when Mateo was happy to be anywhere so long as there was plant life about? And here where there were all sorts of fauna pushing through stone and crystals, Remi genuinely thought his son would be in heaven.
"Did they?" He asks, looking surprised, before striking where Mateo had pointed. Seeing nothing, Remi huffs and slams the axe a few feet higher, revealing more nothing. Breathing in deeply and trying to restrain the urge to collapse the entire wall to ease his frustration with himself, instead, the alchemist forces himself to exhale calmly. "Ronin did not mention it...Halo?" Wrinkling his nose and thinking of Finn, Remi runs his tongue across his teeth.
"Anytime you would like to go, let me know and I can take you." He offers delicately. "We wouldn't even have to fly, we could just use the compass."
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Charged with hormones and sore about losing his routine and his best friend, it would still be wrong to say that Mateo hates how perfect the Climb is. He dislikes it precisely because it is one of his versions of heaven, and he doesn't want to be happy right now. "Mmm," he replies helpfully in the affirmative, growing more irritable with every strike of the pickaxe that reveals nothing.
"Guess it didn't matter much to him, so it wasn't worth mentioning," he mutters of his other father, reaching down to absently grab up the other pickaxe, even though it's heavier than he thought it would be and he decides that he hates it as well.
"We learned about the compasses in the Collegium. Only one person can travel, or the other one will get sick," he says as he takes a clumsy swing at the wall. "It's fine. Ever has probably made new friends by now anyway."
Glancing at Mateo with a thoughtful expression, Remi thinks it's less that Ronin didn't find Finn's relocation interesting, and more thought it best not to mention that the Spyglass and Lullaby were neighbours, instead of being on opposite ends of the continent. Distance didn't really effect men like Remi and Ronin, and yet the proximity did matter, somehow.
"I can be the one to get sick." The alchemist offers, though he mentally makes a note to talk to Ronin about making sure Mateo could get around. It's the Caido version of discussing whether they should buy their son a car, I guess. "Come on, you know that is not true." Remi replies, and not only because Ever didn't seem capable of eating a new food much less making a new friend.
Clumsy or not, it's Mateo's swing that reveals a bright shock of silver running through the smooth black wall. Mouth slightly agape (come on, who'd have thought Mateo would be the successful one here), the alchemist claps his son proudly on the back. "Guess you should have been the muscle all along, mm?" He says with a grin.
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
04-14-2022, 09:28 PM (This post was last modified: 04-14-2022, 09:31 PM by Mateo.)
MATEO
I don't know if it's true, Mateo wants to snap, because I haven't seen him, because he moved to Halo, Dad. But of course, it's taking all his energy just to lift the pickaxe, never mind swing it, and when it connects and somehow, unbelievably, reveals a vein of silver ore, he nearly drops the thing. And when Remi claps him on the back, he does drop the thing. "Oh fuck--" he blurts, narrowly avoiding the axe as it tries to land on his foot, stepping back and against his father by accident.
"Sorry," he mumbles, though it's not exactly for walking into Remi and they both know it. "Things have been crappy since the Tower. We can't walk anywhere alone in the Collegium, and we're supposed to have our parents pick us up to take us home. All the good subjects have been replaced with history and training. I think they want us all to become Dragoons."
Not normally one for casual curses—strings of flowery expletives when his shoes had gotten dirty perhaps, but dropping an axe?—Remi raises his eyebrows, more surprised at the swear than at the sudden bolt of silver in the wall. Reaching out a hand to steady Mateo’s back, Remi tries for a reassuring smile that will likely convince neither of them.
Hearing, for the first time, that Mateo was meant to be collected by his parents, has Remi’s stomach tightening as his bowels fill with ice. “Oh—“ He begins, but finds that there is nothing for him to say. His son had clearly spared he and Ronin this information, knowing how impossible it would be for them, and yet the mere fact that Mateo had been moulded into the sort of child who knew to make such decisions… Gods. “I dreamed you into life…” Remi’s voice is suddenly wet with emotion as he tries to gather his lanky child close. “…and now it seems you are living a nightmare.”
Swallowing hard against the shards of ice forming in his throat, it occurs to the alchemist that despite his boasting of always putting his family before anything else, he…well. He absolutely hadn’t.
“Mi dispiace tanto, Mateo. Non ti meriti niente di tutto questo.”
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
Yeah, Mateo instinctively wants to agree, especially because the dramatic comparison between dreams and nightmares is absolutely up his street. He doesn't, though, because suddenly he feels less angry and invincible and more like a tired little kid who misses how things used to be. (That's because that's exactly what you are, Mateo).
"Mi sento così inutile," he murmurs, all but melting into his father's arms. "Se fossi più grande, forse potrei aiutare..." It isn't something that has ever occurred to the Taliesin boy, but at this point, what use is it being a kid? He hates the Collegium, his best friend is gone, and his parents are worried too much about the war to... parent.
The words make Remi want to spread his wings and tentacles and everything else at his disposal that he might wrap Mateo up so entirely as to keep him hidden from the world. But the time for such things is already too far past. A parent can tell their child that there is no monster under their bed, but if the parent regularly dines with such creatures, what reason has the child to believe them?
"No, non vorrei mai questo per te..Una guerra non è il momento migliore per essere giovani, ma.." But what? It was better than nothing? Even if the thought sounded hollow in Remi's mind, such that the alchemist just swallowed, shaking his head. "Ti amo, Mateo." Remi says instead, reaching to pull his son against him, if he'll let himself be hugged. "I know so very little these days, but I do know that."
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
He'll let himself be hugged and then some, Mateo embracing his father tightly and burying his face against his chest. "Ti amo anch'io, papà," he mumbles, his voice muffled and his cheeks wet, but just as it is for Remi, Mateo knows that much as well. "But I don't want to be a Dragoon, okay? Can you tell my teachers that? Or can't I just... stay and work in my greenhouse, or finish the skyship?"
Swiping at his cheeks and glancing across at the vein of silver glinting out at them, he scoffs out a weak laugh. "I can't believe I was the one to find it," he mutters, letting out a long sigh and gazing up at Remi again. "I think I would like to visit Ever in Halo, if we still can?"
Resting his cheek against the top of Mateo's head and absently wondering if there would come a day when his son was too tall from him to embrace him like this, Remi snorts laughter into Mateo's dark curls. "I did not even go to school because we were already on the road. I am not the one you need to convince if you want to go the non-traditional route." Though Mateo might not see Remi's grin, he'll no doubt feel the energetic zest of his father's emotions. "Whatever you want to do, I will support you." He adds, even if that meant going to bat for Mateo with Ronin.
"Honestly, me neither." Remi agrees with a chuckle, before picking up his axe and eyeing the wall to gauge how best to get the ore out. "Absolutely." The alchemist agrees earnestly. "As soon as we get this back to Stormbreak, we can go. How is that?"
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"I will tell Dad that he either has to let me work in the greenhouse or he has to come and pick me up every day, and tell my teachers I'm exempt from training," Mateo says easily - and he's not beyond blackmailing either one of his parents (ironically it's something he's picked up from Remi and Ronin, too). Smiling despite himself, he nods to Remi and reluctantly peels away from him. "Thank you," he mumbles.
With his smile growing crooked, he moves forward to lean down and examine the vein of silver, never having seen anything like it before. "Well, I don't think I can lift up the axe again, so that's as much help as I can be." He laughs. And gods, as Remi agrees that he can go and visit Ever, the boy all but lights up from the inside, his shoulders slumping in obvious relief. "Maybe I can bring some herbs for him. I think there are some that will survive the cold climate..."
Snorting again and knowing full-well that this manipulative streak has absolutely been nurtured into Mateo if not natured, Remi nods agreeably. "Perfect. Besides, who would ever want to be a dragoon?" He asks, waggling his eyebrows. Ronin would, was the obvious answer, which is what perhaps made it all the more humorous to Remi.
"Well, since you were the one to discover it, I think it is only fair that I excavate it." Remi offers easily. Between ringing pangs! from his axe, the alchemist calls over his shoulder, "I think there is a greenhouse in Halo, isn't there? Even if there isn't—" thwak thwak "—the houses must be heated." thuk! A large boulder of silver falls neatly out of the wall.
"..Right?"
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"Garth from my history class wants to be a dragoon," Mateo says with the moody drawl of a teenager, though it's entirely directed away from Remi now. "What kind of a name is Garth anyway?" Huffing out a sigh, the boy comes to sit down on the heated stone a few feet away from where his father is attacking the wall with the sort of ease that would terrify anyone unused to such displays.
The idea of a greenhouse in Halo has the boy perking up all over again, though. "Really? I mean, people live there, so there must be some kind of heating or they'd be really, really dead. But the greenhouse sounds amazing. Ugh, I wonder what kind of things they grow there..."
Well Garth sounds like a complete tit, Remi might have said were he talking to Ronin and not his teenage son. Instead, the alchemist just huffs disapprovingly. "A very basic one." He agrees of the name choice, thinking it was the equivalent of a dried baggy of herbs when compared to the fresh shooting that was Mateo.
"I think I heard that once." Remi says with a nod. Though with all the fighting the greenhouse might be gone, he really has no idea. "Maybe a house plant then. Especially since Ever does not seem to get out much." Said with a slight wrinkle of his nose, Remi places his axe—and Mateo's—back into his bag before heaving the boulder of silver onto his shoulder as if were nothing more than a pillow. "Well then let us get this home and you can find out what sorts of things they grow first hand."
Coding base by Sky!
Speaks with a thick Italian accent.
Force and magic can be used against Remi without permission.
"He's a very basic person," Mateo agrees with a very Remi-like scrunch of his nose, watching as his father hauls out the silver ore and grabs it up with the sort of strength that would make any self-respecting monster wet their pants. For Mateo, of course, he merely clambers to his feet and brushes off his clothes, ready to go whenever Remi is.
"Ever got out plenty when he was in Stormbreak," he mutters with a soft frown. "When he was with me, anyways. I guess now he lives in an igloo and he's by himself, though so... a house plant sounds good. I think I've got something I can bring with me at home."
Nodding to Remi, Mateo sweeps forward suddenly to hug his father again. "Thanks again, Dad," he mumbles. "Sorry I was an ass."
