( open ) out of isolation

[motivation]

Who: dutch (motivation) & YOU, thomas nightingale (ettersberg) & YOU
What: a month in the life of a former assassin, a month in the life of the former last sanctioned wizard of the uk
When: may
Where: flona cove and khalo
Warning(s): alcohol and fyrra use, nudity, sex and probably swearing

Comments

[motivation]

Mh.

( she hums, thoughtful for a moment but not really bothered. it's hard to feel bothered. the water's so nice and jim's body is warm, right there, alive. she likes jim.

so she sets her chin onto his shoulder and wraps her arms around him from behind instead of holding on to his shoulders and lets herself float. )

I learned how to dance and entice royalty and kill.

[willrevile]

[ He laughs softly when he notices what she's doing, and extends his arms out, skimming over the surface of the water and being a very cooperative flotation device. ]

You any good? [ Jim glances over his shoulder. ] I mean, I'm not royalty.

[ And she hasn't murdered him yet, though he's definitely already picked up on her abilities, there. ]

[motivation]

Damn good.

( the response is immediate and unthinking, confidence a second skin she wears easily. )

Married a prince and all. ( for a moment, her lips press together and her face turns into his neck, the memory of her wedding night penetrating for a moment. ) He's dead.

[willrevile]

You didn't want to do it anymore, [ he observes.

Because she didn't like her childhood. Because she's a bounty hunter now - no, a reclamation agent? What had she called it? A Killjoy. ]

[motivation]

I ran away the night of my wedding.

( after her husband died. he'd been meant to be her ticket out; instead, he'd been another target. she hadn't loved him because she hadn't known him, but she'd wanted the idea of him and the idea of freedom from khlyen so badly.

none of that seems particularly pressing right now. )

[willrevile]

Sounds like a decent call.

[ Jim presses a hand over one of hers, where she's holding onto him. It explains some things about the walls she has up - walls that she seems to be sitting atop of, at the moment, instead of lurking behind. ]

Are you happier?

[motivation]

( dutch isn't just sitting on top of the walls, she's swinging her legs while at it, too. it feels good. )

Yeah. I mean. Khlyen still found me again, but yeah. I don't hate him anymore.

[willrevile]

Who's Khylen?

[ Doesn't sound like anyone Jim would want to know, based on context. Should I call you Princess, he almost asks, but it seems too morbid.

It's nice here, this mood is tranquil. He's not in any hurry to ruin it. ]

[motivation]

( she wouldn't hate being called princess. d'avin asked her if she was one right in between sex and trying to kill her (how fun that had been) because he'd wanted to know if he'd bedded an actual warrior princess.

he had, of course. )

My mentor. He's dead now, too.

( or... not. because he's in stasis as well and dutch has no idea how to deal with that, so she's just not thinking about it. denial is a beautiful thing. )

[willrevile]

That's a weird thing to have in common, [ Jim reflects out loud. He flicks water with his free hand, though it's not at anybody, and shifts around, floating a little, moving them a tiny bit through the pleasant coolness. ] I never hated mine, though.

[ He's seen Chris, up there. Once. He hasn't had the heart to look again, too afraid of what his head might conjure up; the possibilities are too cruel. ]

[toten_sie]

[ Randel's hands move to support him, to draw him closer, and the kiss will continue as he does. This is a kind of multitasking he enjoys, a skill he has that he's glad for. There's no terrible memories here, no awful weight to the way it feels to be with another man. This was something he'd shared with other soldiers, a respite from war instead of something intrinsically tied to it.

He actually starts to go hard instead of needing to help himself get there. Thomas is very handsome, intelligent and kind. ]

[motivation]

( dutch thinks about it for a moment. presses her lips to his shoulder. )

Sorry.

[ettersberg]

( old age means that thomas's libido is not as quick and urgent anymore as it may have been in his youth, but ageing backwards has changed some things up again. maybe it's also the drugs, the way every sensation seems heightened now. even just their kisses have him half hard and wanting so much more. )

[poolhall_killer]

[Still, it surprises Venom that no one (to his knowledge) has caught Nightingale. He's such a kind gentleman, and if Venom wasn't in the middle of sorting out his personal affairs with Phoenix and Miles, he'd give the older man a chance.]

Aside from my previous blunder of a question, nothing new is going on with you?

[willrevile]

You weren't there, I checked, [ is a little teasing. Maybe a bad joke, about her being a killer, but there's no menace in his voice.

Everyone at home expects the open wound to be his father's death - and in a way, it is, because Christopher Pike was more of a parent than anyone in Jim's life. But it's just a bruise now; a gentle ache that he wants to keep, because without it, he might not remember the importance of it. ]

[motivation]

( she could have been. how many people has she killed without knowing why they deserved to die, if they deserved to die? if killing them was just some weird test of loyalty or ability from khlyen or if they did something bad?

she'll never know, now. right now, that's okay. )

'course I wasn't.

( because he's from a whole other world. part of the universe. whatever. )

[ettersberg]

( nightingale isn't so sure he's in any state to be someone's significant other. the closest he'd come to even approaching it had been john, and with john it had been friendship and sex before anything else, before dating.

he shakes his head. )

Well. ( not nothing. ) I found an egg that hatched a sugar glider.

[willrevile]

[ (She couldn't have been. He checked. He obsessively stalked.

Thoughitwouldhavebeenbettercastingthan--)

Jim lets himself float a little, halfway tangled with her hands, looking up at the curious phosphorus canopy above the ethereal pool. ]

I don't mind that you've killed people. Or that you're good at it. I should mind, given what I do and where I'm from, but I've killed people, too. Just in different ways.

[motivation]

( dutch thinks on that for a moment. turns the words over in her head. examines the weird clench of her heart and then stops because she can't make sense of it. )

I mind that I killed people.

( it's not their death that bothers her so much as not knowing if they deserved it. if they were good or bad. that she was nothing but a puppet. )

[willrevile]

[ Jim looks at her. ]

You know yourself.

[ In that, at least. And from the way he says it, it's a good thing - something to be valued, anyway. It's different from the inside and outside perspectives; he thinks he likes that she minds. He finds himself almost smiling.

He knew she cared. That's why I don't mind. ]

[motivation]

( not minding would be easier. not minding would mean she wouldn't care if there was forgiveness for her, if she could ever make up for all the blood on her hand.

she's a weapon that's been pointed this or that way by khlyen for years. these days, she decides which way to go, but that claim to agency doesn't erase the past. )

Most of myself.

( she hadn't even known, until recently, how she'd come into existence, what her connection to khlyen and the green and the hullen had been, khlyen still holding those pieces of her hostage even in death. )

[poolhall_killer]

[Oh. Oh that sounds too cute. But now he has a question...]

I suppose all types of animals come out of eggs, here. But what is a sugar glider?

[willrevile]

[ What's the point of easy? Jim would say. ]

More than you realize, I think. You don't give yourself enough credit.

[ He sits up, runs a hand over the back of his head, through damp hair. ]

[toten_sie]

[ When he feels Thomas start to go hard, feels the shift against him, one of his hands reaches down to run across his thigh. There's a question in his eyes, but the hand stays on his thigh. Does he want more? He's happy to give it to him, but he has to know.]

[ettersberg]

( now that is a question nightingale can answer quite easily. in fact, watch him reach a finger into the front pocket of his shirt. when he pulls the finger out again, a little sugar glider is hanging onto it.

he flattens his palm, letting the little animal rest there. )