[slowdown] / nico & umber.
Oct 9, 2024 17:33:14 GMT -5
Post by gamemaker tallis 🧚🏽♂️kaitlin. on Oct 9, 2024 17:33:14 GMT -5
They've changed the suite again.
Dynamo made a point to mention it on the train ride over this time, instead of leaving him to discover it in front of the poor already-traumatized kids Nico was meant to be responsible for. Last year had been all but a disaster, and he hadn't even realized he was putting his fist through the new hall mirror until all was said and done. The bird bone girl had looked back and forth between he and Marik with a million questions, but neither had a good answer for the elder mentor's outburst. Nico has lost track of all the ways nothing has remained the same over the years, heels dug too far into the pattern and the habit.
Instead, Nico just grumbled something about Capitolite Cunts only being good for ruining everything, and left Marik to deal with the kids alone. He's still pretending he didn't almost start drinking again that year, chest heavier than it had been in a lifetime. He's still pretending he didn't give in six months later, watching Sera get paraded around Twelve after they replayed those kids deaths. They hadn't even lasted the first hour.
Ten didn't tolerate that. She took a bottle out of his hands and cracked him over the head with it. Sitting on the small kitchen's counter-top, Nico rubs the his palm over the scar there and fiddles with the bottle cap he's got held in another. Over and over, he figets with the small circle, letting the scent of the sweet rum collect on his fingertips.
Its home is open on the dining table, exactly seven steps away. He counted each.
He has no business being awake at this hour, not when the boys have final fittings for the interview looks in the morning with their respective prep teams. Nico doesn't know what he would've done without Dynamo, doesn't know how he ever did any of this without the help of Marik. (He knows the answer is that he didn't.)
It's the loudest voice in his head. Telling him he should be asleep. When he hears the creaking of floorboards, the words are already on the tip of his tongue. (His shame has always been very loud.)
"You better be sleepwalking," jaw-clenched, "or I'm about to knock you out."
Wrong hall, coming from the bedroom closer to the elevator. Even with the renovations, that hasn't changed. If it was the victor's hall, maybe he'd have begged Marik to not hesitate, to come wallow with him, to sit and let the night swallow them both. Maybe he'd ask him to pour two fingers into a glass and let Nico watch him drink it. Nico could get down with that.
But that mop of curly brown hair certainly doesn't belong to Marik, and so much kindness bled out of him. There is only the capacity to be here, to keep going, to not stop.
"Do as I fucking say, not as I do, you know? Why the hell aren't you asleep?"
Dynamo made a point to mention it on the train ride over this time, instead of leaving him to discover it in front of the poor already-traumatized kids Nico was meant to be responsible for. Last year had been all but a disaster, and he hadn't even realized he was putting his fist through the new hall mirror until all was said and done. The bird bone girl had looked back and forth between he and Marik with a million questions, but neither had a good answer for the elder mentor's outburst. Nico has lost track of all the ways nothing has remained the same over the years, heels dug too far into the pattern and the habit.
Instead, Nico just grumbled something about Capitolite Cunts only being good for ruining everything, and left Marik to deal with the kids alone. He's still pretending he didn't almost start drinking again that year, chest heavier than it had been in a lifetime. He's still pretending he didn't give in six months later, watching Sera get paraded around Twelve after they replayed those kids deaths. They hadn't even lasted the first hour.
Ten didn't tolerate that. She took a bottle out of his hands and cracked him over the head with it. Sitting on the small kitchen's counter-top, Nico rubs the his palm over the scar there and fiddles with the bottle cap he's got held in another. Over and over, he figets with the small circle, letting the scent of the sweet rum collect on his fingertips.
Its home is open on the dining table, exactly seven steps away. He counted each.
He has no business being awake at this hour, not when the boys have final fittings for the interview looks in the morning with their respective prep teams. Nico doesn't know what he would've done without Dynamo, doesn't know how he ever did any of this without the help of Marik. (He knows the answer is that he didn't.)
It's the loudest voice in his head. Telling him he should be asleep. When he hears the creaking of floorboards, the words are already on the tip of his tongue. (His shame has always been very loud.)
"You better be sleepwalking," jaw-clenched, "or I'm about to knock you out."
Wrong hall, coming from the bedroom closer to the elevator. Even with the renovations, that hasn't changed. If it was the victor's hall, maybe he'd have begged Marik to not hesitate, to come wallow with him, to sit and let the night swallow them both. Maybe he'd ask him to pour two fingers into a glass and let Nico watch him drink it. Nico could get down with that.
But that mop of curly brown hair certainly doesn't belong to Marik, and so much kindness bled out of him. There is only the capacity to be here, to keep going, to not stop.
"Do as I fucking say, not as I do, you know? Why the hell aren't you asleep?"
