exile [closed & open]

[prince_of_beasts]

Who: Dimitri, CR, and you
What: Reunions; aftermath
When: Dec.23rd onward
Where: Around the ship
Warnings: Survivor's guilt, PTSD, delusions, suicidal ideation

1. you've got sucker's luck (Darcy, cabins)

Mornings, every morning, Dimitri paces outside the cabins. It can't really be called 'patrolling'; he's too agitated, too sunk into himself. He starts at the fifth hour, and goes until the seventh, just in case, just in case.

When Darcy wakes in her bed, Dimitri's already pacing tight circles in front of her door.

2. oh you meant so much; have you given up? (Ossie & Giles, the cottage)

He's asleep on the doorstep when the latch of the gate clicks. An ear twitches. Dimitri's up and running before he's fully registered the sound, streaking down the path with a desperate yowl.

A few moments later, a fluffy yellow cannonball slams into Ossie's chest.

3. does it trouble your mind the way you trouble mine? (Okie, Playback)

Okie's already left his cabin by the time Dimitri gets to it. Any thought of his ship phone is buried under three weeks of compounded exhaustion and hysterical grief, but a string of frantic questions leads him to Playback.

"Okie?" he calls, flinching as the flickering lights rake across the back of his skull. There's a shape, a familiar silhouette, Dimitri's heart breaks -- "Okie!" He bursts into a run and does not bother slowing down; he launches himself into Okie with a rattle of thunder, and kisses him on the mouth.

4. did you fall for the same empty answers again? (positive CR)

Dimitri searches for the people he knows. Anyone, everyone, any name he recognizes from that accursed signup sheet, desperate to know they made it back, that they didn't slip into some pocket of void on the journey between wherever-it-was and here. He knocks at cabin doors, paces through familiar haunts, occasionally remembers his ship phone long enough to send Are you back? Are you safe?

If he spots someone around the ship, though, he freezes in place, mouth open, eyes wide, face a marbled blotch of exhausted bruising, tear-stains, and bloodless terror. His throat works, but the most sound he can manage is a choking rasp.

5. oh, you're thinking too fast, you're like marbles on glass (open; pick a location or throw me your own!)

Eventually, the frenetic energy driving Dimitri has to run out. His spring unwound, he stutters to a stop wherever it leaves him:
- at the buffet, midway through reaching for a serving-spoon;
- in a stairwell staring blankly at the landing;
- in the showers on the sports deck, shoulders red from too long under water running too hot;
- in Sand Dollars, hands wrapped around a steaming paper cup;
- at night, at the edge of the upper deck, hands white-knuckled on the railing.
Always standing, wherever he comes to rest. His expression is hollow, his skin waxy, his hair greasy and limp; if he's called out to, he might look up, but his eyes are bleary and don't focus.

does it feel like a trial? (wildcard)

HMU in DMs here or bird1312 on Discord!

Comments

5.

[decohere]

Ava's quiet as she enters Sand Dollars, pretending not to pay much attention to the presence of another. But she's always hyperaware, Dimitri's location an itch in the back of her brain as she fixes a cup of tea.

When she sits, it's with him in her line of sight. Mostly because it's her usual seat. But it's her usual seat because it's the best view of the entire cafe, so.

[prince_of_beasts]

Movement, in his peripheral vision. There's enough of Dimitri functioning to shift him out of the way, incidentally putting his back to the wall, which Glenn's been badgering him about for the past however-long-he's-been-here. The tea sloshes in its paper cup. Heat bleeds into a part of Dimitri's hand where it hadn't before.

He blinks. His surroundings resolve sluggishly; he picks his head up, squinting like he's stepped into a bright light. "A ... ava?"

[decohere]

The water in her own mug is far too hot and not yet transformed into anything strong enough to resemble tea quite yet, so she simply enjoys the feeling of steam on her face. And blinks through it at Dimitri's startled acknowledgment of her. "Yes?"

They're not exactly on anything she'd consider speaking terms. She can't think of the last time either of them have even bothered to attempt. But she can't come up with any reason to be rude, either.

"It must have been quiet here," is all she can really think to say. Not many that stayed behind, after all.

[saltwaterlungs]

Darcy raced out the door before Dimitri could pin her down. Within the next half hour, Darcy comes slinking back. Restored to herself, more or less, it's just the eyes that give away how hard the last week has been.

"Hey," and she sounds so normal that it almost startles her for a moment. No hoarseness, not on this side.

"Sorry, had to stop Phil from having a PTSD moment. I ehn- it was bad."

[prince_of_beasts]

Dimitri hasn't moved from his spot. Hasn't moved from his pose, actually, where he'd reflexively jumped away from the door. He turns to Darcy piecemeal -- first his head, then his feet, then his shoulders, lagging behind the rest. Only once his body's turned do his eyes focus.

All the blood drains from his face. His eyes go wide; his pupils flare wider, black dots on a sheet-white pane. "Darcy?" he croaks. "Darcy -- no. No, no, please, please -- I'm sorry. I'm sorry -- "

[saltwaterlungs]

"I'm not more dead than usual, Miti," Darcy's streak of being the adult in the room continues, and they gently place a hand on his arm.

"I'm fine. Made it back and everything. It's okay."

4

[crushed_pearls]

Dimitri's knock is answered by a sharp ringing sound, metal on metal. Erin's clomping footsteps follow, and then her voice through the door.

She's exhausted.

"Bent a knife," she manages, muffled. "Who is it?"

[prince_of_beasts]

"It's Dimitri. I -- I wanted to -- "

He sounds no better, ragged and breaking. What can he say? Asking Are you alright? would just be insulting. He can't, won't, demand details.

" -- I know," he says finally. His voice cracks. "Some of what happened ... the broadest facts only. But."

[crushed_pearls]

"...There's a school of thought on my world that suggests a man shouldn't suffer needlessly by worrying over what he can't change. They ran an empire for awhile. It sucked." There's a 'thunk', at around Erin's head height; the door moves in its frame as if, say, someone is leaning against it. "...They had me in irons, Dimitri. Cold iron."

4

[configuration_birdwatcher]

That look of battered, exhausted despair and terror is a familiar reaction, but not one Bastion ever wanted to see from a human they'd made friends with. They take a quick glance downwards and to the right, on the off-chance that their proprioception has failed to update them about what their gun arm's doing and their threat assessment system reacted to something that hasn't reached their conscious mind yet. But, no, it's still pointed at the floor.

// I won't hurt you, they say.

[prince_of_beasts]

"I know," says Dimitri's mouth reflexively. His mind catches up more slowly. Recognition sinks in, and terror settles into wide-eyed uncertainty. He's avoided asking the questions outright when he can remember to, playing along until he can reach for some confirmation one way or another, but if anyone won't judge him for his madness it would be the construct that whose mind is all metal and crystals. "You're -- are you -- here? Did you come back?"

[configuration_birdwatcher]

They're concerned for Dimitri, who must be experiencing an organic perception error of some sort to need the external verification, and yet it still comes as a relief that his reaction isn't because he's discovered a reason to be afraid of them.

// I'm back, Bastion confirms. // Number 2 intended to trap us permanently, but Ava killed him, which released us.

4.

[yournewsidekick]

Twenty seconds pass after he knocks on the door of room 120.

When it creaks open, Nimona stands there with an entire loaf of stale bread in one hand, her jaw unhinged as if she's about to eat half of it in one bite. (It's a familiar-looking loaf of bread; one of many loaves he scattered around the ship these last three weeks.) She stops, eyeing Dimitri.

Slooooowly, she removes the bread from her mouth, re-hinges her jaw, and says, "Dimitri. Hey."

He looks awful. Jeez.

"...You okay?"

[prince_of_beasts]

Twenty seconds of absolute Hell. Dimitri almost crumples when the door opens; his bones keep him upright, but his spine bows and his shoulders buckle inwards. Oh Nimona got some of his bread, that's nice. That feels like he helped.

"Ye -- " It's reflexive; it's also such a thin lie it borders on insulting. " -- no. But I stayed behind, I have no right to complain -- are you?"

[yournewsidekick]

Her brow furrows -- man, humans get so weird over whether they've got a right to do this or a right to do that -- but she shrugs. "Eh. Been worse."

It's true! She was dead for a while! And look, now she's got a loaf of bread! Everything's comin' up Nimona.

(Sort of.)

"I mean, don't get me wrong, it sucked goats, but hey -- I'm alive now, so..." She peers closer at Dimitri. "You, uh, wanna come in and have some bread?"

Before your legs collapse is heavily implied, but left unspoken.

[mistertwister]

He knows he should check in with people. Knows he should make sure they made it back, make sure they know he did. But even back here on the ship, the sound of wind rings in his ear, and he can't help but try and run from it.

Once he's tucked himself somewhere that feels safer, he sends out word that he's here, he's himself, he's in the arcade. He's surprised to see Dimitri's the first to find him, even if he knows he shouldn't be. And then he's running toward him, and-

After a moment's shock, all he can do, all he wants to do, is give in to it. He forgets everything but the feeling of his love's lips on his, melts into this moment of connection. His sky clears, slowly, gently, blue peeking sheepishly from light clouds.

Except, strangely, for a single stain, dark and angry, stretched across the left side of his head.

[prince_of_beasts]

This is real. It can't be anything but. Dimitri's mind isn't always cruel, but it would never fabricate anything this kind.

It's a long time before he can make himself pull away. When he does, it's only to bury his face in Okie's shoulder, shaking with suppressed sobs.

[mistertwister]

Okie isn’t very intent on pulling away either, but when he does, he throws his arms around, puts a hand on the back of Dimitri’s neck. He’ll feel stupid for it later, but without thinking he gently shushes as if calming a horse.

There’s something calming about not being the only one who isn’t calm.

“Hey, hey, hey,” he coos gently. “What’s goin’ on, Mitri?”

4

[littlefairytale]

Ruby wakes up in a too-quiet room that still feels less like it belongs to her than the mockery of her school dormitory she's been sleeping in for the last three weeks.

(It always did feel like Clarke's space more than hers, and even now her belongings and hoardings have been taken away, Ruby struggles to feel truly settled in a space she's had little time to make her own.)

It's disorienting. It's still a relief.

The knock on her door finally forces her out of her very engaging post-wake-up activity of staring blankly at the ceiling, though even after she calls, "Coming!" it takes her a few seconds longer to remember where she put her eyepatch, and another few to adjust to the magic aid enough to move, after weeks without.

Only then does she finally tug open the door to see Dimitri, looking— not so well. "—Dimitri... hey."

Compared to many others from the trip, she feels like she got off easy.

like marbles on glass

[lovethyneighb_or]

Mulcahy finds him at night on the deck. He doesn't seem to answer to any noise, and he doesn't know the young boy's name to call. At any rate, it's a sight too strange and too worrying for him to simply leave him alone.

It's all right. He lived and worked among front-line soldiers for some time. He's had some experience with this, and if he gets socked in the jaw for his efforts, well, that's all right too. Mulcahy can take a hit.

A thin blanket gets draped around Dimitri's shoulders.

[prince_of_beasts]

A hiss of startled breath. The young man whips around, one fist raised -- then freezes.

(Not much more than a boy, really. Too broad-shouldered for 'scrawny', but thin, pared to bone and wiry muscle that only highlights the teenage jut of his chin, the remnants of baby fat clinging to his cheeks. Too young for that hair-trigger violent reflex.)

(The backs of his eyes shimmer red, like an animal's.)

With visible effort, he uncurls his fist and lets it drop. "A-apologies," he croaks. "I was -- startled."

[lovethyneighb_or]

He knows the look, of course. The 4077 got dozens of them in the post-op every day. Hawkeye used to call it a children's war.

The only thing new is the odd shimmer in his eyes, but Mulcahy is several years into this whole multiverse business, so that doesn't put him off either.

"Think nothing of it. I only wanted to make sure you were all right. Have you eaten?"

2

[ossie_oswald]

"Ah!-" Ossie says in surprise, carefully trying to scoop this tremendously large cat up so his claws don't catch in his suit.

"My poor little dear thing- were you waiting for us?" he gives the kitty a little kiss on the head, "here we are- come on, let's get us inside, my dear boy," and Ossie starts back up the path to the cottage.

[prince_of_beasts]

The cat glues itself to Ossie as he picks it up, rubbing its head against his face and neck with a panicky insistence. What is this he smells like? Wrong. He smells wrong. He should smell like flowers, and cottage, and cat.

And something is missing -- the cat twists in Ossie's arms to prop itself up. Its head swivels; it meows, plaintive and terrified. It's trying very hard to keep its claws in, but they prick against Ossie's shoulder despite the cat's best efforts.

[ossie_oswald]

"Oh, you poor dove," he coos, a hand going carefully to the cat's head.

"It's alright. I'm alright, Giles is- he'll be back very soon," he soothes, "shhh, it's alright. My dear boy, my dear boy," and Ossie fumbles just a little for the doorknob to the cottage.