Ernest Giles (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
ring_for_giles) wrote in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
come_sailaway2022-09-02 05:45 pm
ring_for_giles) wrote in come_sailaway2022-09-02 05:45 pm
[closed] and if tomorrow it's all over
Who: Giles and Oswald
What: finally confronting what they've been dancing around for far too long
When: beginning of september
Where: their private pocket dimension
Warnings: discussions of sex
It's been a few weeks since the Events at the diner, and although things have calmed down significantly, it's still been very tense. Giles has done his best to put everything out of his mind whilst around Oswald, but he's still been more distant than usual, and it hasn't helped that Oswald has been just as distant. He can't know for certain the cause of Oswald's distance, but he's sure that what Sharky told him is no small part of it.
Although Giles has known that it wont get any better if they don't talk about it, if he doesn't start the conversation, he's been unable to bring himself to take that first step into the unknown. The arrival of a new suit, one that feels familiar when he puts it on (although it cannot be the exact same one he remembers), is what finally starts a plan forming in his mind and has him take that final step.
Whether it's a good plan or not, Giles has no idea, but it's a plan and it's better than nothing. It's also a plan that has him pacing the living room, checking and rechecking the gramophone, adjusting and readjusting his suit, and trying his level best to keep his anxiety in check.
Oswald has to come into the room eventually, and when he does Giles will be waiting with a small but inviting smile on his face and almost all trace of his racing thoughts pushed down and rendered invisible.
Just don't look at the constant movement of his fingers.
"I believe I promised you another dance"
What: finally confronting what they've been dancing around for far too long
When: beginning of september
Where: their private pocket dimension
Warnings: discussions of sex
It's been a few weeks since the Events at the diner, and although things have calmed down significantly, it's still been very tense. Giles has done his best to put everything out of his mind whilst around Oswald, but he's still been more distant than usual, and it hasn't helped that Oswald has been just as distant. He can't know for certain the cause of Oswald's distance, but he's sure that what Sharky told him is no small part of it.
Although Giles has known that it wont get any better if they don't talk about it, if he doesn't start the conversation, he's been unable to bring himself to take that first step into the unknown. The arrival of a new suit, one that feels familiar when he puts it on (although it cannot be the exact same one he remembers), is what finally starts a plan forming in his mind and has him take that final step.
Whether it's a good plan or not, Giles has no idea, but it's a plan and it's better than nothing. It's also a plan that has him pacing the living room, checking and rechecking the gramophone, adjusting and readjusting his suit, and trying his level best to keep his anxiety in check.
Oswald has to come into the room eventually, and when he does Giles will be waiting with a small but inviting smile on his face and almost all trace of his racing thoughts pushed down and rendered invisible.
"I believe I promised you another dance"
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"Oh. Roommate. I'd wondered. Sorry." Disjointed, but not angry or upset with Giles himself for being present. "Uh, how does anyone judge what alright is, under these circumstances? Like. I'm not hurt or nothing, if that's what you're asking."
But he's here. He's here, and has to get used to a new set of rules and circumstances and torments, and this time he doesn't even have run of a whole city, just a single ship, where there's no one he knows, nothing familiar, and still no underworld.
"I can, uh. Get out if you need the room for something."
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Giles isn't going to pry further if Bash dismisses it again, but he knows well enough how hard it is to adjust, especially without someone to talk to. So he'd like to help, if he can.
"There's no need to trouble yourself on my account, I was only passing through. You're luckier than most, I have other accommodations, so you'll have the room to yourself the majority of the time"
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So he shifts so he's sitting pretzel-style instead, looking up at Giles quietly. "Not injured. Scared, lonely. Fucked up. This, uh. This is my second time, being tossed into a new world with new rules and people from all over the multi-verse. In fact, I think I've been kidnapped from my previous kidnapping. Or maybe, like. Traded like a Pokemon card or some shit. So. How's a guy supposed to deal with that? I gotta adjust, figure out how...how this place is gonna fuck with me, right? Um. Not that it's really your job to...help with any of that. I mean, just because you got bunked with me doesn't mean I'm your shit to handle. Right?"
He can't decide if he really is lucky, to have the room to himself. After almost a year in Dupe with partner nearly that whole time, to be all by himself feels daunting.
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If it were Giles in that position, plucked from one durance-adjacent experience to another, he'd be terrified of doing anything beyond what he had to, of getting to know anyone, lest he be ripped out of it again and into the next just as he was starting to get used to it.
Although, is that not what happened to him? The world he'd returned to after Arcadia wasn't his own in any meaningful sense after all, and- No. Giles isn't going to allow himself to continue down that train of thought, he can have his panic about it later. In private.
"It may not be my job to help, but I'd like to anyway, if I can." He sits on the side of the bed, keeping his countenance as open and receptive as he can, "I don't know you, so I don't know if there's something that would be of more help, but I know I find it easier to process when there's someone with a willing ear to listen"
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"It was a really different kinda place. Different rules, different roles, different, uh, methods. I...it's gonna be a lot of. Untangling, what it did to me, while trying to cope with what this place is gonna do at the same time."
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"It takes a long time to come to terms with and begin to recover from experiences such as these. I'm not sure it's a process that ever stops." Not that he knows precisely what Bash has been through, but he can make an educated guess as to the shape of it, "This place doesn't have all that many rules or roles to fall into, the traumas seem to come mostly at random. It is both a blessing and a curse."
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"No way to brace for heavy rolls. I getcha. Makes anticipation...different. I get it. Well, better to know that."
There's a small pause. Bash looks up. "Shoot straight with me a moment, and then pretend you never heard me ask this question: do the Captain's torments ever involve sex?"
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"No, not that I've seen. The Captain strikes me as..." He stops, thinking over the best phrasing, a theory starting to coalesce in his mind, "As someone trying to enact the childhood they never had. Our trials, both the ones I've experienced and only been told about, have largely been replicas of books or of common milestones in an American childhood. He seems to like to play games with us, ones that do more often than not involve anguish and death, but are more like a child who plays by ripping the arms off their dolls than a directed act of sadism"
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"Shit. I don't know what to do with any of this at all. It's a lot, you know? I mean. You, at least, seem pretty okay. Uh, what's your name, by the way? I'm Bash. Bash St. Expedit."
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He doesn't withdraw his hand, it's Bash's until such a time as it stops helping or Bash withdraws.
"If I seem to be okay, it's only because I've spent the last few years learning to manage my anxieties surrounding places like this. That, and a lifetime spent in a career where maintaining a level of professional indifference is encouraged, if not required, certainly helps"
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He lets out a laugh that's not a sob, it's really a laugh. "If you ever need space to not be okay, your own cabin oughta be that, right? Like. Once I get to where I can fake it, I'd be glad to return the favor. If that'd help you at all."
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He was going to decline, of course he was. Giles has been handling things adequately so far and he can continue to do so on his own, but...
He meant it when he said he finds it easier to process when there's a willing ear to listen. He can't burden Ossie with it, won't let himself burden Ossie with it. Not when Oswald is struggling enough as it is. Sharky had served the purpose fine, but he didn't have the context to understand and Giles doesn't particularly want to give him the full extent of it.
Bash, however, has the understanding of similar experience. It's not quite the same, and he likely won't have the more historical context, but it's similar enough. And perhaps it's only fair to receive help in exchange for giving it.
So Giles shuts his eyes, lets out a small breath and recentres himself.
"Yes, that could be helpful in the future... Thank you"
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He squeezes Giles' hand and then lets go, finally.
"And in the mean time, even if you're not staying in the room, you're welcome here still. I'm not gonna be a bad roommate even if you're absent. I promise."
Ah, here he goes making his first big mistake, because Giles looks different from the fae entities of his world. Well. Not that different from the cait-sith he was bound to, but still enough that he's not watching his ass.
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Giles snaps his eyes away, he'd be glaring at the bedsheets if he weren't keeping his expression carefully composed in neutrality. A chill breeze picks up in the confines of the cabin, and when he finally speaks, low and dark, it's nearly drowned out by the cracking of dry leaves
"You should be careful what promises you give me"
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...the irony of promising to be a good neighbor is not, in fact, lost on him in this moment. And yet. And yet, he still seems at ease, not peeling away from Giles or getting weird over what he's just realized.
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The breeze is gone, but rustling remains, albeit far quieter now.
"You're not scared, curious." That means either Bash is incredibly stupid, or... "Am I to take it you're aware of the Lost, then?"
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That isn’t to say Bash isn’t incredibly stupid. If accused of such, he’d heartily agree to it. High school dropout who never did get a dyslexia diagnosis, he especially felt like he couldn’t keep up with the scions of Thoth and Athena around him.
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"I'd caution you not to speak that name again. I believe we're about as safe as anyone can be from the Gentry's influence here, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea to bandy Their name about." Giles gives Bash a warning look, his tone level and brokering no argument. "Changeling is the term you may be more familiar with. We of the Lost were taken by the Fair Folk, held captive and shaped by Them until we manage our escape. And if you'd like the full introduction, then..."
He inclines his head in an approximation of a bow, his position on the bed allowing for not much more than that
"Giles, of King John Barleycorn's Autumn court in the First Freehold of London."
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It's not the full 'I'm waving my huge dick' title, and he leaves off the geographic markers because it's complicated with Duplicity and Boston and New Orleans--he hardly knows where he belongs anymore. He doesn't know where he's from.
"And I'm not sure if they're the same in my world as yours, but, uh. I'll remember that. Won't use the F-word anymore. I'd heard of changelings, but. Didn't know you were real. Suppose it makes sense. Wait. John Barleycorn like the song?"
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Giles is sure there's plenty who would start fawning upon learning they were in the presence of a deity, it must get draining if all you want is some friendly company.
"Precisely like the song, though it wasn't the name his parents gave him you understand. Names can have tremendous power, so many of us chose to change ours upon our return, and monarchs often take a new name when they ascend the throne." He pauses, before adding with a wry smile "Summer's crown is held by King Arthur"
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"It sounds a little bit like our Legends are to us. We do things, stories are told about us, we grow into being a little more who that story was about. Does...that make sense? I'm not one of the smarter ones, can't explain all the meta details stuff like Dennis could."
He leans his head against the wall, glancing up at the ceiling as if half-afraid the Captain already knows what he's about to say next.
"It's actually one of the reasons these inter-dimensional kidnappings fuck me up so much. It's damned near impossible to inhabit the title of 'demigod of Midnight Roads' on a ship. No roads; not even a real shipping lane. You know we're not, like, going anywhere. Right?"
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He pauses for a moment, laughs a little, forcing what levity he can into his voice
"The ship goes nowhere and the seasons don't change. It's a purgatory, a world caught in limbo. Unchanging and yet in constant flux."
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He'll settle in eventually, surely.
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It's not much comfort, but it is what it is.
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