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Entry tags:
.:Oh shit it's November:.
Who ⬤ Ganymede and Co.
What ⬤ You know what.
When ⬤ Nebulous times.
Where ⬤ Fine Wine, ΩQuiet Winter’s Wanderlust, Gany's McMansion, Net Slum, Protected Forbidden Pilgrim
Content Warnings ⬤ mentions of kidnapping, captivity, transphobia, dissociation, existential depression, and probably incoming other cws, lmao
What ⬤ You know what.
When ⬤ Nebulous times.
Where ⬤ Fine Wine, ΩQuiet Winter’s Wanderlust, Gany's McMansion, Net Slum, Protected Forbidden Pilgrim
Content Warnings ⬤ mentions of kidnapping, captivity, transphobia, dissociation, existential depression, and probably incoming other cws, lmao
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He frowns, going quiet for a bit, considering his words. Are they just simply excuses, the words he is saying? Or are they the truth? Ganymede does...actually still trust him, that's not in question. He just wanted to hear an apology for that, but he sullenly doesn't make that clear just yet.
Then: ]
...Before the tower, you said you didn't want to see my face ever again.
Apologize for that too and kiss my hand as well.
[ Ganymede sets down his fork and holds out his right hand delicately to Michel like he's a delicate and high-class prince. ]
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...I didn't want you to be hurt.
[ Ah. And more than that. He remembers the emotion choking him, Gorre's algorithms twisting his hurt into agony that needed to cause pain as release.
He reaches for Ganymede's hand, still not glancing up to his face, and slowly lowers his head to brush a warm kiss to the back of it. ]
And I'm... so sorry for my words then.
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[ Good, because that comment seriously hurt. He doesn't care about the intentions in this specific, exact case.
And he knew...that was Michel too. A comment that was potentially a combination of nothing less than abject fear and the desire to say whatever cruel words cut most. But still himself nonetheless; he believes he can figure that better than anyone else. The gentle kiss against his hand sure is something, hands tingling lightly from the kiss; an action that shows as much remorse that ekes evidently out of his voice. ]
...You will make up for breaking your promise.
How? Make a new one with me. Promise me that it's no longer trying your best to remain by my side, but that you will. No matter what happens.
That you won't give up, and whenever you have troubles, you don't hide them. You tell me. Even if you don't realize the source or whatever. Get it?
[ Ganymede closes his eyes, letting out a small sigh. ]
The fact that you had been there for me so many times, and I couldn't be there for you until it was almost too late...I won't ever forget that. Understand?
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This is penance, isn't it? It feels poetic. ]
...You were there for me. I was able to hang on a little longer because you were always at my side. Even when I wasn't certain I knew myself any longer.
[ He finally lifts his head again, lacing his fingers together with Ganymede's as he leans in to kiss his cheek. He's clumsy with his words at the best of times. Let alone now, with both of their emotional wounds so fresh. But he does know what he owes here. ]
...I will promise.
[ Right now it doesn't feel triumphant. But someday, perhaps it will. Perhaps if he wasn't the type of person who preferred to run from his problems, things would never have escalated as far as they did. So... the least he can do is face his mistakes now. ]
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No words saying that it's unreasonable to expect such things follow, or any replies with a condition.
...He can firmly trust that the other man's promise is true. Ganymede releases a shuddering sigh. ]
I'll accept those words when we're standing at the end of this back home, together.
[ Ganymede moves still to lean his head against Michel's chest. He wants to hear the sound of his heartbeat. He's trying to hold back tears from all the words that have been shared and so many emotions that bubble up. He speaks again, voice small: ]
...I was really scared I had lost you.
Are you hurting anywhere? Does anything feel off?
[ Their food is going to get cold. ]
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The heartbeat under Ganymede's cheek is steady, a little fast from nerves. But quiet and steadfast and so very human. He brushes a fingertip very gently over Ganymede's cheek, rubbing at the traces of tears. ]
...I-I'm sorry for frightening you, too.
[ There are more apologies still. He suspects he'll be tripping over them for a while, not unlike the clutter he'd grown used to leaving in his wake in his room at home. Familiar chaos, the product of his own clumsiness and thoughtlessness. ]
I... think I feel like myself again. [ In all senses, positive and negative. ] Fatigued. I'm more sore than anything. You were injured more than I was...
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Feeling the heartbeat at all is a relief. It's proof that he's here. That nothing that happened yesterday was a dream. He hiccups and lets out a small sob after feeling the gentle touch against his cheek, tears starting to flow even more.
So he's not moving himself anytime soon. ]
...I-Injured? Only my head still hurts.
[ Ganymede isn't thinking about the emotional damage on his part again so he's thinking just physical even though the other kind of mentioned it a bit earlier.
Thankfully thanks to a place that went up, he can get some painkillers but that's neither here nor there. ]
W-What about other wounds? [ Emotional, he means. ] When your door opened, I-I saw...
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[ Michel frowns a little, wrapping his other arm around Ganymede protectively. The petting has turned to careful probing, fingertips sliding gently over Ganymede's scalp in search of bruising. He didn't think he'd taken a hit like that during the battle...
He'll force him to go to Netslum shortly, once it opens. But for now, he'll simply fret as he can. His worry keeps him from doing more than flinching minutely when Ganymede asks about "other wounds." ]
...Mm. It's what you saw before, isn't it?
[ He thinks Ganymede may have remembered. It seemed not everyone lost as much as he had, while Gorre was taking over. He's quiet for a minute, picking his words with care. ]
When I was losing my memories... those were what remained. Because they were data. [ He saw it again and again and again and— ] I-if there's anything you still want to know, I believe I can speak about it now.
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[ Ganymede being swung around by Tavros (after being grabbed unceremoniously by the neck) so hard that his face was a bloody mess had consequences. Even if his face seemed to heal up with little to no scarring due to a lucky spot of fortune. At this time with injuries healing slow, it did jostle something in his head.
No apparent bruising, but if he touches a spot on the back of his head, he reflexively flinches. ]
That's right. In the mirrors, I think...
[ There's a small pause on his end, thinking. Ganymede can't remember his own memories, but the memories of other people witnessed in the mirrors...aren't those a different story? ]
...Was that woman the only person who treated you terribly? Before, when you had 'changed', there was talk about how cruel the world had been to you.
So, I want to hear it from you.
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[ He moves his fingers away from the spot, but his jaw goes taut. An injury like that, lingering this long...
He's tired. He's worried. And he's quietly, desperately afraid. He swallows carefully and lowers his hand to rub the back of Ganymede's neck. The topic isn't closed yet, not by a long shot. But if he presses now, Ganymede will think he's trying to dodge more explanations. And he supposes he owes him this. ]
Aimee... was the worst I experienced. But, no. It wasn't only her.
[ And he pauses again, because resolve or not, this is still hard. The worry throbs like an ache at the forefront of his thoughts. Pain on top of pain. It's no wonder that at times he believes it's all he can feel. ]
...I suppose I should tell you from the beginning, as briefly as I can.
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[ Oh...wait, is he actually getting scolded for once? That's actually a little funny. Not that Ganymede is sincerely thinking that part himself, nope.
He does relax a bit into the slight rub against the back of his neck, though. It is also not that he doesn't address the injury, but it truly is a matter of 'one thing at a time'. Given the scope of the other topic, it'd be hard to address it all at once, after all. ]
From the beginning will work.
In your own words, I could know more.
[ And know who ELSE he might have to put a hit on when he gets straight on out of this stupid game.
It's fine. ]
cw: transphobia, mention of conversion therapy, gestures
He'll... have to think of what can be done about the healing. Someone here must have more medical knowledge.
And thank goodness Netslum arrives when it does and takes some of Michel's stress away RIP. ]Very well. I don't see a reason to revisit anything Gorre said. He was well-acquainted with the facts.
[ Also this spares us the time paradox of the threads run in parallel...
Michel is quiet for a moment longer, sorting through his thoughts. It's fine. Brief, clinical, to the point will do. ]
I am intersex. I don't know if the doctor was unaware of it when I was born, or whether my parents ignored any information they were given in their excitement to have a daughter at last. I grew up... stifled, but happily enough. My mother and brothers loved me. My father was distant, but not harsh. My family is most likely not as wealthy as yours, but they're noblesse d'épée, and they trace that lineage back to the eleventh century. Image was everything.
[ That, he imagines Ganymede understands, even if his family is very different. ]
I was somewhat frail as a child from the complications during my birth. It wasn't unusual for me to be sick for weeks at a time. When I was fourteen, just at the end of the school year, I fell ill again. I was bedridden for a few months at home. I felt... so unwell that I was completely unaware of any other changes in my body at the time. But when I finally recovered, I was... as you saw me in that memory. Taller. Gangly. My voice changed completely. [ He touches the Adam's apple at his throat. ] I was ecstatic. I finally... began to match my own image of myself. My parents were less pleased. They were terrified of a scandal, and so they closed me in my room until they could decide what to do with me. Medical intervention, or religious — both, or simply waiting for me to wake up changed back as suddenly as I'd transformed in the first place.
[ Another pause. Brief, bare bones. ]
They couldn't stand to see me. And this isn't, to their regret, the eleventh century any longer... they couldn't simply turn me over to the care of servants without fear of some gossip escaping. So Aimee volunteered. She was a family friend, intended to be engaged to my brother. She... for six months, it was as you saw in the memory. [ And more. ]
The rest is as Gorre said. My brothers let me out of that room, and sent me to another property in Strasbourg when I was sixteen. I've been there since. So, really... I've had very little interaction with the world at all since then. As little as I could manage.
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He lets out a small hum of agreement about ... yeah, not revisiting the facts (yeah...yeah.)
Ganymede doesn't know what 'noblesse d'épée' even means, though. Probably old money but fancier and in Francais. But, he does understand 'image being everything'. In a personal sense, because that's important to him even now. He wrote down things about his family, but he didn't include the fact they're rich because it didn't seem important. ]
Aimee...that piece of trash. [ They're all pieces of trash. ] But, I appreciate you telling me everything. You could've just brushed it aside, because it's painful to recount at all in any way.
...Though, I hope your mother and father run into a barrage of fists especially hard until their faces are unrecognizable.
Aimee too.
[ He nuzzles his head into the other male's chest. He reserves commentary for Michel's brothers but he wants them to experience a comeuppance of a sort too. They're not blameless. Still, the inbox messages are there where Michel spoke vaguely about his brother(s) before and can easily be retrieved (he rechecked them constantly in Michel's absence this is my excuse.) Maybe he hold his tongue on the slight chance Michel is fond of them; he has a strange feeling Michel might be even if he can't prove it with his missing memories.
He didn't sound like he had hated them, anyway. ]
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[ He brushes a light kiss to the top of Ganymede's head, mindful with his injury now, and gathers Ganymede carefully into his arms. He remembers those words to Gorre.
I wanted to be told freely about the things that had hurt him when the time was right...
He's been difficult for Ganymede. He does know that. Still so guarded, still so fearful. In a very different way than his family, he wonders if he's absorbed their fixation with image. He'd wanted so badly to be seen as a whole man. Strong, implacable. Resilient. But he's never been whole. ]
...And I don't wish any harm on the three of them. I hate Aimee. But that's not... what I want.
[ He has to believe that still, through the battered and bloodied pieces of what remains of his sense of self. Otherwise, there really was no meaning in heeding their requests and demands to come back after that battle. He has to... ]
Now can we talk about your injury?
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Well, I'm glad. Usually I don't have patience for that, but for you I'd make exceptions.
You deserve them, and a lot of other good things too. Including me.
[ A lot of people have treated Michel like trash. He will treat Michel like a King.
And not because he feels he has to. It is just because he wants to; the fact that the other has had terrible experiences is not actually the prime motivator though it does add onto it. It's funny, because whenever he was with Apollo and demanded answers, the man treated like the idea was foolish. Like it was his fault for seeking them, and not already knowing.
So in his heart, he hates not knowing. But he understands Michel's reasons for them; they're not arbitrary or foolish. Though he would not have desired to stay ignorant forever. ]
They're lucky you're so kind.
[ But Aimee will not live to see the rest of the year. There's a small pause when the other asks the question and Ganymede brings his head back so he can look at Michel, lightly confused. ]
...How do we talk about it? It's there?
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His fingers are still rubbing soothingly at the back of Ganymede's neck, though the look he gives him is a little stern. ]
That you should be resting with it instead of running around and jarring it more, to start with... what have you been feeling, aside from the headaches?
[ He's not a doctor, but he supposes he's experienced enough injuries — head injuries and otherwise — to make at least a crude diagnosis. ]
...Nausea? Is light more painful?
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Those things did not come from nothing, and even though there's a stern look, he decides to give his lips a peck. Before settling down again so he can receive more rubs. ]
Ringing. No nausea, I think.
...I can't tell if light is more painful than not. It probably all blends in too well.
Though, sometimes it's more of a dull ache than a largely painful one.
[ Beat. ]
And I had no choice but to run around; I'm one of the Bracelet holders. No amount of rest will make the pain go away, the way things are. It...might be with me for a long time.
[ He says this because he doesn't know of the infirmary and its painkillers yet but shh. ]
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He lets his breath out slowly. Not one hour at a time. One minute at a time. Begin there. ]
Even if you believe that a bracelet holder needs to be at every battle — and to me, the data drains felt very similar — can you at least agree that you don't all need to be at every battle? It does no good if you don't take the time to rest.
[ I don't care about the others, he wants to say. I can't stand seeing you hurt again.
He doesn't. His hand moves coaxingly from Ganymede's neck down his back, soothing instead. ]
Rest will help, or will at least avoid making it worse. I'll... see what else we can manage for medicine here.
[ And tomorrow Net Slum will be up and prevent Michel's hair becoming even more white. ]
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One he doesn't recall.
He doesn't understand the context. There's a longer pause still as he realizes what Michel is saying to him, and maybe he is enjoying the back rubs a lot too. ]
...Okay.
[ It's the only way he can be of use.
No, he's stopped thinking like that...maybe. Memories of crucial events are missing. He's grasping something, trying to recall conversations about certain memories that lead to revelation.
But they're missing.
...Michel isn't, though. He's here, with him. His hands reach out to grab a hold of the other man's shoulders, fingers curling lightly into the cloth. He's here. He's real. ]
It's hard for me to stay put—I'm...I'm used to moving around a lot. But, as long as you're with me, I think I can do that. [ Finally a little smile appears as he looks at Michel. ] You might have to hold me a bit more, though.
[ Their food is definitely cold by now, RIP. ]
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For a second his expression is pure surprise as he looks down at Ganymede. That he would offer to stay? That... he's allowed to ask?
Disregarding time timeline of the boss battle later that same day.A little tentatively, carefully, he tightens his hold around Ganymede and leans down to press a kiss to his cheek. ]
Would you... promise me in return? That you'll stay by my side.
[ Between the lines, in careful silences: I don't want to be here. But it would be even more painful to be here without you.
The physical damage from the battle is enough. But as resilient as Ganymede seems... Michel worries. ]
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Also I forgot the Uta battle was after Michel's, so he says: ]
I promise you. If I need to fight, for whatever reason, I'll bring you with me.
[ Maybe he will try to bring Michel with him to Uta's fight, and he gets locked out by barrier? Seems legit, right? Everything will be fine.
All he knows is just as he wants Michel by his side, Michel will want to be by his.
...He doesn't have much to be concerned about now with Michel by his side. ]
...There are some things I don't remember. I know that. I tried to write down as much as I could, but I think I still missed things.
But, at least I'm not missing you. Though, sometimes, this feels like a dream. Like it's not real.
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...Alright. And if I feel the need to fight again, I'll tell you as well.
[ Right now, he can't imagine it. But if one of the phases were Sinclair or Oria, or Fai... there are still people he owes too much to. For them, he would shake off the haze hanging over him. He has to believe he still could.
He gives a little nod to Ganymede's words. It's difficult, remembering everything, to also remember to watch his tongue. How not to say things in ways that will confuse everyone... ]
I often felt like that, even before this. My childhood, the world outside those walls, all of it felt like something I'd read in a story somewhere. Not part of me.
[ And this place, well. It isn't real. It can only make the feeling stronger. He reaches for Ganymede's hand to cover it gently in his. ]
...You're here. And I'm here.
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Okay. It's a plan, and a promise.
[ That's not going to work with Uta but Ganymede's hopes being smashed to smithereens hasn't happened just yet. Considering their track record has been good, even his inner cynical voice has taken a backseat to it all.
Isn't that convenient in of itself? ]
...Really? No, I think that makes sense. All of those horrible things that happened to you, seem so horrible that they probably appeared unreal. Even if those things were far away from you now.
[ The fact that this place seems more real with each and every passing day feels suffocating, most of all. But, at least Ganymede is certain of one thing: ]
Yes. I'm right here, and so are you.
[ And right now, they will always be themselves. Maybe, the future is less scary now that Michel is here by his side. And maybe, he can return to that world. To that place called 'Greece', achieve the Apex of his dreams, with Michel right beside him.
Maybe...things will be okay.
... ]
Our food is probably cold too, isn't it?
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My memories returned. So... I believe all of them are still stored here, somewhere. Whether this is a dream or not, I believe you'll get all of it back.
[ He's promised to be here. So, as best he can, he'll anchor Ganymede until that happens.
He can't help the quiet huff of a laugh about the food, though. ]
...Yes. You'll still be angry at me if I don't eat it, won't you?
[ It might be cute, to see Ganymede pout a little. He feels a tiny bit more motivated after all. ]
no subject
[ Ganymede sounds hopeful, though he smiles a little at that. He could truly believe anything Michel says.
Well, within reason. He still doesn't accept his personal downer lines aimed at himself.
(Maybe even after Gorre, Ganymede hasn't learnt his lesson.) ]
Yeah. I would be. So, start to eat it for real. Otherwise I'll also assume that you don't want to try my cooking.
[ Yes, he's pouting a bit now. ]
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1/2
2/2 [spongebob voice: one day or so later]
im going to send your mudkips into space
they're really innocent this time i swear
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