station72 | [ closed; around day 43ish ]

[ Sam relaxes a little at that, part because he's relieved to hear neither of them are seriously hurt and that Shiro's actually getting some sleep, and part because he'd caught himself standing at parade rest trying to hold himself back. He unclasps his hands from behind his back, rolling his shoulders out before perching on the edge of the bed, on the other side of Shiro. ]

( I felt it when he just shut down. ) [ Different than Bucky, because Shiro isn't a broodmate and it's obvious this is more of a sleep than a coma, however deep. But that doesn't mean it hadn't freaked Sam out. ]

( Let me heal the bruises, at least? Please. ) [ He needs to do something, and coming up with a plan will have to wait until Shiro's awake. ]

[Breathing slowly. Easily. Though that starts to change as they talk -- increasing at an even pace. No nightmare. Not now. Like his brain is too tired to pull up the awful memories -- leaving just the vague mental images of stars flickering into view, like a night's fog being burned away.]

[Slowly pulling himself out of sleep.]

[Still not awake enough to realize other people are nearby. But approaching it gradually -- for once in his recent life.]

( You know I've lived with worse than a couple bruises, right? )

[ He's going to be sore tomorrow, but knowing his injuries would just reappear on Sam's body still makes Bellamy uneasy. His own comfort at the cost of Sam's isn't a balm. He shakes his head, but his attention is drawn back to Shiro as he feels the shift in his thoughts. Bellamy's knuckles rub lightly over Shiro's breastbone as the bond between them hums in wordless comfort; Bellamy offers up his own remembered stars, constellations viewed behind thick glass, framed by dull metal walls. ]

( I felt it too. But before...he'd never been like that before. )

[ And presumably Shiro wasn't going to be feeling too great when he did wake up. Bellamy almost wants to stall him, and give him some time before he has to wake and deal with it. ]

( That's very reassuring, thank you. It definitely doesn't- )

[ Sam'd had more to say there, about how knowing that he's been hurt worse in the past kind of makes Sam want to heal him even more, or that just because he can live with it doesn't mean he should, but his attention is pulled by Shiro stirring as well. He reaches out across their mental link to give a quiet shhh, a soothing sense like the stroke of a hand over his forehead, fingers through his hair. He'd have done it physically, rather than mentally, but Bellamy's right there - and he forgets about the strength of brood connections, for the moment. ]

( You can go back to sleep, Brave Heart, it's okay. You're safe, we're all safe. ) [ If it was someone else, Sam might have just left it at you're safe, but he knows Shiro well enough to know just how much he values those he cares about above himself. Then he looks back over at Bellamy. ] ( He hasn't, not that I've seen. It felt... different. )

[There's contact. More than he's used to having -- more than he's had in... years? It's strange. Not bad, not upsetting, but strange. Who would do that? Who would be the one to touch him like that? Someone ... one of the team? Or -- ]

[There are faces suddenly flitting through the images of stars, his own alien skies and the ones Bellamy has supplied. Pale hair around delicately marked features, cheeks touched with pink. And then another with bone-white skin and terrified eyes -- it could be Pidge, if not for the haircut being ragged and unkempt. The only ones he can imagine would be the ones to try and reassure.]

[And no, if he sleeps, he'll miss them. For all the urging to rest, he's still struggling to climb up out of his impromptu hibernation.]

( It's the symbiote. It's what happens after, for him. ) [ Blowback, Bellamy thinks ruefully. ] ( I can't decide if it's better or worse than— )

[ Bellamy's thoughts break, fracture as Shiro's thoughts take a turn away from peaceful, star-scattered skies.

The danger with linking this closely to broodmates is that the divisions between himself and them begin to blur. The faces that pop up in Shiro's mind are, for a disorienting moment, people Bellamy feels he should be able to put a name to and can't, but attaches distress to regardless. His hand turns to press a palm to Shiro's heart, as if to stifle the spike in emotion there. ]

( Don't. ) [ As if that urging ever had effect. ] ( It's not real. )

[ Not real in this moment, here and now. Those people aren't here. Bellamy looks over Shiro's bulk to find Sam, eyes widening in silent plea for help and for an explanation, perhaps. It's hard to split his thoughts, but Bellamy's expressive enough to get his message across. ]

[ The symbiote. Seems like so many of their abilities come with a price, and Sam's honestly got no idea if it's just because not many of them have the hang of how they work yet, or if it's just always gonna be like that.

He'd speculate a little, because he likes Bellamy enough to be okay with being a little more open with his opinions on the symbiote than he might with the Nest in general, but unsurprisingly, Shiro isn't listening to the attempts to get him to go back to sleep.

Sam responds to Bellamy's plea by pulling in a deep breath and exhaling nice and slow, calm seeping out through their mental link in a way he knows he's done with both of them before. This next bit, not so much - but he opens up his connection with them a little more anyway. Allows the faces that circle Shiro's mind flit by, letting them go instead of getting caught by them as he adds his own images of the night sky in among theirs, looking up at the stars from above the cloud layer.

He gives in, leaning over a little to stroke his fingers through Shiro's hair - it's not like he hasn't done it before - and rests his other hand next to Bellamy's. This time, the brush against Shiro's mind is tinged with the faintest hint of apology, that they're not the ones Shiro's looking for to be there. ]

( You're at the Bearings, in Concordia. It's Bellamy and Sam, we got you. )

[So much contact. So many points of it. They're distant. They're real and present, but also far enough away. Not cloying or holding him down like other hands, like the ones from...]

[There's a sense of something passing over. Like a shadow. Like the fading tatters of a dream. Or, in his case, a nightmare. Something wanting to take root and slipping away instead. It's not real -- we got you. And it's gone. Fleeting images of clawed hands slipping away like water.]

[There's just... stars.]

[Stars and slowly spinning galaxies in distinct colors. The worry passes, the nightmare dissolves, and he's back to where he was moments ago. Dragged down by lingering exhaustion and the reassurance around him.]

[For once.]

[ There's something wrong in Shiro's head. It's reminds Bellamy of a fractured bone, healed over poorly. All the pain of it is still there, and it's beyond any of them to ease. Or it will be, so long as Shiro keeps everyone so strongly locked out. Bellamy thinks Angel could help with it, but he's loathe to nudge Shiro towards the kind of vulnerability necessary for such an attempt.

When Shiro quiets, he look up at Sam. His expression is faintly despairing. This isn't like Octavia with a nightmare. Bellamy can't soothe this away with a story or the old, deeply ingrained Blake proverb. ( Fear is a demon. ) It's deeper than that. And he knows by now that Shiro won't sleep like this again without help. ]

( Lexa told me when we get back to the station it'll be easier to work with the symbiotes. Getting a handle on it will help keep this from happening to him again. )

[ Not that Bellamy really knows what training symbiote powers entailed, but it's worth a shot. And it feels like invasive than someone poking around in Shiro's head. ]

[ There's a quiet surge of respect when the nightmare retreats. Sam pulls back a little from Shiro's mind, a final stroke through his hair as he untangles his fingers and leaving a faint sense of so damn proud of you. Shiro let it go, he stopped it from taking hold - and sure, he did it with support, but that's the point. He adds it to the list of what he needs to talk to Shiro about when he wakes up.

He looks back up at Bellamy, brows furrowing a little. ]

( Easier'd be pretty damn awesome; there's a reason I keep bugging people to let me heal them, you know? ) [ Aside from actually wanting to help, anyway. ] ( The symbiote makes things complicated, but. )

[ And here he hesitates. He knows Shiro's shields aren't that great, though they've been getting better, but broodmate or not, he doesn't know how much of Shiro's issues that Bellamy knows. It doesn't feel right talking about them while Shiro's asleep.

But the way Bellamy's looking at him with quiet despair is pretty much impossible to ignore. ]

( Back home, I was a soldier with a fucked up brain. ) [ Simplifying things, yeah, but it's still the truth. ] ( I learned how to make it less fucked up, and how to use it to help people do the same. Problem is, it's real damn hard to get anyone to accept help. )

["Something wrong" is an incredibly apt description. He'd even agree with it, were it something said aloud. He's just... never known how to fix it. Or even if there was a chance to. Just something to live with and carry on with. Because saving the universe was more important. Being a team and functioning together was more important than sorting out his head.]

[He's working on the shielding. Trying to pull them together out of desperation and determination. It's so much easier to let people in. That, he's practiced. Making connections, maintaining connections. Closing them down, not so much.]

[They've probably got a little while longer just to talk before the forced unconsciousness wears thin. But for now, there's no lost faces, no shadows. Only stars.]

[If he could dream like this every night, life would be a lot easier. Fucked-up, injury-scarred brain or no.]

[ closed; around day 43ish ]

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