( closed ) they being dead yet speaketh by jóhann jóhannsson

[incinerates]

CHARACTERS: Bakugo, Elliot & Hadrian
WHERE: The Red Coast ( Barracks )
WHEN: Day :037, after The Bad Thing Happens
SUMMARY: A sad, bad, horrible day ends with stressed trio doing stressful things to one another.
WARNINGS: Body horror, frank portrayal of mental health and drugs, a teenager with new cusswords to try out, the mods were mean and we're coping via roleplay. More to come if necessary, sorry Avior.

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[stilettoes]

[ peter's free hand, just a little flecked with blood from holding fast to his wrist, comes up and knots itself in the folds of elliot's clothing, pulls him in closer. his other hand flexes in elliot's palms as he lays it there for him, garish shards of bone flexing out just a little more as if stretching themselves out. the sensation is strange, a limb he's never had before, and he makes a noise, breath and relief because elliot is here. it's terrible, how he feels he needs whatever elliot has to offer - the crisp sounds of fingers flying over keys, the sensation of him running rampant programming in the background, humming and heated. he's so sorry, and it's there, not a whisper, just a feeling. ]

Not mine. [ he shakes his head ] The blood. Bakugo's.

[ no eloquence, just breath. i'm alright, i'm alright, i'm al - a pause to collect himself, aiming to loosen his grip on elliot's scarves, but it never comes - the peace he normally can find at the bottom of his bottomless pockets, always there like a knife. instead, he feels like he's reaching and he's reaching, and when fingers try to glance over it, he's scalded before he can find his calm, burnt out.

the symbiote in peter is young still, eager to fight against its host's stressors. peter's mind stalls, gutters, revs loudly in frustration, and then chokes out again and the symbiote responds in kind, still prepared for a fight that's long since left charred remnants behind. he can't calm himself, a rarity because he's always calm, a cool and easy-going presence barring the moments late a night when juno's collided into him full-on contact. even then, he wakes with a smile, as if nothing's gone wrong, a dream is just a dream.

this is not a dream, and the blood is real and the panic and rage is real. not his own and terrifyingly tattooed all over him, impressed upon him so deeply he can't claw it out of himself.

he meets elliot's eyes, mouth twisted, a rictus of sharp teeth as he keeps him close, physically, tries to find some kind of peace in pressing up against him mentally, they way you feel the pulse of someone's heart at their temples.

he doesn't know what he's asking for when he says please help. the words even sound like an obscure jumble of a language that he's never spoken before. but his brain is begging as he tries over and over again to set himself right and failing miserably with each turn. ]

[raw]

[ Elliot can see it then. (See is the wrong word, it's something he does with his brain, a sixth sense that the symbiote has for the way its connection to itself expands in a space outside the physical world.) The seams of it, how it's not just Bakugo's blood but Bakugo's terrible wrath, that some tsunami of emotion has overcome Peter and left him stained and shaken and undone in its violent wake. ]

I don't know—

[ How.

But.

That's not true, suddenly. What he means is that there's nothing he can do to change this when there's no distinct cause, can't patch Peter up or tell him it's going to be okay or even guide him in shielding himself because fuck knows Elliot doesn't know how to do that. He's open, wide open, so when Peter grasps for him their edges blur together with how willingly he takes that connection.

His eyes close.

Like one hand gently touching the other, the Elliot symbiote reaches to soothe the Hadrian host, and Elliot offers it up like it's all he has even though he's not sure what he's offering. ]

( Here. Here. Let me— )

[ He doesn't even realize he's not speaking aloud; maybe his mouth is even moving. But it's his inner voice, resonant, monotone, always accompanied by the whir of process, >> feeling = input >> if feeling => this: >> run ('calm.exe')

In reality, all he's doing is touching Hadrian's bare skin, blood-sticky, his spine curved in a way that implies holding himself distant from that urgent clothing pull. In their minds, though, he reaches out, smothering, and maybe there's an offer in there somewhere but mostly it's a heavy, muting blanket and a relaxing warmth like the morphine had been. ]

[stilettoes]

[ he knows that feeling, and at first he almost wants to shove away from being so close to it. it's weighty and almost smothering, but all of it tastes like elliot - metallic ozone dripping onto his tongue. almost immediately he wants to ask - pills? but the words don't come out. peter's trying to search with burnt fingertips through it all. when did you take them, when did you, when, tell— he hadn't felt them when elliot had arrived, had felt the sharp angles of his mind so clearly. nothing there to dull him.

let me it says.

and before he can think again on it, come inside he responds, both hands white-knuckled on the door as he lets elliot in.

he remembers the cloying heat of the sauna, and the static sensation of the morphine before, and he bucks against the way the sensation as it comes together over his connection, willingly given over but suddenly realizing just what it's doing. the panic is partially to blame, racing around, trapped as piece by piece it's very slowly smothered by a warm blanket of morphine-like calm. the whiplash leaves peter's mind heaving, bruised and aching thing keening along the soothing touch.

peter's mind bobs along with the sensation now instead of against it. he's moving along it, sluggish and contented. whatever elliot is... giving to him is enough to let him breathe, enough to cool the fire at his temples. what was squirming before, uncertain of the feeling coming over it like some hungry beast, is soothed, the rage and anguish blanketed. it's simmering, but finding itself gradually being cooled with every passing moment of elliot's presence. peter swallows cold air once. twice. deep, big, hungry gulps instead of short, pained gasps as his eyes widen, dark and swimming, searching sleepily almost. ]

( Elliot, what... )

[ softly, a song on a lazy cadence more in tune than the first that clings as much as peter's fingers do in reality. whatever this is, he feels it pressing him under, weighing him down. still, he tries. what are you doing what have you done don't go far. ]

[raw]

I'm right here.

[ Whispered, aloud. ]

I told you, I've got your back.

[ Something tight-strung in his voice: he can feel what he's doing now, the way the soothing calm radiates from him without actually finding its origin in him. In fact, his own emotions, as if in counterpoint, are jagged with anxiety, bright like magnesium. But again, still, he knows how to cope when his own brain is sabotaging itself, or chemicals slice through his detachment.

His own eyes just as huge and dark. ]

( I think this is my power. )

[ Knives and drugs and explosions, what a brood they are. But it's helpful, at least in the moment. Like he's hacked into Hadrian and found a way to reprogram all that overload before he melted down entirely. ]

[stilettoes]

[ his mind stretches and tests the sensation of it in its calm torpor, touches the edges of it. ]

( This is you? )

[ the fire in him is feebly licking out on the last of its fuel. elliot, wrapped around his every nerve ending, keeps him still and quiet, swaying in the dark ocean. It's still unsettling and unnerving. somewhere in peter's guts he detests it, but he knows this is... preserving him. keeping him afloat here between the two of them. there's no room to feel anything but the calm here washing over him wave by wave. so he... he trusts elliot to control his emotional intake and output, swallowing up every command to fire off bakugo's residual mourning wail inside of him. his eyes close a moment.

hand one drops from elliot's scarves, the second in his palms twitches a bit, the wet sound of bone pulling back, skin knitting together into a soft, fine white line against the pad of each slender finger. soothed. danger now at bay. ]

( Feels a bit familiar. )

[ warm steam, the look in elliot's eyes before, how he'd settled his head in his lap. his breathing gradually slows now, dull glass smoked over. he flexes a little against the hold of the symbiote, pushes further with his mind now as he gathers up all his pieces, scattered so explosively before. ]

[raw]

( Yeah. )

[ Breathless, even mind-to-mind; Elliot feels constricted by his own body. In order to soothe the explosive burn of Hadrian's borrowed emotion he has to take some of it on himself, and even third hand Bakugo's guilt and grief and anger is hideously familiar.

But Elliot has his own symbiotic relationship that takes care of those feelings: he represses grief masterfully, tucking it away somewhere where it will feed and strengthen Mr Robot. He feels all those things for Elliot, and all that's left for Elliot himself is the post-traumatic sensation of raw nerves and shaky hands, his heart as rapid as a hare's.

He holds out as long as he can, growing more and more agitated as Hadrian rebuilds from the rubble up, and then he breaks away with a drowned man's gasp, flinging himself back, wide eyes in a pallid face. When the touch is lost, so is the muffling quietude, the power ebbing away. ]

Fuck.

amber style aka phone tags

[stilettoes]

[ sound, color, clarity, breath.

it comes back to him like a storm, a broken window colliding back together in reverse at the last second as elliot jerks away. peter hears the “fuck” like a chorus in his ears, breaking murky water as he immediately focuses his gaze on elliot, shifting forward to his feet as elliot jerks away. he keeps a distance, but posture says he’s prepared to dart in and steady him. his hands hover a bit, prepared to tug him forwards if he looks like he might lurch in the wrong direction.

bakugo’s emotions, volcanic, are smoke and ash now, tamped out for peter but somehow alight there in elliot’s expression. ]

Easy now, Elliot, easy. I...

[ gratitude, but concern (god when did he become so goddamned concerned for him? damn this.) he moves forward a little more purposefully now, reaching out to herd elliot gently in the direction of a place to sit. ]

Rest. What you did was [ a shake of the head, disbelief as he feels the dregs of the phantom sensation in his mind space ] incredible.

oppa amber style

[raw]

[ Elliot sits, gratefully, on the edge of one of the beds, breathing out a little sigh of — exhaustion. Relief. He still feels strange, wired like he took something, a little shaky, and still very .. close. Connected: to his symbiote, and therefore to the Nest, to Peter.

He'd known they got extra sensory abilities. He was stronger, fitter, he was telepathic. But he hadn't known it would be like that. Still, there's gladness in him when he looks at Peter, whole and capable again, put back together. It had been too disorienting to see him falling apart. ]

You're welcome.

[ A touch of irony in his low, rough voice. Elliot looks down at his hands — there's a little bit of Hadrian's blood on them, but that weirdly doesn't both him right now. ]

[stilettoes]

[ peter waits for him to sit before moving in himself, sitting a palm length and a half away. there’s a swell of silent thank you thank you thank you as he takes elliot’s hands methodically in his own and pulls at a thin scarf around his neck with the tips of his fingers. he holds it a moment in his nearly unbloodied hand, and then presses to elliot’s. the bit of blood smeared there isn’t fresh, but doesn’t resist being pulled at by the deep maroon fabric, a shadow peter will wash away later.

truth be told, he’s been embarrassed. he prides himself on the idea of being in control of his own narrative, careening and wild, but always of his own volition, and as it stands he’s had it rent from him with every ounce of bakugo’s grief. it’s a wail set through a canyon, echoing in varying degrees of mourning, pounding on the walls.

the feeling of it is denied purchase, claws scraping uselessly on dark glass, gathered up, tempered for the heat because peter is a creature of keen adaptations, growing and learning the shapes of his broodmates. but where he’s glass to bakugo, he’s soft silk and satin for elliot to skirt or fall into as he wants, a bed mussed and then remade as he faintly traces elliot’s exhaustion with a mental fingertip that trembles for half a moment, aftershock in a twitch. ]

I’m sorry that was so unpleasant for you, darling. [ elliot’s awe at his power, and his statement, indicator enough. a suggestion: ] Put your head down a moment, maybe.

[raw]

[ Elliot isn't used to gentleness, still, even though this isn't the first time Hadrian has offered it. He flinches at first, inwardly, then calms, though his jaw is still clenched and his eyes close as he attempts to relax into it — an attempt he probably wouldn't make sober with anyone else.

He does lie down eventually, though not to sleep. He's wired and awake, mind jumping frenetically like a skipped record, despite the accentuated dark smudges beneath his eyes. Mostly he's thinking about the mission, though — this isn't unusual, it's easy to catch Elliot sorting through the facts as he knows them like a seashell collection on any given day, and he spends more of his time sifting around for more than actually doing normal activities. But in this mood it's especially frenetic, as he adds the black circles and Pidge's samples and the death of a young diplomat to the nested folders of what they know. ]