Hijinks Mingle

[potentite]

Who: Everyone!
Where: Anywhere around the hub!
When: Days 103-105
Open/Closed: Open mingle!
Notes: See this post for details on the moon prompt and this one for the telepathy/dream/spirit prompts!



[A | Flower Gleam and Glow]
[The nearby moon is still passing close to the hub island, meaning the effects are still in play. Perhaps now is the time to stop and smell the large lit up sparkling moonflowers that have bloomed? Or be annoyed by the mosquito-like insects that came with them.

Alternatively, the deer seem to draw some sort of energy from the moon's light. Given their size, at least their sudden aggression and proximity to the base camp isn't the worst thing in the world but a kick would still break a rib or other bone so be careful! Possibly help each other deal with these cute but troublesome fauna.]



[B | Eavesdropping]
[For some reason, the telepathy will suddenly get rather wonky. Characters won't know why it's happening, though of course no doubt there will be ponderings, but it means characters won't be in control of their ability to broadcast — or more specifically, not broadcast — their thoughts. Time to find out secrets of an embarrassing nature. Or maybe something sadder is going on in your character's head.

If this wasn't bad enough, the area around the signet might experience burning or tingling. Just try to keep a lid on your brain for the day and distract yourself from any annoying pain.]



[C | Talking In Your Sleep]
[Or maybe your character just doesn't have the most interesting thoughts. Maybe they're busy thinking about pie instead of their upsetting childhood. That's fair. Pie is great.

But surely sometimes it haunts their dreams. With the telepathy running amuck, it's no wonder dreams and nightmares are leaking through, too. Of course, it doesn't have to be an accident. Feel free to grab a friend and share a fanciful dreamscape together on purpose! But for those nuts that are tougher to crack, accidents can and will happen.]



[D | Who You Gonna Call]
[Last but not least, as Friday rolls around, there seems to be something odd going on with the island. If your character is inclined towards the spiritual or supernatural, they'll no doubt notice the strange heavy thickness hanging around. There are whispers in the air and all of new energy just feels solemn. Might be good to give people a heads up and keep an eye on it.]

Comments

[finagles]

[ Slow, or especially cautious.

McGillis has noticed over the years, that despite his flippant personality, he hesitates. Sometimes when he least expects him to, as he does now with the chocolate. This small thing, this small gesture offered to him. Over the years McGillis has braved it more and more -- extending little gestures to Gaelio, sometimes larger ones. Efforts to keep him close, even as he keeps himself at a distance. How reluctant he feels to truly give up his reprieve. How he, himself, cannot commit.

It's as though some signal from the universe tells him not to attempt to overcome his nature, for those are often the times where Gaelio pulls back, or looks away.

Suspicion bred in his bones when his heart and his mind refuse to embrace it.

He sets the plate back onto the tray, which still sits atop his tablet, when Gaelio finally waves it away. After a moment's consideration, he shifts tablet out from under tray and places it to the side for safe-keeping, teacup still balanced in hand. ]

The wrong choice?

[ Another sip as he mulls over the reply. ]

If there's a wrong choice to make, you've left me with the chance of making it.

[ And haven't you? Have you?

A sudden ache in his temple, flickering across his countenance. He passes gloved fingers over the source, in distraction. ]

Which one is it? What makes it wrong?

[reckoner]

[ Only sweets, only confection.

How silly to weigh it so carefully and abstain. Gaelio's brow keeps a dike, trouble gathering like water, moreso when he notes the reappearance of the tablet without McGillis having himself taken a cookie. His mouth shifts, gaze heavier and narrower with the returned inquiry, and as McGillis lifts his fingers to his forehead, the air itself seems to twinge with the pain. A pressure against his own skull, from without and within. That shimmer flickers.

Gaelio feels his bottom lip jut and resists. With an exaggerated huff, he steps forward, dropping his cup to the tray before scooping the whole up, and himself sitting.

Right on the table.

Indeed, on the tablet. A sturdy thing, military and space grade, it will survive.

Given that the table's fastened to the floor, this crowds their knees, but he acknowledges it only by crossing one leg, and balancing the tray on his knee and shin. ]

I don't know, [ now too lightly, if threaded with steely recalcitrance, ] but I don't want to live with any regrets.

[ Over... wafers... ]

I've an idea, anyway.

[ His left hand lifts the plate, holding it in the air between them, and he closes his eyes before tentatively lifting his right from keeping the tray balanced. ]

Let's not look and both pick! At least we can be wrong together.

[ And if McGillis finds himself truly disappointed by his selection, then given the ample amount of each variety, it will be both easy to solve and a quick cut to realization of actual want. ]

[finagles]

Ah --

[ He lifts a hand in the air, half-way committed to stopping Gaelio from using his tablet like a cushion the moment that he pings onto it happening.

Before his very eyes. His files, his work, buried under the build of a 6'7" man. But it's far too late, far too little, the gesture limp and the utterance noncommittal.

He sets his hand back down in his lap and shoots Gaelio with a disapproving look, however well he knows that is another pointless effort that will be ignored. Predictably, Gaelio breezes on. McGillis rests his elbow against the armrest and his cheek against his knuckles, giving his attention to the announcement of this new idea with a surlier air.

He also gives into a childish urge to nudge the legs now filling up the space at his desk with a knee, just before crossing his own. ]

No cheating, then.

[ Another smirk forms, replacing the quick flash of displeasure from earlier.

With a clink of ceramic against table, he sets his teacup down for the exercise. He obliges easily after all, closing his eyes, choosing blindly from the tray presented to him.

If fingers happen to nudge against fingers, he won't pull back. For this is his dream, and such things have happened in them before. ]

[reckoner]

[ That gesture, that initial clip of protest, and of course, the dour look: of these Gaelio is acutely conscious. Neither oblivious nor cowed, the spark in his eye and the sharp cut of his mouth broadcast mischief. He risks becoming outright insufferable when McGillis knocks knees, a flash of teeth before he presses his lips together, pressing, too, the urge to further that.

Mock indignation must follow the rule-contingent acquiescence. ]

That's my line. I, of course, am a paragon of integrity --

[ Which is why he cracks open his eyes, but only for the millisecond necessary to satisfy himself that McGillis complies. A somewhat stretched millisecond. No, two milliseconds, a half-second, his lower lip catching in teeth as his eyes linger on blond lashes against fair cheeks, the keeping arc of his mouth, too acute for ease and yet --

ah, he's reaching. Gaelio hastily shuts his eyes. ]

-- no peeking --

[ His fingers again stretch, wrist twisting palm.

Whether because he'd looked too long, or because of his sheepish haste following, fingers do brush more than confection. It does not incite a subsequent bout of self-consciousness, instead, devilment renews in his smile, twitching into place as his wrist turns further, his thumb and index moving as if to pluck up a wafer, but deliberately dragging lightly over a mid-finger knuckle.

Gaelio hums, a loud burst behind his lips. ]

Not that one, I think!

[ And turns, drops, selects something firm and flaking before beginning his retreat. ]

[finagles]

Of course.

[ Parroted on a silky note. His hand begins to rove about the plate, hovering above treats more than touching down on them, and inevitably, as previously predicted, fingers knock. Gloved fingers. He doesn't startle, and neither does Gaelio -- in fact, the opposite?

In fact, a touch that can only be interpreted as a deliberate one ghosts over his knuckle. The sharp line of McGillis's mouth loses a bit of its edge, a prickle of heat felt somewhere at the back of his neck. It may very well be one of those dreams, though it's been years... and even in this dreamscape removed from reality, a twinge of uncomfortable guilt takes him by surprise. To think that his mind could still conjure up those sort of scenarios.

But why "still"? He and Gaelio are Inspectors, at this time, investigating a branch of Gjallarhorn. Nothing has happened to change that.

His eyes remain closed. Even with Gaelio's bright hum, bright declaration and quick retreat, he stalls, his own path to chocolate having come to an abrupt halt. ]

It's still cheating if you change your mind while picking.

[ Barely a scold, honeyed words from a honeyed smirk. Shortly after that, he does choose, landing on something that seems more chocolate than cookie.

It's brought to his mouth without lifting his eyelids. Chewing carefully, McGillis leans far back in his chair. With his own considering hum, eyes flick open to resettle on Gaelio. Hands fold again in his lap.

The leg perched on his knee drifts back and forth, lazily. Ankles brush, as fingers did, the outline of another boot felt with the side of his heel. One deliberate move for another. If he dreams, he dreams. There's no harm in it.

There's no risk in it. ]

Hm... so tell me, are you satisfied with your choice?

[reckoner]

[ In sum, the possessive caress of his index finger and thumb along McGillis's finger, as if first falling upon that blind choice, cannot have lasted longer than a second. One, single tick, the measure of heartbeat without ferment.

Yet, there is ferment.

McGillis chides in dulcet sugars, and Gaelio's eyelids stagger open, a fluttering staccato. McGillis has not yet opened his eyes, granting Gaelio another moment to stare, now with warmth coaxing through his neck, splashing cheeks. Yet, his surprise, and the color on its heels, do not delay him. While he hadn't expected such a response, the mischief that produced it hasn't abated, now flourishing under honeyed sun.

Gaelio watches those lips part for the chocolate, watches the spread of throat and chest as McGillis leans. Flicks his eyes to the cookie in his hand before returning. ]

Is it?

[ A hitching lift to his voice, and Gaelio pauses to measure it better, a breath of too-innocent pomp. ]

A paragon of integrity can't be a cheater. For honor's sake, I'll have to reclaim that first treat, only... it's a real problem, after all, I wasn't looking... will I be able to find it again?

[ As McGillis open his eyes, once he has those eyes, Gaelio winks.

Setting the plate back onto the tray, he hovers his hand above it once more, as though to make a show of feeling along the assortment. Yet, the incorrigible cut of his smile falters at renewed contact, and once more surprise disrupts his eyes, now skipping down to their legs, watching as that idle, inattentive motion grazes ankle and foot.

As though McGillis permitted himself anything but the deliberate.

How mad, if true, reciprocation to his superficial overtures well beyond known bounds and norms. His mind casts for a less heated explanation, the dream resisting awareness of its definition, of other types, of what he too had woke and ached with in years past. The moment Gaelio knows he's dreaming, the moment the atmosphere's sheen blackens.

And yet.

Even as the air thickens, his keen confusion receives another layer. It begins where McGillis's heel and ankle touched. Pinpricks at heel and spreading, a numbing that goes senseless in seconds. Gaelio stares down, refusing to reach and prod and make too obverse their furtive provocation. Besides, he understands immediately and innately that it would do little good. Less than pins and needles, than the limb slept on and sleeping, and waking. He can't feel it at all.

More or less alarming: he can't move it, either. More or less, but most frustrating, as he'd like, he'd terribly like, to slide his own heel more daringly.

The dream shrouds, but when his eyes draw up to meet McGillis's, bewildered distress flits through them before easy affection smothers it. ]

No. [ Both blunt and breezy, a chuckle in an exhale. ] I can't be, if it makes me a cheater. McGillis --

How should I find it? My fated sweet?

[finagles]

[ The all too charming wink enters his vision like a net, an unexpected cage of webbing. It captures; McGillis pauses, finding it difficult to look away.

As always, finding it difficult to look away. He'll wake to none of this, a voice pesters -- won't he? Does he truly dream? Is it dreaming that encases the smooth skin in front of him in that soft light, or is it the strange draw of Gaelio's expressive features heightened in his mind's eye, tugged into the warmth of them whenever he allows himself too long a glance? The light in them, the life in them.

The gilded promises in them. And how -- even if there was something real for him beneath that gold casing, that same voice pesters, oh, you would ruin it.

The tilt of his mouth turns soft while he listens to Gaelio ponder his dilemma. Sadder, but gently appreciative. His dilemma of honor over this game of sweets.

It evens out entirely once the atmosphere changes.

The fog of distress creeps in, timed with McGillis daring to tread and test the water, giving him further pause. He watches it flicker over those brilliant features. That same voice hisses and pesters, reminding him of past dreams where he dared to touch, only to spread rot and gangrene. It adds to the weight in the air. He removes the contact, pulling back from the shape his heel had landed against, and adjusts his seat. McGillis searches for the well-worn professional and the impassive persona to wear.

A thread of wariness remains. A thread of tension weaving through him.

Any moment now, something terrible will rise up from this atmosphere and rear its monstrous head.

Gaelio's eyes, endless blue oceans, are back on him now, the surface of the water twinkling. He feels as blundered in the brain by the sight of them as he would be from a sinister development. After another moment of staring, his own eyes too intense and too bright -- he scatters himself out of the water, tilting his head at an angle to watch the ground.

A tired exhale, muted smile returning. ]

Fated?

[ Murmured musing over the word. He lifts his fingers to engage in the introspective habit of twirling his bang. ]

What of free will? You made the choice that seemed right to you. Perhaps, instinctively, you understood that the first sweet was not as sweet as you'd prefer. You never bit into it -- did you know better? Did sense and intuition guide you?

[ The low lilt of his voice, pouring out like velvet, disguising gloom. ]

Does anything matter more than grasping the freedom to design your own fate?

[reckoner]

[ It should not sink in him, the sight of McGillis's foot retreating. Afterall, he could not feel it. Not when the contact lingered, not when taken. McGillis retreats with more than that shift of his foot and seat, his attitude itself changing, cooling. When Gaelio settles his eyes on that familiar face, hoping to take shelter in it against the dismayed miasma that would spread for his dying legs and the lost touch he'd become insensible too, there is less comfort there to be found.

That smooth dispassion looks so like a mask.

Yet, Gaelio persists.

He doesn't know what else to do, where else to look. There is nothing and no one else, and from the moment he met McGillis, he had become heliotropic. In the dream, that is the light he sees, encouraged by the air's shimmer. It lends actuality to that golden halo, stretching into a soft outline. Such warmth in that, in disarming contrast to that smile. Gaelio wishes he could reach, could press the tips of his index fingers to the corners of McGillis's mouth and push up, petulant but insistent.

Meanwhile, he can't feel the tray on his knee and shin, and less and less of its weight on his thigh.

Gaelio watches the twirl of that bang, nostalgia keeping him light, but levity struggling against the rest. At least nothing to doubt in his answer, something easy and obvious. Tempting, to close his eyes and listen only to the rich purr of his voice, to imagine a less obscure expression.

He keeps his eyes open. ]

Perhaps that. But, perhaps something else. What if, instinctively, I understood it was plenty sweet, and I was too cowardly to risk it? To truly grasp that freedom, and venture for what I shouldn't have, but wanted?

[ Cookies and chocolates and a more deliberate turn of his hand, a more decisive touch -- ]

Even so, there are more important things. We might disagree.

[ His smile digs more into his cheek than he means, than he can control, and it makes another layer of bodily disjointing. Gaelio cannot completely ignore it, that whatever has crept from foot to ankle to whole leg, and then the next, has stopped at his hips. If McGillis were to ask him to move to free the tablet, he's not sure he could.

Still not yet having eaten his own selection, or touched his tea, Gaelio leans forward, over the tray, closing his left hand around McGillis's ankle.

Abrupt, as much as the fade of his smile, the confusion in his eyes that nears but does not yet break into fear. ]

Can you feel this?

[finagles]

[ McGillis remains oblivious to the true cause of Gaelio's distress for a little bit longer.

He's able to sense it, able to see it when he glances at his features, but at first he's simply certain it has something to do with the aftereffects of his strange overture. Although... those short glances eventually turn his head, once he notices the extent to which Gaelio's gaze is fixed on him. Like he looks to McGillis as a source of relief in something, in whatever ails him, rather than as the source of distress.

How wrong he is in that.

McGillis blinks, fingers falling away from the curl, attention shifting back.

It means he looks directly at him while he takes in the reply to their mutual posturing about sweets. True to form, they have different takes on both the subtle meaning behind choice and the weight of its importance. A nostalgic feeling tugs his lip up, in response to the crooked one fashioned on Gaelio's features, but the heaviness in the air keeps it from blooming.

We might.

He could pontificate further, but something is wrong -- confirmed when Gaelio suddenly reaches over to clamp a hand onto McGillis's ankle.

That something is evolving. He attempts to smother the surprise out of his eyes, leaving only his matching confusion. ]

I can.

[ Rather than pull away from that grip, he leans in and over his lap, bracing a touch on Gaelio's forearm. ]

Is something wrong?

[reckoner]

[ Of course McGillis can. As well-regulated as he kept himself, Gaelio likes to think he'd have been able to discern the shift in McGillis that would result from something like that. The shift that had passed, an extension that retreated back, intimated nothing like.

Consternation bleeds further into his expression. Worsened by having to explain something so improbable and strange to McGillis. He's tempted to laugh it off, though it would be a short-term solution. Lips begin to pull between his teeth, and he does not yet release McGillis's ankle as his mind races.

Why only him? If it had been both, if he'd had either tea or treat, he could understand it as poison. They had been apprised often of the possibility, attractive targets due to their blood and promised positions. But McGillis is unaffected, and Gaelio's touched neither tea nor cookie.

As his fingers begin to loosen, as he begins to doubt his own legs, before he can sit up and wave this off, McGillis leans. Gaelio's eyes drop to the hand on his arm, breath gusting, pushing back out his lips. A second breath, a weak laugh on it, quavering. ]

No, it's just...

[ Raising his gaze, caught then by the steady press of those blue-greens. So close, so unwavering. ]

...Um.

[ Fingers flex, reaffirming their grip. ]

It's probably nothing, you should definitely finish your tea and keep eating.

[ Or!! It!! Will!! Get!! Cold!!

And he really doesn't want to interrupt his break with this. ]

But I can't, er, feel or move my legs.

[ Ended on another faltering laugh, as that does sound ridiculous. No big deal, just inexplicable and immediate paralysis. Or, he must be making it up as an excuse to not budge from his perch right on top of the tablet. Gaelio tries to wiggle his toes, or his foot, or anything, and swallows what bubbles up his throat when his effort yields nothing. At that, he does let go of McGillis's ankle, beginning to straighten, to lift and wave that hand in a dismissive sweep, to try to pull back his arm as well. ]

Seriously, finish your tea!

[finagles]

[ Subtlety is not one of Gaelio's defining qualities. The more perturbed he looks, the more he's actually looking, the easier it is to see.

McGillis makes no move to return to his tea or his food. He waits out that instruction along with the pauses littered before it. He expects to hear that he might be experiencing some sort of physical discomfort -- pain, nausea, dizziness? What he doesn't expect to hear is the opposite, a lack of feeling in two limbs.

No feeling whatsoever in his legs? He can't even move them?

That's never happened before. He doesn't understand, chest seizing up in warning. Surprise returns in the form of two blinks, consecutive, and a stare that gains intensity after Gaelio outwardly confesses to the problem.

Rather than allow him to pull his arm back, to keep dismissing it in the ridiculous manner he insists on, he uses the gesture to stand up out of his chair. With a prickly frown, he surveys Gaelio's chosen spot on the table. ]

If this is some strange joke, Gaelio...

[ A clipped admonishment in the end, misplacing the enthusiasm for it in lieu of stepping in to place a hand on Gaelio's shoulder. His eyes have wandered lower, to the legs that are apparently not working, as he quietly judges something.

While he states his intentions, he plucks tray from lap and sets it aside. Sweets and drinks have been officially dismissed. ]

There's a medical station nearby. I'll bring you there and we'll have someone examine you.

[ Gaelio might be a man of formidable strength and size, but so is McGillis. He can carry him for that long -- and if he is pulling a prank, what better test than to pick him up and threaten to immediately bring him to a medic? But... he has a feeling this is quite sincere.

In his head, the distant sound of metal scraping on metal. He pushes himself to ignore it.

Scooping an arm under his knees and curving the other around his back, he proceeds to lift him bodily into the air. Acting quick, so as to give Gaelio less time to squawk and protest. ]

Hang on.

1/2

[reckoner]

[ Ah. How disappointing, how distressing, if not as distressing. (Whatever his investment in McGillis, he's not so dismissive of his own person as to find an interrupted break less upsetting than inexplicable paralysis. Even if they'd been having a good time, and his legs went and ruined it.) Though it isn't disagreeable, really, that augmenting severity in McGillis's eyes, mouth.

If bred of concern rather than disapproving disbelief. Gaelio feels his face crumple, presses it flat, only the protrusion of his bottom lip lasting through his response. ]

Why would I joke about this...?

[ Testy frustration scratching at the edges. The reprimand effectively smothers the unfurling urge to lift his hand, to cup over McGillis's on his shoulder. Indignation instead wants to cross his arms, but he tamps that down, peering up at McGillis's face while awaiting his conclusion.

Lingering petulance. An easier emotion, a more natural response, than the trepidation that crouches at the ready for any longer attention to his unresponsive legs.

So, then, the plaintive huff when McGillis takes the tray, though he does not move to stop him. ]

All that tea, wasted...

[ Terribly immoderate of them. But, wait.

How is he going to bring him to the medical -- ! ]

[reckoner]

[ McGillis.

is getting closer still.

Gaelio stares, dumbfounded, unable to feel it but watching as his legs lift, as McGillis tucks his arm low. He can feel the arm curling below his shoulder blades. McGillis might be swift in it, but Gaelio always has time to squawk and protest.

Reflex flails his arms, would kick his legs, but they keep dormant. ]

W-w-w-hat are you, McGillis!

[ As to that flailing: the arm closest to McGillis's chest should fall around his shoulders, neck, a convulsive grasp for support. On its recalcitrant and flustered way, he swipes at collar, fingers claw through blond strands (not meeting scalp, not quick a smack, not quite a combing through, not quite a shove), until scrambling across the back of his neck and clutching at farther shoulder.

His other hand vacillates between beating and grasping at McGillis's front, as his eyes swing between McGillis's very near face and the floor, finally settling palm against the starred shield of Gjallarhorn.

In other words, palm against pectoral.

Against chest.

Something he has yet to realize while adjusting to this stark change in position. During his floundering, surely only as a result of that motion, heat rushed through him, and sticks in his cheeks and neck, a rash of rose. ]

H-hey.

[ Much quieter than his initial yelp, eyes drawn down. ]

This is...

[ no, no, no. None of what he thinks, feels in the rapid and resonant palpitations of his heart can he say.

a safer word, that should be true, though must be dug out and dragged out from the farthest reaches, this farthest thing from mind and concern. ]

...embarrassing.

[finagles]

[ If the situation was less serious, he'd spare a moment to appreciate and draw out that pouting spell. It's always been strangely appealing to incite and to watch. However, that isn't why McGillis proposes an alternate explanation, nor does he lift Gaelio off the table to give him reason to confess.

Not to embarrass him, either.

And certainly not so he can receive a flustered smacking, but within the vein of responses he was likely to receive, he expected one similar to this. Noting, among that development, the lack of responsiveness in his legs and confirming belief with a note of internal dread. He takes the arms that flail against him in stride until Gaelio settles. He does settle quicker than McGillis expected him to, ultimately the more disarming development.

Settles and quiets with a hand against his chest, and McGillis has already been quiet, leaving them with nothing but the fact of their new position. A nostalgic twinge has him pausing. Memories of scraped knees and twisted ankles, back when they were much younger and Gaelio would exert himself to keep up. Memories that came later, long after he'd gotten the hang of keeping up -- post-training exhaustion, wobbly legs, pulling Gaelio in to lean against him on their way to the showers.

A long time ago. And within those memories, scattered throughout the long span of years, there isn't one that quite matches this.

A first time for everything. ]

You can't stand.

[ Comes the matter-of-fact reply. Out of the corner of his eye, he's able to pick up on the dusting of red spreading across the face that lingers so close to his.

How easy, how simple it would be to turn his head --

Even if he dreams, he doesn't dare. Not this time, not like this, not while he's still trying to pinpoint the meaning behind Gaelio's injury. He slides the arm beneath his shoulders closer in, to secure him in place. Staring ahead, serious and focused, he begins to move forward. Out towards the corridor. ]

So we'll use my legs. Don't worry, it isn't far. I'll avoid being seen.

[reckoner]

[ It might be the dream, the air of which colors with what they share. Suffused in it, Gaelio has not yet recognized the fabrication of it, a moment invented and stolen from a past long dashed against rocks, long crushed in scorching, screeching metal.

But, it might be the dream that makes nostalgia contagious, or his own disposition toward savoring proximity to McGillis, mind brimming with his collection of every like moment past. It might be both that provides so readily the reel in his mind: the first time McGillis did not step away, did not shrug loose, let him lean. Regularity thereafter, mapping years and growth less by lines against the wall, more by the expanse of those shoulders. The muscle-corded strength of that arm so quick but firm in tugging him close, perceptive of his weakness and encouraging. Flushes of gratitude, born only, had to be only, of blood still rapid from exertion.

No, nothing quite like this. They tended to be more pungent with sweat in the more recent memories, slung against, tanks sticking. If he were to drop his head low, straining his neck but not too far, he could tuck his face between shoulder and neck and inhale, and it's only as his chin begins to tip, as though ceding to magnetism's pull, that Gaelio realizes both the thought and the movement and halts them.

If crimson keeps, even darkens, it must be due to embarrassment alone. After all, as he mutters, voice low and oddly husky, ]

As if anyone wouldn't see you.

[ McGillis Fareed, as much Adonis as Apollo, between spectacle and authority it's laughable to think every eye wouldn't turn and hold. Gaelio does drop his chin, but toward his own chest, curling in -- at which point he realizes the placement of his hand.

Heart thunders in bright red ears as he looks for a second that stretches, and stretches, too conscious of the sturdiness below both hands. Muscle and strength and the effort of years he alone witnessed. A man of Gaelio's size can't realistically fantasize about a truly enveloping embrace, but --

he jerks his hand back, tucks it below his chin. Focus on the sinking, not the blood. ]

...you don't have to trouble yourself. They already think what they think.

[ It must range. Bauduin commands respect, but Gaelio's not oblivious, Carta didn't need to call him a perpetual loser for him to understand. With McGillis, there were some that saw the Fareed heir as humoring the Bauduin. At worst, he was ridiculous. Gaelio rarely minded, at times amused, even smug.

Even if ridiculous, he stood at his side. Jealousy was so unattractive.

Even if ridiculous, McGillis lends him his legs. ]

But, geeze. I'm some bodyguard. You're always looking after me. You'll get tired of it someday, and then what will I do?

[ Don't lean, don't breathe too deeply. His fingers adjust on farther shoulder, shaping deltoid. ]

[finagles]

[ That tipping, Gaelio lowering his head an inch. Reflexively, McGillis turns his head to check on the development, catching him face-to-face in the moment that he rights himself.

An easy smile, and easy enough to face forward again in order to guide them through the hall, but not so easy to discount red, glowing cheeks.

He blinks to himself, a shutter of a picture overriding it -- white, jagged lines disrupting the image, slashing through it -- a slight catch in his step, also righted reflexively. The tone of voice with which Gaelio counters him, heard close to his ear, sits in the pit of his stomach. A slight clearing in his throat, followed by a noncommittal hum. Both in response to his ability to hide and Gaelio's discounting the effort, discounting the thoughts of others.

He doesn't particularly care either, of course. If a head or two turns at the sight of them in the hall, he ignores it with practiced composure.

The door to the medical station slides open. ]

If I don't look after my bodyguard, how can I expect to remain properly guarded?

[ Breezing past the question smoothly.

A little distance inherent in it, in the removed quality of his voice. He floats above the picture in his mind and settles on bright flare of Gaelio's features after settling him down on an examining table.

Another easy smile, keeping a hand steady on the back of his shoulders and lingering close. ]

Can you lie back? I'll go look for someone.

[ Though he's not keen on leaving him alone, it's empty in here today... ]

[reckoner]

[ Quick and broken, the meeting of their eyes. That McGillis ensures both keeps the blood from continuing to flood and burn, though it lingers, though it has not fully emptied when the door opens before them. Gaelio noticed on the way. The looks, the imperfection in McGillis's stride, the sound that vibrates close. Gaelio almost believes he can feel it against his arm against his side, carried through the chest against him.

Against farther shoulder, his fingers never still, but shift slow. Enough to pass for idle adjustments, but for kneading. But for curling there, and there, and dragging his thumb into that dip.

That may contribute to what lingers.

He shouldn't. He does not look at his hand, as though by being blind to it, he could be oblivious to it and had no responsibility for it, no need to stop. Only shifting his hold, rather than mapping the muscles of shoulder and neck. Like that he's carried, his eyes downcast, his face flushed, one hand curled low and the other searching, and his legs dead.

And his face itching. Only the right side in a jagged pattern, and he resists the compulsion to rub against McGillis's chest, or to scratch. Whatever prompts it, he knows with a heavy roiling in his gut that if he acknowledges it, scraping fingenails against the suggested line of it, more will break.

Distraction from the discomfort by the door, by McGillis's answer, so smooth as to be slippery, slipping toward insincere.

Gaelio's lips part, but he slants them closed with a prohibitive inhale.

Properly guarded. You can't with me, but I'll do better. I'll do better.

Too much like a plea, too desperate and crafting of excuses.

The table is metal, cold, hard beneath him. The room very bright, very white but for the slates of sleek grey metal, very sterile.

His arm around McGillis necessarily shifted when set down, but he has not loosed and dropped it, not with McGillis's hand, the warmth of his near chest. Gaelio keeps his eyes on McGillis's chin, rather than his eyes, huffing out a breath, struggling against a rush of solemn petulance. ]

If I lie back, I'll feel like a corpse.

[ With his discomfort beaten back, he manages instead to thread a jest through it, and it isn't as easy as it sounds.

Not when it really does feel like that. The metal would swallow him, or water. Why water?

But, he shouldn't prolong this inconvenience for McGillis, shouldn't keep him. His fingers still, palm begins to slide back, over McGillis's shoulder blade. Daring too much before breaking contact. ]

Hurry back.

[ Lightly, lightly, and it's safer not to expose his eyes when he adds, blithely, but quietly, ]

I'll be lonely without you.

[finagles]

[ Absent fingers run over his shoulder, dip close to his neck, just casual enough to pass for idle movement. It can be counted as a familiar facet of Gaelio's personality. He touches others casually.

McGillis still has trouble pinpointing the exact moments he began to change his opinion on the habit. The iterations of changes were slow, gradual, but many. Shifting over the years, beginning with cold contempt and suspicion, somehow ending in repressed satisfaction. Even after setting Gaelio down, McGillis recalls the shape of a thumbprint peppering the dip above his collar.

It has been dreamlike. He has the vague notion that he might be in one (since it isn't his, and since-), recalling details like the redness of Gaelio's skin and the ghost of his touch as exaggerations of a dreamlike atmosphere.

As close as they remain, he catches that inhale. He wonders what would've been said, what words would've escaped his lips that Gaelio deemed necessary to tamp down.

What has remained unsaid between them, in the length of time they've known each other? It could fill oceans. A condition that worsened the longer they ignored it, without managing to split them apart entirely.

As close as they remain, their hands remain on each other a beat too long. McGillis watches blue eyes evading his, the fascinating details of his features -- and with the distraction of that phrasing, his own mouth closes tight, on a thin line.

A corpse in his arms.

Why does it always feel that way?

I'll be lonely without you, and fingers sweeping again with detail that sits precise at the front of his mind, palm heavy at his back. It's dreamlike.

It's simple enough to tilt forward and graze his lips against a landing area of temple. An absent press. ]

Don't speak as if I'll never return.

[ Absent murmur, and indulging more as the dream dips into indulgences, while hands lift from him and he lifts back to stand straight, his palms pass as heavy and squeeze to cup the back of Gaelio's neck before letting go.

Carefully relinquishing the hold, a smile flits to his lips before he turns on his heel. A smile both fragile and small, shielding back something darker that presses at the door. ]

I'll be quick. Everything will be fine.

[ What masterful lies.

And he goes. ]