RP Log; complete

[chokhmah.livejournal.com]

When; backdated March 26/27th (past midnight)
Rating; PG-13
Characters; gun_gnir Jade & chokhmah Peony
Summary; In which Jade has a nightmare, Peony wakes him up (a la sleeping beauty), they attempt to talk about serious issues, and even manage to sap a little.
Log;

There was the heat from the fire and the smell of blood and the pained sounds of the dying amidst the laughter of the ‘monster’ that had worn his professor’s face. A monster that he’d created all because he had thought… Hadn’t thought really. He had assumed and he had neglected to really learn what it had meant… But it was more than that as well. There was a hopeful look on the face of someone he called a friend, a look that was only being held together by the idea that they were just amending for their previous crimes. The fear of losing those few he held dear in this world. It was their blood on his hands. Merely nothing more than a drop in the already vast amounts he had stained all over him. And one of the worst fears… That somehow he’d lose the lessons and humanity he’d learned and return to the way he had once been. There was only one fear and guilt and horror that would top that.

Jade had nightmares before. It would have been impossible to avoid such things with the life he’d led and the roles he’d chosen for himself, but they were never, or had never been this bad before. The dark blonde haired man, normally a rather still and silent sleeper, was shifting around in bed tonight. His lips moved, ever so slightly, in unspoken words and there was a very light and fine beading of moisture building up on his forehead. And yet, he hadn’t awakened because as much as he feared it, Jade couldn’t stop his mind from watching the worst fear he had, locked away deep inside of him, from playing out beneath his eyelids.

Watching Jade sleep usually was almost like watching the dead, he was that still. Except for the rise and fall of his steady breathing Peony always imagined that staring at a corpse would be much like staring at Jade. He reached out and swiped at a bead of sweat that slid from Jade’s temple, such a light sleeper, usually that act would have been enough to rouse the other man from sleep. It was hard to watch. Never in the years that they’d known each other had Peony seen Jade so visibly disturbed. Not even when their beloved professor had died. Not even when…that scene that Jade was probably dreaming about was reality. Time painted horror more starkly than the reality of blood. Time, age, lessons learned, it magnified the errors of the past.

Peony moved, his action causing one of the rappigs to roll off the bed in a dull thud. He straddled Jade, hands pushing the other man’s shoulders down, stilling the tossing and turning as much as he could with his weight. “Wake up,” he ordered quietly. Selectively deaf. Jade had always been that way, one of the few things that Peony found annoying about his lover. He pressed their lips together forcefully, nipping roughly at Jade’s stiff, dead lips. “Wake up,” it meant, a command that Jade always recognized without fail even if the intention behind it was different this time. His hands shifted, sliding his arms around Jade completely, holding all the shifting and tossing still, holding all of it in his arms. He sucked on that lip without thought. “Wake up,” spoken again this time, against those still dead lips it was almost a growl.

There was blood and the cruel sound of laughter and then Jade’s blood red eyes snapped open to gaze into the clear water blue stare of Peony’s own. It was only through years of recognition that Jade didn’t atomically react in a defensive manner to suddenly waking up in the arms of another person, having grown as much used to sleeping alone as he had of sleeping besides someone else. Instead, Jade met and held Peony’s gaze while the last of the nightmare faded from the forefront of his thoughts. It wasn’t until Jade blinked that the darker blonde came back to his senses and let out a deep breath.

“I’m awake now.” A response to the command. He always responded somehow to Peony’s commands, be it in physical form or verbal. Always to show that he was there and that he could still remember. Relaxing into the hold and turning his head so that he could rest his cheek on Peony’s shoulder, Jade brought up one hand to his the bridge of his nose. A headache or just the memories or the aftermath of the nightmare. He wasn’t one to lightly tell. It would go away. It was the past and there was no reason to dwell in the past.

But the memories would haunt him forever even if he didn’t dwell on them.

“Well?” Peony’s tone was expectant, just short of demanding that Jade talk. It made him wince. They were so unused to being soft or gentle that even when it called for it the most natural reaction was perfectly contrary to the concern that he held. He tried to pull Jade closer even if they were already skin to skin, his embrace so strangely protective. He was eloquent, it was demanded of him at times, but eloquence was so structured, built and artificial. It was more truthful for him to just push the words away for a moment and be protective and concerned without vocalizing it.

Of course Jade would need to be coaxed, it had been several years since they’d had a serious conversation of this nature and there was a reason for that. Both of them were more than just a little reluctant to bring up the unpleasant past. But maybe it was overdue. So he’d coax even if it was uncharacteristic of him.

Strands of dirty blonde hair clung to Jade’s face and Peony brushed them away, tidied them aimlessly as he waited for a reply to that unspoken command of, “Just talk.”

To be asked to speak… Unspoken as it was, it was a request just short of a command to talk. But Jade always talked. He was a rather eloquent spokesperson when the situation called for it and even when the situation didn’t. But he could also be horribly blunt and painful in the worst of times too. However, that was only when the situation didn’t refer to himself. When it came to matter concerning his private thoughts and feelings, he changed and clammed up, if not outright avoid the situation. There were less than a handful of times that Jade could remember being truthful and simple and actually voicing the thoughts that were always his own.

So to be asked…even if it was Peony…. Even if it was just the two of them and it was obvious that he was pained and troubled…. Letting out a humorless laugh, Jade pinched the bridge of his nose before dropping his hand and returning Peony’s hold with a one-armed hug. He didn’t need the protection. Would never ask of it. Would have laid his life down before he let any harm come to Peony that he could prevent somehow, but it didn’t mean that he wasn’t affected when it was so freely offered. “It’s nothing,” he said, so characteristically of him. It never was, of course, but Jade was nothing if not cold sometimes. Even to those he cared for.

The laugh that Peony echoed almost sounded exactly the same as Jade’s. They were so alike in so many ways, painfully alike. If the situation were reversed Peony knew he’d have been equally reluctant to speak. But if the situation were reversed perhaps Jade wouldn’t pry quite so hard at the issue. He’d always been the more aggressive of the two even if it wasn’t always apparent to those who looked at them.

“With you is it ever nothing?” he murmured against Jade’s hair in a dry voice. Just the slight difference in the inflection of his tone, it could have easily been teasing, easily been their norm.

Peony let out a soft whistle, almost absently. While Jade was the one that was most affectionate towards Peony it was Gelda and Nephry that answered best when he called for them. He could hear the soft pitter patter of them hurrying for him. “There,” Peony declared simply as the two rappigs climbed onto the bed. He shifted them so that both of them were lying on Jade. He’d never been good at comforting people, it was probably better to let Gelda and Nephry take care of it as much as they could without human speech.

Being sandwiched in between Peony and his rappigs was not all together a new experience for Jade, though it wasn’t exactly common either. He could tell them apart of course, although not as fast as Peony could. But he knew the basic habits of all of them, so it wasn’t as if he had to try and guess who it was that would respond first. And the names of said rappigs was both a comfort and a horrible irony at the same time. Nephry was the sister who cared so much for him, even though she knew how much of a monster he’d been as a child and Gelda…. Gelda the first name of the professor who…

“Does it really need to be said?” Jade questioned almost absent-mindedly, petting the head that rested on his stomach, Gelda was always the more motherly of the group, and turning to look at Peony in the dark. Jade’s eyes caught what little light there was in the room, due to windows and cracks between the curtains. The reflection was that of a jewel or old blood, dried up and stained, but still very much there and a painful reminder of the blood that had been on his hands and would always be there, if not always seen.

Jade fell silent then, lost in his thoughts and memories. While the color of his eyes brought the reminder of the blood on his hands, the fact that his eyes were such an unusual color were the reminder of how that blood ended up on his hands in the first place. His mind sometimes was all he was really good for and not even then all the time if it had caused so much trouble and grief in the past.

Peony let out a soft huff, one that Nephry echoed as if she perfectly understood the situation. “It doesn’t need to be said. But sometimes it helps, or so I’ve been told.” He shifted slightly, pulling away from Jade only as much he had to. Turning to lie on his stomach Peony slid lower on the bed so that he could rest his head against Jade’s shoulder. “Just think out loud. I won’t say a thing, I’ll be just like them,” he offered, looking up at his longtime friend and lover.

They had both done so much, been through more than many would in a lifetime. But they felt so young at that moment. They were both so ill equipped for these moments. When it was sensitive and when it was emotional. They were children when it came to dealing with these things. Peony almost looked it, looking up like a lost pet. Truthfully Jade owned him as much as Peony owned Jade.

He kissed the pale shoulder softly, still coaxing even if he knew they were inept.

If it helped, Jade had only seen it happen in others and never in himself. It wasn’t exactly a method that Jade could often choose, or even had the luxury to do so. There weren’t many who he trusted or who knew enough of the story to be more than a questionable youth that simply did no more harm than good. Looking down at Peony, Jade let out a quiet little sigh. He was certainly one of the few people in the world that fit both the trust and the knowledge. And if Jade had to make any sort of guesses, he would have to guess that there wasn’t going to be any way, sort of having someone come into their room all of a sudden, that he could get out of talking about his nightmare.

“You already know it was a nightmare,” Jade stated as if he was repeated already well-known and established fact about something ordinary and plain, rather than talking about a nightmare that had effected him so badly only a few minutes before. “And I’m sure you can guess what the majority of it was about.”

“It was just… worse this time…” Worse because he hadn’t really thought about it in so long? Worse because of the curse only a few days ago that had affected them all? Jade didn’t know and he didn’t know what else to say so he settled for silence as he continued to pet Gelda and avoided looking directly into Peony’s eyes while he searched for the right answer.

No speaking, no words from him. The life he led was overly verbose anyways so it was no loss to just be quiet for a few nights. Other than Jade’s quiet voice it was just the sound of bodies shifting against the bed sheets and quiet breathing. Peony nuzzled at Jade’s shoulder lightly, asking him to go on, to explain how it was worse, why it was worse, and why it shouldn’t be. The past never changed, it didn’t get worse. It was their state of mind, which he half blamed on this hellhole, that made the past more painful. But still, if not for this place he wouldn’t have an opportunity to just be there for Jade.

A kiss and touches against bare skin that were for once not sexual at all, that was all Peony offered.

“You’d think in my age that I would have gotten used to having nightmares by now,” Jade mused. Whether it was spoken to Peony or to himself, he wasn’t quite sure, but it didn’t really matter anymore since such things had already been spoken. Words were like actions. They couldn’t be undone or resaid. There wasn’t a magical eraser or re-do button to push when things didn’t go right or when the wrong thing was said. A person had to learn to live with the things they said and did. For better or for worse. Jade had learned how to deal with the ‘for worse’ since that day so many years ago, but he hadn’t quite reached the ‘for better’ part.

“I suppose… It’s because I was reminded of much I’ve actually gained to lose should things ever repeat themselves. They really were quite awful. The Professor. The fire. My foolish youthful arrogance. And if that wasn’t bad enough already, Luke somehow managed to find his way into my dreams as well.” It wasn’t much and it wasn’t detailed, but Jade wasn’t sure if he wanted to tell Peony what his nightmares had been like. Not out of fear or hesitation, but more out of knowing himself as he did. He knew what kind of attitude he would fall into as he described them. To anyone else it would seem cold and callous, but Peony would see it for what it was. Defenses. Walls Jade had built since his youth or walls that he had to climb over in hopes of understanding things that were so simple to everyone else. But not to him. And in almost a similar fashion, not to Peony either. They related on those points in a similar, but unlike fashion. “He really does manage to find his way into all sorts of trouble.”

“Though… For all the trouble he’s gotten into and for all the trouble he’s caused, I should wonder how his records would compete against mine.”

Peony buried his nose again Jade’s shoulder, nuzzling for a moment before biting him. “Idiot,” so softly spoken the sound was lost but the motion of his lips still spoke against Jade’s skin. Maybe he hadn’t been prepared for this either. For them to be open and share things like this, to hear Jade acknowledge all that he’d lost and all that he’d learned from that incident. Horribly stunted, that’s what they were. Their emotional development probably halted in their adolescence. Sharing these things? It was a big step for them, a big, forceful step that made both of them trip and stumble.

But they’d regain their balance. They always did.

Peony didn’t say anything more yet though he put his palm against Jade’s chest, rubbing in soothing circles. Jade wasn’t the only one to blame for all of it. Luke appearing…that was not entirely Jade’s fault. Peony too had asked it. And he’d ask that same thing of that child again because it was the right thing to do given his role. Sharing the guilt would do little to comfort Jade though. Understanding, sympathizing, none of it could really lessen the effects of the nightmare. “It’s like you told Luke. We’ll spend our whole lives paying for it.”

Paying for past regrets… Others wouldn’t see them as regrets or things that should be lamented about, but rather, things that had to have been done for the good of the whole, or had further the advancement of their society. Some would have even celebrated their choices. And that was how they had to see things as well. Judge what was best for all and see how things could be used to help better their society somehow. But it didn’t mean that just because they could see things in such a light that they enjoyed it. Or rather, the small part of themselves that hadn’t become wrapped up in roles and duties and responsibilities regretted it.

“I find that having to live forever to make up for my regrets rather distasteful.” Luke hadn’t been the only one covered from head to toe in blood on that day since past. But unlike Luke, it had been harder for Jade to lament over such things, even if he did regret them. It wasn’t a matter of not letting things affect him; it was more that he simply did not know how. The nightmares had reminded Jade that he still did not understand what it meant for a person to live or to die and that the true value of a human life… Was something he still didn’t understand, even with all the death he had on his hands. Necromancer was more than an appropriate title.

“I’ll be there too,” Peony replied with a certainty. He would live as long, if not longer than Jade, baring the possibilities of assassinations. And he had just as many regrets to make up for and even more inevitably regrettable decisions to make. “So I’ll make sure you take a break from that once in a while, we’ll do it together.”

Peony pressed himself more firmly against Jade since he couldn’t move any closer. When they got back, back home, back to their roles of emperor and subject, Peony would have some work to do. Something he’d very willingly do because it also meant bringing Jade closer to Grand Chokmah, meant that they could toss out that cot in Jade’s office and he’d finally bother to get a new bed for his own bedroom.

Those words… The meaning behind them… That would be as close to a confession of feelings as either one of them would get to if not under the influence of a citywide curse. It was almost laughable in a morbid and sad way how stunted the two of them were when it came to being truthful with themselves or with anyone else. “I suppose I’ll have no choice but to live with such a fate,” Jade murmured, a rare real and soft smile on his face. “Still… It could be worse.”

“A lot worse,” Peony agreed as he let himself echo that smile. He would have kissed Jade who looked so temptingly, and uncharacteristically, gentle. But that would make the smile dissolve beneath his and he wanted it to stay there just a moment longer. Peony pressed a soft kiss to Jade’s cheek, a rare gesture between them, before settling against the other man again. He couldn’t speak for Jade and he wouldn’t speak for himself. But Jade made the regrets tolerable.