Day 66: Game Room (Fourth Shift)

[knightspirit]

The game room, huh... In normal, everyday life, it wouldn't have sounded too terrible, but as things were, it seemed like more of an annoyance. Games were fine, but priorities.... On the other hand, Kyousuke seemed to have hit a block in figuring out the clues to the the illness, and just thinking without getting anywhere wasn't very productive, either. At this point, it may have been best to push it aside and come back to it fresh. He had his reservations about it, especially since the end of the day was rapidly approaching, but... Frustration wasn't going to get him any closer.

He poked around what games were there with resignation, still half wondering what he was even doing and trying not feel guilty for needing a break. After a while he came across an electronic device marked "Game Boy Color" and picked it up out of curiosity. He'd heard of those before... If he was right, this thing was older than he was, by quite a bit. Flicking it on confirmed his suspicions; the sound and graphics from it spoke for themselves.

Shrugging, he took it a random seat, wincing at the pain in his ribs as he sat down. He guessed it wouldn't kill him to mess around with this thing for a little while.

[Lloyd!]

Comments

[atrabilis]

Nothing was wrong, and yet, Albedo would speak of apologies. He would place himself at fault for something he had no hand in, for a task another had forced upon him. Frowning, Nigredo raised his head and stared evenly. {Don't,} he gave.

Don't apologize to him. His life belonged to his brother, and he-- {I owe you everything.} And apologies did not exist, not from this source.

As for the purposed cure, Albedo gave facts Nigredo had considered but ultimately overlooked for the end result. It was foolish, he knew, but the boy supposed he could be excused given what he currently was. Sickness had little room for caution. He nodded, solemn, albeit it came with an addendum.

"I wouldn't mind," Nigredo said. "If that becomes the only option, I wouldn't be adverse."

[purgatio]

Albedo's heart caught in his chest at his brother's sending. There was truth in it, and Albedo was having trouble believing. That Nigredo could say that so clearly. Believe that so utterly. His little brother's expression was solemn, serious, and Albedo could only stare transfixed, caught between fear and wonder. Again, he would hold himself in a kind of disbelief--for he had never thought they would be anything close to this.

He blinked, focusing on the conversation, and again tightened his fingers against his brother's hand. Albedo's expression matched Nigredo's own. "I know. I know you wouldn't." His tones had dipped into childlike, something in Albedo lost. "But I can't stand to be without you. So." He looked downward, then back up, watching near sadly. "So don't do anything reckless. Nigredo."

You're all I have.

[atrabilis]

One could never fake anxiety. Fear made a poor fabrication. Nigredo watched as truth and abjection passed through his brother's violet eyes, as guilt seeped into his own. The youngest had not meant to risk himself; he had only thought to raise a calculated point. He should have given it more consideration.

"I won't. Promise." Facets he would never touch again. "I will only do what you ask of me," was the conclusion. Nigredo may lose sense and falter in judgement calls, but he would not move on his own.

[purgatio]

Albedo wondered if he had meant to ask that of him, to only listen to himself. It was a temptation to be sure, but-- "Don't say that," he said harshly. "I'm not... I can't always be trusted."

The closest Albedo would come to admitting. What U-DO would do to him. What had transpired behind his eyes that night.

"Take what I say and advise, but don't just blindly trust me, I don't--" Deserve that kind of faith. I was the one who wanted to kill you, remember?

It had been so long, since Albedo had recalled that.

[atrabilis]

He watched Albedo for a long minute, with a focus unseemly for a sick child. Silence threatened to close his throat, to thread a string between his lips, but Nigredo rejected the impulse and simply sighed. It required clarification, he supposed. Anyone would have reached the same conclusion.

"You can't always be trusted," he echoed. Nigredo shook his head. "There will be mistakes, I know." He still had his mind, after all. He still retained that perfection in memory, that hatred behind another's eyes.

But Nigredo was no puppet, no slave to impulses not his own. "This is my choice." Since the beginning. "I refuse to move against you and Rubedo."

[purgatio]

He understood. Understood and accepted, even as there were flaws. Because there was something else there, greater than his own insecurity, to mention. The boy swallowed and looked away, and by the time he looked back, Alan's mien held traces of anger.

For Nigredo had spoken wrong.

"If you love me," he started, knowing very well how unfair that was. "You will go against him if you have need. Nigredo--" The boy reached out suddenly, to grasp his sibling's shoulders. "You know I would never ask you to go against him for me." And it was true, all of it, as stark and clear as it would ever be. If Nigredo ever took Rubedo's side, Albedo would be hurt beyond compare, but he would still love his sibling. And he would never ask Nigredo to fight Rubedo on Albedo's behalf.

"But you will do it," he went on. "If your life is at risk." Albedo stared at Nigredo, violet gaze burning hot. "I accepted you. And you said that was all you needed." To let go of a want for death. "And I won't have you throw that away so easily."

This was a tangent, and an awful, powerful one, but it was not something Albedo would simply set aside.

[atrabilis]

One couldn't blame Albedo for the anger, and if the younger was not the entity that he was, Nigredo might have acquiesced on principle alone.

There existed more, however, than a pitiful want of death, a complexity he could not swallow until more recent times. Until he had his reason to cast aside wants for truths, Nigredo would admit that at some point, throwing away his well-being for an arbitrary purpose might have been the bone and bread of his life. Only now, Nigredo remembered himself, in ways memory could never touch.

In the beginning, there were no sides. Only his brothers.

"To risk my life," he began, quiet in his explanation, "is to go against you. As much as it would be to fight Rubedo. And I won't betray either of you." The single unmovable point. "Don't think that I would let myself die, Albedo. After everything."

[purgatio]

There existed comfort and pain. Nigredo would dole them out in equal measure. He would declare a denial of death in the same breath as he would speak Rubedo's name. But wasn't that what Albedo wanted? Hadn't Albedo been the one who had tried to convince his brother that the both of them had been loved?

That was true, but everything had changed. Everything, now, had changed. For his brother was sick, and might become something that could not recognize Albedo, and Albedo had killed to protect him, and still needed to save him.

His mental state was frayed and unraveling further, and in the end, he could only-- The boy pulled closer, hands still on his brother. "Do you love me?" He had asked this at the beginning, and it was the same now. A need for stability, a want, a desire. But here came a sharper edge. "Nigredo, do you...."

Love me best. More than any other. It went unsaid but was so easily, pitifully given.

[atrabilis]

The question... That question came as unexpected, and Nigredo stared outright, mind flickering between comprehension and confusion. To love one best, however silent the hope, spoke volumes, and for one like Nigredo, it came as a pivotal point. An approach at the crossroads.

Without this scenario, perhaps they would have never touched the question. As it was, Nigredo was beginning to understand the strain present in the other. A part of him continued to wonder why Albedo was bending backwards for a shared task while the rest knew the very reason why.

Nigredo pulled a hand free to place on top of his brother's hair, an attempt at calling attention. {I love you best.} Meant more to him than any other for multitude of reasons. For one. {You're the one who keeps me alive.}

[purgatio]

Despite everything, despite the fact that Albedo was the older brother, and Albedo was the one who needed to take care of Nigredo, and that Nigredo was sick-- Despite all of that, Albedo leaned forward, head huddled beneath Nigredo's chin against his chest like a child requesting comfort. Like another time. Albedo's hands moved to grasp Nigredo's shirt front, and as before, he inhaled shakily, breathed in his brother. Swallowed warmth under his tongue.

"I'm so tired," he murmured. A thought in the night, a simple truth come to pass. And it was the first time, the past few days. Albedo had never been one for exhaustion, had never spoken any word of fatigue before this. It was a claim to mortality, to weakness of the like that he had never shown. And above all, it reiterated the strain on his mental state, the pure and simple truth that something was fading.

But still, he breathed, and on his intake, Nigredo's scent was strong, familiar--still sugar and decay in his mouth. This touched on reassuring. He breathed, and held to this sibling.

Like there was something permanent in the moment. Like there was something breaking in time. Like there was comfort, when perhaps there wasn't. Thought would break in a moment, like minds in the night, reform into nothing, but for now, Albedo took relief in the thoughtless silence; quieted in the peaceful ripples of a action long since realized.

Stilled within the only sanctuary left to him.

[atrabilis]

Arms reached easily, wrapping around to hold another in a firm embrace, and Nigredo--fever, sickness, and all--murmured concerns beneath his breath. He found a kind of premonition afforded to parents and lovers alike, where the consequences of his beloved seemed as clear as his surroundings. As damning as the implications. And even as things were, Nigredo would not allow them to fall into place.

He was never the passive witness to a brother's suffering.

"You are tired," came the agreement, quiet and without heat. "You've done more for me than anyone." You've accepted me. And that was all he needed. Albedo was correct. Correct but--

Nigredo lowered his eyes, his line of sight filling with white. There would be parts and pieces to sort, but for now, what was in front of him was fine. "Trust me to live," he pleaded. "I will never betray you."