pluviosa | SO BELOW

He laughs a little and rubs Shang Beida’s back gently. “Don’t know about that, but thanks. Anyway yeah, I was curious. And I wanted to get away from the water.” Or ‘water’, whatever. “I’m guessing you came to check on me? Thanks, schatzi.” It’s very sweet of him.

“I wonder what happened here. It’s… it feels lonely. Like it should be teeming with life, but…” Even he can be sad around dead things sometimes.

He leans into Casper’s side with a sigh of contentment. He… really did not realize how touch starved he was. “Yeah, I… didn’t want you to have to, um, be strapped to the railing alone? Or… for me to be strapped to the railing alone either, really.” He tilts his head to press a kiss to the other’s jaw.

“Yeah. It… the ghost I talked to said they had some kind of energy source that just… wrecked the whole planet with radiation, but that doesn’t explain the oceans being gone… but it’s all so… there’s just nothing out there. On the whole world, maybe, except for right here.” He shivers a little and wraps an arm around his boyfriend’s waist. It’s a strange, lonely feeling.

"Maybe it was so hot it flash-fried everything? I don't know." He leans into the other man a little more. "I... I kind of also came up here so that if I freaked out you wouldn't have to see it. And I know you're going to say 'I'd rather be with you if you freaked out' but I don't... want to make you upset." It hurts in a weird way and he doesn't know how to deal with that.

He's quiet for a few long moments and closes his eyes. "Even if this place has no water, it still reminds me of... that place." The castle under the waves.... "I've been trying to stay away from people so that I don't... freak out on them. No one else should have to deal with my issues. I don't want to deal with my issues." He opens his eyes and looks down at the deck.

Shang Beida blinks hard and bites his lip. “I don’t want you to have to be scared and alone. I… if it makes it worse and you’d rather I go, I can…” Time is running down, but he could get somewhere away in time, especially if he flew. If Casper really wants.

“I don’t want to make it… I just want to be able to help. You’re my- my boyfriend, I signed up to deal with your issues. And you deal with mine.” He’s well aware that he’s a mess, especially after… that. “I had a qi deviation all over you and everything.”

"No, I -" Ah, hell. He's gone and messed it up. "No, I just... I didn't want to make it worse for you." And he did have a deviation about that and he feels guilty about causing his boyfriend to worry and -

"I just want you to be happy. I want you to be safe."

"I'd still be worried about you even if I wasn't here. I just wouldn't be able to do anything about it. I wouldn't know if you were okay. I... I don't want to find you like you were when the plants... I don't want you to be alone. I want to be able to be here for you. And... not to make it worse." He twists to wrap both arms around Casper, face pressing into his shoulder. "I love you, 心爱."

He pulls his boyfriend in close, wrapping his arms around the other's back and rubbing it gently. "I love you too. I don't want you to be alone either. I'm just... sometimes I'm afraid that I'm 'too much'? That I'm just going to drive people away? And I don't want to... like... inflict myself on you. Even though I know that's not... how you see it."

It's probably the trauma. It's probably because he's always had to make himself small and ignore his own feelings for the sake of others his whole life. He's been here less than a month, he can't expect himself to change so quickly. "I'm just... afraid of being annoying and needy, I guess."

“You’re not too much for me. And you definitely don’t… you’ve never been inflicted on me. And absolutely never been annoying.” He turns his head to kiss Casper’s cheek. “I’m… I’ve never really been able to help anyone? Not that they appreciated, anyway, I nursed my king back to health but he was just angry about it. Not the point. I mean I just… I like being able to help you. It feels. Nice. I want to be able to be there for you. And I… I know I’m a lot, and I talk too much and I’m clingy and… I don’t want to be too much for you either. I don’t want to inflict me on you. I want… I don’t want to be more than you want.” He can’t help melting into Casper’s arms anyway as his boyfriend rubs his back, eyes closing. “I’m not used to… anyone liking me, I guess.”

Edited (A depressing final sentence) 2024-07-29 12:58 (UTC)

"You help me all the time." He rests all of his weight against his boyfriend, glad to have someone he's sure he can heal on. "You're everything I could want, schatzi. You're kind and sweet and you like me for some reason and you help me when I freak out and you don't judge me for it. And you're smart and funny and absolutely adorable and... and I could go on." He presses a kiss against Shang Beida's jaw, taking a deep breath of his scent.

"People... don't like me either. It's good that I'm away from them, but... I'm still an awkward mess. But you don't seem to care that I am..."

Shang Beida can feel his cheeks heat and he presses his face into his boyfriend’s neck with a whine. “You’re so nice to me. You just… say things like that.” He hugs Casper tighter, the other’s weight against him solid and comforting. “You’re so fucking sweet and you like me and you want to protect me and… I’m an absolute awkward mess too. I don’t know what I’m doing but… neither do you and we’re— figuring it out. And you’re so… no one has ever cared about me like you. And I still don’t know why anyone wouldn’t like you, you’re… you’re so great. I know you’re ice and death but… you might as well be spring, baobei. Warmth and light and life and… sorry, that’s. Sappy.” His author brain managed to actually be romantic for once but he just feels like a dork saying something like that. “我爱你.”

"... Yeah it is, but it was good." He chuckles and looks down at the straps. "... We should probably secure ourselves before we get thrown into the air or something stupid. I should... probably hang onto Bob, too." Not that Bob can't fly, but no one wants to get launched without permission. "You're.... if you're going to be okay, then I can be okay."

“Mm. Yeah. Straps.” He leans back and looks at them. “Next to each other, and then—Bob in your hoodie pocket maybe? We definitely don’t want him to get unpleasantly launched. Don’t want him to slide out either… I could pull out my spare robe to wrap him in to be more secure if he’d be okay with that. Up to you, of course, Bob.”

He kisses Casper’s cheek again. “We can… hold hands and both be okay.”

Bob huffs and walks down his hoodie into the pocket, nestling in there quite comfortably. Or as comfortable as a large raven can be in a jacket pocket.

That settled, Casper eyes the strap and hangs one end of it around the railing, pulling it across himself securely and wrapping the other end nearby. He also grips onto the railing itself - yeah, he can probably hold on to this, but the strap is a good insurance policy.

"I - um. It's okay if... if you're here. I - I'll be okay..."

"Right. As long as you think you're secure, Bob."

He presses a kiss to Casper's cheek again. "I'm here. And we'll both be fine." He wrinkles his nose at the harness he's carrying but shrugs it on and attaches it firmly to the railing, close enough to Casper that he's pressed against the other's side. He makes sure he's not getting in the way of Casper holding onto the railing, and... wraps an arm around his waist. "Don't want to get all... knocked into each other," he says, like he needs an excuse to be holding onto his boyfriend. But also he's pretty sure it'll be comforting for both of them. His other hand goes onto the railing, for good measure. "Kind of wish there was like. A countdown."

He leans his head against the other's shoulder, looking out. He feels something rumble and -

"I think that's our cue?"

Shang Beida holds tightly to Casper and the railing both. "Here we go..."

The ship lurches into motion, galloping forward with teeth-jarring steps until it leaps into the air and holy fuck that is a long way down. The engines propel them forward and. Okay. Flying boat. That's a thing.

"...I wonder if the flying engines use the whatever energy that poisoned everything with radiation," he says, because he is always going to focus on the stupidest possible detail. He squeezes his arm around Casper while they're in the air and not bouncing. "You okay, baobei?"

He doesn't seem to mind the height, letting his arms dangle over the edge. It's kind of exciting, seeing everything from this angle - he kind of wants to fly again. It's been a while since he's had a good flight.

"Maybe it does. I'm not sure. We could ask the Ship." He nods a little bit at the question. "Hm? I'm fine. Heights don't bother me. It's depths that do." He smiles softly at his boyfriend. "What about you?"

Heights do kinda lose their edge when you can fly. "I'm good. I didn't realize we were avoiding the like... Mariana Trench? Obviously not that because this isn't Earth, but. Yknow. The equivalent. Like goddamn that is just a.... really big crack in the earth. Canyon, I guess, now that it isn't underwater? I don't know geological...y terms. Geology, that was the word I wanted. But yeah just like... there has to be a reason it walks rather than flying everywhere. Like, the legs don't look... original to it? I assumed it was legs on an ocean liner, but if it's legs on an airship... there must be a reason they thought walking was better than flying. Either they didn't have the energy for flight, or there was a reason not to use it. And, uh. What the ghost I talked to said about the radiation was. Alarming."

"Yeah, no I was thinking that too. It must have a limited energy supply, or not have a way to convert whatever it's using into fuel efficiently enough to have a large store of it. Walking might take less energy than flying since you'd only need to power a leg the instant you need it to move, rather than constantly. And it's probably easier with the weight distribution and I'm rambling again, sorry." Not that Shang Beida doesn't, but still.

"What did the ghost say? ... How bad is it?"

"Baobei I was absolutely rambling that is the last thing you need to apologize for." He bumps the other with his shoulder companionably. "And yeah like... the ship is heavy as hell, and the like, physical structure of the leg itself would do a lot of the work holding it up, versus flight would need to like, hold the entire thing, and also move it."

"He said the shields on the ship would probably only keep the radiation out a few hundred more years... that it started before even his grandparents were born but there was some kind of energy source developed that went wrong somehow and was poisoning everything with radiation. I think everyone moved into cities that were shielded against it, but the shields were powered by the same thing that created the radiation, so it just kept... getting worse until... until all there was was this. I don't know what happened to the cities. I don't know why they didn't stop before it was too late. And I don't know how long ago he was alive, if there's, if we have a time limit ticking down on the radiation hitting us. I mean, no matter how long ago it was there's a time limit, but there's a difference between it being in a hundred years and it being like, next week. Sorry, I'm... that's depressing and alarming and all. I just can't stop thinking about it."

He feels the other bump his shoulder and he huffs. "Okay well. I know saying 'don't think about it' is not going to do anything useful. As for the radiation..." He's not sure how much that would affect him? "We could ask the Ship how long the barrier has left. And like... we're probably okay? I don't know how old the ghosts here are. It's not like I know fashion trends of the future Leg Boat people."

Anyway. Hm. "The domed cities kind of remind me of a book I read once? With kids fighting a virtual war that mas like a proxy war and - I dunno, I'm not usually a science fiction person but I think most civilizations that isolate themselves die out pretty fast if they don't have the resources to keep them sustained? And if there was radiation everywhere I can't see where they'd have enough resources to wait it out. I think radiation takes a really long time to go away depending on what kind it is?"

"Yeah I tried to be like what year is it for you, so I could like, ask the ship what year it was... but asking the ship about the shield would be a lot more. Like. Efficient. I don't know why that didn't occur to me. But... yeah, but like. Look at the Ship, they've got all this layered space full of farms--they clearly had the technology to make the most of space and grow food? Did the cities not have the shit the boat has, but if they didn't, why the hell not? ...Is all this spatial shit powered by radiation murder energy too? What is powering the shield and the spatial shit and the just, fucking everything?"

"...But yeah, the radiation definitely takes a long-ass time to go away, since it's apparently still all... deathworld out there. I wonder if the Ship knows the half-life..."

The other side of the trench is coming up. "...I think we're gonna land soon. Let's uh. Try not to bite our tongues off I guess." He braces himself, holding tight to the railing and Casper both.

He nods and holds his boyfriend close. "I've got you, schatzi." He presses a kiss to his boyfriend's temple and braces for landing -

It's a little harder than he'd hope, but the ship continues running in a rough, wobbly jog. He holds on to Shang Beida a little longer until the ship smooths out. ... The rain doesn't bother him as it starts to trickle down, but...

"Looks like it's going to get worse." He starts unwrapping himself from the railing and reaches over to help his boyfriend.

God, he thinks he could probably brave the Endless Abyss if Casper was holding him all protective like that. I’ve got you. It still makes his heart flip.

It doesn’t take long to get off the railing and out of the harness with Casper’s help, and he’s as glad to head towards indoors and out of the rain. “Wet robes,” he complains vaguely, then distracts himself by leaning in to kiss Casper. “Love you, baobei.”

He blushes faintly and nods. "Yeah... love you too." What else should he even say to that?

As they head back under the cover of Ship, Casper catches some water in his hand idly. ... Hm. He grabs his boyfriend's hand as they get under the overhang of the upper levels. "... I want to try something." He taps his leg and suddenly there's a clear baseball bat with a blue core in his hand.

He holds it out towards the rain and Shang Beida might be able to sense some energy flowing from him to the bat until -

The water collected on the deck around them suddenly freezes, then reaches upwards into a number of spindly threads. The tip of each thread starts to 'bloom' into a flower - a little childish, a little rough, but unmistakably a flower on each one. The flowers form into a 'carpet' about thirty feet long. ... Pieces are getting shattered by the ever increasing rain, but he pulls his boyfriend into a kiss, bending him slightly backwards as his arms wrap around Shang Beida. He doesn't care if he's getting wetter - his heart is too warm.

Finally he lets his boyfriend go, smiling. The baseball bat disappears as he taps it to his leg. "It might be really temporary, but I... um. ... I wanted to make something for you."

SO BELOW - EVENT LOG

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