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[prince_of_beasts]

A synthesized woman's voice picks up the call.

"Your call has been forwarded to an automatic voice message system. Two - Zero - Two - Nine - One - Eight - Two - One - Three - Two -- is not available now. At the tone, please record your message. When you've finished recording, you may hang up or press the # key for more options."

Dimitri hasn't figured out how to customize the thing yet.

Comments

[prince_of_beasts]

"I thought he wasn't talking to anyone! What did you -- ?!"

... he can't. Not now. He's burned out every emotion he has. He can't muster anything besides flopping back onto Darcy's shoulder, shaken by quiet sobs that soon subside because he can't. He's too fucking tired.

"Tell me later. Sleep now."

[saltwaterlungs]

"I've already been scolded about it, I know it was dumb, I- I fucked up. I fucked up, and-" she can't even say she paid for it, "it's- I'm handling it, okay?"

She quickly disentangles herself to shed her boots and remove her knives and such, returning to lay her head on his lap.

"I'm sorry," she croaks, settling in.

[prince_of_beasts]

"Don't. Don't. You're alright now. That's what matters."

It takes a bit more awkward shuffling for Dimitri to settle himself -- between the two of them they have a half-dozen elbows and twice as many knees -- but he does, arms wrapped around himself.

"We're alright," he mumbles, as the last scraps of his strength give out. "We're alrigh'."

[saltwaterlungs]

The same dream again, always, as her nerves slowly give out. Sleep comes cold and washes over her, and the girl who lived here will never-

She jolts awake at a noise outside and it's over, she can still feel hands on her face, she paws at the drool on her face. In attempt to let Dimitri keep resting, Darcy otherwise tries not to move too much, just keep an eye on his breathing.

[prince_of_beasts]

Too late. Even exhausted as he is, Dimitri sleeps light; he twitches through a brief nightmare before his eyes flash open with a gasp. He bolts upright, heart pounding just-in-case, unfocused eyes sweeping the room. "Wha's -- who's -- ?"

[saltwaterlungs]

"Nobody, Miti- I just thought I heard someone. 's okay."

She lightly grazes her nails over his leg, trying to ease his panic.

"We're good."

[prince_of_beasts]

Dimitri's mind catches up with the rest of his body. He settles, rubbing his eyes. "Goddess. Okay ... what time is't?"

Please let them have gotten at least an hour.

[saltwaterlungs]

Darcy withdraws her phone to check.

It's been a crispy 45 or so minutes and she relays as such.

"I don't think I'm getting back to sleep," she sighs, "especially if people are getting up now."

Which means they need to talk. Ugh.

[prince_of_beasts]

"Ugh. No, me either."

Dimitri feels a little less like he's the one who just woke up from the dead. He levers himself upright, biting back a yawn.

If Darcy doesn't say anything, he'll ask, but he doesn't want to pressure her right out of the gate.

[saltwaterlungs]

Darcy's already thinking about it, though. And there's no pressure he could put on her to speak that she isn't already putting on herself.

"Skulduggery... told me that the reason that the Captain isn't repairing the ship is that he found something out that's made him depressed. And... I'm fine, but it's been a rough month, so I've been thinking about what helped me in the past... Clarke- back before you arrived I think, on the camp- she... goaded me out of a spiral I was in. She told me it was alright to give up, knowing it would make me mad. And it did. So I tried to do that to him. I told him that it was totally fine if he gave up, and... some other stuff."

Details she can't share without tipping her hand, and she loves Dimitri like a brother but she knows his rage like her own and she knows the risks of telling him.

"He told me to decide how long I wanted my death to take, minimum five minutes. I said ten."

She rubs a hand anxiously over the side of her neck, slotting in to rest her thumb over her carotid.

"The Captain was going to strangle me for ten minutes. I apologized and I tried to-" deep breath that jostles the water in her lungs, "he let me go. He let me go, because of Skulduggery."

[prince_of_beasts]

"Because of Skulduggery?" Dimitri asks, because everything else Darcy just said is under a protective ringing white haze. He can't process it right now or he'll explode. Something vital will break deep in the core of him and he'll vaporize the Serena Eterna in an expanding cloud of caustic steam. "What does this have to do with him?"

[saltwaterlungs]

"I don't know."

That bit still doesn't make sense to her. Skulduggery is arguably the person whose gotten the closest, between seeing the bridge and the way Skulduggery seems to be able to handle him but... is that worth a life? Is that really worth staying the Captain's wrath?

"Honestly, I have no idea. I... guess I should be grateful. But..."

[prince_of_beasts]

"But?"

[saltwaterlungs]

Darcy goes very quiet.

"I just wish my life was mine. That if I fuck up I could just... fuck up on my own without other people getting dragged into it, even if it helps me. That's it."

[prince_of_beasts]

"That's -- that's ... "

Oh no. Oh no oh no oh no. Here it comes, the fog rising, the blinding searing horror of an Abraxas --

Dimitri's voice cracks. "Ten minutes, Darcy."

[saltwaterlungs]

"I didn't think he'd actually do it, okay?! I was trying to prove I wasn't scared of him."

Which she absolutely without a doubt totally isn't.

"But it's fine, he didn't do it, and I'm fine. It's fine."

[prince_of_beasts]

"It's not fine!" Dimitri fists his hands in his hair, lacking anything safer to do with them. "That's -- that's not anything you need to prove! You should be scared of him! You're the one who told me he never lies! Did you -- did you even tell anyone before you went to do this?!"

Again, again, it burns like a brand in his mind, "Ten minutes!"

[saltwaterlungs]

...right. She did tell him that.

"...no," Darcy admits, and visibly winces when Dimitri reminds her of how long it would've taken. The couple of seconds it took her to drown were agony enough, what would this have been like?

"I'm sorry," she can't bring herself to look at him, "I'm sorry."

[prince_of_beasts]

"Darcy -- !"

Dimitri doesn't like getting upset, least of all with friends. Between his strength and his status, any emotional outburst turns people careful and quiet. One of those things doesn't matter here, but the other can never and will never leave him.

But what else can he do? How else can he feel? Knowing he could have returned from one friend's deathbed to find another's? With no idea what was happening, or any chance to stop it? His mind burns and he just, he just, he just --

"Why?"

[saltwaterlungs]

"I already told you! I was- I was trying to help-"

Snapped back, but she really doesn't want to be lashing out like this at a friend.

"I'm sorry, I'm going to fix it and I've already been yelled at for it, okay!?"

[prince_of_beasts]

"That isn't -- it's not -- it's not about you fixing it, it's -- "

He doesn't know what he's trying to say. It's selfish. Darcy's the one who was nearly killed, and Dimitri's making her reassure him when it should be the reverse.

"Why didn't you talk to someone? Anyone?"

[saltwaterlungs]

"Because I didn't. I had the idea, and I did it, I didn't stop to think or talk it out with anyone. I just did it."

Impulsive as a greyhound with a rabbit. It's going to get her killed one day and she knows it. And in any case, the whole thing was hinged on knowing what the Captain was. She couldn't have explained it.

"I'm not scared of dying if it would've helped, Dimiti."

[prince_of_beasts]

Terror roars in Dimitri's chest, raw and all-consuming, visions flashing like lightning through his mind's eye -- a broken skull, the thunderous buzz of flies, the suffocating reek of rot from the dead-weight sprawled over him. Glenn died a knight's death, Rodrigue had tried to reassure him, but Rodrigue hadn't seen his son's body. He'd been in no shape to bring home.

"You should be!" Dimitri cries. "Enough not to -- to throw your life away like this! Enough not to seek it out!"

[saltwaterlungs]

"I wasn't-"

Darcy flinches at the outburst, both hands going up to the back of her neck.

"I wasn't seeking it out. I was just... trying to help."

[prince_of_beasts]

Has Darcy ever flinched from him before? Not that he remembers. Not that he's noticed. Dimitri freezes. Very slowly, he straightens, settles his shoulders, lowers his hands and folds them on his lap.

"I didn't," he says, halting, "I wasn't -- " He can't say he's not angry with her, because honestly, he is. But he wouldn't lash out. (Wouldn't he? Darcy seems to think so. When did Darcy start being afraid of him? How can he take it back?) "Please, Darcy. There are better ways for you to help. There are -- " Dimitri swallows. "You don't have to, to 'screw up' alone. That's what we're for."

("Bit hypocritical, wouldn't you say, old thing?")