“right, let’s say it doesn’t concern me. but i’m not concerned. i just don’t buy it.” that he’s doing anything but resting and, what, being a sitting duck? yeah, right. “and believe it or not, clueing me in on a thing or two might not be the worst thing you’ve ever done.” the impertinent quirk of his brow says it all: he’s not one to excel in staying out of the wrong place at the wrong time.
He told her much of it —— not all, couldn’t bare / bear it, it hurt too much, but Xion understands that and would never demand more. But he told her so much, as much as he could stand to, because he couldn’t handle the unease of her dreaming of that torture the way she dreams of the way knuckles felt against the straight line of her his / throat or the stars that always followed. Wanted to warn her, so that she could choose to leave. When she didn’t, so she might at least be prepared.
( what a sad pair they make. preparing each other for the trauma they’ll inevitably inflict. )
She has dreamt of Tartarus. His memories live in her, something painful - warm, sometimes worse, sometimes - sweet ( loves his family, mother, his favourite birthday ) — she has dreamt him and of it. She hasn’t told him, even when she wakes up with a hand around her throat because she’d rather choke than have to swallow more flame, rather shatter bone. It hurts, and sometimes she thinks he mind will crack with the weight of it, but it hasn’t yet and so she ———
Right now, she’s grateful.
Her hands settle on his face; she sinks to her knees between his, where he sits on their couch, collapsed in on himself. Spine curled, bent painfully. She looks up to him. He’s so much taller than her but he’s so smallnow that she can press their foreheads together.
His eyes are far away the way hers are, when she sees and feels his agonies.
“Percy,” she says, voice very low. His eyes widen, storm - at - see, and don’t seem to see her when they raise. “Percy, I’m here.”
“Xi —”
“Yeah. I’m here. You’re here, too.”
That has his eyes clearing, just barely, and Xion feels a watery smile steal her mouth. She loves him. Seeing him like this feels like Xemnas’s hands between her skin and self, rearranging. Something wrong, innately bad, breaking the fabric of her self and her world, and he is so much of her world. She wishes for not the first time that at least the memories she leeched from him could be stolen in truth, if only to save him from this, but —
“Am I — hallucinating?”
— but he’d never want that. She wouldn’t, either. They both know how precious memories are.
“Yeah, Percy. But it’s okay. ‘Cause you’re safe with me, okay?” Even now the words feel wrong in her mouth, sick self - devouring insisting she can keep no one and nothing safe, but the comfort is more important than Xion or the way her body feels like a weapon, or at least something built around one. “You’re in our apartment. Here —” She lets go of one of his cheeks and he lets out a quiet, wounded sound at the loss, but her hand finds his and guides it to the hand still against his face. It curls gently around her wrist. “Feel my pulse. Can you feel my pulse?”
“I —” His voice fails. She breathes and does not cry, because she can’t. Because there are more important things than her pain, and because he has ached for her in so many small and so many gaping - wound ways that she can do nothing but return the favor. Her free hand presses carefully to his chest.
“I can feel your heartbeat. Can you feel it?”
“Yeah —”
She takes his other hand and presses it carefully to her chest.
“Can you feel mine?”
Mine. Mine. He taught her that she was allowed to call it that.
He breathes. His eyes draw closed.
“My heartbeat’s real, Percy.” She remembers, pulse like breath around she / he and Annabeth. Remembers how overwhelming and sick and exhausting it was. Not just a place but a CREATURE, a WILL. Not just a thing that would do them harm but a WILL THAT WISHEDTHEM AGONY.
Her heartbeat flutters, bird’s wings stilling too - quick. She is not that. She knows. She knows that he does, too.
“My heartbeat is real. The other one isn’t.” His brows furrow. She guessed right. “Feel my heart, Percy.” His name again. Over and over. His name. He is Percy, and real, and not just a small collection of agonies. “It’s real. You taught me that, right?” Her voice almost breaks. “My heartbeat is real. I’m real, and so are you. Not the other pulse. Not the fire.”
His hand tightens around her wrist. It doesn’t scare her.
“I love you,” she breathes. His shoulders loosen, a breath escaping neither had realized he was holding. His eyes are still feverish when they open, because love cannot undo all agony, but they meet hers and he SEES HER.
he’s not going to ask about — gods, what was his name, gabe? he’s not going to ask how young percy was when all that mess started, but he wants to say, i know, i understand, i get it. feeling young ought to take a mind back to safer times, because happiness is easier when all is safe and secure. it hits him abruptly, sometimes, how young they all were when life took a sudden tilt into a nosedive, and how all the danger and uncertainty robbed them of a childhood. percy had, if his camp adventures were anything to go by, never been fully safe, never really been allowed to be a regular kid. neither had he; it was jarring to hear someone else say it out loud. at a loss for words, jason simply reaches over and pulls percy into a one armed hug.
when it felt right to joke again, he’d tell percy that they had so many things they missed out on to catch up with, and they’d better start with tamagotchis. right now, though, he’d just hold on for a bit.
“ it’s been too long. “ and there’s an almost awkward moment between them, mostly instigated by reyna who’s still standing like a roman praetor: straight-backed and uptight, in contrast to percy whose form always seems relaxed and easygoing. she can feel that weird bit of energy between them, friends who don’t quite know how to greet each other yet.
and as reyna only hesitates slightly to go in for a one-armed side hug, percy meets her with what she thinks was supposed to be a handshake before he realizes what’s happening. seeing her start to pull away, percy laughs and immediately wraps a hand around her shoulder, hugging her so fiercely she almost loses balance. reyna’s still smiling as they let go. “ yeah, i missed you too. “
leo getshim on the cheek, and percy rolls back against the arm of the couch, cracking up. “h–heeeey now.” and in the back of his mind, he can already hear the lizzie mcguire movie they’re bound to hum for the next six hours. still, he musters up the next couple words between the laughter caught in his throat. “you’d better watch your back, valdez. this isn’t over.”
and… it really isn’t. because the next time they’re scrolling down their phones on his bed, he reaches his very tall way across his bed and blows a raspberry on the spot leo’s t-shirt is riding up. tummy? absolutely gottem.
