narcissithstic | MENTAL LINK

Then you will have it.

[Absent and distant when he mouths out his response, her fingers still warm where they're laid out over his knuckles. She doesn't need to ask— she'd never need to ask— but with everything that's happened over the course of the last month, there's something to be said for the courtesy of sworn fealty: he imagines she needs the confirmation as much as he does.

The muscle in his forearm cinches tighter by degrees, wound by unseen, thoughtless tension.]

[ Her hand slides down his wrist, curling around the hardened edge of muscle to pull herself upright. It's just to illustrate how stiff he has made himself. She doesn't know if relaxation would help him, she knows that feeling of coiling in on herself deeper and deeper, the only way to keep from shattering. But how can she not wish him some kind of peace. Her thumb rests in the groove between radius and ulna. ]

Ren.

[ She can't ask him for any more favors today. She has been selfish and greedy enough as it is, it sits in her stomach like too rich a meal. A sigh. She wishes there was something she could say or do for him. All she can do is understand. To recognize the storm of his being and not flinch from its fury. ]

[Say it, he thinks, the sharpness of his own unspoken demand a terrible contrast to how small she is on the floor beside his perch - how open her heart is to him, and the gentleness of her aching fingers. Better that Ilde speak truthfully in his presence, selfishness embraced rather than spurned; if he dislikes what she asks for, he'll refuse. That much is his right.

The rest is hers.

He inhales once, cooly. Exhales. Tips his chin downwards by degrees to get a glance at her from across the curve of his own shoulder. Like this, their broodmates are far, too distant to intrude and for once, he's thankful of the fact.]

[ She is devoted to the brood, but there is no way around Kylo Ren as the central piece of that puzzle. The undeniable affection she has for him, for all his strengths and all his weaknesses. There is no hiding from him.

Don't fight it.

From the first moment they met he's called to her to let loose her desires, to unbind all of her inhibition. It's such a task when she has knotted them so meticulously day in and day out, each bond a ward to keep her suffering from breaking her into nothing but shard. He already knows so much, but what of those ugly secret things even she fears? Her hand tightens around his wrist, full of tension and struggle herself now.

Don't fight it.

Her breath shakes, body fighting her physically even as she works her mind to let go. Her want is so simple. She wants everything from him. Wants to mean everything to him. To entangle too deeply to ever escape or breathe. She sits up onto her knees, looking at nothing other than him. In that moment there is nothing else beyond them, not the humming of the Station, not the murmur of the brood. That is what she wants. To see only him, be seen.

Don't fight it. ]

Don't. Don't struggle.

[ Let it go, for now, with her. ]

[Thin as he feels— transparent in her presence owing to their bond— it's such a simple thing for her to ask of him. He can lean into her as easily as he draws breath and no part of himself would be lost. It's different than the exchange between himself and Sam. Stronger, perhaps.

And why wouldn't it be? They are mirrors in a sense: born to serve, entire lifetimes spent at the heels of someone else. For her, the Godking, him, the Supreme Leader. Ever since their first meeting he's wondered what the man (though he imagines her king would hate the term) might have in common with him - if that's why she stays so close in spite of their default bond or the knowledge that Kylo Ren isn't the creature she left behind.

He shifts forward, closer towards where she's on her knees, facing the intensity of her stare— of her. He doesn't blink. Doesn't flinch, doesn't fight it, just as she asks. There's a heat to it, a friction like the rubbing of skin on skin or wood before a flame, as if something might ignite at a split-second's notice. His free hand winding over her own and settling there, heavy, aching. Fingers edging on intertwining.

If Ilde wanted him to notice her, she's won that victory. For the moment it helps dull the pain of loss - holds his attention for beat or two before his thoughts (inevitably) circle back around to the emptiness of the station. A cold, hollow distance encircling them both that he's so thoroughly attuned to it nearly aches like the phantom pain of a lost limb: the reminder that She shut him out, as so many had before.

And for once in his life, even Kylo Ren is incapable of shirking the blame. He knows he was the one that wounded Her without so much as a moment of hesitation.

Again.

Perhaps that did make him the monster the rest of their brood believe him to be. Perhaps he would never again find favor in spite of any and all efforts to knit torn flesh - condemned and branded and cut off from his purpose. The longer he stays here, the less likely Cathaway is to change her mind. Ilde is too much like him. A liability.]

I'll teach you what I know tomorrow.

[And however much she craves from that point onward. Tonight, he needs to make amends, as much as possible.]

You should rest. You'll need it.

( So, Ilde wants us to rip out Petre's eyes and teeth, and hang him. )

[ the mental tone is basically just WELP vocalized. ]

( Thoughts? )

And?

[Ren's grown fond of Petre in spite of the inherent conflict between broods - that said, Ilde's rage isn't necessarily misplaced.] Wanting to act isn't the same as acting.

She doesn't guide our hands.

( Usually always comes before acting, though. )

[ He is right, she's not doing anything yet, much as Sam's concerned she might. And he's trusting her not to. So hopefully that doesn't turn out for the worst. Then again, this is Castor. ]

( I told her we can't kill him, because we'd be turning the rest of the Nest against us. She got an unholy level of pissed. )

Good. [Which, owing to the clarity of transmitted thought, is very clearly approval aimed directly at her rage. After the lengthy stretch of empathy in the wake of Avera 9, there's something satisfying about knowing someone else is privy to Ilde's untempered reflection.

Though it does spark an interesting train of thought.]

—why are you telling me this?

( Wow, thanks for the consoling sentiments, buddy, I knew you cared. ) [ obviously sarcasm, but more on the side of withering amusement than anything sharp. the question takes a moment of thought, before he answers. ]

( Because she needs someone with her, and I already struck out. ) [ By 'with' he doesn't mean as a keeper, and that notion's made clear in the transmission. What Ilde's going to do, she's going to do, and trying to police her will probably just put fuel on the fire. Right now, he means for her mental state. Whatever talk she needed to have, Sam didn't give to her. ] ( You mean more to her anyway. )

[ Sam's not stupid, he knows there's something between the two of them on the level of something darker the rest of them just can't reach to. Either way, considering it's Ren, he has no idea if the suggestion will be taken or ignored. But figures it's worth it to put it out there. ]

Your humility never ceases to entertain. [Milder than what it might otherwise be, at least.]

I'll speak to her. Petre and I have an...agreement; if I explain the situation to her, she'll understand.

[He feels it like wound thread, the tension held there under the pressure of shared responsibility, how heavily the idea of letting this lie wears on Sam's mind - as if Ilde herself is a charged blaster. It isn't an entirely inaccurate descriptor.]

( Well at least someone's having fun. ) [ he lives to entertain you, ren.

okay but wait, what is this bullshit right here? ]

( An agreement with Petre? What kind of agreement? )

The kind that means he and I share a similar mindset. More importantly, motivation.

[So yes, he's having the time of his life at the moment - aside from all the misery and self-loathing and general grief.]

I think he likes me.

( I'm glad you found a new friend, man, but that doesn't really tell me about the agreement part. )

[ he gets that you like each other, which, okay, no accounting for taste, but what does that mean? He'll back off Ilde? Because that would be lovely. Agreement usually means both parties get something, so-- ]

( What's he getting from you? )

Guidance.

[It should fill him with a grim sense of pride that so many on the Station now look to him for assistance in furthering their own strength. Perhaps it does on some distant, entirely unnoticed level— Ren isn't exactly a master of introspection at the best of times, let alone moments like these.]

A purpose beyond existence alone.

[~~A big brother that acts like a toddler, you know the deal~~]

( A purpose. And you're going to provide him with that. )

[ excuse, but what the eff purpose are you going to issue him, ren? he has a purpose, it's serving the nest. not that he seems to care, but whatever. apparently ren has a new minion. one that's going to piss ilde the hell off. one that sam doesn't trust as far as he could throw him... well, okay, less than that, because Sam can probably throw him pretty damn far.

the concern that's there, in the link, isn't for what ren will do with him, but more what that kid might try if he turns on him. he didn't exactly seem any kind of stable or reasonable, and has already messed with Ilde twice. ]

( Just be careful, okay? )

[ The mental fog from waking is still present, but there's something more important to focus on. It's hard not to, after all, from how intensely Ren's rage could be felt down to the bone. ]

( Ren. )

[Whatever Hux might feel across the distance as awareness finds him, there's no mistaking how much it worsens the moment Ren's mind twists to establish the connection between them. It isn't forced upon the General as a purposeful assault, doesn't come as a weapon pressed to his throat, bearing down against vulnerable skin. Instead there's a sincerity to be found in it - more akin to a wounded animal in howling, bitter agony, incapable of restraining its own desire to lash out.

Still, it hurts. Vividly, violenty. And aside from that drowning sensation there's no affirming vocal or mental response. Nothing to latch onto as a sign Kylo Ren is even dimly aware of Hux's attempts to reach him.]

[ it feels like the shrill ring that's left after a grenade goes off, even five, ten minutes after, the shocks still holding to him like a death grip as the symbiote bleeds loss into sam's mind, and all he can think is no, no no no, not like that. they were all linked and he was there, in his place, how can he just be gone so suddenly? there's this gaping hole in them now, and sam only feels it push wider and wider.

even as he's being shuffled out of the VEN building, only half paying attention to where hands are urging at him, on the pavement his feet hit, sam's mind is feeling over that bleeding void, like a soldier presses hands over a fatal wound, knowing it's useless to stop the flow of it. he finds Ren there, agony loud and searing, violent tempest that his mind typically is now like an inferno in comparison to a match stick. all he can do is reach, pull at him, such a stark urgency in the sentiment, but without anything more to say to fix this, patch this, or even begin to address it. ]

( Ren. )

[ Distance, he's found, dulls the senses. The connection is weaker in some ways. Or maybe just quieter, with having so much space between them. As he reaches for Ren, he's met with the easily identified static of rage, mind a jumble. It's as though he's hearing it all underwater.

But as Ren bridges the gap, reaches out a mental hand to pull him closer, the weight of it all comes crashing down at once. Like breaking to the surface, only to be met with a cacophony. Ren's anguish sears through like fire in his veins, like what he imagined being swallowed up by Starkiller would feel like. Through the daze and shock, he thinks maybe he didn't ever get off the planet and it's all being played in fast forward.

Hux's knee jerk reaction is to pull away, as though he's set a hand on a still heated ship thruster. The emotional pull is too strong, curled around his mind, vice-like. ]

( Ren. Ren! )

[The connection should be clear enough. After all, they are bound to one another like molecules, like air, like— so much more than anything that bears a physical existence within the universe itself. Instead it's muddied static, howling for the phantom pain of a lost limb that no longer exists, punctuated by disjointed glimpses of memories and music, the salt-tang of blood, the way Ilde's voice carries somewhere behind him. Behind them.

Something is wrong.]

[Thankfully it doesn't last. Like a bulb burning at its hottest before the filament snaps, there's a rush of sensation etched across their connection, across the map of Ren's tangible grief and outrage, the shaking of bloodied hands that've been scraped over shattered pavement. Drowning, desperate— cold water filling someone else's lungs. Rogers shouting in anger though it's all garbled by decay. Building, building—

And then it stops. Dies out alongside Ren's hold on their link, receding into stark, sickening silence.]

[ sam had felt pain when they lost anakin, still feels it like a throbbing wound, but it's nothing like what comes from ren. they had the bond with the force, he knew, and some manner of history, but it never came to light, despite so much ren had openly shared with him. there's a blur and a rush of things that aren't familiar - still ren, but not something he'd seen of him before, too muddled to make sense of yet. ]

( Ren? Are you hurt? What happened? ) [ there's the fear that it's some sort of brain damage, but wouldn't the symbiote repair that? it had pieced sam's mind back together, after all. dread sinks deep in him, anchoring and dragging at him. ]

( Are you ignoring me? )

[ u said... i was special........... or something like that ]

Why would I ever?

[A flicker of emotion; sincerity wound throughout a deeper, grounding pain. The phantom ache of a lost limb— and more.]

HATRED all will suffer for their crimes.	SERVICE within it, glory beyond measure.
CONTROL chaos brought to heel through pain.	FEAR failure, weakness, mediocrity...

MENTAL LINK | IC INBOX

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

after ILDE

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

no subject

day 023

no subject

post boom :(

no subject

okay take II and let's pray my phone doesn't eat this tag as well.....

no subject

phone no!!

idk petre misses his big bro

Petre.............................