boxfullofzeroes | voicetest the voiceless

voicetest the voiceless

They're not dead.

Less dead than they'd felt, at least. Their shell doesn't normally take so long to reform.

Then again. Their shell doesn't usually break of their own violation as they ascended in a boiling rage, ate at least one realm, a god, and all the Godseekers.

(That last point is debatable, actually. There's some odd sense, deep under their...shell? Void? Wherever they once stored things like Isma's Tear, much deeper now...that the sea-mind is still there, sluggish and held in a stasis. They're already adjusting enough, and they don't seem to be dying or trying to kill them, so that problem is neatly sorted as 'for later'.)

They push their body to stand. Their horn clangs uncomfortably loudly against the grate they've apparently woken up beneath. They're somewhere in the Royal Waterways. A quick check of the map--or, not so quick, as it takes time to locate where it had been--shows they've risen about halfway through, closer to the City of Tears than the White Palace. They'll go to the Stag Station in the City Storerooms next.

So they think. Complications arise on the way.

The Infection is gone, leaving dead Flukes, Pilflips, and Hwurmps in piles enough it takes time to force their way past. Their body seems too small. No, their body is fine--there's something wrong with perception itself. That will take time to adjust to.

Then, they discover the Monarch Wings now stretch and warp when used, twisting around the nearest pipes after landing before the Knight forcibly calls them back. Shade Wings, they decide to call these.

Once they're high enough to hear the rain above, they realize a noise they'd ascribed to water running in the distance is, in fact, something swirling behind their mask. Many somethings. All the fragments of Siblings with enough self left, staring out from their eyes. It's disconcerting.

By the time they actually get out of the Waterways, they're using their Shade Wings to grip ledges and drag themselves up, with those holding onto things better than their own arms are with the Mantis Claw.

The Knight faceplants awkwardly onto the floor of the building Lemm's shop is in. If the City is the same as below, there's little left to try killing them in the area.

They'll just take a moment here, thanks.

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(He is focused, and momentarily stressed, but this is broken briefly by the appearance of the smaller Shades. Greenhorn especially gets a hesitant, wavering little acknowledging nod. Hello, yes. He sees them...)

The shadow of the Shadelord's palm towers, a little bit.

At his sides, Lemm's hands squeeze into fists and loosen again.

He comes closer, resolved, and touches at their palm. His own flattens against it, in fact, like some terribly mismatched celebratory gesture.

The Shadelord's hand is solid, still, in a way the Knight's were softer. It is still them. He can get used to it. And they're fine. They are, for all intents and logical purposes, fine.

Lemm huffs a sigh and, hand still against theirs, turns to look up at their face.

"This isn't one of the silliest things we've done." Is it. Affirmation? What is normal, for them?

Compared to theirs, his touch should barely register, if at all--and yet it does.

They don't know what he means. They're having trouble thinking, suddenly.

Lemm's hand is tiny speck of warmth, the shape of his claws spread across their palm no matter how little space it takes up. They want to hold him, like they did Grimm, but they're--they--they're being absurd, they know it, but still--

One claw. Their smallest. Carefully shifting, creeping closer, easy to see coming, easy to get away from. Coming to curl around his back.

Ah.

He doesn't look. He sees, definitely, there's no way he'd miss it - but he doesn't look.

If anything he stares at the floor, determined, or resigned, or something else entirely.

The Shadelord's talon touches at his back, and Lemm sways just the barest little nudge at the contact.

It's. Fine.

Is it?

They don't squeeze. They don't move. There's the desire to stroke down his back and know how his ruff feels like this, but the Lord of Shades refuses it. They just...leave it there, feeling as though the Nightmare's Heart is thundering somewhere in the back of their mind. It's persistent enough they check inwardly, but no, it's nothing. It's only them.

It's not the silliest thing they've done, it's stranger, it's weirder -

Anyway, it would be nice (not for him, for someone else) to enjoy this, it would be nice (for someone else) to take a moment like this and run with it. For anyone else it would be nice to go and do something so bold and heartfelt and come back and write about it and maybe an age later someone like Lemm would get to read about it and it'd seem so very fantastical, wouldn't it, to connect with a god like that.

That's not what he wants.

Lemm trudges a step forward and follows his hand's lead and rests against their palm horn-first. It would be nice, for him, for now, to be reassured.

Their claw curls a little more before they can think.

They freeze.

Lemm's fine. The Lord of Shades is fine. The Knight is fine.

A memory surfaces without prompting: standing at the Stag Station after the first shared ride, nervously standing at his side, making sure he won't tip over without touching. He's not tipping over now, he's only leaning. Into them. Intentionally.

At an aching pace, their claw slides down, settling somewhat around his waist. Wrapping around a little further. Another, angled straight, setting where the last had been.

Nearly as slow, their head tilts and lies sideways on the pavement, staring at Lemm partially through their fingers.

- and maybe it's unwanted, he wouldn't be surprised but he would take it gracefully this time - he promises himself he will take it well. He will. He waits -

The first claw follows him into place, and then a second.

Lemm's shoulders slacken, he turns his head just a notch down and to one side. It's not a nuzzle. It's not. There is something very interesting on the floor over there.

Memories, in turn, of the Knight looking at him, of the way they err around him, because he doesn't signal right, because he can't say, thoughts of times they touched his shoulder or patted his horn and he didn't know what to do with it.

There are solid claws around him and they're fine. They are fine. There is not a scratch on the Lord of Shades nor the Knight nor any of their Siblings. They're fine and they will get their mask fixed and they will be fine.

Lemm has one hand pressed flat against their palm already. The free one sticks itself unceremoniously through the gap between their claws and holds at the back of their hand, hugging it to him - or rather hugging himself to their hand, really.

(They are huge and could snap him in an instant but: they won't. Lemm knows they won't. He has faced them down in worse moods, Knight or Lord of Shades.)

Facts assert in their head in a list:

Lemm is tiny. He is vulnerable.

Lemm is their friend. He trusts them.

This is not a hug.

This is almost a hug.

Gentle, slow, not quiet as slow as before, their hand curls until it's fully around Lemm's back. Not crushing, not trapping, attuned to be pushed away should he make the slightest shove, only holding.

They don't pull him closer. Instead, they move. The Lord of Shades' body curves until it echoes their claws in a C-shape; a protective, affectionate wall.

He hadn't actually considered what this would feel like until just now, which is why it occurs to him a little late that it might be a lot, actually.

A minute shiver runs through him as he registers that what is happening is he is being held. He hadn't quite thought this far ahead (the thought had occurred, though, somewhere much deeper and fainter and never entertained enough to properly register) but they are holding him, aren't they.

He is too old to be this affected. And these things aren't for him, they're for other people to go and do. And anyway -

Lemm shuts it out, all of it, and holds himself tighter to their hand and tucks his head in; it is dark and he is very aware that they're surrounding him and his friend is - willing, they're not pulling away but coming closer and that's - it's - it's so secure. He doesn't know what he was expecting. (Stay, he wants to stay.)

Hopefully they don't mind too much that he is rain-soaked. A wet beard and fluff aren't exactly the most pleasant of tactile sensations. Maybe they can try this again when he's dry, another time -

- They're fine, anyway. They're fine and they're here and it feels - all the tightly-wound stress is falling away so easily.

"'M sorry I shouted," he murmurs into their hand, sounding terribly dazed, and presses their hand closer. "Again."

A moment. He'll have a moment of this and then he'll pull himself together. They do have places to be.

...They remember...it was nice, to hide under Seer's wings. It's a strange thing, comparing their abyssal form to soft darkness such as that, but watching and feeling Lemm react, the wonder if it's so different to him.

They shake their head and pull a single claw back, hesitating, and oh, they're an idiot. They are the Lord of Shades, Lord of the Void, and their body is something they can do anything (nearly) they wish with.

They make that claw dull along its point and length, and then rub it back and forth across his shell. They don't mind--they don't care. They care for making him worry, that's all.

They will feel him go tense in a nasty, jerking flinch.

He doesn't know how to think about anything else suddenly, he wasn't ready and the contact is like the times the Knight has tried comfort before and it knocked him so terribly off guard he couldn't - it's -

Careful what you wish for, and all, but he wanted to be reassured. And to reassure. Lemm reminds himself of this, over and over, as he stands there in total hyperawareness of the dulled claw moving against his back and the cool presence wrapped around him. There is no reason to hold himself apart from this; he knows it's earnest, he trusts the Knight.

He tentatively allows himself to register: the contact is achingly nice.

(He's reminded of walking in to them sitting on his counter unexpectedly, and the shock of so badly wanting to fuss had hit him so overwhelmingly hard he scared himself out of it. Idiot, he thinks. All they'd done was rest, only they'd been so upset...

Well, he gets to fuss this time.)

The tension goes. Lemm leans fully against them and his own arm rubs similarly at the back of their hand, what little he can reach. Silly perhaps, to think to comfort a Higher Being so much larger-than-life and with such a small gesture, but he will not be daunted. He's allowed to try. That's the thing.

The Lord of Shades stills, and their small amount of grip goes completely slack. If Lemm is done, he is, and they're not going to contain him for an instant longer. He's not Grimm, who could be smothered in layer after layer of shadow and be shaken but fine.

--But he comes back nearly as fast as they do so. Leaning more, holding more, matching their aborted motion. And it's overwhelming, that he is, and that they can feel it like this.

They return to it.

And, in what would be absolutely horrible penmanship, had they a pen and not tracing blunt lines along his back: GRATEFUL.

Now that he's actually given himself some space to soak it in, this whole thing is profoundly pleasant. Lemm closes his eyes. A moment. Has it been a moment? Only - he can afford a longer one, can't he? Can they? -

- Is that a glyph. The sensation isn't unpleasant any more than the comforting touch was, but it's new and he shudders, and that's - embarrassing, he knows they'd have felt that as well as his stiffness earlier and he just. Cannot. Bring himself to care enough.

"...Butterfly's chance in a gale that I'll be able to read that," he mumbles, half-muffled by his face being pressed into cold hard Void. "Tell me in a..."

...Moment. Right. No, he's had several, this is getting ridiculous. They need to go and get their mask fixed.

With all the reluctance in the world, Lemm eases his face away and slides his arm back and gives them a gentle, indicative half-nudge. (Ah, he doesn't want to. All the more reason.)

"...Tell me," he corrects. He sounds sluggish.

They uncurl their hand immediately, though it doesn't go far as it might've just minutes ago. They rest it in a loose fist next to him, points of those claws, even the dull one, tucked away but for the thumb.

GRATEFUL,

is repeated from another hand.

The Lord of Shades isn't getting up.

This was nice. Differently than Lemm might feel it, but still. Very much so. Something fragile and warm is sliding around their mind and body. They don't need to surge up from lying, half-coiled, on the wet pavement. They haven't exactly made an appointment.

Lemm forgets, for a little while, to account for or correct the disoriented, half-drowsy look still plastered on his face.

He can read that now, though. He tips his head acknowledgingly to one side, sheepish.

Them, or him? He is. More likely though they're referring to themselves, which is - is nice. Is nice, too. They got what he was trying to do.

"Aye." It comes out as a sigh. He really is discombobulated.

Still, they look messy, all tangled up on the puddled floor like that. He'd invite them back, but... He sincerely does not know if they'd be able to fit.

Lemm folds his arms. Poor substitute. But they're not moving, so, still somewhat swept up in the wave of impulsive decisions, Lemm sidesteps and leans a shoulder against their fist.

"Got worried," he mutters, earnestly, with a hand-flicker against his arm. "There'll be a day I can get through the unpleasant surprises without... losing my temper. Getting better at it. Might not look that way."

Ah. Contact like that seems to have loosened his vicegrip on personal explanation, a little bit. He dares prodding that a bit more.

"I -" this is bitten off, like he expected. Undeterred, he takes another try: "I liked - that was fine," he struggles out. "Most things're fine, but I." Half-shrug. "And I can't. Ah." This is incomprehensible. This explanation rather fell flat.

He looks down and rubs at his arm, slowly.

They hadn't thought to aim focus at it, as the volume generally wasn't what troubled them.

But they had noticed. The Shadelord's head shifts along the wet ground, leaving ripples in puddles on stone as they nod.

He's leaning on them. He's not putting words together nearly as well as usual, but--he's leaning on them. The word liked penetrates a little late, and they don't know what to do with that, with the bloom it spreads and shivers. The latter, physically so.

The Knight is experiencing a great deal of emotion today.

Liked. Most things are fine. I can't.

Parsing their own thoughts about this is difficult. Their emotions, however, conclude...perhaps...they could--they should--take more initiative...?

Their thumb-claw uncurls again and settles against his other side. Not quite pinning him between it and the rest of their hand, but, once again, holding. If not quite so encompassing as prior.

In the meantime Lemm has settled for staring at nothing and rubbing a finger joint at the spot between his eyes, grappling in private with the tangled-up layers of reasons he can't get the words out. He's already given up for now, relegating this conversation for another day when he's had more time to comb through it all. Maybe he can rehearse.

When their thumb makes contact he's a little unsteady on his feet, suddenly, and it pulls a tiny, soft noise of surprise out of him.

His hand lowers. And he just stares, for a while, at the Shadelord. There is something oddly helpless about that look, before he wrenches it away to stare back at the floor instead.

The hand settles on their thumb. His thumb sweeps back and forth, half-restless and half some attempt at returning the comfort, a tiny range of motion against the vastness of them. He takes several tries at saying something useful.

"...Bleeding heart, you are," he forces out, voice a little shaky at the edges. "Trying to turn me into one as well, are you? I won't stand for it."

The protest is null. He's quite obviously not going anywhere.

Lemm is their friend, the Knight, the Lord of Shades, the same--he doesn't fear them, he trusts them, they've thought this and they've thought this and it's hitting them like a blow which leaves their vision bursting with stars.

This means they can still....be them. They're more, Siblings, Void, but they're yet themselves. Bleeding heart. Not a common descriptor, but none have gotten near enough to know anything similar. Therefore, perhaps they are!

Infinitely gently, they tip their thumb until he's just barely squeezed between their thumb's knuckle and their fingers. Teasingly, gleefully:

TOO
LATE.
GOT
YOU.

The squeeze wrings a shaky sigh out of him, but he's quicker this time to lean into it, to allow... whatever it is that comes flooding in. It'll take practice. He's still stiff, a little bit.

And he can feel the strange weightlessness behind the feeling, the sneaking suspicion that the more he opens that door the more he's going to want to stow behind it. A little daunting. Like an empty storeroom. He has his habits...

He can't be bothered to identify all of that right this second. Lemm lets his head drop against their hand, a kind of gentle forehead butt that only involves the very bottom of his horn. He stays there, still leaning, and watches their signing sidelong with a soft, unmasked little breath of a laugh.

"I've told you. You're a pest." Still stroking their thumb with his, arm hooked around it, Lemm holds on a little tighter. He'd stay here all day, hugged tightly by their hand and his horn pressed against them both in ways that make his head spin, if he could, but -

- But he is pragmatic. It's raining. It's cold, and wet. The metal rack needs cleaning. They have a broken mask. Slowly, Lemm shifts back, stops leaning. He pats their thumb twice.

"Come, then. Enough." It is not. It is scarily not. He is going to have to ease into this more carefully, maybe, in future. "We've both got things to do, hm?"

Another scraping nod, far more enthusiastic, shaking the ground just a little.

BEST
PEST!

The Lord of Shades reluctantly withdraws their hand, nudging his back one final time with the curve of a knuckle. Lemm's correct.

The whole of them shifts oddly as they forget they haven't got legs to stand on. Still this form, not the Knight's form. They could make legs, perhaps, but that wouldn't be of any particular help. It could be amusing, perhaps, to tower standing above some of these buildings. Not now.

Front half drifting from the stone, they look down to Lemm, and back to the hat rack once more.

CARRY?

they offer again.

Another laugh, this one a bit more like himself, a bit less out of his comfort zone, more half-sarcastic.

"The best of a rude thing isn't desirable. How ridiculous."

Their hand leaves him and he is out in the open, suddenly, again, and he feels weird about that.

He is being terribly silly. Lemm takes a deep breath and strokes down his damp beard, and smooths out the precariousness he's feeling just standing there by himself like he always has.

"Yep, if you like," he says with a sigh, and without thinking about it this time. Then he blinks. "...I mean I'd manage. Hm. Never mind." He goes to scoop up his crowbar.

The Lord of Shades bows. It's strange to do in such a sinuous form, with a high amount of their body still half-coiled on the ground. Unfamiliarity doesn't stop them.

...Hmm. They know he'd manage, and they're realizing, suddenly, with their size disparity, if they carry it, they'd leave him behind. They can deliver it. They don't want to.

They pick up the hat rack in a single hand on one side, held between claws by its base like a splinter.

And then, shyly, they set one of their other hands by Lemm. In front of him. Palm-up, flat.

He's amused by that, too. It's a stunted little half-bow they get back, done for the novelty and lacking in any real formality.

Lemm watches them pick up the hat rack with... no real surprise, he supposes. He could have specifically told them not to, but he went with a fiddly little never mind instead, so that's on him.

Their hand is examined, and it takes a moment for understanding to sink in.

Oh, but that's different. Only he knows they're... active, is maybe the easiest way of putting it. He's seen the way the Shadelord moves, all that flowing Void and such. Has seen the Knight blast across the square with the Crystal Heart and trot about like there's a fire lit under their backside.

Lemm shifts in place, debating.

"Now... Now you know I don't ride well," he stutters, meaning the Stag. It's not much of a decision either way.

CAREFUL.

They will be. Completely. They're confident in this much, now. They're not going to risk hurting Lemm to the slightest degree, even if they'll have to slither through the streets at a pace that would frustrate them normally. They'd still make better time.

NO
FORCING.
BUT
VERY
CAREFUL.

The Shadelord's claws curl inward a little.

He makes a very displeased noise. Because, well, he's going to have to, isn't he.

He's not totally obtuse, he knows exactly what the Knight has been struggling with lately and all of this is not nothing. This offer, even, is far from nothing.

...Anyway. Who else could claim to have done this. It's making history. That's all this is. A perfectly Relic Seeker-ish thing to do, he tells himself, as he inches forwards staring at their palm and - puts a hand on it, feels his way forwards, stooped right down.

He puts a foot on their hand. Nope. Takes it off and straightens up and scratches at his beard self-consciously because right, yes, they are watching him work through this aren't they.

Lemm counts to five and grabs shakily at one of their claws for support and hop-steps up, wobbling despite there being absolutely no reason for it.

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♥

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