Nova + Chisaki: Sunset

[taking_names]

Who: Nova and Chisaki
When: Sunday
Where: An inn in sight of Mount Everest
Before/After: After the Emotionally Significant Travel log
Warnings: Chisaki being Chisaki, language



The clouds finally started to clear a little before sunset and everything was drying up.

Chisaki sat back on the roof of their hotel, leaning against a stone wall where the stairwell down was. She crossed her arms behind the back of her head and looked sideways at Nova. Actually cuddling up against him, instead of an awkward squeeze around the shoulders or a brief hug, no longer felt particularly terrifying. She leaned her head against his shoulder and looked at the horizon.

The Himalayas were easily the biggest mountains in Zenderael. Mount Everest dominated the view from here; a tall, jagged peak of ice-capped rock, which rose up from behind another mountain just in front of it. Chisaki pointed a finger towards it, before she looked sideways at him. She looked at him curiously.

"It's the biggest mountain in the world," she said. "I don't think you can make anyone out from here, though, but there might be people climbing up it. It's like a few days away by foot. Crazy, huh?"

Nova was still trying to decide how to feel about what, to him, had seemed like a somewhat embarrassing showing, but Chisaki seemed so relaxed that it put him at ease too.

Life seemed to be very good now. The Dark was far away, there was a glorious mountain vista to behold, and a crazy, endearing earthgirl who wanted to be with him despite, well, everything, it seemed.

"I'm pretty sure I've never seen anything like it," he said. There was a little bit of hesitation before he added, "...are you having a good time?"

A smirk crossed Chisaki's face.

"Nah," she said. She cuddled up against him to let him know it was a joke; to be sure, in fact, she slid an arm around his chest, and kissed him on the cheek. It was a bit of an awkward stretch to get up there, thanks to the height difference between them, but she had gotten used to that ages ago. "Everything sucks and I hate mountains, Indian food, and orgasms. Surprise, motherfucker!"

It had the desired effect, and Nova laughed a little, clasping her hand in his.

"We could always go find a glass mandra to fight if you're bored." He squinted out at the now-rosy sky. "At night. It will be super fun."

In retrospect, if that had been a date on some level, it had been kind of a terrible one.
Chisaki stuck her tongue out with disgust. "No thank you," she said. "I could pass on having to do that again. Though, I guess you could need the ingredients--and I'd evventually heal myself of whatever the acid did." Unless it burned through to her heart, she supposed. She wished that she knew more, then, but that entailed wishing that Jordan was alive.

She would never admit to wondering that, sometimes.

Her fingers squeezed his hand back. "You think we need to tell Irava--the Wise and Great One?" she asked. "She should probably know. I mean, maybe she already does. Maybe she's observant and knows shit."

Would he need the ingredients? He was having second thoughts about alchemy as it was. And it wasn't as if being burned by acid was the sort of experience you shrug off, even if you can heal from it. Nova's fear of glass mandras had come from an encounter he'd walked away from, after all (even if he had died before he got up to do the walking).

Maybe it was better to leave glass mandras alone. It had only been a joke, after all.

"I think we should tell her," Nova said. "I've told some people who don't live with us already, so it would be like singling her out not to."

And he'd already singled her out not to tell her about what had happened with Missie...

"Yeah," Chisaki said. "Saves us some awkwardness, too, if she starts catching on. Or figures out why I'm in your room late or whatever."

She leaned her head back down against his shoulder and looked out at the mountain. She never really admitted to it, but she liked views like this. It had been occasionally nice in Zenderael, before she met everyone, when she could forget how rough things had been. Her lips pursed thoughtfully.

"Who all did you tell?" she asked. "I think a couple of my friends might have guessed I had a crush on you, but I never confirmed it."

"Ah... the grumpy paladin. And a friend you haven't met, a spellsword."

It was possibly owed to her that things hadn't turned out any worse than they had... although maybe that was not a thing to be shared with Chisaki.

Oh, yes. The grumpy paladin whose evil head ghost killed himself and caused a problem. That subject struck her as something that should be dropped and quickly. She nodded.

"Yeah, maybe I can meet her sometime," she said. "You could meet my friends sometime. They're a cleric and a paladin--well, uh, maybe more the paladin." Her expression shifted into a thoughtful one and she looked down at her lap for a moment. "The paladin and me fought in the war together. His name's Victor. He found out about my being a molavvas, but didn't turn on me. We kinda teamed up and stuff."

She paused. She decided to not mention the part where she said he looked pretty good for a guy in his thirties, either. "We could all hang out?" she asked. "Him and the cleric are a couple but kinda denying it or something? I dunno."

His name was v....w... nope it was gone. Maybe he could have her put it on a card. He almost had hers down now after a week of study. Chatsarko, or something very close to that.

Someone knew her secret! That was good, he wanted there to be more people that knew and that could trust. They should definitely be friends.

"That sounds fun," he said. It was meant to encompass both the idea of hanging out with her friends, and the fact that her friends were a couple but denying it.

"He reacted well even though he's a paladin?"

If he was faking it Nova certainly wasn't above a casual poisoning. But faking it didn't seem... paladin style..

"It sounds like he used to be a traitor," Chisaki said. Her tone was initially cheerful, but then it became awkward as she realized how it sounded. Her expression fell. "So I guess he--you know, he knew what it was like a little. He didn't hold it against me or anything."

Though he did burn some of her skin when he found out. She decided to not mention that.

"I'll tell them sometime. Ashtaroth--that's the cleric--" Chisaki realized even as she said the name that it would mean nothing to Nova, and then quickly added the clarification. It seemed unlikely that they had ever met before. "--she doesn't know, though, so we'll keep it quiet just until we get an idea of what's going on with her. In case she's like into justice and murdering me."

"All right, so it's a secret from one of them but not the other." He could handle that. It wasn't as if they'd gotten into the habit of discussing it in public, anyway. They barely discussed it in private, always sort of dancing around the words.

That her paladin friend was a traitor was only a curiosity to Nova, not as grave as it should have been. The paladins' unique devotion to their duty was a distant abstraction to him, so the idea that something had compelled this person to betray their code was more interesting than appalling.

"Are they... did people from earth make them?"

"Ah, yeah." Chisaki said, "they did. Um, they're--I mean, they talked about it a little. I don't know what they feel about it really. I wasn't sure whether to ask."

She looked down at the ground for a moment, before she looked back up. She slid closer to him again, though, and looked back at the mountain. Still pretty, but certainly not going anywhere. "I'm glad you feel differently than you used to," she said quietly. "About players and stuff. And your life. I was worried I couldn't... do anything about it, or something? Or you'd never be able to... you know."

She frowned, slightly. She hadn't been able to do anything about it, but she didn't want to say that.

"I wish I could have gotten everything sorted out sooner," he said. "I was so angry about my old life being false that the real one I had didn't seem like it counted. I was going to throw it away before I even started it!"

A small sigh.

"But now that I've forgiven the players I have less in common with my friends," he grumbled.

He'd never have been able to face Alex, if Alex were still alive.

He'd actually considered trying to get mad at the players again just so that he would have that common ground back with Ravindra and Irena. It wasn't like the players cared that he was okay with them now that he was a murderer.

"I guess that shit has to take time--I mean, I'm not saying you handled it perfectly, but I doubt you could have just made yourself feel exactly what you wanted to when you needed to, you know?" she said, glancing briefly at him from the corners of her eyes. She looked away again, back at the mountains.

"You still got stuff in common with them," Chisaki ventured. "Or you can find new things. You know what I mean? We had more in common than saying we're both fucked up, even when we were just friends. We figured out what that was."

She skipped a beat.

"Okay, so I dragged you to things," she said, "and made you have fun anyways, and it's how we built some positive and reciprocal good feelings shit."

"Positive and reciprocal good feelings shit," he echoed, just to reaffirm to Chisaki that she had released such a phrase into the universe.

"I guess I will have to find new things," he said. In a way, he almost needed a new identity -- not replacement of the old one, because he didn't intend to reject what he'd been made the way that Alex had... but... additions to it. He needed to finish what his player had started.

It would be fun, though. Now that he didn't hate the world, it would surely be much easier to find things to be excited about.

"Do you have things in common with your new friends? The ones you were just telling me about."

"A little," Chisaki said. "Sort of? I'm still figuring out what all I have in common with them. I guess we all like going out, so there's something there. I'll have to find out?"

She shrugged her shoulders. He could feel it lightly against him, when she did so. She nodded at Nova, before she looked back out at the mountains. Her fingers clutched his hand against, squeezing, while she thought about that some more. "We'll have all sorts of stuff to do, you know?"

She grinned at him. "I'm gonna be a rogue, anyways. I'll probably give your life all sorts of fucking excitement from that."

"What sorts of things do you plan on doing as a rogue?" he asked, looking at her with worry that was half feigned.

His main experience with rogues was doing business with them while both parties pretended that the goods had been procured by completely legitimate means. The full scope of their doings were actually a bit of a mystery to him. It was probably more exciting than brewing potions, though (although he did find brewing potions to be entertaining).

"I think I'll go treasure hunting and stuff. Maybe I'll steal some stuff, too, but I'm not sure what, exactly," Chisaki said. She wasn't exactly a purse snatcher, really, but she could make a habit out of breaking into places. "Maybe get into hard to get places. I'm kinda good at that sort of thing, you know? And maybe some fighting and stuff too. I figure I'll kind of cobble everything together from that."

She laughed. "Don't worry, I'm not gonna turn your house into a crime scene!" she said. "That wouldn't be cool, really, you know? It'd make things harder on you."

"I wasn't worried!" Much.

"You can bring trouble home if you want to. Well. Not deadly trouble. A reasonable amount of trouble. Whatever that is." He made a face. "I don't really know what I'm saying."

She did make it sound like fun, though... Well, he could contribute by packing her up with lots of potions before she left home.

"I think I get what you're saying," she said. She looked up at him and smiled, before she leaned her head back onto his shoulders. She half-close her eyes while she thought about it. "You're cool with me doing whatever. Thanks."

"Yes, that sounds about right."

He might regret it later, but for now it seemed like kind of an adventure. Anything was possible! And he was inclined to believe that there would be good things ahead.

Good things, like this moment, lying there with her, gazing at the sky as its colors changed and darkened. Yes, truly peaceful and wonderful and carefree. And with so little civilization around, soon the mountainous vista and purple-orange clouds before them would be nothing but a pure, black...

Terrifying expanse of nothingness.

He smiled at her with sudden urgency. "Well, this has been delightful. Ready to go back inside now?"

She never made the connection he did. The fact that he was scared never even occurred to her. She just sat up, enough to turn her torso, and put her hand down on the ground where she had been to look at him better, instead of at the awkward angles that being next to him required.

"What?" she asked. "We just got out here. It's not even--"

She looked back at the sunset. Her eyes winced; the sun hit the ice cap atop Mount Everest, which shone especially brightly when looked at directly. Chisaki shielded her eyes with her other hand.

"It's not even dark yet, man!"

He looked up at her, trying to will his perspective on the matter into making perfect sense and being a universal truth.

"Exactly. Who wants to watch the end of a sunset? All the good part is the first half. The second half is just predictable and depressing."

Chisaki's eyebrow twitched. That made absolutely no sense. She sat back onto her haunches, which had the effect of putting her back entirely to the sunset. The hotel's roof and the nearby buildings blocked the setting sun from sight, so she could see it, at least.

"What?" she asked. "That made no sense. What's actually going on?"

He pushed himself up to a seated position and frowned a little, feeling unfairly scrutinized on something so inconsequential.

"When the sun sets," he told her, with as much dignity as he could muster, "It's going to be really dark."

"Yeah," she said, "that's called night. That's how night works."

"I don't like it."

Why didn't she understand! Wasn't this simple?

"What's so scary about the dark!"

She blurted that out, irritated, and then realized. Her own words explained the situation. She stopped talking, then, and quickly looked away with an expression that began sheepish. Then, it turned guilty, as the full weight of that set in. She looked down at the rooftop, and sighed, embarrassment still staying on her face.

"Sorry," she said, quietly. "I wasn't thinking. It's--when you went to the Dark, right?" she asked, looking up at him. She frowned. "It... left an impression."

Ah, she seemed so contrite about it... probably much more than there was any reason for her to be. He wasn't that afraid, after all. It was really more of a... strong preference that it should be always daytime forever.

But since she was feeling bad for him, this was a rare opportunity to get his way in a very important potential point of contention!

"Maybe this is a good time to confess that I sleep with the lights on now!" he announced brightly.

Chisaki's face screwed up. "Okay, uh... you know, whatever, I'll get used to it somehow, I guess," she said. She shook her head and looked to the side. "Guess I should mention, too, that I have a really strong sense of smell. So if you don't shower or take a bath every night, I'm gonna smell it. And not get to sleep."

She frowned.

"So lots of bathing and fragrant girly shit in our room," she said. "That's what I'm saying. Because otherwise it'll drive me crazy."

Life with magnified smells sounded... unpleasant. He nodded awkwardly at those instructions.

"All right, I'll be mindful of your nose."

"See? Positive and reciprocal good feelings and shit." Chisaki nodded her head, like she was some sort of magical relationship expert. Then she thought some about what they were actually talking about.

Her expression faltered.

"Do you want to start sharing one room most of the time?" she asked. They had sort of, halfway hinted at it, but she decided that they had a lifetime of sort of, halfway hinting at things. Being clear and direct seemed like a much better way to get by. "I mean, besides when we're... you know."

The idea that they might be moving a tiny bit too fast thanks to already living together didn't really occur to Nova. He had no specific memories of any previous relationship or the rate at which it might have progressed. Sleeping together -- in the literal sense -- seemed like a natural, and desirable progression. He had never particularly liked being alone.

"Yes, I don't see why--" ...he was going to say 'not,' but actually hadn't they had just discussed several reasons why it might not work, both of them on her end of things?

"Wait, should we decide after we've tried it?"

Chisaki had considered the idea that they may have moved too fast, but their relationship was already far out of the ordinary. The circumstances around it weren't anything like normal dating. Normal dating had never worked out very well for her in the first place. All she could do was just try things out as they came.

"Sure," she said. "Sounds like a good idea. Just in case you smell offensive or I bitch and moan about the light always being on." She shrugged her shoulders lightly, then she started to stand up, but thought better of it. This was why she had a boyfriend.

"Up."

What would he do if she really did find him unbearable to sleep with? Probably mope forever. He was already moping a little just thinking about it. But the first lesson of getting along with Chisaki seemed to be not to take her too personally; she rarely seemed to genuinely mean anything bad by the things she said.

She asked for a hand up, it happened, before he had gotten up, himself. He flashed her a look of feigned exasperation before he pushed himself up to his feet, then leaned down to take her hands and pull her up as well.

"You're up," he confirmed, amused. She really liked this little ritual, didn't she.

"Sure am." She grinned at him. It wasn't quite brightly, but it was the genuinely happy smile that she gave him sometimes. She stood up on her tip toes and kissed him on the lips. She liked that little ritual, in fact. Reilanin taught it to her, once, and it reminded her of happier times. Simpler times.

She grabbed his hand and started tugging on it.

"Come on, let's get back inside," she said. "We can see what's on Nepalese TV and make out and shit. That sounds like a winning plan, right?"

He leaned down to meet her in the kiss. His return smile was bright. He liked this. There had been a lot of things ominously hanging over them, before. His preoccupation with his lost illusions. The tension and uncertainty of whether being together would be a disaster. Now there was just him and Chisaki, together sort of like always, except finally able to enjoy one another.

He let her lead him toward the door to the stairwell.

"It's a wonderful plan."