Jaidon (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
cridecoeur) wrote2010-05-29 02:41 pm
cridecoeur) wrote2010-05-29 02:41 pm
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title: a la belle étoile
prompt: #99 at![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png)
stayintheroom, newly planted flowers, a dried up river, mortal? and "growth" for women are awesome.
pairing: chiela/terasu, pipra/nikolao
word count: 2,809
rating: r
a/n: this is an excerpt from my original big bang fic, a sci fi space adventure set basically in the present, give or take a few years, on an alien world. the characters involved are fighting in an intergalactic war with worse odds that russian roulette. some of them have super powers. some of them can shape shift. all of them are running out of time.
They make their way to the edge of the camp - just the fact that they make it surprises the hell out of Chiela, a combination of Sprita’s freaky-ass insect radar, foreseeing ships before they pass over, a liberal application of Nikolao’s shadows, and a whole fucking lot of luck - traveling through a dried up river bed, trying to make as little noise as they can, which… well, they don’t get caught and that’s the only thing that really matters, not how gracefully they do it - believe her, it’s not very gracefully, especially not when one of them is blind. They can hear, but not see, the Gencha camp from where they are, a whole fucking lot of enemies milling around, shouting back and forth, and Chiela doesn’t like to think about what will happen if they get caught this time. Luck was with them on Morpheus’ ship, but now? There’s too fucking many of them, they’d never make it out alive.
Okay, alright, Pipra says, speaking directly into her - and presumably everyone else’s - mind, We’re close enough. Like, go, Ixchel!
Ixchel bows her head, and even her snakes are quiet now, writhing silently atop her head, instead of hissing along with her movements as they normally would do. She takes a few careful steps away from them, up onto what would be the bank of the river, where the grass and weeds grow thickest, and kneels down. Immediately, Chiela can feel that old power rising, older than her even, and she spent thousands of years in the Cloud before her life on Earth, then the months spent on Nikolao’s ship and now a scant few days on Amah, a blink of time, comparatively.
Pressing her hands into the ground, Ixchel begins humming softly, almost too softly for Chiela to hear - if she weren’t in her mundane form, she wouldn’t be able to hear it at all. The flowers on her body begin to bloom and then to multiply, spreading down her arms until they reach the ground. They don’t stop there. They spread around Ixchel, bloom around her, spreading out and out, until they line the river bed and carry over the ridge, some of them as large as Chiela’s fist, and others so big they could swallow her whole, exotic and strange. Terasu climbs the bank to stand beside Ixchel, setting one hand on her shoulder. As soon as she does, that faintly luminescent glow starts up, her body shining a soft blue, the color of the sky after dawn. She draws her sword, letting the tip touch the ground, waiting, though what for Chiela doesn’t know, until the earth starts to rumble, that glow intensifying until Chiela can hardly bear to look at her, and when she turns to watch Ixchel instead, she finds that she’d grown right into the ground, roots trailing from her body. Now Chiela can tell her snakes are hissing, but she can’t hear them, not over, y’know, the ground rumbling and then splitting the fuck open where Terasu sword tip touches the ground, in a circle all around them, and suddenly there’s a barrier of light surrounding them in all directions going up as far as Chiela can see. Maybe even to the sky, who knew? Also? They are so totally fucked. No way the Gencha aren’t going to notice that.
“Nikolao,” Ixchel says, only that isn’t Ixchel talking, no way. That sounds like the fucking voice of God, deep, rumbling and powerful. If that’s not the planet speaking through Ixchel, then Chiela doesn’t know what it is. Ixchel throws her head back, face raised to the sky, and now Chiela can see where light’s licking at her mouth and eyes like fire. Holy shit. They have gone beyond crazy and into the land of the totally un-fucking-believeable, although Chiela should really be used to that by now. Hey, neither the Cloud nor Earth prepared her for this, give her a break.
Terasu turns around and, shit, there’s light trailing from her eyes, too. She mouths along with Ixchel when she says, “Nikolao. Pipra,” and Terasu takes a few steps forward, raising her sword - which for the record? is pulsing white with light - until she’s holding it inches from Nikolao’s throat. Nikolao’s standing stiffly, chin raised, doing that thing where he refuses to show any sign of weakness, no matter how terrified he actually is. And for possibly the first time since Chiela’s known him he looks fucking terrified. Apparently Pipra’s just fine with showing weakness because he’s clutching Nikolao’s hand in his. Nikolao doesn’t shake him off, which Chiela figures is the greatest tell of how scared he really is.
“You’ve come a long way,” Ixchel says, and Chiela doesn’t know whether that means their galaxy hopping or how Nikolao’s gone from being an angry, drug riddled asshole to something like a normal person. Pipra’s possibly less crazy than when they started but it’s kind of hard to tell. “Now you must go a little further,” and Terasu’s raising her sword as if she’s about to strike and, wow, are they talking about death here? Because it sure looks like that’s what they’re talking about, and they’ve come a long fucking way just for two of them to be sacrificed now to some talkative planet. Chiela remembers Terasu saying bending the planet’s will and I don’t know why his gift hasn’t been taken back, and this seems a little extreme, although maybe he’s being punished for separating the planet from its representatives, too. That doesn’t have much to do with Pipra, though, and, probably, Chiela should have just given up on trying to make sense of things by now, but she’s got a sense of justice this just doesn’t sit right with. After all, Nikolao fixed everything he screwed up, that’s got to count for something right?
Chiela’s half-way to shifting bodies, halfway to stopping this, scales already spreading over her skin, nails lengthening to talons when Ixchel says, “Do not be afraid,” and Terasu brings the sword down in one keen arc, slicing through both Nikolao and Pipra with one movement, only they don’t, y’know, split into pieces like they should but remain whole and what the fuck? Seriously, what the fuck is that?
Nikolao and Pipra both stand shock-still, Pipra with one hand still raised as if he could have blocked the blow like that, Nikolao with his free hand held locked against at his side, then turn to stare at each other a bit stupidly, and this is the most emotion Chiela figures Nikolao’s let show ever that wasn’t anger or drugged delirium, although it’s par for the course as far as Pipra goes. Actually he’s not shouting or bouncing all over the place, so this is pretty subdued for him.
“Oh my gosh,” Pipra says, and Ixchel interjects with a, “You have been absolved,” and suddenly both Pipra and Nikolao are glowing blinding white and falling to the ground. Chiela takes a few stuttering steps forward, reaching for them, when Ixchel says, “Leave them. They must bear this alone,” and, seriously, they’re both writhing on the ground, making no sound, as if they’re gone utterly beyond pain.
“No fucking way,” Chiela says, “Sorry, but I don’t have to listen to you,” and drops down beside them, setting a hand on each. They go still beneath her touch, then reach up to grab hold of her wrists, one each. Chiela lets herself fall fully into the transformation, her wings flaring wide, her body one long contraction of muscle, scales full thick, like interlocking armor and just let Terasu - or Terasu possessed by the planet, which is still a little beyond Chiela’s realm of comprehension; she was much happier when she wasn’t dealing with living gods - try to strike her with that sword. The planet wants to play with mortality, it’s fucking welcome to try with her; she’s born more years than she can count and she’ll bear as many more, toy swords aside. She rumbles deep from within her chest, smoke curling from her nostrils, fire banked, ready to be called upon, should she need it. But Terasu makes no move to stop her, and Ixchel says nothing more.
Chiela closes her eyes and lets her consciousness spread, leaking into the minds of those around her. Mostly she finds fear, fear for so many reasons, and, honestly, they’ve all been afraid too fucking long. She can see, now, that this will have to end today, one way or another. They can’t go on like this any more. They’ve been worn down to the bone, sharp.
Chiela finds one point of calm among them, Dioscorus, who’s never faltered, once, and seems now, more than ever, utterly beyond his mundane form. She opens her eyes, and is startled to find - though she really shouldn’t be; she’s mostly just surprised he hadn’t struck Terasu down to begin with; he really must have taken Nikolao’s orders not to kill anyone to heart or maybe he just has more faith than Chiela - that he’s kneeling beside her, body full metal and bristling with blades. Chiela knows that if this came down to a fight with Ixchel and Terasu, with the very planet itself, Dioscorus would fight beside her, no questions asked. He’s loyal to Nikolao and Pipra before anyone else.
He sets one hand on her flank, just as her consciousness brushes against Terasu-and-Ixceh-as-the-planet and beneath the surface of their minds is something so vast, so old, so all-encompassing that she can’t look too deep for fear of losing herself to it, entirely. There’s the life of everything beneath their veneer, green-warm and strange. Chiela supposes this is what people mean when they talk about god-consciousness, this thing she can’t even begin to comprehend. She lets Dioscorus feel that through her, and he grunts, surprised or… something, Chiela’s not sure. She’s never claimed to understand Dioscorus. There are days she can barely make eye contact with him, let alone understanding his motivations.
She reaches for Nikolao and Pipra and finds…
… absolutely nothing, as if they simply don’t exist any more, or don’t exist on a realm that she can reach. That’s. That’s utterly unprecedented. She’s never met a being she couldn’t connect with. She can read the Planet, she can read the Endless, but she can’t read them, not a single thought or feeling, no cinematic pictures of their past or even their present. She thinks of Pipra’s constantly babbling mind and each of Nikolao’s grudging thoughts, and simply doesn’t understand.
Before she can really begin to comprehend what’s happened, or even attempt to, Pipra and Nikolao both release her wrists, curling in on themselves, still. No thrashing or writhing, no impressions of pain, simply stillness. Chiela curves the length of her body protectfully around them and waits, Dioscorus drawing forward to sit beside the both of them, cross-legged and patient, utterly implacable, much like when he was fighting, much like the days he waited for Nikolao to release him from his holding cell.
They don’t have long to wait. Apparently what they were meant to bear alone - and yeah, right - wasn’t meant to last. Suddenly, they’re pushing themselves to their feet, the glow fading away to reveal… that they’re totally translucent, no longer flesh and blood, looking like ghosts, the crystal coating their bones revealed in red and blue skeletons, and, shit, they really were talking about death. Chiela shifts back quickly to her mundane form, because she’s fucking got something to say about that.
“Jesus Christ,”Chiela says, “You killed them.”
“No,” Ixchel says. “We have given them our final gift. They are no longer of you.”
“No longer of us.” Chiela says, “What the fuck?”
“They are mortal no more.” Terasu says, starling Chiela, because she’d said nothing yet, and Chiela’d kind of figured that she couldn’t, like this, could only act, and, “Wait, wait, wait,” Chiela says, “Mortal? They’re not fucking mortal?”
That seriously deserves another what the fuck but Chiela skips over that, instead turning to stare at Nikolao and Pipra. Pipra, himself, is staring at Nikolao, eyes wide, hands fisted over his mouth, shocked, and Nikolao’s staring down at his own body, raising his arms and clenching his fists, looking like… actually, Chiela’s not sure. She’s never seen a look like that on anyone’s face before.
“Oh my gosh,” Pipra says, dropping his hands from his mouth, but keeping them tucked under his chin, and he doesn’t sound particularly immortal. There’s not any of that infinite knowing or even calm behind his voice that usually accompanies an Endless. Although if there was Chiela probably be demanding that Terasu and Ixchel change him back - even though that’s kind of impossible - because an infinitely knowing and calm Pipra would be wrong on so many levels. Hell, just the calm would throw her off. For eternity, Jesus Christ.
Before Chiela can say anything else, or demand any further answers, the glow fades from Terasu, and she drops her sword, looking like she’s just about to hit her knees before Dioscorus catches her - thankfully back in his own skin now, otherwise that would have been one nasty impalement - setting her back up on her feet, no sign of strain, as if Terasu weighed nothing. She maybe wobbles on her feet a little before she seems to catch herself, straightening up and rubbing on hand across her face and, “Fuck that shit,” she says, “I’m going to resign,” which would be a nice thought, if it weren’t also impossible. Then she looks up at Chiela and adds, “You’re pretty fucking brave.”
“See, I figured you’d call me stupid,” Chiela says, because she really had.
“Yeah,” Terasu says, “You’re that, too.” Then she looks over at Nikolao and Pipra and adds on an, “I do not fucking believe this,” which isn’t really a surprise considering she thinks what Nikolao’s done is a perversion of nature. Once again, bending the planet’s will and I don’t know why his gift hasn’t been taken back, so another gift on top of that probably - actually, it probably pisses Terasu off. She hates being wrong.
Also? Chiela’s just realized that none of the Gencha have come to investigate the blinding white light which is slowly fading now from where it stretches to the sky around them. No one’s cresting the ridge, and the shouting in the camp doesn’t seem any more frenzied than it did before, although, okay, two of them just became Endless, so maybe regular logic just doesn’t apply to this situation. Maybe the earth only rumbled for them, and, hell, the light could have just been an illusion for all she knows. Maybe she hallucinated it. Maybe they all hallucinated it. Group hallucinations happen all the time right? Unless all the angel sightings on Earth were real, which, hey, Chiela’s seen way crazier stuff than that since leaving Earth, so maybe they were. After all, Chiela’s turned out to be an ancient, Endless space dragon and the aliens in the cornfields turned out to be Nikolao and Pipra. Way crazier shit.
“Oh my gosh,” Pipra says, “Oh my gosh, Nichjo,” and Chiela turns to find Pipra holding up Nikolao’s hands, running his thumbs across his palms, and when Chiela looks closer, she realizes the skeleton there is whole, not the fractured, warped mess that kept Nikolao from using his hands much at all and, “Holy shit,” she says. Nikolao closes his eyes tightly, looking as if he’s on the verge of tears or something, which is causing Chiela some serious cognitive dissonance. Pipra gives a shocked, watery sort of laugh and throws himself at Nikolao, wrapping his arms tightly around his neck. Nikolao pulls him in tightly against his body, running his palms up and down Pipra’s back, eyes clenched tightly until suddenly they open wide, shocked, and, “You can see,” Nikolao says, as if the realization only just struck him, and, hey, it’s only just struck Chiela, and she probably looks shocked stupid at this point, but it’s a lot to take in.
Pipra pulls back, though his keeps his arms around Nikolao’s neck. “I can totally see,” he says, with a wavering smile, sounding as if he’s on the verge of tears himself. Nikolao gives that same shocked laugh, taking Pipra’s face between his hands - which he can actually do, now - smiling like he’s never smiled before. His smiles were so rare in the past that they were practically nonexistent, but none of the ones he had given matched this one. He kisses Pipra’s forehead and then his cheek and then his mouth, like her just can’t help himself, like the world’s about to end. Which, given what they’ve got to do today, it very well might.
prompt: #99 at
stayintheroom, newly planted flowers, a dried up river, mortal? and "growth" for women are awesome.pairing: chiela/terasu, pipra/nikolao
word count: 2,809
rating: r
a/n: this is an excerpt from my original big bang fic, a sci fi space adventure set basically in the present, give or take a few years, on an alien world. the characters involved are fighting in an intergalactic war with worse odds that russian roulette. some of them have super powers. some of them can shape shift. all of them are running out of time.
They make their way to the edge of the camp - just the fact that they make it surprises the hell out of Chiela, a combination of Sprita’s freaky-ass insect radar, foreseeing ships before they pass over, a liberal application of Nikolao’s shadows, and a whole fucking lot of luck - traveling through a dried up river bed, trying to make as little noise as they can, which… well, they don’t get caught and that’s the only thing that really matters, not how gracefully they do it - believe her, it’s not very gracefully, especially not when one of them is blind. They can hear, but not see, the Gencha camp from where they are, a whole fucking lot of enemies milling around, shouting back and forth, and Chiela doesn’t like to think about what will happen if they get caught this time. Luck was with them on Morpheus’ ship, but now? There’s too fucking many of them, they’d never make it out alive.
Okay, alright, Pipra says, speaking directly into her - and presumably everyone else’s - mind, We’re close enough. Like, go, Ixchel!
Ixchel bows her head, and even her snakes are quiet now, writhing silently atop her head, instead of hissing along with her movements as they normally would do. She takes a few careful steps away from them, up onto what would be the bank of the river, where the grass and weeds grow thickest, and kneels down. Immediately, Chiela can feel that old power rising, older than her even, and she spent thousands of years in the Cloud before her life on Earth, then the months spent on Nikolao’s ship and now a scant few days on Amah, a blink of time, comparatively.
Pressing her hands into the ground, Ixchel begins humming softly, almost too softly for Chiela to hear - if she weren’t in her mundane form, she wouldn’t be able to hear it at all. The flowers on her body begin to bloom and then to multiply, spreading down her arms until they reach the ground. They don’t stop there. They spread around Ixchel, bloom around her, spreading out and out, until they line the river bed and carry over the ridge, some of them as large as Chiela’s fist, and others so big they could swallow her whole, exotic and strange. Terasu climbs the bank to stand beside Ixchel, setting one hand on her shoulder. As soon as she does, that faintly luminescent glow starts up, her body shining a soft blue, the color of the sky after dawn. She draws her sword, letting the tip touch the ground, waiting, though what for Chiela doesn’t know, until the earth starts to rumble, that glow intensifying until Chiela can hardly bear to look at her, and when she turns to watch Ixchel instead, she finds that she’d grown right into the ground, roots trailing from her body. Now Chiela can tell her snakes are hissing, but she can’t hear them, not over, y’know, the ground rumbling and then splitting the fuck open where Terasu sword tip touches the ground, in a circle all around them, and suddenly there’s a barrier of light surrounding them in all directions going up as far as Chiela can see. Maybe even to the sky, who knew? Also? They are so totally fucked. No way the Gencha aren’t going to notice that.
“Nikolao,” Ixchel says, only that isn’t Ixchel talking, no way. That sounds like the fucking voice of God, deep, rumbling and powerful. If that’s not the planet speaking through Ixchel, then Chiela doesn’t know what it is. Ixchel throws her head back, face raised to the sky, and now Chiela can see where light’s licking at her mouth and eyes like fire. Holy shit. They have gone beyond crazy and into the land of the totally un-fucking-believeable, although Chiela should really be used to that by now. Hey, neither the Cloud nor Earth prepared her for this, give her a break.
Terasu turns around and, shit, there’s light trailing from her eyes, too. She mouths along with Ixchel when she says, “Nikolao. Pipra,” and Terasu takes a few steps forward, raising her sword - which for the record? is pulsing white with light - until she’s holding it inches from Nikolao’s throat. Nikolao’s standing stiffly, chin raised, doing that thing where he refuses to show any sign of weakness, no matter how terrified he actually is. And for possibly the first time since Chiela’s known him he looks fucking terrified. Apparently Pipra’s just fine with showing weakness because he’s clutching Nikolao’s hand in his. Nikolao doesn’t shake him off, which Chiela figures is the greatest tell of how scared he really is.
“You’ve come a long way,” Ixchel says, and Chiela doesn’t know whether that means their galaxy hopping or how Nikolao’s gone from being an angry, drug riddled asshole to something like a normal person. Pipra’s possibly less crazy than when they started but it’s kind of hard to tell. “Now you must go a little further,” and Terasu’s raising her sword as if she’s about to strike and, wow, are they talking about death here? Because it sure looks like that’s what they’re talking about, and they’ve come a long fucking way just for two of them to be sacrificed now to some talkative planet. Chiela remembers Terasu saying bending the planet’s will and I don’t know why his gift hasn’t been taken back, and this seems a little extreme, although maybe he’s being punished for separating the planet from its representatives, too. That doesn’t have much to do with Pipra, though, and, probably, Chiela should have just given up on trying to make sense of things by now, but she’s got a sense of justice this just doesn’t sit right with. After all, Nikolao fixed everything he screwed up, that’s got to count for something right?
Chiela’s half-way to shifting bodies, halfway to stopping this, scales already spreading over her skin, nails lengthening to talons when Ixchel says, “Do not be afraid,” and Terasu brings the sword down in one keen arc, slicing through both Nikolao and Pipra with one movement, only they don’t, y’know, split into pieces like they should but remain whole and what the fuck? Seriously, what the fuck is that?
Nikolao and Pipra both stand shock-still, Pipra with one hand still raised as if he could have blocked the blow like that, Nikolao with his free hand held locked against at his side, then turn to stare at each other a bit stupidly, and this is the most emotion Chiela figures Nikolao’s let show ever that wasn’t anger or drugged delirium, although it’s par for the course as far as Pipra goes. Actually he’s not shouting or bouncing all over the place, so this is pretty subdued for him.
“Oh my gosh,” Pipra says, and Ixchel interjects with a, “You have been absolved,” and suddenly both Pipra and Nikolao are glowing blinding white and falling to the ground. Chiela takes a few stuttering steps forward, reaching for them, when Ixchel says, “Leave them. They must bear this alone,” and, seriously, they’re both writhing on the ground, making no sound, as if they’re gone utterly beyond pain.
“No fucking way,” Chiela says, “Sorry, but I don’t have to listen to you,” and drops down beside them, setting a hand on each. They go still beneath her touch, then reach up to grab hold of her wrists, one each. Chiela lets herself fall fully into the transformation, her wings flaring wide, her body one long contraction of muscle, scales full thick, like interlocking armor and just let Terasu - or Terasu possessed by the planet, which is still a little beyond Chiela’s realm of comprehension; she was much happier when she wasn’t dealing with living gods - try to strike her with that sword. The planet wants to play with mortality, it’s fucking welcome to try with her; she’s born more years than she can count and she’ll bear as many more, toy swords aside. She rumbles deep from within her chest, smoke curling from her nostrils, fire banked, ready to be called upon, should she need it. But Terasu makes no move to stop her, and Ixchel says nothing more.
Chiela closes her eyes and lets her consciousness spread, leaking into the minds of those around her. Mostly she finds fear, fear for so many reasons, and, honestly, they’ve all been afraid too fucking long. She can see, now, that this will have to end today, one way or another. They can’t go on like this any more. They’ve been worn down to the bone, sharp.
Chiela finds one point of calm among them, Dioscorus, who’s never faltered, once, and seems now, more than ever, utterly beyond his mundane form. She opens her eyes, and is startled to find - though she really shouldn’t be; she’s mostly just surprised he hadn’t struck Terasu down to begin with; he really must have taken Nikolao’s orders not to kill anyone to heart or maybe he just has more faith than Chiela - that he’s kneeling beside her, body full metal and bristling with blades. Chiela knows that if this came down to a fight with Ixchel and Terasu, with the very planet itself, Dioscorus would fight beside her, no questions asked. He’s loyal to Nikolao and Pipra before anyone else.
He sets one hand on her flank, just as her consciousness brushes against Terasu-and-Ixceh-as-the-planet and beneath the surface of their minds is something so vast, so old, so all-encompassing that she can’t look too deep for fear of losing herself to it, entirely. There’s the life of everything beneath their veneer, green-warm and strange. Chiela supposes this is what people mean when they talk about god-consciousness, this thing she can’t even begin to comprehend. She lets Dioscorus feel that through her, and he grunts, surprised or… something, Chiela’s not sure. She’s never claimed to understand Dioscorus. There are days she can barely make eye contact with him, let alone understanding his motivations.
She reaches for Nikolao and Pipra and finds…
… absolutely nothing, as if they simply don’t exist any more, or don’t exist on a realm that she can reach. That’s. That’s utterly unprecedented. She’s never met a being she couldn’t connect with. She can read the Planet, she can read the Endless, but she can’t read them, not a single thought or feeling, no cinematic pictures of their past or even their present. She thinks of Pipra’s constantly babbling mind and each of Nikolao’s grudging thoughts, and simply doesn’t understand.
Before she can really begin to comprehend what’s happened, or even attempt to, Pipra and Nikolao both release her wrists, curling in on themselves, still. No thrashing or writhing, no impressions of pain, simply stillness. Chiela curves the length of her body protectfully around them and waits, Dioscorus drawing forward to sit beside the both of them, cross-legged and patient, utterly implacable, much like when he was fighting, much like the days he waited for Nikolao to release him from his holding cell.
They don’t have long to wait. Apparently what they were meant to bear alone - and yeah, right - wasn’t meant to last. Suddenly, they’re pushing themselves to their feet, the glow fading away to reveal… that they’re totally translucent, no longer flesh and blood, looking like ghosts, the crystal coating their bones revealed in red and blue skeletons, and, shit, they really were talking about death. Chiela shifts back quickly to her mundane form, because she’s fucking got something to say about that.
“Jesus Christ,”Chiela says, “You killed them.”
“No,” Ixchel says. “We have given them our final gift. They are no longer of you.”
“No longer of us.” Chiela says, “What the fuck?”
“They are mortal no more.” Terasu says, starling Chiela, because she’d said nothing yet, and Chiela’d kind of figured that she couldn’t, like this, could only act, and, “Wait, wait, wait,” Chiela says, “Mortal? They’re not fucking mortal?”
That seriously deserves another what the fuck but Chiela skips over that, instead turning to stare at Nikolao and Pipra. Pipra, himself, is staring at Nikolao, eyes wide, hands fisted over his mouth, shocked, and Nikolao’s staring down at his own body, raising his arms and clenching his fists, looking like… actually, Chiela’s not sure. She’s never seen a look like that on anyone’s face before.
“Oh my gosh,” Pipra says, dropping his hands from his mouth, but keeping them tucked under his chin, and he doesn’t sound particularly immortal. There’s not any of that infinite knowing or even calm behind his voice that usually accompanies an Endless. Although if there was Chiela probably be demanding that Terasu and Ixchel change him back - even though that’s kind of impossible - because an infinitely knowing and calm Pipra would be wrong on so many levels. Hell, just the calm would throw her off. For eternity, Jesus Christ.
Before Chiela can say anything else, or demand any further answers, the glow fades from Terasu, and she drops her sword, looking like she’s just about to hit her knees before Dioscorus catches her - thankfully back in his own skin now, otherwise that would have been one nasty impalement - setting her back up on her feet, no sign of strain, as if Terasu weighed nothing. She maybe wobbles on her feet a little before she seems to catch herself, straightening up and rubbing on hand across her face and, “Fuck that shit,” she says, “I’m going to resign,” which would be a nice thought, if it weren’t also impossible. Then she looks up at Chiela and adds, “You’re pretty fucking brave.”
“See, I figured you’d call me stupid,” Chiela says, because she really had.
“Yeah,” Terasu says, “You’re that, too.” Then she looks over at Nikolao and Pipra and adds on an, “I do not fucking believe this,” which isn’t really a surprise considering she thinks what Nikolao’s done is a perversion of nature. Once again, bending the planet’s will and I don’t know why his gift hasn’t been taken back, so another gift on top of that probably - actually, it probably pisses Terasu off. She hates being wrong.
Also? Chiela’s just realized that none of the Gencha have come to investigate the blinding white light which is slowly fading now from where it stretches to the sky around them. No one’s cresting the ridge, and the shouting in the camp doesn’t seem any more frenzied than it did before, although, okay, two of them just became Endless, so maybe regular logic just doesn’t apply to this situation. Maybe the earth only rumbled for them, and, hell, the light could have just been an illusion for all she knows. Maybe she hallucinated it. Maybe they all hallucinated it. Group hallucinations happen all the time right? Unless all the angel sightings on Earth were real, which, hey, Chiela’s seen way crazier stuff than that since leaving Earth, so maybe they were. After all, Chiela’s turned out to be an ancient, Endless space dragon and the aliens in the cornfields turned out to be Nikolao and Pipra. Way crazier shit.
“Oh my gosh,” Pipra says, “Oh my gosh, Nichjo,” and Chiela turns to find Pipra holding up Nikolao’s hands, running his thumbs across his palms, and when Chiela looks closer, she realizes the skeleton there is whole, not the fractured, warped mess that kept Nikolao from using his hands much at all and, “Holy shit,” she says. Nikolao closes his eyes tightly, looking as if he’s on the verge of tears or something, which is causing Chiela some serious cognitive dissonance. Pipra gives a shocked, watery sort of laugh and throws himself at Nikolao, wrapping his arms tightly around his neck. Nikolao pulls him in tightly against his body, running his palms up and down Pipra’s back, eyes clenched tightly until suddenly they open wide, shocked, and, “You can see,” Nikolao says, as if the realization only just struck him, and, hey, it’s only just struck Chiela, and she probably looks shocked stupid at this point, but it’s a lot to take in.
Pipra pulls back, though his keeps his arms around Nikolao’s neck. “I can totally see,” he says, with a wavering smile, sounding as if he’s on the verge of tears himself. Nikolao gives that same shocked laugh, taking Pipra’s face between his hands - which he can actually do, now - smiling like he’s never smiled before. His smiles were so rare in the past that they were practically nonexistent, but none of the ones he had given matched this one. He kisses Pipra’s forehead and then his cheek and then his mouth, like her just can’t help himself, like the world’s about to end. Which, given what they’ve got to do today, it very well might.