𝒦𝒶𝓋𝑒𝒽 🏛️ (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
indigently) wrote2023-01-23 02:27 pm
indigently) wrote2023-01-23 02:27 pm𝒪𝓅𝑒𝓃 𝓅𝑜𝓈𝓉 🏛️
OPEN POST
action • text • canon • cross-canon • assumed cr
indigently) wrote2023-01-23 02:27 pm
for @prescribes
[ Well, it's certainly not the response Kaveh expected. Careful as the words are, the sentiment is indeed implied, and the thing is, outward emotion of any kind is an odd look on Alhaitham. It has him raising his brows, and where he should just be content with any niceties he gets, he can't help but shoot back a somewhat snarky reply: ]
If I didn't know you any better, I'd say you're going soft on me.
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[ ugh, kaveh, alhaitham will do anything in his power to avoid the appearance of 'soft'. he hates to care! but somehow, kaveh makes him do it anyway. ]
Not that I don't like quiet. I love quiet. But if you have problems, I assumed I should ask if you require assistance before they become my problems.
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So now you're checking in on me for the sake of your precious peace and quiet?
What are you, Alhaitham, my babysitter?
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for @parries
[ Well, there's no time like the present moment to continue their discussion, and the means of communication do not honestly matter to the architect. As such, Kaveh makes his way into the study with all of his usual aplomb, picking up the book in question and leafing through it for the condoms he himself placed in there earlier, for reasons that he still hasn't entirely explained— and that, honestly, he's not entirely sure he fully knows himself. He should probably feel embarrassed over the whole thing, but with the worst of the uncomfortable conversational turn having passed them by at this point, any worries of the sort are long gone, and his mood has changed for the better once more.
Perhaps in the long run however, the outcome of the situation is to end up somewhat more unpleasant for Alhaitham, who now has to listen to Kaveh's lyrical voice as he goes about lecturing the scribe on his choice of words. ]
Regardless of your opinion on the terminology, Alhaitham, surely you can see that the textbook language for an act so intimate is dry at best and dispassionate at worst. It's none of my business, I know, but it's a total turn-off.
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What would you like me to say to that, Kaveh? Should I apologize for turning you off?
[ Not that he's saying that he'd do that, of course. ]
Besides, I offered an opportunity for you to adjust my verbiage. You could exercise it, if you care so much.
[ For better or for worse? He'll change his terminology immediately. And he'll stick with it, even if Kaveh hasn't forecast how things might play out into the broad future. ]
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No need, I'm used to it. I'm just saying that if you ever do plan on getting la— I'm sorry, on having "sexual intercourse"— [ and here he lifts his hands, fingers forming air quotes as he talks ] —you're liable to scare off potential partners with that kind of language.
[ On second thought, maybe it would just be easier to exercise that opportunity and change Alhaitham's vocabularic choice to one that he prefers. Not for his own benefit, of course, but to prepare the other for any of those potential partners whom he might come across...
His finger taps against his lip, and after a moment or two, he looks up at Alhaitham with a nod. ]
You know what? You're right. You should change how you say it.
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a novel... thank the concept of structured argument
and another thing, (rambles on for a full wikipedia article)
I cannot with these two
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and all the while, from dawn to dusk, tighnari silently catalogues how many glasses of wine kaveh enjoys, how often he reaches for the bottle, how many bottles they empty between the three of them.
after another round of genius invokation tcg sees collei nodding in her seat, tighnari gently declares the evening complete, and clears up the table. collei smiles blearily, before she's heading off to her own hut, and cyno lingers long enough to help with the dishes before he's off to sumeru city again, breathing a soft kiss to the corner of tighnari's lips.
and then there were two. i'm not tired. walk with me? tighnari asks, and together he and kaveh set out to the lower slopes of gandha hill, to watch the swath of stars fling itself across the heavens. tighnari points out vulpes zerda in the sky, they chat a little more, and then, fall silent. it's a comfortable silence, at least for a little while, before tighnari ventures, quietly. ]
Kaveh.. you know you can trust me, don't you?
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By the time they're walking over Gandha Hill, Kaveh is pleasantly tipsy. He hasn't noticed Tighnari's eyes on him, but he's certainly had more than enough drinks during the day for his friend's watchful eyes to notice. After all, it's his first day free in a while, so why shouldn't he celebrate and enjoy himself? And in his defense, it's not until dinner that he drank more heavily, anyway. Cyno's jokes...
He's enjoying the quiet, eyes trained on the stars making their way across the heavens, when Tighnari's voice reaches his ears, and he turns, a slight frown on his face. He's not sure of his friend's purpose, but there's something about his tone that makes the architect nervous. ]
...Yeah? Of course I know that, Tighnari. Why do you ask?
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I think you know why.
[ kaveh is an intelligent man, academically and emotionally, and tighnari is sure that he will understand where this is leading, and what tighnari is referring to. his hand smooths across the grass, finding kaveh's, squeezing. ]
If you trust me, why won't you ask me for help?
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the wound is the place where light enters you; / post-interdarshan competition
tonight, four hours after the dramatic conclusion to the interdarshan competition, and a single hour after kaveh's dinner out, alhaitham meets kaveh in the front room of his house. he says, without need for explanation, ]
Sit.
[ in his hand, the first aid kit unfurls into its major components: gauze, tweezers, antiseptic, plasters of a variety of shapes and sizes, safety pins curled in balanced on the tension of spring and clasp. practised hands bring a basin of cool water. the towel is orange. it had been a part of a set debated for at the counter of a very bemused stallkeeper on treasure's street, the collateral damage, as it were, between alhaitham's general disinterest in colour and kaveh's need for all of them. it is handwoven and inexpensive; it had been chosen by alhaitham for the task because it is a towel, and because it is not one of the nicer ones in the household that kaveh would protest to using it for such a purpose. it is one less argument on the heels of a day that stretches, long, long, like lengthening shadows, as alhaitham sits behind kaveh on the divan and gestures for him to remove his shirt.
the wounds catalogued by a brisk flicker of alhaitham's eyes come hardly as a surprise. a day's laying in hot desert sand, the bruises and scrapes that come from being collateral damage between the general mahamatra and what is essentially a flying gremlin, the tussle and tumble from being sped across a racetrack propelled by nothing but mehrak's propensity to explode and a singular, stubborn ideal. all of it culminates in a story told through harsh, red lines across the pale of kaveh's skin, mottled purpling bruises the size of small dinner plates, and a bristling sunburn that pains to be perceived. alhaitham documents each with clinical detachment. he wets the towel. he wrings it until it is merely damp. he begins to clean.
it is, after all, not the first time has done so. it, too, will not be the last. ]
Lean forward. [ these are the words that break the silence. ] Do not slouch. Gravel has gotten in.
I cry for them
He said, he said, he said. But all for naught, of course.
His bags line the wall of his bedroom, packed for nowhere. The house he marked out will sell, but not to him. And maybe that's for the best, Kaveh thinks, when the alternative to an empty house is someone who, while he may be painfully, obtusely acerbic at the best of times, is standing in front of him right now with a first aid kit and a command on his lips. Someone who, as recent events have uncovered, spent his closely-guarded personal time on finding answers that benefited Kaveh alone.
It's with such knowledge that the blonde is obedient without complaint or even comment, sitting on the divan and divesting himself of his cloak and his shirt. His face is wan, drawn from the days of exhaustion and emotion all culminating in a conclusion that has left him wanting to burrow into the depths of his sheets and cry himself hoarse. Every last inch of him aches and stings, and even half-naked he doesn't dare to look down at himself. Not that it matters— He knows all too well after all that Alhaitham will do that for both of them, seeking every stray mark and line and cataloging them in a memory practically eidetic.
Usually, Kaveh might complain about the supposed disinterest with which his roommate takes on such tasks. In the fragility of the moment, however, where a word too kind or a touch too tender might push him headlong into the spiral, he finds himself appreciating it— even as he grieves in his mind for the latest in a long line of hopes and dreams to be shattered by the cold touch of reality.
A diadem on the rainforest floor, a smirk on the fading lips of a long-dead ghost.
Alhaitham's words cut through the noise, grounding him, leaving him to nod as he bends forward in obedient response. Long fingers dig into a knee that aches almost as much as the rest of him, teeth gritting as if to get ahead of the pain that defines a dirtied wound on sunburned skin, no matter how gentle his carer's hands may be. ]
Alright. [ A single word, spoken instead of the "thank you" that burns on the tip of his tongue.
Kaveh's eyes squeeze shut. ]
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a diadem on the rainforest floor. a smirk on the fading lips of a long-dead ghost.
another ghost, haunting the annals of kaveh's memory, a force unto itself. alhaitham does not remember his own father. even if he did, he is not under any illusion that the nonexistence well of his sympathy would allow him to relate. but alhaitham, too, knows loss. the draw of towel over kaveh's wounds elicits the faint squeeze of kaveh's eyes. alhaitham, too, reads this without needing to see it. it is plain in the shifting of the contours of kaveh's cheeks; it is plain in the tension of his body. this is a language that alhaitham has gained fluency in over time. wounds washed, he puts aside the towel, letting blood diffuse into the water basin. alhaitham take tweezers from the kit. he leans in.
apropos of nothing, this is what he says: ]
Our inkwells run low.
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for @sapio
First of all: I'm already in bed. My hair is up and there's moisturizer on my face. If they are indeed making out on the couch still, that makes this a "you" problem, not an "us" problem.
[ For a moment, he considers leaving it at that— but that's practically inviting snark in reply, and son he continues: ]
The way I see it, you have a couple of options, and mostly involving destroying the mood so completely they have no choice but to give up. Personally, I recommend sitting next to them and reading in your best monotone voice from the dullest chapter of the dullest textbook you own.
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I wouldn't be so sure it's a 'me' problem.
They are already knocking pillows down.
1/2 this is too early in the convo to hit you with double notifs but he's incorrigible I'm sorry
Could you try physically separating them? We both know you're not exactly the "feeble scholar" you make yourself out to be.
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we wouldn't want him any other way
idk he wants to send flurries of text messages all the time lol
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for @localgrandma, getting a good workout of his shocked icons
Madam Faruzan!! You can't just ask someone that!!!
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Still, I am curious as to what the young people are interested in.
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for @desideration
Ah, now whose turn is it to offer too much praise, Lord Kamisato? Besides, having the chance to work on this project is an honor. Regardless of how difficult your schedule made it, please be assured that I would make the time. But there are many who would not go to such lengths for my comfort, [ —in fact, if anything, often the opposite is true— ] so I'm grateful nonetheless.
At any rate, I will see you this evening.
[ And so at 11PM exactly, Kaveh is allowed into the Kamisato Estate for a meeting with her lord. Despite the late hour, the discussion goes smoothly, with each side presenting all needs and requirements to receptive ears. The Kamisato lord is respectful of him in a way that takes the architect by surprise; usually in such negotiations he is continually hounded by clients who, despite not being artists themselves, seem to believe they know exactly what will work and what won't in a design. But when Ayato speaks, it is to query, to answer questions, to educate in the ways of Inazuman architecture. This, despite being a man who is surely used to ordering others around—
The meeting flies by; before long it's past midnight and Kaveh is sitting back with a contented sigh. It went better than he could ever have imagined, and despite the late hour, he doesn't feel tired in the slightest. ]
I'm sure you hear this often enough, [ he says with a smile, ] but you're not at all what I expected.
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Excellent, I'll be looking forward to our meeting. Until then.
[ From the outside, it may seem a bit off color—the idea of enlisting a man from another nation to restore Inazuman culture of eras long past. But unlike certain principles his own nation is only now learning to let go of, Ayato is not the type to believe that things must be done in only one way. Perspective can be valuable no matter where it comes from, and the Sumerian architect's talent speaks for itself. As unconventional as this approach may be, he has little doubt in the project's success.
By the time they have concluded business discussions, he's more than certain that he has indeed chosen the right person. Ayato never dares to presume he will enjoy the company of those he meets with, yet even he is somewhat surprised by how pleasant it has been to have Kaveh as a guest. Refreshing is how Ayato would describe him, both in the way of ideas and in temperament.
He meets Kaveh's smile with one of his own, a now lukewarm cup of tea in hand. Ayato is sat across from the other man in traditional seiza, but he doesn't seem to mind that Kaveh has taken on a more relaxed posture. ]
It isn't an entirely unfamiliar sentiment. [ The statement is punctuated a good-natured chuckle. ] Now I'm curious to know what you did expect.
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apologies for taking a bit, i've been a little under the weather the last few weeks!! 🥺
not at all! I'm still recovering from sickness myself so I totally understand ♥
i hope you're feeling better!! 🥺
for @localweirdo
I mean... I guess. Maybe a little.
But there's been a lot of bad too.
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Maybe I can help you think of it in a more positive manner!
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for @scribal
I never ASKED you to hype me up??
[ How the moods will change. From cheerful to self-doubting to aggravated. Likely, Alhaitham is the last person he should have contacted about this, but, well... ]
Ugh forget it, I shouldn't have told you. It's not like you'd get it anyway.
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I get it. You want someone to want you. The easiest way to do that is to have casual sex with strangers. It's not fulfilling though, and knowing you, you'll likely suffer from heartache in the end.
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I am so sorry for him being so impossible
no!!! i love it!!!
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Are you free right now?
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Is something the matter, Madam Faruzan?
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