Cornelius Hickey (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
spotsalone) wrote2025-04-11 07:04 pm
spotsalone) wrote2025-04-11 07:04 pm
Entry tags:
angelo and the hickster's post-belle arctic adventures
angelo cr chart
mutineers cr chart...
timeline:
- arrival; late july, mutineers' hill
- tent chats; early august, temporary camp
- spotting the ships; late august, terror camp
- tuunbaq attack; sept 1, ice floe camp
- boarding terror; fellas it's gay; early sept, hms terror
- dog to dog communication; early sept, forecastle
- bark bark bark; early sept, on deck
- coat! and post-tozer debrief; early sept, angelo's cabin
- 🌶️; early sept, hickey's cabin
- the dogs are unionizing(?); mid sept, cargo hold
- tozer/captain stuff, look at them having an adult conversation; mid sept, greatroom
- little rescue mission; early oct, terror bay
- post-little debrief; early oct, hickey's cabin
no subject
So much of it is exactly what Elias wants to hear—which makes it feel like a targeted attack. He wants to call it all a lie even though it's blatantly not—but it doesn't make sense, either. My heart belongs to the Captain. How can both things be true? And where is the resolve he had earlier? Anything, for you, and God did he mean it, but it's much more difficult to feel the knife at his throat and still say go ahead.
He can't leave, but now staying feels impossible. He can't do this. Already, this hurts so badly that he can't pretend it doesn't. It fogs up his head, leaves him lost and balking in indecision when he's so used to his mind running at a gallop. It's like forgetting how to breathe. Even if he decides the sacrifice is worth it, how? He doesn't know how to be that person.
He's already been silent for far too long, but opening his mouth may as well be pulling a trigger. Angelo has cornered him. There's no hope of escaping into some deflection. His plan to preserve this memory unmarred is already ruined, as they are apparently incapable of existing near each other without the walls caving in.
Angelo knows what kind of person he is. Elias could claim it was all just a manipulation tactic, playing into Angelo's insecurities, telling him what he so clearly needed to hear... Catastrophic, but it would spare them both. They're too far gone for a painless escape.
A mercy, really. Like Billy. ]
I would tell you that, yes. I'm glad to hear my strategy has worked so well. You...
[ His voice is already hollow, and it dies out as he hears his own words. If he tells Angelo it was all a lie, he would believe it, wouldn't he? Because Elias is the type of person who would tease out a vulnerability and use it like a tool.
Angelo knows this, and he frames it as a refuge. Comforting darkness. No one has ever...
His eyes find the coat hanging next to the bed, just a dark shape against white paint. ]
...It wasn't a strategy. I meant every word. I don't know how you've inspired me to care what you think of yourself, but...
[ Again, he loses the thread. Maddening. He exhales, teeth clenched, and works his arm under the blanket to hold Angelo to him. His nose presses into Angelo's hair. ]
I don't understand what I am to you.
no subject
Elias holds him tightly, clammy skin to clammy skin, and for the first time since they finished their act, he feels naked and exposed. ]
... that makes two of us.
[ It's difficult to breathe with his face pressed into the crook of Elias' neck, but Angelo makes no move to shift away. ]
What you are to me, what I am to you... I don't know any better than this.
[ The way Elias phrased it seems like a bad joke. How he 'inspired him' to care? As if Angelo had ever had one of those precious strategies about it, as if he'd ever asked for Elias to contort himself over the basic facts of his existence. Is it that Elias is trying to make up for desiring someone filthy? Is Angelo too low to consider as someone to love, so he has to prop him up to make himself feel better? Angelo isn't sure if he could blame him.
But that's not how Elias had touched him. That's not how he looks at him, when they are not sinking into this spiral of... Of what? What is this? Is it misunderstanding or is it that they understand a little too clearly?
It would be nice if Elias could remain optimistic about this. Willfully, unshakably optimistic, as he always was, even in the face of death. How could he place enough weight on Angelo to somehow let that shatter? ]
no subject
Buried somewhere in everything they've said today, in words or otherwise, is the key Elias is looking for. It's just a matter of sifting through the rubble, he knows. Something better saved for tomorrow, when he's rested. And alone. ]
Let's not do this tonight.
[ He lays a hand against Angelo's cheek, drawing back some to allow their eyes to meet. ]
But know that I want you here with me. More than anything.
[ He smiles again, this time warm and genuine. For all the turbulence of today, the simple fact of wanting Angelo has not changed. If anything, that desire runs more deeply now. A stubborn, wounded part of him still wants to burn it down and run, but he bites it back, at least for tonight. If that decision must be made, he'll make it another day. ]
no subject
'Let's not do this tonight,' might just be the greatest verbal point of agreement they've had all day.
From this close, he can make our Elias' face even in the darkness, and he manages a crooked smile in return. Elias still wants him here. It's a good peace offer, smoothing over a battle they had never meant to start to begin with. ]
Mhm.
[ Words have consistently failed him today, so he decides to reciprocate the reassurance with the ghost of a kiss to the lips instead. I wouldn't want to be anywhere else is too difficult to say out loud, when they both know that there is a single impossible dream that threatens to render it a lie. ]
Sleep well, Elias.
[ It doesn't take much to shift into a position that feels comfortable to fall asleep in. Just about any way they could be tangled up could have done. It's the sheer warmth of it that really does him in and drags him back into a weary drowsiness in no time at all. The anguish that they cause each other will be held at bay by it for just a little longer.
Even knowing that Elias is the man who could destroy him, Angelo feels safe when he drifts into sleep. ]