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[It would be almost as devastating to Gregor to come out of this having hurt Miles as it would be to have confirmation of madness. It's no trivial thing to him to make sure Miles gets back safely.

Gregor is right about the buoyancy-- it's his mind, after all, what he thinks will be is what is. Delving down is the hard part, convincing himself to let Miles in. Allowing him out again is natural and graceful, if oddly painful, two things stuck fast that must separate once more. Now he's feeling his own form of Miles's reluctance; Miles had just been ahead of him on that.

There's no trace of Gregor's presence out in the water, shadowy or otherwise. That there'd ever been one at all was an unnecessary mental construct meant to guide Miles through the murky depths. But it's exactly the same as it was here before Miles went in, wide and peaceful with specters flitting about through the water like smudges with trails of paint behind them.]

[ Pleasant and cool after all that scorching heat; he takes a moment to let it balm him, drifting before floating the rest of the way through this section. Back through your walls, he say, gentle in his warning. He doesn't want to hurt Gregor on the way back through Cavilo and company, not after all the progress they've made. ]

[Be fast, he answers grimly, preparing himself for this, the absurd incredulous joy fading away. But Gregor is used to facing his demons, and facing and facing and facing them, so this is nothing new.

Cavilo and company indeed.

This time on the way out there is a new image, a persistent one given that it's rising to the top of Gregor's mind in the wake of Miles's assessment of his psyche. It's an image Gregor has only ever imagined, but he's imagined it many times, doleful and aching: Aral talking to his grandfather Ezar on his death bed, Negri nearby for witness, swearing through clenched teeth that if Gregor grows up like his father he will make sure he is removed from the throne. However necessary.

It represents Gregor's paranoid wonderings not just about his own paranoia but about those around him, looking out for it, watching him all this time. He feels constantly beset by them, aching to prove them wrong and unconvinced he can.

Until now.

As Miles floats upward, the scene, once loud and detailed (the wrinkles on his grandfather's face, reconstructed from holovids of him; Aral weary and grim, already worn to the bone by duty and being worn further; Negri, flashing between alive and stoic and dead and mutilated, as Gregor most clearly remembers him) fades into nothing, like a memory finally at long last acquiescing to time.

From there it is only a slow drift through Gregor's depression. Now there are real memories and not fabricated ones, again on topic with Aral quizzing him mercilessly at fifteen on the personal loyalties of each Count to each other; or sending Simon to rouse him out of bed in the middle of the night at the academy to ask his blank-faced judgement on some dire matter, his eyes weighing him silently; or at last a sign of tired gentleness at Gregor's abject apology regarding Miles's treason charge. That had been a complicated, stifling mess of a conversation, which Gregor tries to shuffle away from Miles.

No second guess necessary about what's on his mind already: a wordless incredulous victory that he will live up to Aral's unspoken hopes for him, at least this much. It's much clearer felt in the top layers, light breaking through at last.]

[ Miles' mouth seems to go dry. That's his father - overshadowing Gregor in much the same ways, or so it seems. Such a spike of sympathy from a person who utterly, 100% understands what it feels like. (And a moment to recognize how gentle Aral had been with him in comparison. Firm, but not quite ... this.) He never roused me in the middle of the night, at least, he thinks softly. You got the worse deal.

The comment is threaded with humor though. Gentle, gentle in the wake of these difficult memories. Instead he chooses to stoke those victorious impulses. That his father was - is surely proud of him and everything Gregor's become. Miles will so testify, in as many words as it takes to convince his father. (He suspects it will only take two.)

None of that will happen, he says as darkness gives way to light and sensation of his own body begins to return in bits and pieces. My father stepped down. You will be an amazing emperor... ]

[Let's not compare, he thinks back quietly. It's not as if Gregor doesn't get roused in the middle of the night now, on occasion; some incidents do not wait for morning to need the emperor's input and approval. Aral had been doing him a necessary bit of training for that. But at sixteen, it hadn't felt that way. He'd felt smothered and put upon.

Now he sees it much better, with more context, and is starting to approach gratitude more strongly, amid all the other factors of his relationship with Aral. He's grateful too that Miles is finally separating from him-- that intimacy hurts somehow, so sharp it lances straight through him, both the closeness and the detaching of it. His inviolate sense of personhood and desire for isolation is reasserting itself gradually, making the unsticking easier.

If I accomplish anything, Miles, it will be because you and your parents have carried me all the way. A plain truth as Gregor sees it, without fanfare, merely fact.

... Are you all right?

For all that, not quite ready to detach completely and go back to verbal. Gregor can only dimly feel his fingers starting to twitch, one of them gone numb where it's slipped around Miles and been awkwardly stuffed between him and the couch.]

[ Something still feels changed between them. An extra layer to the link - some sort of window in the door, perhaps, or an extra stream of water. He feels as though he could reach in much more easily if he chose to. That is ... soothing, deeply.

So too is Gregor's assessment of Aral. He warms a bit, grateful for Gregor's perspective. We may have carried you, he says, but you were worth the burden. Just as matter of fact in return.

That's the last truly intertwined thought he has before he finds himself slowly coming back to his body. He's slumped completely against Gregor during this thing, one hand at the small of his back while the other has gone completely numb against Gregor's knee. Slowly, thickly, he opens his eyes again. He is sore in more ways than one right now. And he can't shake the feeling of having a blazing mark upon his chest somewhere, despite the lack of physical changes ...

His mouth doesn't want to work either. The words come out as a croak. ]

Heavy.

[It's difficult to quantify that change, and far too soon for Gregor to make sense of it. There's so much he's reeling from, it's all an overwhelming rush boring down on him at once. Processing needs to happen one thing at a time.

He's silently warmed by Miles's return on their exchange, letting the reassuringly normal feeling of mutually avowed loyalty settle over him and guide him more gently back to reality.

He heaves a deep breath, suddenly on manual breathing, and coughs. That's about all the physical movement he can manage before wincing as the pins and needles come up to him all at once.

Maybe not talking yet. God, how long were we in there?]

[ Miles is quicker to recover; it wasn't his psyche being invaded, for one. And for the other, he is well used to having to fight his body for every fraction of a millimeter he has to move it. Good thing ... It takes all of his mental willpower just to turn its head on on side, to see what his chrono says. If anything the effort required makes him sag against Gregor more. ]

Hour ... two hours. I think.

[Gregor is the type who goes passive in resistance to the inexorable whims of fate, so this active struggle to regain feeling does not suit him. He is correspondingly slower-- and it was his psyche being invaded, as Miles had pointed out.

There is a profoundly unsettling sensation of a huge gap in his head, now, slowly filling itself back in. Bizarre.

Are you sure it wasn't a week? Weary humor finding its way past hollow exhaustion. I feel wrung out, like a sponge.]

Could have been a full day and an hour. More than that.

[ He really has no way of knowing either, but judging from the fact that his bladder isn't killing him yet, he can only assume. Ever so gently, he reaches out soothingly to Gregor, the mental equivalent of holding his hand. ]

Did ... did I hurt you?

[Gregor laughs helplessly, a creaky sound lined with rust as it comes out of his throat. He manages to open his eyes; his arm tightens around Miles convulsively.

Hurt me? No. He shares the strange sense of emptiness filling in, like the tide coming in over a hole dug on the wet sand of a beach, and then forces himself to speak out loud roughly:]

The assurance you have given me can never be repaid.

[Typical Gregor, to launch right from non-verbal to fully composed, formal sentences.]

[ That, on top of everything else, is almost too much for Miles. He's so glad his heart hurts. Very, very awkwardly, he forces his arms to work again. One is already basically around Gregor anyway; he only has to loop the other around too to give his Emperor a tight hug. Not to envelope or even pull him in - he has neither the size nor strength for that - but holding him all the same. He's so glad. ]

[Being hugged like this, something that happens to Gregor very rarely and only with this sort of unprepossessing gladness by Cordelia and now Miles, is too much for him. He can feel the happiness for him from Miles so cleanly.

He feels like his whole inner self has been scooped out, muddled around, and is now slowly being put back in. Different. Changed. All of those nightmares still reside within him. He will probably never be wholly free of worrying that he will crack one day, not with vicious, grotesque imaginings of his father's deeds to dog his steps, but as of right now, at this precise moment, he knows for sure there is nothing.

There is nothing lurking within him, no genetic memory of instability to cut his legs out from under him. He would destroy so much of the Imperium with that fall. If anything comes in the future, it will be wholly a product of his environment, and that can be controlled for.

That burden has suddenly been lifted from him wholesale, in much the same way Miles had felt when Gregor had taken his pain-- stunned at what life was like without the weight of it. Now he has taken his, except Miles doesn't have to give it back; he's just taken it. The gaping emptiness of what is left is now filled with profound, exhausted, wrung-out relief, enough to pierce his heart.

Gregor presses his face into the crook of Miles's shoulder and cries silently with the force of it, unmoving.]

Edited 2016-01-16 22:21 (UTC)

[ If he didn't know those were tears of relief, Miles would be concerned. He's ... still a little concerned, as he must be, but it's ameliorated by the gladness, doubled over again. Let Gregor cry. He'll stay here next to him as long as it takes, arms wrapped tightly around him and forehead against his emperor's chest. ]

You're all right. [ Gentle, so gentle. ] You're more than all right. I so swear it.

[ If that isn't enough reassurance then they may as well give up right then and there. (And never get out of bed again, indeed.) ]

[It's hard to tell he's crying; if Miles didn't have a direct line, the only sign would be the gradual dampening of his shirt. Gregor has always cried like this, in utter silence, unable to make himself any more vulnerable than the act already makes him.

But Miles, though... What sense is there in hiding from him anymore, anything at all? It's sheer habit that keeps his face where it is, Gregor trying to find some place of who he is without Miles inside him, bolstering him up. It feels like loss, not to have him. But the surreal incredible relief shows no signs of fading, and it eclipses the loss, outshines it.

He clutches at Miles, his arms loose but his fingers tight in his shirt, for long moments, recovering himself as well as he can piece by piece. Eventually he whispers hoarsely, emptily,] I was convinced you'd find something. I was... going to make you swear to tell me when you felt it come up, so I could try to kill it. Stamp it out. [He shudders once.] This total cessation of having to worry about it is-- bewildering.

[ Nothing left to hide at this point - as if there would be anything that Miles wouldn't accept at this point. The only thing he might have recoiled from would have been Gregor gleefully partaking in some of the same actions as his father, and he'd known that would never be the case. Joy not just for Gregor, but a twinge for himself too. Faith fully justified.

He shivers, slightly, at Gregor mentioning wanting to kill any part of himself. Him first before Gregor, god ... ] Like you taking on my pain. [ He says, echoing Gregor's earlier thoughts. ] It is - strange. And glorious. And terrifying all at once, isn't it?

[ Another mental image, this time of that tense conversation after he'd returned from the Dendarii from the first time. Him, Aral, Vorhalas, Henri, and Gregor all in the room to witness his testimony. Miles having found his way back to service after all ... A tinge of the same bewildering relief in that. ]

[Gregor hadn't been looking forward to trying to kill part of himself either, but he'd approached it with a bleak fixation. There was no other way he could live with himself, not with all that was riding on him and not in the more basic elements of being alive. But he is well aware that the process could never be as neat and surgical as a scalpel cut; no, there would surely be some collateral damage...

It's mistaken to attribute it to Miles, he knows, since Miles had only reported back what he'd seen. Miles had been the mirror, not the fact. Yet Gregor could have no mirror but him, would have none.

His tears dry up enough for him to left his head and discreetly wipe away the water, not quite looking at him yet.] Miles, if it's one tenth of this feeling, I must restate my offer ten times as firmly. I can't repay you, so let me offer-- as a friend.

[The same offer Miles had made to him, and oh, Gregor knows what a difference that makes, to be utterly void of obligation in the offering.]

[ It makes all the difference in the world. Equally as terrifying and liberating as the cessation of pain itself - that Gregor could just offer, and there be no obligation from Miles to refuse on grounds of Gregor being the Emperor. In fact he has less reason to refuse now, as it is something owed, in a strange way. Miles is giddy from being able to lift this burden from Gregor's shoulders. He ought to give that feeling back to his friend as well.

It would feel very nice too. As stiff as he is, all his bone aches seem doubled at the moment. It ... seems a bit unfair to turn it over right this second. Hmm. ]

All right. How about - a few hours, at first. A few hours a day if you like. You only had it for a few minutes, you know.

[ He brightens a bit as another thought occurs to him. ]

There is something else you could do that may help just as much.

[Gregor's not eager to turn it over right this second, either, and hadn't really meant it that way-- he's too wiped-- but a couple hours a day seems a suitable proposition, which he sends wordless acquiescence to. (It seems much easier, and logical, to do that now, with the link instead of with words.) Miles had taken it all from him so neatly and nigh-on permanently; Gregor can handle some physical pain that Miles manages to live with every moment of his existence, he's convinced.

He doesn't delude himself that it will be simple or easy, to retain that sludge in himself willingly or to physically bear the pain, but he will figure it out. That core of him that is forging steel shows through now in some small measure, as he withdraws enough to look at Miles directly, face dry, eyes intent.]

What is it?

[He asks very simply, but there is a lot behind the question.]

[ Gosh. Now he feels a bit silly, like he's offering some terribly trivial thing. Well, he already agreed to a few hours a day. This isn't a replacement for that. ]

On Beta Colony, I used to get massage therapy. Very pleasant, if also impermanent.

[Oh. Well. Gregor can't help his eyebrows shooting upward at the suggestion.]

Hmm, [he says noncommittally, withholding a pithy comment about requesting massage from the Emperor.] You do realize that would require me to learn it on someone. With... the knowledge you've given me, that is not so uncomfortable a thought as it once was, I grant.

[What a delicate way to dance around that topic.]

[ He did just suggest Betan massages to the Emperor. God, he is out of it. He burns rather abruptly with shame now, not - not wanting this to come off as anything except an innocent suggestion. No ghost dredging, please. ]

Well - I mean, just as another option. To consider. It needn't all be us swapping my pain back and forth, or spending most of the day at half my size. God forbid.

[He is so used to perceiving Miles as shameless that getting this direct blast of it in total contradiction to that belief is startling for a moment. Any desire to mock him vanishes into smoke. Gregor hadn't thought it was anything but innocent in the first place; it's baffling to imagine Miles capable of ulterior motives where he's concerned, after what they'd just done.]

I will consider it, [he promises him, because he can't quite bring himself to promise to actually do it. But he will think about it.] It's not a bad suggestion. I think in my head I haven't fully adjusted to this idea that I'm Greg. You make it look very natural, switching back and forth.

[ Good enough. He's glad to let the subject - and his shame - fall away. ]

The trick is that I believe it very honestly. I was neck deep in it, out with the Dendarii.

The implication being that I'd have to fully believe I'm not the Emperor... [A short exhale. Then he murmurs,] That would be a trick, wouldn't it.

[A momentary pause.]

Although it occurs to me it must not be significantly less tricky, for you.