i saw the sun and its name was man
You could say a lot of things about Minoth's relationship with Amalthus - what he did, what he didn't do, what he succeeded at and what he failed to do, what he built up in his head and what actually happened...you could say all of those things. It probably wouldn't be your place to, especially seeing as Minoth himself didn't know what he thought of them himself, consistently, but the one thing anyone could observe and agree upon was that the whole thing was characterized by a very blunt, deadly distance.
They stood apart from each other, aesthetics entirely divested and dichotomized, and only grew farther and further apart each day removed from that of resonation. Once again, you could comment on whose fault that was, which one gave up first and which one let that happen, or you could simply recognize that Amalthus had had all his hard knocks well before Minoth's time, when he salvaged a lost treasure from the time of Torna's dread reign and awakened it to be whatever he needed it to be - status, principally, but moreover...whatever he needed it to be.
Whatever. He. Needed. It. To. Be. You know. Thereabouts. Take it as you will.
Now, that is, in general, a tale for another time, complete with further details of consent and responsibility and the consequences of leaving one's own grisly fate to be passed on to another, when neither of you deserve it. What we're interested in now is the happier side of things. One might almost term it a glance at sunrise when the seemingly eternal and horrific gloom of midnight has been cast for ages and ages.
Addam Origo, too, was held at arm's length, by the queen foremost, but also of course by his uncle and adjacent siblings, and then his father, and in word but not in deed his beloved Nuncle. All of them knew the silent fact that he, as plans go, was not meant to exist. His mother died far too early to make terribly much of a difference, and so though he was happy, Addam was very much adrift in his own mindless orbit.
When they first met, Addam stood far closer to Minoth than anyone ever had, and indeed far closer than he himself had any right to. They were total strangers, because of course they were. And just as obviously, it was like they had known each other for centuries, if not forever.
"Hello," said Addam, and then gave his name, first and last. "What brings you to Torna?" So hospitable, aren't you?
Of course he'd never been around other people who'd needed to introduce themselves. Did he even expect Minoth to reciprocate?
But that bright, bright smile, wider than an entire belt of asteroids, shone up into Minoth's darkened, as-yet-unscarred face, and in due time the Blade found himself answering, "My name is Minoth. I'm here with my Driver." As with as it could be, when he didn't even bother to take me across the front hall of the palace with him.
It wasn't freedom, no, because such inspiring places as the desert or the forests or the hills or the seas were never places Minoth could explore alone. No, he was always left to empty, hidden halls. If there were anyone in them, none of them would ever want to talk to him.
Well. Not that he would have wanted to talk to them either. But taking the first step across that menial distance is always the hardest part.
"Your Driver?" With hands still propped to hips, the youth cocked his head to one side, and the scraggly tuft of hair tied off just to the side and above his right cheek swayed, ever so slightly. "Oh, of course you've got a Driver. That was foolish of me not to notice."
Of course. Because Blades didn't have autonomy, not in that way. Because Minoth still answered to a higher power that wasn't anything close to being like the God that Amalthus loved to tout and spout about.
Because Minoth was only some handful of years less than a decade old and already he hated humanity and its trappings too, and didn't feel himself all too well inclined to look for exceptions. Did he take kindly to the fact that Amalthus had endured hardship and decided to come out the other side a light-wash, coercive abuser? Not in the least, but it was proof for the pudding more than it was for the spoon.
Amalthus was bad because that was how Drivers, and thus humans, were. That, above all, was easy and even damned natural for Minoth to believe.
So he thought through all these things, while Addam was still grinning so gamely at every weathered curve and pristine panel like he knew without having to know that he'd found a new friend. He considered what it would gain him to be genuine here, what it would cost him to playact, how much he'd bet with Baltrich that Addam was a no-good rabble-rousing liar and how much he actually valued the company of a confidant.
Eh, what the hell? The boy was dressed nicely enough, he couldn't be all that much of a street rat. He had sort of a...foppish air about him. The world would be his friend, if only they had a viewing window to co-opt.
"Hey, we all have our moments, Prince," Minoth returned at last, letting his arms uncross and his right leg splay out. "I suppose I should be flattered that you didn't assume."
Oh, yes, one supposes. But Addam didn't take him up on the second remark. No, he was too focused on the first.
"Oh, no. I don't care how many diplomacy visits I see by happenstance, nor how much my father argues that I should see the world now that I'm eighteen to completely fly in the face of all how I know he doesn't really want that. There's no need for you to be calling me by any such titles."
Any such... "Titles?" Minoth echoed faintly. If his arms hadn't been fallen already, they would be now.
Too, a more sardonic conversation partner would have given a slight snort and rolled his eyes. Addam didn't do so; he was well and fully in earnest as he gave an emphatic dip of his chin, lips lightly pursed. "Yes, titles. Despite what my uncle may choose to believe, a bastard prince fourth in line to the throne is still a prince. I certainly don't need you reminding me, too."
Implicit in that statement were quite a many things, some informational and some not. What Minoth took away, above all, was that sometimes he was a little too prescient for his own good - in other words, what they call flying a little too close to the sun.
That's the ground work, anyway. You know the rest. The one convergence point of that same distance was the experiment; nothing more, and nothing less. With the prince, however, Minoth nearly always found himself with personal space invaded - or rather, shared. It wasn't an unwilling thing, all in all.
As Addam grew older, and Minoth stayed functionally the same (because jadedness is not age, not really), the other way and mean he found himself was continually torn between whether the affair was meant to be platonic or romantic; whether Addam was just a touchy-feely sort of guy, or whether he was enamored on a different level.
Because, if you'll pardon my saying so, Minoth certainly was. It was just that his internal interpretation and usage of levels meant that he buried such feelings as deeply as he could. If the Driver was emotionally aware, then the Blade was emotionally intelligent. Neither were both.
So it took Minoth quite a long time to realize that not only did Addam enjoy his company, as that much was quite plain, but he himself experienced a happiness he'd never had when the other man was around.
Never. Not ever. And that...that wasn't right. Was it?
But nevertheless. So he knew it. So he attempted, at divers times, to process it. Did he know what to do - what he meant to do - with this information? Not a chance in hell - Alrest, rather. It was a moral quandary like none he'd ever seen, ever known, ever dreamt of.
Because of course he'd never thought that such a thing would ever apply to him.
For two, four, six, eight years he thought about it, and found nothing much ever to come of it, as the distance only grew, farther and farther all the time - on both counts.
And so Minoth was alone with his thoughts. He grew used to the way ether flowed in his altered physical form, not always weaker but never quite stronger, either. Just...more self-contained. That type of self-sufficiency was a good thing, to be sure, but it rankled all the same. Oh, yes. Always with the distance.
He kept it, when word came that Amalthus would be at the palace as they approached. Truth be told, he was far too busy dissecting it all over again with Addam, this time among a half-dozen-plus more fireside companions.
Being preoccupied with managing Mythra, the prince had a fair bit less time to spend lollygagging with his old friend, but to be sure, whenever the slightest, faintest flicker of a problem cropped up, he was there in spades, ready to throw his handiest lot in or otherwise lean doggedly in from nearby until somebody else dealt with the issue.
Just such an issue as was found in the sand gardens the day of Lora's knighting ceremony, when the kids and adjacent (that is to say, Haze, and she pulled Lora and Jin with her, and Aegaeon was eager to follow with Hugo's gamely approval and Brighid's not-quite-mincing step in time, and Mythra would positively negatively snap if she got left behind again) disappeared to various and sundry celebratory activities.
The king, stood in his finest clogs and royal grooming, only gave the remaining pair a cursory glance, before likely deciding that he was better off not knowing, and turning back towards the palace. Zettar, in due time, followed him.
Minoth, meanwhile, continued the staring contest with his Driver that he knew wasn't as one-sided as it felt, even from several meters away.
If he kept looking, building up boiling ether behind his eyeballs until it practically hurt, maybe he could ignore the painful stabbing in his Core, resultant as sure as anything from the wholly new phenomenon of being in the same general area as not just Amalthus or Addam, but both at the same time.
His Core, his base programming, simply couldn't decide. Amalthus still had control, still had a hook on Minoth's half-cock heart. Addam was coming in from without, and was very nearly outmatched by that token.
Architect. It felt just as disgusting as it sounded.
Minoth hated indecision. Abhorred it. Detested nothing more strongly on this earth. Indecision was what plagued Addam, most of the time. And for all what he had decided he had grown to love about the prince, that single potentially assimilatory quality was not one. He'd always made up his own mind; never had the choice but to. So this?
"Are you alright, Minoth?"
Uh-huh. There it was. He should have been expecting it. But, he'd been busy all but doubling over, because it wasn't just stabbing but shooting, and judging by the way non-human signals affected him in a human way, these days, his forehead was probably burning up, which meant that his coloration was surely thrown off balance, and soon enough Amalthus would see, and...
"I'm fine." Off with the gauntlets, twist one-two. "I just..." Just need to take responsibility for this, because functionally I'm my own Driver, and a good Driver knows enough to stop and deal with the aggressor when their Blade is in pain.
He was still halfway in between being faced to the palace gateway and being turned politely to the side, where Addam had localized himself because of course he hadn't thought that perhaps Minoth had liked having something, someone more pleasant to look at in the foreground while Amalthus loomed in the back.
"Don't need him to see me-" Sure enough, don't need him to see me at all, what's to look at, I hope he doesn't get anything out of it but Architect, could you imagine if he did...
As Minoth tugged insistently at the fingertips of his gloves, the rest of his composure gave its way fully out, and he fell forward, which is to say to the side, towards Addam, who caught the wayward vestments as they, too, fell.
"Like this."
It was then that Addam finally looked, finally saw, finally made estimation of the man still lingering by the archway, bereft of his erstwhile bosom companion of the golden persuasion.
"Are you-"
"I just told you." The hand not locked firmly onto Addam's right wrist was palming frustratedly at his Core, desperate for any feel or read on its condition, so Minoth hardly noticed, consciously, the presence of Addam's own other hand on the side of his torso.
Close. He was close. He was so damned close. So why was this still a problem?
Since Addam was on his right side, Minoth made the hasty stage-direction decision not to even attempt looking anywhere to his left, and thus was well aware of how long it took his prince to stop gazing timidly back at the Quaestor. Not until they were practically on top of the benches at the foot of the Saschum Gardens was Minoth confident that he'd recentered his focus, and even then...
Titan's foot. Why was Addam the one more preoccupied about the whole thing? It wasn't his mess to clean up. He shouldn't have even had to tote Minoth away like a wounded soldier from a battle that hadn't begun, only echoed its malicious cannon fire in and into the ears of those who'd been set upon.
But they had indeed reached the benches, so sit they did. Minoth wasn't about to complain that they hadn't left the area, after all. He'd certainly prefer to keep an eye on his assailant, to see that he had gone with his own eyes.
Now that he was far enough away. And hadn't he always been? Apparently not.
A few of the senior attendees of the ceremony were also lingering by the shallow ponds, but they, unlike certain people Minoth could name, had the good sense not to go poking around whatever disturbances traveling with a mongrel beast like him would eventually bring. So that was fine enough.
Fine enough. That summed up his whole life so far, didn't it? He was good enough for Amalthus's purposes, when he was needed, and when he wasn't he kept to himself, out of the way, most of the time.
And if you were content existing in such a consistent state of flux, you could get along that way.
But Minoth had had enough.
In search of the right words with which to break the silence, he rubbed absentmindedly at his scar with one hand, his Core with the other. If it wasn't those, it would be his jaw, but of course it was those, because he couldn't escape having them.
Not ever. And forever was bound to be a long, long time.
This moment, not quite so long, was just then capped off by Addam quietly cupping a hand around the just-so-unoccupied lower half of Minoth's face, on his left side, and leaning in to press a kiss to the other.
Somehow, that still wasn't confirmation. It could mean anything, coming from Addam. And who was Addam, anyway?
He wasn't Amalthus. But, neither was he Minoth himself. He was a different kind of counterpart.
He was part of what had caused this incident. But that...wasn't exactly a bad thing, now was it.
Minoth hadn't explained. He hadn't exactly thought that he wouldn't need to.
Why did Addam know? He'd never explicitly said that the reason he was afraid - yes, afraid - of getting too close to his old Driver was that his Core might act up, might project sympathy of a subconscious kind onto the situation when Minoth himself all but despised the man, not only for everything he'd done to his Blades, and thus what he was responsible for as a result, but just for the...the scum that he was.
Oh, he was horrible. And yet Minoth still found himself bound to obey, even now, with Addam so near. It didn't make any sense. Even a storyteller hates when things come out of order, when the characters don't play up to their own roles.
Especially, the storyteller does.
"You know, I quite like your hands."
"Huh?" Oh, there hadn't been any cue given for this.
Addam had taken the named appendages in his own, resting in his lap, and begun tracing idle patterns in the palms. It was natural, to him, apparently. Just something you did, with a friend.
With a Blade. With your Blade.
"I'd never seen them before. That's a sad thing, don't you think?"
"I suppose." Not like Blades' hands are meant to be seen, particularly. They're meant to be used, meant to hold weapons. They're not meant, themselves, to be held.
But Addam had always been a bit of an exception, in that way, eh?
"Can I ask you something?"
"Shoot, Prince." Heh. What a silly kid you were. And so was I.
"You said you didn't need him to see you like this. I suppose you meant in a state of weakness, or some such, but I would think, in a sense, that he deserves to see the pain he has caused you. That by watching you run away he only continues to win out."
Ah. Indeed, undeniably, Amalthus was the one who had won here. Right? He was the one who had stood his ground, who had asserted his dominance.
Who had chosen a direction to walk and struck along it, never minding the consequences.
Huh. But anyway.
"Tch. You act like there's something I could do about it. What am I gonna do, write a play about how great you are so he can think about that over and over for five hundred years, how grandly he screwed up?"
"You might," Addam answered mildly. "But you might also just stick a little closer to me. If, that is, you're amenable."
"I-"
"He used you. That's all he did."
"I...guess I can agree with that," Minoth allowed quietly, trying not to furrow his brows overmuch as he considered whatever it was Addam was trying to get across.
"Oh, Minoth." Addam looked up from his ministrations, trained his eyes on Minoth's.
Neither pair wobbled indecision. And that was a good thing, right?
"Stop guessing, would you?"
And it was then that Minoth knew. He was not just lit, but lit from within; not just warmed, but warm all over.
Maybe he'd known it from the start.
Every dog has its day, is something like the saying goes. But more than that, every moon has its sun.
When he is yours, there is no such thing as being too close.