“Mm… is it morning already?” he winced, eyes blinking open while his mind lulled with tired thoughts that drained him. It’d been a little under two weeks since they’d returned from the laboratory with Orvana, and at first, Lavimo found that he barely had the energy to do anything. His thoughts were too burdened from his experiences, of how useless he’d been. But now that he’d been sitting around for so long, he felt the urge to do something, or to at least move a bit. He didn’t want to sit in his bed forever.
But when he tried to lift himself up, he felt the hand wrapped around his waist tighten, fingers tracing his stomach as Haven tugged him closer. “Where are you going?” they sighed sleepily, mouth moving to nuzzle at the back of his neck before Lavimo gave in and rolled over to meet them.
“I wanna do something.”
“Like what?”
“I dunno. I just wanna move around,” he replied, moving his arms to wrap around Haven’s small waist, burying his head into their neck as he planted a kiss on the bottom of their jaw. “Make me something to eat?”
“Mm… whaddyu want?” Haven yawned, stretching their arms above their head as their legs straightened underneath the covers, before they immediately sat up and smacked their hand on top of Lavimo’s face above his delighted smile. “You want somethin’ fancy?”
“Hehe… you’ve been acting so nice ever since we got back,” he smiled underneath their hand, grinning from ear to ear as he giggled against it. “Are you still worried about me? I promise I’m okay now.”
“Tsk. I’ll decide whether you’re okay or not for myself. Now tell me what you want to eat, dumbass,” Haven snapped, turning their hand into a fist to give him a swift bonk on the head, before they twisted around to reach over their side table to grab bandages that were wrapped into a tight ball. And they snatched it up and unraveled it slightly, before they began to wrap it around their chest in order to flatten down their breasts.
They did this every morning, and they never went outside without their chest being properly bound. Lavimo didn’t know why their body bothered them so much, since he thought they looked fine either way, but he knew Haven dealt with a lot of dysphoria from their top half if they didn’t bind themselves. And he watched them do it while he ran through different food options in his head, thinking over pancakes, eggs, bacon… before he finally gave them another smile and requested shyly, “How ‘bout a kiss?”
“No. That won’t sustain you. If you don’t tell me what you want to eat, I’m going to fix myself some oatmeal and you won’t get anything.”
“Heheh, okay… then I want hash browns and burnt toast,” he gave an eager grin, wrapping an arm around Haven’s legs to press a kiss against their hip, before sitting up and tossing his legs over the bed with newfound energy. “Eeeee, I’ve been getting so many nice meals lately, you’re the best cook ever, Haven! Everything’s better when you make it.”
“Not true. You’re just biased, the food you get from the royal cooks is the same.”
“No way! You put your heart and soul in it, don’t you? Are you telling me you don’t cook for me with love?”
“I cook for you because you seem to like it and people need to eat to survive,” Haven retorted, finishing the last layer of binding before they reached over for the tunic they’d tossed over their couch, stepping off the bed to throw it over their head without a care. “If you keep making a big deal about it, I might poison you, you should be careful.”
“You wouldn’t do that…” Lavimo frowned, walked around to his dresser to put on some proper pants, before Haven gave him the most sadistic grin he’d ever seen.
“I dunno, I might… poison doesn’t always kill you, you know… I could easily just give you a laxative and have you shitting your brains out for days.”
“What?! No way, don’t do that!! I’ll actually get mad if you do that!!” he snapped, putting his shirt on with a huff before he stomped over to them. And he pressed a hand against their shoulder to turn them around, Haven still smirking at him like the sly snake they were. But all he did was give them a simple request, pure and sweet in its nature. “Don’t do that. Now can I have a kiss? Before my walk? Please?”
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“You’re so fuckin’ needy,” Haven grinned, snatching him by the collar while they caressed his cheek with their other hand, dragging him down to give him an aggressive kiss that made Lavimo wince. And with only one nip of his lip, Haven pushed him back, giving a sturdy pat on his chest before they leaned down and began slipping on their boots. “Now go on. I’ll make the hash browns and I’ll burn the toast just for you, so go do your laps. Work up an appetite while you do, ‘kay? Maybe jog a bit.”
“Heh, okay!” Lavimo smiled, brimming with joy from the affection he’d received before he put on the rest of his clothes and accessories and left to be on his way.
Honestly, he didn’t know what he’d been expecting. He went on walks through the palace occasionally, it was a nice way to calm down when he was stressed. But to see a stranger walking through the halls of Lilino unattended was certainly not it. At first, he didn’t know who this person could be… until he recalled the portrait of Arcadia he’d seen not too long ago. He’d been too paranoid when he got back, so he went through Lilino’s storage of art and artifacts and had come across one. He’d memorized her looks, memorized every little last curl and shape, and had drawn in his notebook many different versions of what she could look like if she was male. Orvana had said she, or… he… she’d said he was transgender, so Lavimo tried to improvise and envision all kinds of appearance he might have, so that when he finally came across the man, he would know who he was talking to. And honestly, the person in front of him wasn’t too far off from some of the concepts he’d developed in his sketchbook. Maybe that’s why his heart had dropped in his chest. Maybe that’s why he’d started to feel almost uncontrollable anger just seeing his face, even when Arcadia was greeting him kindly, even looking a bit excited to see him. Maybe that’s why Lavimo had blurted out his question instead of playing it safe… because more than he valued his survival, he needed answers.
Feather didn’t know what to say to it, though, as he hadn’t been expecting this confrontation either. He wasn’t even sure how this little man had figured out who he was. But the question Lavimo was asking him fueled his guilt. Did he… start the apocalypse? Did he? Feather didn’t know the answer to that question for certain. But he knew that he, well…
“Most likely,” he responded to the lonely prince, Lavimo’s face twitching as Feather’s smile faded to reveal a completely blank face. “Yeah, I most likely caused the apocalypse. Sorry.”
“Ah… sorry? That’s it?” Lavimo wavered, brows furrowing against his amber eyes as his jaw went slack in disbelief. Did that mean everything Orvana said had been the truth? Of course, the woman obviously wasn’t trustworthy, and he didn’t want to side with her… but so far, all of the information she’d given him had been entirely accurate. “Hahh… let me guess. You didn’t mean to?” he winced out, Feather’s eyes squinting at him as he took in that accusation.
“Yeah, that’s right. I didn’t mean to. How do you even know about all that, though?” he lowered his head, suspicion beginning to take root in his core as he stared at Lavimo’s distraught features. How did this weak-looking brat know so much about him? Cirrus had more influence than this kid by far and more access to vast quantities of knowledge, and even he hadn’t learned or pieced together anything about Feather’s true identity. Though, after today, he'd probably have figured it out, but that didn’t change the fact that Lavimo didn’t know him like that, and they’d never personally met before. So how did he know? Who gave him that information?
But Lavimo felt too overwhelmed to properly answer. His memories still felt too fresh after the hallucinations Orvana had made him see. His father, all his older siblings… his mother on her death bed. All victims of the apocalypse. The apocalypse that Feather had started.
“Why don’t… why don’t you even look guilty?! How can you admit you did something so evil and look like you don’t even care?!” he screamed, Kya and Leocadies turning to glance at their leader with slight concern as Feather frowned.
“Ah, well… I didn’t mean to, so, why should I feel bad? I didn’t even know I caused it until centuries later,” he shrugged, Lavimo’s mind turning muddled, the rest of Feather’s words turning his mind numb as he felt a certain darkness claw at his heart. “The important thing is that I’m now working on a way to stop it. I’m helping Cirrus, ya hear? And with my concept, I’ll be able to do a lot. You don’t have to worry about me not trying to fix my mistakes, at least,” Feather spoke, attempting to reassure Lavimo in his own way, but it didn’t feel like it mattered anymore.
Lavimo didn’t know what to do. The man who had killed his family and ruined his life was right in front of him. The man who had started the apocalypse and took everything he loved away was… was right there. Right there, standing right there. Right there in front of him. In front of him… right there. Right there, right there, right there, right there… and he wanted to destroy him. He wanted to clutch Feather’s face in his hands and watch as it crumbled. He wanted to kill him ten thousand times over as revenge for all the lives he’d taken. He wanted his father’s laugh back, he wanted his mother to read him a bedtime story again, he even wanted his siblings to laugh and make jokes at him like they had back then… he wanted so much. He wanted, he wanted, he wanted… but in the end, he would never get any of that back. And that truth was what fueled his corruption to the brink, spilling over the edges of his heart he had tried to confine it in. And right then, Lavimo lost a type of innocence he could never get back… and felt it as his mind seemed to snap.
Do you think Lavimo is justified, or do you disagree with how he's acting?
