Archive of Our Own

Work Text

It’s been… probably a while since the explosion. Time is hazy for Atlas, and spatial awareness is even worse. He knows that he’s technically aware of the train of events that leaves him to the present, but they feel so far away. Slippery. Hard to focus on. He feels himself shifted around a lot, the world a blank, dark place, sensations and sound and gravity much more apparent than anything visual.

He remembers taking something for the pain. He remembers healing magic, someone’s… Two someones, maybe? He could recognise Bhyram’s work anywhere, despite his… lack of sense of self, at the time. Enough time has passed to where the painkillers have kicked in, but without knowing what, exactly, he took, that could mean literally fucking anything.

The world grows softer, quite literally, as he’s jostled again. Set on… Something. Soft. Smooth. A bed, he realises, after a painfully long amount of thought on the matter. They must be at the hotel. Someone must have carried him. There’s a conversation happening, or so he thinks, the words garbled and far away.

Atlas elects to lie there, incredibly still, as the world slowly comes further into focus. He can’t see it, but the words start making sense. There’s a fan blowing. He smells soot, and dust, and blood. Ozone, light magic. At some point, he tries moving his head, hoping to knock off whatever’s covering his head, whatever’s keeping him from seeing the hotel room.

Minutes pass like this.

"Okay.” A voice breaks the silence, from right next to him. Bhyram. "Hey. Atlas? Can you... hear me?"

Oh. When did– Was Bhyram always sitting next to him? Or lying? Something.

"Bhyram," Atlas murmurs. His voice is

hoarse

, from screaming, but it's clear enough.

“Hi, yeah,” Bhyram says. His voice is deliberately gentle. “Uh. So. You’re probably - kind of… a little freaked out. Which - that’s, uh, normal, with something like this. Um, maybe don’t move around so much, it’s not going to… help. Do you - remember what happened?”

Remember, remember… “There was an explosion,” Atlas says, more like recalling a distant memory than something that happened at some point today. Presumably today. He

thinks

it’s still ‘today’ enough to call it as such.

“Uh huh. A trap, on the boxes you were going to look at. Um. Do you remember anything…

else?”

“You,” he says immediately. “I felt… your healing. It has a certain– a specific feeling to it. You healed me.”

There’s a slight pause. “Yeah, I did,” Bhyram agrees. “Your face was pretty badly burned, so I, uh, fixed… some of that. Sigma got the rest.” His voice sounds

audibly

hesitant. He’s not addressing something.

“Sigma gave me the painkillers?” Atlas asks, scrunching his face up. Trying to give himself time to think. There’s something missing. Damned blindfold on his head. Maybe someone wrapped the burns or something.

“No, he, uh - he dumped a lot of healing into you,” Bhyram corrects. “Brin gave you some pills. Uh, the fact that you know that is - is good! That’s good.”

“...They’re working,” Atlas says. He nods into the sheets– oh, he’s lying on his side. Maybe he can use the blanket to leverage off the wrap or something–

No. Wait.

It clicks. That

cannot

be it, but he has to be sure. He moves his head again, slowly inching across in one direction until he gets lucky– Some part of Bhyram’s fur is there. Soft, familiar, warm, even if it

also

smells like dust and blood and ozone.

“I’m… not wearing a blindfold or bandages, am I,” he says.

“...no.” Bhyram’s tone is not exactly

flat,

but it is… dull. “You’re not.”

Distress hits him quick, a sharp spike of panic that tells Atlas to do…

something.

It’s never really clear, nor all that coherent. Sit up, claw at his eyes, stare into the sun,

something.

He’s not even sure if the sun is still out by now.

He does none of these things. None of that would be useful, and in fact much of it would be harmful instead. Atlas grits his teeth, forces the panic down into a tiny little box to shove away for the time being. Pretend he’s at work, almost, as his mind gets clearer and clearer.

“Help me get up,” he says, slowly, laboured, already trying to do just that without waiting for assistance. “What… time is it? Did anyone say?”

A paw unexpectedly scoops under his chest and picks him up. “It’s… noon, maybe?” Bhyram says, next to his shoulder. “I think? Not quite noon yet? I’m not… totally sure.”

“Ah, so it’s bedtime,” Atlas says, flat, discontented. The worst joke he’s ever made in his life. He huffs anyway.

“Hah. Yeah. I - I guess. Being blind does, uh, make - make taking naps any time

really

easy.” Bhyram takes one of Atlas’ paws and loops it over his own shoulder, holding him up while he stabilizes himself.

The touch makes him flinch. He requested it, knew it was coming, and still somehow didn’t expect it. The free paw, the one not thrown over Bhyram’s shoulders, pats down his own flank, trying to feel what all he’s even got, if anything got damaged.

Linen from a shirt, the material of his pants, both are fine. His cloak, though dusty, is still tied where it should be. Even his medical bags are still there. Fine, well broken in leather, metal buckles and zips, all in place. They feel, at least, undamaged. If light magic bleached the colour of them– well. He can’t see it to be upset by it.

His eyes are ruined, aren’t they?

It’s disorienting, but Atlas begins the uncoordinated fight to get the buckles of his bag undone. He might have joked about bedtime, but goddamn it, he’s not going anywhere else today. If anyone tries to get him to do

anything,

they can simply go fuck themselves.

“I, uh. If you tell me what you’re trying to do, I can - try to help. I’ve, you know. Done. I know how this works.”

"I– Want this

off.

I have an overlarge tunic good for sleeping in. It's in the main section of my bag, and–" Atlas' ears go flat back, realising he has absolutely no idea where his bag is. Of course he doesn’t. He’s fucking blind now.

"I don't know where..." he trails off, instead just scowling at… whatever direction he’s facing.

“Hey,” Bhyram says, gently. He slides Atlas’ paw off his shoulders and puts it on the bed, not letting go until he’s sure Atlas won’t collapse. “It’s alright. It’s probably somewhere nearby. Do you remember where it was last? I can sorta… feel around for it, for you. I don’t know where you’ve put your stuff, but I

do

know how to walk around without tripping on everything and that, uh,

that

is a. A learned skill.” He pauses. “A trial and error skill. That you definitely… don’t have. Right now.”

Atlas shrinks as he’s laid down. It feels stupid. He’s not some hatchling incapable of doing something as simple as

lying down,

but… it’s probably closer to the truth now than it ever has been. His scowl deepens. Everything is starting to hit, all at once. He’s blind, he’s unsteady for the time being, and, worst of all, he has no idea what to do with any of that.

The bag. The bag, Atlas. Focus on that.

“The… The wall, I think, by the other bed,” he says, then stops. “Actually, I… don’t know what bed I’m on. Where

are

we?” It frustrates him that even that is beyond his current realm of understanding.

“We’re on yours,” Bhyram tells him. “Tess put us down on the closest one to the door. I know where to look now. Uh, so to speak. But can I - first just, let me - please just let me get this.” He shifts, and then - paws on the strap of Atlas’ bag. They sweep along the length of the leather until Bhyram finds the buckle. It clinks, pulls slightly, and then comes free, and he pulls the bag away. Then his weight shifts and he’s gone, moving around somewhere else.

Where he moves is completely beyond Atlas. By sound alone, he can’t really… track him. Maybe if he were talking, but by just his soft steps, it’s impossible. Atlas suppresses a frustrated noise.

“Uh - oh, is this it?” Bhyram calls. “The one that feels like… hard canvas, almost?”

Oh,

there

he is. Somewhere… Ahead, and… to the right? Ish? He sounds farther away, but the description of the bag sounds right. Even that is difficult. Telling where someone is in a

fucking hotel room

that consists of two beds, like three other pieces of furniture, and a bathroom. Fucking incredible, that he can now lose someone in

a room.

Atlas doesn’t bother suppressing the miserable, irritated groan this time. "Yes," he mumbles, lying his head down. "Just– Just grab the softest thing in there. Main section right on top. There's only the one. It's notably soft. You.. can’t miss it."

There’s the sound of a zipper, and fabric rustling. After a few seconds, Bhyram calls out, “Uh, I fffffound it, but - uh. I think - um. I can’t - I’m not touching it, but I think this is your pearl? And I’m not - going to touch that to take it out of the tunic unless you’re okay with it. Do you - should I… bring that? Over to you? Too, I mean? The whole bundle. Or, uh…”

Atlas’ breath hitches. His pearl. He’d almost forgotten that he brought it this time. In Fortune and Frost Point, the first expeditions… He’d just left it at home, for safety or convenience or both. Truthfully, he doesn’t know why

this

time he ended up bringing it. It’s not like he really likes the damn thing.

Hard and a little small and a little discoloured– Atlas has an interesting relationship with his pearl. For the longest time, he thought every pearlcatcher felt that way about their pearls, a strange mix of contemptment and obligation.

His pearl is him. Atlas chooses to put his faults there. There’s only been three occasions he’s added to it that have been achievements of his. Everything else has been a failure. The first few patients he lost, for example. Things that remind him who he is at his core: full of faults of his own, a collection of his failings and achievements both that have led to today. He always did learn more from mistakes.

The damned thing may be one of the most hated things he owns, but hell if it isn’t

his.

Atlas might hate the pearl, but it is him, deep down, in some way, even if he wishes it weren’t.

“...Yes, please,” he mutters, after an extended period of debate. “All of it.”

“Okay.”

There’s a full minute pause there, where there’s a bit of rustling and then the very occasional click of one of Bhyram’s claws on the floor. Then something settles onto the mattress, a heavy bundle, and Bhyram leans on the edge of the mattress and does not jump back up.

Blindly

(fuck)

, Atlas runs his claws along the bed, searching for the dip that obviously contains his pearl. He manages to hit Bhyram in the– the

nose? it felt wet

– in the process. The apology he grumbles probably sounds more annoyed than actually apologetic, but Atlas cannot bring himself to care.

He pulls the little bundle closer, leans it against his flank so he can feel it and not lose it as he strips off his day clothes. They fall… wherever, he doesn’t care, somewhere off the bed into the void that is the fucking floor, never to be see–

felt

again. God.

A short, sharp inhale, followed by a blink or two. His eyes feel dry. It feels entirely incorrect to blink and it still be dark when he opens his eyes again. He focuses on the feel of soft fabric in his claws instead, grabbing it once the clothing has been lost forever.

It’s an old, old tunic. Long, practically a short gown, threadbare and worn soft with time, something he only ever pulls out to wear on nights that are rough. Today feels like one of those nights. He goes to pull it on when a piece of … something falls, crumbling out of his mane and down his neck, and it reminds him of the state he’s in.

For a moment, he wonders if it would be inappropriate to ask for this. In another moment, he decides that he

cannot fucking care–

he deserves this.

“Bhyram,” he says, more uncertain than the rest of the things he’s said so far, “Would you… mind helping me into the shower?”

“Mm?” Bhyram’s voice sounds like it moves as he speaks. Swinging his head towards Atlas, maybe. “Oh, yeah, I can do that. Uh - here, just - put a paw on me and I can help you up.”

It takes a second of batting around, like last time. This time, he… hm. That feels like a horn that he might’ve just hit. He grumbles another half-hearted apology, but he does as told, letting Bhyram direct him as needed. The pearl he leaves on the bed. Hopefully that won’t get lost in the void, too.

Bhyram helps him off the bed, then slings one of Atlas’ wings over his own shoulders and back and guides him across the room. Even crossing the short distance feels monumental. “I, uh, I don’t know where the shower controls are,” he says. “Will used them last time, I don’t. I don’t know how they work. Sorry.”

“I’ll… figure it out,” Atlas says, because really what else

can

he do? Nothing, in fact! Nothing.

This entire situation sucks.

Hopefully a shower will help, even a little bit.

He lets Bhyram guide him in, set him down on the cold tile. Everything in the bathroom feels far too loud, with the sound being able to reverberate as it does off of hard surfaces. There’s not much he can do about it, so he focuses on the task at hand instead: scooting himself along the floor until he can find the shower wall. It’s… hm. There’s two sets of controls, he remembers, one higher up for larger dragons, one lower and smaller for small dragons. He’ll just have to find that.

To himself, he’s thankful that Bhyram is, well,

also

blind. He can’t see how stupid Atlas is sure he looks, in all his undressed, purple glory. Fuck, does he hate the purple stripes of his legs.

“There… should be some little bottles on the counter if you can reach those,” Atlas mumbles as he searches. “If not, I’ll just make do with water. I don’t care.”

There’s a pause, and then something clatters off the counter onto the floor. “Oh - dang,” Bhyram mutters, and then there’s a clunk. “Ow. Got it, I think? I - I don’t know if these are what you’re looking for. They

smell

like soaps. Uh, I’m going to just kind of. Toss them across the floor? And you should be able to hear where they end up?”

There’s a clattering of plastic across the shower floor, and they bounce into one of the walls and then rebound into the center of the shower. Roughly. Close enough. One of them hits his tail– that one, at least, is easy to grab.

“Thank you,” Atlas says, resigned.

“I’ll, uh, wait outside,” Bhyram says, his voice already retreating.

Atlas slowly collects his bottles of soap before he returns to his previous task. It takes a little while to find the controls, but eventually he finds a set of little knobs, and a hose that surely leads to the showerhead. Claws trail up the chilly material and– ah, yes, he’s holding it backwards, but there it is. The knob he picks first is cold. Mistake. Atlas yelps, shuts it off, and turns the other one on.

“You okay?” Bhyram calls, from somewhere just outside the bathroom.

“Cold water,” Atlas calls back.

“Ah.”

His shower goes as– well. As easy as it possibly can, given the situation. Aching limbs that shake mildly as he washes his mane, unable to stand enough to properly get his chest and belly and flank all at once. It takes far too long to do anything. He’s not even sure if he found all the bottles Bhyram tossed, let alone used the right ones for their intended purposes. Conditioner, at least, has a certain feel to it. That one he’s pretty sure he got right. Maybe if there’s one good thing out of the whole day, it’ll be the fact that his mane is soft. Hooray…

Once he’s

fairly

certain he’s clean and free of soap, Atlas shuts the water and calls Bhyram back in. While Bhyram fetches a towel, Atlas tries not to feel too helpless for needing the assistance, and utterly fails at it.

Hypocritical,

he thinks, bitterly,

I can tell patients to ask for help all day, in and out, but it’s too shameful to do myself?

Nevertheless, he takes Bhyram’s help, because he has no other possible choice. He gets dried off, brought back to the bed, just manages to pull on his night clothes before having to lie down properly and catch his breath. God.

Bhyram’s weight shifts on the mattress again. He’s… leaning on it, maybe, though he isn’t fully hopped up onto it. “If it’s any, uh, help,” he says, “from the sound of it, that went

way

better than the first time I tried to clean off after losing my sight.” His movements are silent now. He must have divested himself of his armour while Atlas was showering.

“What does that mean?” Atlas says. “How does a shower go… poorly?”

“Well, I didn’t have a fancy shower. I had, uh, a rainwater pond, but a small one, so basically a puddle. I missed it. Like, trying to get into the puddle. I missed the puddle. I hit my head on a rock so hard while trying to get water onto myself I almost knocked myself out. It was - it was bad, I’m really glad nobody was watching. So, uh, yours went

way

better, you’re very, uh, adaptable. This really is supposed to be a compliment.”

Despite himself, that gets a snort out of Atlas. “Bhyram, I don’t think that that counts as a

shower.

Did you even have soap?”

“I didn’t say it was my first shower, I just said it was my first time trying to clean myself. And, uh, no. I didn’t.”

“Fine, fine. Yes, you did say that. It sounded awful,” Atlas says, and pauses for a moment to breathe. “What about the first…

Actual

shower?” A beat. “Actually,

please

tell me you’ve had a shower –a proper,

actual

shower– before Will wrangled you into one the other day.”

“I have. Had a shower before. Many times, actually,” Bhyram says, evasively.

What–??

“Bhyram, I–

With soap? At least?”

Atlas says, too thoroughly baffled to be upset at his general situation for the time being.

“Yes! With soap. Um. Just - no, yeah, with soap and everything.”

“Your hesitation does

not

inspire confidence, Bhyram.”

“I’m not lying! That is all true. It’s just, um… not… recent.”

Atlas sighs. “Until the other day.”

“Yyyyes. I’m - we have

bathing pools

at the clan where I live

,

I’m

clean,

we just don’t really have

showers

at home. We’re in the

Sea.

Half the time, if you want to take a bath, you have to swim to get there in the

first

place. Trying to make baths fancy is kind of a, uh, a losing battle.”

“Okay, sure,” Atlas relents, and falls into silence. Catching his breath, tired from even a short conversation. There is

so much more

he could ask about that, but there’s other, more pressing, things to think about.

After breathing for a bit, just breathing, Atlas asks, “Do you know where Will went?” The sound is muffled from lying sideways in the blankets. He does, at least, feel less gross lying in bed now.

There’s a pause, and faint sounds like inhaling. Sniffing. He’s scenting the air. “I don’t know where they are,” he says after a moment. “But I smell that Spruceheart was in here, though I don’t think it was for very long. Maybe they’re all… together? Probably? Uh - if Hypnos is with them, and he probably is because he’s not here, then they’re okay. He can keep them safe.”

Atlas does not know how a dog could possibly keep two adult dragons safe, but he’s not going to question it. Maybe later, but not now. What he does now is curl up and pat the bed until he finds his pearl to scoop up close to his chest. “If you say so… I guess they’ll be back later, then.”

“Actually,” he adds, lifting his head back up. “What

do

we do until then…? What do–” He pauses, letting out a noise of frustration. He takes a breath, forces him to huff out some of that energy. “What do you

do,

Bhyram, for fun? I– I can’t see. I’ve never

not

seen things, I… I certainly can’t read my novel,” he finishes, miserably.

“Reading is possible but only if you have someone to read

to

you,” Bhyram agrees, “so, uh, that’s… that’s not really going to work here. Uh. For… fun. Hmm. Uh. Well. I don’t really… know? I spend time when I’m not working, uh, sometimes I fix things by touch. Like - new straps on my armor, or gloves, or whatever. Just a lot of - anything I can do by touch. There’s not a lot of it. Cleaning things sometimes. I’m okay at cooking.”

Hm. “Cooking? Really? What do you cook…? Granted, not like there’s anything

here

we could cook, but…”

“Whatever I can. Uh, I make a lot of snacks for the hatchlings and stuff.

I

can’t eat most of it, but it’s fun to make stuff for other people. When I can. I can’t read any labels on anything but I can usually tell whatever I’m holding by the smell of it.”

Atlas hums. “Colour me… surprised, I guess. I don’t know what I expected,” he mutters, and taps his claws against the surface of his pearl. “Well. Cooking is out. Reading is out, and– I guess if Will comes back, they could play some music for us, or something, I… I just don’t know what all there really is to do here. Nap, maybe.” He is tired, but he’d like to wait for Will to get back. If he can. “Any ideas?”

“...no, you got pretty much everything,” Bhyram says, and then sighs. “Listen, I - I know. It sucks. I know it sucks, it’s bad, it’s not fun. There’s not - there’s not a

ton

you can do. It

sucks.

Um. If you want, I can try and at least check and see if there’s anything changing with your eyes, and see if I really need to go finding more hobby suggestions. It’s been… an hour, almost two, maybe? I can try and see if they’re. I don’t know, settling, or recovering at all.”

Settling. Recovering. God, wouldn’t that be nice, to recover from this? Atlas doesn’t bother hiding a whine. “Might as well,” he says, miserably. “You can try, do whatever you like. It’s… not like I can get

more

blind than this, I think.” Atlas laughs, humourless and tired. “Fuck, maybe… Maybe I’ll get lucky, and it’ll be temporary. It– No, it has to be. It just, it has to be. Go ahead, take a– a feel.”

“Okay, uh, let me -” Bhyram shifts his weight again, hopping back up onto the bed. “I’m going to touch your face. If I can find it. Ha ha. Uh, just a second.”

A pause. Then claws against Atlas’ scales, at the back of his neck. “Oh, there you are,” Bhyram says, sounding genuinely rather cheerful about it. His claws trace across Atlas’ mane and up to his head, and then he carefully wraps his paw around the inner corner of one of Atlas’ useless fucking eye sockets, resting on the orbital ridge. His touch is gentle. Faint flickers of magic, little wisps, flit around the edges of Atlas’ perception.

“...ah huh,” he says, after a long moment, not taking his paw away. “Wwwwell. So, the good news is you do - you do still have eyes, all the bits that should be there are, uh, there, I think. Which is good! That’s great. That’s great news.”

Great, he still has eyes,

Atlas thinks, perhaps cynically. He would hope that they’re there… He can still blink, after all, but that doesn’t really mean much. ‘All the bits’ being there, as Bhyram says, is much more promising information. For a second, hope flitters through Atlas’ brain. Maybe he won’t have to retire at

thirty-fucking-one

after all!

“But, uh, I don’t - I don’t think they’re… going to

work.

At least not for a while.” He clears his throat. “I think they…

could

work, and probably

will

work, at some point in the future. But, uh, it might be a few weeks or months or something before you start to… see anything. And then, uh. After that, it might be kind of… blurry? All the time? I can’t be sure, I’m not an expert. But - they were

really

damaged, Atlas. Sigma basically worked a miracle here putting them back together.”

…And that stupid, foolish hope comes crashing down all at once. Not entirely, but very nearly.

“How

blurry?” he asks, sounding very, very small. “Do you– think I could read? Recognise facial details? I… Hell,

work?

I– I can’t perform

surgery

if I’m

fucking blind.”

Some of that panic he’s been repressing creeps into his tone. Damn it all. It’s like a dam has broken. “Oh my god, my work…!”

“I - I don’t know, I

can’t

know that kind of thing,” Bhyram tells him, because

of course he can’t know that kind of thing

. “That’s - um, that’s

if

they recover, and I - I do think they will! To some extent! Uh, it’s just - there’s nerves, and stuff, in there, right? And they’re - mostly there, but they aren’t, uh, grown? Like they should be? Anymore. Healing magic made them be where they’re supposed to be but your body has to, uh. Catch up, sort of? I - I can’t - you’re not… me. If it were me, I’d know how much they could heal. But this - I don’t know how well your body will fix them. I’m sorry.”

As Bhyram talks, Atlas’ head sinks further into the tundra’s paws in dismay. Of

course

that would be the answer. Atlas likes to think himself a pragmatic person– realistic, even if it makes people believe him cynical from time to time. He got his hopes up, like a fool, and he can’t even be completely sure as to why he allowed that in the first place.

Stupidity, he can only assume.

Atlas takes a heavy, shuddering breath. Only now is the gravity of his situation beginning to settle on his shoulders. Aside from his hobbies, the medical world is really all that Atlas has known, ever since becoming an apprentice as a teenager. He broke into it early, graduated early, became a full time practitioner by early adulthood. Now, in the prime of his life (really, just

beginning

the prime of his life), he’s supposed to… cast that all away? Against his will, all because of some

stupid fucking trapped box

in a town he

doesn’t want to be in

because the alternative

also

meant having to lose his livelihood.

The situation sucks, in short.

It weighs so, so heavily, and Atlas cannot keep the sniffling and snivelling at bay any longer. He cries, then, and feels dumb for doing so. In front of people. Bhyram cannot see him, but he’s still perceiving this. Atlas cannot hide, cannot run from this. This is his reality, and he cannot accept this.

His hold around the pearl tightens, painfully crushing the hard thing against his ribs, bruisingly strong, using what little strength he has left. He stays like this for a while, only daring to speak again when the sniffling becomes less obtrusive: “Humour me,” he says, wobbly. “How long would

your

body take to– to heal something, like this? Could it even do that?”

“I don’t know,” Bhyram replies. There’s a distant tone to his voice, something hard to identify or place. “They’d have to be my eyes for me to know. I would… have to not get hurt with anything else that could divert any of my body’s… power. I’d have to do almost nothing except rest and heal. Maybe it would be months. Maybe it would be hours. They’d have to be

my eyes

for me to know.”

He’s silent for a moment. One thumb-claw brushes along Atlas’ cheekbone, swiping away the tears there. He takes a breath. “I - Atlas,” he says, clear but quiet, “I… might be able to fix this.”

"Don't bother," Atlas says through a sniffle, assuming they're empty words. Something meant to ... cheer him up, or something. He

knows

that Bhyram and Sigma and everyone else have done what they can already. The bed creaks as he pulls his limbs tighter to him. Claws click against the pearl.

“No, listen,” Bhyram says. His voice shifts slightly; Atlas assumes he shook his head. “I mean I might

actually

be able to. I don’t know. I’m not sure. I don’t know if it would work, I don’t know if it would work

fast enough,

I don’t - I can’t be sure. And it would hurt a

lot.

For, uh, for both of us. But it

might

work. And I - you need to be able to see, right, that’s how you do… everything that you do. So I can - I can put up with a little… unpleasantness. I can try to fix this.”

"You've already

done

everything you could've!" Atlas says, voice raising in volume. “Don’t– get my hopes up with promises that you can’t deliver on!”

“I’m not - I’ve been

trying

to avoid doing that, because I

don’t

want to mislead you,” Bhyram says, and he genuinely sounds just a bit hurt. “And I’m not saying this

will

work. But you need… even a chance, right? I can give you a

chance.

Please don’t

shout

at me about it.” He pulls his paw away.

“Don’t–!”

Atlas lunges, surges forward without thinking, trying to do anything he can to find that paw and bring it back. Everything is wrong, his sensory input is all over the place, sensitivity levels not what he’s used to– it’s disorienting to be touched.

Somehow, though, it’s worse to be left alone. He scrabbles around for contact, pulling desperately at

whatever

bit of fur he can find. Every touch is too painful and nowhere near enough.

“–leave me alone,” Atlas finishes, sinking his claws into fluff. Here comes the damned tears again.

“Uh - ow, careful,” Bhyram mutters, “that’s - that’s my wing. Okay. Uh.” He shifts, scooting himself closer, and Atlas can feel the brush of a tail against his side and his own tail. “I’m not… leaving. Sorry. I didn’t mean to spook you there. But I

am

being serious, though I can’t make you any promises. I can’t - I can’t just give you eyes, I don’t have any, everybody knows that. But I -”

His voice catches, and he clears it and tries again. “I trust you. And so I’m - I’m going to trust that you won’t tell anybody about this. Right? Because I don’t want - I don’t want anyone to know. I don’t. I don’t know how I’d explain this to anyone, but I just - more than that I don’t

like

this part of myself, or this part of my power, or anything, and I don’t, um, I don’t want people to know about it. If I can avoid that. So I need to trust that you’ll keep this a secret. Can - you can do that, right?”

The words take a moment to sink in, and Atlas forces himself to take a couple of severely unsteady breaths before speaking in a more normal tone of voice, "You... There's more? To what y-you do? I..." A sniffle, damn it all. "You haven't sold me out. Even after I, I told you just how easily I could kill you…"

Something dark and ugly curls within– he doesn’t particularly

enjoy

remembering that particular exchange, held in the dark of a destroyed laboratory deep in the Icefields.

"…But maybe you should've. I wouldn't tell."

“You already know I’m not going to turn you in,” Bhyram says, in the patient tone of someone who’s explaining this for the tenth time and isn’t annoyed about it. “I know what you could’ve done, but I also don’t really think you could’ve. It would - that doesn’t matter right now. The point is that I trust you, and so I’m going to take a chance here. On you.”

Bhyram trusts him. Atlas knows this, and while he has no

plan

to betray this trust, he just… hopes Bhyram knows what he’s doing. “Okay,” he murmurs. Another sniffle. “What is… your secret?”

“Gods, which one?” Bhyram asks, and then, “never mind. That’s a bad joke. Uh, okay. I haven’t - been

lying

about what I can do, but I haven’t, um, been telling the truth. Exactly. Kynaba gave me the power to take injuries from other people. To keep my... superiors healthy. But he also didn't want me to die. So he gave me the advanced healing. And the, the two things work together. But the advanced healing alone wouldn't be enough if I, you know, got... shot really badly, or something. So my transformational exchange thing, it's - it's not a one-way street. Nobody can magically heal any injury I take. But I can - I can give them away. I can force them on other people and take their... wholeness.”

He takes a breath in and blurts the rest out in one go. “And what I could do is - sort of... trade with you. I can give you the burned out eyes I have, and take your damaged ones. And then maybe.

Maybe.

I can heal them. Just by having them. And then I could take my injury back. And maybe.

Maybe.

You would be fine.”

The words wash over him slowly. He's struggling to follow, scattered as his brain still sort of is with exhaustion and emotion both, and he murmurs pieces of Bhyram's sentences under his breath. Repetition, get the words to click. Eventually, they do. Enough to get the gist.

"It's... painful, you said," Atlas mutters. "But what is there to– to lose? You're blind anyway.

I'm

blind now." He stumbles over the word terribly. "There... isn't much lower to go."

Once again, he desperately tries not to get his hopes up. And, once again, he’s already losing that battle before it really begins.

“There’s nothing to lose,” Bhyram answers. “There’s no reason not to try. Except for the fact that this is really,

really

going to suck. It - it’s bad, it feels

bad,

I can’t describe it. It’s going to feel

bad.

I need you to understand that before you let me do this.”

"It

can't

get any worse than this," Atlas mutters. "I don't care." Emotionally, physically, psychologically– if he's not at rock bottom already, it's an incredibly near thing. As far as he’s concerned, it really cannot be much worse than what he feels at this exact moment in time. His

job

is on the line. His entire life and reason for being.

Bhyram is silent for a second. “Okay,” he says, and his tone is… hard to place. It has a very

if you’re sure

sound to it. He shifts, sitting up properly, and carefully takes Atlas’ face in both forepaws, cupping his jaw, both thumbs near his eyes. “Do you want to, um, just… right now? I mean, are you ready? It’s going to hurt. So much. You’re going to feel exactly what I felt and what Thanatos felt when he gave himself this wound. It’s going to hurt

a lot.

I can’t - I

cannot

overstate how much this is going to suck.”

Pain doesn’t matter. Atlas can endure pain. He’s endured it many times in the past, breaks and gunshot wounds, stabs and bites, burns and even drowning, on one very… memorable occasion. The pain doesn’t scare him. He’ll be fine, he’s sure of it.

"Before Will gets back," is all he says. His claws click against his pearl again. He’s tired of the disclaimers.

“Okay. Then, um - oh, you might want to put something in your mouth, maybe? For - you don’t want to bite down on your own tongue. A piece of cloth, or something.”

Atlas just grabs the hotel blanket and shoves a wad of it into his mouth unquestioningly. He doesn't have to move to get it, he is not shredding the one comfort item of clothing he owns, and he's not having to pay the security deposit.

"Mrnfh,"

he says intelligently, mouth full of blanket, just to demonstrate that it is, in fact, full of blanket.

Bhyram steadies his grip. His touch is gentle, very carefully cradling Atlas’ jaw, his claws pressing very gently against the bone at the inner corner of his eyes in such a way that he can very gently stroke the brow ridge with his claw-tips.

“I’m really sorry about this,” he says, and then Atlas feels the magic reach out and

grab him.

Immediately, Atlas realises that he’s in over his head.

And immediately, Atlas knows that he cannot back out of this.

Bhyram’s healing magic feels like, generally, a cool, soothing wash of mist, gentle and helpful. It always

feels

healing, something welcoming and easy to experience. This is nothing like that. This is not healing, nowhere near. Bhyram is not gentle.

It is aggressive and hungry and cruel. Bhyram lets it out from somewhere inside of him and it bursts free like a flock of magpies and arrows to Atlas, and he feels it impact him and latch on like a wolf, sinking cold claws into his body and soul, pouncing and never letting go. It feels like a predator has trapped him strong in its jaws, some snarling, terrible thing, and his heartbeat goes frantic, rabbit-quick in his chest and throat as the magic takes hold.

This magic feels unlike anything that Atlas has

ever

associated with Bhyram before. Even in fights, even when he renders flesh and blood from bone, it is because he

must.

The deaths he deals are gentle, or melancholy, or dutiful, something Atlas could spot from a mile away. He’s well versed in death, after all. Bhyram does not

like

killing. It brings him no joy– in fact, he reckons that it brings Bhyram nothing but cold resignation, not that he can relate.

This aspect of his magic, this– this aspect of

him…

It’s different. Vastly so. This thing is unlike any version of Bhyram Atlas has ever encountered. It is vicious and hungry and

mean

. It takes a primal, savage joy in what Bhyram is about to do.

It is going to

take

from Atlas. To strip away something from his being, to take from his body and make it its own– all to make Bhyram stronger. In that moment, Atlas is sure that this thing is going to kill him. It is

going

to tear him apart, rip him into shreds and a mess of viscera, feast on his wholeness.

A primal fear grips Atlas, something deep and instinctual and not something he can consciously wrangle. If he were fully healed up, fully rested,

maybe

he’d have a chance to fight against this– this magic, this awful, all-consuming magic. Maybe. It's unlikely.

It wants to eat him alive, and every little piece of fear comes back to him, compounded from all of his experiences in the past few months. Runi's ambush, getting used as bait, the not-Leigh huldragone in particular, the

real

Leigh and all the awful things she's done to him recently,

the fucking thing in the window

. All of it pales in comparison to this thing that wants and hungers and craves, and it's terrifying.

Through the connection, it overwhelms Atlas’ senses, overriding some of them with Bhyram’s. He can sense the countless old injuries scattered throughout Bhyram’s body. Old, aching bones, tendons that don’t quite stretch how they should, patches of skin where the fur doesn’t grow anymore, missing teeth, the warped reconstructed bones of his right forelimb that Atlas himself helped put back together, and of course, his eyes. It could take

all

of that from Atlas and give it to Bhyram. He feels it crawling in his body, pulling itself through his muscles under his skin, through his throat and veins, picking out every piece of Atlas that is broken on Bhyram and matching them up. It could strip every scar from Bhyram’s skin and force them into Atlas and make him into an absolute

ruin

of a dragon and make Bhyram pristine, untouched, untouchable, immortal.

And, Atlas finds, horrified,

it wants to.

It was designed for this express purpose. It was

made

to do this, to work itself into people and tear them apart and lay them bare and let Bhyram take what he wants from them. This is what it’s

supposed

to do. The way Bhyram heals, giving pieces of himself away to other people to make them whole, is antithetical to this thing’s wretched, ravenous existence.

It's nearly… intimate, Atlas comes to realise. Fighting himself to give or take exactly what he wants from those under him, those that submit themselves to this power of his. Willingly, no more and no less than what Bhyram chooses for the magic to take.

Every time he’s healed, has he had to fight this power? This power that wants him to take and take and take? The countless times he’s done it– hundreds, thousands, Atlas isn’t sure. Every time, he must fight it, and every single time, he must win. It’s

angry

about that. That’s not what it’s

for.

This,

this,

this moment where it’s latched onto Atlas’ soul and blood like a leech, wrapping itself around him -

this

is what it’s

for.

No one ever knows. No one must know.

He hides it well, this thing, dwelling inside.

It feels more like a creature in some respects than mere magic. Some awful,

terrible

creature, implanted into Bhyram’s soul, sutured in with impressive and fastidious precision and grown so intimately into Bhyram himself that he cannot be rid of it. This thing is–

Sure,

it’s tied in, merged, but in some delirious train of thought that passes through Atlas’ terrified mind, this thing simply

cannot

be Bhyram himself.

It simply can’t be. Atlas tries to rationalise. It’s a

monster.

It’s a

demon.

It’s– maybe it’s an angel, or the disgraced castoff shell of some kind of hateful god, or a piece of the Shade tamed and repurposed, or– just another dragon’s soul, twisted and bloated and starved and warped into what it is now. Atlas has no idea what the fuck this thing is, but it just

cannot be Bhyram.

As Atlas spirals, there’s– something. Something that draws him from the world of terror he’s in, just for a moment. Brought closer to the present, he can feel– tension. His muscles are taught, gripping roughly at Bhyram’s wrists, holding.

He’s speaking, it takes him a second to realise. To him, about him, maybe to himself. He doesn’t know.

“No,” Bhyram whispers, his voice catching. His grip on Atlas’ face tightens for a fraction, only to immediately loosen– he… doesn’t

want

to hurt him, does he? No. Bhyram doesn't want to hurt him. He's about to, but he's going to try and minimize the damage, soothe some of the pain. Atlas can feel every tumultuous, conflicted, determined emotion through this magical connection. Bhyram repeats, firmer and quieter, “No. You're not

for

it, not like that. Only a little. It only gets a little bit of you.”

Bhyram reaches out, further in, takes hold of that magic, and

pulls.

He’s strong. He’s

incredibly

strong. Not just physically, but here, in this, with this magic. It’s a howling, hungry thing. It’s like a crevasse in the ice, if a crevasse could hate, a sharp, black, devouring pit that is so much deeper and more vast than anything Atlas could imagine, and Bhyram keeps the snow smoother over the surface so that no one can see.

It writhes and slashes and gnashes and thrashes. It slashes at him, beats him with itself, trying to batter its way out of his grip. Atlas knows, he just

knows,

that if it were to win, he would be taken whole, consumed and devoured. Without a doubt, Atlas knows this. It knows that he knows, and it

wants.

Oh, does it want. It wants to rip Atlas into scarred, withered shreds, unrecognisable. The thing's

need

to do exactly that is palpable, almost, one Atlas could not fight. He must trust that Bhyram won't let it, that he'll keep a leash on it, that he'll

pull it out

when the time comes, and leave Atlas bare and changed, but whole.

And Bhyram does not let it. He takes a slow breath as it screams and shrieks and tears at him, and he picks it up and puts it back in its cage and shuts the door again, only letting it hold on to Atlas so he can use it as he wants. It howls as he puts it where it belongs, but it

is

him, isn’t it? What else could it be? It can’t fight him forever. As he locks it away, he caresses it, whispers to it. Soothing it, talking it down, though what someone could

possibly

say to something like

that

to calm it, Atlas doesn’t know.

Strangely, it’s almost sort of sweet, in some twisted, fucked up way. Atlas never has had his head screwed on right. Bhyram is trying to wrangle this thing, is successfully doing it, however the fuck he does it, and maybe later, once this is all over with, it'll dawn on him just how much power Bhyram holds in doing this.

“Okay,” he whispers. His grip is steady, his breathing calm. “Okay.”

There’s a moment of stillness, a brief respite. The

thing

is coiled between them, lying impatient and growling underneath Atlas’ skin up his throat and across his face like some kind of

parasite.

It twitches and twists, eager, starved, but answering to its master.

“It has you now, huh?” Bhyram breathes, and Atlas can feel the warmth against his face. He himself is already breathing hard. Their exhalations mingle. “I - hhh. I can feel it. It’s latched on. Okay. You're doing great so far.

Now

comes the really bad part. It’s going to burn. It was ghostfire, wisps directly to his eyes. That’s what you’re about to feel.” He feels guilty. Even though Atlas agreed to suffer this, even though there’s no other way to help, he still feels guilty. Atlas can hear him swallow, feel his anxiety. He speaks again, barely audible. “It’s… it’s okay if you scream. I think I did.”

Firm paws press gently against the bone of Atlas’ cheeks. Through the connection, he feels Bhyram’s intent: he’s

trying

to provide comfort, just for a moment, whether or not he thinks Atlas might appreciate it (he does). He’s trying to convey that he’s

sorry

about the pain he is going to cause, trying to help Atlas think a little less about it, despite how difficult it is. At first, Atlas wasn’t worried about the pain. Now, knowing about this

thing

inside of Bhyram– he is worried. And Bhyram doesn’t want him to suffer, and he knows he will, and it hurts him that he’s about to make Atlas go through this.

Bhyram tried to warn him. He really did.

Atlas didn’t listen.

He should have.

It’s a good thing that he’s been sort of muzzled.

It begins all at once, unceremonious and brutal. It feels like fire. That’s all he can equate it to, because this is something peculiar, a very

particular

type of pain Atlas has never experienced before. Until now.

It’s searing and freezing all at once, and it feels like it’s been slammed

directly

to Atlas’ open, staring eyes, no eyelids to shield him even a little bit. He recoils instinctively and tries to withdraw, but cannot. The pain ripples through his body and he wants to run, to get away from it, but he

can't.

He's

stuck.

Someone has shoved a torch directly into each of his eye sockets, weightless and burning and frigid. There is no

substance

to the flames that lick and devour, there’s nothing that can be batted away– but Atlas tries.

The scent of iron permeates the air as Atlas’ harsh grip turns into pulls and then, when Bhyram will not release him, into damaging rakes of his claws. He bats frantically at the arms holding his face. His claws dig in through layers of fur and skin further into the flesh underneath, tearing through anything he can, wrist to elbow, anything, anything to be free. Rich, hot blood spills over Atlas’ paws.

Bhyram does not relent; Atlas cannot escape. His grip is firm on Atlas’ head. Not tight, but unyielding, steady paws that hold him securely even as Atlas throws all his weight backwards in an attempt to get away.

"Shhh, shhh, Atlas," he says, and Atlas vaguely registers a sigh. His voice is taut and pained. “I know, I know, it hurts, it's

awful

. I tried to warn you. Shhhhhh. Be careful, you're going to get hurt.”

Somewhere, distantly, Atlas is aware he is screaming again. The blanket in his mouth is muffling him.

"Try not to struggle," Bhyram continues in a soft murmur, even as Atlas shreds his wrists and arms. "Please, Atlas, hold still, it'll be over soon."

Atlas cannot heed his words. There is nothing but fire in his world– everything else is entirely secondary. There are burning coals being pressed into his eye sockets, and he knows, he’s sure of it: this is

only

for the singular, express purpose of decimating his eyes, beyond all recognition.

Bound by instinct, Atlas fights this, fruitlessly but not entirely harmlessly. Nearly everything that makes him the dragon he is is stripped away and he is reduced to a scared, fighting animal, struggling until he physically cannot. His tail thrashes against the bed, though his hind legs get tangled in the sheets, ineffective and only furthering the trapped feeling. There is no thought, not really, not while this happens, but there is some far away, shrivelling thing, tiny and yelling and argumentative, that demands that Bhyram

know

that he is

trying.

He is listening, he’s trying to hold on, to bear it.

Whether or not Bhyram gets the message is entirely beyond him. The smaller dragon is forced to shift his whole body to reach a wing around and

make

Atlas be still, forcing it down over the sheet and trapping his legs before they can become free of blankets and threaten to disembowel him. Atlas fights this too, his efforts unsuccessful.

The burning does not

stop

while all of this happens. Not all at once. The burning in his face and what was once his eyes merely ebbs, slowly in shivering waves, bit by bit. After some time, what feels agonisingly long, Atlas eventually finds that he can feel movement of air past his face, feel Bhyram’s claws holding his head. As the pain recedes and he begins to be able to

think

again, he realises that Bhyram has not bruised his face. His hold has always been gentle, despite its strength.

All he’s done is destroy the eyes. Everything else is intact, perfectly fine, just as it was.

If Atlas were– were

capable

of it, now, with the new lack of tearducts, he’d be sobbing. Horrible, ugly sobs. As it stands, he cannot. There are just heaving, ragged breaths, desperate gulps of air to try and calm his tortured nerves.

That vicious, spike-toothed magic still clings, reluctant to give way. Bhyram reaches in once more and, in one calm, deliberate move, grabs hold of it. It reminds Atlas of grasping a snake by the jaws to pry it from a limb; he takes the magic by its mouth and works it back out of Atlas. It lets him do this, of course, because it has… been

fed.

It’s feasted on Atlas, after what must be a very long time, and it’s languid and confused and easy to manipulate. It doesn't fight much, only coils and half-heartedly tries to writhe its way out of Bhyram's iron grip. It doesn't matter, it can't possibly win. Bhyram pulls it free. Carefully, so that it does not tear at Atlas on the way out, then he puts it back in its cage where it belongs and shuts it away. Just like that, it’s gone. It’s done.

“That’s all of it,” Bhyram breathes. He releases his grip, freeing Atlas to do as he pleases. One of his paws drops away; the other falls to the base of Atlas’ neck, tracing the line of his throat and coming to rest gently against the scales at his collarbone. “It’s over.”

It’s

over.

Atlas is safe.

The not-tears continue, and the first thing he does is try to bring his shaking, bloodied paws up to touch his face, to feel what, exactly that awful, hungry thing has done.

Even expecting it, having seen Bhyram’s lack of eyes countless times, the experience is still jarring. There are no eyes, nor even eyelids. There are just scarred, burned pits left, hollow eye sockets filled with old wounds. He knows, from seeing Bhyram, that they are shiny and lumpy. Scarred tissue, destroyed nerves, with next to no feeling left. The only sensation Atlas can pick up from the area is that from his paws.

Bhyram takes a few deep breaths, slightly shaky ones. "Are you... okay?" he hazards. There's something strangely breathless in his tone.

Atlas' paws drop to the bed. The entirety of his body goes limp at the same time, only his heavy breaths jostling him. Bhyram catches him before the rest of him can hit the sheets, drawing him instead into a hug of sorts, with Atlas’ head over Bhyram’s shoulder. One paw strokes the back of Atlas’ mane, and already he feels himself relaxing. “

Mmm…

there,” Bhyram murmurs, wrapping his other paw around Atlas’ chest and torso, under his ribs. Once again, he's supporting Atlas’ full weight on his arms. He tips his head slightly to the side to lean it against Atlas’ neck. “There you are.”

The wad of blanket, now fairly shredded and

very

soggy, drops out of Atlas’ mouth. "I'm, alive," he says, one breath at a time. "You?" His voice is even more torn than it was earlier. The air reeks of blood.

"Yeah," Bhyram says, still with a heady breathless air to his words. Fragments of sentences make it through his deep, shaky breaths. "I'm

fine

, uh, for me it... was. Hah.” He lets out a low, satisfied chuckle. “Hah, oh,

wow

, I forgot how… it kind of feels...

really

good? On my end? Which I, I hate. A lot. I don't

want

to like it, but I'm…” he trails off for a second, drawing another deep breath in. Atlas can feel him shiver once, a slow shudder of his whole body.

“Wow,

that's good. Mmh. It feels kind of like..."

Drunkenness, maybe? Pleasure, satisfaction? That’s… sort of what it sounds like to Atlas. An afterglow. Low and loose. Elated?

Bhyram continues, “I don't know how to describe it. It's... warm and full and sort of comfortable and happy.

Really

happy. Which - not good. Iiiiii know." He lets out a little rumbling purr, a laugh, something happy that trails off into a warm, sated hum. It cuts off a second later, though his voice doesn't lose that languid tone. "Oh, god, no, I can't - hell, no. Don't let me

like

that, no matter

how

good it feels.”

Bhyram wrenches his attention back from wherever it has wandered and strokes the side of Atlas’ neck, over and over, down his mane and to his shoulders. “I'm… sorry,” he adds. “I am. I'm sorry it hurt you. That

I

hurt you. But it's over now. You did

so well.

That's the worst it'll ever get for you, I promise. It's all... better from there."

“Okay,” Atlas says simply. He’s not going to judge Bhyram on his schadenfreude– it’d make him an even bigger hypocrite than he already is, of course. No, he understands it, that strange, intimate elation, of

taking and taking and taking

from another person until there’s nothing left. There’s a perverse sort of glee in it, in Atlas’ opinion, one which he cannot fault Bhyram for revelling in, if only he were to allow it for a moment.

“Okay,” he says, one more time. “I’m… okay. I’m fine.”

And he is. Especially as he lets his entire body weight sag into his friend, and Bhyram just holds him without question, practically cradling his head.

“Shhh, shhh,” Bhyram murmurs. “I know that was a lot. Everything’s going to be fine. It really is.” He pets Atlas’ mane, and a deep purr emanates from his chest, low and warm and soothing. Atlas simply leans into it further. If he had the ability, he thinks maybe he’d close his eyes. He can feel the destroyed muscles of his face twitch with the attempt.

There's silence for a few minutes. Bhyram just purrs and pets him and holds him until he can feel Atlas' trembling subsiding.

“You should try and get some rest,” Bhyram says, softly. He takes his paw off Atlas' side and there’s some fumbling around on the bed and then– ah. Gently, he nudges something against Atlas’ chest again. His pearl. It’s fine, it’s safe, and judging by the tug on the sheets underneath, he surmises that Bhyram didn’t even touch it directly. A social taboo, both of them are aware, one Atlas ponders on from time to time.

“All safe. Nothing to worry about.” He can hear the smile in Bhyram’s tone. “You're going to... crash, probably. I'll explain everything to Will when they get back. Just - lay down, okay?” he continues, and Atlas nods into his shoulders. Yes, that sounds like a fine plan. He distantly feels Bhyram shift him, lift him up and transfer him down into the sheet beneath to lay sideways. He feels Bhyram lay down too, facing him, one paw on his head, claws stroking delicately over his now-empty eye sockets.

He tugs his pearl close again, feels it dig into his ribs, hard and unyielding. The mild pain, something easy to manage,

familiar

, reminds him: no matter how changed and battered and beaten he has become today, Atlas is still whole. He may be changed, but he is not broken. No more broken than he always is, at least. He trusts Bhyram will explain this to Will, whenever they come back. It doesn’t bother him. Exhaustion will pull him under soon anyway, as gentle claws, combing his mane, scratching at his ears, lull him to sleep.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

God. He hasn’t done that in almost two decades. Not since he baited Graston into smashing him over the head with a rock and then transferred the injury back while Graston tried to drag him over to some poor fucker dying on the snow to dump it off. Not since then, when he’d sent his lieutenant reeling and fled into the blizzard, out of earshot, so he could no longer hear the command word when it was called. He hasn’t let himself take anyone’s wholeness since then. That thing that’s him has been hungry for years, through everything he’s done, chewing at him and tearing at him and wanting, wanting, wanting. And now he’s fed it. For Atlas’ own good, for his benefit, but he’s fed it all the same.He’d forgotten how it feels. How as soon as he starts to let it draw he’s flooded with that wave of euphoria, how it feels getting to eat after a week starved, how it feels like throwing off some kind of shackle and breaking free, how it just feels so, so good. It makes him want it more than anything. It almost makes him dizzy. It feels powerful and graceful and beautiful, devouring someone’s wholeness like that.Atlas let him do it . Atlas - well, he didn’t understand what he was agreeing to, not really. And how could he have? There’s nothing else in the world like this, unless the Corps has built more, in which case Eleven help all of Sornieth. Or, er, ten. The Icewarden turns a blind eye to these things.No, Atlas didn’t know. He just put his face in Bhyram’s paws and urged him to do it. Anything for a chance to fix his eyes.Bhyram wants to give him that! He does. He wants to give him that chance, and he can, and he will. And that’s why he let that thing out to devour a part of his friend.Atlas is asleep now. Bhyram can tell, from the pattern of his breathing. He’s exhausted and in pain, of course, just like Bhyram himself was when he first took that wound from Thanatos, though at the very least the pain will be fading. It won’t linger, fresh, like it did for Bhyram.He’s fallen asleep with his head in Bhyram’s paw. Bhyram can feel the hollow outlines of his eye sockets, different from even just a few minutes before, when his face was whole. He can feel the scar tissue, the bone structure. He recognizes each and every little lump and line of scar tissue. It’s weird to feel it on someone else’s face.Atlas let him do this. He keeps coming back to that thought. Atlas trusts him enough to put his life in Bhyram’s paws. Atlas let him do it. The thing inside him that just fed poured elation into his bloodstream, but even through that he feels good about this particular little thing. Atlas trusts him. He feels worthy of that trust. He’s earned something precious, there. Atlas doesn’t trust easily.He strokes over Atlas’ destroyed face again. It doesn’t disrupt him at all. He can tell he’s out cold. The air is heavy with the stink of iron. He’s going to have to do something about that. But - But not yet. He’s… tired, too. The adrenaline is wearing off. The euphoria that’s making him smile at nothing and purr and laugh is starting to ebb away. The best way to deal with it is to go to sleep and let it pass, so he makes sure his eyes are closed -He has eyes. He’s caught, suddenly, by that. He has eyes. He can feel them, twitching and moving beneath his blindfold. They’ll be blind, he knows, since he took them from Atlas and they’re broken right now, but - he has them. And, as he moves them, he can tell - oh, he can heal this. He can definitely heal this. It won’t even take that long at all. This will work. It’s a very strange feeling, having eyes again after this long. No, no, he’ll deal with it later, he’s too tired right now. He needs to rest. Let the feeding high pass. Then he can figure out what the hell he’s going to tell Will.The room is silent. A clock ticks on the wall. He pets Atlas’ face, gently, and slowly lets his own motions fall still, lapsing into a still-elated daze.It’s nice. It shouldn’t be nice, he just hurt his friend a lot. But it is nice. To lay here, holding him, both exhausted from that ordeal. Atlas has nothing more to be afraid of. The worst is over for him. He can sleep, he can rest, he can recover from all this. Bhyram will try to do the same.It’s so peaceful in here now. No more screaming, no more frantic claws ripping at his wrists. Quiet. Warm.He’s dozing off when he hears a key in the door, though he’s sure Tess left it unlocked. The door opens. He hears careless humming, movement, the sound of paper and plastic rustling, cloth. He hears the click of Hypnos’ claws as the dog trots into the room and a murmured word as Will says something incomprehensible to him. The door shuts, and then - and then - Bhyram hears as the scent of blood finally hits Will’s nose. The humming stops.He hears motion and senses concern, resigned worry - “Oh my god,” Will says, sounding horrified. Bhyram can hear a thunk as whatever he’s holding gets dropped to the floor. His paws race across the floor. His emotions are spiking with alarm, swamping quantities of it, but it’s tempered by an edge of professional detachment and dutiful efficiency.And beneath that, a few other things. A tinge of fear, a hint of suspicion. He has no idea what’s happened.Bhyram lifts his head. “I can explain,” he calls, immediately, and then fights to lower his voice. “I can explain, it’s fine, everything’s - fine, he’s fine.” He knows it must look horrible. It looks like he’s done something truly awful to Atlas. And he has, just - not in the way it might look.Will’s presence enters his aura of perception, and he realizes he really, really should’ve considered what to say when this inevitably happened. He has no idea how to explain this. He’s - he’s going to have to explain what he can do to Will. He’s going to have to tell them. He’s going to have to let another person in on it.But Will’s - Will is trustworthy. They’ve kept Atlas’ secrets for years, haven’t they? They can keep Bhyram’s, too. And it’s not like they would turn him in. Atlas is a monster, too, and if they’ll protect him, they’ll protect Bhyram. They can be trusted.“He’s fine, ” Bhyram adds, as soon as Will is close by. “He’s okay. A trap went off and burned his eyes, so -” he almost chokes on the sentence. “So I switched them for mine so I can heal them.” There. There, that’s what happened, condensed into an extraordinary oversimplification. It’s weird to just admit that. “That’s, that’s my injury, not his, I’m - I’m fixing his.”“A trap w- what?” Will is baffled. Bhyram hears them yank off what sounds to be jewellery; it clatters as they drop it on top of the wooden dresser, then their paws scamper across the floor to the bathroom and Bhyram hears water running. They’re washing off. He pulls himself up while they do that, slightly dizzy. There’s a hint of that euphoria left still, thrumming in his bloodstream, but he can’t - he can’t let that affect him right now. No. No more of it. Even as the thing inside him curls, contented and sated and full, happy with what he’s done.“Um,” Bhyram says weakly.Will returns, drawing close again. “Let me see him,” they request, firmly. Bhyram can feel their emotions settling into what feels like a deep well of worry, nebulous, directed towards - both of them? But mostly Atlas. That’s to be expected. Bhyram moves back, out of the way, letting Will lean over the bed to touch Atlas’ head. Bhyram hears him move, very slightly, but he’s not conscious. “What do you mean, switched eyes?” they ask, as they examine the pearlcatcher. Oh, god. “He, I - okay, I didn’t think about this,” Bhyram mutters, “uh. You - I know you can keep a secret. Like this. I - uh, I can explain more later, but basically just - I can give my injuries away if I need to and take someone’s, uh, wellbeing. It’s a whole, a whole thing. His eyes got burned badly inside, so I took my missing eyes and gave him that injury and took his damaged ones in return. I’m - I’m still blind, right now, I can’t see anything, but I, uh, I have eyes right now and I’m working on, uh, healing them. And then I’ll give them back. Of course. I don’t know how long it’ll be but - he needed them healed. So I’m. Doing that.”“Okay!” Will says, clearly processing that as best as they can. “Um…! Okay.” Their emotions are absolutely reeling, but it’s under control. They’re calm, businesslike. Silent.Bhyram feels the urge to explain. He feels like a hatchling caught doing something naughty, like he has to justify what he’s done, try and explain and minimize the damage. “He’s… tired, right now,” he says into the silence. “Because it’s - the process is, uh. It hurts. A lot. And he - the trap earlier almost killed him.” Oh, shit, that might freak Will out. “But he’s okay,” he hurriedly assures them, “he’s fine, Sigma healed him and I just - I’m working on finishing the job.”That is, apparently, enough for Will. Bhyram feels his emotions settle, placated with that explanation, and he hears him set Atlas’ head down and turn to face Bhyram. He hears Will take a deep breath, steadying himself. “And I guess that he gave those to you?” he states. “Because it hurt?”“What?”“There’s blood on his claws. Are you hurt anywhere else?”Oh. Oh, right, the - the blood that he knows they all smell had to come from somewhere. That’s. That’s right. It came from Bhyram. Because - because Atlas was clawing at him, trying to get him to let go. That’s right. He suddenly feels the wounds, long lacerations down his arms and wrists, gouges out of his forepaws. “Oh. The. I… forgot. About.”He touches one forepaw with another and feels a torn sticky patch of raw flesh, the skin ripped away. That’s worse than he thought. “Uh. Yeah. He, uh, maybe I should’ve… expected that. But I didn’t want to - y’know, restrain him or anything. He was - he was really upset, and desperate, we didn’t have time and I don’t think he would’ve let me do that anyway. I couldn’t - uh, I’ll be fine.”No, wait, he needs the energy for his eyes. He can’t be wasting it on these gashes. “Uh, but I might… maybe I should have these healed, actually.” They hurt. “Anywhere else?” Will repeats.Oh, right. “No. He tried to kick my stomach out but I did manage to stop him there. I’m fine.”He hears a breath. Relief. “Good. He keeps the claws back there much sharper than the front,” Will tells him. “And even those are sharper than work technically allows. They’re good for self-defense.”
Oh, I’m aware they’re sharp. Ow.
“Guess the fluff comes in handy, huh?” Will tries. Bhyram huffs out a breath that could be a laugh in response. It’s… the joke falls flat. Will clears his throat. “What can I do?” he asks. “For you, um, I know what I can do for Atlas.”Bhyram has no idea. He tries to think about that for a second, but Will’s already moving on.“Which… we should do,” he says, voice pointed away from Bhyram again. “Do you think the two of us could move him to the other bed ourselves…? I really don’t think it’ll - bother him. Too much. Or I can go find a bigger dragon. And then at the very least I can clean the blood off of you and get an actual measure of how badly he got you. It’s kind of hard to tell with the blood matting your fur…”Bhyram can sense his worry, shifted and redirected towards Bhyram himself. It’s surprising, but - it shouldn’t be, at this point, not after how much Will has already demonstrated that he cares about other people, specifically Bhyram. And this - this is why Bhyram trusts him so much.“Uh - yeah, let’s move him,” Bhyram agrees, and hauls himself off the bed onto the floor. He’s… a little dizzy. Not too bad. “I can carry him if you get him on my back. And - yeah. Then, yeah, I should - I need these treated. If for no other reason than I need to focus on his - on my eyes.”“What kind of treatment?” Will asks, and Bhyram hears them hop up and start to move Atlas, dragging him to the edge of the bed. “Magical, or physical? Either way, I’m cleaning you.”“Magical will actually work this time,” Bhyram says, as he feels Will haul Atlas’ mostly unconscious body onto his shoulders. “Since, uh, these aren’t - oof - injuries I took from someone. He just slashed me up a little. That’s normal. I can - Thana and Lev probably won’t tell anyone.” They’re very secretive. But - no. No, no. Lev will be able to sense the thing in there. “No, never mind, we can’t ask them. Lev will see - no. Um. I think…” Atlas isn’t able to help at all. Who else can - Sigma? “We might need Sigma. But we’ll have to - mmph! - make him promise not to tell anybody, or, uh, ask any. Any questions. At all. No questions.” He feels the wounds on his arms, clotting and drying, split open as he moves, and he smells fresh blood in the air. Atlas’ weight rests on his back, and he - with Will’s help - carts the unconscious pearlcatcher over to the other bed and lays him down.Bhyram sits down on the floor next to the bed and tries to focus, trying to figure out which wound is worst so he can try to put pressure on it. He senses Will move away, and then there’s a faint clicking sound. Will’s emotions swirl with a myriad of different mingled thoughts and feelings: shock, awe, vulnerability, protectiveness, worthiness, concern, a sense of power. They just carried Atlas, and now they’re carrying something else of his - his pearl. They’re shocked to even see it.“He - is he okay with other people touching that?” Bhyram asks, out loud. Maybe he was being over-cautious earlier. “I, uh, I tried to avoid it, but I couldn’t - he wasn’t, um. Coherent enough to tell me if that was okay or not.”Will sets the pearl down on the bed next to Bhyram; he feels it depress the mattress where one of his wings rests on it. “No,” they say, “he’s not. Not normally, anyway. One time L -”Their voice catches, and they swallow the word and continue, emotions dropping slightly and settling on melancholy. “Our roommate snatched it up and he was so angry I thought I’d end up with a body to deal with. But no, it… he doesn’t like his pearl.”That much was obvious. Bhyram had gathered that.“But he doesn’t like it handled by anyone else, either. It’s… complicated.” Their emotions tint fond.“...he seemed to find it really comforting,” Bhyram says quietly. “He asked for it earlier. To be brought over.”Will makes a thoughtful hum, but no words. They aren’t sure what to say to that, and move to the next thing. “I can go and find Sigma,” they offer. “Do you know… where he might be? A guess?” Bhyram hears rummaging around, the sound of bright sharp metal and the rustle of fabric and the bloop of some kind of liquid in a bottle, and then he feels Will’s paws on his arms, lifting them to check on them and start trying to clean some of the blood out of his fur.Bhyram has no goddamn idea where to find the old spiral mage. “He’s probably, uh, either in his room or with the others? I don’t - I don’t know, did you see them down by the, uh, the pool when you came in? I’ve been… up here.”“No, I was out shopping with Spruceheart, I was too busy to notice specific people after I waved to Freylin on the way in,” Will replies.“Well, uh. Your - your guess is as good as mine, then.” Ow, that stings. Bhyram sits still, patient, feeling his heartbeat in the new wounds. They would need stitched if he had them traditionally treated. Will won’t be able to do too much without getting a healer. He hears them sigh.“You’re right, you need Sigma for this. I’ll try the pool. Just, um… here.” A touch on one of his paws, turning it upright. Will presses a pad of folded gauze to one of the worse wounds on Bhyram’s inner wrist. “Keep pressure here, on your wrist, with this gauze, and I’ll be right back. Hopefully it’ll stop bleeding again by the time we get up here.”Bhyram moves his other paw to the gaze and presses down. “Got it,” he mumbles. He’s starting to feel tired. Not… great. He needs this healed, and soon. He hears Will step out of the room, and the door shuts.“Wait,” he realizes, thinking back. “You have a roommate?” No, who’s going to answer? Will left. With Hypnos. Not that Hypnos can speak.If - if Sigma comes in - wait. Bhyram stretches one wing out and lays it on Atlas’ body. No, he’s facing the door. Bad, bad, they can’t have that - Sigma will see his missing eyes. Bhyram stands up and leans on the bed, trying to keep blood off the sheets, to nudge his face and turn it away from the door. After a second, he also pulls the sheet up over Atlas’ head. There. Hidden. Sigma probably won’t ask about that.By the time Will returns, Bhyram is back where he was sitting. The gauze he’s been trying to hold on his wrist is soaked through; he can feel the blood on his claws, spilling over his paw. “I think I might’ve, um, nicked something a little bit vital,” he tells the two as they enter. “It’s - uh. Can we get this fixed?”
Please don’t ask. Please don’t ask. Please don’t ask. Please don’t ask.
Sigma’s shock is evident in the flare in his emotions, and Bhyram hears the mechanical whirr and leathery shuffle of wing membrane as he flutters over. “How did this happen?” he asks, immediately, because of course he does. “You weren’t this bad before.”He’s not going to explain this. He just - he just won’t. “Sigma, I really need you to not ask me any questions about this,” he says. Sigma’s emotions flare up again, concern and suspicion, and Bhyram adds, “but - don’t worry about it, okay? It’s - uh, this is - uh. It’s… handled. It’s not - it’s handled, it’s fine. You don’t need to worry about it.”“You can’t blame an old spiral for worrying about you,” Sigma sighs. “It’s part of being a friend.”Touching, but still. “I… thanks. But - don’t worry. It’s fine, I promise.”Miraculously, he and Will manage to wrangle Sigma’s cooperation without any further questions, and the pain in Bhyram’s wrists and arms fades away. Still, Bhyram doesn’t relax until Sigma’s out of the room and the door is locked. Bhyram lets himself lean heavily against the bed. He’s not really in any pain. His head feels strange. He has blood matting his paws and wrists, but other than that, he’s… better than he’s felt in a while. He sets to grooming his paws, scraping the blood away with his tongue. That’ll do.Will comes back with Hypnos, and they shut the door and lock it, and there’s a long moment of silence. They’re looking at him, he can tell.“...is now a good time to talk?” Bhyram tries.Will sighs, and the sound carries, coming closer, dull claws on the floor below. “Now is… as good a time as any, I think,” they say. “I’d like to if– if you have, you know, the energy for that right now.”He had a little bit of a nap before Will got back. He nods. “Yeah, I - I’m up, for now.”Will’s voice gets closer. “Come on, let’s get you back up. The floor isn’t as, well, nice? If you’re gonna be on the ground anyway, do you want to go sit outside on the balcony?”“There’s a balcony?”“Mhm,” Will reports. “Um, one of the windows is actually a door? I found that out earlier this morning, and… well. If we sit outside, at least we won’t disturb Atlas. Hypnos could watch him, right?”“Yeah.” That sounds nice, actually. Some fresh air, maybe. The scent of blood in the room is strong enough to be a bit dizzying. “Hypnos?”He senses the dog trot over, and he holds out a paw. “Up, pickup,” he calls out. Hypnos obediently steps up next to him and stands tall. Bhyram scoops him up under the belly with one paw and sets him on the bed. “Guard,” he says, and pats Atlas on the shoulder. He senses it as Hypnos picks his way over the blanket and  silently lays down next to the sleeping pearlcatcher. Will must be watching in… some kind of awe, because the noise he makes is pretty close to it. “You know, I don’t think I’ll ever be… not astounded by the training and smarts of that dog. He is a very good dog,” he says, appreciatively. “But, um, anyway, would you like a paw up? To get outside?”“Yeah, please, I don’t know where the door is.”“I’ll hold it for you,” Will says. Gentle paws find Bhyram’s, and he helps him up. The room is small, after all, so it’s not a very long distance to the door. It must take a bit of effort to open the door, judging by the little grunt Will makes. The room is really meant for larger dragons.Air rushes in, smelling of the sea and the city and other dragons outside and plants and a hundred other things. Bhyram ducks through and feels out the size of the balcony, then finds a spot that doesn’t seem too uncomfortable to sit himself down. He folds his paws underneath his chest and waits until he hears Will exit too and the door slide shut. He senses them sit down next to him.“...okay,” he says. Not too far away, the ocean crashes against the cliffs. Seagulls wheel overhead, crying out plaintive strident wheedling calls. Bhyram takes a breath in and lets it out again. It’s been a long time since he explained himself to anybody. “Okay. Uh. I’ll tell you… anything you want to know. About - about all this. And there’s some things you really should know that I - that we… that you haven’t been told. So I guess… where do you want me to start?”Will is silent for a long moment, and then, “...Is it too broad to just ask for an explanation for um–” A pause again, uncertainty in their emotions “– How exactly you… switched eyes? That, doesn’t… really make sense to me. I can see that Atlas has your scars now, but what does that mean, exactly?”“Oh boy,” Bhyram says, and takes a deep breath. “Uh, this is - this is going to require some. Explaining.” How the fuck does he define this? I’m one of the Icewardens’ favourite kids’ escaped lab rats? That’s not going to work. “Are you familiar with, um, the Gaoler Corps?”“Um… I can’t say that I am, no. Something in the Icefields, I assume. Something to do with… Orders, or something? Based on name?” More uncertainty in their emotions. They really have no idea what they’re talking about, but they’re trying to be open and curious. Patient, despite the concern.“Uh, kind of. It’s basically just their, like. Military. It does… military things. It’s not just gaolers. Uh, obviously. I used to be part of the Corps. I’m not, anymore, don’t worry, I, uh, escaped.” He pauses, trying to gauge Will’s reaction to that.Surprise comes first. “They– Oh, is the Gaoler part just, uh, in name? You don’t have to be a gaoler to be in it?” Will cringes. “Okay, that– may have been the worst thing I could ask. Maybe you were a gaoler at some point, I don’t know. Sorry. Sorry, just, um. Please, continue. You used to be in there, you escaped, and that somehow has to do with Atlas’ eyes.” Something occurs to them. A sharp spike of uncertainty, concern, maybe suspicion. “Wait, ‘escaped?’” “Yyyyes. Um. I’m - I’m getting there. This is relevant.” He takes a breath and lets it out. “I was with the Corps for… a while. I signed on and joined this, um, pilot program run by their R&D division. I didn’t know what they wanted to do, I just wanted to be helpful. ” Fucking idiot. “They wanted volunteers to undergo some, um, trials. Some… alterations. To be a better, uh, a better Corps member, maybe even leadership someday. They wanted to know if they could build a perfectly usable general. Well, yeah. Yeah, they could. I - what you see? All of this?” he gestures at himself. “This isn’t - original. They built this. I wasn’t like this. I used to be a spiral, a long time ago. This body, my body, was built from the ground up. Designed for their purposes. For fighting, for recruitment, to… look good. I know. It’s - it’s like that on purpose.” It’s supposed to be likeable, to make people think positively about him, about the Corps. “I’ve kept it and maintained it for years, yes, but this body wasn’t - I didn’t make it myself. They did.”Seagulls again. One wings by close enough, screeing, that Bhyram flinches. “I promise I’m going somewhere with this,” he says. “They rebuilt me physically, um, but they also gave me some - some abilities. You’ve seen, uh, how I heal. How I adapt. Those are both… gifts that the Corps gave me. So are the runes. I know you saw them. I could feel it.” The tattoos encircling his wrists and neck are subtle, hidden under his fur, but for someone who can see and who is specifically working through his coat, they’re easy to spot. He definitely felt Will’s curiosity spike at one point while handling one of his wrists a couple days earlier. “And then there’s the way I can heal other people. It’s, um, it’s by exchanging something of theirs for something of mine. If I’m whole in some way, and they’re broken, I can take… my wholeness, and give it to them, and take the broken piece. And then I have the wound, and they don’t anymore. But I can do it the other way, too. I can take something that’s broken about me and I can give it to someone else and take what they have. That’s - that’s the part I don’t tell anyone. I can do that because Kynaba put -”Put what? He has no idea what the hell it is.“...sssomething in me,” he says, lamely. “I… don’t remember how it happened. One of the times they were working on me I woke up and it was there. I don’t know what it is, Kynaba never would tell me. He just snapped and said not to ask questions about stuff I wouldn’t understand anyway.”Will clears their throat, apologetic, purposefully interrupting but trying not to be rude about it. “If– If it’s okay to ask, um. Who, exactly, is Kynaba? Some…” Metallic clinks– bracelets, jewellery, put back on, shaking as Will gestures to themself. “...Higher up, I guess? Administrator? Er, no, military, right, there’s… generals, or something. A… general?”Hah. “No,” Bhyram says, shaking his head. “I was the general–” “Oh, shit,” Will mutters under their breath. Clearly they weren’t expecting it and– well. Bhyram can’t blame them. It’s a good thing, really, maybe all that effort towards not seeming in command is working.“–Kynaba is science division,” Bhyram continues. “Experimentation, research, weapons.” Kynaba. He hates and fears that gaoler. He won’t go within five hundred kilometers of Kynaba if he can avoid it. “He’s the one who made me. Experimentation, research… weapon. Ta-da. Here you go.” He gestures vaguely with one forepaw, and can’t stop the bitterness in his tone. “Do whatever you want with it.”Whatever emotions Will had previously all wilt as the information sinks in. He’s worried about Bhyram, upset for him. He’s quiet, though, save for a muffled “Oh no…”  So they understand the implication. They understand what he means. They get the idea already.Will swallows, then adds much more gravely, “That… didn’t end well for you.” It’s not a question, it’s a statement of fact. And, perhaps, the biggest understatement of the century.He almost wants to laugh. He doesn’t, though. “No. It didn’t.” He takes a breath. “This… doesn’t exactly all matter when it comes to Atlas, sorry. I’ve gotten off topic. Just -  “No, no,” Will interjects, much more forcefully this time. “I want to listen. To whatever you have to say, whether you need or want to say, whatever the reason– Um. Please, I’m… I’m here. For you, too, not just for Atlas.”He almost doesn’t. He almost brushes it off and gets back to the topic at hand. But is there anyone in the goddamn world except for Ambrose and Aini who knows him? Even his old team doesn’t, they only got pieces. They never got the full picture. They didn’t ask for it, either. And Bhyram’s been doing a good job making sure people don’t even think there is any kind of picture to ask about. But hell. Here’s Will, asking, and they already know more than nearly anyone else does. He feels a tight, intense longing. He wants someone to know, someone to understand. And Will is asking to be told. To know him. For once in his life, he wants to be known. He wants to be seen. He knows it won't pose any danger to him, so there's nothing to be afraid of. So what is there to hold him back?Nothing at all.“That’s a funny thing to say about a death machine,” he says clearly.Will’s neatly trimmed claws scrabble along the stone of the balcony. Awkward, scooting over without standing, until there’s an arm looped around Bhyram’s shoulders. “Maybe it is,” Will says, the sound directed outwards, looking over the city, the sea. “But I’m saying it anyway. So… carry on. If you’d like to.”Yeah. Where to go next? Him. That’s where. “The Corps wanted a general,” he says, “that they could use as a… figurehead, I guess. Someone stupid enough to submit willingly to everything they wanted to do. Once they had me, and I was… mostly finished up, they handed me off to my company, a subset of a division that was, uh, technically mine. Not - not really. It really belonged to my first lieutenant. I was just there to be a - a machine, a powerhouse. To fight things. To kill things. To be really, really good at killing things. Which is - which would have been fine. It would’ve been okay. If. If it were just monsters I was fighting. Or slavers. And not…”Will is not going to call the Corps on him. Will is not going to call the Corps on him. “Uh, people who weren’t listening. Or people who were in the way. Or people who had something we wanted. Or people who saw something we didn’t want them to see. Or… you get the point.”“I think so,” they murmur, and drop their head to his shoulder as well, resting on their arm. “Just… innocents, right?”It still hurts. “Yeah. A - a lot of them.”“Corruption doing as corruption does, and… Mm. You were their fall guy, huh…? Since you technically did it.”“Oh, they didn’t want to lose me. If they had their way I’d still be there. I - I fought my way out. I had to - Kyanba gave Graston my leash. He put a switch in my head, a command word to make me do… anything he wanted me to. So I couldn’t get away. He’d just bring me back. I had to disable him before I could run. But then - yeah. Yeah, whatever wasn’t covered up they put on me. As - as far as I know they only pinned one…” entire goddamn village - “incident on me. But, uh, it’s enough to have a ‘kill on sight’ order out. Still. And they’re not - they’re not wrong. I did… do it. Atlas is a damn saint compared to me.”“Hm.” Discontent. “But you didn’t have a choice, did you?” “Not in the moment, no.”Will scoffs, then. “Then I wouldn’t consider you to be– Okay.” Will pauses to take a breath, to calm those swirling emotions bubbling up, the rage and upset and concern for their friend. Fuck, he’s upset them. “I don’t think it’s a fair comparison to make, Bhyram. Not to– not to Atlas. Um. You know I follow him anyway, and maybe that makes me a bad person, sure, but Atlas is by no means a– a normal dragon. Many would call him a monster, even. He is nowhere near a saint. If you were back in those days, and, and– you had control, Bhyram, of your actions, would you have done it? Willingly?”“What does that matter? I did it. My motives don’t matter. Not to the dead.”“Not to the dead, no. They’re fucking dead, and– we can’t do anything about that. But if anyone were to be labelled a monster for it, it shouldn’t be you. The blood might be on your paws, but you didn’t put it there. This Graston guy did.” Will spits the name. They’re angry at his old lieutenant. Just like Aini had been. Bhyram had had to beg her not to try and hunt him down. For her own safety, of course. Not - not because he didn’t want her to kill Graston.He hates Graston so fucking much. More than Kynaba, even. The name makes his claws twitch, scraping against the stone, and makes his stomach lurch with fear. “I thought maybe I’d killed him,” he mutters. “That at least I'd done that when I escaped. But no, he lived. I hate that he lived. He’s one of the only people I really wish I could kill.”Will’s nodding jostles both of them, fervent, agreeable. “I think you should be allowed to! Or, at least be allowed to want to.”“I do want to. He used me.” Bhyram tips his head back, as if looking at the sky. “He made - remember what we talked about? With… balance? How Atlas’ balance is still - positive? Because he does good in the world? Graston made mine tip the other way. I’m never going to pay it off, and I’m never going to forgive him. I want him dead. I’ll never do it, but - I think the world would be… better. Without him.”“What, he immortal or something?” Will mutters.“Retired.”“Retired people can still be killed,” they say, entirely seriously.“I’d have to… find him. And it’s - it’s not worth it. It would take so much just to do that, and it would be risky to go back to the Icefields into the cities for it. And for what? He’s not doing anything anymore. It’d be pointless. Just revenge at that point. And that doesn’t make up for anything.”Clearly, Will wants to argue. He’s bitter, annoyed, absolutely certain in his belief that Graston needs to die. However, he doesn’t push the issue. It’s not his place– there’s a forced emotional detachment forming. It’s not Will’s fight. He’s going to lie now. “You’re right,” is what he says. “I’m… so sorry, Bhyram. Um. For what it’s worth, I still don’t think you’re a monster.” It’s unpleasant when people lie to him like that, or say things that they blatantly don’t believe. It sucks. But - this is par for the course. “I know you don’t actually agree. You don't have to. But thanks anyway.” Bhyram lays his head down on the stone, ignoring Will’s little bubble of startled shock.Will remains sitting up. He gathers himself back together, keeping his limbs to himself once more. “You’re right, I– I don’t agree. I think you should have the opportunity to kill him. If you want. There’s– I guess a reason I’m still around Atlas. I won’t pretend that I’m a saint either.” He huffs. Frustrated, still. “Bhyram, do you think I’m lying when I say that I don’t think you’re a monster?”Of course. “Yeah. It’s - you can’t change facts. ”“I can’t change facts, but I can read them for what they are! The facts tell me that one, you didn’t want to do it, two, you had literally no choice in the matter, and three, some bitch named Graston ordered all of these things, and you just had to listen. That paints a very different story when you look at it like that, Bhyram,” Will insists, distinctly missing his usual halting cadence. With each list item Bhyram can hear a faint thud and the jingle of Will’s jewellery, like he’s counting forcefully on his claws.Yes. Yes. But. That’s not - that doesn’t change anything. It doesn’t matter why he did it! It matters that it happened! “You can’t kill four hundred fucking people and not be a monster, Will,” he says, harshly.More jingling, upwards– paws, thrown into the air. Angry exasperation. “Yes you can! When it’s not your fault! If I steal a gun and go and blast the concierge right now, unprovoked, are you going to blame the fucking gun?” Will groans. So far, it’s the most frustrated he has ever heard Will. Then, he takes a breath, forces himself to be clearer, more gentle, “I don’t care what the number is! I live with a killer, I work around death day in and day out, sometimes with reasons a lot more petty than being literally forced into it. It doesn’t matter to me, Bhyram. It could be over a thousand and I still wouldn’t think you’re a monster.”And - …well, he’s right, isn’t he? This is exactly what Ambrose told him, over and over, in the weeks she spent dissecting his control runes with him locked in a bare stone cave under Dragonhome. Same damn thing. Well - minus the ‘living with a killer’ part. That he should’ve just - he already knew that, of course Will doesn’t give a shit, why would he? Quite frankly, it’s offensive that Bhy’s been treating him like he just doesn’t get it. Will isn’t an idiot. They do and believe what they do because it’s their choice. Maybe Will not caring how many innocents he's slaughtered is a bad thing. But what's definitively good and bad is so muddy, nowadays, and he's so tired, and he just wants to take what comfort he can get and not have to question it. Why is he being so stubborn about this? About wanting to feel bad? There's no reason for it. He needs to just… let it go. The past is dead. That's what Ambrose told him too. The past doesn't matter. Especially if it wasn't even his goddamn fault. He made the mistake of falling for the Corps’ recruitment and submitting to what they did, but that shouldn't have earned him the life it did. It was just a couple stupid mistakes. Like poor Tess and her erased life. Just one stupid mistake.He can't argue with this, and he shouldn't. Ambrose was right. Will is right. And he wants them to be right, because he's tired of being a monster in his head, and he doesn't want to be anymore. Not that one argument will change everything, but - he has to start changing somehow. Keep changing, really, it started years ago. It started when he first flew into the blizzard expecting to die.He’s been silent for too long. He can feel Will getting a little nervous, worried. He has to respond.“...you remind me of an old friend,” Bhyram says, softly, and smiles faintly. “She said the same thing. Maybe with different words, but - the same idea. I'm - I was the weapon. Not… the wielder. It’s easy to forget that and get wrapped up in thinking it’s all me. I’m… sorry. I haven’t taken you seriously, you’re - right, here, you are, I just - get stuck. Sometimes. Thinking about it. You’re not stupid. It’s not fair to just think ‘oh, well, you just don’t get it’. You do. I'm sorry.”With a heavy sigh, Will settles down on the ground fully, his tail flicking once before settling up against part of Bhyram’s. He lifts one feathered wing to rest over Bhyram’s back, warm and soft. “I’m– listen, I’m really trying here. You’ve been nothing but kind to me, nothing but kind to fucking Atlas, of all people, and– that. Matters to me.” His head drops to the stone as well, jewellery clicking in the process. “I might remind you of an old friend, but… maybe I could remind you of a new friend, too.”Bhyram considers that. “...wh. Hold on, which. One. What?”“Which one– huh?” “You said ‘remind me of a new friend’, which one is…? Like. Imitating?”“Which one I rem– Bhyram?” Will asks, incredulously. He pauses for a moment, then dissolves into giggles. The wing resting on Bhyram’s back shakes with them. “Bhyram, I’m trying to tell you that, um, I’d like to be your new friend!”Oh, for the Eleven’s sakes. “Oh - ohhhh. I, I did tell you they picked me because I’m an idiot, right?”“Well, if you’re an idiot, at least they picked a loveable idiot. You’re very entertaining.”Bhyram snorts. Entertaining? He’ll take it. It’s - that’s fine, actually, that’s good. He tips his head slightly to the side, resting one jaw-joint on the balcony stone. “I’ll take it,” he says, and then laughs, genuinely. “I - wow. Uh, is it weird to say - oh, sorry, I didn’t agree yet, yes, I would really like to be friends. Please. To be clear. You’re great. Uh, what was I saying? Yeah, uh, it feels… kind of like a relief to have someone else know about all that. I guess. So, sorry, but also, thank you a lot.”It is a relief. He feels a little bit lighter. Just like when Ambrose pried that story out of his rigid jaws. He’d felt better then, too. It’s good to trust someone like this again. It’s good to not be alone. It’s good to have people on his side.  “Are you… naturally good at talking to people, or did you, uh, go to school for that? Or - or something?”Will laughs then, too. “No! No, um– Well, actually? I guess technically yes if I was in school for it, but it wasn’t a class? I, um, spent a not insignificant amount of time talking down really drunk pre-meds at parties they really shouldn’t have been at.” “I think that kind of counts. That’s… experience.” Bhyram pauses. No, he’ll ask. “I don’t know what a pre-med is.”There’s shock, resignation, and understanding all in order in Will’s emotions. Notably, there’s… no pity. Shouldn’t there be? Maybe. But there wasn’t before, and there isn’t now.“Pre-medical studies,” Will says. “Just, um. How do I explain that, because I doubt you know much about… advanced schooling, right?”That’s one way to put it. “That is… not something I did much. No.”“It’s like… Things you study and learn before you can learn more about medical stuff.” Will laughs. “A lot of people tried to get into it that just, really could not handle it. I managed to convince a few to do something else that they liked better.”“Is it. This is such a stupid question. Is it… really hard?”“Not for the faint of heart, that’s for sure. It’s a lot of studying and tests and late nights and– god. I wouldn’t do it again. No, never. I’m happy with where I am, but I would rather die, I think, than have to do all of that over again? If I had to, maybe I’d just… I don’t know. Do something else… entirely. Probably. Hair?”It's easy to forget, when they're set next to each other, that Will and Atlas have the same medical training. That Will is an extremely qualified professional who is extremely good at his job. Bhyram makes a note. He musn’t forget so easily in the future. It isn't respectful to Will to forget.“I… can confirm you’re very good at. Hair,” Bhyram says, not following his own train of thought in the slightest with his words. “Fur. F...eathers?”Will chirps, “All three! Um, I have fur and feathers, and Atlas has hair, so I’ve… done a little bit of everything by now, I think. Well rounded? I think I’d do good if I went into… that field, but I think where I’m at is good too. They say turning your hobbies into, um, a job can kind of kill the joy. Do you have any hobbies?”Oh, so - so that’s why Atlas let him groom him in Frost Point. He’s used to a tundra doing that. Okay, that makes a lot more sense now. “I… well. Being blind kind of, uh, cuts down on what I can do. I can cook, that’s fun, and I can mend things by touch, which I like doing. Uhhh. I would - I wish I could read, still, I’d do that, but now I have to get someone to read to me, and usually that’s not… I’m not going to bother someone to come do that.” “Oh! That’s perfect then!” The wing leaves Bhyram’s back, Will sits back up, clapping their forepaws together with a dull thump. “Do you want to listen to a book with me at some point? Tonight, maybe, if Atlas is still asleep or something? I love listening to books, and music, and podcasts, and the radio– Anything, really. No sight required, I can get stuff done while listening.” “...I’m beginning to think maybe I should - live somewhere with more advanced technology,” Bhyram mutters. “That sounds - that sounds great, we don’t really have that in Void’s clan. They’re, um, they’re pretty old-fashioned - that I know of, at least, uh, aside from stuff like Sigma’s augments and the, um, the robot dragons. I didn’t know you liked music and stuff? Where do you… get , uh, any. Any of that?” he idly begins to groom one forepaw, his right one. It aches a little.“Well… I live by Aergate, right? Um, the suburb is called Swiftreed, but that doesn’t– sorry, irrelevant,” Will says, then tries again, “There’s a lot of trade and stuff that comes through. So I just… get it from the store? I have, um, a little player, and the books come as little encoded crystals that hold the stories, plug it in, and uh– I’m not terribly schooled on that kind of advanced magic, but it works, and I know how to use it. So.”What the hell? That’s incredible. “Oh, wow, just - anybody can get those?”“If you have the, the money for it, yeah! But, uh, you have to have the money for it, which is really obvious, but I know that not all places even use coins and stuff…” Will trails off. He’s excited still regardless, enthused about books and technology and all sorts of things that he interacts with daily. Clearly, they’re living in two very different worlds from one another. “...wow,” Bhyram says, after a minute. “I - wish I could get one, I feel like I’d be way less bored all the time. When I’m not working I mean. Uh, but, yeah, uh… Void’s clan doesn’t - doesn’t do money like that. I could, um, maybe… request that someone get one? For me? In a city? Maybe.”Pat pat, a gentle paw on Bhyram’s shoulder. “Don’t worry about it, I’ll get you one. They’re not that expensive, I can see if there’s one here in town somewhere? They do money here, at least.”Will is, Bhyram has come to realize, an exceedingly kind dragon. You don’t need to do that, it’s fine starts to form in his mouth, but - it’s an offer, a present, from a friend, and he would enjoy it, and why does he keep always doing this? Always turning down anything he might enjoy just because someone else might be mildly inconvenienced by getting it for him? All it’s doing is making things suck for him for no reason. He accepted Will’s offer to groom his coat, and it was arduous, but it was great for him, and Will honestly seemed to enjoy it. He has to be more like that. “Really?” he asks, instead, to confirm.“Yeah!” they affirm. “I’ve got so many stories saved up in a drawer at home, I could easily give you some later when I get home. You– Someone has a mailbox or something there, right? Um. Well. I’d buy some here with the player anyway. This is, assuming I can, you know, find any here.”Bhyram can’t help the smile that creeps across his face. “I - well, if you don’t mind, if it’s not too much, then - yeah, thank you,” he says, softly. His grasp of how much things cost is… not great. But he knows how to appreciate a gift regardless.“I’ll go out tomorrow and go look around, see what I can find. Um, I– don’t really want to go back out today, not while Atlas is, well. You know.” “No, no, yeah, we - uh, he shouldn’t be left alone. It’s really - being blind is really disorienting when it first happens, he was adapting pretty well earlier but it’s still - he’s going to have trouble.” Bhyram flicks an ear back towards the door of the balcony. He doesn’t hear anything from inside, so Atlas is still definitely asleep, because Hypnos probably would’ve alerted him if he woke up. “He took a shower earlier and everything without any help, which is way better than I managed when I first lost my eyes.”He touches his face again. His eyes. That he… has, again. That’s still so weird. That’s not going to stop being weird. He could take his blindfold off, right now, but he almost doesn’t have the courage to. It’s - he’ll be blind anyway, it doesn’t matter. He leaves it on for the moment.“Adapting, huh?” Will snorts. “I think he’s just stubborn. He’d adapt because he would rather struggle than… do literally anything else, actually. But it’s a good thing he was able to do that at all. Um– I might have to convince him to let me wash the blood off of him, though. And you too, maybe. He… really did some damage there. I’m glad it’s feeling better…?”Oh - oh, no. “Oh, no, shoot, I got blood on his tunic when he got me earlier, didn’t I? Shoot. I hope he’s not too upset, I think it’s important to him.” “Wouldn’t be the first time it’s gotten blood on it,” Will says, mildly subdued, then immediately takes up the more chipper tone again. “It’s, um–! Black fabric, mostly, it has some red at the back. It– won’t stain, is my point. It’ll wash out fine, don’t worry about it.”“...I forgot clothes had colors,” Bhyram says, after a moment. “Okay. Okay, that’s alright, then.” Will got that strange tone when talking about the blood, so he’s not going to ask. He’s not going to ask. There’s something weird going on there, and it’s something he can’t ask about. “I, uh, I think I got most of it off my paws, though, at least? Or - well.” He lifts a paw and licks along it to test. There is a faint tang of blood to his fur still. “No, it’s still in my undercoat. I really - I really didn’t mean to make such a huge mess today, honest.”“You know, I doubt Atlas did either? It’s– don’t worry about it. It looks like it’s mostly just your arms, it won’t, um, take too long to clean up,” Will reassures him.“Yeah, I was, uh, holding on to his head, kind of?” Bhyram sits up, then mimics the position. “He couldn’t, uh - I mean, it hurt, so he was fighting me, and he was just trying to get me to let go, but I - you know. Obviously I couldn’t let him go, I was working on him. So he just kind of, um, ripped me up a little bit while I held him there. He was really struggling.”A beat. He sighs. “I kept telling him not to fight it or struggle so much, and I think he was trying to listen, really, but it was, uh, still just too much for him. Which - I mean, that’s to be expected. I kind of figured that.”“And he– He listened , sort of, during all that panic and pain?” Will asks, sounding truly baffled.Bhyram had felt, somewhere, behind Atlas’ screaming and the pleased growl of the thing in him that was drinking from his friend, that Atlas did want to listen. He just… couldn’t. “Wwwwwell. He tried to. It’s - not his fault, um, it takes kind of a - a certain kind of person to feel that and not just, uh, try to escape at all costs. I did… burn his eyes out.” He clears his throat.He does feel bad about it. Awful. That wound hurt the first time he got it, and it’ll hurt the next time he gets it, and it hurt Atlas horribly. He doesn’t blame him at all for his defensive struggle. “He tried to do what I said, he just couldn’t. So I had to… I really did my best not to be rough with him, even though the, uh, the thing makes me feel very - makes me not pay attention to things. I don’t think I bruised his face anywhere, I was super careful there, uh, but I might’ve pressed down a little hard on his legs when he was trying to kick me. I had to be -” what’s a good way to put this? He can’t think of one. “I had to be very, um, firm… with him.”A lot of things emanate from Will’s directions. Shock, first and foremost. Lots of shock. Disbelief followed by some kind of… rationalising? He might be putting pieces of the story together. To be fair to him, it is a lot to sort of take in. There’s even something soft that he mutters, a faint holy shit? under his breath that Bhyram is pretty sure was meant to not be heard. That’s carried in a muddied eddy of… awe? Whatever that means.“I– can’t believe it worked?” Will says, sounding oddly strangled.“I mean.” Bhyram flexes his forepaws. “It only worked as much as, um, I managed to keep him pinned down and not let him, uh, gut me. He - really I think he listened as well as he did last night, it’s just that he was in a lot of pain and couldn’t help but -” He gestures with his paws, clawing at the air. “Y’know. He was definitely better at listening last night and the night before.”“What!” Will squeaks, and then their voice takes on the air of someone that is– much too interested in gossip. “What happened last night? What were you two doing while I was asleep??”“Oh, oh my god.” Bhyram forgot to tell him about the thing in the window, the awful - “I meant to bring this up, uh, I completely forgot. Um. We need to cover - the balcony, there’s a door. Oh god. We need to cover that up tonight. There’s, um, a sort of hungry thing that keeps, uh, showing up outside at night. And it wants to - get in, I think, and… do something? I don’t know what, probably eating people, but it’s dangerous and it’s hunting and I stopped it the last two nights but I think honestly if we just put a curtain up, or something, it won’t be able to see in and see that there’s people it wants to hunt. I think. I’m not sure. It’s kind of hard to tell.”More shock. That is… not what Will was expecting. Not even remotely. “Okay! That– um. Great, okay, good to know. I’ll, um. Make sure that that happens. God. Neither of you thought to tell me this earlier?” “I’m so sorry, I meant to, I just - I got distracted? He really didn’t want to talk about it after the first night, uh, he specifically waited to ask me about it until you couldn’t hear. And then today I just - a lot happened today, I… forgot. I’m so sorry.” If he’d forgotten again, what would’ve happened? What if he can’t stop it now because he has eyes? Horrifying. Absolutely horrifying. He’s so glad he remembered.Even still, Will seems a little dejected. “Okay, I can… We’ll do something about that right when we get back inside. Oh my god. Thank you for telling me about it. God, a monster on the balcony…” Their words reduce to horrified mumbles.Oh, he feels terrible. He reaches out; he’s in contact with Will, so he knows where their body is. He takes one of their forepaws. “It’s - it’s okay, it’s not - I had it, um, handled. And if it had gotten in -”Could he have done something about it?Probably. What exactly, he’s not sure. But he would’ve been able to do something. Unleash his own horrible thing, somehow, maybe, he doesn’t know. He can’t explain that, and that’s not even very reassuring, so instead, he says, “I wouldn’t have let it hurt you. Either of you.”Will doesn’t seem to believe that, but… they’re reassured anyway. “Thank you,” they say, and squeeze the paw that holds theirs back. No. He needs them to believe it. “I mean that,” Bhyram says. He needs them to not be afraid. It likes fear; it feeds on fear. “I will not let it hurt you. I promise.”“...I’ll hold you to that,” they say, and it sounds like a smile. That seems to work. They’re a little caught off guard, but grateful.“Count on it.” Bhyram returns the smile, or at least he hopes he does. If they didn’t smile at him first that may look a little weird. Oh well. Too late now.A cold breeze ruffles his mane. He picks his head up. “...where’s the sun now?” he asks, suddenly. “How - how late is it?”“Mmm…?” Will pulls their paw back, and then they next speak their voice is pointed away, looking, calculating. “I think… There’s still a couple hours until dinner? Not early, not late, you know…”Okay. That’s fine, then, they have time. Bhyram nods. “So that’s not - imperative. It’s not a, uh, a threat right now. Okay.” Gods, he’s tired. The exhaustion from wrangling his magic earlier is back. It was chased away after his brief doze on the bed, but it’s back now, and his head hurts. He raises a paw and rubs at the side of his face, where his blindfold sits. “I… both myself and Atlas haven’t been, um, sleeping well the last few nights. Because of the - the thing in the window. I know I said I had, uh, I could talk for a while but I’m - kind of… tired? And I think maybe I should go inside so I don’t fall asleep out here and then, uh, die because the thing ate me.”“Let’s, um! Definitely head inside. Have a nap even, maybe, it… might help. And, I’ll get the curtains, don’t worry about it,” Will says, and suddenly that paw is reaching for Bhyram’s again. Tugging him up, offering a paw to take inside.He takes the paw and stands. “Yeah,” he agrees, with another smile. “I - thanks. I don’t even know if there are curtains, that would be really helpful.”“There are. They’re kind of ugly, though.”He hears Will once again struggle a bit with the balcony door, and then it slides open. He follows Will through back into the hotel room.It’s quiet. Atlas, on his bed, is nearby, and Bhyram steps sideways until he feels it bump against his flank. There. God, he is tired. He feels for the edge, then hops up as Will gets the door closed again and locks it with a heavy thunk.This weird sensation in his face - is that his eyes? It is , isn’t it? His eyes hurt. That hasn’t happened in forever. Bhyram presses both paws against his eyes, over the blindfold, old fabric rough against his eyelids.Of course, Will picks up on this immediately, the nurse that he is. “Are your eyes bothering you?” he asks. It’s one hell of a statement. What a day today has been.“Uh. I don’t know, maybe? I - don’t remember what they’re supposed to feel like,” Bhyram says, with a huff of laughter. “It’s been too long.” Maybe he should take the blindfold off. Maybe he’ll be able to see. No, that’s stupid. But what if…?Before he can think about it too much, he grips the blindfold and pulls it free, not even bothering to untie it. It gets stuck on his horns, of course, like it always does when he doesn’t untie it, and he has to toss his head back and twist it around to get it off and drop it to the bed sheet. Then he opens his eyes.Nothing. Darkness. He blinks them a few times, and he can do that, he knows he’s doing it. He can feel it. No, nothing. He touches his face - no scarring. His facial coat is unmarred save for a few little nicks and old scratches. His mane starts in his forehead like it’s supposed to, and he runs his claws through it, marvelling at that. “...nothing on sight, just to - report that,” he calls out, feeling his face gently. “They’re still not working. This feels so weird.” Will’s voice carries strangely across the room, moving around as he talks, rummaging around in bags, pulling zippers and clasps.“Well, don’t worry, I um, I brought some eye drops for dryness, and at best they help and at worst they do nothing, so if you’d like some, I can– Oh!” Will comes to stand nearby and suddenly stops.Regaining his eyes has not taken away any of Bhyram’s extra senses; he’s still very, very much able to read the emotions of those around him. He’s struck, then, by a sudden, almost violent surge of interest and attraction from Will, directly next to him, very sudden and very intense. Immediately he can feel them attempt to fight it back, batting it down and away, desperately trying to remain friendly and respectful about this. The attraction gets swamped with what might be shame."I'm. So sorry. Oh my god. Um." Will stammers. "Please, please ignore that, I know you can feel it, and– I promise I'm not– not trying to be weird." His voice gets muffled when he buries his face in his paws in absolute mortification. “I have the drops. I can– put them in for you. If you’d like.”That’s… a lot. It’s - he must have his old face from the recruitment posters back. That’s… well. He was built like this for a reason. He clears his throat. “Um. Uh, it’s - it’s fine, it, uh. I’m - it’s fine, I know you don’t… mean anything by it. I was… custom designed. Like this.” He sweeps his fur out of his face again and holds it, turning his head and trying to see if there’s anything that shows up. Anything at all. There isn’t. “I, uh, yeah, actually? That might be good. It can’t… hurt, right? Why not, right. Um - how - what do you want me to… do? For that?”“No, it… It shouldn’t hurt, here.” They step closer, opening what sounds like a little vial. “Just. Lean your head back… Yes, like that, try not to blink.” They grip under Bhyram’s chin, resting their palm on the underside of his jaw, steadying his head, which he lets himself rest in their outstretched paw for a moment. As they do so, Bhyram can hear a swallow, being this close. He can hear the faint rapid patter of their heartbeat. One two, one two– four drops total, two in each eye. Nice and easy and quick. He doesn’t let himself blink. They relinquish their hold on his face as soon as it’s done. Their emotions are still whirling, but he ignores it. They already said to just not pay attention. He knows it’s just the Corps-built face he has. It’s nothing.Oh, that - that does help. That helps a lot. Now he blinks a few times. “That does feel better. Yeah, yeah, you were right. You really, uh, know your stuff.” He offers what he’s pretty sure is Will’s direction another weary smile.“You could– say that! Maybe. Um, I’m not an optometrist, but I know some basics, um, I’m… glad it feels better. Easier to rest, at least, if you’re not, you know. Ignoring the discomfort, right?”“I have, uh, apparently I have a bad habit of doing that,” Bhyram mumbles, rubbing a paw over his face again. “I’m. Working on it.”He’s sitting on the edge of the bed already. Surely - he could just lay down near Atlas, for a little while. Surely that won’t make him fall asleep.The last thing he remembers is the faint sounds of Will moving around, drawing curtains, and then them stepping near, fiddling with some kind of device. Something about an alarm? He doesn’t remember them hopping up or settling underneath his wing. He only realizes that’s even what’s happened when there’s an odd little chiming sound that wakes him. Will’s alarm. Atlas is on one side of him, and Will is on the other, snuggled up against his flank under his wing. It’s kind of sweet. He likes this. He doesn’t often get to sleep in a pile with other dragons, and the tactile feel of it is really soothing. It’s nice. Atlas does not stir when the alarm chimes. He shifts ever so slightly, but he is well and truly out. Will, however, groans and drags themself out of the warmth to go and collect the little device from across the room, clicking it off after only a couple more chimes. There’s a click in the same direction, the smell of a match going out, the knob of the lamp flicking on. “Dinner time,” Will mumbles, thick with sleep.Bhyram yawns, which makes his jaw make a quite frankly alarming cracking noise, but he can’t think about that, because when he blinks his eyes several times, he feels like there’s a difference. Maybe he’s imagining it. But - but maybe he’s not. His breath catches. He raises a paw and scrubs at his eyes again, then tries again, shutting his eyes, opening them. Is there a faint difference in the darkness? He needs to test it. He needs to test it right now, immediately, at this very instant. “Will?” he calls out. “Can you - could, please - hold up something bright. A, a candle, or something.”“Huh…? Oh. Um. Sure, there’s– would an oil lamp work?”“Anything that’s - the brighter the better,” Bhyram tells him. There has to be. There has to be a difference. He feels like there’s a difference, and after seeing only darkness for so long, he would know. “I want to see if - come over here?”Notable surprise, confusion. Will obliges immediately, claws clicking along the floor as they bring the lamp closer.He senses they’re nearby. He thinks he might, maybe, see something. “Okay, uh - move it around? The lamp, I mean. I - just, um, move it in shapes or something, not too fast, I’m going to try and track it.” Please work. Please let this work. Please let this work. Please let this work. He hears the very faint slosh of oil, and there’s a subtle, vague difference in the darkness that he’s seeing. A shift in the shades of it. He’s sure that some parts are brighter, and some darker, and he tries to focus, jaw tight, until he’s reasonably certain he’s got his gaze fixed on a point in front of him that’s brighter than the rest of his vision. Will doesn’t speak, but Bhyram can feel his emotions, incredulity and disbelief.The point… moves. Up, down, center, circle, triangle, diagonal. By the Eleven, he hopes these are the right shapes. He follows what he thinks is that subtle, hard-to-discern point. “..am I - is this - am I getting it?” he asks, after a full minute, barely breathing. “Yes?! ” Will tells him, sounding shocked. “Yes! You are! Oh my god…!”Holy shit. He’s got it. He honestly was fairly sure that was nothing, that it was going to be him imagining it. But - no, no, here he is.“Oh my god, I can see,” Bhyram says, and to his mortification he can feel himself tearing up. That’s something else that he hasn’t done in five years, and as such, he does not remember how to stop it. “I mean - it’s working , I can - it’s. I know this - this isn’t about me.” This is about Atlas. These are Atlas’ eyes, not his own . He needs to not get used to this. “But I - augh,” he chokes out. “Sorry. Sorry. I did not know if this would work. It’s, it is, it is , so he’s - he’s going to be fine, he’s going to be able to see.” His face burns, and his throat feels tight. This is about to get really embarrassing, isn’t it?More sloshing, the point of light fading away into obscurity, as Will sets the lamp on the desk again. Bhyram isn’t alone in the dark for long, however, as Will sets his paws on either of Bhyram’s shoulders. "And you'll be fine, too! I think you can be a little bit selfish, Bhy. You weren't always blind, right? I think that... it's okay to feel really, um, excited and maybe even a little conflicted here." His tail, audibly, brushes against the carpet as it swishes back and forth.“I, no, no, I only lost my eyes… four, five years ago?” Bhyram rasps out. Has it really been that long? He presses his claws against his eyes very gently. “Holy shit. I didn’t think I’d care this much.” “Only four or five–!” Will cries, shock colouring the words. “Oh my god, I thought– It was maybe longer than that. You’re so, um, nonchalant about– No, that’s, that’s stupid. It doesn’t matter.” He squeezes his shoulders. “It’s okay to cry,” he says, much more gently.Well thank the gods for that, because Bhyram does, immediately. He can’t not. He draws in a shuddering breath and feels tears against his face, and - with nothing else to do - he leans forward to where he knows Will is and buries his face in Will’s mane. Soft and silky with supple feathers strewn throughout. “I didn’t think it would be so much,” he mumbles, muffled by fur and feathers. “God…”Apparently, though, this is enough to fully wake Atlas, who was already slightly roused by the chime of Will’s alarm. Bhyram is struggling to breathe when he hears a thick, ragged voice from the bed. “Wh… what happened? Who died?”Oops. He’ll try to explain. “No, nobody,” he calls, still muffled by fluff. “I just, uh, got - got emotional. It's working, Atlas, I can see - light and shadow. It's blurry, really vague, but - I can see it, you'll be able to see it too, maybe, probably more.” “What?” Atlas says, already sounding significantly more awake. His voice is still hoarse, however, evident when he continues, “Already? That– no, there’s… that’s impossible.”“It’s true, I just had Will test me, moving a - a light around.” He has to stop to breathe in several times. He’s getting Will’s mane soggy. Shoot. “I - I had Sigma fix my wrists earlier, and I’ve just been asleep mostly since then, and - oh, sorry, Will, I’m - sorry. Uh. It’s just - I can’t see much, just where there’s a light and where there’s not but - it’s working. It’s actually working. Sorry. It just hit me kinda hard.”He tries to laugh, but it mostly comes out as a sob. “I told you I’d do anything I could,” he states wetly. “Worth a, a shot.”The bed shakes with Atlas’ effort to scoot back closer to Bhyram. His paw pats against the blankets a few times until he finds the soft fur of Bhyram’s flank. He’s in disbelief, in shock, but clearly grateful. He doesn’t say it aloud. Instead, he mirrors, “It’s… definitely worth a shot, huh.”Bhyram reaches down blindly with one paw and grabs hold of Atlas’ paw while he cries. He doesn't say anything; he can't, his throat clogged up and his breath devoted entirely to staying conscious while he sobs into Will's mane. At least they don't really seem to mind. He doesn't pick up any pity off of them, or anything but sympathy and that same delight and elation from before and a sort of fondness. Atlas's emotions are more distant, dazed. Gratitude, mostly.Bhyram lets himself feel those emotions. He did this. He did this. He's the one making this happen. What a day. He has no idea how long he cries for. But by the end of it, he feels very dehydrated, and his face is sticky, and Will’s mane is soggy, and his abdomen kind of hurts. He's so tired, even though he just woke up. His breathing steadies, and eventually he finds himself just leaning on Will, still holding Atlas’ paw, quiet.That's enough. He raises his head and blinks at the darkness. “...I think,” he says, thickly, “I'm okay for now.”And he is, but Will is an inordinately sweet dragon, and so while Bhyram stumbles his way through the remainder of the evening - cleaning himself up, washing his paws, eating dinner once it's ordered - Will is there with both him and Atlas, helping them both. He's invaluable. Irreplaceable. Patient and gentle, all the way to the point where - well past dark - they settle into bed again, and Bhyram hears a few lines of an audio-book before he falls asleep again.

----- CHAPTER BREAK -----

The world comes into focus slowly. There’s… noise? Someone’s speaking at him? Shaking him, definitely. His eyes peel open, and the world is red, muted. His shoulder is aching, just a little bit.“Will, it’s time to get up,” Atlas says, firm though not unkind.Oh. Oh.  He’s under a blanket. That’s what’s up. Okay. Will forces themself to sit up, rubbing a dishevelled paw over their face and through their equally as dishevelled mane. The blanket falls to pool around their hips and half over their wings. “Morning,” they mumble. God, did they sleep hard last night. Guess fucking themself silly really did wear them out. Incredible how that works. “What’s happening?” they say, speaking before they take stock of the room. Atlas, in bed next to him, blindfold off and facing his direction– err, mostly, he’s a little too high to ‘meet’ his eye. Bhyram, sitting on the ground politely nearby, just at the end of the bed. Clear, Ice white looking over at him, looking, thinking. Maybe it’s just that silly romantic in him that’s watched too many trashy romance movies and sitcoms, but Will likes to think it’s because he’s trying to memorise how he looks. And– ah. right.“Um,” they say, pausing to lick their lips and try to decide if this is insensitive or not, “Are you… ready? Then? It… looks that way.”Bhyram tilts his head ever so slightly to the side, observing Will for a moment longer. Then he looks down, nodding. “Yes,” he says, “I am.”He clears his throat. “Atlas, lean down for me?” he requests. He reaches up and puts both forepaws on Atlas’ face, claws curled around the bottom of his jaw, thumbs at those empty eye sockets. “...this does look bad,” he murmurs, viewing the scarring. “It’s. It’s for the best I usually have the blindfold. Hah. A-anyway.”His claws gently stroke the orbital ridge. “You’re tense,” he notes. “Breathe easy. It will not bite you. It won’t hurt you this time. I promised you that; I wasn’t lying. This will not hurt you , now or ever again. Relax.”The way he does it– God. Will squashes down the instinctive reaction of god I wish that were me as quickly as he can muster. This is absolutely not the right time to be thinking things like that. Even if Bhyram is painfully attractive. It’s a serious moment. Will just smiles at the two of them, sympathy hopefully overriding the rest of that.“Breathe with me,” Bhyram instructs, and waits as Atlas matches his breathing pattern, slow, in, out. His gaze flicks across Atlas’ face. “Like - yes. Like that. Good. Now.”Bhyram closes his eyes, and his brow furrows. He’s quiet for a second. His claws tense, ever so slightly.“Hurry up,” Bhyram whispers, “come on–”What happens is fuzzy and difficult to discern. It’s like watching a piece of paper burn in both flash-forward and reverse– a flicker of blue light and flame leaps across Bhyram’s face, a grotesque spattering of scar tissue twisting itself into his flesh with the hiss of fire meeting flesh and liquid. His jaw is set. The scars on Atlas’ face crawl backwards and wrap into themselves, disappearing. In some way, Will thinks, it’d almost be pretty if it weren’t so… unpleasant.Bhyram’s forepaws flex again, though he does not tighten his grasp to the point where it would break Atlas’ hide or even bruise him. The air takes on the stink of burnt flesh and hair.  “Please,” Bhyram whispers, his voice choked. His jaw is tight. He lowers his own head, hiding it against his chest, dragging in a ragged breath. The broken tone nearly has Will getting up, moving closer, something. This wouldn’t be a good idea, they know.His claws sweep gently over Atlas’ face again, and when they pass over the sockets and back again, his eyes are there, whole, closed. Bhyram holds his face for another few seconds and then lets go, recoiling like he’s been - well. Burned.“Okay,” he manages to force out, “you’re good. You’re good.”And he is. Atlas is calm throughout all of it. Will’s been by his side enough to know how to read him. Whatever Bhyram’s doing is definitely unpleasant, but evidently, only for him. Atlas is unaffected, at least from what Will can tell. Bhyram, however–Bhyram stands and staggers a few steps back with a hoarse, wordless exhalation, paws going to his head. He makes it a couple paces before he stumbles and crashes to the floor, catching one wing underneath himself and twisting it. His claws dig into his head as he curls in on himself. His rear paws kick once at nothing, then he huddles into a ball, mantling his free wing over his head and body.
Oh fuck.
Will moves, gracelessly untangling from the blankets before hopping off the bed to creep closer. He keeps his distance at first. That does not look good. He’d recognise panic for what it is anywhere. From what Bhyram’s told him of the original injury, it’s not surprising. “Bhy…?” Will says, exceedingly gently. If Bhyram were to react in – augh– blind fear, there isn’t much he could do to really… stop him. He’s worried, even still. It won’t stop him from trying, especially as Atlas hasn’t… moved. Maybe that calm isn’t as natural as Will originally thought. He’ll be fine for a moment. Will looks back to Bhyram.Bhyram is shuddering on the floor. He’s trying to breathe in, but he can’t manage to get anything but shallow pants out. “This is - worse than, than I remember,” he manages to gasp out, and then his words devolve into nonsense noises that pitch up into pained keening and stop being words at all.Definitely a panic response. "Oh Bhyram," Will murmurs, and sits down right next to him, careful not to touch. "It's going to be alright, Atlas and I are here. Can I touch you? Um, I'm right to your left." Their voice is gentle, soothing. It hurts to see him like this. He’s so strong, at least from what Will has seen and heard, both from Bhyram himself in passing and from what little Atlas has said. It’s bad, it has to be, if Bhyram is cowering like this.For a few tense moments, Will sits nearby, ready to move if he’s told off. But he isn’t. He isn’t invited further in, either. No, Bhyram is silent. Will isn’t even sure if he heard him, instead locked into whatever time and place the injury came from. He’s just lying there, crumpled, breathing heavily and shallow and pained. Like a prey animal, almost.Internally, Will runs the pros and cons of settling some part of him on Bhyram. Sure. It could hurt or kill him outright, if he’s remembering literally anything about how that healing works. Still, it’s worth a shot. There are worse ways to go out, he decides. He reaches out a paw, only hesitating for a moment before settling it on the wrist of his mantled wing. Will doesn’t bother hiding the instinctive flinch, but– he’s fine. It’s fine. He takes to rubbing gentle circles into the fur there.“Hey,” Will says, knowing the words may not get through, but maybe the tone will. “It’s okay, Bhyram. We’re okay. It’s okay.”The only thing Bhyram does is belatedly flinch, but he doesn’t pull away. He doesn’t otherwise respond.Motion out of the corner of Will’s eye takes his attention. Atlas, blinking rapidly, shaking his head once before clearly making himself get up and move. Will watches as Atlas hops down in a far more smooth motion than he had and comes to settle down on his haunches before Bhyram. He reaches under the mantled wing, resting a paw on Bhyram’s shoulder.“Bhyram, I need you to breathe with me,” Atlas tells him, gentle and firm. The same tone of voice he uses with patients sometimes, Will notes. “We are at the resort, in the Sunbeam Ruins, room 216. Breathe with me.”“We’re here, Bhy,” Will adds, more quietly, still petting him. “Come on back to us.”Little dark stains seep through the fur on his face and head where his claws are digging through his skin and flesh. But he’s trying to listen, fighting it. Will smiles, and moves that paw up Bhyram’s wing a little. Larger motions, petting, gentle. “There you go, come on,” he says encouragingly. Hypnos is also putting himself directly against Bhyram’s chest, totally unafraid, leaning into him. It takes a few minutes, but the more he hears and feels, the more Bhyram’s trembling begins to abate as he tries to match breaths with Atlas."Here," Atlas says, reaching to pull Bhyram’s claws away, "It's okay. You're safe here, Bhyram. Having to re-experience trauma is naturally going to affect you." His claws look stiff from how tightly he's been digging them into his head, but he lets Atlas pry his paws free from his skull, bloodstained and shaking.“...sorry,” he croaks out, finally, as he feels his paws in Atlas’, “I didn’t - think. It would.” He pauses for breath, his voice ragged and husky. “Fuck, that was bad,” he manages. “Is - Atlas? Shit, I didn’t - are you okay?”“I’m perfectly fine,” Atlas says, and to Will it sounds truthful. He hopes it’s truthful. He’s terribly worried about both of them. Atlas continues, “No need to worry about me. The light is bright, but it’s nothing I can’t adjust to. Are you alright? Coming down?” Bhyram’s chest is still heaving. “I - no, I don’t,” he starts, confused. “It doesn’t - give me the. When I’m taking something, it’s not - I don’t get the… elation thing, I can still think. It just - it just hurts. I’m not - fine. But I’ll be fine. You - sure you’re… okay?” When he speaks there’s a tinge of blood on his teeth; he’s bitten the inside of his mouth.Atlas’ face falls ever so slightly, Will just knows it. Some of his worry leaks through, maybe hidden from someone less familiar with Atlas than Will, and now maybe even Bhyram. “I’m fine,” Atlas repeats, “But you aren’t. You’re bleeding, Bhyram.”Bhyram’s voice hitches slightly into a choked laugh, and he tries for a smile. Much too gruesome to be reassuring, in Will’s opinion. “That happens to me a lot,” he says, almost conversationally.“Atlas can be taken care of later, if, um– he needs it. Right now, we’re worried about you, Bhy. You’re not… okay. Don’t worry about us, let us help you,” Will adds, ears falling back.“No, I’m not okay,” Bhyram agrees. “But I’ll - I’ll live. I did last time.” He takes a few seconds to just breathe, and his throat works a few times, trying to clean the blood from his mouth without spitting it on the floor.Atlas gets up again, tells Bhyram to stay, and locates and moves to his medical bag. Gauze, probably? Something better to spit blood into than just… swallowing it. And clean up that head wound. Will tracks the movement when Bhyram’s words click.Horror dawns on him. Live like last time? Oh no, that doesn’t sound good. Yes, he lived, but… the first thing he did was try to comfort Atlas.Will moves again, still without asking. If this ends up getting him hurt, he’ll be surprised. He shuffles around to sneak under Bhyram’s wing and lie against him, much like Hypnos. “Oh no,” he mutters. “Bhy, did… you not have anyone to comfort you? The first time?” “Hah,” Bhyram says. “Haaaahaha. I. Well. Hyann gave me a blanket, I remember that much. Thanatos - Thanatos tried to… heal me? Tried to get me to undo it, I think, I don’t - it’s fuzzy. I can’t - remember who was shouting at me, a few people, I don’t know who. I had to lie and tell them I couldn’t give it back.” “Shouted at you?” Atlas says, sounding just as horrified as Will feels. “They shouted at you for this?” He brings over the gauze, putting a wad of it into one of Bhyram’s paws and holding the other to his head to stop the bleeding of the worst wound first.“That’s awful, Bhyram,” Will says.“People don't like when I heal. You've seen Sigma get upset with me for it. But. In - in their defense,” Bhyram tries, and spits blood into the gauze in his paw. “In Thanatos’ defense I didn’t - tell him how it worked. He didn’t know it would hurt me, he was… guilty, I think. About it. Crying on me and stuff. I upset him.”Will rolls enough to reach up and pat at Bhyram’s neck and jaw. Out of the way of Atlas trying to help. “You still shouldn’t have had to do that, Bhy, couldn’t they tell you were in pain? Or– Or scared, or… something? That’s kind of awful, actually! Even if they were upset with you, there’s a time and place!” they insist, getting mildly heated about it and only just managing to wrangle it in. They do not want to add onto the shouting. They can’t do that to him.“I’m so sorry that happened,” they murmur, more gently.“Wasn’t their fault,” Bhyram replies, leaning his head into Will's touch, “they were all - we were all… doing badly. With the blinding and the teeth and the blood loss and. Whatever else, I don’t remember. If they couldn't tell - not their fault. And I, I handle pain… well. Usually.” Except for right now, with this wound, which is the same wound. “They had themselves to think about,” he finishes.“An explanation isn’t an excuse,” Atlas says. Behind him, his tail lashes once before he gets it back under control.“Well– It’s, um, whatever, because I don’t think they should have yelled at you anyway. And I’m still sorry about that. And, also, just to… reinforce. You didn’t do anything wrong, I don’t think. Not to put the fault on you.” Will finds Bhyram’s free paw and forcibly settles it onto their own head, much like a cat. Will knows they’re soft. They’re there and so is Hypnos and by god they have no plans of leaving Bhyram. Not until he’s doing a little better.“Maybe not,” Bhyram says, his voice quieter now. Rougher, but quieter, calmer. “Not that time. I should’ve told them. It - it’s in the past. They’re all fine now. I think. I don’t know. I - it served a purpose. I served a purpose then.” His claws curl in Will’s fur, winding the strands around each individual digit. As he does it, Will picks up a purr. As good of one as he can get, anyway. He’s not full tundra, he’s never been able to produce a true, proper tundra purr. There’s too much snapper in him for that, but he can get close. Some growling, rumbling little approximation that he hopes gets the point across. “I’m still going to call them-of-the-past dickheads,” he decides.“Hey, come on,” Bhyram says, with a hint of humour. “Some of those people are my good friends. And I can’t - I can’t blame them, a lot of them were worried about. Wives. And things. Too much to be worried about whatever I had happening, and, uh, I had Hypnos anyway. And most - most everyone didn’t even, uh, know I could heal until then. Didn’t know anything I could do. Still don’t.”“Hypnos is a very good dog,” Will agrees.At the same time, Atlas interjects, “Still don’t? You– Did all that for them, and none of them figured anything out?”“...no,” Bhyram sighs. “They weren’t - they didn’t ask. Which - I mean, uh, good, I’m - that’s safe for me. But -”This time, Will interjects, “They– They didn’t ask, and you didn’t volunteer that information either?” They and Atlas exchange a look. He doesn’t seem too thrilled about that either. Nice to talk about it with someone, huh? Wait–Hold on. What’s wrong with Atlas’ eyes–? How did they not notice– No, no, not the time. Bhyram first.Will cries, “Did no one know about it at all? Before us?”  Bhyram shakes his head. “No. No one asked, and I couldn't - I didn't want anyone else to know. Not safe. I have - one very good friend who knows, because she's the one who broke my command word,” he says. “She knows everything. But only her.” Hypnos is methodically licking his wrist, staying clear of the gauze.“And– And us.” Atlas sounds mildly strangled.“And you.”“Oh my god, Bhyram,” Will murmurs.What do they say to that? Either of them? There’s a lot more weight to the conversation Will and Bhyram had on the balcony than they could have ever imagined. Sure, he’d said that it’s nice to talk about it to someone, but they had assumed that he meant, like… from time to time! Not at all! Oh, god, that’s so much more impactful than they really feel equipped enough to handle. Something like that gets told to them, and then they promptly spend the entire next morning doing– No, no, they CANNOT go down that route. Oh god. Oh god. “Thank you,” Will blurts out before they can ever consider going down another path. “For. Oh my god.” They look towards Atlas, their expressions for once an equal mirror. Neither of them are exactly used to this kind of vulnerability.Atlas’ brow draws tight, and he breaks the look to return his gaze to Bhyram. “...For trusting us,” he finishes for Will, quietly, just enough to hear. It’s all just so much.“...it’s terrifying,” Bhyram admits. “I put - a lot of work into hiding, uh, everything. But I - I want to. Trust you, I mean. You… already proved that I can. Over and over. So I always will.” He lapses into silence, speech exhausted for the moment.Will just manages to cut off whatever awful, strangled little noise that tried to pry itself out of their voice box. God. They forcibly resume their purring and simply butt their head into Bhyram’s paws. They may be reeling, just a tiny bit. The gravity of that statement is not lost on them. They’re just not entirely used to statements like that. It’s nice, they decide.This time, Will speaks for the both of them. “Well, we’re happy to have that trust. It won’t– We won’t. Um. I hope we’ll be able to keep it,” they settle on, and Atlas hums in agreement.With Bhyram’s wounds treated, Atlas can get up once more, put away the soiled gauze and put away anything else and come back to sit down next to Bhyram this time. He throws a wing over the tundras on the floor, big enough to sort of fit both of them under it. Enough that it counts. Will hopes that Bhyram can feel it.He seems to be able to; he lets out a slow breath at the contact, relaxing further. After a second, he picks his head up off the floor. “I - forgot. To ask. It - it did work, right? You - you've got your eyes back as they should be?”Will swallows. Oh fuck. Right. Will lifts his head up too, twisting slightly to peer up at Atlas. Atlas doesn’t meet his eye, too busy looking around the room, still blinking regularly. Bright, he’s squinting. But that’s not all. He'd noticed it already, but hadn't gotten a good look until now.The scleras are wrong. Atlas has always had green irises and much paler green scleras– common of many Wind dragons. Typical, not too stand-out, even if Will has always thought them to be absolutely gorgeous. Now, though… the scleras are black. Deep and dark and a little shiny with moisture. The green of his irises seems more vibrant, almost, but that could just be a trick of the light. Uh oh. "Yes," Atlas replies. "It did work. Everything is... a little brighter than I'm used to. Maybe that'll subside. But things are clear . Colours all look the same, I can see the clock and read it just fine.” He sighs in relief. “Yes, I ... think I'll be able to work just fine." It must be dawning on him now that the panic has passed because his voice breaks. "Thank you." Bhyram’s body goes limp. “Then that's all been worth it,” he sighs, and huffs out a laugh that shifts into a hiss of pain. He leans his head back against the floor. “It really was worth the shot. And the - the risk. For me. Of being… known.”Will swallows. God, they hate having to ruin a… tender moment.“Y-yeah,” they stammer. “There’s um… You look great! There’s no scarring or anything! No burns, um. You did some really incredible work Bhy. Really, I mean that but. Um.” They pause, try to take a breath. “Atlas, um, your eyes look… different. Maybe you should go. Go see.” “What do you mean, ‘different?’” Atlas says, instantly and possibly justifiably suspicious. “Fuck. Okay.” Will winces, but Atlas carefully disentangles his wing so he can bolt to the bathroom for the mirror.Bhyram frowns too, picking his head up, though of course the muscles of his face don't properly respond, many of them ruined. “...oh, oh no,” he mutters. “They're - are they partly white, now? That's - that's what happened to Thanatos.”“Not… quite–”
“Why the fuck are my eyes black!”
Will makes an unhappy while, then hastily clarifies, “They're… not all black. Just the scleras. The rest is green. Still.”Bhyram winces, then clearly regrets doing so, jaw going very tight for a moment. His claws tug at Will’s mane just a little, though he's clearly making sure not to actually pull on the strands. “I, don't. Uh. I can't… control that. But I did - I did say sometimes when I do this parts of, uh, me can get - can get tangled up in, uh, whoever I heal. I - I'm so sorry. I don't think I can fix that.”Atlas is quiet for a while, inspecting himself, though Will cannot see it. They lie there, content to be a stress ball. Eventually, there's a hefty sigh from the bathroom, and Atlas returns. “It'll be fine. I can work with different. The vision is clear, it'll be more than enough to continue doing what I do. If I got it back at the cost of them looking strange, then so be it. It's an easy tradeoff,” he says.“...still, though,” Bhyram tries. He clears his throat a few times and turns his head to spit a little more blood into the gauze. “You'll let - uh, if you suddenly find you can do ice magic, uh, let me know? It - it happened to Thanatos. Last time.”“I already know Wind and had to learn some Arcane. What's one more?” Atlas snorts. “I'll let you know.”“Great, good,” Bhyram says. He draws in another pained breath. “Okay, I have - I have to ask, uh, do you - do you have anything that might make this. Hurt? Less?” He takes his paw off Will to gesture at his face. “Iiiii, it's really bad, and I can't - I need to focus. Today. If we're going to the Cathedral.”…And it must be really bad if he's asking for it. He didn't even complain when Atlas had turned his arms into ribbons the other day. God. Will presses his head further into Bhyram's paw and body, the ultimate lap dog.Meanwhile, Atlas hums his affirmative and goes to collect something from his bag. Pills rattle in a bottle, one which Will cannot see. The room's fridge opens to collect water, then Atlas returns with them. “Here,” Atlas says, and Will shuffles down out of the way for Bhyram to move.Bhyram hauls himself upright. “Thanks,” he mutters, clearly grateful, and takes the pills without hesitation. Atlas could've handed him anything and he would've taken it. No questions asked. Will can't blame him for it, considering they'd do the same thing.“Do you think you'll be alright to move?’’ Atlas asks. He himself is already doing so, grabbing his bags and digging through and pulling his outfit for the day out.“Yeah. Just - need a few minutes. Maybe something to eat.” Bhyram laughs, breathless, still recovering. “I’ll be fine. I can - I can get up, now, sorry, I’ll get off the damn floor.”Will nods, and pulls themself up as well. Leave as much room as he might need. As they move, something catches their eye: Bhyram's blindfold. Oh, that might be good to have. They hop up to snatch it from the dresser and get close enough again to present it. “I have your blindfold, if um, you'd care to wear it?’’ they tell him.Bhyram gets himself up and moving, stretching his wrists and hips and wings. “Oh, yeah,” he says, “I’ll - I’ll need that. Thanks.” He offers them a ghost of a smile and holds out one forepaw for the fabric, though his claws are still, very faintly, trembling. He takes the blindfold when Will hands it over and sits back on his haunches, looping it expertly around his face and going to tie it behind his horns.He struggles with it, though, hissing involuntarily as the fabric presses against his returned scars. His claws fumble the fabric and he nearly drops it. He sighs and drops his paws. “Could you,” he starts, wearily. “Just - yeah, thanks.”Will goes to do so at the same time that Atlas sweeps over. Will could do it just fine, but… this seems important, somehow. They sit back, watching as Atlas takes the cloth from Bhyram's trembling claws. Just as Bhyram had for Atlas, he now does for Bhyram, tying what Will thinks is an acceptable blindfold for him. A surgical knot, Will recognises. Habit.“Try that,” Atlas says once he's done.Bhyram tips his head back and forth, then shakes it. The blindfold is secure. “Works perfectly,” he says, flicking his ears to test their range of movement. Everything seems good. He takes a breath and lets it out. “Okay. Okay. Well. Good morning. ”He laughs, almost in disbelief. “The day hasn’t even… started yet, really. Let’s - let’s go?”He doesn’t wait for an answer, already stepping over to where his armour is resting. He touches it with one paw, then sits down and starts to don the set piece by piece, familiar routine motions.“Good morning!” Will chirps helplessly, and goes to pull on something more appropriate for breakfast. They may not be able to accompany them, but they can at least all eat together.Atlas gets ready quickly, impatient, antsy. Will surmises he's anxious to just get the day going already, after yesterday's… debacle. When he's ready, he opens the door and holds it with his tail, waiting in the doorway. A little rude, maybe, in Will's opinion, but that's Atlas. They smile despite it, but stay near Bhyram just in case once they're all ready, choosing to watch as he pulls on all that metal. Will wonders what it's like to walk around in that all the time.“Let's go,” Atlas calls, just as Bhyram pulls on the last piece. He hasn't even grabbed his sword yet! Will scoffs as Atlas steps out entirely, the door clicking behind him.Bhyram holds up a paw in Atlas’ direction, wordlessly telling him to wait a second, while he sniffs the air and then grabs his sword without feeling around for it. He loops the belt around himself and pulls it tight, settling it against his side. “Alright,” he calls, “alright.”He hesitates before leaving the room. Atlas is in the hall already. But Bhyram turns. He reaches out with one forepaw, laying it on Will’s shoulder.“Remember what I told you?” he says, very quietly. “I’ll do everything I can to keep him from getting hurt, or heal him if I can't stop it. I'll try to keep him safe. I promise. I won't let anyone or the world take him from you.”Will sighs. Relief or anxiety or maybe even frustration about Atlas, he's not sure. But Bhyram is here still. Something to focus on. They're supposed to go to a Cathedral today. Something about a fight. Something about ending all the nonsense they're in this town in the first place for. It could be dangerous, Will knows.Bhyram will keep him safe. He knows this. He trusts this. Nothing will go wrong. It can't.“Thank you,” he says.Bhyram offers Will a weak smile, then turns and hurries after Atlas.