#she brought it up when I said ''hey fuck roleplay'' and then we haven't spoken about it since obviously

[ace-malarky]

Breathe

In which Olizaar has a perfectly understandable reaction to his future being yanked violently out of the direction he thought it was going

(pertaining to things I Have Not Yet Written in the main story of this because it's really hard to have focus when your co-writer thinks the thing is dead lmao)

~~

 Olizaar sits in the corner of the closet and has to remind himself to breathe. Maybe he’d breathe anyway, but it gives him something to focus on.

 Anything other than the fuss happening above his head.

 Distantly, he hears a dragon roar. Promithio, probably. He’d always been more vocal about – everything.

 Olizaar had thought he’d resigned himself to this reality, if not accepted it.

 The door of the closet creaks open. Olizaar tenses but it’s only Kiri poking his head in.

 The kid spots Olizaar – he hasn’t made much of an attempt to hide himself – and slips in, closing the door behind him. Mihin isn’t with him, and Olizaar is grateful for the drake’s absence. He doesn’t think he could take looking at a dragon right now.

 Kiri clears himself a space to sit at an angle to Olizaar, feet close to touching.

 Olizaar watches him, flinches at another roar, waits. Focuses on his breathing. Feels like he should be moving. He’s always moving. Olizaar never stops, normally. But here he is.

 “He wasn’t pleased when they found me, either.” Kiri offers him a lip bitten smile. “I think I made the concept too real.

 Olizaar frowns. “I didn’t intentionally do this. It was Nyssa’s cliff raptor that brought the egg out of its – whatever that was.”

 Kiri shrugs. “And I didn’t intentionally bond with Mihin, but there you go.”

 Olizaar shoots him a narrow look. “You’re different on your own.”

 Kiri hesitates, then smiles. “Fewer people make it easier.”

 “I meant without Mihin.”

 “Ah.” Kiri looks down. “Well, that…”

 “I don’t think Ishal – well, I can’t imagine her any different. I’ve only known her after she had Mals.”

 “And now–”

 “Don’t say it.” Olizaar cuts him off, holding up a hand. “Please.” His breath catches in his throat and Olizaar coughs like that would clear it.

 “Sorry.” Kiri draws his knees up to his chest. “Maybe I’m not… I just thought…”

 Olizaar flicks a glance at him and suppresses the flicker of irritation. He’s tired of – it isn’t fair.

 Kiri shakes his head before Olizaar can say anything else, which is perhaps just as well.

 One of the dragons roars. Not Promithio, Olizaar thinks. One of the others. They don’t roar nearly as often so it’s hard to say who it is.

 “It doesn’t have to change you,” Kiri says. “But I think we change anyway. Having a dragon doesn’t make it out of nowhere, not… not really.”

 “They just make it a different sort of change, right?” Olizaar laughs, the sound bitter. “And you can’t say no.”

 “Maybe you could.”

 “That would please Promithio.”

 Kiri snorts. “He’d be affronted you didn’t want it.”

 Olizaar tilts his head back against the wall. “Contrary son of a fuck,” he says, almost fond.

 Kiri laughs.

 Olizaar smiles in his direction. “Thanks.”

 Kiri shrugs. “Anyone would’ve.”

 Olizaar snorts. “You think the best of people too easily.”

 “Isn’t it better too?”

 “Don’t you get… disillusioned by people proving you wrong?”

 Kiri tilts his head as he thinks. “People haven’t, on the whole.”

 “Maybe you’re just a good judge of character then. You can tell who’s good for you.”

 Kiri laughs. “Maybe.” He reaches out a foot to tap Olizaar’s. “That includes you, you know.”

 Olizaar wrinkles his nose. “Sure.”

 “No, listen, you can’t say my judgement is good in one breath and then doubt it in the next.”

 “I said good, not infallible.” But Olizaar is laughing, and it finally feels as though the tension releases itself.

 It’s at that moment, of course, that Ishal pokes her head around the door.

 “There you are. Kiri was supposed to bring you back.”

 “You didn’t specify after how long,” Kiri replies.

 Ishal scoffs, clearly amused. “You two have spent too much time around each other.”

 Olizaar forces a grin. “Bad influence, right?”

 “No,” Ishal says. “It’s a good thing, Oli. You always will be.”

 Olizaar avoids looking at anyone by using the moment to get to his feet.

 Kiri scrambles to his feet. “Have they…?”

 “Reached a decision?” Ishal asks. “Not exactly.”

 “What does that mean?” Olizaar asks.

 “That when the egg hatches, it will be the hatchling’s choice to be wild or bonded.”

 “That’s… insane. So I just have to not be there when it hatches.”

 “Have your eyes on a penta like mine?” Ishal reaches out as if to ruffle his hair, but Olizaar is just out of range.

 Olizaar laughs at her. “Every boy’s dream, right?”

 Kiri taps at Olizaar’s elbow. “And – listen, Promithio is – well, he’s not all bluster, but – I can stand with you, if you want.”

 Olizaar does ruffle his hair, and Kiri submits to it with a sigh and a grin. “You really are the best of us.”

 “Well–”

 “No, he’s right,” Ishal says. “Now come on. They’re waiting.”

 Olizaar steps close enough and grabs Ishal into a hug before she can instigate it. “Thanks,” he says, face pressed into her shoulder. He has to bend slightly, but it’s worth it.

 “It’s Kiri did everything,” Ishal says into his arm. “Hey, Kiri, c’mere.”

 He stutters out some kind of half-hearted excuse that doesn’t stop him stumbling in easily when Olizaar tugs him.

 “Thanks,” Olizaar says into his hair.

 “I didn’t do much,” Kiri mumbles.

 Olizaar snorts and claps him on the back as they disengage. “Sometime you’re going to have to accept a compliment, you know?”

 Ishal laughs and steps back out of the closet. “Come on.”

 “Yeah,” Olizaar says. “Yeah, we can do this.”

 Kiri bumps shoulders with him and smiles. “Just remember to breathe, right?”

 Olizaar nods, squares his shoulders. “Right.” He leads the way back up the tunnels to where the dragons wait.