#started playing during defiance sooooooooo

[warriorofthesky]

envy - crow ficlet

the one thing crow wasn't expecting is envy.

he barely notices it at first; shame and guilt wash against the shores of his mind, wave after wave, tasting like gunpowder, metal and salt and overwhelming everything else. memories bubble to the surface, echoes of words said in his own voice, eyes - blue, resigned, then orange, almost golden, and furious - and the tiny speck of envy winks out, buried beneath all the grief.

but it is there, skirting at the edges of his consciousness, biding its time until he has gorged himself on guilt. its very existence catches him off-guard, jolts him from his stupor and is swiftly put aside, over and over again - because how dare he? - but here, in front of cayde-6's memorial, he can't deny it anymore.

he is envious of a dead man.

he is envious of a dead man he murdered.

(not me, comes the feeble retort, easily dismissed.)

crow tries to conjure an image of the hunter vanguard in his mind. uldren's memories surface, unbidden, but he ignores them; the cayde-6 he seeks is not to be found through uldren's eyes, but in the reticence that colors ikora's expression when she thinks he is not paying attention, the barely-there extra second zavala takes to look in his direction, the brief (painful, horrifying, frightening) hesitation he sometimes catches in the guardian's orange eyes... and in the absence echoing through the tower even now, years and years later. this cayde-6 is easy to imagine, but the process is no less harrowing.

how did it feel, he wonders, to be so loved in life that death wasn't enough for it to be the end? to have it linger with such intensity that, even changed into hatred and grief, it just won't fade away? the many deaths on the tangled shore, the whispered insults, the invisible wall he simply can't break - context doesn't absolve them, but he can see - and feel - the wound now, in all its angry, jagged glory.

he almost misses the mask.

(uldren sov was loved too. the very thought sends his heart into a frenzy; is this panic, disgust... or something different? half-forgotten faces flash in his mind, laughing, touching him, bringing him close... but it's not him.

he pushes them aside. he will not envy a monster.)

he has no right to feel this way. the shame it brings is of a different shade, one all his own, and all the more bitter for it. and yet... he can't quite ignore the curiosity, the want that burrows deep below his skin. he can't look away.

the sun sets, the chatter of the tower quietens, the city below comes alive with light. still, he wonders, yearning a gnawing pit at the bottom of his stomach that won't fade, a wound of his own he can't help but prod at, uncaring for its scarring.

glint compiles beside him when the stars come out, shell twitching and worry running down their link in a faint hum. crow moves easily, automatically, a reflex borne out of habit and companionship, and soon the small ghost rests on his palm, close to his chest. his presence is warmth against the cold spreading inside his rib cage, melting away its sharpness. crow takes in a deep, long breath - it doesn't hurt as much, now.

glint watches him, but doesn't say anything, and after a moment of contemplation neither does crow. he knows what the ghost means.

he tears his eyes away from cayde-6's memorial for the first time in hours.

maybe he doesn't need to wonder.