Welcome to Gaia! ::

In retrospect, he should have known that answering her question would definitely cause her to ask him for more information instead of continuing to play into gossip. At least she was smiling now, which he supposed was an improvement either way, even if the gossip rag he was trying to distribute wasn't supposed to be featuring him as a main character. Maybe Faustite. Could Albite be the main character? Did he have any gossip about him other than surprisingly, a b*****d?

... Ironically, he did have some smooching gossip about Albite, but it would inevitably bring the topic back to their fight because he knew that Cryolite and Albite were involved to some degree, even if it wasn't the same as what he and Cryolite held. Maybe it was best to just give up and answer the question.

"Aye," he admitted, with a dreamy sigh. "Bit taller than me, blond hair, blue eyes. A lot of people call him an icy b***h, and I guess that is true, but I think he has an icy crust. Underneath that crust," couldn't say lawyer vibe, "there's an intelligent man with wit for days and a soft interior he doesn't really let anyone near, not unless he trusts you. He grounds me, in a way. Not as free as I tend to be, but in a way that feels secure."

It didn't feel like Cryolite was stifling him. It felt like they were coming to a mutual agreement.

"Pretty certain you don't know him," he admitted, glancing to the side and wondering if saying his name would be a violation of trying to keep him safe in Albite's eyes. "Think he awoke after you left, so he'd have no reason to seek you out and visa versa."

He cleared his throat.

"Plus I probably shouldn't babble everything about him. His story to tell. Plus," he cleared his throat again, "Albite."

Fulgurite was drawn to both Cryolite and Nectaris for different reasons as much as they were adjacent. Nectaris was optimistic, a ray of sunshine, caring, protective, generally adorable and wanting the best. Cryolite was more grounded, realistic, but also deeply caring, protective, and wanting the best for those who earned that loyalty. They were both smart and insightful in their own separate ways.

They both made Fulgurite sigh with heady affection.

He flushed, anyway, when directly called out as all romantic. Especially when talking about him, considering the moment... "Ah, thanks," he rubbed his neck, offering a sheepish but warm smile her way. It lit up the edges of his lips, the shine of his eyes. "Turns out I'm more romantic than I seem ya know?"

Maybe anyone who read his copious fanfiction would know that, but Fulgurite kept that close to his heart, hidden to the public in plain sight under a writing username he never linked back to anything about him. It'd be hard to guess, and he preferred it that way. Kept it disconnected from him.

It made sense she wanted to meet him. To be honest, if they were the same side, and not for Albite's threat, he'd be setting up a time for them to meet already. If he was going to be dating both of them, it was fair for them to know each other. They were metamours if he was with both of them. Usually in a fully knowledgeable relationship like this the metamours knew each other, right?

The whole Negaverse versus Order... White Moon... Whatever s**t made it complicated.

"Honestly, I just want to show him off to everyone. But," he swallowed, "don't know what qualifies as endangering him, especially because you are technically a traitor. Obviously I don't care," and he'd continue not to, "but I don't want him to get hurt and I don't want Albite to think I'm hurting him. I'm sorry."

He let out a dejected sigh, adding afterward, "Romance is unexpectedly complicated sometimes."

Almost as complicated as figuring out how to keep himself away from Albite on this team and also how to run this op without making general-sovereigns mad--

Fulgurite couldn't help his relief. It was obvious in the way his shoulders settled, in the way he let out a slow breath. He had no problem answering questions ordinarily about himself. In all honesty, hiding this from her sounded and complete and felt incorrect. But they were on opposite sides, and it made everything more complicated.

Everything about this was complicated, from his own feelings on the matter to Albite to the fact that if anyone of the Negaverse came upon them right now, they would both be great candidates for death.

Nothing was easy. "Thank you. Maybe someday in the future, we can all talk without an ax hanging over our heads."

And wouldn't that be a dream.

... Heh. He supposed he could, couldn't he? Nothing was easy about this, but perhaps the kisses and the smiles felt like they were. And wait, did she say she made him something? She didn't have to do that! He couldn't quite stop the blush, and it only got more sincere as she showed him what it was. A wire-wrapped bracelet that echoed of who he was, from the designs to the stone.

"Nikki," murmured Fulgurite, reaching out to take the bracelet. He was quiet for a few moments, turning the bracelet this way in that, observing the stone, trying to figure out what fine work she had put into it and what stone it actually was. He was actually trying to wrap his head around the fact that she had done this at the same time, so unnecessarily generous and beautiful and kind.

"Thank you," he murmured, reaching out to gather her closer again.

"You didn't have to do this, but I'm really happy you did. This is really sweet."

Would he wear it as a civilian as a way to keep her close against the divide, or should he wear it as a senshi to brag that nothing he was being told was going to change what he was going to do? He'd have to think about it. For now, he was happy to just hold it.

She wanted to, and it made sense -- doing things for people who were loved just made sense. And she loved him, right? It was that power of love that she was trying to use to win him over, and he had to admit, he was definitely feeling it right then. She made him something, something pretty, because she was trying to flirt with him, because she wanted to save him with the power of love. It was adorable and he loved that about her.

"Little gifts are a good way to flirt," noted Fulgurite, glancing over and down at her next to him. "Also just generally a good way to show affection or care for someone, so it's a nice double win." And it was one that made it just a little easier to ignore the most pressing issues for a few moments. He couldn't feel any eternal or general auras. It was just them and the jewelry she had made for him, sitting on a bench in the middle of the hibernating botanical gardens.

As he thought about it, Fulgurite decided he would be cautious about keeping it on his wrist. He didn't want it to disappear when he powered down nor did he want to prompt any attention as to what it was from people who would put either of them in danger. That didn't mean he couldn't slide it on for now, though, and he quickly moved to slip the wire bracelet over his right wrist.

He sighed happily at how it looked.

While he was keeping a lot of the details about his own life these days close to his chest, she wasn't, and he glanced over to her in mild surprise when she revealed she was an accessory maker. "A jeweler, I think," came a warm tease as he looked over the bracelet. What other accessories did she make? Did she make little hair ties and bandanas, or did she specialize in wire bracelets like these? He wondered one moment if he could figure out who she was, he realized in another that even if he could, somehow, he shouldn't. Even if he didn't pursue it any further, there was no telling who had access to his records...

He hoped not. That meant his own creative pursuits would be up for notice.

"I have some creative pursuits too, for my job," how did he word this without giving too much away? Why did he have to think about it? It oft felt like he was walking on eggshells unnecessarily-- "Spend a lot of time thinking about what looks beautiful together. It's soothing." Well. Close enough, if she didn't just figure that out herself.

How many florists did Destiny City have, anyway? Certainly enough--

"I hope these things relax you too."

She was wiggling.

Nectaris was the same as the Sylvite he remembered, but something seemed lighter and happier about her. It was adorable. He couldn't help a quiet, "aww," that was an affectionate murmur before he actually got to the point. "You did! See, not too hard."

It helped that she was adorable, honestly, to the point it was hardly fair. How could he possibly be anything but charmed by it? And why would he want to be anything but?

She was working some wonders on him, but then she rounded back to the saving him, and he found himself biting on the inside of his lip. s**t. He needed to find another distraction. Did he have another piece of gossip he could share? There was that op, he was pretty sure, but was talking about that wise? He could almost feel her response now; he didn't have to do it, he didn't have to go through with it, he could just leave.

But he couldn't.

"I can't, Nikki," that little nickname remained as he glanced out at the hibernating and dead flowers around him. "I can't do that to my family. I know leaving requires me to abandon them-- and the Negaverse knows who my family is, too. Leaving might put them at risk."

He shook his free hand out, looking back to the bracelet on his wrist.

"I don't want to hurt them."

Well, s**t.

To be honest, he knew this was bad news before she even said anything, considering the wiggling stopped and she wormed herself away from him. He kept his hands in his lap and reflected on the fact that he suddenly felt strangely cold beside her -- and not in any comforting way, the way he joked with Cryolite. This was a serious discussion, and something she was passionate about, and she was approaching the same realms as Raksha and Selinur, and an amplification of what she always did. They talked, they bonded, she asked him to leave.

Three starseeds. To be honest, it had been a while since he had beaten anyone for the soul in his chest, but he couldn't deny that his total was assuredly higher. At the very least, Benitoite when Fulgurite was "recruited" and shoved under his command taught Fulgurite how to do that, and he listened. He took those starseeds as he was told, especially from their senshi and knight opponents.

It was an uncomfortable reality to sit in as Sylvite had pulled him away from his anger and violent tendencies, but it was still his reality. It was often better not to think about it, and she was confronting him with it, and as much as she was trying to look into his eyes by the end of it he couldn't quite look at her.

"Never had a choice in joining," Fulgurite murmured, running a hand through his hair. "The guy who recruited me was close to my sister. Pulled me in as a taunt. You were as good as you could have been, for what it's worth, considering," he gestured loosely at the sky. "You even stopped me from taking out my anger on others. Taking starseeds and energy is uncomfortable now." But it was still expected. He was still expected to murder a whole cadre of basic senshi and pages after he finished this mission.

It was such a blatantly bad proposal that he had no interest in doing it, but what choice did he have? She spoke of her mother and he bristled, shaking his head at the concept and turning his attention away. It wasn't the same -- he couldn't -- they needed him -- he needed them -- and in the end what did the surrounding matter anyway if they all had each other? He could perhaps prevent them from dying over here, protect them from the backlash over here, not force his family into new identities or homes over here--

He could protect Cryolite over here with a view of the missions he was getting into. He could protect Nectaris by keeping her away from them.

"I already don't know what my numbers look like," replied Fulgurite, grimly. "Lost view of that between the coaching and the missions. But I also know," he finally looked toward her, "that I'm just one person. My exit or arrival isn't going to change anything. Heliodor will still collect bags of starseeds. Albite will still take starseeds. Even if I don't, that doesn't end."

So why bother?

"At least this way, I can stop my father from grieving yet another loved one."

Or worse, dying.

He couldn't leave even if he wanted to. The risk was too heavy. For a creature of water, he was full of roots. Roots to the ground. Roots to his family. Roots of his resistance to being pushed and pulled.

It was going to keep ticking up if he stayed. Honestly, it was almost unavoidable with the team he ended up on, but he wasn't sure if there was a better one, a more lenient one, a less connected one. Albite's recent behaviour made looking at detaching himself from a team appealing, but he didn't want to have to pick up a team of his own because of it.

But did it matter? Was it all worth it just to keep others from mourning him, to keep himself from losing them and his own being, to keep others that he knew and cared about safe?

He never wanted this.

The thought wrung in his mind as Nectaris kept talking and started to get choked up. She mentioned the princess. The princess she has saved, he assumed, which would make that Princess Ganymede. Her being a mother felt like prime information he might have advised him to include. Children were a weak spot to the point where he wondered why anyone would want them in this war.

But Nectaris was reinforcing that by leaving, she allowed that relationship to stay. It didn't too get destroyed by the war -- and she was crying.

A distraction.

Instead of responding, Fulgurite took the signal of her clinging to his arm to wrap her up on a hug, pulling her close and murmuring, "It's okay. It's okay."

Because was it?

No, but he hoped the soothing words helped.

Was it, though?

She sounded unspeakably sad, and he felt the results of that on his skin. She was crushed against him as much as she could be and she was crying. Was that his future if he ever left? Having to think about his family and crying every time they came to mind?

How would Dad be doing? How would Orah? Would he stalk them on social media in hopes of being able to confirm they were okay or at least alive? Would he just spend days in his room, sobbing about what he had lost, sobbing about one of the only things he still cared about at all?

It was a thought that was hard to confront. It felt easier, in a way, to let Order keep pushing him and for him to keep rejecting. Perhaps one day, he and Cryolite could retire from their conscription and find a cabin on the lake to hide in together. Grow old, maybe adopt a few cats...

... Though he'd have to arrange how he was going to invite other connections to that secret place. Could he even still invite Nectaris if he retired?

Fulgurite made no move to push her away, holding her close and rubbing her back soothingly. It felt nice to have her this close again, to the point where he could almost ignore their conversation and focus on just her and her alone.

... Almost.

"For you, it's worth it," he murmured in turn.