drakenet | text to various

[SOME TIME LATER... There's a knock on Lydia's door

Presuming she opens it, she'd find Stiles looking very deflated. He's got a lot to think about, a lot to worry about. But he told Lydia that he would fill her in, and there's a certain level of comfort in the familiarity of coming to her to talk out a problem.]

[ When she opens the door, she starts out brusque and prepared to be huffy. The moment she spots him, though, her demeanor shifts into something softer, searching. ]

... Stiles?

[ She doesn't find more prying questions because she's too startled by his disposition. ]

Hey. [He tries to lift his mouth into a smile of greeting but can't muster it. Instead, he just wipes a hand roughly over his mouth.]

Can I-? [he gestures to see if she's okay with him coming in.]

Yeah.

[ She blinks suddenly, jarred from her surprise, and steps aside to pull the door open. Her room has been personalized as effectively as possible, the walls painted a vibrant magenta color, and the whole room decorated with the swirls and color accents one might expect of Lydia. There's a chair by her vanity.

It's Lydia, though, so she won't needle him to talk about it. She'll just fire off a quick text brb stiles here ?? text to Allison since they'd been talking, and wait for Stiles to get around to it in his own way. ]

[he takes the chair by her vanity, sinking into it like he's exhausted. And he feels like he is. It hasn't been that long since he stopped texting Lydia. Maybe an hour? But it's all changed since then, hasn't it?]

So- [He's doubled over in the chair, elbows on his knees, hands roughly combing through his hair as he tries to figure out a way to start.] Apparently one of the knights didn't make it back. She's still on the island. I don't really- I don't know what happened. Vi didn't want to get into the details.

[ Lydia lets the door swing shut, turning toward him and pacing slightly across the room, lacing her fingers together and allowing her brow to knit together. After a moment of shuffling, she settles on the bed. There's no good way to ask. ]

Still on the island, but not ... ?

[ Dead? ]

I don't think so. I would hope Vi would have told me that much. Wynn's going to send people back. A lot of people.

[He sits up a little straighter, finally looking at her.]

We're going to war.

[/dramatic cut to title sequence]

Against Andres.

[ Wow. She's glad she sat down. Silence spreads between them, heavy in the room.

She finds it hard to swallow the news of war, particularly because she gets the feeling that Stiles isn't excluding them from 'we.' This isn't the knights, but not the teenagers. They signed up for this. This fight belongs to them as much to anyone else in this castle, squires or not.

And yet. She can't quite process, or even imagine it. ]

How are we supposed to help fight a war?

I don't really know. But we have to help, don't we? We can't just-

[We now interrupt your regularly scheduled ramp up to a panic attack to give you a message from our fearless leader. Stiles has his own phone and can watch Wynn's message where he is, but he stands and moves to sit beside Lydia on her bed so that he can watch with her.]

Tomorrow. [He repeats at the end. Vi had told him that he had until tomorrow to think it over but it didn't really sink in until now.]

[ Lydia pulls her phone out when the speech starts, holding it between them so Stiles can watch beside her. Even after the video ends, she continues to stare numbly at the device.

It's Stiles' repetition that pulls her out of her distraction, eyes darting up to search his face. Clear uncertainty lingers in her face—both that Stiles is willing to throw himself into that, and that either of them should at all. Any Knight to set foot on that island is open to execution, and they're not exactly well-trained. But Allison will go.

Her gaze drops, a pang of guilt that she had even considered backing out, even for lack of ability. ]

We have to go.

[ A moment later, something strikes her. She looks back up at Stiles. ]

Scott would go.

[Stiles doesn't remember Scott, doesn't remember a best friend that Lydia has assured him he's had for as long as he should be able to remember. He doesn't know anything but stories and bits and pieces. But he knows himself and he knows the sort of person that he would trust as much as he apparently trusted Scott.]

Hey, we grounded Heathrow, didn't we? [it's a weak attempt at a joke, but it falls flat. They could end up dead. But that's not going to stop him from going.]

This is a little bigger than an airport.

[ But she's not saying she won't go. Her thumb clicks down on the hold button of her phone and she pulls her lips between her teeth, at a loss. ]

We might not come back.

That's... yeah. [What more do you say to that? It's true. They could die out there. They were just kids, really. Sure, they had experience with weird shit, but...]

Lydia, I-- [The words choke in his throat. Like always.]

Oh, shut up.

[ She drops her phone to the bed and rolls her eyes like this is all just impeding on her personal time instead of ... a serious fucking issue. That's definitely easier. ]

Like I'd really just sit around here while everyone flung themselves at the readily-waiting guillotine.

[ Because she assumes that's what he was going to say. OR DOES SHE. This may be a deliberate attempt to dodge the fact that they both know he's in love with her. We just don't know. ]

That's not- I didn't think you would. There's a reason I came here first and not just because I told you I would give you more information when I got it. [He lets out a huff of a sigh, not sure if he should just drop it? But doesn't he always? And there may not be another chance. That's not even an exaggeration.]

Can you just- [Forming whole thoughts is for chumps. And he's about to lose his nerve. So before he does, he shuts up and just leans in to kiss her. It's abrupt and chaste because he's not sure how she's going to react.]

[ When his lips fumble over hers, Lydia's eyes are wide open and she's ready to express some confusion that gets quickly cut off. It's not soft, or suave. He bumbles his way into the kiss, and it's almost like a concentrated headbutt courtesy of the way he has to talk himself into it, and surges forward.

For a moment, her eyes search his face, then briefly flutter shut. Her head tilts, just slightly, allowing it, but she pulls back after just a second, eyes flashing wide again. It's not just the slight lean, but she almost shakes her head, just a few millimeters, as if she's shaking him off.

Keeping her face close to his, Lydia worries her brow with a certain lack of understanding—or perhaps, more likely, an uncertainty in how to react. ]

I didn't say you could do that.

[ Her tone carries no aggression; it's careful, a mere observation. ]

[He's probably bad at this. No, he's definitely bad at this, but she doesn't jerk away or slap him, so he's got that going for him. It doesn't last very long, but that's fine. As his eyes open, he's searching her expression for signs of anger.]

I know. I'm sorry. I shouldn't have- I just... I didn't want to die without doing that. At least once. [They had done that. Or she had done it to stop him from having a panic attack but he knew that she didn't remember that and explaining it might make him sound even more strange right now.]

[ With her 19 wis, she manages to figure out that he means her specifically. Drawing her lips between her teeth, she drops her gaze and watches the carpet out of the corner of her eyes, mulling it over. ]

Then, maybe you could try not dying.

[ Once she finds the words, she draws her gaze back up to meet his, more of her usual steadiness catching up. That sharp, critical edge isn't quite all the way back in her voice, but the sass has returned. She might not give him much of an indicator as to the kiss itself, but it's hard to deny that she cares when she's clearly affected by the idea of him getting killed, ok.

That's easier to process, at this point. More straightforward. ]

[She's not giving him much to work with, but that's nothing new. She hardly knew he existed not too long ago.]

I will... definitely try not dying. So long as you do the same.

[ Good. They can agree on that.

Lydia glances away from him, staring out at her room, towards the door, with a certain emptiness. Her shoulders slouch as she deflates. Tomorrow, they'll really be gathering as soldiers to fight in a war that some of them barely understand for people they've never met, with no fighting abilities to speak of.

Absently, she reaches out to fold her hand over Stiles', too lost in her own thoughts for anything else, but needing to just sit and feel that he's there with her. ]

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