diversified | Blessed by light and burden of shadows. [ closed ]

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Blessed by light and burden of shadows. [ closed ]

WHO Shannon Vaughn (

privatematter), Eli Delacroix (

aspectional).
WHAT Eli is an idiot; Shannon is curious. How exactly does D/s go down when you're not to the Having Sex stage in the relationship yet?
WHEN Late 1990. Seven months after Jumpscapades.
WHERE Shannon's place.

Shannon was anxious. Not in a bad way, but the anticipatory way that everyone got when something new and exciting was going up and there was no way it could go badly, but predicting the end outcome was almost impossible. It was a great feeling, but one that left Shannon feeling like a teen heading out to prom instead of a grown man getting ready to have fun with his boyfriend and potentially make some hilariously heartfelt gestures to express his trust in Eli. That was probably something he didn't do enough in general, actually.

Breakfast had been something simple. Pancakes, fresh cut fruit and sausage. Eli had come over pretty early to get ready, talking over the generalities of what they were going to do while the specifics were to wait for after they were done. Well, now they were done and sitting on the couch, and Shannon's leg was jiggling even under the hand he had placed on his knee to keep himself still. Lacey had wandered off after breakfast, stomach filled with her own food and presumably was napping on the foot of the bed in Shannon's room. Probably for the better, really.

"So," he said, ignoring the obvious tell he was giving off. If Eli took it for misapprehension, then Shannon was going to definitely lean over and smack him. "Where do we start?"

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Shannon pulled Eli even closer once the younger man made the first move, listening to him ramble. Curiously, he reached over Eli to the nightstand for the analog clock he could read with his hands. After a moment, he turned back to Eli and settled himself back down. "It's been a while since we started, and I'm gonna guess it didn't take hours for us to finish up. You haven't slept yet?"

The longer Eli spoke, the easier it was to read into his disposition. Something was a bit off, but Shannon couldn't quite figure out what. Better to get him to talk more, perhaps reveal something, or nudge him toward sleep so that he could get some rest and sort it out later. With the hand he had used to check the clock, Shannon started to stroke at Eli's jawline with his thumb. Where his palm had laid was a good place to monitor heartbeat in lieu of watching for nervous motions.

There was a small shake of his head as he spoke, a little more frantic than he would have normally done. "No, I had to deal with Matheus first. And then I couldn't slow my mind down so I started cleaning. That didn't help much. Oh! Right. Speaking of, I took his key. You can give it back to him later if you want."

His pulse was going far faster than normal and because of that, his skin was cooler to compensate for that uptick in heartbeat. When Shannon started to stroke his jawline, Eli let out a soft sigh. It was nice and after winding himself up so badly, it was something that was desperately needed to begin to even think about getting him back to normal.

"I take cleaning to include giving Lacey a bath," Shannon noted with some amusement. As he put all of the pieces together, Shannon considered both the problem and what solutions he had for them. Right now, Eli was wound up and obviously unable to focus nor rest due to the lack of focus, perhaps as a result of Matheus crashing in earlier. It wouldn't have surprised Shannon that Eli pushed through for his own sake and then came crashing down without anything else to hold onto. His own mind felt blissfully clear after the round he had gone through, aside from some jumble he was easily able to work past, and now he needed to figure what would calm his het-up boyfriend down the best.

Shannon shifted, moving more to sit up and place a leg over Eli to straddle him. It was the best position he could think of to run his hand along Eli's clothed chest without stopping the motion at his jaw. He was hoping the physical contact, the grounding, would help for Eli like it did for himself. "I'll deal with Matheus," he promised, leaning in to kiss at Eli's cheekbone. "Why don't you just talk with me for now? Tell me something. How's your dad been doing? Jasper? Any interesting stories you've been holding out on?"

"Yes. Cleaning helps settles my mind. Didn't work this time." Ignoring his own problems to help Shannon through his own rough patch was exactly what Eli did and was why he was at such at bad point right now. Even in his worst moods, he still had some control over himself so that he didn't go completely off the rails, but this was definitely different. He couldn't control himself at all and that was a very bad thing.

"I dealt with him. Used my powers on him." Considering what his powers were, that wasn't good. While the contact seemed to be helping, the questions making him think didn't. He pushed Shannon away and covered his head with his arms while he tried to comply with Shannon's questions, getting more and more upset as he tried. "I don't know. I can't think. Too many dads, Jasper's here and not, no more stories in my head they're gone. Stop asking me things. I can't think right now."

Whatever reaction Shannon had been expecting for the prodding, it was not to be shoved off and have Eli come to some small kind of panic attack. It left him stunned for a moment while he listened, reaching over with feather-light fingers to figure out what Eli had done to muffle his voice, what new position he had taken. This was wrong. It sounded like Eli was getting drawn further into his head where everything was upside down and backwards, and Shannon wanted to do whatever he could to pull him back out. Dealing with that ominous statement about Matheus could wait.

Time for a different plan. He moved to take Eli's wrists, pulling them apart and pinning them to the pillow under his head. Well, he took Eli's right hand by the wrist, and took his left one by the hand to avoid accidentally adding pressure to the point where Trigger had become fused to his arm. He put down enough pressure to not be insignificant, but nowhere near where it might speak of attempt to cause pain. He leaned over so that he could be right in front of Eli, propping himself on his hands without putting his weight on the wrists he had shackled.

"Hey, listen to me," he said, tone now firm and kind. His worry drowned out his desperation and his love drowned out his worry. There was little doubt in his tone right now. "No more questions. Just listen. Look. Stop thinking. Focus on me. Get out of your head and pay attention. All right?"

At his hands being moved away and then pinned down, Eli went tense and silent, looking at Shannon warily. His fight or flight response was warring inside him on what to do and for now, all he could do was freeze in confusion while his mind tried to catch up and do something about it. If it was a different situation, he would definitely be enjoying this, but that somewhat wasn't the case now. His breath was coming out in short pants and his body just seemed to scream panic despite him not vocalizing it.

Then Shannon started to speak and he started to relax slightly. "Right, got it. Stop thinking. Listen and focus. Listen and focus. Focus. Focus. Focus on Shannon." That then turned into him repeating Shannon's name over and over again under his breath, almost like a litany against his shattered mind. Shannon could fix this. Or at least some part of Eli desperately hoped he could.

Shannon could tell this was difficult for Eli. His whole body was tensing up like a coil, and he only started to unwind while he repeated Shannon's name like a prayer. That was only plugging the hole that would soon burst the dam apart. He leaned further over and laid a kiss along Eli's temple. "Good," he said. "That's good, Eli. Keep focusing, listen to my voice. I'm going to get up now, but you'll hear me and you can watch me." He gave another kiss, then tentatively let go of Eli's wrists and extricated himself from the bed.

It was a little awkward because he was still in his boxers, but there was nothing to be done about that right now. No, what Shannon really needed to do was sing. "Never gonna give you up," he started, voice a bit unsure but soon gaining balance. "Never gonna let you down."

He continued on, making his way to the guest room closet. His parents enjoyed the incense Shannon kept and tended to burn some whenever they would come to visit his place, so Shannon took to keeping it in the guest room so they could grab it without disturbing him while he was sleeping. He carefully pulled a jar of incense sticks and the tray from the shelf at the top and set it all down on the nightstand opposite Eli's side, while never breaking his stride with the song. "Never gonna make you cry, never gonna say goodbye..." With the book inside the nightstand drawer, he struck a match and made sure to light all the sticks equally, waited until he could feel the heat blossom at all the ends, then blew them out and arranged them. He returned to the bed while the soothing aroma began to float on the air, reaching out to check Eli's physical position.

As he finished the chorus, he paused in the song. "Okay?" he asked, simple and unspecific. Eli would take it any way he pleased and Shannon was all right with any answer he would receive. He just needed to make sure Eli was still in the moment.

That was definitely better. The moment Shannon pulled away, Eli's hands moved to hug himself as his eyes stayed locked on Shannon as he moved around. His chanting of Shannon's name quieted down so that only Eli could hear it and so it wouldn't cover him speaking. No matter what, he would listen and focus just as Shannon said to.

Hearing Shannon start singing caused some confusion before he continued to listen and focus on his voice. His voice and the beat of the song was pulling him into a state that was far less manic and more relaxed. His mind was only just starting to slow down a bit and settle. When Shannon returned to the bed, he let out a soft sigh. "Okay. Listening and focusing. No thinking. Everything's still fluttering. Like birds."

Shannon felt out the position, moving now to put one hand against Eli's cheek to make sure his attention wasn't wandering around elsewhere. Even if he wasn't looking at him, Shannon wanted him to remain aware of his presence no matter what else was going on inside his head. "Birds aren't so bad," he said, giving a small smile to encourage Eli on. He was focusing, working out what few of his thoughts that he could. "They like to sing, too. Like this."

His song started back up again. While the scent was filtering throughout the room, Shannon used his free hand to feel along Eli's arm and began to knead at it, different from his usual motions. This was a massage, something else to keep him from floating back into his head. Another anchor point. Touch, smell, sound. He was just going to hope for sight although he couldn't rightly account for that one. While Eli had used Shannon's senses to draw him into their own world where nothing else mattered, Shannon hoped that his more grounded attempt at the same could help calm Eli until things started to fall back into place no matter how that was going to happen.

Even without the hand on his cheek, Eli was still focused on Shannon, eyes wide and seeming to be unable to see anything else but him. The hand was grounding though, just like all physical contact seemed to be with him. It was easier for him to feel a person's electrical field that way and make contact with it and with Shannon right there, an electrical field he knew so intimately now that he could sense it from anywhere in the world, he was all he could focus on for the moment, even with his mind shattered into pieces like it was.

"Birds don't usually sound like you and they usually sing to claim territory or to court mates. This is yours so you don't need too claim it so..." He trailed off for a moment as his mind took its sweet time catching up to what he was saying and when he finally did, it was quite obvious. "You're not courting me again, are you?"

Before he could say much else, the singing and the massage thoroughly distracted him from that train of thought and Eli wiggled himself closer to Shannon in response. It felt nice and along with the scent, it was definitely starting to lead him into relaxing, his eyes starting to close a bit. "That's nice. Keep doing that?"

Edited 2014-04-20 05:38 (UTC)

Shannon couldn't help but laugh at the comment. Eli was on some train of thought he hadn't considered, but at least it wasn't too hard to follow. When Eli scooted closer, Shannon shifted until he was sitting up halfway and moved both his hands along Eli's arm in a more thorough massage; when that one had enough attention piled onto it, Shannon moved onto the next with hardly a pause in his movement.

His song came to a pause and he took the opportunity to answer. "Of course I'm not courting you again. Think of it as... just confirming what I've already accomplished." Leaning over, he gave Eli a quick kiss. There were few words to describe the relief Shannon felt at Eli obviously beginning to slowly wind down. "Whatever you want, Eli. I'll keep going."

"Good, 'cause you've got great plumage and a lovely voice. Don't need to court me again." He's definitely getting way too deep into this bird stuff, but it's better than how he was previously. Well, previously was far less embarrassing for everyone involved, but still. "Guess this Aspect mates for life."

He moved so that his head is resting on Shannon's shoulder before he unwrapped his arms from around himself to latch onto Shannon, wrapping him up in arms and limbs as he sighed and closed his eyes completely. "Sleep with me? Brain's slowing down now."

Doing his best to accommodate the clinging octopus that Eli had become, Shannon shifted his grip around to continue massaging and rubbing at Eli's back. He was more than used to the younger man's penchant for trying to become a human blanket or otherwise make sure he was pressed up against Shannon with every possible part of his body that he could. Shannon just chalked it up to his body heat being really pleasant to lay against.

Chuckling softly, he huffed into Eli's hair. "What kind of a life-mate would I be to deny that?" he asked. "Get some rest, Eli. I'll be here."

Now that Eli was latched on to Shannon, he was fading fast and making quiet little noises at the massage. He was definitely enjoying it and he'd be upset later to find out he fell asleep during that. He'll have to pay him back with a massage of his own to help with his sore muscles.

For now though, he nuzzled Shannon's neck happily and sighed contentedly. "Best life-mate," he murmured softly before sleep caught up to him and his body shut down. He was out like a light.

Shannon waited. He knew Eli was asleep, but there was a certain point where sleep turned deep enough that he would loosen his grip and Shannon could untangle himself. Most times, he would have been fine with laying here until Eli awoke, with possibly a trip to the bathroom or kitchen in between, but he had something else to do before all that. Gently as he could, Shannon rearranged Eli to wrap him around a pillow and then made his way to the living room and the phone hanging on the wall there.

He tried Matheus' place first. After a few rings (and leaving only a message on the last try to call him back ASAP), Shannon gave up and tried somewhere else. Javier. Even if Matheus wasn't there (unlikely), Javier was the most likely one to know where Matheus was. Maybe they could get some things sorted out.

Not surprisingly, Matheus had made his way to Javier's place after Eli had let him go. Like the brothers of their previous life, they were incredibly close to each other and seemed to rarely be not at each other's side. Of course, there was also the fact that Matheus had been zapped and that Eli had said to warn Javier to not come over, which is what he did and more.

By the time Shannon called Javier's place, he was definitely waiting for the call, if how he answered the phone was any indication. "Shannon, please tell me that's you," he said, some worry in his voice.

"You've talked to Matheus," Shannon answered. If the matter Matheus had come over for was actually important enough to make Javier worried before getting in contact with his partner, then Matheus wouldn't have left no matter what Eli might have done to him. No, this was definitely in response to whatever outburst Eli had been subject to thanks to being so thoroughly out of sorts. "Eli said... He's okay, right?"

That was what he wanted to get out of the way first. That everyone had escaped from that unfortunate incident unscathed. Aside from some lingering distress in the back of his head, Shannon felt fine. Well, if one looked past how sore all of his muscles still were; it wasn't bad, just persistent. He was much more worried about Matheus, physically, and Eli, mentally. That wasn't going to stop him from yelling at Matheus too, though, he just needed to work up to that.

"He's here and don't worry, he's fine." There was a "I'm grievously injured here!" said in the background presumably by Matheus that Javier was happily ignoring. "Don't mind him, he's being a child. The only thing injured was his ego and his shirt. Looks like Eli was just trying to put the fear of a god in him and succeeded instead of actually trying to do damage."

There was a long moment before Javier decided to continue speaking, the worry now more obvious in his voice. "What about you and Eli? How are you two doing? Especially you, I heard something about a fire happening when Matheus walked in on you."

Shannon let out a small sigh of relief at hearing Matheus in the background. There was a lot wrong with the situation, but as long as Matheus was still able to complain, things couldn't have been as bad as he had been imagining. That didn't mean that everything was sunshine and roses, however. "Eli said he used his powers. What did he do?"

At the mention of fire, Shannon pulled the receiver away and sniffed at the air. There was no smoke or lingering scent of burned anything thanks to Eli's nerve-calming cleaning, nor any lingering heat to speak of such an event. What was Javier talking about? "We're... okay. Eli was pretty messed up, it sounds like Matheus already knew that, but he's resting right now. What fire?"

"Paralyzed him and then gave him a zap," Javier replied after a pause, probably to look at Matheus and silently confirm what he had been told. When Matheus had arrived, he had been a rambling mess despite his reaction when dealing with Eli. It was only with Javier that he was comfortable with sharing just how terrified he had been by Eli's response.

"Good to hear he's resting and Matheus knows, otherwise he would've provoked him more." There was a shout of protest in the background yet again that Javier ignored to continue speaking to Shannon. "From what I could get from Matheus' rambling earlier, when he walked on you two, you set a book on fire."

Edited (phone that wasn't the word I wrote ) 2014-04-22 16:16 (UTC)

Understandably enough. Shannon knew the two were close, but he also knew they would be straight with him where it mattered; he knew them well enough to gauge Matheus' reaction even if he would never admit it. "Enough of a zap to burn his shirt," he concluded. That Eli had been pushed far enough into causing damage, although not to Matheus himself, was frightening. Just what had been going on in that brain of his?

Sucking in a sharp breath, he let that stand in silence. Then he shook his head. "That couldn't have been me. I don't do parlor tricks like you guys do," he refuted. "I mean, that would be bad, right?" There was a pause where he tried to think back during that time, assessing his mental state and trying to pinpoint what had happened and where. It was all a bit of a jumble.

"I'm surprised he didn't do more, really," he said with amusement in his tone. He was well aware of the mutual issues the two had with each other and found them incredibly amusing to watch when they dealt with each other. "You two were in a D/s scene with each other, right? He was protecting you from a perceived threat, one he had already come into conflict with before."

Hearing that made him sigh and he had to shake his head in response. "That's not how it works. Our abilities are originally a defensive instinct to protect ourselves. We have to teach ourselves to harness them to actually do anything worthwhile with them." There was a very long pause as Javier tried to find a good way to word this before deciding on being blunt. "Yes, it's a bad thing that you were able to do that. If you access your powers, there's a greater chance of you awakening your Aspect."

Edited 2014-04-22 17:06 (UTC)

"Are you excusing the assault?" Shannon asked in bewilderment. Although Eli had definitely not been acting on rational thought, there was definitely something to be said for zapping someone and paralyzing their body just because you were angry. It wasn't exactly qualified under the defense of others, either. He did, however, appreciate the effort because he really was worried for everyone involved (except for maybe himself, as he seemed to have gotten out with the least issue now that he had gotten some rest).

Shannon leaned himself up against the shelf underneath the phone cradle. He scrubbed a hand over his face and said, "So that whole thing could have ended even worse. No wonder Eli was worried. Can't do it on purpose, though, so that's at least a silver lining."

"No, it's not my place to do so. When Thomas hears about this, you two and Matheus will have to report to him on it. Aspects don't harm other Aspects and if you're showing signs of manifesting powers, he'd want to investigate that." The tone his voice takes on is hard to place, but there is some worry still in there. Whatever was going to happen, Javier didn't seem to be happy about what it was going to entail and what it meant for those three.

"You could have awakened and we wouldn't even be talking, probably because you would have killed Matheus and Eli by now and moved on to the rest of us," he answered flatly. "Thankfully you didn't, so there's still hope for you."

"What, we have to report to the principal?" asked Shannon sarcastically. That was actually a terrifying prospect. Much as he would rather die than let Nate awaken, he really, really hoped it did not come to such an extreme. It wasn't his fault that an actual psycho was buried under his psyche and he knew better than to tempt fate like that. "Look, we'll be fine, Javier. It was all just... really bad timing and probably not enough communication where there should have been."

"Not helping," he replied. "I don't want to think about killing any of you. Killing anyone. Are we sure it wasn't Eli? Electricity can set things on fire, too."

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